Best & Worst of 2013

To sum up our first year on the Internets, we've each compiled a list of our top five favorite movies of the year. We've also included our worst five of the year for completion’s sake. Happy New Year! 

Dustin 

Top 5

Note: As of this writing, I have yet to see American Hustle or Inside Llewyn Davis.

1. Mud: This was a movie that did everything right and then some. Atmospheric, great characters and dialogue. Everything set up pays off at the end. Easily my favorite movie of the year.

2. Captain Phillips: This is the exact kind of movie that appeals to me. I love true stories of adversity. The casting of the non-Tom Hanks characters was perfect, and it was suspenseful throughout, even though I’m not a fan of Paul Greengrass’s jerky camerawork.

3. Disconnect: This was a quality indie film about how technology develops faster than our ability to cope with it. Four loosely connected stories unfold simultaneously as events from the Web impact real lives.

4. Emperor: This historical film about the investigation into whether Hirohito should be tried for war crimes was vastly underrated (it has 31 percent on Rotten Tomatoes as of this writing). I think most critics missed the point on this one, focusing on the romantic subplot with a couple cliched moments, rather than on how brilliantly this movie brought to life post-war Tokyo.

5. This Is the End: This was the funniest movie about the Rapture since Left Behind.

Worst 5

Note: I had yet to see 47 Ronin as of this writing, although it would be in my bottom five.

5. White House Down: I watched this as an in-flight movie between South Korea and Indonesia. Nothing could have made that flight seem longer than this movie. Even with 17 minutes edited out for Asiana Airlines, it was still long and tedious. My time could have been better spent getting a head start on my expense report, or staring at the back of the seat in front of me.

4. Texas Chainsaw: This movie had some “dumb fun,” but it made a fatal error in asking us to root for Leatherface. They don’t need to make any more of these movies.

3. Tyler Perry’s Temptation: This may have been one of the dumbest things I've ever sat through, and I felt my butt cheeks clenching in embarrassment of the thought someone might see me in the theater watching it. Not even the best actors could have brought this trite and predictable script to life, and none of them were in this movie.

2. Movie 43: This was a notoriously bad low-brow sketch comedy that might be slightly shocking airing on the CW at 9 p.m. It was self-aware of how bad it was, which makes me question how it even got made in the first place. It did have a couple highlights, such as the superhero speed-dating skit and Terrence Howard's inspiring pep talk to his basketball team.

1. Scary Movie 5: If one movie of the year should be placed in a time capsule for 1000 years, it should be this. That way no one alive today will accidentally see this joyless PG-13 atrocity. And 1000 years from now the technology this was filmed on will be so obsolete, no one in the future will accidentally see it either. References to every movie of the past year aren't jokes. One revealing sequence was an overlong parody of Evil Dead. Not the Sam Raimi classic, mind you, but the reboot released a week before this movie, which should give you some idea of how fast this piece-of-shit was thrown together.

Nick

I would like to point out that I have yet to see Her, American Hustle, Nebraska, Upstream Color, 

Before Midnight, Blue Jasmine, Inside Llewyn Davis, Short Term 12 and Enough Said. 

Top 9 (in no particular order)

Mud (4.5 stars of 5): A fairy tale based in reality. Never have I ever thought that Matthew McConaughey would be in two of my favorite films of the year. Drink!

The Wolf of Wall Street (4.5 stars of 5): The most disgusting fun one can have in theaters this year. Has a pace and energy reminiscent of Goodfellas with characters who are more likable the more deplorable they become.

12 Years A Slave (4.5 stars of 5): Some of the scenes and shots in this film will be forever mentioned among film society. My favorite being when Solomon is left hanging from a tree branch with his toes hardly touching the slick mud beneath him. All this while people go about their day behind him. Some acknowledge him and some ignore him. The feeling we get is a harsh truth that this is not a rare sighting.

All Is Lost (4.5 stars of 5): What I wanted Gravity to be! Somehow engaging with so little plot and no conversation. All Is Lost had me on the edge of my seat for the whole movie.

American Hustle (4.5 stars of 5): The attention that Christian Bale gives to his toupee in the opening scene is akin to how much attention David O. Russell gives to all the details in his films.

This is the End (4 star of 5): This was my favorite film of the year until the rest of this lot was released. That speaks volumes on how well this movie was made.

Spring Breakers (4 stars of 5): I feel that everything that happened after Selena Gomez left the party was in her mind. Although she left, Gomez still told the story therefore all the visuals come from her and this is so interesting because all of her friends survive the gun fight. She’s imagining that all the partying has gone too far and has escalated into her fun-loving friends helping Alien in his drug war. She has hope that they will get out alive. I’m more pessimistic.

Frances Ha (4 stars of 5): Do you like the TV show Girls? Frances Ha has the same concept, but more endearing and no nudity.

Spectacular Now (4 stars of 5): The most realistic teens that I can remember seeing on film.

Worst 5

The Croods: There are jokes about how cave girls love shoes… (sigh)

Gangster Squad: Film noir is probably my favorite genre. I’m a sucker for it. Since this film became an idea I was excited. Gosling, Penn, Brolin, Mackie, Nolte, Stone! Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland) as director! Too high expectations can really ruin a film, but it wasn’t only my expectations that ruined it.

R.I.P.D.: I had all but low expectations for this film, and it really was worse than I imagined. I wonder if it was made by the same production company as Men in Black?

Planes: I didn’t actually see this movie, so it's probably not fair to Disney's film. Well, it wasn’t fair for Disney to make a film that looks like their subsidiary Cars. Why would they do this if Cars is the worst-reviewed canon on Pixar's resume? Could it be because Cars raked in $8 billion in merchandise? That’s data from before Cars 2 was released!

Movie 43: Never has an hour and a half runtime felt like forever like this mess. Liev Schrieber made me laugh, but he is an excellent actor. No, I don’t hate Emma Stone, but she is in three of my worst five of the year.