It's the end of the year...

Which means the time of short days, Christmas cards, and especially of year-end lists, the first of which have been rolling out. I'm planning my own little year end extravaganza: one post about statistics (how many films I saw, how many new how many old, how many for the first time, how many in the cinema etc.), one reviewing my most notable cinematic experiences of the year, maybe a top 5 or 10 of older films, and in any case a top 5 or 10 of 2007 releases.

The latter is tougher than it sounds, and not just because ranking your favorites is always hard. Quite a few good 2006 releases weren't released in the Netherlands until 2007. In order to be more or less comparable with American groups, however, I will make a top 5 of films released in America in 2007. This means for instance that Little Children will be out of consideration for the 2007 list, but Once, which is officially a 2006 movie, will be in the running since it wasn't released theatrically in the US until this year. Since I do want to give attention to some of those 2006 films, I'll also make a short side-list of 2006 releases seen this year (sounds confusing? Well, maybe it is...)

I might also do a couple of acting lists. Cinematography I'll skip: it wouldn't yield anything beyond raving about Roger Deakins anyway. I might even give out some weird awards, I'm not sure. We'll see. Suggestions for categories are welcome, in any case.

Anyhow, enough technical details. On to what I really want to talk about: which films do you think I still need to catch up on before making my final list? I'm not talking about big films that still need to be released, like Sweeney Todd. There's no press screening date for that as of yet, and I refuse to download it, as I think it's a movie that needs to be seen in theaters. I am talking more of releases from a few months ago that I might have missed. I'm already planning on watching Zodiac (it topped Jeffrey Wells' list and is mentioned on several others) and I'm considering whether I have the energy for Inland Empire. But what else should I check out? Half Nelson? Gone Baby Gone? In the Valley of Elah? Into the Wild? Let me know! And in case you're wondering what I have and have not seen, I kept a handy filmlog.



The Guardian also has a list, incidentally. Interestingly enough, in the top 8, most films are films they gave 4 or 5 stars in the original review... Except for the #2, which only got 2 stars at first. The film? Eastern Promises. Confirming that it's a film that - while it might not look all that interesting at first- grows on you as you think about it more.

Also: added to my DVD-collection as of Sinterklaas: Marie-Antoinette (Coppola, 2006), Brick (Johnson, 2005), La Luna (Bertolucci, 1979) & Tystnaden/The Silence (Bergman, 1963)