SDG here with a follow-up to my June post on family films of 2008.
As the year draws to a close, it looks like my sense of 2008 as a good year for family films was on the money. In fact, the premise of my June post became a full-fledged article which appeared first in the December issue of Catholic World Report and is now available in an abridged version at Decent Films:
Family Films Move Forward in 2008
Unfortunately, many of the films that, in June, I was looking forward to hopefully didn't pan out. I knew some of them wouldn't pan out, but I was hoping for more than we got.
The one spectacular exception, of course, was Wall-E, the crown jewel of the year's family films, as I hoped it would be.
And today, a worthwhile film opens that wasn't even on my radar in June: The Tale of Despereaux.
At least one other film, Bolt turned out to be better than I expected. OTOH, City of Ember turned out to be a visually stylish disappointment, kind of cool but not very good. Journey to the Center of the Earth was a little more fun, but also not exactly good.
Fly Me to the Moon was barely a flyweight contribution (and the buzz I heard on Armstrong's involvement was wrong — it was Buzz Aldrin who voiced himself, which makes a lot more sense on multiple levels). And The Half-Blood Prince didn't even arrive — it was postponed until next year.
Still, between Wall-E, Horton Hears a Who, Kung Fu Panda, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Prince Caspian and The Tale of Despereaux, plus a raft of tol'able also-rans… not to mention, for families with older kids, The Express and Son of Rambow… definitely a good year, all in all.
Here we are. And just as you also felt, 2008 was not exactly a stellar year for adult-oriented films, was it? Aside from notable exceptions. 🙂
Did I say that? See, this is just a much harder question. The field for “adult-oriented films” is so wide. I’ve seen a lot more than I’ve reviewed, and have yet to finalize my top 10 list. I’ll be back in a few weeks…
I became really exited when I heard they were making a movie of “The tale of Despereaux” but for what I’ve seen the movie is very different from the book. Which is disappointing because it is one of the best children’s book’s published in recent years.
We read this book as a family in our summer vacation and there were some part in which we would actually get all choked-up with the story.
I will never see the word “perfidy” in the same light again.
In His love…
Catholic Deacon
Did I say that?
I thought you did, in so many words. Back in June, in response to my question “Will you have a part two, which covers the non-kid friendly fare” you said:
Not as such. I wrote this up because it seemed to me there was a trend of sorts. I’m not seeing another trend to write about in non-family fare.
Therefore, I assumed that, since you did not write about a trend of good mature films in ’08, you did not see such a trend. 🙂
What about the mouse Martin from Redwall? He’s also a beloved figure in fiction!
David B: True, I don’t see a trend there. But I wouldn’t say there isn’t a trend … there’s just too much data I haven’t sifted through. But FWIW a friend of mine commented earlier today that it’s the best year for top-notch movies since 2003, whatever that means.
Well, I ‘ve been particularly surprised because in 2008 I got to see three of the best movies from ’07 that I’ve seen: Zodiac; Reign Over Me and Gone Baby Gone. I noticed that none of them was in SDG’s “Best of ’07 list”. Have you seen any of them SDG? I think that you would at least review the second movie above, given its subject matter.
Matheus: Zodiac and Gone Baby Gone both received due consideration. I did not see Reign Over Me.
I thought, in many ways, that Bolt was an anti-Happy Feet, the former having a not-so subtle anti-Hollywood, pro-parent (eventually), and pro-family theme running through it and the latter being anti-all-those-and-more. I didn’t know much about either of them going in, but my reactions to them were completely opposite.
Watching Bolt, I was reminded (and my wife had the same reaction) of The Journey of Natty Gann from a while ago, where the eponymous daughter journeys (so you can see right off where the title came from) across the country to find her father.
“FWIW a friend of mine commented earlier today that it’s the best year for top-notch movies since 2003, whatever that means.”
I guess it’s the quality, and not the quantity, that counts, eh? The moral themes and conflicts in The Dark Knight have been recently coming to my mind, and the year’s best portrayal of self-sacrificing love was in Wall-E, a “kid’s movie”.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but my parents took my kids to see it. Mom said it was pretty boring for most of the film, and my kids were asking to go home.