You know that awesome feeling you get when you put on a jacket or a pair of pants you haven’t worn in a while… then you go out and at some point you stick your hands in the pockets and to your surprise you discover there’s a $20 bill in there that you totally forgot or didn’t know about? That’s the same kind of feeling I get whenever I go see a film that I don’t really think will be any good… but then ends up being much better than I thought it would be.
So in this season of year end lists (We’re still going to do Most Disappointing, and Most Overrated lists this week), I thought we’d share our top ten surprising films of the year.
HOW THIS LIST WORKS
The #1 film on this list is not necessarily the “best” film on the list… just the one that has the biggest gap between how bad I thought it would be, and how good it ended up being. So #5 might be the best film on the list… but if it was only 27% better than I thought it would be, then the film that wasn’t as good, but was 75% better than I thought it would be would rank higher. Got it?
THE MOST SURPRISING FILMS OF 2007
1) MR. BROOKS
2 words ladies and gentlemen.. Kevin… Costner. Really, that name sends negative connotations rushing through your head, but this brilliant film ended up very nearly making my top 10 films of the year list. The scenes between Costner and William Hurt were some of the most compelling character interactions on screen this year. Awesome movie, and easily my biggest surprise of 2007.
2) STARDUST
The only reason this film isn’t #1 is because the presence of Michelle Pheiffer, Rpbert De Nero and Claire Danes gave me some hope even though it was one of the worst marketing campaigns of all time. This film did end up on my Top 10 Films of the year list.
3) NEXT
i thought this would be worse than garbage, but I actually ended up mildly enjoying this little flick. The premies was very good, Cage was actually very funny in it and oddly enough I loved the ending.
4) TMNT
Wow, I preached for about 4 months about how awful this movie was going to be. I warned everyone to have no hope for it at all. However, while TMNT certainly didn’t end up as a classic… I had fun with it and had to eat my words to a lot of people.
5) REIGN OVER ME
Little throw away film that I thought MIGHT have some potential… but WOW this movie ended up being fantastic. Came very close to cracking my top 10 list, but it certainly made the top 15. I think Adam Sandlers best performance of his career, and yes that includes Punch Drunk.
6) WAITRESS
Kerri Russell’s career had been pretty much dead since she cut her hair, so this little indy film didn’t look like it had much potential… and to be honest the only reason I went to see it was because Fox invited me to a screening and I really wanted to see the Fox Lot. Once again, ended up in my top 15 and almost on the top 10. Russell is back, Fillion is great as always and the story is just pure sweet as pie. Loved this movie.
7) LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD
I knew the film had some potential, but I don’t think anyone thought it would end up quite as good as it was. Many thought that being rated PG13 instead of R would ruin the film… it didn’t
8) HAIRSPRAY
A bad looking musical ends up being remarkably charming
9) DISTURBIA
We all knew this “Shia” kid was going to be in Transformers, but most of us had no idea if this kid could actually act (who knew… now it looks as if he’s the next Tom Hanks)
10) OCEAN’S THIRTEEN
Never count out a cast like this or a director like this… so I did have some expectation for Ocean’s Thirteen… but with the disapointment of Ocean’s Twelve those expectations weren’t very high. Glad to say this one built on all that was good about the first one instead of all that was bad about the second one.
