Movies of 2009: Animation Elation, War Sadness, Planet Pandora

By Norm Schrager at January 2, 2010 | 3:46 pm | Print

The cinema year of 2009 began with gobs of acclaim for one fantasy and ended with more acclaim for an even bigger fantasy. When Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire was showered with Oscars earlier in the year, the world economy was shaky. Okay, trembling. What better time to give a great big hug to an Indian street rat using his unlikely knowledge to get rich and snag the girl? Clearly, the World Bank could use this kid…

By year’s end, James Cameron revealed a wholly different underdog story. And reinvigorated the idea of cinema as “great escape”. As of this writing, Avatar has just crossed the $300 million mark in the US, still making sci-fi fans feel all tingly upon repeated viewings. And there will continue to be plenty of repeated viewings for this one.

In between Slumdog’s puppy love and Avatar’s audaciousness, there was a record-breaking year marked by many tears, a few laughs and lots of animated loveliness.

The Numbers
The 2009 US box office gross was $10.56 billion, up 9.7% over ’08. Don’t credit the higher prices of IMAX and some 3D titles: 2009 saw the same average ticket price as 2008 (a little over $7) and nearly 90 fewer movies. The last time the US box office sold this many tickets was 2004, a year with sequels for Shrek, Spider-Man, the Fockers, Harry Potter, Jason Bourne and Danny Ocean’s crew.

The King of the (Other) World
If my memory is correct, Avatar marks about the fourth time James Cameron has approached a movie with enough brio, balls and bombast to piss people off before the film’s release — and then win them over with one viewing.

Avatar is the uber-movie of that portfolio, one of the most aggressively confident and daring movies in years. For all its political statements, Avatar can be annoyingly simplistic; but its visual attack just keeps coming and coming. Frankly, I don’t care if it’s animation or motion capture or ani-mo-cap-motion-mation. It just looks fantastic.

A Treasure of Animation
Speaking of animation… In November, we reported on the 20 animated films eligible for the 2009 Best Animated Feature Oscar, and the lineup is a fascinating mix of styles and genres — as diverse as any live-action films.

From Pixar’s Up to the stop-motion worlds of Fantastic Mr. Fox and Adam Eliot’s Mary and Max, to the great master Miyazaki’s Ponyo, it’s going to get really difficult (and short-sighted) to simply refer to an animated film as “animated.”

The War Comes Home
As American military participation continues in Iraq and Afghanistan, the films reflecting the war feel more personal, as soldiers come home, attempt to readjust (or not), and often get redeployed.

The Messenger, my favorite film of 2009, tells of a troubled soldier without sharing the details of his Iraqi service; Brothers (left), another outstanding film, examines a Marine’s mental state while showing us his most horrific war experiences. Even Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker, a great film of puffed-out chests and bad-ass bravado, has a certain pain, both at home and under fire.

It’s no surprise that the highest-grossing movie of the year was Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, an extreme comic-book take on war and violence. It lets American boys get all pumped up on firepower and battle technology with nothing at stake. For these kids, getting shot at is about as real as snagging a date with Megan Fox. And that’s okay. Let that be the closest any of them get to the real thing.

My Favorite Double Feature
If I ever program a theater, here’s the first double-feature on my schedule: I Love You, Man and Humpday. Although the films come from wildly different backgrounds — one’s a happy Hollywood release, the other rough and underground — they both offer very funny ideas about love between two straight men. Both show off some impressive acting and both are on my Honorable Mention list of 2009′s best films. Don’t even wait for me, rent ‘em both and watch ‘em together.

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