March 27, 2007
shooter
The keywords for this film's imdb entry seem about right: Assassination / Marksman / Falsely Accused / Based On Novel / Military Veteran. Of course, they can't begin to get at the two most basic questions: when will Mark convert his supporting-cast eccentricity — and he really is the most riveting sideman in Hollywood — into lead role charisma, if ever? (Not here, though he's litely charming enough even when being "heroic").
And also, who was the production genius who failed to buy Lil Wayne's song "Shooter" for the opening credits or middle montage or closing credits, surely one of the most embarrassing gaffes/absent presences in recent cinema? (Probably Mike Flicker, though Producer Eric Howsam probably deserves some blame as well — but honestly, shouldn't Marky Mark have insisted? Shouldn't it have been in his deal? If we were doing choreographed high-drama sniper shit in a liberal revenge fantasy, and if we were former rappers who had found our true calling but were still true to the game, we would have a seventh attorney who was in charge of exactly those kinds of things.)
11) Smokin' Aces (nothing)
10) Factory Girl (wasn't Smokin' Aces)
9) Dreamgirls (the club sets; Eddie Murphy's Marvin Gaye skullcap)
8) Avenue Montaigne (the one brief image of the young Dani)
7) Notes on a Scandal (Bill Nighy dancing)
6) Alpha Dog (Justin Timberlake in general)
5) Shooter (Mark Wahlberg dressed as a frickin' yeti for the final showdown; Ned Beatty's career-long conversion into Buford T. Justice)
4) Backstage (Isild LeBesco's facial physiognomy; plausibility of such drecky pop being huge in France)
3) The Host (brief familial hallucination of feeding the lost child; Kang-ho Song's facial expressions)
2) Children of Men (blood on the lens for long tracking shot; Clive Owen's slumped shoulders)
1) Pan's Labyrinth (Spanish Winona Ryder; Harold & the Purple Crayon riff; title better in English)