Thursday, July 2, 2020

2020 in Movies: Mid-Year Review

It's been a strange year to be a movie fan. Studios are releasing big titles like Trolls World Tour and Scoob! on video on demand, streaming services have become the primary source of new content and with movie theaters unlikely to open in the United States for the foreseeable future, there's a very realistic possibility that the entire release model is going to change permanently.

Bigger picture concerns surrounding the industry aside, the movies that have seen the light of the day across various distribution channels in 2020 so far have been pretty damn satisfying for the most part. DC cranked out its first wire-to-wire triumph (Birds of Prey), Pete Davidson established himself as a film star to be reckoned with a pair of poignant yet funny coming-of-age tales (The King of Staten Island, Big Time Adolescence), Netflix has yielded impressively consistent results from a dynamic slate that has featured everything from understated family dramas (Uncorked) to high-octane action projects (Extraction, Spenser Confidential) to proudly goofy comedies (The Lovebirds, Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga) and Blumhouse delivered yet another masterclass in how to combine horror with deep, timely themes (The Invisible Man). Regardless of the potential for further changes to both the release calendar and methods of distribution in the coming months, it'll be interesting to see if this quality clip will be sustainable and 2020 can potentially end up rivaling the brilliance of 2019 by year's end. Below, you'll find a list of everything I've seen so far in 2020 ranked from worst to best along with some mid-year awards. Hope you enjoy.    

37.Fantasy Island (C-)
36.The Turning (C-)
35.Never Rarely Sometimes Always (C)
34.Onward (C)
33.The Platform (C+)
32.The Wrong Missy (C+)
31.The Half of It (C+)
30.7500 (C+)
29.Come to Daddy (C+)
28.Bloodshot (B-)
27.Love. Wedding. Repeat. (B-)
26.The Rhythm Section (B-)
25.The Gentlemen (B-)
24.Horse Girl (B-)
23.Lost Bullet (B-)
22.Have a Good Trip: Adventures in Psychedelics (B)
21.Taylor Swift: Miss Americana (B)
20.Coffee & Kareem (B)
19.All the Bright Places (B)
18.Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (B)
17.Da 5 Bloods (B)
16.The Hunt (B)
15.My Spy (B)
14.Sonic the Hedgehog (B)
13.Underwater (B)
12.Buffaloed (B)
11.The Lovebirds (B)
10.Big Time Adolescence (B+)
9.Spenser Confidential (B+)
8.The Way Back (B+)
7.The Photograph (B+)
6.Uncorked (B+)
5.Bad Boys for Life (B+)
4.Extraction (A-)
3.The King of Staten Island (A-)
2.Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (A-)
1.The Invisible Man (A)

Mid-Year Awards:
Biggest Surprise: Sonic the Hedgehog
Biggest Letdown: The Gentleman 
Most Underrated Movie: Uncorked
Most Overrated Movie: Never Rarely Sometimes Always
Top Performance: Elisabeth Moss, The Invisible Man
Worst Performance: Lucy Hale, Fantasy Island
Best Direction: Leigh Whannell, The Invisible Man
Worst Direction: Jeff Wadlow, Fantasy Island
Best Script: Judd Apatow, Pete Davidson and Dave Sirus, The King of Staten Island
Worst Script: Jillian Jacobs, Chris Roach and Jeff Wadlow, Fantasy Island
Best Ensemble: The King of Staten Island
Worst Ensemble: Fantasy Island
Best Cinematography: Stefan Duscio, The Invisible Man
Best Score: Robert Glasper, The Photograph 
Best Visual Effects: Sonic the Hedgehog  
Breakout Performance: Mamoudou Athie, Uncorked
Breakout Director: Cathy Yan, Birds of Prey
Top Directorial Debut: Sam Hargrave, Extraction
Top Acting Comeback: Delroy Lindo, Da 5 Bloods
Top Directorial Comeback: Peter Berg, Spenser Confidential
Top Action Sequence: The Beautiful Car Chase/Fist Fight/Shootout/Knife Fight Long Take from Extraction 
Best Villain: Roman Sionis/Black Mask (Ewan McGregor), Birds of Prey
Worst Villain: Every antagonist from Fantasy Island
Best Performance in a Bad Movie: Jimmy O. Yang, Fantasy Island
Worst Performance in a Good Movie: Norm Lewis, Da 5 Bloods
Best Overacting: Ewan McGregor, Birds of Prey
Worst Overacting: Jeremy Strong, The Gentlemen 
Most Inexplicable Second Half Collapse: The Turning
Most Satisfying Ending: The Invisible Man
Movie I'm Most Excited to See Operating Under the Comically Optimistic Assumption That Theaters Will Be Able to Open Sometime During the Next 6 Months: Tenet
Movie I'm Most Excited for That I'll Actually Be Able to Watch in the Second Half of 2020:
The Trial of the Chicago 7 

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