The 2011 film year and the experiences we had at the multiplex are officially memories. But 2012 brings the promise of new experiences and new memories in the dark of a crowded theater, so naturally, we should join the chorus and offer up our personal anticipations.
HitFix has already offered up a lengthy, well-considered (though overly populist) list along these lines. It features a lot of the usual stuff, but while a number of the films on our list show up there, a few do not.
I asked Guy, Gerard and Roth to send me their top 10s, combined them with my own and came up with what we are collectively looking forward to at theaters in the new year. The result was an interesting mesh of the usual and the not-so-usual, both on the various lists and on the eventual combined collective.
Two films that ranked rather high on HitFix’s list, I was surprised to see, didn’t even register on ours: Joss Whedon’s “The Avengers” and Peter Jackson’s “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.” The latter, in fact, only showed up on one of the lists submitted by the four of us, which is REALLY surprising, though perhaps indicative of the fact that the film kind of looks like more of the big-screen Middle Earth that we’ve already seen.
Just missing the list were Pixar’s “Brave,” David Cronenberg’s “Cosmopolis,” Neill Blomkamp’s “District 9” follow-up “Elysium” and Rian Johnson’s “Looper.” Meanwhile, films that were mentioned here and there but not high enough or in bulk enough to register on the full list included Wes Anderson’s “Moonrise Kingdom,” Laurent Cantet’s “Foxfire,” Kathryn Bigelow’s tentatively-titled “Kill Bin Laden,” Terrence Malick’s “Voyage of Time,” Derek Cianfrance’s “The Place Beyond the Pines,” Oliver Stone’s “Savages,” François Ozon’s “Dans la maison” and Andrew Dominik’s “Cogan’s Trade.”
So what does that leave? Well, check out our new gallery for the answer. Not all of the films chalked up will make it to release in 2012, I’d wager, but for now, they all seem to be in the clear. Hopefully.
Feel free to offer up your own list in the comments section below.
For year-round entertainment news and awards season commentary follow @kristapley on Twitter.
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