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Ranking the Movies of 2018: Week 6

'Black Panther' Debuts and a New Number 1

By Sean PatrickPublished 6 years ago 5 min read
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Black Panther blew my mind this week with its absolute awesomeness. While I could not make it my number one for the year, it leaped in at number three for the year and the number one overall movie of 2018 in terms of movies actually released this year. Ryan Coogler has changed the face of superhero movies, quite literally, and the world of superheroes is better for it.

Black Panther made history this week but of course the real world history keeps getting in the way of pop culture history. Last week there was a shooting at a high school in Florida. The horror of the shooting and the 17 people killed will last in our memories for a very long time but what has come in the wake of the shooting is what is making an immediate impression.

The bravery of the kids affected by the shooting in the aftermath has been as incredible to witness as the reaction of our politicians has been disappointing. That led me to my new number one movie, one of my all-time favorites and one that I often turn to when I am feeling cynical about Washington D.C, a cynicism that only grew deeper this week as I watched actual politicians attack teenagers who just want a reasonable discussion of guns.

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington may be a beloved Frank Capra classic that finds Jimmy Stewart in a David vs Goliath battle against the forces of corruption in Congress but at its heart is the same bone-weary cynicism that lingers in our society today. Yes, the film inspiringly takes the side of Stewart’s goober outsider as he maintains his moral compass despite the graft and corruption of Congress but as inspiring as it was I could not help but notice the ugly modern parallels that keeps the film so relevant today.

Mr. Smith’s opponent in the film, Edward Arnold’s Boss Taylor, uses his vast fortune not merely to buy the loyalty of Claude Rains’ Senator Paine, but much of the media as well. In a frightening parallel to modern times, Taylor uses newspapers and radio stations that he owns to hide the fact that Stewart’s Congressman is giving an epic speech in defense of his ethics. In a media landscape like ours where an ever winnowing number of billionaires divide the media pie, the Boss Taylor of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is the ultimate filmic cautionary tale.

I watched Mr. Smith Goes to Washington on my own, a rare moment when I wasn’t on assignment or working on behalf of the Everyone is a Critic podcast. Our classic this week for the podcast was Samson & Delilah, a movie released ten years after Mr. Smith, in 1949, and directed by another all-time great director on par with Mr. Capra, the legendary Cecil B. DeMille.

Going into Cecille B. DeMille’s religious epic I was expecting something cheesy and overlong, along the lines of DeMille’s insufferable, Greatest Show on Earth. Instead, what I found was a surprisingly entertaining yet dated religious epic. Victor Mature’s Samson is often a little plodding and dopey but Hedy Lamarr’s Delilah is genuinely entertaining and made the whole movie work for me. I don’t love Samson & Delilah but of the versions of this story brought to the screen, it’s by far the best.

We were inspired to watch Samson & Delilah by the release of the Pureflix take on the story called Samson. The biggest problem with this Samson is the lack of a great Delilah. The choice to downplay this essential character keeps the movie stuck in neutral and focused on a Samson who is interesting and charismatic but needed a Delilah as good as he is to make the movie work.

The other new release this week is the latest work from Aardman Animation, Early Man. Director Nick Park delivers a gentle and pleasant story of caveman, the Bronze era and soccer. How these elements go together is mysterious but the film is good natured enough that I didn’t worry about the logistics. I enjoyed Early Man but I also barely remember Early Man. The film is sweet and amusing and doesn’t linger in your mind more than a day after you see it, hence the movie’s place on this list.

Also joining the list this week is a movie that inspired a special Patreon Only bonus episode of Everyone is a Critic. The Greasy Strangler was a movie that a Patreon supporter of the podcast, Jason Mollett, asked that we watch and review. Unfortunately, I only made it 33 minutes into The Greasy Strangler before I had to turn it off. The film is gross for the sake of gross. It was made to get exactly the disgusted reaction that I had to it. If you are curious about just how gross The Greasy Strangler is, the film is available now on Amazon Prime. Somehow I still hate Maze Runner: The Death Cure more than this.

Finally, a bit of column clean up. I had, for the past two weeks, forgotten to place the movie Columbus on this list. I neglected to place Columbus on this list despite the fact that I loved it and that I wrote a lengthy piece about the film and its remarkable use of film language. It’s one of my favorite things that I have written and somehow I neglected to place the movie on this list. Weird.

Here are this week's ranking of every movie I have seen in 2018.

1. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

2. Phantom Thread

3. Black Panther

4. Just Charlie

5. Columbus

6. Hostiles

7. Boogie Nights

8. Foxy Brown

9. Becks

10. The Ballad of Lefty Brown

11. 12 Strong

12.Act & Punishment

13. Insidious: The Last Key

14. Sheik Jackson

15. Samson & Delilah

16. Heat

17. Early Man

18. Almost Paris

19. Play Misty for Me

20. Samson

21. Last House on the Left

22. Burnt Offerings

23. Paddington 2

24. Cloverfield Paradox

25. Peter Rabbit

26. Proud Mary

27. Den of Thieves

28. The Commuter

29. Fifty Shades Freed

30. Winchester: The House That Ghosts Built

31. Forever My Girl

32. 15:17 to Paris

33. The Greasy Strangler

34. Maze Runner: The Death Cure

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About the Creator

Sean Patrick

Hello, my name is Sean Patrick He/Him, and I am a film critic and podcast host for the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast I am a voting member of the Critics Choice Association, the group behind the annual Critics Choice Awards.

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