My Favorite Three Films of the Year on the Eve of Oscar

By the time anyone reads this the Oscar nominations will have been read. So, I wanted to reflect on three of my favorite films without influence from the Academy. These are not predictions--I am sure you will not see any of these nominated for best picture!--but my own favorite films of the year. This year I have not seen as many films as I usually do--that's what happens when you have a child in August I guess, but with limited viewing these are my top three:

3. An Inconvenient Truth-- Such an important movie. It is about the effects that Global Warming is having on the world. It is a kind of documentary on the issue and the fight that Al Gore has had in congress making them realize the importance of the changing environment due to humankinds negative influence. Something to think about in relation to our God-given mandate to care for creation not to destroy it!

2. Blood Diamond-- Again, an important movie. About the diamond trade in Sierra Leone. But it gives a picture of Africa that is important for people to see including the civil wars, genocides, corrupt governments supported by Western interests. The questions that arise from the film have to do with the Western responsibility: How do we as individuals stop supporting economic stuctures that cause/ continue to uphold the oppression of human beings. This was truly a life changing film that has me praying and thinking alot about Darfur and the present genocide that is happening there--a repeat of what we saw in Rawanda in 1994, where over 800,000 people were slaughtered systematically. Where is the outcry for Darfur today?

1. Apocalypto--I know I know, what an odd choice for number one. Well I have to say this choice is purely based on entertainment/ artistic value--though the message of the film is thought-provoking too. This film is nothing less then amazing. It's beauty, and cinematography is astounding, it's images breath-taking and it's plot has one at the end of ones seat. It takes the genre of chase to a whole new level and just commits to telling the story of this culture in a parabolic way, with lessons for our own culture. From the opening quotation by historian Will Durant about the fall of the Roman Empire: “A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within,” to the shocking exploration of this cultures religious beliefs including human sacrifice, it is truly an original tale in Hollywood today. And that's where I take the critics to task. The film critics did not like this movie--not least because of Mel Gibson's anti-semitic comments--which I condemn as well--but with all the garbage Hollywood produces (the same story over and over again), you take on a risky/ original project and they hate it! My friend Dan and I didn't hate it. Our jaws were on the ground the whole time.

Risky and original is important these days in Film, even as I look at the list of films being made for 2007: Saw III, These Hills have Eyes II, Hostel II--Blah Blah Blah--one thing Hollywood loves to do: exploit an economic success to the ground, even if it has zero artistric integrity--and that is what they are doing with this renewed "teenage-horror" genre. I would watch something original any day over that.

Other films that I know I would have like if I could have gone to them, and which might get nominations this year include: Babel, The Queen, United 93, Children of Men, Flags of our Fathers, and Letters from Iwo Jima.