A Few Good Men (1992)

IMDb plot summary: Neo military lawyer Kaffee defends Marines accused of murder; they contend they were acting under orders.
Directed by Rob Reiner. Starring Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson, and Demi Moore.

This is one high-quality movie. The writing is great, the directing is great, the acting is great, the music is great. It may not have touched any deep emotional reserves inside of me, but it was a very solid movie and a very exciting courtroom drama. Sorkin's dialogue is at its best here, and I'm delighted that he adapted it himself for the screen. I enjoyed this one quite a lot. 4 stars.

Flickchart: #506 out of 1887, below Down With Love and above Say Anything...

Wreck-It Ralph (2012)

IMDb plot summary: A video game villain wants to be a hero and sets out to fulfill his dream, but his quest brings havoc to the whole arcade where he lives.
Directed by Rich Moore. Starring John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer, Jane Lynch, and Alan Tudyk.

Oh, this was fine. The concept is creative, the animation looks great, the nods to all the different video games were fun and not annoying. The main problem with this movie is that it took me until the very end to give a crap about any of the characters. For most of the movie, I was impatient for it to be over. I found Ralph boring and Vanellope annoying at best and none of their jokes were terribly funny. I really just wanted the movie to follow Felix and Calhoun around the entire time - now THEY were interesting.

The story does end well. The twist is good, the fight scene is good, and by the very, very end, it is kind of touching how everything works out. The movie just shouldn't have taken me an hour and 15 minutes out of an hour and a half to get to that point. 2.5 stars.

Flickchart: #833 out of 1886, below Josh and the Big Wall and above The Core.

Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

IMDb plot summary: Three magazine employees head out on an assignment to interview a guy who placed a classified ad seeking a companion for time travel.
Starring Aubrey Plaza, Mark Duplass, and Jake Johnson.

Major spoilers ahead, as my main complaint was the ending.

This is one of those that I can almost guarantee will slide its way significantly down my Flickchart over time, because I'm going to forget Mark Duplass' weird charm and Aubrey Plaza's entertaining character which made it worth watching, and I'll be left with just the dissatisfaction I felt with the rest of it. The romance didn't really work at all - the two characters were great individually, but I never like they worked *together*. The sideplots with other characters were bland and unnecessary.

My main beef, however: the ending wasn't satisfying at all. It's ambiguous, but not the sort of ambiguous that says, "Oh, either it's a slightly happier or slightly sadder ending." Depending on what happened there at the end, the movie *drastically* changes genre. It's either a charming sci-fi romance... or it's a completely tragic story about someone who decided to follow a maniac she was temporarily obsessed with and then they both disintegrated and died. The movie tries to aim us toward the first ending, but without any real answers (including answers like "what the heck was going on with his girlfriend?"), there's still the nagging sense that it could be a completely horrific story and I'm never going to be really sure. That bad taste in my mouth is, I suspect, the taste that will remain six months from now. 2 stars.

Flickchart: #805 out of 1885, below No Highway in the Sky and above Batman.

Flight (2012)

IMDb plot summary: An airline pilot saves almost all his passengers on his malfunctioning airliner which eventually crashed, but an investigation into the accident reveals something troubling.
Directed by Robert Zemeckis. Starring Denzel Washington, Kelly Reilly, and Don Cheadle.

When this movie first came out, I didn't pay much attention to it, as it looked like another generic action flick by Denzel. Boy, was I wrong. I'm so glad I picked this up. It's an incredible drama with some of the best acting Denzel's done in a long time (he certainly deserved his Oscar nomination). After the climactic moment, the ending is a little too cheesy and obvious for me, but everything right up until that moment is really, really excellent. Extremely compelling. 4 stars.

Flickchart: #428 out of 1884, below Big and above Date Night.

Liberal Arts (2012)

IMDb plot summary: When 30-something Jesse returns to his alma mater for a professor's retirement party, he falls for Zibby, a college student, and is faced with a powerful attraction that springs up between them.
Directed by Josh Radnor. Starring Josh Radnor, Elizabeth Olsen and Richard Jenkins.

I mildly enjoyed Josh Radnor's debut, Happythankyoumoreplease, but this movies is more cohesive, more focused, and has less obviously "quirky indie" dialogue, with the exception of Zac Efron's weird cameo character. (I enjoyed it, I just thought it didn't fit in at all with the rest of the movie.) It's a satisfying ride, although I don't think I'm going to remember much about it in 6 months. I hope Josh Radnor continues to write and direct, because if his next effort is to this as this is to Happythankyoumoreplease, he could end up with something I really, really love. 3.5 stars.

Flickchart: #676 out of 1883, below Charlie St. Clou dand above The Man Who Wasn't There.

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012)

IMDb plot summary: As an asteroid nears Earth, a man finds himself alone after his wife leaves in a panic. He decides to take a road trip to reunite with his high school sweetheart. Accompanying him is a neighbor who inadvertently puts a wrench in his plan.
Directed by Lorene Scafaria. Starring Steve Carell and Keira Knightley.

Oh, man, I am so torn on this movie. I was always THIS close to loving it, but I just can't get past Keira Knightley. The girl rubs me the wrong way in just about everything she's in. Put any other actress in this movie and I would have completely loved it, but every scene she was in just made me annoyed with her... except for that very final scene, where my adoring love for Steve Carell's character and horrific end-of-the-world moments finally won out. 4.5 stars for everything but Keira Knightley, but since she's in the movie a whole lot, it brings it down like a star and a half. Sigh. So close. 3 stars.

Flickchart: #683 out of 1882, below Nine Lives and above Nanny McPhee.

The Sessions (2012)

IMDb plot summary: A man in an iron lung who wishes to lose his virginity contacts a professional sex surrogate with the help of his therapist and priest.
Directed by Ben Lewin. Starring John Hawkes, Helen Hunt and William H. Macy.

This movie took me completely by surprise. I picked it up casually at Redbox along with three other movies I really *wanted* to see, and found a fascinating and moving story about a likable character working toward a goal he never thought he could achieve.

What I liked about this movie was how neatly it avoided all the pitfalls that could have made me hate it. It's not an American Pie-style sex comedy, with ridiculous scenarios and awkward, bawdy innuendos, nor does it dissolve into mushy sentimental nonsense. It's a straightforward drama exploring these issues seriously and tastefully, and that ended up creating a gorgeous story. 4 stars.

Flickchart: #401 out of 1881, below Solaris and above To Catch a Thief.