9. Let the Right One In - As original as In Bruges is, it's downright conventional when compared to the next entry on the list, a dramatic horror out of Sweden that shows that you can do a sweet story of young love and vampires and not have it be completely lame. Thirteen-year-old Oskar's lonely life usually consists of avoiding school bullies and hanging out on the world's saddest playground, until he meets his new neighbour, an unusual girl named Eli. They quickly become friends, then run through the clumsy motions of young courtship until Oskar starts noticing that people are dying due to strange neck bites, and his pale new girlfriend is never around in the day. It's just about the sweetest, weirdest, most disturbing little movie you could think of, and perhaps the most daring movie of the year. It's about time somebody restore some dignity to cinematic vampires.
8. Forgetting Sarah Marshall - Along with the blah output amongst many of the Oscar hopefuls, another reason that 2008 was disappointing was the comedic output of the year. Despite my affection for this amiable film (I've now seen it twice, and enjoyed it as much the second time around as the first), it's still a flawed movie, so the fact that it's not only the best funny movie released this year, but that no other movie even comes close, is a bit disappointing.
7. The Visitor - The first great film of the year, The Visitor was released all the way back in April, which isn't exactly the time for thoughtful character studies (to give you an idea, I probably saw the next movie on this list the week after I saw The Visitor, in a theatre where me and my companions were over half of the audience). Somehow, the Academy managed to remember it long enough (or more likely, discovered it later in the year from the comfort of their own homes) to nominate consummate professional Richard Jenkins for a best-acting award (that he has no chance of winning). That was probably the most pleasant surprise from this year's nominations, which otherwise gave me plenty to complain about.
6. Iron Man - For a glorious 2.5 months, Iron Man was on top of the world: it kicked off the blockbuster season with authority, causing quality-starved comic book fans to go wild and start asking if it was the best comic book movie ever. Which was a little overzealous, but it is a fantastic piece of entertainment, so it was easy to understand the enthusiasm, especially in comparison to the past few years of superhero movies. Then another one came out in mid-July, and people were all "Iron Man who"?
![Let the Right One In [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51GYpLBd1CL._SL120_.jpg)
![Forgetting Sarah Marshall [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xRGz4S8AL._SL120_.jpg)
![The Visitor [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51OPxbEnwGL._SL120_.jpg)
![Iron Man (Ultimate Two-Disc Edition + BD Live) [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51hso1X0GJL._SL120_.jpg)
![The Wrestler [Theatrical Release]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51akrGNzLXL._SL120_.jpg)
![Slumdog Millionaire [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51s6y0y84tL._SL120_.jpg)
Article comments
1 - Jordan Richardson
Cool stuff. I thought 2008 was actually a much better year than 2007 for film. Lots of tremendous stuff out there to see.
My Top Films of the Year (in no particular order):
Let the Right One In
Revolutionary Road
Frozen River
The Wrestler
Happy-Go-Lucky
Doubt
Slumdog Millionaire
Gran Torino
WALL-E
Frost/Nixon
I've yet to see Milk, In Bruges, Rachel Getting Married, and several others too, so the list could change too.
Also, wasn't as big a fan of the "superhero" movies as everyone else was. I thought The Dark Knight was average, same with Iron Man.
2 - andre
Where is twilight?
3 - Brian aka Guppusmaximus
I guess I didn't give The Wrestler much of a chance...It is rather boring in the beginning.
Wall-E was one of the best movies I have ever seen and even though I agree about Pixar("UP" is coming soon...Yay), I thought they had some competition with Sony's release in '07. "Surf's Up" was freakin awesome! If they make another one like that then we will have two companies producing great animated movies that are for everyone.
TDK was very good but I think the hype ruined something for me...I can't put my finger on it. Really, I did like it but towards the end it got a little drawn out. I guess when it comes to "Comic Book" movies I'd rather see them animated. Imho, this movie doesn't touch the Spawn Animated Series that HBO/Macfarlane put out quite sometime ago but,again, that's my opinion.
Your list is fairly accurate though I would've included "Eagle Eye". I thought that movie was gonna suck but it turned out great.
4 - Jordan Richardson
"Surf's Up" was freakin awesome!
Really? I hadn't bothered to see that one because I thought it looked bloody awful.
5 - Andy Sayers
I found Surf's Up to be merely average. I'm all penguined out.
6 - Brian aka Guppusmaximus
Well, Jordan, it's tough to say if the animation is as good as Pixar's ( I think it comes pretty damn close) but the script & voice over cast make up for whatever it lacks in that department. It was funny, a little bit touching and it presented a huge point in the same fashion as Wall-E. But, I can't take anything away from Wall-E because that film was brilliant, original & very creative. Still, Surf's Up has to,easily, be in my top 10 for Animated movies.
You should check it out...
7 - Andy Sayers
@Jordan:
Just as you didn't care for TDK and Iron Man, I disagree with Happy-Go-Lucky and Revolutionary Road, both of which I actively disliked. Diff'rent strokes, I suppose.
I'm about to watch Frozen River, so I'll see if it would've contended had I saw it in time.
8 - Cster-sama
I haven't seen most of those movies. I'll check them out in the new year.
9 - Brovky
wer da hell is the dark knight??!!
10 - Andy
You have to keep reading Brovky. Like maybe all the way to number one.