the Hurt Locker - 10/10 - Easily the best movie I've seen all year. The acting is spot-on and the one element of the film that I enjoyed the most was how it took the big name actors and placed them in the most minor of roles and even...
This made the movie seem much more realistic. This movie is also unique in the way that it doesn't follow a traditional unit, it follows a group of explosive experts (Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty) whose job is to handle any situation where a bomb is found. The movie is suspensful, well acted and well directed. This is by far the best war movie based in Iraq that I've ever seen. I almost choked up at the end, but if you see the movie, you will understand where Kathryn Bigelow was coming from.
p.s. Kathryn Bigelow >>>> her bum ass of an ex-husband James Cameron.
Up in the Air - 9/10 - The concept of George Clooney's character, Ryan Bingham, is so extraordinary that it draws you in. His life as someone who is hired to go around the world firing people for companies is not something I've ever heard of before the novel/film. This movie is a lot about choices and how you create your life's path. Ryan's choice was to stay alone, live one day at a time (preferably on the road raking up miles) and make sure he had no excess baggage. His life is turned upside down when Anna Kenrick's character, Natalie, introduces a new way to fire people. Ryan and Natalie's boss, Jason Bateman, is skeptical after Clooney makes Kendrick look silly, so he sends her out on the road with him.
Regardless of what W2B says about George Clooney, this guy can act. Doesn't matter if he is playing George Clooney in all of his roles, he still puts forth a lot of emotion, mostly subtly (see: the wedding scene(s)). Speaking of acting, Anna Kendrick, as the girl whose technological advancement of the company may put Clooney's character of a job, is getting a lot of hype for Oscar season and it is understandable, even though her character is a little unrealistically naive. Vera Farmiga plays Clooney's love interest and it is hard to throw her into the plot synopsis because she is just someone Clooney meets on the road. Her and Clooney have some great chemistry and that helps Farmiga's acting ability.
What Jason Reitman has done with this movie is something beautiful. The overhead shots in the opening credits and when Ryan travels to a new city is gorgeous, especially for someone like me who has never been on a plane. The movie is funny and sad at the same time, something Reitman achieves very well with his writing. There is one scene in particular with JK Simmons, George Clooney and Anna Kendrick that was truly the turning point for me. After this scene I understood everything Clooney's character was doing. I think while this is not the best movie of the year, it is still worthy of a lot of people's attention and is just as relevant to today's world as the Hurt Locker.