My Top 250 Favorite Movies (250-241)

I know, I know. Another list of movies on the internet. I know most people on the net are over lists, but hey, I like them. So a couple of things. One, I don't have anything particularly amazing to say about these movies, for deep commentary, I would look elsewhere. Two, I'd like to stress that I don't think these are the 250 best movies of all time, again for that I would look elsewhere. Rather these are just my 250 favorite movies. Three, for 201-250 I'm just going to write minimally about them, 101-200 I'll try to get a little more in depth and then 1-100 I'll basically be writing little blog posts for each movie. So, here we go!

250.) Watchmen (2009)

Have always maintained that film is not the best medium for this story, a television mini-series would be far better to set up the little details that make the payoff worth it, with that said, I feel like Zack Snyder’s film adaptation is about as good as you could do this story in a couple hours. 

Performance to Savor: Jackie Earle Haley - Near pitch perfect performance in that role. Captures what people love about the character while making the character as despicable as it’s supposed to be!

249.) Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017)

Super popular and beloved film! Seriously though, taken on its own, The Last Jedi has a lot to like about it, with some of the more unique things that we’ve seen in a Star Wars movie.

Performance to Savor: Adam Driver - Emo-Darth Vader is not an easy role to play, let alone make as sympathetic as Driver does. He’s my favorite aspect of the New Trilogy.

248.) Planet of the Apes (1968)

I have a predilection towards Rod Serling, but the Apes franchise is one of my favorite things Hollywood has produced and the first movie is still one of the best in the series.

Performance to Savor: Roddy McDowall - Acting through that make-up could not have been an easy thing to do and McDowall does a fantastic job of it!

247.) The Village (2004)

I am killing it so far with these popular movies. It’s a shame that the secret to this movie got out before release, because I feel like the chatter behind that secret hurt the movie more than the actual way the secret plays out in the movie. I kind of think people were looking for a reason to hate Shyamalan at that point and he gave it with the ending. Other than that, it’s got a great atmosphere and some really tense scenes.

Performance to Savor: Bryce Dallas Howard - Is a revelation in this movie. While she hasn’t come close to this performance, she’s always solid, but here she’s the best thing about a pretty good movie.

246.) Shin Godzilla (2016)

The latest Godzilla movie out of Japan is sort of a reboot to the Godzilla franchise, while bringing the series back to its roots where Godzilla is a force of nature, neither good or bad, but rather something that just happens. The government parts are very equivalent to Anno’s anime series Evangelion, but that’s not what we’re here for, the Godzilla scenes are what we’re here for and while they’re at first oft-putting, they quickly become amazing. 

Performance to Savor: Hideaki Anno - His imagination is just incredible. 

245.) Saving Mr. Banks (2013) 

I am a huge, huge, huge fan of Walt Disney the person. Is he a flawed individual? Sure and that’s something where we shouldn’t not examine those flaws, but figure out where those flaws came from and potentially learn from them. In my opinion, that’s a major flaw in society today, an unwillingness to learn from the past, rather now we just bury the past and deride people, living or dead, for those flaws. He was a genius though and as tough of a guy as he was at times, you can’t find a single person who worked closely with him that doesn’t adore him as a person and a boss. 

Saving Mr. Banks is as good of an adaptation of part of his life that Disney could fictionalize.

Performance to Savor: Tom Hanks - Is pitch perfect in the role. Absolutely the perfect person to play him these days.

244.) The Devil’s Advocate (1997)

Feels like people are pretty mixed on this movie, I wonder if that’s changed any with the recent love of Keanu from society. I love it though, it’s the kind of movie that just doesn’t get made in Hollywood these days, but everyone is so good in it. Keanu is a great lead, Pacino is 90s Pacino’ing, it’s so good!

Performance to Savor: Charlize Theron - I didn’t know who she was when I first saw this, but in a movie with a good performance by Keanu and and while it’s over the top, Pacino still being amazing, Theron steals the show. Her performance, especially in the church in that scene, is incredible and heartbreaking.

243.) Saw II (2005)

I hate that Saw II gets lumped in with the hate the Saw sequels get, because I think it’s a great sequel to the original. Gives you more of what you want from this franchise while subverting what we knew from the first movie.

Performance to Savor: Tobin Bell - Also really gives us our first bit of Jigsaw, he’s really just a cameo in the first movie and Bell’s performance is so good that you can see why a franchise was made around him, even if those movies ended up being lackluster.

242.) Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)

I’m still pretty mixed with the opening half hour of the film, it’s edited pretty poorly, things like Forest Whitaker’s character are head scratching to those of us who don’t follow every bit of Star Wars. Once the film gets past that opening half hour all the way until the end, it offers some of the best stuff from the Disney era of Star Wars.

Performance to Savor: Alan Tudyk - Such a gimme, but K-2SO is meant to steal the show and there’s no one better in Hollywood to steal scenes than Tudyk.

241.) Lethal Weapon (1987)

I haven’t seen it yet, so no judgment, but it’s insane to me they made stuff from the Lethal Weapon property without Mel Gibson. His manic energy is Lethal Weapon to me. One of the quintessential 80s actors, love him or hate him there’s no one like Gibson and Riggs is one of his more iconic characters. 

Performance to Savor: Mel Gibson - His ability to flip switches is unmatched to this day in Hollywood.