MAFFE Awards 2008!! The Films

Yep, 12 nominees this year. I love the cinema of 2007 so much that I wanted to celebrate the best of the bunch. All these films are ones that slip in and out of my top 6 with each passing day. I always find it so hard and unfair to single out so few movies, when there are so many to choose from. If only I was a big awards branch eh?

The twelve wonderful movies are:

"4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days". I sat with my hands covering my face throughout this entire movie.
It was only of the best directed, written and acted movies of the year, and I could never bring myself to watch it again.
It was such an intense journey that I doubt my heart could take a second viewing.
That ending!..............WOW.


I was really not expecting myself to enjoy "A Mighty Heart". This year was full of dark films, and knowing the horrific ending of this real life story put me off watching it so much.
No good could come from me seeing this movie.
I love being wrong. After everything this is such a life affirming movie.
One of the five that made me cry (this one made me heave!)


Number four in bringing on the water works is the love story of the year "Atonement".
I have waxed on lyrical about this movie all last year, and I am a little out of things to say.
Everyone who visits this blog knows it has it's place firmly in the top 12 (near the top in fact).
There is nothing more to say really.
Except, I love this movie.



"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" was one of the unexpected delights of 2007. How a film depicting such tragedy and grief ended up being so life affirming I do not know.
Just the thought of what this man accomplished by writing his book, and the varios people who wrote down his works just exhausts me.
I can't even put it into words. A truly jaw dropping accomplishment (and it made me bawl).


"Into The Wild" divided people like no other film this year. People either loved it or hated it.
This depended on if you allowed the selfishness and self importance of the lead character to get to you, or if you kept your distance and allowed the supporting performers to tell the story.
If you can do the latter you will be rewarded.
And yes....Hal Holbrook made me lose my steely composure *sniff*.


"Michael Calyton" is the movie that I am still surprised I am including. Simple because this is not my type of movie at all.
This just goes to show how a strong and intellegent screenplay, direction and acting can make any genre of movie accessible to those who would usually shrug it off.
Everything is far more interesting due to the complex shades of grey that are painted.


"No Country for Old Men" is one of those films that EVERYONE was raving about. SO I had decided before hand that I would not love it.
Silly silly me.
What got me was the somber tone of the film. The senselessness of the violence today was the thread that made this film different. Bad guys sometimes get away, and the innocent do suffer.


A quiet musical? Who would have every thought it possible.
We are used to our musical being big or bloody or bad, not quiet and simple and just about the music.
This is exactly what "Once" is. A Musical about the love of music and how it can bring people together. Just a guy and a girl with a guitar and a piano and one of the years best.


How to sum up my feeling of "Persepolis" is just a few words. Well it takes you on a journey to another land. Another world even, yet to feel you know it. It simply narrows the gap between our different cultures and reminds us that everyone on this planet are just human beings trying to survive.
Surprisingly funny, extremely political and very moving. Not a combination that can usually work, but here it does.


The final film that brought on the tears for me this year. "Ratatouille" is a film of surprising depth.
Sure there are your standard villains and hero's of the movie, but there is so much more.
A film about cooking rat just seems preposterous. Here you believe. In this world every creature is equal...how...well...lovely. The sense of the outcasts of society being accepted just appeals to the outcast in me.


There is nothing good about industry and religion. Or so the film should be titled.
"There Will be Blood" is not an easy sit. In fact it makes you very uncomfortable.
But this is brave film making. This is a very intelligent way of attacking the current state of the world.
Oil and religion are what it is all about after all. And neither of them are good for the soul.


How was this movie forgotten?
Where were it's backers?
"Zodiac" was one of the first films I saw in 2007, and I sat in that cinema gripped to me seat the entire time. Such masterful story telling and stroke inducing suspense.
I am still perplexed as to how some other movies were deemed better.
There is no accounting for taste.


See you all for MAFFE this time next year. It is April and I am still awaiting my first film LOVE of 2008.