2016 Movie Wrap-Up
As regular readers here know, Barb and I go to a lot of movies – generally one a week. That doesn’t mean we see everything, of course, so view these lists in that context. No particular order within categories.

Here we go:
BEST MOVIES
Hail, Caesar!
The Nice Guys
Star Trek Beyond
Hell or High Water
Doctor Strange
MOVIES WE WALKED OUT ON
The Boss
Bad Moms
Ben-Hur
The Magnificent Seven
Keeping Up with the Joneses
MOVIES WE WALKED OUT ON & MAYBE SHOULDN’T HAVE
Captain America: Civil War
Kubo & the Two Strings
MOVIES WE SHOULD HAVE WALKED OUT ON
Girl on the Train
Conjuring 2
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
BEST MOVIE WITH BRENT SPINER
Independence Day: Resurgence
WORST MOVIE WITH BRENT SPINER
Independence Day: Resurgence
MOVIES THAT WERE BETTER THAN THEY HAD ANY RIGHT TO BE
Zootopia
Gods of Egypt
Legend of Tarzan
Deadpool
Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising
MOVIES THAT WERE WORSE THAN THEY HAD ANY RIGHT TO BE
Finest Hours
Ghostbusters
MOVIES WE ENJOYED BUT BARELY REMEMBER
Keanu
X-Men: Apocalypse
Central Intelligence
MOVIES THAT DID THE JOB
The Infiltrator
Masterminds
Rules Don’t Apply
Allied
BEST MOVIE WITH THE GROWN-UP KID FROM PERDITION
Everybody Wants Some!!
MOVIES THAT WE DIDN’T SEE BUT HATE ANYWAY
13 Hours
Dirty Grandpa
The Divergent Series: Allegiant
My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2
Alice Through the Looking Glass
Office Christmas Party
PRETENTIOUS TWADDLE
Arrival
The Witch
Nocturnal Animals
A few comments, since I didn’t review all of these films here over the year.
CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR just wore us down. We left with half an hour to go, generally ready to swear off super-hero movies. DOCTOR STRANGE, then, was an intelligent surprise. So was DEADPOOL, and I understand why anyone might not like its over-the-top nilhistic approach, but we both liked the kick to the seat of the pants it gave to super-hero movies.
ARRIVAL is slow and full of itself, and I found its big surprise obvious. THE WITCH was an unpleasant ride to nowhere. NOCTURNAL ANIMALS is misogynistic and generally unpleasant, with only the story-within-the-story having any merit, most of that coming from the always interesting Michael Shannon. RULES DON’T APPLY is an interesting and quirky return to film by star/director/writer Warren Beatty, a loving though occasionally acid valentine to Hollywood and a disguised autobiography. GODS OF EGYPT we watched at home in 3-D and had fun – no apologies forthcoming.
* * *
Our local weekly paper, Voice of Muscatine, did on the Grand Master award.
Here’s a good review of The London Blitz Murders.
J. Kingston Pierce gives a nice mention to the complete version of Road to Perdition published by Brash Books. Order that yet?
Nice words about the Quarry TV series as one of the year’s best literary adaptations.
And here the Quarry show makes another “best of” list.
Finally, be sure to check out the Quarry Facebook page.
M.A.C.
* * *
And this just in!
QUARRY: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON
Available February 14, 2017 on Blu-ray™ & DVD
* * *