2008 / Ethan & Joel Coen > Burn After Reading is a bit of a mystery: On one hand, the plot is put together in a way that’s almost too perfect, too clean to be the work of two brothers who just won an Oscar for directing. Things are forced and coincidental to the point where the audience loses the need to think. I know that’s generally considered a negative, but let’s face it: The boys just finished No Country for Old Men and wanted to do something fun and simple. Subsequently, this is an enjoyable, relatively superficial work with some basic commentary on our everyday lives. The best part, though, has to be how great the individual performances were (especially the hilarious Brad Pitt). The Coens have quite a few gifts, and one of them just may be getting the finest out of their actors.

2008 / Ridley Scott > On his follow-up to The Departed, screenwriter William Monahan really tries to up complexity of the plot as if it wasn’t enough the first time around. In many ways, Body of Lies ends up being a similar type of poker face tale of Billy Costigan, though this time Leonardo DiCaprio’s character works for the U.S. Government and fights terrorism. It works but it doesn’t work: The pacing is disjointed and certain subplots seem afterthoughts to make the whole equation make sense. Scott, though, knows how refine coal into diamonds, so there’s little surprise in how effective much of the directing is. If the film has a purpose other than liberal guilt, it’s not completely obvious. And what it lacks in terms of intelligence (ironically) compared to a film like Syriana, it makes up for with a slick presentation and intensity.

2008 / Ben Stiller > Riding on the waves of a star-studded cast and one of the best (and funniest) marketing campaigns for a comedy I’ve ever seen, Tropic Thunder had some of the highest expectations I’ve had for a film all year. But, as it often happens when a lot of big egos join together in one project, the film ends up being more a collection of multiple hilarious scenes rather than a successful, comedic whole. Specifically on point are Robert Downey, Dr. and the head-splitting brilliance of Tom Cruise who both take their ridiculous characters to the perfect level of seriousness. But staggering behind seems to be Ben Stiller, whose schtick, however self-deprecating, feels overused and works mainly as a vehicle to move the story forward. Some of the lines, admittedly, are some of the funniest in recent film memory, though one of the most underrated may be Jack Black’s (after shoving heroine into a couple of guards’ faces): “Let’s move! We only have 16 hours before they wake up!”

2008 / The Wachowski Brothers > Ever since The Matrix sequels reared their pretentious heads, The Wachowski Brothers have been on my shit list for their self-serving, pseudo-philosophical bullshit. V for Vendetta, even with a fine directorial effort by James McTeigue, couldn’t rub off its leftist silliness for a second to let me breathe in the excitement of the man behind the mask. And with Speed Racer, they almost cornered me into something similar with its heavy-handed anti-capitalist angle. But alas, the prettiness (of both the film and Christina Ricci) saved the day. It’s fun, lots of fun, even with the annoyance of Spirtle and Chim Chim, though I gather, as someone who has never seen the animated episodes, that this was part of the show’s charm.

Emile Hirsch seemed a bit miscast, but honestly, nobody cared much for acting in this. (On that note, when did Dr. Jack Shephard leave the island and become Racer X?) The true star of the film was the visuals, and my, how glorious they were. You know how the Crayola 64 packs always had a few neon, ultra-bright colors? Apparently these were the only ones used when doing the Speed Racer storyboards. The Brothers utilize their genuine feel for style in conjunction with an aptly thrown in kitsch factor that makes me wonder what everyone who threw down sharp one-liners at this gentle giant were actually expecting.

2008 / Jon Hurwitz & Hayden Schlossberg > Let’s just keep it simple and say this is an out and out absurdity of a film. There, that makes things easier. Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay won’t win Oscars (nor it should), but it does things that keep you glued to the screen until the end—even through an unbelievable sequence involving George W. Bush where you can’t help but smile. Doogie Howser is all kinds of crazy, and Kumar’s math poetry just makes you tear a little. There is, however, definitely a generational gap in the film that scours it away from a significant amount of moviegoers, and those who are easily offended will probably switch off within the first half hour.

2008 / Louis Leterrier > The most impressive thing about The Incredible Hulk isn’t the fact that it’s actually good, but that Marvel was able to eat the mistake that Ang Lee made and reboot the series in five short years. Not only does it show that the movie-going audiences have surprisingly short-term memories, but also that a storied franchise need not be bogged down by a misfire. That being said, Zak Penn’s script is more on par with his first X-Men 2 effort than Elektra, and Leterrier has targeted a good blend of action and drama while respecting Hulk’s fanbase. Now it’ll be interesting to see if Hulk returns as a good guy or bad guy in the upcoming Avengers movie.