Here we are on the cusp of awards season as the box office is well past it’s cooling down phase and is getting reading for the season’s shift from popcorn and action to the more subdued tones of drama. So before looking forward to that season I am going to take a look back at the summer and list the movies I enjoyed the most as I think it is fun to match it up with my most anticipated list and see what lived up to the hype and what went down in flames. I am not going to lie, this summer kind of sucked. There were some awesome films for sure but the overall collection of movies was lackluster with a pretty huge drought through most of July. Next summer looks to be pretty fucking epic though so maybe this is just the calm before the storm. But regardless, let’s take a look at which movies I liked the most this summer. As usual, these are not the only films I liked this summer but they are my favorite. Sound off in the comments if you want to agree or disagree but do us all a favor and don’t be a toolbox while doing it.

10. Amazing Spider-Man 2

 

Right out of the gates this is a controversial pick as this movie was pretty roundly hated and criticized and it makes me wonder if I saw a different cut of this movie or if the people saying it was a bad Spider-man movie have ever actually read a Spider-Man comic. It is tempting to leave a movie like this off my list given that most people will disagree but fuck all that. I thought it was great and felt the most like Spider-Man of any of the live action movies. That is not to say that I don’t like Raimi’s movies but as a character Spider-Man was much more present. Flame me if you want but I dug it.

 

 

9. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

For as much of this film that I enjoyed it, it should have been higher on this list but when the movie transitions from thoughtful meditation on humanity and the bridge building needed to bring two disparate people’s together into a war movie I became both bored and sort of horrified. I get that you are supposed to be horrified and that in order to get where the series needs to go the conflict had to happen but it was a real bummer. I didn’t want to see the apes die or the humans die. I would have much rather watched the peacekeeping efforts and not the war. Loving action movies as much as I do it feels weird to say that the action here, which was very well done, was a bummer and less interesting but really it is more of a testament to how strong the rest of the picture was. I need to be clear that I really liked this movie a lot but I just found myself wanting a different movie in the end and that is more my issue than the film’s.

8. Only Lovers Left Alive

 

Given that I just complained about too much action in Planet of the Apes it is kind of appropriate that the next film on the list is a character study about a couple of centuries old vampires who don’t do much of anything but ponder the nature of existence. Like a lot of writer/director Jim Jarmusch’s work, Only Lovers Left Alive is a slow and deliberate film that is beautiful and engaging if you have the patience for it and are not looking for something flashy and exciting. I am a fan of Jarmusch and when you put Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton together and let them go as vampires who aren’t particularly impressed with being vampires anymore and you get an engrossing movie that has a lot of depth if not a lot of plot and story. This is not for everyone and it certainly isn’t standard summer fare but as a bit of counter programming from movies that go on forever with mind-numbing action that doesn’t mean much of anything it is nice to spend some time with a movie that means quite a bit even if it takes its time getting there.

 

 

7. Obvious Child

 

Another strange title in a summer movie list, Obvious Child is a comedy about a stand up comedian who finds herself pregnant after a drunken fling as a result of being dumped for her best friend. Far from the typical ‘She’s having a baby!’ sort of comedy, Obvious Child goes more for the ‘she’s not having a baby’ given that it centers mostly around her decision to have an abortion. This movie is also probably not for everyone but it should be. There is plenty said about having kids and it is refreshing to see a film that shows the other side of it. It is a comedy and it is very funny but it does not make light of the weighty decision in front of Jenny Slate’s Donna. Written and directed by Gillian Robespierre, Obvious Child could have felt preachy, too sentimental or too irreverent but it finds a perfect balance and delivers something that is touching, funny and ultimately uplifting. I wasn’t sure what to expect out of it but I really loved it and it served as more great counter programing for Transformers.

 

 

6. Neighbors

My second favorite comedy of the year,  Neighbors was more great stuff from Nicholas Stoller. Neighbors did what Stoller does best which is to deliver seriously funny adult comedy but doing it with more heart than one would expect. There isn’t much to really say about it without giving away jokes but there is a lot more to this comedy than the trailer implies and it manages to have something to say while being raunchy and ridiculous.

5. The One I Love

Another indy pick on my summer list which feels a little weird but goddamn this was a great movie. I did not review it because to do so would require spoilers and I don’t want to give any away so I will just say that I loved this movie and the more I think about it after the fact the more I love it. Mark Duplass and Elizabeth Moss are both terrific and the movie pretty much lives and dies by their performances. Go see this, seriously.

4. Edge of Tomorrow

 

Edge of Tomorrow kind of breaks my heart a bit because people complain ad naseum about how there are no new ideas and everything is a sequel and then when something new comes along it is largely ignored. In fairness, Edge of Tomorrow is an adaptation of the comic book All You Need is Kill which is itself a riff on the Groundhog Day concept but regardless of its origins, this film feels fun and fresh. Part of it may be that audiences are luke warm on Tom Cruise but honestly, at this point, people have to recognize that however they feel about his religion or him personally he is a tremendous actor and action star. Aside from Cruise, who is excellent, Edge of Tomorrow boasts great performances by Emily Blunt and Bill Paxton as well as Doug Liman’s terrific direction. The effects are great and script is very clever with excellent twists and turns and way more humor that one would expect. I will grant you that the title sucks serious balls but regardless Edge of Tomorrow is great.

 

 

3. 22 Jump Street

 

I have made no secret of my love of the 21 Jump Street remake by Phil Lord and Chris Miller and I’ll make no secret of how much I loved their sequel. I didn’t really know if they could pull of the same level of quality the second time around. I needn’t have worried because 22 Jump Street delivers the same level of excellence as the first one that builds off the strong points of that film while skewering the idea of sequels altogether. At this point I think Lord and Miller can do pretty much anything and I will follow them into hell. Between this and the Lego Movie this year I am in awe of them. 22 Jump Street is easily the funniest comedy of the year so far and I really don’t know what else could top it at this point. 

 

 

2. X-Men Days of Future Past

 

Another movie I was a bit worried about going into it was Days of Future Past. I trust Bryan Singer and I loved First Class but it was starting to look grim with what appeared to be massive misinterpretations of iconic characters while overloading from character bloat. As it turns out, none of that was true and Avengers Age of Ultron now has their work cut out for them as far as Quicksilver is concerned. More than anything, though, Days of Future Past managed to pull off a moving piece of science fiction while offering enough action and humor to balance it all out. This movie might have had some fans crying foul on the ins and outs of time travel and what it means for the X-Men series moving forward but it is hard to ignore that it brings back all the great things about the Singer X-men while integrating what worked in First Class in a compelling story that gets to the root of what all this is about in the first place. Days of Future Past is great and it makes me excited to see what is in store for us next time around. And it is a good feeling to be able to be excited over the X-Men again. 

 

 

1. Guardians of the Galaxy

 

This shouldn’t be much of a surprise given how well this did both critically and financially, but it was the movie I was most looking forward to and the one I enjoyed the most. There is the requisite backlash against it now as people can’t wait to talk about how ‘not that great’ it was or how it was overrated but fuck all that. I have seen it four times in the theater and I can’t wait to see it again. There is very little I would change about this movie and it was hilarious, exciting and emotionally resonant all while featuring a talking tree monster and a sentient raccoon in main roles. There have been some complaints about villain Ronan and his lack of motives which really confuses me given he states the reasons behind what he is up to several times. He was different than he was in the comics, sure, but so were several other characters. That is the nature of comic book movies. The amount of fun this movie delivered made me feel like a kid again and I haven’t been so happy with a movie in a long time. Truly excellent.

So there is my list.  There are a fair number of unconventional titles on the list for summer but like I mentioned at the top, this was a weird summer and not a particularly great one. It wasn’t terrible though and some honorable mentions are Godzilla, Sin City a Dame to Kill For, How to Train Your Dragon 2 and Million Dollar Arm. Let me know what you think down below and include your list because that is more fun!