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The American Film Institute named its 2009 awards for “most outstanding achievements in film and television” in front of and behind the cameras. Top films are The Hurt Locker, Coraline, The Hangover (which was a funny movie but no way an "outstanding achievement"), The Messenger, Precious, A Serious Man, A Single Man, Sugar, Up, and Up In The Air. Top TV shows are The Big Bang Theory, Big Love, Friday Night Lights, Glee, Mad Men, Modern Family, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, Nurse Jackie, Party Down, and True Blood. AFI will honor the creative ensembles in LA on January 15th.
More Proof That AFI Is Irrelevant: Includes 'The Hangover' Among Top 10 Films
By Nikki Finke | Category: Awards | Sunday December 13, 2009 @ 4:23pm PST
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Title Studio Gross 1 Alice In Wonderland Disney $62.7 M 2 Green Zone Universal $14.3 M 3 Shes Out Of My Leag Paramount $9.8 M 4 Shutter Island Paramount $8.1 M 5 Remember Me Summit $8.1 M 6 Our Family Wedding Fox $7.6 M 7 Avatar Fox $6.5 M 8 Brooklyns Finest Overture $4.5 M 9 Cop Out Warner $4.3 M 10 The Crazies Overture $3.7 M 11 Percy Jackson Fox $3.1 M 12 Crazy Heart Fox $3.0 M 13 The Blind Side Warner $1.6 M 14 Valentines Day Warner $1.4 M 15 Ghost Writer Summit $1.2 M 16 Dear John Sony $1.0 M 17 Tooth Fairy Fox $0.7 M 18 Alvin And Chipmunks Fox $0.5 M 19 Last Station SPC $0.4 M 20 The Wolfman Universal $0.4M SOURCE: RENTRAKBox Office Poll
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I didn’t see “The Hangover,” but every single person I know who did thought it was the funniest movie they had seen in a long, long time. Crowd-pleasing, laugh-out-loud comedies are slighted all too often at awards time in favor of quieter, quirkier ones. Why is that, especially when pretty much every actor and director will tell you that comedy is much more difficult to pull off than drama?
In a similar vein, kudos to them for recognizing “Big Bang Theory” and “Modern Family” on the TV side.
If all your friends like it, they might all be slightly retard, or full of shit.The Hangover wasn’t funny at all.The trailer was funny, but the movie is a snoozefest that tries it hardest to be clever, cool and funny, but is nothing but a poser, like the suburban white teenager with his hat turn backward screaming thug life!
The Hangover best moment are in the trailer, but those moments are only funny because of the way they are splice together.When you see the scenes in context, they are no longer funny.For the majority of the film The Hangover gives you the same old tired gags and cliches that have been done to death.Do yourself a flavor, watch it for yourself, then you be the judge.I advised you to watch it for cheap, maybe a redbox rental.You don’t want to waste more then a buck on crap film.
More proof that Nikki Finke is irrelevant. Name me a better comedy then The Hangover this year.
Funny is in the eyes of the beholder. You can’t argue about funny. If something strikes you as funny it’s funny — whether I laugh or not. But you can discuss intelligent films. This was a stupid movie in the way Borat and sadly, the last Apatow were. It is unworthy of being put on a meaningful list — funny or not.
The Proposal
I was surprised to have liked the Proposal. But that weird scene with Betty White dancing in the forest makes this one an easy choice…
The Hangover was funnier.
Um, Hangover was arguably the best of the lot. You’re an “indiot” Nikki!
Nikki’s an indiot [sic]?
Nikki – 1
Dodo – 0
i can see why THE HANGOVER is on there. it’s their way of throwing a bone to the masses. THE HANGOVER is pretty entertaining and it captures 2009 the way THE DARK KNIGHT captured 2008 last year.
i cant see why SUGAR is on there. that movie is a mess. to leave off AVATAR or FANTASTIC MR FOX and include SUGAR doesn’t make sense to me.
The Hangover was a film that was universally loved by a large majority of the world. The fact that you think an award winning film has to be about a little boy dying of cancer is truly the problem with The Oscars by passing over truly funny comedies that are much, much harder to execute than dramas.
What’s irrelevant is pretentious views toward cinema.
Did you see it? It’s a great comedy.
Irrelevant? Out to lunch. Even Funny People was better than The Hangover. The Hangover is mean spirited and unfunny.
Adventureland, in contrast, was a lovely film.
The Fantastic Mr. Fox and Where the Wild Things Are should be on this list. A Serious Man? Nisht far mir.
Alright! I don’t care if the AFI is irrelevant or not, but that’s still some well-deserved love for Friday Night Lights!
“Clear eyes, Full hearts, CAN’T LOSE!”
Can’t spell, either. It’s all right.
..and this article is further proof that you have no taste (see what I did there..). I’d say their list is pretty spot on (I’d change a movie here and a show there, of course), both for movies and TV. Calling people “irrelevant” based on their personal taste is ridiculous. The #1 goal with a comedy is to get the audience laughing, and Hangover did that better than pretty much any movie this decade. They even got the credits spot on (in an unique and very creative way), which was a thankful departure from all the awful there’s something about mary – ish montages we’ve had to suffer through over the last 11 years. Would you rather have the AFI try and guess the Oscars or the Emmys? God that would be boring, and neither the Hangover nor Friday night lights (most overlooked show together with the Wire from the last few years) would have won anything. zZZZzzzZZz.
um…The Hangover is the best R-rated comedy I’ve seen since There’s Something About Mary. The blogger is a narrow minded douche.
You’re not an idiot, N — but after seeing a number of the contenders this year… it’s gonna be a real joke when 10 of these films are announced as vying for best pic. At this rate, I’d say 2010 and Bruno have a decent shot of getting a nod.
Nice to see “The #1 Ladies Detective Agency” recognized.
Sorry it won’t be renewed for a 2nd season.
But it’s a positive portrayal of black people (though, of course, not in America) that are neither villains nor victims.
We can’t have that.
No organization is irrelevant, Nikki, who includes the best comedy on TV, Party Down, on its top 10 list.
You’re allowed to not like The Hangover, but “irrelevant” is a very poor word choice. The movie made $270 million domestically. That’s bigger than every Will Smith film ever except Independence Day, and about twice what Apatow’s HITS make.
The Hangover is a movie for retards. There’s no sophistication whatsoever to the humor and it’s entirely devoid of actual wit. It’s pure idiocy with sitcom-style story structuring that people mistook for being edgy because it was adorned with potty-mouth language and full-frontal male nudity.
I will never understand the fascination audiences had with this movie for as long as I live. It had the most unremarkable and lazy concept imaginable, and it claimed to take place in some kind of plausible reality, but anyone from real life would be arrested on multiple felony charges ten minutes into their drunken blackout stupor if they tried to replicate the events from this story. You clowns stole a cop car as a goof? No problem, we’ll let you off the hook immediately and not put you through the system if you volunteer to have one of our officers tase you in the face in front of a field trip of sassy kids…ho ho! The idiots break into Mike Tyson’s property unnoticed, and then they proceed to transport a tiger stolen from the residence up to their “wild and crazy” party suite while somehow avoiding being torn to shreds. Slipping past the lobby of the posh hotel they were staying at with a savage wild animal in their possession is something I’m obligated so suspend disbelief on, right? Sorry, I’m naturally resistant to things that insult my intelligence to such an appalling degree.
This movie is all yours, retards. Those of us who take pride in our standards of acceptance for comedic entertainment have completely washed our hands of it. The makers of this film took their viewership for complete fucking water-heads, and it paid off. The onscreen comedy has been set back a few generations in the wake of its blockbuster success. The bar has been lowered to subterranean levels from which it may never recover.
You claim to be know “sophistication” yet use the word “retard” to insult people? When you decide to move past the 8th grade, let us all know, thanks.
Please tell us your top ten favorite comedy movies, guy or girl who just called “Hangover” fans retards. We’d like to judge you on what comedy movies you think are great as well.
Also, have you SEEN the bar for comedies that have been released in the last several years? Norbit… the last four American Pie movies… Semi-Pro… any comedy with a Wayons in it and/or titled “______ Movie”… Balls of Fury… Bewitched… Drillbit Taylor… Mr. Woodcock… Wild Hogs… Old Dogs…
The bar is not exactly set high nowadays for comedies. At least people LIKED this one. Of course, we’re all “retards.” You’re the one with great taste in movies, right?
Mark,
I agree that the “bar” for quality comedies is six feet under….there’s no story anymore, just bits….I am not sure who is responsible for this problem. My husband is an excellent comedy writer and can’t get his scripts onto screen because he’s told that
1. Producers want visual gags..and really base humor and could care less about belly bursting funny stories….
2. Producers won’t pay writers…instead they want writers to “show them what they’ve got by doing spec scripts for nothing” in hopes to get interest by the powers that be (advertisers? studios?…who) what about the public, who want great comedy movies?
It’s especially frustrating when we watch the tripe that’s out there. It sucks.
I gotta say the one movie I’ve seen that was a great comedy was “It’s Complicated” – my God- Alec Baldwin is brilliantly funny in it and Meryl Streep plays the straight “man” beautifully. Some bad casting in the youngest son (can’t act – whose son is he–perhaps one of the studio heads?) but AB should NOT retire. Yeah I know he won’t….he just likes to raise a ruckus and get some attention.
Anywho….Please producers give writers with great story a chance….otherwise the comedies will become tragedies.
I think Dustin Hoffman once did a little film where he played a man who pretends to be a woman in order to star in a Soap Opera. Hardly “believable” stuff. Widely considered a classic.
I don’t even mean to defend, or to criticize, “The Hangover.” Just saying, I think the premise of your rant is off.
Have to agree w/ Icarus. I like stupid humor as much as the next guy, but TH was a totally soulless, engineered comedy. Everyone else in the theater was laughing though, so take that as you will.
Also, Salena above seems to have missed the fact that the ‘8th grade’ word ‘retard’ is one of the main jokes in TH, and so she proves Icarus’ point.
Now– Observe and Report….THAT is a real comedy. Dark, painful, but still hilarious. Rogen’s best performance too.
What “The Hangover” did was a HUGE achievement.
An R-rated comedy with no star power made $277 million domestic, and is about to make even more with Blu-Ray/DVD sales.
The Hangover was terrible, and I actually sat through it. It was Road Trip 2 for all intents and purposes, a super dumb, super derivative frat comedy. It moved us one step closer to staring at some guy’s ass for 120 minutes.
Any list of top movies for this year that doesn’t have “(500) Days of Summer” on it is a bit suspect.
Disagree. Watched it wanting to like it but the only thing that made it remotely more than boring was it’s (out-of) chronological order (Hmmm where have I seen that before? Pulp Fiction anyone?)
But Pulp Fiction was masterful, 500 Days of summer was good, but not masterful. Do not compare boring to a film the changed the way we look at movies, sir, ma’am, whoever you are.
To be fair, Stanley Kubrick’s 1957 film “The Killing” played around with timelines in a way very similar to Pulp Fiction. Let’s not pretend like Tarantino reinvented the wheel, shall we?
I’m glad AFI named True Blood as one of the top 10 of the year. it deserves the recognition it is getting. True Blood and Big Love are some of the best tv shows on right now. True Blood improved greatly in quality during it’s 2nd season. But, anyway here is the entire list of tv shows that were Honored by the AFI.
The Big Bang Theory
Big Love – HBO
Friday Night Lights
Glee
Mad Men
Modern Family
The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency – HBO
Nurse Jackie
Party Down
True Blood – HBO
True Blood is the only production listed that I would raise an eyebrow to. This season was horrendous. When will we ever see love for USA’s “Psych”??
Wouldn’t it be RELEVANT that, for once, the AFI (or Academy Award committee) actually chose a movie that the public ALSO likes? Seems more relevant to me than not, but what do I know… I’m just one of the movie-going public, not an insider or highly paid critic.
I agree with you, Mark. I hope that if Avatar is great, that Oscars give it a nod.
Nikke, I’m sorry to say you have lost your way here. You post the LA Film Critics as if it matters – have you seen who votes on that list? Please post those names – and then see if you care. Then look at who the AFI brings together for its jury. I thought you were the champion of the other voice…that it’s AFI is amazing…and appropriate.
So basically: Pretentious people think that The Hangover is a travesty.
Everyone else thinks it is funny.
Good to see where Nikki Finke stands on this side of things; just another Hollywood zombie disguised as “edgy.”
This was a lousy year for film and I think most every critic or group will be hard pressed to come up with a top ten list that doesn’t include at least one “Huh?!” selection. AFI has it even harder since they can’t include foreign films. (And if anything has grown irrelevant over this decade, it could be American film in general)
Also, in response to Icarus Quayle, if you want to talk about films that are unrealistic, look no further than Oscar frontrunner “The Hurt Locker”. Yes, it’s well crafted but in terms of realism, it tells the story of soldiers in Iraq about as well as Lethal Weapon gave insight to what it’s like to be in the LAPD.
Can someone please explain “Big Bang Theory?” It is by far one of the unfunniest shows of all time. I have tried and tried but have never even so much as cracked a smile. It is horrible!
comedy is subjective. “unfunniest of all time” to you might be “best ever” to me. pretentious ass.
Icarus-
“It claimed to take place in some kind of plausible reality”? Really? Movies don’t make claims. The people responsible for them might, but movies don’t claim or believe or strive or intend or fail or succeed or do ANYTHING but play on a screen.
The movie was lauded by critics. Sure, film criticism is subjective, and yes, the critics usually disagree amongst themselves on relative the merits of any given film. But these are people who are paid to watch and review hundreds (and in the case of some of the old-timers, thousands) of movies from every genre imaginable. They’ve seen crappy romantic comedies, sword-and-sandals historical epics, melodramas, action movies, Oscar darlings, and pandering piles of garbage, and they’ve rated and reviewed them accordingly.
What, may I ask, are your criteria for deeming these people retarded? Is it the fact that they’re professionals? Is it their extensive knowledge and experience? Perhaps it’s because their opinions of movies are sought, respected, and taken into account by millions of people. You know, I’m starting to agree with you. Buncha retards, they are.
Hangover was a nice comedy. I saw a screener solo late in the run so I may have been at a disadvantage.
Nikki, you certainly have a lot to say about other’s lists, so why not publish YOUR best of 2009 list. Since you clearly have so much negative to say, I think you should balance it with something positive.
Opinions are like noses, but here goes.
Where’s the love for The Stoning of Soraya M? Very difficult movie to watch, tough subject matter, but Shohreh Aghdashloo was amazing.
Inglourious Basterds was a great movie, period, not just for Christoph.
For the deserving mainstream flick, I’d have gone with Star Trek, but that’s not a knock on The Hangover.
I can’t explain for the life of me how A Single Man has charmed anyone, really. I walked out on this movie less than half an hour in. First time I’ve done that in YEARS.
I managed to sit through Coen Brothers’ latest, and that doesn’t belong on this list either. If it were up to me, I’d sentence those two (and I LOVED Fargo and O Brother Where Art Thou) to a weekend McKee seminar. Dropping your third act and slapping a random meteorological event at the end of what I’m guessing was the second act is not an artistic choice, it’s laziness. Okay, it’s an artistic choice if laziness qualifies.
On the TV side, I won’t quibble too much. Okay, I’d have definitely had Dexter, Breaking Bad, and Californication on the list.
And if they hadn’t included “The Hangover” then the headline would have slammed them for being irrelevant as in out-of-touch with the movie-going public. This is a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation.
There’s nothing less amusing than trying to explain what is funny to someone who does not or WILL NOT get the joke. Sorry Nikki, but irrelevant in this context is too harsh a call. I gotta say I didn’t think the first 20 mins of THE HANGOVER was funny, but it is structured to get funnier as it goes along. So tough luck to those who walked out before the long and hilarious pay-off. Most modern comedies exhuast themselves in the title or before the first act is over. If a contemporary version of either Preston Sturges or the Marx Brothers arrived in 2009, many commentators would turn up their noses. And if it’s not too far off topic: the fest circuit that showers meaningless prizes on video amateurs from LA to Locarno wouldn’t appreciate the talent of Yasujiro Ozu or Jean-Pierre Melville if it bit them on the arse either!
Any TV list without Dexter is a joke.
I think Chuck Bartowski is right. True Blood is a great show and deserves to be on that list.
I’ll save the treatise on the subjectivity of art for another day…or maybe never. I haven’t seen everything listed so I can only comment generally, but as someone who works in publishing I’m constantly faced with the challenge/balance of commercial success vs. literary acclaim. Actually, that’s not really true because I still have my job so commercial success wins out. Stalin famously said quantity has a quality all its own and in the case of wildly popular mass media I think there’s a validity to that. I view this the way I view a menu – as much as I love Atlantic salmon there are times I want a big, juicy burger. On those occasions I find the salmon pretentious and unfulfilling while the burger is sublime.
Great, now I’m hungry. What were we talking about?
You’re missing the point. The Hangover was a funny movie, no doubt, but the geniuses at AFI completely dismissed such incredible achievements and audience favorites as Star Trek, Inglourious Basterds, District 9 and (certainly not a great film but a miraculous achievement for it’s mini-budget and maxi box office) Paranormal Activity. And, in my not so humble opinion, Coraline was stupid and pointless. I was bored to tears and resented the time I spent watching it.
I’m more confused by Coraline in this list.
While it was amazing to look at, the story felt really thin and quite frankly, run of the mill. So, does it exist on the list solely due to its artistic visual appeal?
Forget the list, how bad is that video? The grotesque synthesized music and the lack of any discernible pacing is a master class in precisely how not to do this sort of thing. The irony of honoring excellence with…”bleh” is too good, even for the outdated and (Nikki’s right) irrelevant American Film Institute.
People pay to be taught by these people?
i sat through the hangover and didn’t laugh once. humpday was like 3 million times funnier
Every message board is full of people who get so personally irate and offended if someone likes/dislikes a movie they like/dislike. Does emotional and psychological maturity just go out the window when we all log on? I think it really gained traction with The Dark Knight fanboys who have set a precedent of irrational intolerance and immaturity that has ruined the possibility of intelligent online discourse about film tastes.
I saw The Hangover and thought it was just meh. Wedding Crashers, Talladega Nights, Blades Of Glory, the first half of Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, the first half of Tropic Thunder all made me laugh more and harder. That doesn’t mean The Hangover is bad. It’s a cliche, but humor is (let’s all say it together) SUBJECTIVE.
I’ve never found Apatows comedies the least bit funny, and, unlike a poster above who hates the Big Bang Theory, I love that show. I’m sure both sides could form sizable camps to support their opinion.
And by the way, a huge boxoffice doesn’t mean a movie is good since that presupposes that everyone who buys a ticket liked the movie, which is highly unlikely.
The Hangover may indeed be funny but even the trailer for it recycles the shoot the guy in the face with a dart/taser bit they used in Old School – and I don’t even know what to say about Tyson being used in the marketing – much less the movie. A good comedy in its year and even a standout in its genre in the near term but this is filed under the same category that says Hollywood breaks all time box office every weekend every summer. Adjusted for inflation it makes no sense.
Hangover, was over-hyped, well promoted, and only moderately funny. Bravo. But I’ll never get why shows like “Big Bang Theory” and “Two and a Half Men”(though not on the list) stay on the air, and
“Kings” gets cancelled. True Blood and Mad Men are quality shows.
Congrats to The Hangover!
hangover was big and dumb and offensive. not that there’s anything wrong w/ that in a studio comedy mind you but the issue is the AFI including it a year-end list. A naked ploy to attract some attention from the bumbling masses for an irrelevant sputtering organization. Why not support actual filmmakers making actual films instead of packaged shite?
That The Hangover made almost $300 million is not an “achievement”. It’s business.
Some of you people confuse business with quality. They’re not the same.
One would think AFI would care about quality, since business doesn’t really need its help.
I Love You, Man was a better film than The Hangover. Just was. I liked Hangover and it deserves all it’s successes. Up In The Air – highly overrated. Good, solid, well executed movie – but no “Best Film of the Year” nod.
I agree, Nikki. I laughed out loud once through “The Hangover.”
Felt like it new the notes but couldn’t play the comedic music. I wanted to find it hilarious, I just didn’t.
IMHO.
Another example of the neverending Nikki Finke contradiction. Call someone irrelevant for citing a mainstream popular movie in their list, or say they’re out of touch for not citing said mainstream popular movie. seems like a can’t win situation…
You win the snob award again, Nikki… HANGOVER is top-ten worthy.
I LOVED “The Hangover”, BUT Nikke is correct. Why does everyone fawn all over AFI? They have been resting on long ago tired laurels for years!
If we could only put Avatar in the AFI Top Ten…
Off base on this one, Nikki, especially coming from someone who posted a dozen pics of kids waiting in line for Twilight: New Moon, simply to attract page hits.
or perhaps she posted them because it was a huge entertainment story and this is an entertainment news blog. jeez
This explains why I saw AFI singing “Hate On Me” at the karaoke bar. Poor AFI can’t get no love for its lists, man.
Glad to see some recognition given to Friday Night Lights. We love this show. It is our favorite and the one show on TV we won’t miss.