Thursday, December 2, 2010

Bengies 2010, Top 10, and More

I listed "top 10" movies at the Bengies Drive-In Movie Theatre on Netflix while that site had decent user community access tools. Fortunately, I copied off the 8 years of content, and published it as:

http://jspath55.blogspot.com/2010/03/lists-of-movies-that-played-at-bengies.html


That list included an updated "Top 10" for 2009. In 2010, I visited the Bengies as much as possible, not just to see the shows, but also checking out the marquee nearly every week. Below are 28 photos of the marquee, from the operating weeks between April and November. I missed a few, but not many.

On FaceBook, the Bengies admins asked "What was your favorite DouBBle or TriPPPle feature this season?" I'll avoid the easy answer of the Dusk-To-Dawn shows on Memorial and Labor Day weekend (on the grounds that those were not strictly 2 or 3 movies).

I'm going with the September 24-26 weekend line up, known as "Face Fleas thank you Please, Owls Flipped on Inception" on the email list, which included:

  1. Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole
  2. FLIPPED
  3. INCEPTION
I had seen Inception before, once all the way through, and once part way through (it was a Friday and I could not stay awake for the last feature). On the third viewing, Inception held up. The other 2 were great drive-in movies. I could have picked other sets just as easily, there were so many great mash-ups.

Top 10

And now for the top 10. As in earlier lists, I saw each of these at the Bengies, at least once, during the current year.

  1. Inception
  2. Get Low
  3. Megamind
  4. Shrek Forever After
  5. Iron Man 2
  6. How To Train Your Dragon
  7. Despicable Me
  8. Secretariat
  9. RED
  10. Robin Hood
Almost-rans: Toy Story 3, Salt, The Last Airbender, Cop-Out, The Spy Next Door, Shutter Island

Honorable Mention (from "FaceBook Night At The Bengies"):

E. T. The EXTRA TERRESTRIAL
NORTH BY NORTHWEST















List culled from the Bengies email service for 2010, not necessarily complete, or in chronological order, but mostly.

Key: "Y" = saw it; "!" = on Top 10 list for 2010; "?" = saw part of it (or can't remember it); " " pretty sure I missed it.


    Y THE SPY NEXT DOOR
    Y COP OUT
    ? IT'S COMPLICATED
    Y KICK-ASS
    Y HOT TUB TIME MACHINE
    ! HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON
    Y THE BOUNTY HUNTER
    ! IRON MAN 2
    ! SHREK FOREVER AFTER
    ! ROBIN HOOD
    Y SHUTTER ISLAND
    Y THE KARATE KID
      KILLERS
    Y THE LAST AIRBENDER
    ? GROWN UPS
    ! INCEPTION
    ! DESPICABLE ME
      The Twilight Saga: ECLIPSE
    Y SALT
    Y DINNER FOR SCHMUCKS
      VAMPIRES SUCK
      THE SORCERER'S APPRENTICE
    Y TOY STORY 3
    ? The SWITCH
    Y THE EXPENDABLES
    Y The OTHER GUYS
      THE LAST EXORCISM
    Y Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole
    Y TAKERS
    Y GOING THE DISTANCE
    ? THE LOTTERY TICKET
    Y FLIPPED
    ? The TOWN
    Y E. T. The EXTRA TERRESTRIAL
    Y NORTH BY NORTHWEST
    ! RED
    Y GET LOW
      GREASE SING-A-LONG
    ! SECRETARIAT
    ! MEGAMIND
    Y DEVIL
      PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2
      HEREAFTER
    Y DUE DATE
    Y THE SOCIAL NETWORK

2 comments:

Jon Reed said...

I'm very disappointed that Paranormal Activity 2 did not receive more serious consideration for your top ten list. Perhaps you will give this classic another chance during an encore screening.

jspath55 said...

Jon - it's hard to add a movie to a "best of" list when you haven't watched it. Maybe other film critics have lower standards, but not me. As you probably know, I sat through parts of Para-Active 1 last year, along with "The Fourth Kind"; they both get 1 Star or maybe 0 Stars ratings on Netflix ("allegedly based on a true tale").
They only way I'd watch either again is via full bore MST3K soundtrack treatment.

:-)