True Love Will Find You In The End

Saw Daniel Johnston at the Highline Ballroom last night with Klaus and Ned. Amazing show. Even the assholes in the crowd (and there were plenty of them) melted.

He closed with "True Love Will Find You in the End," one of my favorites. Some other highlights were "Silly Love" from Fun, a cover of "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away," "Speeding Motorcycle" from Yip/Jump Music, and "Living Life" from Songs of Pain.

Best Movies of Aught-Seven (revised again)

I just saw a few of movies from 2007--Gone Baby Gone, The King of Kong, and Rocket Science--that weren't included on this list initially, and I've reassessed others. Gone Baby Gone is a knockout, a great adaptation of Dennis Lehane's novel and, quite possibly, better than Eastwood's Mystic River (also based on a topnotch Lehane book). Rocket Science was a hell of a funny movie that--for better or worse--exists in the shadow of Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums. And The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters was--bar none--the best documentary I've seen in a long time.

There are still some films I haven't yet seen that I'm very much looking forward to: Margot at the Wedding; Sweeney Todd; Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story; Michael Clayton; The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; Bella; Starting Out in the Evening; and The Savages. I'll also check out DePalma's Redacted, Across the Universe, Romance & Cigarettes, The Brave One, In the Valley of Elah, American Gangster, and Lust, Caution--Eventually. So I'll probably be a shitheel and redo this list yet again.

I'm not going to make a list of the worst movies I've seen this year, but Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead would certainly be at the top of such a list. Marisa Tomei is naked in almost every scene that she's in and Ethan Hawke makes a very funny face at one point (while wearing a fake mustache), but the rest of the film is a disaster.

My favorite movies of last year (revised):

1. No Country for Old Men
2. The Darjeeling Limited
3. Gone Baby Gone
4. 3:10 to Yuma
5. Juno
6. Rescue Dawn
7. Eastern Promises
8. The Lookout
9. Waitress
10. There Will Be Blood
11. The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters
12. Zodiac
13. Grindhouse
14. Knocked Up
15. Once
16. Fay Grim
17. Rocket Science
18. Lady Chatterley
19. Superbad
20. La Vie en Rose

Other good ones:
Hot Fuzz; Black Snake Moan; Angel A; I'm Not There; Live Free or Die Hard.

Best Performances:

Actor: Daniel Day Lewis, There Will Be Blood; Christian Bale, Rescue Dawn and 3:10 to Yuma; Casey Affleck, Gone Baby Gone
Actress: Ellen Page, Juno; Marion Cotillard, La Vie en Rose; Marina Hands, Lady Chatterley
Supporting Actor: Javier Bardem and Tommy Lee Jones, No Country for Old Men; Ed Harris, Gone Baby Gone
Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There; Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone

Best Director(s): Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men
Best Original Screenplay: Diablo Cody, Juno