At last, my top ten list

I saw "The Wrestler" and "The Reader" today, which means I'm comfortable with dropping the curtain on 2008 at the movies. One of those movies will appear in this entry; the other was a ridiculous bore.

I've seen all the best picture nominees and many of the other Oscar-bait films. I think I can wait for cable when it comes to "Rachel Getting Married," "Happy-Go-Lucky," "Frozen River," and a host of other films. I suppose I could watch Steven Soderbergh's "Che" on demand right now, but I'd rather spend four hours of my life doing something I might enjoy.

The film at the top of the list was virtually assured to end up there immediately after I saw it. I briefly considered replacing it with the film at No. 2, but in the end I went with my heart, not my head.

So here they are, my ten favorite films of 2008:

1. "WALL•E," d. Andrew Stanton -- A visionary science fiction film. A cautionary call to action. A touching (in)human love story. An awe-inspiring adventure. A subversive anti-consumerist screed released by one of the biggest corporations in the world. An explosion of sound and color. A film we'll still be talking about in 50 years. And the best film of 2008.

2. "Revolutionary Road," d. Sam Mendes -- The director of "American Beauty" ditches the sarcasm and the sitcom plot and delivers the ultimate suburban angst movie, a portrait of problems -- both real and imagined -- we both relate to and find ridiculous. Some will find this film torturous. Some will be moved to tears. Some, like me, will find themselves laughing with recognition. The truth hurts, and in "Revolutionary Road," it hurts so good.

3. "In Bruges," d. Martin McDonagh -- A grimly funny fairy tale of sorts, "In Bruges" is McDonagh's feature debut. He wrote it too, which means he's responsible for the unique voices of his trio of hitmen played by Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes (all doing some of their best work). Subtle one minute, broad and blunt the next, "In Bruges" is the most surprising movie I saw all year.

4. "The Dark Knight," d. Christopher Nolan -- I don't really need to say any more about this movie, do I? All I'll add is this: Don't forget the other great performances in this movie, starting with Gary Oldman's best, most uncharacteristic work in a good, long time.

5. "Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father," d. Kurt Kuenne -- The most emotionally draining film of the year was this perfectly crafted documentary about the murder of the director's best friend, the birth of the dead man's son, and his parents' tireless spirits. Edited and constructed like a thriller, "Dear Zachary" has been accused of manipulation. I didn't mind. This film played in theaters, but also runs periodically on MSNBC, whose new film division helped fund it.

6. "Redbelt," d. David Mamet -- Every once in a while, a movie you've never seen comes along. You know, a movie that defies conventions, that surprises you at every turn with both its plot and its dialogue, and that shows you a piece of our world you're not familiar with. And just when you think you know where "Redbelt" -- the story of a jujitsu trainer (Chiwetel Ejiofor) hired by a Hollywood star (Tim Allen) and forced to fight in an MMA tournament -- is going to go, it pulls another fast one.

7. "The Visitor," d. Thomas McCarthy -- Richard Jenkins finally gets to be the star in this subtle, affecting portrait of a jaded college professor who becomes an unlikely friend to an illegal immigrant squatting in his NYC apartment. The film cuts through the politics of immigration and boils its struggle down to basic, human terms -- what would you do if someone you cared about was going to be deported? But "The Visitor" also has a great deal of warmth and humor to go with its wrenching plot, and a plum role for the erstwhile Nathaniel Fisher Sr.

8. "Milk," d. Gus Van Sant -- "My name is Harvey Milk, and I want to recruit you!" Count me in. Sean Penn gives perhaps the most likable performance of his career as the slain California politician and gay rights activist. This could have been a solemn, heavy-handed bore, but was instead a breezy, often humorous celebration of the man and his ideals -- and it couldn't have been released in a more appropriate year.

9. "Hellboy II: The Golden Army," d. Guillermo Del Toro -- Bursting with imagination, GDT's sequel does everything it should: It's bigger, funnier, and more exciting than its predecessor. Hellboy's drunken duet with fish/man Abe Sapien was one of the funniest scenes of the year, but Seth MacFarlane was even funnier as the BPRD's newest agent, Johann Krauss. Think "LOTR"-sized spectacle with the sly humor of "Ghostbusters."

10. "Doubt," d. John Patrick Shanley -- There are four Oscar-nominated performances in this film, but of course the Grand Dame of film acting, Meryl Streep, stands above her peers. She owns the screen as Sister Aloysius, a hardcore traditionalist amid the Catholic church in a time of transition (1964) who suspects Philip Seymour Hoffman's Father Flynn is up to no good with his favorite altar boy.

The runners-up, in alphabetical order:
"The Bank Job," d. Roger Donaldson
"Burn After Reading," d. Joel & Ethan Coen
"Cloverfield," d. Matt Reeves
"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," d. David Fincher
"Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog," d. Joss Whedon
"Iron Man," d. Jon Favreau
"Slumdog Millionaire," d. Danny Boyle
"Snow Angels," d. David Gordon Green
"Transsiberian," d. Brad Anderson
"The Wrestler," d. Darren Aronofsky

• • •

And here, for the record, are all the movies I saw in the past year:

21 ZERO
Australia ***
Baby Mama **1/2
Bank Job, The ***1/2
Be Kind Rewind *1/2
Body of Lies ***
Burn After Reading ***1/2
Cloverfield ***1/2
Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The ***
Dark Knight, The ****
Day The Earth Stood Still, The **
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father ****
Doubt ***1/2
Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog ***
Eagle Eye ***
Encounters at the End of the World ***
Fall, The ***
Forbidden Kingdom, The *
Forgetting Sarah Marshall **1/2
Free For All! **1/2
Frost/Nixon ***
Get Smart **1/2
Ghost Town *
Hancock *
Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: The Best of Both Worlds **1/2
Happening, The **
Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay **
Hellboy II: The Golden Army ***1/2
In Bruges ****
Incredible Hulk, The **1/2
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull **
Iron Man ***
Kung Fu Panda **1/2
Mamma Mia! **
Man On Wire **1/2
Milk ***1/2
Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day ***
Nim's Island ZERO
Paranoid Park *
Pineapple Express *
Quantum of Solace ***
Reader, The **
Recount ***
Redbelt ****
Religulous ***
Revolutionary Road ****
Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired ***
Semi-Pro *1/2
Slacker Uprising *1/2
Slumdog Millionaire ***1/2
Snow Angels ***
Speed Racer ***
Step Brothers **
Transsiberian ***
Tropic Thunder ***
U2 3D ***
Untraceable *1/2
Valkyrie ***
Visitor, The ***1/2
WALL-E ****
Wanted **1/2
Wrestler, The ***1/2
X-Files, The: I Want to Believe ***
Yes Man ***
You Don't Mess With the Zohan *1/2
Young at Heart **1/2

38 in the theater
66 total

Movies I couldn't finish:
Chronicles of Narnia, The: Prince Caspian
Hamlet 2
Repo! The Genetic Opera
Shine a Light