Seventh Annual Movie Ratings Recap

It is now time for my annual Movie Ratings Recap.  This is the fourth MRR I've posted since I started The Quentin Chronicle in November 2011, and the seventh consecutive MRR I've put together since 2009.  I actually had this ready to publish yesterday, but in honor of today being the fifty-first anniversary of the Beatles' first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, a personal watershed moment, I decided to wait twenty-four hours before pushing the "Publish" button.  It seemed the symbolic, if not appropriate, thing to do.

What do the Beatles have to do with this latest MMR?  Nothing, really, except for the fact that my top-rated movie for the twelve month period ending January 31, 2015 is Jersey Boys, the story of the Four Seasons who, along with the Beach Boys, were dethroned by the Fab Four as kings of Top 40 radio beginning with the British Invasion of 1964.  This does not mean that the Four Seasons and the Beach Boys disappeared from the charts.  As I pointed out in my June 25, 2014 review of Jersey Boys, those two American bands continued to chart during and after the British Invasion.  But, teen taste predominately shifted to the English sound, especially the Mersey Beat sound, beginning with the Sullivan show.

2014 (in other words for purposes of this MRR, the twelve month period ending nine days ago) was a down year, both in quantitative and qualitative terms.  I only got to the theater twenty-five times, the second smallest amount in the seven year history of MRRs.  Of those twenty-five films, I did not rank any at the "A" level (only the third time that's happened); and, I only deemed nine of the twenty-five to be worthy of a B+ or better, the resulting 36% being the lowest percentage for that category in the seven year period.  Still, there were only a handful of clunkers I attended, as shown in the chart below.

I have seen all but two of the eight films nominated for the upcoming Oscars.  Those two are The Theory Of Everything and Boyhood.  Momma Cuandito and I might go to the former this week.  As for the latter, I haven't decided whether I want to sit through the one hundred sixty-six minute running time.  If Boyhood does win the Best Picture Oscar, I'll probably give it a try.  I did see The Imitation Game after January 31, 2015, and therefore it's outside the scope of this MRR.

It's time to pull back the curtain and show you my list.  To refresh your memory, within each letter grade set, the movies are listed in my order of preference.  The month of my review accompanies each title.

A:

None

A-:

Jersey Boys (June '14)

Draft Day (April '14)

Finding Vivian Maier (May '14)

Omar (March '14)

 

B+:

 

The Judge (December '14)

Joe (April '14)

Unbroken (December '14)

Selma (January '15)

Whiplash (November '14)

 

B:

 

The Grand Budapest Hotel (April '14)

The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty (February '14)

Words And Pictures (July '14)

Get On Up (August '14)

American Sniper (January '15)

Lone Survivor (February '14)

A Most Wanted Man (August '14)

Birdman (January '15)

 

B-:

 

The Monuments Men (May '14)

John Wick (November '14)

Calvary (August '14)

The German Doctor (May '14)

 

C+:

 

Gone Girl (November '14)

Cold In July (June '14)

 

C:

 

Fury (December '14)

 

C-:

 

Big Eyes (December '14)