“ 52. Super 8 (JJ Abrams)- Like most other people, I preferred the kid stuff to the monster stuff. Abrams is so good at telling you everything you have to know about a character within five minutes; the characterization of and the interaction among the young boys is stunning. Elle Fanning, for that matter, would be up for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar if people weren’t so narrow-minded about what types of performances deserve that. Of course, once we get to the genre elements of the story, everything gets hokey. I’d love to see a scaled-down JJ Abrams drama, but I’m not sure we’ll ever get one.
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From A House of Lies: The Best Films of 2011, Part 3: Flawed but Likeable.
AKA, why I don’t really write movie reviews any more: because this is everything I think about Super 8, but about 5x as concise as my version would have been.
