Its December. 2006 has been an interesting year at the movies. Some good, some quite bad, some meh. However, as a know-it-all critic and film snob, its time to put together my top 10 list.

I see about 30-40 new movies a year. Out of that bunch, roughly 25 contend for the top 10 slots. The movies that fail to clich a spot on my list are still good efforts I want to lend a hand of respect to. Thus, RRA's "Honorable Mention" List for 2006 is here.

Now before I start the countdown, lets understand something. This is NOT my top ten list for 2006. That is coming later folks. But this is the best of the "rest", per say. If anyone then replies complaining about my top 10 list, I will surely be disapointed.

Let's blow this cake up.

#10 - CRANK and THE PROTECTOR (Tie)

I hate when Michael Bay fans defend his films with one of the following pathetic arguments:

"If I want to turn my brain off..."

"I want a good popcorn movie..."

Or my all-time favorite:

"I want to be entertained..."

My problem isn't those arguments. My problem is that they are being used to defend Bay's crap. Fact is, his "action" isn't entertaining, its boring to a retarded state of mind. Why does crappy films use the popcorn defense to excuse itself?

Yet those 3 arguments I could use with the action genre work of Britain's Jason Statham and Thailand's Tony Jaa. They are charismatic, action-potent believable in a time when Hollywood continues to push pretty metrosexual boys as "action heroes"(since at least the 1980s).

Most of all, I watch those two men when I want to see someone kicking ass. Statham has started his B-level action career with the minor theatrical, and mega video, hits in his TRANSPORTER films, and now in CRANK, the entire ludicrous plot thats really only an excuse for high intensity as Statham goes beating the shit out of everyone in town.

Meanwhile, Tony Jaa, Asia's new Martial Arts Cinematic superstar in the grand tradition of Bruce Lee, Jet Li, Jackie Chan, Sony Chiba, etc., is unique in that field. He's not Japanese or Chinese. Tony Jaa is Thailand's shining star in the world movie sky. Hell, his recent THE PROTECTOR became the first Thailand-produced picture to score exclusive global distribution deals before production. Finally, Thailand has something to pride in, besides military coups and under-aged sexual tourism.

Certainly the stories are action junk. But the pure brutish-yet-elegant Cockney personality of Statham, and the quiet-but-destructive Jaa themselves carry those stories to pure popcorn entertainment on a good friday night with a six-pack and a pizza.

Point is, I love action movies. As a guy with a dick(which I can't say many people on the internet, nor Michael Bay fans), I of course love testosterone-driven narratives. The problem is, I don't like derivative crap...but with real men's men in Statham and Jaa, looks like the good-feel garbage side of the action genre is secured for the next decade at least.

NOTE - Both movies made a good, if nothing spectacular, profit, with CRANK confirming that Statham has a small but loyal audience on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

CRANK - Budget: $12 million - Global Gross: $40 million
THE PROTECTOR - Budget: $8 million - Global Gross: $27 million

#9 - SUPERMAN RETURNS

I didn't love this movie as extremely well as Irishman did, but I still liked it, albeit major problems that this movie suffers.

But lets talk the good. When I watched Brandon Routh, I wasn't looking at a previously unknown dude in a Superman costume. He WAS Superman, and not because he looked similar to Christopher Reeve, like Irish argued. But, he Irishman was right never the less. Routh was a really good Superman.

The basic premise is good. In our recent times, with seemingly the world going apeshit since 2001, what if Superman had been gone all this time, and now is back?

A good enough premise I would have loved to have scripted myself. Too bad Singer and his writers fail to take great advantage of this idea.

A key example is this whole subplot is an article that wins Louis Lane a Pulitzer Prize, "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman". Singer could have used her character to give a perfectly logical argument for why a planet shouldn't depend on a messanic savior(and its possible folks). Instead, its never explored, and Lane sounds simply like a bitch that was smiten years back.

Then there is Lex Luthor, played by Kevin Spacey. As I written before, the Luthor that previously Richard Donner and now Singer prefer is a vision of Luthor that I'm not the warmest with. If anything, Luthor in my mind isn't a campy smart guy. He's one of the most intelligent people in the world, with a bastardly twist to his soul that makes him a worthy rival for Superman. Funny how Bruce Timm and Paul Dini captured my take on Luthor, voiced by Clancy Brown, in all those years of DC animation in the 1990s and early 2000s.

Also, this sounds timid, but I wish the doomsday plot that Luthor gives....was more interesting. Hell, why not use Brainiac instead, possibly him coming to Earth as a consequence of Supes' return to Earth from the Kryptoninan "graveyard". Consequences of the Last Son of Krypton's renaissance.

Still, I loved the scene at the stadium. Very uplifting and graceful, as Singer intended.

He's got a sequel to improve upon with. He's done it before with X2. Lets hope he doesn't drop the cape in SUPERMAN STAYS.

#8 - FIND ME GUILTY

In 2005, the great Sidney Lumet got his Lifetime Acheivement Oscar. Earlier this year, he makes his first good movie in at least a decade, and probably much more.

Apparently based on a true story, including the real court transcripts, Lumet returns to the conflicts that his protagonists have against the society to which they reside and get trapped by. DOG DAY AFTERNOON, NETWORK, PRINCE OF THE CITY, THE HILL, and now FIND ME GUILTY.

Me and my friends, when we get nicely wasted for no good reason except to kill our potential brain cells, always have face games. My good friend does a grunt, with a silly attempt at a deep sinister voice. "Vin Diesel!"

Yeah, we had fun at the night club bouncer-turned-actor-turned-action star with the pieces of shit that he's wasted America with, from FAST & THE FURIOUS, to XXX, and even RIDDICK(which actually wasn't that bad, but nothing worth a damn either). Don't get me started with the failed revenge effort that was A MAN APART.

Yet he dishes out a surprisingly effective turn as a mobster busted by the Feds on cocaine charges. Hairline receeding, his life stuck in prison for the next 2 decades, his associates have abandoned him, and now he's dragged into the biggest, and eventually the longest-conducted trial in American legal history. With his useless lawyer not helping, Diesel realizes that he is screwed, and does the most desperate thing that may eventually save him from an affirmed lifetime of prison: He defends himself.

Lumet to his credit doesn't ever excuse Diesel's character of Giacomo "Jackie Dee" DiNorscio, for he is a drug-using gangster who is a frequent womanizer. Nor does Lumet simplify the prosecution into easy-to-despise antagonists. Its the fact that Lumet displays a high school drop-out with a lack of education who ends up using his street smarts to outsmart the Federal Government in the Courtroom.

A nice good film from Lumet, in his 80's and still kicking, even though a sizable portion of the film appears as if the picture is awkwardly pasted that makes for an un-natural editing narrative that jars the viewer.

#7 - JACKASS 2

The boys are back in town, who are here to simply entertain us as they mutilate and humiliate themselves into an exhaustive submission.

Steve-O is here to stab a fishhook through his cheek, and swim with sharks. Chris Pontius is here to drink horsey juice. Wee Man and Preston Lacy are here to use their very contrasting sizes as part of the joke. Bam the Parental Abusing Margera is here to get phallic imagery branded on the buttocks by a hot iron. Dave England is also in town to once again rip his ass. Hell, even "Danger" Ehren McGhehey is back to crash into even more things at very octane-raising speeds.

But its Johnny Knoxville, the crazy stuntman, not the actor, who's returning presence is what makes a 2nd JACKASS movie worth our time and attention. He laughs, blindfolded, as a bull charges him. He simply giggles as a rocket malfunction nearly killed him by mere inches.

Its not like Knoxville needs to kill himself to pay the bills and feed his illegitimate kids. Unlike Steve-O and Margera, Knoxville has a decent movie career happening Hollywood. The fact that he has the cajones and spirit to keep doing these stunts, is why hes the man.

#6 - BORAT: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

I ammmm Borat. I here in US of A to make funny movie about a chariacture of a foreigner in country Yankees never heard of, and can't find. I piss very offendable people off, and do like insane actions to make you all laugh. I... *WHACK*

Wow, a small amount of Borat goes a long way. Sasha Baron Cohen, a religiously devoted Jew, exposes the ugly underside of people when his cartoon of Borat makes people believe he is a real person. No wonder he's being sued by everyone.

Still, funny exploits he gives us in America. Washing his face from the toilet. Uttering anti-semitic and sexist language to shock people on the streets. Cohen goes beyond the Borat that he showed us on the two-season run of THE DA ALI G SHOW on HBO, which is saying something considering that poor incident he conducted with Pat Robertson.

Maybe the funniest gag from all of this is that whole Borat press media frenzy. Him helping Martha Stewart to make a bed on Jay Leno's Tonight Show, and then, in great improv fashion, taking his pants off and going to bed. Also, Stewart goes off on something about a bed post, Cohen as Borat remarks: "Is that where you put the chain for the woman?"

#5 - A SCANNER DARKLY

Philip K. Dick is one of the great authors in all of the literature of science fiction. His hundreds of short stories would later be adapted into such Hollywood fare as BLADE RUNNER, TOTAL RECALL, MINORITY REPORT, etc.

He also was a notorius drug user in the late 1960s and early 1970s. For almost two years, he quit his usually insane-work pattern of writing(he did write 44 novels) and spent his time using amphetamines. His escape from this black hole of drug abuse allowed for one of the more thought-provoking writers of the 20th century to give the rest of the world a rare and honestly detailed look into the world of drugs.

Director Richard Linklater, using his dreamy retroscoping technique from WAKING LIFE, tries to capture this very descriptive-depending narrative into that of film. For the most part, I think he makes a good effort. Hell, one has to dig, if in a perverted way, the casting of known drug using actors in Woody Harleson and Robert Downey Jr(nevermind how many times he was arrested by the police for narcotics) as drug users.

A SCANNER DARKLY the book and movie aren't easy to digest. But it will lay in your conciousness for a few days afterwards, and then pop out in a crazy manner, like a cockroach sitting in your living room.

#4 - THANK YOU FOR SMOKING

Many misguided film buffs really want to dismiss this movie as "an attack made on the mid-1990s from way back a decade later". I totally disagree.

This movie isn't simply a pisser on the symbiotic-feeding relationship of corporations and those that fight against them, but its about the very art of spin politics. Words dominate our fates. Truth means squat.

It helps that THANK YOU FOR SMOKING is also very funny in a honest way. Aaron Eckhart isn't a sympathetic guy. He's an asshole that deserves to be taken down. But he is so funny, and such a willy guy, that we cheer him on as he puts the screws to everyone.

The best scene is how he survives his assured-death.

Funny how at the same studio, the Reitman Family gets both sides of the coin. Jason Reitman hits a homerun of a very good film in his directorial debut, which got critical acclaim and, most important, it made a profit in theaters. Don't be surprised if he gets an Adapted Screenplay nomination come Oscar time.

Then there is his father, Ivan Reitman. Yes, the Canadian-director of GHOSTBUSTERS, STRIPES, MEATBALLS, and producer of ANIMAL HOUSE, ROAD TRIP, etc., had a mega-flop this summer with MY SUPER EX-GIRLFRIEND, which means Ivan the Terrible's career in Hollywood is assuredly over, especially coming on the heels of his last movie, EVOLUTION, which also was a flop.

Jason Reitman, you indeed have a promising future. Don't blow it like your old man just did.

#3 - THE INSIDE MAN

Welcome back Spike Lee. Where you been, dawg?

With the exception of 25TH HOUR, Lee has made several films that either had a good idea but fell short, or outright failed. Seriously, SHE HATE ME would be a worthy entry in a future worst movies list from the last 5 years.

Now he's made a return of quality with a studio film, but one where Lee doesn't sacrifice intelligence or social commentary for.

With Lee-mainstay Denzel Washington giving a solid performance, its Clive Owen that owns the movie. His charismatic dominance of the scenary, surely he won't have much left to do before he becomes a bonafide movie star of the solo capability.

There are alot of assumptions that we as an audience has to make. I mean, a 90+ year old Nazi war criminal that isn't in diapers nor dumped off at a retirement home, rambling off in seniality? But With everything else in the film, including a twist ending to Owen's character that actually took me by surprise(which is very rare), I'll forgive those assumptions.

Fun to note, alot of camera and cinematography tricks that Lee used in his greatly ignored CLOCKERS from 1995 arise in 2006 with THE INSIDE MAN.

I wouldn't say I loved Superman Returns. Did I enjoy the film? You bet. Did I think it was great? Uh-huh. Did I think it was better than Batman Begins? Absolutely! Would I say that I "loved" it? No. Although, I do agree that the Lois Lane character could have expanded on her claim that the world didn't need Superman. However, our biggest disagreement is on Kevin Spacey. Kevin I thought did a great job and brought some humor and/or charisma to this character (not that it needed anymore from Gene Hackman, but remember, he's having to fill his shoes).

#2 - A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION

May the great late Robert Altman lay in peace.

Like Lumet, he continued to work on a regular filming schedule, planning and shooting new projects well into his 80s.

Very forunate that when I saw A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION in theatres earlier this summer, I had the very clear hint that this would be a fitting last film for Altman. Too bad his death days ago ensured it.

Once again, Altman makes a drama with several characters and overlapping stories, but its not NASHVILLE nor SHORT CUTS. COMPANION is about the end of life, and the very acceptance of it. If THE FOUNTAIN took this theme into sci-fi, Altman uses it for his ensemble cast. A long-running weekly radio program of grand tradition in country music is suddenly cancelled, and its creators, in behind-the-scenes drama, will go out with a bang.

Altman will be missed, with his touch bringing much influence and inspiration to generations afterwards. Perhaps its irony that a current modern filmmaker that people love to deride as an "Altman-wannabe", Paul Thomas Anderson, was hired to be an Assistant Director, placed by the insurance carriers just to make sure that if Altman goes ill and can't complete, PTA would have stepped right in.

Irish, whatever you loved it, or thought it was great....that's all word schematics. Point is, I enjoyed it, but you really really liked it.

#1 - THE PROPOSITION

This movie was in my top 10 list for the longest time. But THE FOUNTAIN basically screwed THE PROPOSITION, Australia's own desolate take on the western genre.

Yet THE PROPOSITION is a film of such harshness in such a landscape that unlike the very open and wide-spaced American West, the "outback" is Australia is nothing to be romantic about. In a way, its the reality that the "pioneering" American settlers would see, but which Hollywood rarely let slips out.

Seriously folks, I want every movie buff in here that hasn't already seen THE PROPOSITION to check this film out. Its my #11 movie of the year.

Fair enough