Dueling Reviews Best of 2015: Director vs. Weatherman. Part of an occasional series.

AUTHORS' NOTES:
Weatherman: I am thrilled and humbled to be back for another year. Per turned 30 this year and this is my present to him. I will turn 30 this upcoming year. For my present, I hope someone other than the two of us posts on Horsecut before the Internet ends blogging all together. Maybe we should start a Snapchat account instead.
My field of eligible films is slim once again. I saw only six films in the theatre or on OnDemand/TV debuts this season. That is reflected in the repetitive nature of some of my choices, mainly the bad end of things.
Director: I made good progress this year watching films leading up to the Academy Awards, but there are a few still on my list: Macbeth, Mr. Holmes, Dope, Spectre, Rock the Casbah, Creed, Far From the Madding Crowd. There are also a few films that I really enjoyed but weren’t “Best of” material: The Martian, Hateful Eight, Slow West, and of course Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

BEST FILM
Weatherman: Spotlight - I’m not sure if this is a first, but it feels like it. My pick for best film was also the real winner at the Academy Awards. A win for the journalists! But, really, it showed the power of real journalism done well and the difference it can make. Told a true story and did it with great storytelling. (Editor’s note: Bloody journos!)
Director: Mad Max: Fury Road - Crazy post-apocalyptic war cars. Real people doing real stunts. Guns. Explosions. Badass old ladies in the outback. So chrome. Did you know the Director and Director of Photography are both 70+ years old?

WORST FILM
Weatherman:Trainwreck As I settled in for a holiday vacation viewing, I had decent expectations. Amy Schumer was supposed to be funny, right? This movie fell flat on its face to me, other than appearances by LeBron and Madison Square Garden late in the film. It felt like Schumer was in a movie that was made only to show her as some sort of better-looking and more sexual version of herself than she really is. That annoyed me.
Director: Avengers: Age of Ultron - I’m getting tired of the Avengers. After 2 hours the explosions and fighting and robots just becomes mind-numbing. It is the opposite of Mad Max.

BEST ACTOR
Weatherman: Tough one, but in the spirit of #OscarsSoWhite I’m going to go Jason Mitchell as Eazy-E in Straight Outta Compton . There was some great acting in this movie overall, but he’s a guy that stands out when I remember back to watching it in the theatre.
Director: Michael Fassbender as Silas Selleck in Slow West. He gives a hard-hearted gunslinger a bit of humanity. You might also recognize Fassbender as Magneto in the new X-Men series, Steve Jobs in Jobs, David the android in Prometheus, and as Macbeth in this year's Macbeth. Fassbender somehow inhabits each of these very different characters yet is able to give each a sort of intensity all their own.

WORST ACTOR
Weatherman: John Cena in Trainwreck - He was a like a roided up, sexually confused lover of Amy Schumer. It was weird and he was horrible. Not sure it was his fault, though. The concept of his character seemed off.
Director: Once again I’ll have to go with Chris Hemsworth as "Thor" in The Avengers – He’s got the looks, he’s got the brawn, he’s not really a bad actor, but neither does he bring anything exciting to the role of Thor.

BEST ACTRESS
Weatherman: Of the six films I actually saw in the theatre this year, many were male dominated. The award for best actress goes to Rachel McAdams as Sacha Pfeiffer in Spotlight by default.
Director: Emily Blunt in Sicaro. She’s one of the few sexy actresses who I can believe is also a badass. I sort of have a thing for her

WORST ACTRESS
Weatherman: Amy Schumer. See above.
Director: Ditto.

BEST COMEDY
Weatherman: I didn't really see any comedies this year in a theatre. Guess I need to find my funny this year. Pitch Perfect 2 was going to be my winner, but Per tells me that was my winner last year. My memory fades...
Director: Spy - Melissa McCarthy is a CIA analyst who no-one takes seriously until she gets out in the field and has to prove to everyone that she's a damn good spy. Jason Statham basically plays himself, another spy who thinks he's a total badass but in reality just keep fucking things up. Best part of the film. Hilarity ensues. Runner-up Awards go to The Man From U.N.C.L.E, a fun wacky take on 60s spy shenanigans when an American and a Soviet must join forces, and The Big Short for making a film about the financial crisis actually entertaining.

BEST ACTION
Weatherman: Does Straight Outta Compton count?
Director: Mad Max: Fury Road - Crazy guys with exploding spears, war rigs, spike covered cars, a flame-throwing guitar, old ladies with guns, ‘nough said.

MOST OVERRATED
Weatherman: Trainwreck - Sensing a theme here? The movie made $110,038,130 at the box office. I’m in the wrong business.
Director: Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation - This film got a lot of love from all the critics. I finally watched it and it really didn’t do anything for me. I can’t even tell you what the plot was. However I still will give props for Tom Cruise’s consistently absurd stunt work.

MOST UNDERRATED
Weatherman: Straight Outta Compton - How it was not actually nominated for best film in real life is beyond me. Honorable mention to Nowitzki: The Perfect Shot, a documentary on Dirk Nowitzki. It’s in German and has subtitles, but is really great and takes you back to Germany and tells the story of Dirk, how he grew up and his relationship with his coach and family. I know Lou had to have seen it. If not, you can watch the whole thing here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huSaQVlLjW8.
Director: Ex Machina - This modest 3 actor film is about a low-level programmer brought to his google-like boss’s remote mountain home to test an android to see if it’s truly alive. But not all is as it seems.

MOST DISAPPOINTING
Weatherman: Same as most overrated.
Director: Jurassic World - The premise of this, the 3rd sequel, had so much promise. But ultimately it was kind of hokey and dumb and really had nothing to do with the original other than dinosaurs. Hero raptor saves the day? Come on.

MOST MEDIOCRE
Weatherman: I’m really glad we have this category this year, because I saw probably the most mediocre movie you can ever see. None will beat it. It is McFarland, USA. Kevin Costner stars as a man who loses his job as a coach for bad behavior and the only new job he can find is near the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas. His family moves there, has a rough go at first, but then finds a couple friends and he rounds a track team into shape and the make STATE!. His daughter even has a quinceañera. Wholesome movie that I really wouldn’t recommend anyone wasting two hours on if you have something more important to do.
Director: Bridge of Spies - How can a film written by the Coen brothers and directed by Steven Spielberg be so uninteresting, so dull? The plot is basically: Americans: “We want our two guys back and we will give you your spy back.” Soviets: “We’ll think about it.” Several days later: “OK.” Roll credits.

MOST TRYNA JAUN
Weatherman: Anne Hathaway in The Intern. She’s probably the best looking actress I saw in any movies this year, and if I’m telling the truth, I literally only saw her, and didn’t hear here, while sitting two seats over from a guy on a plane to Los Angeles, who had his earphones in.
Director: Emily Blunt in Sicario. I don’t know that I would necessarily recommend Sicario, but I highly recommend Emily Blunt.

BEST FILM SEEN THIS YEAR NOT FROM 2015
Weatherman: Per is making this hard. I usually go over a list of movies that were released over the course of the year, from some movie website I’ve never heard of, and that’s how I remember what I saw. What did I see this year that wasn’t from 2015? I just watched Billy Madison again, over the course of three days after I recorded it on the DVR. Does that count? It’s still great. Per, does that count?!?!?! Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase also. I gave it another try — during Christmas vacation! — and it was very funny. .
Director: The Hobbit: Killstein Edit - An anonymous editor dubbed Killstein has taken the 9+ hours of the Hobbit Trilogy and whittled it down to 3. There are still some unavoidably stupid things that had to be left in place for it to work, but otherwise it makes the Hobbit actually watchable. That’s all I ever wanted.

BEST TV
Weatherman: Like in past years, my favorites really come from the TV category. Among them: Homeland, New Girl, Downton Abbey (shedding a tear for the final season, pour one out), Real Sports, PTI, Feherty, 60 Minutes, The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst, the one episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live! I saw in person this year. (Shaq was a guest.)
Director: Workaholics made a good comeback this season after a mediocre 2014. Orphan Black is a fun BBC America show about a girl who discovers she is one of many clones, each who’s grown up separately. So one actress plays 4 very different characters who are trying to uncover the truth. New Girl is still my guilty pleasure. Somehow it reminds me of Penn Tower.

WORST TV
Weatherman: E! and Bravo, forever and ever. And cable news. What a shitshow.
Director: I still have a love/hate relationship with The Walking Dead. It has moments of great drama and zombie killing action, capped with moments of stupidity. This past year it especially seemed like everyone was just acting dumb. I mean, why haven’t they armored up their cars? Why don’t they dig a trench around their settlement? So many question. So far, Season 5 ½ seems like it’s off to a better start thank God.

FILMS OF 2016 TO WATCH FOR:
•Hail Caesar from the Coen Brothers.
•Whiskey Tango Foxtrot follows Tina Fey as she journos her way through Afghanistan.
•Batman v Superman may or may not be any good. I recommend the graphic novel it’s sort of kind of based on, The Dark Knight Returns.
•Hardcore Henry is basically a 1st person shooter put into movie form.
•Warcraft is…warcraft
•Ghostbusters might be good. Hard to tell from the trailer.
•Star Trek Beyond had a shitty trailer, but I’m still hopeful since Star Trek Into Darkness sucked.
•Suicide Squad will either be great fun or completely insufferable
•Star Wars: Rogue One might be my most anticipated film of 2016. The Dirty Dozen in the Star Wars universe? Count me in.