Stories are just as valid when told on the screen as they are on the page, so I always make sure to set aside Friday nights as my movie night. This year marked one where I caught up on a lot of old classics I had somehow let fall through the cracks. These were my favourites for 2009.

***

Frost/Nixon (In theatres)

WALL-E

Sunset Boulevard (“Didn’t you used to be big in pictures?” “I am big. It’s the pictures that got small.”)

Star Trek (In theatres)

Up (In theatres)

The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951)

Forbidden Planet

In The Heat of The Night

The Thin Man (And sequels)

The Wizard of Oz (Finally!)

Cars

***

And even though it isn’t technically a movie, I have to give the nod to the reimagined Battlestar Galactica television series. It is, hands down, some of the best science fiction I have ever seen. When I get my grubby little hands on the Blu-ray box set I plan to put up a special blog to discuss the show episode by episode.

Speaking of Blu-ray, this holiday season also happens to mark the arrival of that format in the house. Amazingly, only one of the movies I’ve seen in the format has been live action: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly. All the others (Up, Ratatouille, WALL-E, and Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs) have been animation from the good folks at Disney/Pixar.

Happy New Year, everyone!