Skyfall (score: 8.5)

Not knowing what went right with Casino Royale and what went so wrong with Quantum, Skyfall played it very safe. The plot is very average, borderline underwhelming. The villain has no grand plan, MI6 leader get grilled like a rude sales girl, and while beautiful, the 'symbolism' in the opening sequence is way too literal (burning shooting targets?). But not being a bad Bond that sticks to the formula is good enough for most people, including me; and the ridiculously beautiful cinematography, perfect casting, and breathtaking action sequences didn't hurt either.

Ted (score: 6.5)

Ted would have worked better if it was a stand-up special with the bear (or just Seth McFarland) get up on stage and starts telling the one-liners. The purpose of the tired and uncomfortable story about a man having to prove he grew up to his girlfriend by abandoning his childhood best friend (Ted is part of the symbolism... get it?) is to deliver those jokes anyway.

Amazing Spider-Man (score: 5)

An origin story that doesn't want to be one, Amazing Spider-Man covers Peter and Uncle Ben story like it's a nuance. Trying to "Dark Knight" Spider-Man apparently meant making New York felt like it has only a few city blocks and drag out awkward family sitcom scenes until we beg for the Lizard, who like like a burn victim with a tail, to attack.

Wrong Turn 5: Bloodlines (score: 4)

The fifth installment has nothing that makes the series great. This time they are just bad people that shows up and torture college students. I like the first two films a lot because the main characters made a wrong turn (get it?) and they had the chance to escape, which makes the movies suspensful. No suspense here, the main characters never had a chance.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunters (score: 3)

A below-average super hero origin story with a hard-to-see soft-core porn style lighting and unnecessary slow motion fights, after I thought they movie was over, they had to unenthusiastic try to integrate Civil War into the plot. There are no clever revelation of how vampire fit into the real life story of Lincoln (he was depressed, yet funny, his wife was crazy). It could have been Andrew Jackson Vampire Hunter, and the only thing different about it would be a Civil War costume.

Arbitrage (score: 6.8)

Arbitrage is pretty tame. The trailer promised Madoff, and what we get here is barely a Don Draper, whose crime wouldn't even make a good Law and Order episode. Is it about the corrupt system? Is it about social class? It tried to be so many things at once and ended up being average on all department.

Resident Evil: Retribution (not scored)

Resident Evil film series pretty much mastered walking that thin line of "so bad it's good" without being just bad. It's unoriginal, often silly, sometime insulting, but most of the time still pretty fun. One thing that bug me is that there aren't any new monsters, only either a bigger version or "more" of what we've already seen before.

Cabin in the Woods (score: 8.5)

Believe the hype, Cabin in the Woods did turn the genre on its head with plenty of satisfying surprises waiting for Whedon and 80's horror fans. In order to trick us, the film spent a bit too much time in the middle pretending to be a movie it isn't (having scenes in the dark forest where we can barely see anything) before the awesome second half.

Headhunters (Hodejegerne) (score: 7)

Headhunters established very early that the flawed main character is his own worst enemy, and most of the problems are caused by him. But the movie sent him off to fight several crazy villains in a No Country for Old Men style chase (that resulted in a pretty cool scene in an outhouse), which begs the question: how will he learn anything when all the battle he fought took place on the outside?

Dark Knight Rises (score: 9)

Dark Knight Rises feature tons of great ideas, deliver on an epic scale, but tied together by a very Saturday-morning-cartoon plot. The film gave too little of what's great (Catwoman, John Blake, references to the Dark Knight) and spent too much time on what's not so great (League of Shadows story). With the high score, I will say that I like it because this film is still very Nolan; but it's just not very Batman.

Prometheus (score: 7)

Prometheus, like Alien, is a rare scifi movie with a dark sense of wonder, an anything-can-happen feel with more than enough "oh my god" moments. The film did suffer from the lack of explanation, specifically why every single one of these unbelievably unlikable characters did anything that they did in this movie.

Men In Black 3 (score: 8.5)

Instead of being "another day another alien" story like the second one, Men in Black 3's self contained time-travel case feature enough Men in Black style weirdness, including Josh Brolin's amazing role as a younger and more chilled version of agent K, that help elevate the film from being more than just another Men in Black episode.

Avengers (score: 9)

Avengers understandably cannot go as deep into each character as the heroes' individual films, but Whedon's  script succeed in not single out any hero while telling a fun story that justifies every action sequences. Even if the trashing of New York climax remind me way too much of Transformers 3's trashing of Chicago, Whedon's famous witty dialogues throughout kept everything fresh until the end.

Lockout (score: 6)

The president's daughter trapped inside a maximum security prison in space with the worst criminals is a pretty cool premise, but even if you take out the "worst criminals" and space, Lockout is still the same. It makes no interesting use of the setting, the action scenes are so-so, and while the cute banter between the leads are a pleasant surprise for this type of movie, it never developed into anything special.

The Descendants (score: 10)

Set against Hawaii backdrop, the Descendants is a masterpiece in comedy drama. Much like Sideways, the main character's emotional bitter sweet struggle against the absurdity of the situation he found himself in make for a great journey. I would say that the main character is a lot less active in solving the problem than in Alexander Payne's previous work, but the conclusion is satisfying nonetheless.