Over the years, Hollywood has managed to condition the viewer with particular movie-going expectations.  We expect to be entertained.  We expect a good story.  And we expect that story to have resolution.  In the Oscar-nominated film Doubt, writer/director John Patrick Shanley goes against this notion of a nicely wrapped Hollywood story when he chooses to leave the film's central question unanswered.

Doubt centers itself around the tenuous working relationship between a free spirited Catholic priest, Father Flynn (Philips Seymour Hoffman), and the parish's austere Principal, Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep).  When Father Flynn begins to give both special recognition and time to the school's first black student, Sister Beauvier begins to suspect inappropriate sexual behavior between the two.  Sister Beauvier successfully rallies suspicion and the audience is left with... did anything happen?

James Marsh's documentary Man On Wire is captivating on many fronts. The film tells the story of the French, high-wire-walker, Philippe Petit's illegal performance between New York City's World Trade Center's twin towers in 1974.

First, there is the Ocean's 11-like scheming, planning and executing of the long planned performance. Or, there is the fertile ground which spawned such an amazing feat: the bohemian, play-infused life-style that Philippe and his friends live. And then we experience the glaring paradox between what the twin towers inspired Philippe to do, and what it inspired others to do on September 11, 2001.

I love moments in films. The bus scene in Almost Famous. John Cusack holding up the boombox. Falling Slowly being played in the back of a music store. While they don't tell the whole stories they are a part of, they serve as the icons by which we remember them.

The most recent film I saw at Sundance, Adam, has a few moments that I will remember long after the credits were done rolling. Being here at Sundance Film Festival, I felt it pointless to talk about films that few people can actually see, but with the announcement that Fox Searchlight bought this film yesterday, I'm sure this will be out soon. What grabbed me about this film, amidst the romantic moments of a not so simple love story, were the disarming moments where this story gives you a clear glimpse of what a life in NY is like for a mid-twenties male with Asperger's trying to make sense of his life.

In a world where to run for office or interview for a job or find a mate seems to mean "putting our best foot forward," (which is really just a sugarcoated way of telling us to hide our faults and brokenness, right?) it can seem that to be fully known excludes us from ever being fully loved.

Slumdog Millionaire, a story with the power to move an audience, has received nearly unanimous praise from critics, perhaps because of its ingeniously structured plot or Director Danny Boyle's deft telling of the story.  Reviewers acknowledge its simplicity with astonishment, as if they are surprised that such a conventional story, a love story at that, has moved them so much.  The film is beautiful, few will argue that, but are we really to take this film seriously?  One reviewer referred to the material as hackneyed while in the same breath he praised it as one of the best films he has seen in years.  Is this not a paradox?  Why is there such a need to justify enjoying this film?  Maybe this betrays a cynicism latent within the viewing body; a reluctance to experience the film with unrestrained joy because of its lack of realism.  Fortunately film's virtue does not lie solely in verisimilitude.  Slumdog Millionaire is not real, yet it moves its audience, it is not complex, yet it has the feeling of fullness and importance.  The virtue of Slumdog Millionaire lies in its unity of art and life which transcends realism.

When we began discussing what films stood out under the umbrella of "wonder" this year, numerous films came to the table.  Dark Knight was an early favorite, taking the classic good versus evil narrative to new and perplexing levels.  Slumdog Millionaire struck multiple nerves, inviting its viewers into a fresh perspective on reality, injustice, and that which is written.  And Doubt was plain textbook wonderful.

But the more we sat on our philosophical rubric of sorts, the more we believed Pixar's 2008 installment WALL-E was revealing ideas and methods that we did not expect, and hope do not go understated.

Wha? The robotic kid flick gets your 2008 film of the year?  Well, before you write off the industry's revival of #5 (anyone?), let us remind you that this site is not a "review" site, but one deeply interested in the art of wonder.  And this year, the animated genre's got it.  Let us explain:

rednoW Favorites 2008

This time of year is all about remembering what has been and getting ready for the change that will be. In a year that has had "change" as its montra, we here at rednoW are looking back and remembering the things that have changed us through the wonderful expereince of wonder.

We aren't making a ‘Best of 2008' list in the sense that this is an exhaustive list of all things good - it is simply what we happened to engage with in 2008 that has caused us to think more about what is going on in this world, in our lives and the reality behind it all.

Films

Few things cultivate wonder in us more than the marriage of story, images and song. This year brought many films that made us laugh, cry, call the White House, love people better, and otherwise contemplate our lives. If you are looking for a way to bring a little wonder into your rental cue, allow us to make a few recommendations.

Compiled by the rednoW team (and friends), our Films of Wonder 2008 are listed by US release date rather than some ranking of 'greateness' - if they made the list, we think they are worth your time and money.* But do check back in the next week, we will announce our rednoW film (and album) of the year.

Think we missed something? Tell us what and why....we're all ears.

* NOTE:  There are few "late releases" (don't you love how they wait until the end of year to release?) we have not seen... who knows, we might add some.

In 1960 Disney Studios adapted a well-known children's novel by Eleanor H. Porter into a film by the same name: Pollyanna. The character, a young orphan girl who finds the good in every situation, no matter how dire, became cultural shorthand for naive optimism. Calling someone a Pollyanna is less a compliment about that person's positive disposition than it is a critique of how out of touch from the real world the person is.

Porter's character has resurfaced and been reinvented throughout the years. In Mike Leigh's latest film, Happy Go Lucky, some have wondered if Pollyanna has been spotted again. This time she is Poppy, a schoolteacher in North London. From the first scene the comparison is understandable. After repeated cheerful attempts at small talk with a grumpy bookstore clerk, Polly walks outside to find her bike has been stolen. Through her smiling reaction to this loss ("I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye"), the film quickly reveals Poppy's abnormal way of interpreting her life.

Being a credit card company is not an easy thing to be right now. The stock market is rising and falling like an amusement park ride, and the steep drops and furious margins are nauseating the American public. With much of this crisis being attributed to our collective greed and sense of entitlement, the idea of opening a new credit card is not (or at least probably should not) be high on anyone’s to-do list. But to survive, MasterCard, Visa, AMEX and Discover need us to keep using their services. And if we are all hitting the brakes on spending, the only way to grow as a credit company is to get new customers. So how do you get a new customer in this culture of economic insanity? What kind of promises do you make? What kind of story do you need to tell?