As the summer season concludes, the time has come once again for one of Rhode Island Movie Corner’s biggest traditions. And this year marks a special occasion because this tradition will be half a decade old by the time that we’re done with it this year. Yes, folks, it’s time for the fifth annual installment of Rhode Island Movie Corner’s End of Summer fan poll, where I encourage you, the readers, to vote for your favorite films from the past few months of 2018. For those who are new to this site, here’s how it all works. I’ll be including a link below to a poll that I’ve set up on the website SurveyMonkey. Once there, you’ll be provided with a wide selection of films that came out this summer to choose your #1 favorite film from. And I do mean a ‘wide selection’ because I basically cover every major wide release that came out in theaters during the summer… though not ‘everything’, for the record. With that in mind, if your favorite film doesn’t happen to be amongst all these choices, don’t worry because there is a solution to this via a ‘write-in’ section at the very bottom of the page. Starting today, this poll will run for about two weeks and will conclude on August 26th. After that, I will tally up all the votes and do one big post that covers every film that earned a vote. You can expect that post to be published sometime around the first few days of September. Will there be an undisputed front-runner like in 2015 or will this year’s poll end in a tie like it did in 2014 and 2016? The only way to find out is to vote, and I’m excited to see what you guys and gals pick for this year’s event.
But before I go, I wanted to try something a little different by setting up something along the lines of a ‘Hall of Fame’ to honor all the past #1 picks in recognition of this year being the fifth anniversary of this poll. Thus, without further ado, I’m proud to present…
RHODE ISLAND MOVIE CORNER’S ‘END OF SUMMER’ FAN VOTE HALL OF FAME
2014
The first iteration of RIMC’s ‘End of Summer’ Fan Vote kicked things off with a stunning conclusion where not one, not two, but three films ended up earning the most votes with five apiece. And even more impressive was the fact that these were quite the variety of films. First, there was The Fault in Our Stars, an adaptation of author John Green’s best-selling novel of the same name starring Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort as a pair of cancer patients who fall in love after meeting at a support group. Upon release, the film was a big hit with critics, who touted it for its writing and the strong performances from Woodley and Elgort, and it grossed over $300 million worldwide. Next, there was the biggest comedy hit of the year, 22 Jump Street. Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum returned to reprise their roles from 2012’s 21 Jump Street as officers Schmidt and Jenko, respectively, in a film that was regarded as one of the rare instances of a great comedy sequel that was quite arguably superior to its predecessor. Finally, there was Marvel Studios’ big summer hit of that year, Guardians of the Galaxy. Featuring a cast of characters who were once considered ‘c-list superheroes’, the Guardians have since gone onto become some of the most popular characters in Marvel’s wide repertoire of superheroes.
2015
In 2015, there was simply no competition when it came to the most popular film in that year’s ‘End of Summer’ poll. While films like Trainwreck and Straight Outta Compton got quite a few votes, one film outdid them all with a whopping ten votes. Yes, it was one of the most critically acclaimed summer blockbusters of recent years, Mad Max: Fury Road. After three decades of dormancy, the Mad Max franchise figuratively and literally roared back to life with the fourth installment of writer/director George Miller’s post-apocalyptic action saga, and upon its release, film buffs gushed over it for basically being the antithesis of most recent summer blockbusters. Now as some of you might recall, I wasn’t too big on this film when it first came out, mostly just because I wasn’t too familiar with the Mad Max franchise going into it. Plus, I’ll admit that I may have been a bit peeved at it for a few months for overshadowing some of the other films that came out that summer (e.g. Tomorrowland). Thankfully, this changed when I did watch the previous films for the first time and then proceeded to re-watch Fury Road. Do I still think that it’s a bit overhyped? Yeah, but to be clear, that doesn’t mean that I dislike the film. It is a good film, and thus, was highly deserving of the six Oscars that it won at that year’s ceremony, including but not limited to Best Production Design, Best Editing, and Best Makeup/Hairstyling.
2016
Despite all the articles that claimed that 2016 was one of the weaker summer blockbuster seasons in recent memory, there was quite an interesting tie for first place in RIMC’s 2016 poll between two films that earned nine votes each. One was a film that I’m sure most people expected to be there while the other was a film that quite honestly took me by surprise when it came to it earning the same number of votes. The expected winner was Captain America: Civil War, the thrilling start to Phase 3 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that managed to outshine the polarizing comic storyline that it was based on by repurposing it into the MCU’s lore. Thus, it resulted in a film that boasted a far more emotionally-driven narrative compared to its source material that also featured some of the franchise’s best action sequences to date. The unexpected winner was Bad Moms, a raunchy R-rated comedy from the duo who wrote the original Hangover starring Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell, and Kathryn Hahn as a trio of overworked moms who decide to take a break from the struggles of motherhood and just have fun. While I myself didn’t go see it, I had a feeling that it would end up being a big hit at the box-office, and sure enough, it was. It grossed over $183 million worldwide and spawned a holiday-themed sequel that came out the following year, A Bad Moms Christmas, which also did well financially.
2017
The 2017 poll saw a decently close race between Warner Bros’ two biggest blockbuster hits of that summer. The overall winner with eight votes was Dunkirk, which was quite arguably writer/director Christopher Nolan’s most critically-acclaimed film in recent years. Whereas his past two outings, 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises and 2014’s Interstellar, both ended up being rather polarizing amongst critics and audiences, Dunkirk was touted as one of the most prominent Best Picture contenders of last year. And while it ultimately didn’t win the big one, it did end up winning three Oscars for Best Editing, Best Sound Mixing, and Best Sound Editing. Meanwhile, Wonder Woman, the first genuinely successful installment of the DC Extended Universe, did give it some stiff competition as it ended up earning seven votes. Simply put, in a year that also gave us Logan, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Spider-Man: Homecoming, and Thor: Ragnarok, Wonder Woman still managed to stand out amongst its competition to play a major role in 2017 becoming one of the superhero film genre’s best years to date.
2018
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