##Vote Apollo 13
##Vote Big Trouble in Little China
##Vote V for Vendetta
##Vote Mad Max

Seriously, V for Vendetta should win by a mile. Throws strong, controversial ideas up for debate, and the world presented in it may not be as unrealistic as it was once considered to be.

##VOTE Apollo 13
##VOTE Big Trouble in Little China (though Scott Pilgrim was funny, too, just not as much)
##V for Vendetta
##A Space Odyssey

Another easy round. Only mild debate in group A. But in the end I have to go with apollo 13.

##VOTE Apollo 13
##VOTE Scott Pilgrim
##VOTE V for Vendetta
##VOTE 2001

Group B comedy vs romance is fine -- if either of the movies are any good though ;-)

What to you mean by "dated acting" darg? That's a terrible qualification to judge a movie on. The Sound of Music has dated acting, but is still a terrific film. The same with countless other classics from the 40s, 50s and 60s. I mean, I just don't understand how you can use that as a metric to judge a movie.

As for Scott Pilgrim - I really don't understand why you guys are voting for it. Its in the comedy group, and not good or funny. Big Trouble in Little China is a similar type of movie, but executes it so much better.

V for Vendetta is certainly more witty and enjoyable than Gone Girl...but whether or not its a better movie is really debatable. I *enjoyed* watching it infinitely more, but I don't know if enjoying a movie more makes it a better one, which is something I think we should all ask ourselves in this tournament.

That being said, this round I'm going to be voting for the ones I enjoyed more because fuuuuuck Gone Girl and I'm not at all on the 2001 train

##Vote Ben Hur
##Vote Big Trouble in Little China
##Vote V for Vendetta
##Vote Mad Max

@gold- In that match up, I went with the movie I found more entertaining because I honestly feel like neither had a massive movie impact. But Scott pilgrim is one of my favorites.

Ed Wright > John Carpenter

Scott Pilgrim is one of those movies which is similar to Napoleon Dynamite. If you cannot relate to the particular geekdom of the protagonist, you probably will have a bad reaction the movie.

BTiLC is more of a classic setup where the trucker wins the battle and the girl and becomes the great white hero to a bunch of unfortunates who apparently need his help and only his. Bleh. Boring bit of cultural appropriation, though for 1986 it wasn't received that way by the mainstream culture.

a movie that majority of world's population has never seen / heard of (aka scott pilgrim) can't be up for an award ... just saying

Then BTiLC should be dropped as well. And Rubber. :P

"a movie that majority of world's population has never seen / heard of (aka scott pilgrim) can't be up for an award ... just saying"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Pilgrim_vs._the_World#Accolades

At any rate, I recently watched BTiLC about 2 years ago and it did not age well for me. I can pop Scott Pilgrim in any time and enjoy every minute of it. I'd say I've watched it a dozen or more times in a single seating.

I would have posted them for big trouble in little china....but there aren't any.

##VOTE Ben Hur
##VOTE Scott Pilgrim (I guess...)
##VOTE Gone Girl (I guess...both of these are okay but certainly not great)
##VOTE Mad Max: Fury Road

Vash, I don't see how a bunch of indie awards from sci-fi and comic book conventions really make that film stand out. From the wiki,

"The film finished fifth on its first weekend of release with a total of $10.5 million ($11.5 million when adjusted for inflation),[8][62][23] and by its second weekend of release had dropped to the bottom of the top ten.[63] The Wall Street Journal described this as "disappointing"[62] while Ben Fritz of the Los Angeles Times noted that the film appeared to be a "major financial disappointment"

So bladerunners is right.

I mean, BTiLC is in the same boat as far as commercial success goes, so you have to go off execution

Wikipedia tit for tat. BTiLC was just as poorly panned.

"However, in his review for the Chicago Sun-Times, Roger Ebert wrote, "special effects don't mean much unless we care about the characters who are surrounded by them, and in this movie the characters often seem to exist only to fill up the foregrounds," and felt that it was "straight out of the era of Charlie Chan and Fu Manchu, with no apologies and all of the usual stereotypes."[22] Paul Attanasio, in The Washington Post, criticized the screenwriters for being "much better at introducing a character than they are at developing one".[23] David Ansen wrote, in his review for Newsweek, "though it is action packed, spectacularly edited and often quite funny, one can't help feeling that Carpenter is squeezing the last drops out of a fatigued genre."[24] In his review for The Times, David Robinson felt that Carpenter was "overwhelmed by his own special effects, without a strong enough script to guide him."[25]"

Nostalgia lies (to ourselves).

I mean, I admitted as much in my comment right before you posted that

Not really, commercial success =/= critically panned

I tried to watch Big Trouble in Little China, it was boring and the special effects were kinda sucky, I then fell asleep. Which is weird, I actually like Kurt Russell.

Also Scott Pilgrim's references, visual gags, and self awareness are all amazing. It was a pretty unique movie by a very unique director.

Also for some reason, Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and the World's End weren't nominated, so I gotta back this

"BTiLC is more of a classic setup where the trucker wins the battle and the girl and becomes the great white hero to a bunch of unfortunates who apparently need his help and only his. Bleh. Boring bit of cultural appropriation, though for 1986 it wasn't received that way by the mainstream culture."

Dude. The whole point of the movie is that Kurt Russell ISN'T the hero, he's the sidekick to Wang. Go watch it again. He screws up all the time and is a liability, but Wang is the real badass.

I didn't much like World's End. But Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead are great

Shit, why didn't I nominate Rat Race for comedy

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is there, it's basically the same (Rat Race is a less funny remake)/

Anyone with even a passing liking for Hot Fuzz is either cinematically illiterate (and shouldn't participate in this tournament) or an Englishman (parochialism can be excused).

I'm introducing another category.

It is called: "Visual crap for people who think they're smart but actually lack basic film culture."

It includes lots of nominated films, so I'll single out only those that have received 3 or more votes:

The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Big Lebowski
Inception

@goldfinger
Regarding 'dated acting,' I acknowledge in general what you are saying. But I find in Ben Hur (the many times I have watched it) that it has become a distraction. More so than in the other movies you mentioned. I feel like they are all trying to be (because they are) Willy Skakey's boys and girls.