The 2024 Scottscars
Here’s the big one. The one you’ve been waiting for.
2024 was an important year. The year that changed cinema. The year of the Madame Web.
Welcome to my daft film awards that are 100% subjective and 100% more prestigious than the Oscars. Grab yourself your praline latte and enjoy!
The running order as always:
The 2024 Scottsars Awards
Last years predictions
2025 movie predictions
My 2024 Stats
Movies watched: 84
Cinema : 42 times, 14 of which were Imax
Most watched actor/actress: Jackie Chan (2nd year in a row!)
Most Watched Director: Sam Raimi
Number of times in hospital: 4
Notable films I haven’t seen this year:
The Brutalist
Grand Theft Hamlet
Rebel Moon Part Two
Kraven the Hunter
Kinds of Kindness
Super/Man
Monkey Man
Red One
The Substance
Piece by Piece
Blink Twice
Spaceman
Challengers
MaXXXine
Borderlands
Alien Romulus
The Crow
A Quiet Place: Day One
Moana 2
Orion and the Dark
Jackpot!
Atlas
Road House
But I did see Madame Web twice so that makes up for the above.
And now on to the main event!
2024 Scottscars Awards
Remember this is going by UK release dates!
Bonus Award) Best film released this year based on the character ‘Madame Web’
Sponsored by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 Madame Web
I’m just being silly. Unfortunately Madame Web wasn’t good or bad enough to make it on to any real awards but I wanted to be the first in its lifetime to give it an award. The actors hated being in this, the script was non-existent, the editing was done by a studio executive with a score to settle and the villain was completely re-dubbed in post. Rest in peace Sony-verse.
1) Cinema Experience of the Year
Sponsored by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 Seeing Coppola’s Dracula on Halloween
Packed out cinema screen. Few mates. Few drinks. Fantastic costumes. The worst English accent I’ve ever heard. Not sure how I’d avoided encountering Coppola’s Dracula before, but it was nothing short of eccentric, with everything dialled up to 11. Gary Oldman’s hypnotising take on the ever shape shifting Dracula, with among the best makeup and costume I’ve seen, bizarre story choices, some incredibly creative lighting, cinematography and visual effects and Keanu Reeves trying his best to speak in a British(?) accent. All to a backdrop of a sold out, half-cut, 200 people-strong cinema cheering the whole thing on.
Runners Up:
-Spider-Mondays- Each Spider-man movie played in rotation at the cinema over the summer.
-Wicked in IMAX
-Having my own short film Candlelight play at the Lord Mayor’s Paddy’s Day Festival at Trafalgar Square to 35,000 people. Probably my real highlight, but trying to be a little objective!
2) Shock of the year Award
Presented by Madame Web
😱Winner😱: The weird cast members in the marketing run up to the Wicked release
The first sign of something being off with the cast of Wicked was where lead actress Cynthia Erivo posted that a fan-edit of their Wicked homage poster to make it slightly more like the original stage poster they were homaging was ‘the most offensive thing she had ever seen’. Might want to turn on the news, there’s worse out there.
Followed up by a barrage of interviews with over the top emotional outbursts at even the slightest impersonal question, clutching index fingers, ‘holding space’ and Erivo implying that she wrote and was responsible for the lyrics of Defying Gravity- a song written for the stage by Stephen Schwartz and performed first by Idina Menzel in 2003.
Runners Up:
-Marvel hits rock bottom and brings back RDJ and Chris Evans to the failing MCU
- Nicolas Cage is playing live-action Spider-man Noir
- A.I. starts being used in Late Night with the Devil, the Civil War posters and that hideous new Coca Cola advert
- Robbie Williams is replaced by a CGI chimp in his autobiographical film Better Man
3) The ‘I can’t believe I hadn’t seen this before’ Award
Sponsored by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 The Iron Giant (1999)
Only took me 25 years! Heart warming prequel film to Ready Player One that sees Vin Diesel say more than just ‘Family’ and ‘I am Groot’. Seen as part of a ‘1999’ season at Cineworld to celebrate its 25th anniversary and to make me feel disgustingly old.
Boundary-pushing animation techniques that still hold up today, classic story of boy meets alien and refreshingly dark moments that so many contemporary family films are missing. That Brad Bird is one to watch.
4) Animated Film of the Year
Sponsored by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 Robot Dreams
In an era where most animated films are either sticking with the spider-versey 3D with 2D elements style or just traditional pixar style 3D, Robot Dreams stands out for its stunning commitment to a graphic novel visual style. Things are detailed where they need to be, yet overly simple in things like character design and shading. Getting past the visuals and you have a gut wrenching story about friendship, love, loss and the hardest part of it all- moving on. All told with no dialogue so it can be universally enjoyed. Oftentimes non verbal films can fell like a drag but due to its compelling main characters and genuinely great gags, the time flies in for Robot Dreams.
Runners Up:
-Ultraman: Rising
-The Wild Robot
Almost a winner, with some incredible sequences, but stumbles with a muddled third act
- Transformers One
5) The 'In Case you Missed It' Award
Sponsored by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 Hundreds of Beavers
It’s my biggest film regret of the year not getting to see Hundreds of Beavers at the cinema, in a room full of unsuspecting viewers about to see one of the most refreshingly original films of the year. A live action homage to the silent film era, the like of Charlie Chapman and Buster Keaton, mixed with quite a bit of Looney Tunes- in particular Wile E Coyote and Elmer Fudd, Hundreds of Beavers is a straightforward plot but the most wacky visuals you’re going to see. Crude visual effects, men in suits, fixed camera and high shutter speed- it’s impossible not to get sucked in to see what’s coming next. Goes a little off the rails in the third act but this is definitely one to check out.
Runners Up:
-Ultraman: Rising
I know nothing about the Ultraman franchise and wholeheartedly recommend this one to everyone. It’s barely about the actual superhero aspect and more about balancing life as well as relationships with parents, children and even how Japan views Asians living overseas.
-YOLO
Heart warming Chinese sports comedy about a depressed lady who turns her life around when she discovers boxing.
-Heretic
Hugh Grant is captivating in this thriller. I’m not a huge fan of the genre but it is impossible to look away from.
- Transformers One
Easily the best Transformers film since the original animated one, and honestly- might be better than that. Much better than the trailers.
6) Disappointment of the Year
Sponsored by Madame Web
💀Winner💀: Joker: Folie à deux
So I’ve changed the ‘turd of the year’ to ‘disappointment of the year’ for 2 reasons. One is that Joker 2 was not the worst film of the year, but one that I actually had high hopes for and the other is that I can’t remember enough about GhostBusters: Frozen Empire to write about it.
Joker 2 isn’t a disappointment because it’s a musical- far from it. I thought it could be an extremely interesting idea to have an unreliable narrator and a musical interpretation of his twisted reality. Throw in Lady Gaga and a half decent trailer and I thought this could be a vast improvement over Joker 1, which I didn’t fully connect with. Fast forward to the Joker 2 release and there was about 20 mins of plot pain-stakingly stretched over 2 hours 18 mins, absolute misery with virtually no moments of levity and worst of all- what appeared to be a distancing rather than embracing of the musical genre. Lady Gaga with an extremely limited screen time- exciting shots from the trailer completely absent, the plot coming to a standstill for songs to play rather than the songs advancing it and just overall a lack of energy. Feels like the editing team were trying to backtrack on this one.
This was the first film I went to see after an extended hospital stay and it really made me miss the morphine button.
Runners Up:
- Madame Web
It at least gave me some entertainment, even if it fails at every level of storytelling.
- Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire
Truth be told I think I enjoyed this less than Joker 2. I just had zero expectations for it going in.
- Megalolololopolis
Disappointing. A million interesting ideas with absolutely no coherence.
- Godzilla Vs Kong: A New Empire
I’ll give you a tenner if you’ve seen this and are able to recount the plot without reading it on Wikipedia.
- Argylle
It’s pretty good for the first half until it tells you that ‘Argylle’ is actually ‘R.Kyle’ around the halfway part and the film completely falls apart from there.
7) 2024 Film of the Year
Presented by Madame Web
🏆Winner🏆 Civil War
2024 was a pretty good year for the movies and and any of the runners up would have been worthy winners for Film of the Year but even after seeing it 10 months ago, nothing has stuck with me like the grittiness and intensity of Civil War in Imax. Alex Garland returns to his best in my opinion after Men and Annihilation fell short of the genius Ex-Machina, in Civil War- a vision of a post apocalyptic near future where a civil war ensures that no one wins on any side of the political spectrum. A danger and a warning to all, told through the eyes of the neutral photographer travelling the country to document it. Not one you’re going to stick on with a beer on a Friday night, but it’s absolutely worth a watch on the biggest screen possible with the best sound system you can find. I don’t think any film before has ever made me feel like I was actually there on the ground with the main characters as viscerally as Civil War.
Runners Up:
-The Holdovers
-Robot Dreams
-Dune 2
-Poor Things
On to the predictions! Let’s see if I can improve on last year’s dismal performance.
💭Last year’s Predictions💭
1. Fast and Furious 10, part 2 is shelved indefinitely.
WRONG: Vinny D posted a set photo.
2. Deadpool 3 is the highest grossing film of the year
WRONG: It was second ($1.4m) behind Inside Out 2 ($1.7m)
3. Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim is a huge critical success
WRONG: 45% on Rotten Tomatoes
4. Due to critical and commercial failures of Madame Web and Kraven the Hunter, Sony cancels their Spider-man villain-verse.
CORRECT: Reports say that the universe has ended with Kraven
5. Chris Nolan is announced to direct the next Bond movie. Bonus point- it's a 2-parter
WRONG: Chris Nolan’s next film is The Odyssey. No word on Bond.
6. A new live action Astro Boy movie is announced
WRONG
7. Kevin Feige stands down from the Marvel machine in some capacity
WRONG
8. Hayao Miyazaki comes out of retirement again
CORRECT: 3rd time he’s came out of retirement now.
9. Turd of the year is Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire
WRONG: It was runner up. So close!
10. My film of the year is Mickey 17
WRONG: It was delayed… Again. April 25th 2025 supposedly.
Score: 2/10 💀
I said that I couldn’t do worse than my 3/10 last year, but here we are.
💫Predictions for 2025💫
1. Avatar 3: Fire and Ash is delayed again.
2. Sony gives the Spider-man Film rights back to Disney/Marvel
3. A live action Biker Mice From Mars movie is announced
4. James Gunn’s Superman makes less than Man of Steel at the box office
5. Mahershela Ali’s Blade film is cancelled, or at least he leaves it.
6. Both Captain America: Brave New World and Thunderbolts* fail to make over $500m
7. An Iron Giant Sequel (or more likely remake) is announced
8. The Naked Gun reboot performs very well critically and commercially.
9. Turd of the year is Tron: Ares
10. My film of the year is Mickey 17 (AGAIN!!!)
Well that’s it! Thanks so much for reading and I hope I got your new year off to a good start. I’ll try and post again before next year, but I do say that every year….
Now you can resume what you were doing before reading this blog, which was presumably watching Madame Web.
Happy 2025 y’all!!
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