Number 8. The Visitor
Walter Vale is one of the most full-realized, believable characters of the year and it's in the way that writer/director Thomas McCarthy and actor Richard Jenkins bring him to vivid life that gives The Visitor its beating heart. The Visitor is as full of life as any film in 2008, partially because it's about a man who discovers the passion for his own in the most unusual of places - his own apartment. I hate it when people try to classify The Visitor as a movie about our nation's ignorant and stupid immigration laws. Yes, that's part of the fabric of the story, but The Visitor is a much more complex film than that. It's a beautiful, heartwarming story of a man who opens his closed heart to music, friendship, and love. When Walter plays his drum in that final scene, he does so with anger at what happened to his friend Tarek, but also as a tribute to the man who changed his life by merely being a visitor to this country
Walter Vale is one of the most full-realized, believable characters of the year and it's in the way that writer/director Thomas McCarthy and actor Richard Jenkins bring him to vivid life that gives The Visitor its beating heart. The Visitor is as full of life as any film in 2008, partially because it's about a man who discovers the passion for his own in the most unusual of places - his own apartment. I hate it when people try to classify The Visitor as a movie about our nation's ignorant and stupid immigration laws. Yes, that's part of the fabric of the story, but The Visitor is a much more complex film than that. It's a beautiful, heartwarming story of a man who opens his closed heart to music, friendship, and love. When Walter plays his drum in that final scene, he does so with anger at what happened to his friend Tarek, but also as a tribute to the man who changed his life by merely being a visitor to this country