The best Christmas presents I received this year were from Aaron Sorkin and Diablo Cody. From those two screenwriters came two screenplays. From the screenplays came two of the year’s smartest, most entertaining films.

Charlie Wilson’s War, a film about a Texas congressman who decides to wage a covert war against the Soviets by supplying the Afghans with weapons in 1980, is a lesson in geopolitics, probably a 400-level class. It’s not nearly as inspiring as either The American President or The West Wing, but Sorkin here has created three of the best characters he’s ever written. In the hands of Julia Roberts, Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Tom Hanks (as Charlie Wilson), Charlie Wilson’s War is an ensemble comedy so smart and so fast you’d swear it came out in the 1930s.

Juno is not a 1930s comedy, though. No, Juno is an even rarer gem. It’s a film just as smart as Charlie Wilson, though a lot hipper, and one that utilizes and even defines certain contemporary American archetypes. Cody’s screenplay is a marvel, but like Sorkin, her words are only as good as the performers. Ellen Page is perfect as the pregnant 16-year-old who decides to against an abortion and instead plans to give her baby up for adoption. Show up for Cody’s sharp, savvy screenplay, but stay for Page’s performance.

I Am Legend starts out as a solid, suspenseful flick about the last man on earth after everyone is wiped out by a deadly plague. Well, almost everyone. There are some humans who turned into vampire/zombie things that are comically designed when compared to the solid setup the film gives them. They don’t really show up until the last third of the film, which like Castaway is pretty much a one-man-show. Smith is up to the challenge. The FX guys obviously aren’t.Then there’s Depp in Sweeney Todd, as hunk of coal number two.

Star power aside, Depp brings nothing to the role. Nothing. He can’t sing, or at least, he can’t emote. He lacks the power and theatrics demanded of a role in Sondheim’s operetta about a vengeful barber cutting throats in Victorian London. Director Tim Burton, as usual, gets caught up in creating the world of Todd, allowing everything to come to a crashing halt when Depp performs, weakly.

So that was my holiday. Today is the first day of 2008, and like most years, my location prohibits me from doing a 2007 Top Ten list right now. There are still a couple 2007 films to see. Check back in a couple weeks.

Holiday Recap Movie Ratings
Juno–****
Charlie Wilson’s War–***1/2
I Am Legend–**1/2
Sweeney Todd-**