The year of cinema has (pretty much) come to an end, and so our various best-of and worst-of lists are finding their ways online, but what about those surprising films, those films that we had little or modest hopes for, that actually turned out to be pretty awesome. These can be films that either defied the trappings of their genre, or were simply far stronger-composed than either the trailer or the leading star's presence suggested. Though not necessary meeting the highs of the year's best, these films were nevertheless extremely pleasant surprises in their respective genres, and among the most thoroughly entertaining studio genre flicks released all year. What do they prove above all else? We severely underestimated Channing Tatum all this time, and the guy is going to be huge in the coming years. Here are 10 surprisingly awesome films from 2012.
10. Safe
Critics were lining up to pre-judge Boaz Yakin's Jason Statham-starring thriller Safe, given that the trailer basically suggested that it was nothing but an unsavoury, lazy rip-off of the mediocre Bruce Willis vehicle Mercury Rising. While in the narrative stakes Safe might be pretty standard fare, it is entirely elevated by Yakin's visually superb direction, and Jason Statham in a slightly more emotional, caring form than we're typically used to when he's blowing away gang-bangers and shagging Amy Smart on a race-course. Statham plays steely protector to a young Chinese girl who the Triads are eager to track down, and spends most of the film running across New York, pumping lead into as many foes as possible, and when he runs out of ammo, he just shoves them through windows instead. Yakin's technically precise direction allows for some visually stunning sequences, notably when The Stath speeds away in a car, while Yakin shows him running over a foe in one swift, smooth single take that plenty of other directors would lazily have divided into several shots. It's also easy the praise the film's lack of sentimentality; it engages with the bond between the two leads, and is sweet in its own way without ever getting saccharine or betraying Statham's well-worn demeanour. For wonderfully-realised ass-kicking, cracking one-liners and a brisk plot, few action films were as purely, unapologetically to-the-point as this in the last twelve months.