The Top 10 Movies of 2005 Are --

Beats me. I have no idea.

There were years in the past when I could have taken a whack at a list like this, particularly when I lived in Manhattan, when I was averaging about 120 movies a year in theaters.

This year, I saw maybe 25.

Sure, they were generally good movies; when you only see a couple of movies a month, it is easier to avoid the crap. I can certainly come closer to a ten best movies list than a list of the ten worst movies, since I managed to avoid them all.

But this year I just didn't see much. I can't remember seeing a single foreign language film, or a single documentary. I'm sure I saw an independent film or two, but I'll be damned if I can remember what they were.

I know I liked Cinderella Man, and Crash, and Brokeback Mountain, and Good Night and Good Luck, and a lot of Jarhead. I liked Pride and Prejudice, and I liked King Kong more than most people. War of the Worlds, too. Narnia was good; so was In Her Shoes, and North Country. The Wedding Crashers and the 40 Year Old Virgin made me laugh.

I didn't really get the raves for A History of Violence; I thought it was predictable and underplotted. I'll have to see it again. I liked chunks of Elizabethtown, but it could have been a lot better.

I still plan to see Munich and The New World and Capote in the next few weeks, and I even hope to see The Squid and the Whale before it leaves the art house down the road. I'm sure I'd like Walk the Line too, if I can squeeze it in.

But I'm going to have to catch most of the 2005 releases on DVD and cable. So if you want a best-of list from me, you'll have to wait a few years.