

Ben Affleck

This Sept. 29 article ranks as No. 4 in our countdown of notable 2014 content, based on readership and editors’ choices. The Top 10 series runs through New Year’s Eve. Links to earlier installments are at the end.

Detroiters love to hear this.

Julie Hinds of the Detroit Free Press talked to actor Ben Affleck about his impressions of Detroit after spending months here filming the new Batman movie.

"I love it. It's made a big impression on me," Affleck tells Hinds in a phone interview. "I went and toured some of the car factories. I was really kind of moved by how American industry is actually employing American workers here in Michigan, that it's really happening, I saw it with my own eyes."

"I went and got a Ford and got a GM car and traded in Japanese cars that I had," he says. "I know there are Japanese cars built in Kentucky now, and the world's a complicated place and so on. It felt right. It felt right to contribute to the economic well-being of this area."

Affleck and his wife, Jennifer Garner, have been exploring the area and celebrated their ninth anniversary at Bistro 82 in Royal Oak in June, Hinds writes.

Top 10 Countdown so far

10. ’Ballsy’_Cadillac_Ad_During_Oscars_Stirs_Debate_About_its_Politics, March 2

9. Dan Gilbert’s Graffiti_’Degenerates’ Identified_as_Grosse_Pointe_Teens, July 1

8. A Detroit Dance_Called_’the_Jit’_Is_Subject_of_New_Documentary, Jan. 3

7. Detroiters_Reach_Back_to_Say_on_Social_Media: ‘I’m_So_Detroit I . . .’, July 17

6. ’Topless_Prophet’ Is_the_Latest_Ddetroit_TV Series, Oct. 9

5. Detroit_Pupils’ Video_of_’Happy’ Goes_Viral, March 15