The Top 10 Films of the Decade ("the 00's")

And so it’s inevitable: the top 10 films of the naughts. The last movie I saw of the 90’s was Gavin O’Conner’s The Tumbleweeds, the last film I’ll see in 2009 I think will be yet another film named Nine (the musical this time). A lot has changed, too much to detail here. The official tally assuming I don’t go to the movies tonight (I have plans for tomorrow and Thursday) will be 2428, or 242 films a year, not bad - just over the average of 4 a week I tell average people I see (the real average is between 4 and 5 and probably growing).

A top ten list is cruel, but if your forcing me here goes (in reverse order to build suspense, of coarse):

10.- Goodbye Dragon Inn (2003, Ming-liang Tsai) - An atmospheric work, a study of color, mood, done with humor and insight, at the end of a decade when film might be dying I couldn’t resist kicking off the list with a film about a theater’s closing night. As a sucker for time and place films, this will be a repeated theme here (proving how subjective such a list is). This is a wonderful architecture study with some incredible compositions, hypnotic and nostalgic.

9.-Almost Famous (2000, Cameron Crowe) - Yet another nostalgia trip, perhaps the most entertaining film of the decade, it comes in two flavors - seek out the “director’s cut”, running 3 hours I still want more.

8.-Somers town (2009, Shane Meadows) - A coming of age story, told in London as a study of time and place - two boys living in a housing project fall for the same women, a beatiful Polish immigrant. A great social comment in the form of a sweet and entertaining film about the joys of childhood, wherever you are.

7.-Three Times (2005, Hou Hsiao-hsien) - The story is the same, the politics aren’t and therefore neither are the emotions. Two lovers, played by the same actors are shown in three time period: 1911, 1966, and 2005. You can call this the Hou Hsiao-hsien “sampler” - each period has its own style, each his own style as seen in his other films.

6.-Talk to Her (2002, Pedro Almodovar) - Every Almodovar film is a mini-masterpiece, this is a perfect blend of dark humor and romance - discover it, I won’t ruin it for you.

5.-Vera Drake (2004, Mike Leigh) - Leigh’s best since his masterpiece, 1996’s Secrets and Lies. A period piece about an abortion provider and mother, Vera Drake.

4.-Touch The Sound (2004, Thomas Riedelsheimer) From the director of Rivers and Ties, this documentary follows Evelyn Glennie, a deaf musician and attempts to put us in her shoes. A powerful soundscape.

3.-Wendy & Lucy (2008, Kelly Reichardt) An edge of your seat thriller without violence, Michelle Williams is charged with atomic energy in a Pacific Northwest drama about Wendy, a young women running away from something. That thing is not important, we know so little about her but we know so much about her. This is one of the best films of all times.

2.-The Piano Teacher (2001, Michael Haneke) An instant classic - I remember being a 17 year old scared shitless, driving home, not sure what I just saw - it shook me in a way horror films cannot. A few days later I processed it and realized it was one of the best films I’ve ever seen. Since then I’ve been brave enough to revisit this brutal and painful fantasy - much has been written academically about the film, which is easier to watch for upon review, but the film is best experienced cold, of coarse - see it and be prepared.

1.-Syndromes and a Century (2006, Apichatpong Weerasethakul) A film of the century: two stories, 10 years apart set in a Thailand hospital. Weerasethakul’s films are pure joy, and this is no exception, a light hearted political love story, warm, beatiful and simple.

Runners up:
11.-Beau Travail
12.-Up
13.-Head On
14.-Slumdog Millionaire
15.-The Departed
16.-Since Otar Left
17.-Time to Leave
18.-United 93
19.-ATL
20.-Rocky Balboa
21.-Into the Wild
22.-The Princess and the Worrior
23.-This is England
24.-The Dreamers
25.-In America
26.-Ghostworld
27.-American Psycho
28.-Mysterious Skin
29.-The Circle
30.-Bad Education
31.-Million Dollar Baby
32.-City of God
33.-Nowhere in Africa
34.-Redacted
35.-I’m Not There
36.-Junebug
37.-Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son about His Father
38.-Chop Shop
39.-Nobody Knows
40.-Of Time and City
41.-RR
42.-Our Song
43.-A Searious Man
44.-Stevie
45.-Lost in Translation
46.-There Will Be Blood
47.-Paranoid Park
48.-Palindromes
49.-Downfall
50.-Operation Filmmaker

There are sadly many great films that made the short list - some 200. Enjoy these films with this disclaimer: I could spend years on this list, rewatching, evolving and changing my point of view. I like to think the fact I’ve sent two nights and a few hours on it and no more proves I’m going from the gut. All films are not for all people: but they were for John Fink. I regret the fact that there are no true Bollywood films on this list and not many documentaries (my 2009 list contains documentaries such as Beaches of Agnes, Anvil, La Danse, The Windmill Movie, Carcasses, and The Garden, the shortlist contains the likes of Capturing the Freedmans, Jesus Camp, Standard Operating Procedure, After Innocence, Tupac: Resurrection and Street Fight).

If anything I’m going off memory - some films on here I’ve seen only once, others I’ve relived or written about many times. Even as I write I regret this. Hit - Publish Post - No Turning Back - done.

Let’s meet back here in 10 years.