Your Top Films Of This Decade 2000-2009

[u2roolz]

Hey Folks,

 

I did this at my Facebook account. I asked people to post their Top 10 or how ever many films as the best of the decade.

I know it gets tough to whittle it down to 10 but obviously it could be one per year. Or do what you want. Get crazy with it. Do it by genre etc.

 

http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/index.php#YearIndex is a good website to go to to get lists of movies by year for refreshers.

 

With only 2 months left I'm not sure anything is coming out that would break into one's Top Anything. I could be proven wrong though.

 

So I'll get back to this soon. I'm doing a "very good - amazing" list by year for now and then will break it down to less films.

 

Thanks,

 

Kristofor

 

PS I'm really curious to see what people list. I always feel like I missed a really amazing film due to time or location (like living an hour away from a big city and canceling netflix to save money.)

[u2roolz]

 

I already have my mind made on one specific list: The Best Martin Scorsese Film of this Decade.

 

The Suspects:

2002's Gangs Of New York

2004's The Aviator

2005's No Direction Home

2006's The Departed

2008's Shine A Light

 

The Aviator closely beats out The Departed but not by too much in my book. One of the "downfalls" of The Departed is on the repeat viewings. Granted this proved to be one of the most shocking somewhat satisfying endings ever. But once you've seen it you tend to pay attention to all that precedes it. This is all amazing stuff to keep you completely in the story, but we all know how it's going to end. Maybe it's best a film to watch after a couple of years with plot amnesia.

 

I really think Leonardo DiCaprio's best performance came in The Aviator. For this reason it sets it higher than The Departed. While I don't like comparing things like this, it is fun to see how one judges one's films of a director against their other works. The supporting cast all put in fine work : Cate Blanchett, Kate Beckinsale, Alec Baldwin, Alan Alda, & Jude Law.

 

The other single reason that I put this above is the cinematography. Scosese and Robert Richardson did something that really set the film apart and above other historical biopics. They fooled around with the color palette. For the 1st hour or so the scenes have the colors red and cyan blue, leaving out the color green completely. This was done by Scorsese to give the film the look of the old bipack color films & multicolor system (which was owned by Howard Hughes) which left the same effect. Once you get past the 1935 point of the story, the look of the film takes on the saturated old three strip technicolor look. Seeing this in the theater really blew me away. It took me to a time that I could never get to, unless if I rented an old movie from netflix.

 

Edit: Here's a page I found that has a lot of beautiful stills from The Aviator. With examples of both processes I mentioned. I also failed to mention that those processes were done by computer and not film stock.

My link

[anthony]

In no particular order:

 

Magnolia

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Garden State

There Will Be Blood

No Country for Old Men

Donnie Darko

Kill Bill Vol 1

Amores Perros

Lost in Translation

Punch Drunk Love

Ghost World

Vanilla Sky

Almost Famous

Big Fish

O Brother Where Art Thou

Memento

Bubba Ho-Tep

[u2roolz]

That's a mighty fine list of films. A lot of directors that I respect and love up there.

LOL. That may look like my list when I finalize it.

Although, I haven't seen Amores Perros. I have been told amazing things about it.

Bubba Ho-Tep I actually just bought this past summer for a dollar at a going out of business sale. I have yet to watch it.

 

Edit: My preliminary list didn't have Magnolia on it. Probably because my reference site (thenumbers) has it listed as being released in 1999.

It got a wide release on January 7, 2000. Damn. Another PTA film I have to fit in.

 

This is going to be like that deleted scene in High Fidelity where Cusack keeps calling the music critic with his Top Five List changes. lol.

[Beltmann]

They fooled around with the color palette. For the 1st hour or so the scenes have the colors red and cyan blue, leaving out the color green completely. This was done by Scorsese to give the film the look of the old bipack color films & multicolor system (which was owned by Howard Hughes) which left the same effect. Once you get past the 1935 point of the story, the look of the film takes on the saturated old three strip technicolor look.

That's one of the things I most loved about The Aviator, too. It's really one of Scorsese's most under-appreciated movies.

 

Strangely, my experience with The Departed was the opposite of yours. I liked it upon first viewing, but felt it was minor Scorsese. But when I watched it again on DVD, and was free to pay attention to things separate from story (since I already knew the plot), my appreciation only grew. It might not be Taxi Driver, but it's a damn good Scorsese movie. (I don't know what effect this had on my experience, but I had seen the original source film Infernal Affairs several years earlier and remembered a good chunk of the plot from that.)

[W(TF)]

Will look at the refresher list later, but offhand and in no particular order....

 

Ying Xiong (Hero)

Shi mian mai fu (House Of Flying Daggers)

Wo hu cang long (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)

The Departed

Slumdog Millionaire

Black Hawk Down

Match Point

Eastern Promises

Gladiator

Inglorious Basterds

Walk The Line

Ray

The Visitor

Blood Diamond

Tropic Thunder

Cadillac Records

Almost Famous

Bend It Like Beckham

Gangs Of New York

The Bourne Identity

No Direction Home

I'm Not There

LOTR I - III

[mpolak21]

Top Ten of The Decade:

 

1.) The Royal Tenenbaums

2.) City of God

3.) Magnolia (if it counts as this decade, which I guess it should if it went to wide release in 2000)

4.) Kings and Queen

5.) I Heart Huckabees

6.) George Washington

7.) Synecdoche, New York

8.) No Country for Old Men

9.) The Squid and The Whale

10.) Wonder Boys

 

Next Five

 

11.) This is England

12.) Frost/Nixon

13.) Almost Famous

14.) Lost in Translation

15.) The Athlete.

 

One film per director so I didn't suffer an aneurysm while making the list.

 

--Mike

[Gobias Industries]

Off the top of my head, and I didn't see a whole lot of movies this decade:

 

1. There Will Be Blood

2. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

3. The Departed

4. The Lord of the Rings

5. Wall-E

 

Yeah, I don't remember a lot of what I've seen...hah.

[RainDogToo]

Girl, Interrupted

No Direction Home

I’am Trying to Break Your Heart

I’m Not There

Control

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Good Night, and Good Luck

The Aviator

Wristcutters: A Love Story

Catch Me if You Can

Big Fish

Coffee And Cigarettes

Wet Hot American Summer

Walk the Line

Northfork

Idiots and Angels

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The Reader

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

The Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Blow

Waking Life

A Scanner Darkly

There Will Be Blood

Doubt

The Departed

District 9

The Reader

Revolutionary Road

The Weather Underground

No Country for Old Men

Almost Famous

The Go-Getter

The Man Who Cried

Heaven

(500) Days of Summer

Wall-E

Up

[The High Heat]

Mystic River

[Beltmann]

Here's a preliminary list, based mostly on whim. Allowed myself 5 feature titles per year, which wasn't perfect--some years, it was hard to narrow it down, while other years it was hard to find five worthy candidates. I also threw in one short film per year, mainly for sport.

 

Alphabetically:

 

2000

Ali Zaoua, Prince of the Streets / Nabil Ayouch / Morocco

The Circle / Jafar Panahi / Iran

The Day I Became a Woman / Marziah Meshkini / Iran

The Gleaners and I / Agnes Varda / France

Requiem for a Dream / Darren Aronofsky / USA

Short film: The Heart of the World / Guy Maddin / Canada

 

2001

A.I. Artificial Intelligence / Steven Spielberg / USA

Amores Perros / Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu / Mexico

Atanarjuat The Fast Runner / Zacharias Kunuk / Canada

Ghost World / Terry Zwigoff / USA

The Road Home / Zhang Yimou / China

Short film: Love Song / Stan Brakhage / USA

 

2002

Ararat / Atom Egoyan / Canada

Divine Intervention / Elia Suleiman / Palestine

Lilja 4-Ever / Lukas Moodysson / Sweden

The Son / The Dardenne Brothers / Belgium

Tully / Hilary Birmingham / USA

Short film: Segment Mexico [from 11'09"01 September 11] / Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu / Mexico

 

2003

The Best of Youth / Marco Tullio Giordana / Italy

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 / Quentin Tarantino / USA

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World / Peter Weir / USA

Shattered Glass / Billy Ray / USA

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring / Kim Ki-Duk / South Korea

Short film: Merci! / Christine Rabette / Belgium

 

2004

Before Sunset / Richard Linklater / USA

Death in Gaza / James Miller / UK

Head-On / Fatih Akin / Germany

Moolade / Ousmane Sembene / Senegal

The Weeping Meadow / Theo Angelopoulos / Greece

Short film: Polkadiddles / Lilly Czarnecki / USA

 

2005

The Constant Gardener / Fernando Meirelles / USA

A History of Violence / David Cronenberg / USA

L'Enfant / The Dardenne Brothers / Belgium

Our Daily Bread / Nikolaus Geyrhalter / Germany

The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada / Tommy Lee Jones / USA

Short film: Sweetie / Becky Brazil / UK

 

2006

Children of Men / Alfonso Cuaron / UK

Old Joy / Kelly Reichardt / USA

Requiem / Hans-Christian Schmid / Germany

Ten Canoes / Rolf de Heer and Peter Djigirr / Australia

This Is England / Shane Meadows / UK

Short film: The Last Dog in Rwanda / Jens Assur / Sweden

 

2007

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford / Andrew Dominik / USA

Into the Wild / Sean Penn / USA

There Will Be Blood / Paul Thomas Anderson / USA

You, the Living / Roy Andersson / Sweden

Zodiac / David Fincher / USA

Short film: Auf der Strecke / Reto Caffi / Switzerland

 

2008

The Beaches of Agnes / Agnes Varda / France

The Class / Laurent Cantet / France

Frozen River / Courtney Hunt / USA

Hunger / Steve McQueen / UK

Let the Right One In / Tomas Alfredson / Sweden

Short film: Skhizein / Jeremy Clapin / France

 

2009

Certainly going to change as I catch up with stuff...

Humpday / Lynn Shelton / USA

Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' By Sapphire / Lee Daniels / USA

Storm / Hans-Christian Schmid / Germany

Tokyo Sonata / Kiyoshi Kurosawa / Japan

Where the Wild Things Are / Spike Jonze / USA

Short film: Next Floor / Denis Villeneuve / Canada

 

I'm sure I'm forgetting a truckload of titles that ought to be on here somewhere.

[uncool2pillow]

This decade was really owned by Wes Anderson, Clint Eastwood, and (like the 3 previous decades) Martin Scorcese. I think Eastwood's output (volume & quality) make him the winner. Letters from Iwo Jima, Flags of our Fathers, Million Dollar Baby, Changeling (my favorite of his this decade), and Gran Torino all are great movies.

[W(TF)]

I also enjoyed-

 

The Last King Of Scotland

Into The Wild

The Constant Gardener

Little Miss Sunshine

Volver

Iron Man

X-Men

Two Lovers

Hustle & Flo

Paradise Now

We Own The Night

Flags Of Our Fathers

3:10 To Yuma

Meet The Fockers

Reign Over Me

The Matrix Reloaded

25th Hour

Crash

Narc

Million Dollar Baby

The Wedding Crashers

The Hangover

City Of God

Star Trek

 

..and if documentaries count,

 

Bowling for Columbine

When The Levees Broke

The Hunting Of The President

The March Of The Penguins

Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Roméo Dallaire

Summit On Ice

I'm Your Man

The Boys Of Baraka

An Inconvenient Truth

One Man's Island

Be Here To Love Me

Grizzly Man

Dogtowm and Z-Boys

Riding Giants

[u2roolz]

I'm glad to see films like Before Sunset, A Scanner Darkly, and Northfork in here.

 

I'm a bit surprised to see Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind missing. This film has stuck with me since I saw it in January of 2003. While I won't go into everything that I loved about it right now, I'll start off by saying that George Clooney did a hell of a job first time feature film directing. Sam Rockwell was fucking amazing. Newton Thomas Sigel's camera work was beyond beautiful - all of those old fashion in-camera tricks was insane. As well as the use of desaturated/saturated colors. Charlie Kaufman adapted Chuck Barris' "autobiography". Overall, it was the story that hooked me in.

 

Ok, that is all.

 

Edit: I'll leave you with my Best Films of 2000 (in release date order)

The Ninth Gate

High Fidelity

American Psycho

The Virgin Suicides

Almost Famous

Requiem For A Dream

The Gift

O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Traffic

Shadow Of The Vampire

[W(TF)]

Ah yes....how could I forget High Fidelity and About A Boy. Both classics.

[IRememberDBoon]

I was suprised Requiem For a Dream or Traffic werent earlier. Both of these films were great IMO

 

Even Blow was good:-)

 

What about SIDEWAYS one of the funniest films ever IMO

[Beltmann]

Traffic just missed my list--it would have been number 6 on my 2000 list. I went with Requiem for a Dream instead. At the time, I preferred Traffic, but Requiem has held up better, I think.

[bleedorange]

I was suprised Requiem For a Dream or Traffic werent earlier. Both of these films were great IMO

 

Even Blow was good:-)

 

What about SIDEWAYS one of the funniest films ever IMO

 

Sideways will definitely be high on my list. That movie has aged very well and I can still watch it over and over.

[IRememberDBoon]

Sideways will definitely be high on my list. That movie has aged very well and I can still watch it over and over.

 

 

I love when they are walking by the old couple at the country club and Hayden Church is saying something about the chick riding his johnson or something and the husband of the old couple says "Hey Buddy do you mind" or something and I die laughing every time. im laughing typing this

[bleedorange]

I love when they are walking by the old couple at the country club and Hayden Church is saying something about the chick riding his johnson or something and the husband of the old couple says "Hey Buddy do you mind" or something and I die laughing every time. im laughing typing this

 

The commentary by Haden Church and Giamatti on the DVD is a classic one. Absolutely hysterical.

[W(TF)]

+1 on Sideways, I loved it when Sandra Oh got off her Honda and punched him in the face. Also enjoyed Juno quite a bit, Whip It not so much. The Wrestler was good, so was Doubt. Casino Royale deserves mention as the best Bond film in a long, long time.

 

The one film I tried to watch three times and couldn't stay awake through was Reservation Road.

 

For films where I recognized the brilliance but found no enjoyment in watching them, Magnolia has to take top spot. A.I. wasn't far behind...just dragged on and on, I couldn't wait for it to end.

 

Most disappointing sequels the family had to see in theater-- Spiderman 3, Shrek 3, The Dark Knight, Harry Potter IV and V (haven't seen VI, I'm done with them). They were all money down the drain as far as I'm concerned.

 

For sentimental/tear-jerker value I'd cast a vote for Seabiscuit, Hotel Rwanda, Gran Torino, and Pursuit Of Happyness.

 

More violent than Tarantino & Cronenberg: Watchmen.

 

Creepiest creep films I saw-- One Hour Photo, Before The Devil Knows You're Dead.

 

Favourite family movie- probably School Of Rock.

 

Family film that most demanded you revert to a cro-magnon state of naievty: The Water Horse.

 

Comeback actor of the decade- hmmm, maybe Bill Murray? (Royal Tenebaums, Lost In Translation, The Life Aquatic)

[Wild Frank]

No love for David Lynch? Mullholland Drive and Inland Empire were both great pieces of work.

[Guest Runaway Jim]

1. There Will Be Blood

 

and then the rest, not really in order...

 

The Bourne Trilogy

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

The Departed

The 40 Year Old Virgin

Catch Me If You Can

No Country For Old Men

Traffic

The Royal Tenenbaums

The LOTR Trilogy

25th Hour

Into the Wild

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Minority Report

A History of Violence

United 93

Hot Fuzz

Mystic River

[Guest Runaway Jim]

+1 on Sideways, I loved it when Sandra Oh got off her Honda and punched him in the face

 

She hits him with her helmet. Even funnier.

 

Most disappointing sequels... The Dark Knight

 

Couldn't agree more on that one. I can't understand why some people think TDK was so amazing.

[cryptique]

I'm not a voracious consumer of film, and I often see things many years after they are released, so my list of favorite films of the 2000s could be quite different in another few years ... but here are my choices, in no particular order.

 

Kill Bill

Infernal Affairs (the original and superior film that Scorsese remade as The Departed)

Oldboy

Kung Fu Hustle

Milk

No Country For Old Men

City of God

Ratatouille

Hustle And Flow

The Triplets of Belleville

Sin City

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind