I want to know what they are. And everybody else*, too! I want to stress that making fun of people's selections is highly encouraged but that everybody's just kidding around! Come on! Also, here are some critics' lists to agree/disagree with.




Roger Ebert's top 20 link courtesy of BigD

Roeper's top 100 And he ends it with a whole bunch of honorable mentions. What the hell Roeper, narrow that shit down, jeez. Also, pick better movies next time. Boom roasted.


The AV Club's top 50



*I know I can count on JoeyJoJo, for one. If more pepole were like JoeyJoJo, the world would be a more organized and hilarious place. I'll post one too at some point, after I crib off of you guys.

ask and ye shall...
No order, except Sch. is my number one.

1) Schnechdoche, NY
2) Adaptation
3) Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
4)There will be blood
5) no country for old men
6) inglorious bastards
7) Kill Bill 1 & 2 ( it took me a while to come around on 2)
8) Momento
9) Pan's Lab
10) American Psycho
11) Bruno
12) Mullholland drive
13) Children of men
14) moon
15) the wrestler
16) old boy
17) the royal tannenbaums
18) happiness
19) hostel
20) requiem for a dream

I think 1999 had more good movies in that year than this whole decade combined.

Ordering and selections are pretty rough outside the top-10, which is also pretty Asia biased. Meh. I'm sure I'm forgetting like a million things, and am way behind on films likely to have a push for top-five.

1. Oldboy

2. Schnechdoche

3. There Will Be Blood

4. Adaptation

5. Happiness

6. No Country for Old Men

7. City of God

8. The Royal Tenenbaums

9. Amores perros

10. Capturing The Friedmans

11. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…Spring

12. Pan’s Labyrinth

13. The Twilight Samurai

14. Battle Royale

15. Roger Dodger

16. Last Life in the Universe

17. Let the Right Ones In

18. Kill Bill I/II

19. The Clone Returns Home

20. Match Point

Oh shit.. happiness was this decade, huh? I'll have to go back and edit one out.

I wasn't kidding about 1999 btw.. check out this list..


No order, except John malk number 1

1) Being John Malkovitch
2)Fight club
3) American beauty
4) The matrix
5) run lola run
6) magnolia
7) bringing out the dead
8) 3 kings
9) the sixth sense
10) blair witch
11) the summer of sam
12) eyes wide shut
13) red violin
14) Cruel intentions ( i'm a sucker for this film)
15) Dogma
16) boys don't cry
17) Election
18) Ghost dog
19) Girl interrupted
20) toy story 2


(also green mile, the insider, the straight story, drop dead gorgeous and some others)

They don't make years like that any more. I remember in 1999, I saw so many movies, and each one I loved, just movie after movie.. I thought we were going into a movie Renaissance where indy sensibilities were going to be incorporated by the studios. Oh, silly mie.

That really is remarkable. I also remember thinking how Movie Making seemed to be heading in an incredible direction - and the let down of Reality of the power of the studios.

I am still a little partial to "The Incredibles" as one of my favorites from the past decade.

1. No Country for Old Men
2. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
3. There Will Be Blood
4. City of God
5. Memento
6. Kill Bill 1 & 2
7. Y Tu Mama Tambien
8. The Royal Tenenbaums
9. Oldboy
10. Lost In Translation
11. Pan's Labyrinth
12. Inglourious Basterds
13. Requiem for a Dream
14. Children of Men
15. The Wrestler
16. Mulholland Dr.
17. 25th Hour
18. Wall E
19. Zodiac
20. Spirited Away

Looking at these decade end lists makes me realize how many movies I still need to see.

Also, because of the number of films on your list which we share in common, I'm going to have to see the remaining films on your list which I have yet to see.

I've never even seen an interview with Kaufman, but he'd have to be on the top of the list of people with whom I'd like to have dinner.

where's kauffman's confessions of a dangerous mind that movie ruled

EH yeah but so did a whole lot of other movies that aren't in the top 20.

Really, Bruno instead of Borat?

Absolutely.

---

Hmmm....seems Happiness was '98. Oops.

I was thinking that also.

You guys didn't think LOTR was top 20?

I might try to come up with a list, there are a lot of movies to choose from. I will probably get shit from everyone with my picks lol.

BigD why did you like Summer of Sam so much? I really didn't like that movie. Mira Sorvino being hot was its only quality. (edit) nm that was just the 1999 list.

Every single LOTR movie put me to sleep. That's why it's not on my list.

Wow, this thread came together way way faster than I had expected. Now, to read it.

I'm horrible at lists so I'm probably forgetting stuff. I'll do a lot of editing but this is what I have.

1) LOTR: Return of the King (03)
2) Dark Knight (08)
3) Avatar (09)
4) Road to Perdition (02)
5) Black Hawk Down (01)
6) No Country for Old Men (07)
7) Sideways (04)
8) Collateral (04)
9) Finding Nemo (03)
10) Slumdog Millionaire (08)
11) Pans Labyrinth (06)
12) Cinderella Man (05)
13) Apocalypto (06)
14) Blood Diamond (06)
15) Gladiator (00)
16) Bourne Identity (02)
17) Borat (05)
18) City of God (02)
19) Iron Man (08)
20) Into the Wild (07)

Yeah, that's a bit crazy. But I'm not sure it's a big deal...BigD (and Dutch) aren't really comedy movie guys to begin with.

Most good movies fill me with a kind of crushing sadness that leaves me unwilling to repeat the process anew, so with that caveat, here is an unexamined, fuzzy list of Wang's favorite movies of the decade:

- No Country for Old Men
- There Will Be Blood
- Almost Famous
- Knocked Up
- The Bourne Ultimatum
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
- Juno
- Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
- Royal Tannenbaums
- About a Boy
- Memento
- The Departed
- Traffic
- Mystic River
- Syriana
- Michael Clayton
- Little Miss Sunshine
- Signs
- You and Me and Everyone We Know

Actually, I thought about that for a full 15-20 minutes, which is longer than I expected I would. The breadth and depth of my cinematic experience/appreciation is embarrassing.

Wang also liked Brick, but he would have to see it again to determine whether it makes his list

Also, ****: I forgot Amelie which definitely makes the list.

Amelie and Brick are good additions. I haven't seen so many of the good movies.

Christ, you spend one evening in close proximity to a child and this is what happens to you.

I really like a lot of the movies listed. I haven't seen one of my favorites here, yet: Shawn of the Dead.

trust me. it won't.

Actually, the kid and I watched TMNT2. I told him the snapping turtle should have been nominated for an Academy Award.

Seriously, though, I liked that movie, and I know that is almost certainly objectively incorrect.



Okay. Consider it added to my list.

Yes, and I'll tell you exactly why. While I liked Borat, I remember at the time thinking that I liked the borat incarnation on "The Ali G " Show better, and saw the movie as just a thinnly veilled excuse to do more "Borat" sketches. And it was funny, absolutely funny, but I felt a lot of the movie was filler, and didn't see the point of it being a movie ( other than to make lots of money).


Whereas Bruno I thought was genius, because it was doing something more.... With borat we as an audience get to be smug, and laugh at all these dumb people who get duped by this funny faux eastern european. We are all smug and in on the joke. And that sort of smugness is all fun and games until you see cocks swinging around on the screen, or two men hard core making out, and that's what I loved about bruno.. Bruno made many of the audiences just as uncomfortable as the people on the screen. There were many people who walked out of my screening of the movie, and I've heard many people, in real life and online say how much they hated the movie, because of the gayness and male nudity. And I thought that was just fantastic. It was an evolutionary Andy Kaufman, where the joke is on the audience, and the audience is NOT in on it, and evokes other emotions besides humor and laughter ( like anger, disgust and sexual identity confusion). And I also thought it was just plain funnier than borat. There were several times I lost controll of myself laughing, like hysterical, uncontrollable laughter. THe climax scene was just so brilliant, so, so good.




This is not true . I love a good comedy. My two favorite movies of all time could be considered comedies ( the Big Leb and Dr Strangelove). I just don't like cliche, disposable comedies. If my comedies are going to be dumb, I want it to err on the side of physical gag dumb, like Jackass or something. On my top 20, about half of the have strong comedic elements ( though few would be considered pure comedies) IE 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 17, 18, 19



He's squirrelly. I've seen him on The Daily show, and a couple of other things on the net. He's about like you'd imagine.

God damn it. I guess I'll put in The passion back in. And I did find that it had strong comedic elements, though certainly not intentional.

I'll co-sign with McGee on all the Boarat/Bruno stuff.

---

I eat up any Kaufman interview I can find. There's one where the interviewer asks him a question that irritates him a little and that I guess he's sick of, and he gets bitchy with him and half-sulks for the next ten minutes of the interview. He's like the perfect crazy genius/weirdo artist.

Yeah that's pretty much my list except Iron Man < Almost Famous and Into the Wild < Momento. Lets be honest.

Hmm yeah I get what you're saying here. I hated Bruno to when I went to go watch it because it was so unbelievably over the top gaym and I watched it with my mom. (Yes, I watched it with my mom). Im not a homophobe or anything but it kinda freaked me out. When I watched it again with some friends later on DVD I enjoyed it alot more though.

However imo, the main reason Borat should be on the list instead of Bruno is because Borat actually won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, whereas Bruno probably wont win anything since it is really. (lets be honest), just a different version of Borat.

OK, I strongly disagree, and here's why.

Making people uncomfortable is not particularly difficult, and was not the best part of either of these movies. I think that the brilliance of the movie came from its anthropological study of its subjects, not from freaking out the audience. Not that I don't also appreciate the aspect of them that you describe, but I don't think it's what made them so awesome.

The real genius behind Borat is that 1) he coaxed people into showing sides of themselves that are totally taboo in our culture (e.g. racism), by giving them a sympathetic ear and 2) he tested people's cultural relativism -- how much do we tolerate this guy's inappropriateness because he doesn't know the rules here? Both of those things made Borat totally fascinating and to the extent that Bruno also hit those notes it was decent, but not nearly as deeply revealing. Bruno freaking people out was not really counterbalanced by their instinct to be open-minded/tolerant as it was with Borat, so it was really just people being grossed out by gay stuff.

Something winning or not winning an oscar is not a way to make an argument about a movie that's going to mean half a shit to me. I could go on for hours about the failings of the academy awards, but I won't because it's a boring topic I've whinged about enough in the past. I will say, however, the fact that borat won an oscar for screen writing is a pure joke, because everything that was great about that movie was unscripted, at least in any traditional sense. And maybe there is merit in recognizing a new way to write a film, where you make a plot with people who are utterly unware they are in a movie... but I think bruno did this better ( and I'm saying bruno did it better almost exclusively because of the climax scene).




It may not be difficult to make an audience uncomfortable ( see the way people squeem at Jackass, or any of a number of horror movies) but rarly is there a point to the uncomfortableness, rarely does the fact and way (some) of the audience reacts to a movie tie into the themes of the movie. ( the only other movie where I think I've seen something like this was Natural Born Killers, which I could get into if you're interested). The point of Bruno is that people in american culture are still extremely homophobic/ grossed out by gays, uncomfortable with gayness. This point was funniest when illustrated on the screen, but it was taken another level in people's reactions in the audience ( and subsequent reactions on message board, casual conversation and what not) Borat didn't make the audience uncomfortable at all, at least in that sense, because everyone was happily in on the joke. Some people might be uncomfortable in general from that style of humor, but that's not what I mean. It was this crafted audience uncomfortablenss, and how it relates to the theme of the movie, which sets it apart from Borat, I think. As I said before, Borat could have just been scenes from the ali g show. There was nothing about the plot of borat that was funny, it was all the individual situations. All of the "plotty" scenes from borat that weren't him ****ing with people weren't funny ( for the most part). So I don't see why Borat was a movie, the same way Jackass-The Movie is really funny, but not really a movie, just a collection of Jackass TV show clips they are charging for ( But Jackass was a little more honest about this, and didn't try and dress it up in a dumb plot). The same is true of bruno, really, except for 2 things.. the movie audience homophobia factor as I've gone into in detail, and the climax, which is the funniest thing in either movie. Bruno was essentially setting up that scene, and it was really exquisite.


I'm not sure if any of that made sense, I'm really tired and am about to go to bed. But... probably most important to me besides these sort of Meta-homophobia considerations, I just found bruno plain funnier.

I totally agree with all this, and would just like to add that if, as an audience member, you're not grossed out by gay stuff, the movie isn't funny, or even really interesting to watch have an affect on the audience (people being uncomfortable with gayness is not news). it's just boring.

i saw you (bigd) say you thought it was funnier, but i think you're in a pretty small minority position. i can't even remember what "the climax" was - that's how inconsequential the plot of the movie was

LOL I mean the near riot. I'm also fine being in the minority position in thinking bruno was funnier, I've never claimed to speak for the people.

This is exactly my point. The cock swinging around and freaking people out was fine, but I didn't find it all that funny...in college I had at least 3 friends that pulled the same trick whenever they could, and it's much funnier in person. Frankly, I don't care if it grossed out audience members, I judge a movie on how it affects me personally, and Bruno just wasn't as funny as Borat for me because I didn't have a huge reaction to the gay antics one way or the other aside from mild amusement. Now if the reactions of the people in the film were funnier that would have made a huge difference, but for me the reactions to Borat were a lot better.

Wow... This is pretty much my exact list give or take a couple i haven't seen (Avatar, Sideways) although I didn't really care for Apocalypto as much as others. I'd probably have Blood Diamond in my top 10 and Finding Nemo lower but nice list!

Curb is unscripted, and I would give it an oscar in a heartbeat. (If they did that for TV shows)



I saw the movie and I don't remember the "climax" either. You saying 'near riot' still isn't helping. I have no recollection of a near riot.



*shakes head*

1) Traffic
2) City of God
3) O Brother, Where art Thou?
4) Gangs of New York
5) Almost Famous
6) Gladiator
7) Schnechdoche, NY
8) LOTR trilogy
9) Bottle Shock
10) Slumdog Millionaire
11) Borat
12) Wall-E
13) No Country for Old Men
14) The Incredibles
15) Cinderella Man
16) Kill Bills
17) Wrestler
18) Sugar
19) Memento
20) Mulholland Drive

Caveat: I never saw Inglorious Basterds or There Will be Blood

Well, crap. That means I need to do some research and stuff.



Haha

Gov drop what you are doing and go see Avatar right now please.

Did any of you like Sideways as much as I did? Most people disagree with me with this, but I loved it. It might be because I have a sense of attachment to the area it was filmed. I went to college near there and there is a casino right next to all the wineries and restaurants. Paul Giamatti's character just blew me away, such an awesome movie.

Sick Boy I agree that Memento is a great movie and it is more well made and complex than Into the Wild. It is my list though and I liked Into the Wild better lol. Also, I couldn't leave Iron Man off that list... I still haven't seen Almost Famous though.

It seems like nobody ever agrees with me when I tell them how much I liked this movie.

I don't disagree at all that you like that movie.



sideways and shaun of the dead would both be solidly in my top then for sure.

Yeah, I knew exactly how badly that thought was being conveyed but I was too lazy to do anything about it.

I’m almost certain there are “better” movies of the decade and almost as almost certain that I’m forgetting something, but I think these are my favorite movies of the decade.

I don’t know if I have the categories right either, but whatever.

Overall

No Country for Old Men
Inglorious Basterds
Lord of the Rings
Blood Diamond (I cheated putting this one up here. It wasn’t initially in my overall category, but I decided I wanted four movies in each category, so it got bumped up. This definitely wouldn’t have made it here after the first time I watched it, but it’s really grown on me. The other three I am comfortable with as my top three.)

Drama

There Will Be Blood
Almost Famous
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Before Sunset

Action

Kill Bills
Gladiator
The Dark Knight
Black Hawk Down

Comedy

Kung Fu Hustle
Juno
Shaun of the Dead
O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Animated

Finding Nemo
Up
Wall-E
Spirited Away


Rewatchability was a big criterion of mine, which is why I’m calling it my favorite movies instead of the best movies. I think there were a lot of really good movies that I wouldn’t care to watch again.

I understand that I'm in the minority with this one, but I hated Juno. I loved Kung Fu Hustle, forgot about that one.

For best picture, maybe, but not for best screen writing.


you don't remember straight dave's man slamming max out? Really?

I think it's a really underrated movie.

i think he means the wrestling match. i think that was amusing, but it was ruined for me somewhat by the account i read of how it was filmed. if i hadn't read that first i'd have probably thought it was funnier.

i think that borat/bruno reminds me a lot of delirous/raw. in both cases the first ones were so fresh* and funny, and the second were stale and tried to compensate by being ruder, crasser, more over-the-line, but lost the charm of the originals.

* i had seen a few scenes of Ali G prior to Borat but didn't really know much about him. i was too young to know who eddie murphy was when Delirious came out. i was well aquainted with both Eddie and Cohen by the time the second movies came out.

i don't know how much you like that movie, but i think it's pretty great.

It was in my top 23, but I didn't want to go outside the parameters of the thread title.

You mean, because it was a film of 1999?