THE TOP 100 FILMS OF THE OUGHTS NOMINATION + DISCUSSION THRED

And so opinions differ. The ending of In the Valley of Elah, with the flag, seemed perfect too me. So much lost.

Only including films with US Distribution, so a good handful of my fav docs are screwed:
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
Mysterious Skin
Manda Bala (To Send a Bullet)
Billy The Kid
American Teen
The Monastery
Alpha Dog
Forbidden Lies
Summercamp!
Order of Myths
The Pool (Chris Smith)
Iraq In Fragments
Paper Heart
Frownland
35 Shots of Rum
Up the Yangtze
Workingman's Death
Wit (Mike Nichols)
Gerry
The Brown Bunny
The Girl Next Door
Blue Crush
Darwin's Nightmare
The Strangers

Agreed with upthread, When the Levees Broke is some difficult and amazing stuff. I saw it after I put together my original list (thanks, Netflix).

Manda Bala (To Send a Bullet)

this is a cool movie

Took a break from studying to throw this together:

Best love story:
Before Sunset (2004)
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Sweet Land (2005)
Secretary (2002)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Punch-Drunk Love (2002)

Best demystification of love:
Cast Away (2000)
Solaris (2002) (remake)

Best romantic comedy:
Two Weeks Notice (2002)
Bridget Jones's Diary (2001)
Down with Love (2003)
Dan in Real Life (2008)

Best buddies:
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
Sideways (2004)
Made (2001)
Wedding Crashers (2005)
The 40 Year Old Virgin (2005)
Knocked Up (2006)

Best Christmas:
Elf (2003)
Bad Santa (2003)
Love, Actually (2003)

Best family comedy:
The Royal Tenenbaums (2002)
Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Cheaper by the Dozen (2003)
My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002)

Best movies about child abuse, neglect, or growing up wrong:
You Can Count On Me (2000)
The Woodsman (2004)
Mystic River (2003)
The Squid and the Whale (2005)
Sherrybaby (2006)
My Architect (2003)
Big Fish (2003)

Best movies about adults caring about kids:
About a Boy (2002)
School of Rock (2003) [a.k.a. The School of Rock]
Martian Child (2007)
Half Nelson (2006)
Role Models (2008)
Freedom Writers (2007)

Best case for benign authority:
Black Snake Moan (2007)

Best movies about addiction:
Rachel Getting Married (2008)
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2003)

Best high school movies:
Superbad (2007)
Juno (2007)
American Pie 2 (2001)
Bring It On (2000)
Crazy/Beautiful (2001)
You Got Served (2004)
Get Over It (2001)
Strangers With Candy (2005)
Real Women Have Curves (2002)

Best detective-of-self stories:
Broken Flowers (2005)
I Heart Huckabees (2004)
The Human Stain (2003)

Best WWII:
Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)
U-571 (2000)

Best movie about the Holocaust:
The Pianist (2002)

Best socialism:
The Take (2004)
Sicko (2007)

Best anti-communism:
North Korea: A Day in the Life (2004)
K-19: The Widowmaker (2002)

Best post-Soviet capitalist blues:
Eastern Promises (2007)
Everything Is Illuminated (2005)
Power Trip (2003)

Best anti-anti-communism:
Good Night and Good Luck (2005)

Best anti-war/anti-Vietnam War:
The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (2003)
Tigerland (2000)
Sir! No Sir! (2005) (subtitle: The Suppressed Story Of The GI Movement To End The Vietnam War)
Why We Fight (2005)
Apocalypse Now Redux (2001)
What American Needs: From Sea to Shining Sea (2003)
Red Barn (2003) [short documentary in progress]

Best movies about violence, for and against:
A History of Violence (2005)
Bowling for Columbine (2002)
In the Bedroom (2001)
Jane Goodall's Wild Chimpanzees (2002)
Rambo (2008)

Best costume epic/Western:
Gladiator (2000)
The Last Samurai (2003)
Open Range (2003)
Cold Mountain (2003)
The New World (2005)
Shanghai Noon (2000)

Best ship opera:
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)

Best wishful metaphor for American power:
The Bourne Identity (2002)
The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)

Best movies about American power and the right in Latin America and the Caribbean:
The Agronomist (2003)
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (2002) (a.k.a. Chavez: Inside the Coup)
The Trials of Henry Kissinger (2002)
Quantum of Solace (2008)
Machuca (2004)

Best movies about immigrants/internationals:
Fast Food Nation (2006)
The Visitor (2007)
Gran Torino (2008)
Babel (2006)
Spellbound (2002)
Dirty Pretty Things (2002)
Al Otro Lado (2004) (a.k.a. To the Other Side)

Best drug war:
No Country for Old Men (2007)
Training Day (2001)
Traffic (2000)
City of God (2002)
Narc (2002)

Best movies about the "conflict of our time":
No End in Sight (2007)
Gaza Strip (2002)
Munich (2005)
Syrianna (2005)
W. (2008)
Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay (2008)
Good Kurds, Bad Kurds: No Friends But the Mountains (2000)
Asurot ("Detained") (2001)
The Manchurian Candidate (2004) (remake)
Burn After Reading (2008)

Best anti-Bond:
Casino Royale (2006)

Best Africa:
Hotel Rwanda (2004)
Stander (2003)
The Constant Gardener (2005)
Lumumba (2000)
Red Dust (2004)

Best India:
Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai (2000)

Best Ireland:
Billy Elliot (2000)
Bloody Sunday (2002)
The Boys from County Clare (2003)

Best greed/obsession:
There Will Be Blood (2007)
The White Diamond (2004)

Best anti-corporate:
The Yes Men (2003)
The Corporation (2004)
In Good Company (2005)
Mondovino (2004)
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005)
Sunshine State (2002)

Best legal:
Legally Blonde (2001)
Paradise Lost 2: Revelations (2000)
Michael Clayton (2007)
Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer (2003)
Monster (2003) (really should see those two together)
Erin Brockovich (2000)
Runaway Jury (2003)
Longford (2006)
Fracture (2007)

Best movies against the gender double standard:
North Country (2005)
Personal Velocity (2002) (a.k.a. Personal Velocity: Three Portraits)
Far From Heaven (2002)
Whale Rider (2003)
Bend It Like Beckham (2002)
The Contender (2000)
Charlie's Angels (2000)
Chicago (2002)

Best movie about gender transition:
Venus of Mars (2004)

Best movies about looksism:
Shrek (2001)
Zoolander (2001)
Shallow Hal (2001)

Best electoral politics:
The Green Bus vs. the White House (2004)
Head of State (2003)

Best Katrina documentaries:
Trouble the Water (2008)
When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006)
Tim's Island (2006)

Best evocative epochal worst-case-scenario/end-of-world/dystopia/alien invasion:
Children of Men (2006)
War of the Worlds (2005) (remake)
Dawn of the Dead (2004) (remake)
Idiocracy (2006)
The Core (2003)
The Invasion (2007)

Best monster horror:
The Host (2006) (a.k.a. Gwoemul)
30 Days of Night (2007)
Slither (2006)
28 Days Later (2002)

Best ghosts:
The Ring (2002)
The Others (2001)

Best Star Trek:
Serenity (2005)
Star Trek (2009)

Best sports:
The Wrestler (2008)
Run Fatboy Run (2007)
Seabiscuit (2003)
The Rookie (2002)
The King of Kong (2007)
Go Tigers! (2001)
Leatherheads (2008)
Remember the Titans (2000)
Miracle (2004)

Best boxing:
Million Dollar Baby (2004)
Girlfight (2000)
Cinderella Man (2005)
Rocky Balboa (2006)

Best going off the grid:
Into the Wild (2007)
Grizzly Man (2005)
Dark Days (2000)

Best subculture:
A Mighty Wind (2003)
Best in Show (2000)
Krumped (2004, short documentary) (precursor to Rize)
24 Hour Party People (2002)
Dogtown and Z-Boys (2002)
Rize (2005)

Best stand-up:
The Original Kings of Comedy (2000)
Comedian (2002)

Best metal:
Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2008)
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (2004)
The Atlas Moth (2003)

Best non-metal music:
Westway to the World (2000)
Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten (2007)
The Filth and the Fury (2000) [a.k.a. The Filth and the Fury - A Sex Pistols Film]
Biggie & Tupac (2002)
Eight Mile (2002)
If I Should Fall From Grace (2001)
Standing in the Shadows of Motown (2002)
Dig! (2004)
Monks: The Transatlantic Feedback (2006)
Cuba Feliz (2000)
Lost in Translation (2003)
We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen (2005)

Best movies about radio:
The Ladies Man (2000)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)

Best movies about journalism:
Shattered Glass (2003)
Robert Christgau: Rock 'n' Roll Animal (2000, short documentary)
The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Veronica Guerin (2003)

Best movies about writing:
American Splendor (2003)
Adaptation (2002)
Starting Out in the Evening (2007)

Best movies about artists::
Pollock (2000)
How to Draw a Bunny (2002)

Best super-heroes:
Spider-Man 2 (2004)
Batman Begins (2005)
Iron Man (2008)
X2: X-Men United (2003)
Unbreakable (2000)

Best suspension-of-disbelief-at-movies-as-faith:
A Serious Man (2009)
The Village (2004)
The Night Listener (2006)
The Prestige (2006)
Doubt (2009)

Best back-to-the-future horror:
Memento (2000)
The Butterfly Effect (2004)
Donnie Darko (2001)

Best movies about movies:
Mulholland Dr. (2001)
Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003)

Best movies about pornography:
Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008)
Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy (2001)
Auto Focus (2002)
The Notorious Betty Page (2005)
Indie Sex (2007) (a.k.a. Indie Sex: Censored)
The Fashionistas (2002)

Best sex:
Team America: World Police (2004)
Kinsey (2004)
Where the Truth Lies (2005)
Young Adam (2003)
Libertine (2004)

Best raunchy comedies:
Waiting (2005)
Clerks II (2006)
Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004)
How High (2001)
Not Another Teen Movie (2001)

Best new-awkward:
Meet the Parents (2000)
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004)
The Heartbreak Kid (2007) (remake)
Blades of Glory (2007)
Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004)

Best dreamy/meta-action:
Shoot 'Em Up (2007)
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
The Way of the Gun (2000)
Hot Fuzz (2007)
Bad Boys II (2003)
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)
Crank (2006)

Best action/suspense/thriller:
Cellular (2004)
Red Eye (2005)
Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Taken (2008)
Vantage Point (2008)
What Lies Beneath (2000)

Best heists:
Inside Man (2006)
Ocean's 11 (2001)
Flawless (2007)
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007)

Best catch-the-killer/threatening other:
Grindhouse (2007) (released separately on DVD as Planet Terror and Death Proof)
Zodiac (2007)
The Pledge (2001)
Insomnia (2002)
Cache (2005)

Best movies about living closer to the end of life:
Iris (2001)
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007)
Savages (2007)
Synecdoche, New York (2008)

Best movies about mourning:
Forever (2006) (documentary)
Garden State (2004)

Bonus:

Best '00s movies disqualified because they opened in the '90s:
Office Space (1999)
Galaxy Quest (1999) (December 25 release; international release in 2000)
Spring Forward (1999) (2000 general U.S. release)
Crazy (1999) (Heddy Honigmann doc)

Don't want to be snarky but what does Billy Elliott have to do with Ireland?

No, it's not snarky at all to point out a mistake that dumb. That's what I get for listing a movie I haven't seen for nine years! Make that "Best UK" or some other face-saving correction.

are you nominating _all_ of those?

Best action/suspense/thriller:
Cellular (2004)
Red Eye (2005)
Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Taken (2008)
Vantage Point (2008)
What Lies Beneath (2000)

dude, this is just a list of action/suspense/thrillers. 'vantage point' probably wasn't even the best action/suspense/thriller released that week.

yeah, that list genuinely seemed more like: list of all movies released this decade, put into catagories.

king of kong: a fistful of quarters
battle royale

Nah, Cellular and Red Eye really are two of the best meat&potatoes thrillers.

x-post

Actually, this took some honest self reflection at various points over a long period of time--I've been keeping all-time recommendation/fave lists in categories for years now, and just grabbed the '00s ones and reordered them a bit (which is why the mistake). I mixed together the top tier and the "also recommend" movies to give some categories a few more choices, but kept them ranked. So yeah, probably the entire non-meta action movie category is relatively weak, and the bottom three are infinitely weaker than those in, say, "movies about child abuse," where there were literally a dozen more films to choose from that I didn't like (hated Fat Girl, wasn't crazy about Mysterious Skin).

I thought Vantage Point was surprisingly clever, while something like Taken was silly but effective for what it was. They won't make my Top 50, but I hoped looking at all these movies in categories might stimulate reflection and memory, and none of these is a waste of time (IMO) or rental money. Cellular is awesome. Red Eye and Die Hard are as entertaining as advertised. What action movies you would list instead, history mayne? I'm betting I probably didn't see them or would disagree, but that's cool.

Vantage Point was ruined by Matthew Fox's terrible acting. I really liked Cellular as well, was expecting Phone Booth pt 2, but it went off in a much more entertaining direction.

(I should give Mysterious Skin another chance: Mood is everything, which is probably why I liked Die Hard.)

ya that was such a hauntingly brooding thriller

Mysterious Skin was great; perfect for the novel anyway.

So yeah, probably the entire non-meta action movie category is relatively weak, and the bottom three are infinitely weaker than those in, say, "movies about child abuse," where there were literally a dozen more films to choose from that I didn't like (hated Fat Girl, wasn't crazy about Mysterious Skin).

this is my point. are you really nominating all 70-odd of those of those films? (this is the nominations thread.)

how many votes will we get? i nommed about 10 films and will most probably be able to vote for 50 films i really liked/loved this decade (ok, still not seen a lot of the canon/things i most probz will like) but that list does seem ott.

50 votes! 50-49-48-47 etc sliding scale w/points.

lol at me guessing 70-odd. that list is the best part of 400 movies.

who cares how many nominations there are? i don't understand the nomination restrictions on polls anyway. i understand nominating -- i like the lists as a way of finding things i don't know or being reminded of things i've forgotten -- but in terms of what you can vote for, it seems to me you should just be able to vote for any movie (or album or song on the music polls) that came out in the designated years. the whole concern about "oh but then everything will just get 2 votes," first of all probably isn't true, and secondly in the results of the polls there's always this inevitable moaning about how consensus coalesces around predictable things. anyway. nobody's put any restrictions on this nominations list, which is nice. i just don't understand people complaining about having too many movies on it. nobody's forcing you to vote for vantage point.

people can vote for whatever they want, call them "write-ins." i'll post the list of nominations when it's time to vote but people can campaign for films not on the list within that thread.

i'm going to stick my neck out and guess that "Red Barn (2003) [short documentary in progress]" isn't going to poll.

i have no problem with someone nominating 286 films if that's what they want to do. i'm just checking that is actually what he intended with that post, because it sounds like he doesn't actually like quite a lot of those films and just did it to fill up some categories.

Hello, caek. I like all those films and never said otherwise. Red Barn is an amazing documentary in progress about the protests against the Red Barn restaurant chain coming to the U of M Minneapolis campus neighborhood in the Vietnam War era. I didn't mean to be anti-social by including it, but it did screen at festivals, establishing its release date in the '00s according to imdb rules, so I thought I'd throw it onto the big list. Why not?

I was just checking you actually intended to nominate all 300 films or however many you've got there. Like I say, this is fine with me, why not?, but saying some are "infinitely weaker" suggests to me perhaps you were just dumping a list of almost all the films you saw in the 2000s, and didn't realise this was a nomination thread.

No, those are all movies I liked and remembered well enough to recommend--each one is at least a B+ in my memory. Lost in Translation was beautifully shot and acted, but pretty alienating to me outside of that night-on-the-town sequence, so that and Vantage Point probably mark the low end of B+ for me. There are probably another 300 B or B- films where I don't remember them well enough to recommend, or just loved certain things about them (like all the Scorsese, though I suppose The Gangs of New York should be B+ for the action and Day Lewis alone). And there were probably another 300 C films with some fleeting merit, and another 300 D or F films without any for me.

Also nominating:

Mary and Max (2009)
A stop-motion animated tale of pen pal between 8 year old Melbourne girl (Toni Collette) and a 44 year old morbidly obese New Yorker (Philip Seymour Hoffman).

Retracting my previous nomination for The Man from Earth (2007). A wretched film of interest only to fans fo Zeitgeist and the like, and I must have been drunk when I appraised it.

i'm going on holiday in 2 days time for 3 weeks. am i too early/late to nominate?

whichever is the answer i'd like to nominate 'smart people'

I'm Not Scared
Happy-Go-Lucky
Day Night Day Night
Spider

bump

State and Main
Spartan

ivans xtc
Ping Pong

Hello, caek. I like all those films and never said otherwise. Red Barn is an amazing documentary in progress about the protests against the Red Barn restaurant chain coming to the U of M Minneapolis campus neighborhood in the Vietnam War era. I didn't mean to be anti-social by including it, but it did screen at festivals, establishing its release date in the '00s according to imdb rules, so I thought I'd throw it onto the big list. Why not?

― Pete Scholtes, Sunday, 6 December 2009 19:18 (6 days ago) Permalink

I am so confused. Did it play at, like, the Hoboken International Film Festival or something? Why is 'red barn documentary' bringing nothing up on google?

Wonder Boys

Why is it confusing that a short documentary film that played one or two festivals doesn't turn up on Google? Red Barn screened in 2003 as a short before the Minneapolis premiere of The Fog of War at Get Reel: The City Pages Documentary Film Festival. Is this genuine interest?

well, if you're going to say it should be in consideration for a best-of-the-decade poll, yes

maybe we should start nominating our favorite youtube videos?

I'm not going to nominate a short, but everyone should check out Motodrom
http://www.sundancechannel.com/videos/230296616

sort of needs to be seen in a theater imo :/

what is your problem with pete liking this particular obscure documentary

can't tell if you're joking or not but i have no problem with him liking it, i just don't see the point in nominating an undistributed short documentary that played two minneapolis festivals in 2003

how many festivals should a film be seen at in order to get nominated and what population should the city (in which these festivals take place) have in order for the screenings to matter. also, what if the filmmakers were googleproofing their film's name in order to avoid being found.

can't tell if you're joking or not but i have no problem with him liking it, i just don't see the point in nominating an undistributed short documentary that played two minneapolis festivals in 2003

― avatar brothers (Tape Store), Sunday, December 13, 2009 2:03 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the point is he liked it and wants to vote for it iirc

googled: "red barn" minneapolis film festival

on first page of results summeries: "The eight-minute film "Red Barn" by Al Milgrom will be shown prior to the ...."

I couldn't find anything when I hit the link though. city pages must be the only people to put it on the web, and have taken it off since 2003.

then if you google: "Al Milgrom" "red barn," you'll hit the motherload.

red barn owns, you goddamn philistines.

Milgrom temporarily left Marvel in 2000 after insulting just-departed editor-in-chief Bob Harras with a phrase hidden in a comic he inked.[4][5]

Al Milgrom is better known in the Twin Cities as the program director of MSP Int'l Film Festival. Haven't seen the doc, but strongly suspect a vote for it is a vote for the man behind it.

it's a conspiracy