The (Now-Overrated) ILX Top 100 Films of the 2000s Poll Results

Whereas I'd say not care about Bowie might improve Velvet Goldmine.

Especially if you like seeing Jonathan Rhys-Meyer's naked.

it's also not exactly "about" dylan, he's just its vehicle.

― hellzapoppa (tipsy mothra), Monday, February 8, 2010 11:56 AM (42 seconds ago)

Yeah - that was the same for Velvet Goldmine - and I wonder if that was part of the frustration. Like, I know very little about Dylan, so I watched it more as a formal experiment in producing identity and rock stardom, etc. With Velvet Goldmine, I was irritated by chronological inconsistencies.

I enjoyed INT much more than you guys but, yes, Cate Blanchett was the most annoying actor in it.

Heath Ledger actually impressed me most.

So we're halfway through and this is still like 65% hatorade.

charlotte gainsbourg was good i thought, but seemed like everyone else around her was so obviously acting (i didn't see much/any of the scenes with blanchett yet though)

Velvet Goldmine is such an obvious fantasy though. I can't imagine getting wound up about it.

Heath Ledger actually impressed me most.

― Inculcate a spirit of serfdom in children (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 8, 2010 12:00 PM (6 seconds ago)

In the same way that I found Viggo's scene in the bathhouse impressive?

same thing with Velvet Goldmine: you have to know all the mythology to get what haynes is playing around with, and then you know enough to know what he's getting wrong, and then you have to figure out whether it's intentional or if he's just wasting your time or what... but yeah if you're not there at step one ("bob dylan is important and interesting") then probably it's not your movie.

I'd say not really caring about Bob Dylan is probably an impediment to enjoying it though.

yeah i think so. otoh i know serious dylan fans who really didn't like it, because they don't like people messing with their own ideas of dylan.

the little kid at the beginning of the film.. imho didn't start it off well because it was just so phony in such a typical hollywood style

"typical hollywood style" was the point of that segment -- it was a nod to that biopic mode, the high-gloss way we conceive and portray our contemporary legends.

I enjoyed I'm Not There and I don't really care about Bob Dylan.

i think even more than velvet goldmine and far from heaven, i'm not there is partly/largely about the way movies tell stories and how and why they work. (which is reason enough to hate it if you hate that kind of thing.)

Unless you're Ozu, I don't know how else to render moral quandaries in film – a kinetic medium – without resorting to taut, well-edited action scenes.

Soto, you dug the first 2/3 of Munich so much that it made you utter the above, a statement waaay beneath you? Come on - you DO know that resorting (good word) to taut, well-edited action scenes is not the only way to render moral quandaries in film (beyond Ozu). Otto Preminger was a genius at this. He rendered, even created moral quandaries by eschewing taut, well-edited action scenes. See, gawd so much, Fallen Angel, The Human Factor, my beloved Angel Face (which I recently discovered was in Robin Wood's all-time top ten too!). Even when he was helming a taut thriller like the almost unbearably intense Bunny Lake is Missing, he never resorted to Spielberg fireworks (he never resorted period but that's another matter).

Great films that render moral quandaries without resorting to taut, well-edited action scenes:

La Cienaga (Lucretia Martel 2001)
Close My Eyes (Stephen Poliakoff 1992)
The Five Senses (Jeremy Podeswa 1999)
Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk 1959)
Love Streams (John Cassavetes 1984)
Make Way for Tomorrow (Leo McCarey 1937)
Manji (Yasuzo Masumura 1964)
Mikey and Nicky (Elaine May 1975)
The Mirror (Jafar Panahi 1997)
The Mother and the Whore (Jean Eustache 1973)
My Architect (Nathaniel Kahn 2003)
My Parents Read Dreams I’ve Had About Them (Neil Goldberg 1998)
The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges 1942)
Red Line 7000 (Howard Hawks 1965) - the 'action' scenes here, which may not have even been directed by Hawks, are the least compelling thing about this, my very favorite Hawks
Shoah (Claude Lanzmann 1985)
Some Call It Loving (James B. Harris 1973)
The Story of the Late Chrysanthemums (Kenji Mizoguchi 1939)
The Target Shoots First (Chris Wilcha 1998)
Those Who Love Me Can Take The Train (Patrice Chéreau 1998)
Time Out (Laurent Cantet 2002)
Trouble in Paradise (Ernst Lubitsch 1932)

others

"I enjoyed I'm Not There and I don't really care about Bob Dylan."

Yeah so did I, but I think we're probably in the minority here.

xpost Oh and of course:

Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman 1975)

But the moral quandary is more ours than Dielman's.

Unless you're Ozu, I don't know how else to render moral quandaries in film – a kinetic medium – without resorting to taut, well-edited action scenes.

Uh ... Eric Rohmer?

Ahahahaha. Oh, that's rich.

This is Eric's Inglourious Basterds.

I came around the 2nd time on Ledger-Gainsbourg; could be HL's best performance.

c'mon, Beatles' cameo is hilarious.

So we're halfway through and this is still like 65% hatorade.

Different movies, different haters.

yeah the ledger part seemed drab to me first time through, but it was also one of the parts i remembered most clearly. second time through made it make more sense to me. i think.

Thank you for that list of movies you like, Kevin. If there was a point there, it slipped by me.

I think his point is that your statement about moral quandaries requiring taut action sequences was total bullshit.

Preminger... never resorted period but that's another matter

I could use a different verb for Skidoo!
love ya KJB

Anyway, tipz is right; I'm Not There is about America, maybe in 'folky' ways nothing else was in the '00s except Deadwood.

shit's about to get real imo

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v212/etienne_saint/40-year-old-virgin.jpg

This wasn't great, though not at all terrible. The timing of everything was slightly off, like it hadn't been edited quite correctly. The volume of the dialog was too high relative to the music (though of course this could be the theater's fault). It included a couple of the lamest and least funny comedic cliches, foul-mouthed/horny middle easterners and elderly people. Makes you wonder if the studios require them to be in every comedy, because Jud Apatow seems like he's way too talented to rely on tired crap like that.

― Chris H.

saw this yesterday - hilariously satisfying. I didn't detect any bum notes/or "unnevenness" of tone until the verrrrrry end and that "I was saving it for you" groaner. Otherwise a practically perfect comedy. Funny to see Keener in a non-totally loathsome role.

― Shakey Mo Collier

this was the funniest thing i've seen in a long time (bar the Aristrocrats, which doesn't really count. Uneven tone? Well it has a tender side to it certainly, it's a Judd Apatow production (that may not mean anything to some people I guess). Lately comedies have been so much all about the joke (Anchorman, I'm looking at you) that when one comes along that has a real plot and actual characters and a good story, I suppose it's easy to think the tone is uneven when all it really is is a good movie with a lot of funny stuff in it (I'd put Elf and Bad Santa in there as well).

― kyle

Anticipate: 40 Year-Old Virgin (Better late than never)!

#49

The 40 Year-Old Virgin
Judd Apatow
2005
United States
(362 points, 16 votes)

lol no hatorade here!

^^^I'm Not There (and Velvet Goldmine) are both awesome, both playing with the same kinds of ideas (albeit via different sets of mythologies) and I love Dylan AND glamrock and yes I think plenty of both films was meant to be funny. certainly there are a LOT of jokes in I'm Not There ("look, its Allen Ginsberg on a motorcycle!")

lolz

best juxtaposition of the thread so far

i'm sure a good quarter of my ballot would have just been apatow/state goofballs riffing on shit

damn I forgot to vote for 40 year-old virgin

I think we're already running outta comedies that have a decent shot at placing.

omar's right, shit's gettin shit now

Wow - I'm really glad I don't have an opinion on this latest one, because now I can ignore or skim this thread for a while and do real things.

sarahel is correct, Eric. But sarahel, soto made the statement, not Eric. P.s. OTM re: Rohmer

Also, you don't even need humans (in front of the camera) to render moral quandaries without resorting to taut, well-edited action scenes:

La Région Centrale (Michael Snow 1967)

haha, rogen looks so gross

'40 year old virgin' is def my least favorite of the rogen/apatow clan comedies

Wow - I'm really glad I don't have an opinion on this latest one, because now I can ignore or skim this thread for a while and do real things.

it's quite possible to do this even when you do have opinions on things

xposts morbs, much love to you AND Skidoo! (sorry - I adore the shit outta the thing!)

It's also possible to spend hours reading and posting on threads when you don't have an opinion on its subject.

Ha, easily my FAVE of the Apatow movies. The funny outweighs the creepy conservative factor.

40yov is the first thing i saw rogen in (hadn't watched Freaks and Geeks yet) and i was seriously shocked to learn he was like 21 or something when he made it

didn't vote for it though. xp

40-y-o virgin is cute enough. my personal ratings system awards an extra star for significant catherine keener screentime.

Oh wait, I forgot Superbad. That's both the best and will be highest-placing.

is knocked up too pussyified for ilx?

ILX Film Faves: Might As Well Be TV

40 Year Old Virgin is Apatow's best, but not worth voting for.

oh so that's why morbz liked the simpsons movie. its exploration of the cinematic medium.

ILX Film Faves: Might As Well Be TV

― Fusty Moralizer (Dr Morbius), Monday, February 8, 2010 12:18 PM (1 minute ago)

The Wire >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Brick

it's the best apatow movie (and the least woman-hating!)

so other than knocked up and superbad, what other comedies even have a shot? zoolander? that's basically it, innit?

as far as I did like it (say 3 stars), YES

xxxp