ILX Top Films of 2000-04 RESULTS (yes, really)

26 - High Fidelity, 84 points, 1 first-place vote

25 - Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle, 85 points

24 - Ratcatcher, 86 points

23 - O Brother Where Art Thou, 92 points, 1 first-place vote

22 - Belleville Rendezvous, 93 points

21 - The Pianist, 97 points, 2 first-place votes

20 - Punch-Drunk Love, 99 points, 1 first-place vote

I had a metacomment on the '80s poll results thread that could've been blurbed here bud.

19) The Incredibles (Bird, 2004), 100 points

The best thing, or perhaps the most refreshing thing, about this movie: Brad Bird (the writer / director) eschews How They Became Super-Heroes and just jumps right into the action. The first Spider-Man, the Hulk flick, the upcoming FF flick - they all hinge on establishing the PERSON (foibled, imperfect, angst-ridden) first, and then showing the circumstances that lead to their super-ness, which is all fine & good (it's a key component of what makes the characters iconic), but forces the filmmakers to get all that NECESSARY pre-amble out of the way, perhaps too quickly, to move onto the REAL movie, or (at the very least) creates a jarring disconnect between the origin and what follows. ("Necessary" because, of course, a lot of the appeal of these Marvel characters isn't so much what they can do, but HOW they came to be able to turn green or climb walls.)
The Spider-Man flick is what I'm thinking of here - the origin sequence was fantastic, but when the Green Goblin started attacking, the movie lost a little something, and the climax seemed oddly perfunctory as a result - kind of like watching an hour-long drama, and knowing the killer's going to be revealed in the next 5 minutes because it's almost time for E.R., chop chop. I blame Macy Gray, of course. Even movies like Van Helsing or Underworld are guilty of this - a belabored set-up, shabbily bolstered by crap ass characterization, followed by oodles of special FX and a bunch of supposedly significant plot shenanigans. (In these cases, I blame Kate Beckinsale.)

But, yeah - The Incredibles just hits the ground running. Here's the super strong guy, here's the stretchy girl, here are their kids, and here's what's going on. And it (the story / the characters) doesn't lack for nuance or depth in doing this, either, which is probably the most amazing thing.
-- David R.

18) Together (Moodysson, 2000), 102 points, 2 first-place votes

Together was one of my favorite movies ever, which is why I'm a little disappointed by the turn his work has taken.
-- Symplistic

I don't feel it's pointless.

17) Adaptation (Jonze, 2002), 107 points, 1 first-place vote

Starring Nic Cage and Nic Cage... how the hell can anyone sit through this movie? -- Me.

x-post

16) Kung Fu Hustle (Chow, 2004), 108 points, 1 first-place vote

Kung Fu Hustle (Shaolin Soccer) is also amaz-fuck-ing.
-- Alex in SF

Movie this year I'd most like to take a kid to see: Kung Fu Hustle. Man, if I were 12, that would be the greatest movie ever made.
-- slightly more subdued (Kenan)

15) Kill Bill, Vol. 1 (Tarantino, 2003), 111 points, 1 first-place vote

NOT EVEN TOP 10 ARE YOU HAPPY MORBIUS????

I lay in bed thinking about this, so be kind: Quarantino's action at least in the Crazy 88 fight I'd characterize as cubist action, where the camera pov moves so much that we're as close to seeing the fight in every angle at once. I don't particularly like it from a genre stand point, since it disorients the viewer and dissipates the energy of the scene (both of which contribute to experiences of the viewer trying to re-position himself with respect to the action, which "costs" energy at expense of the action itself). In the end, it was too self-consciously Artistic for me to enjoy on a primary level.
Single-shot sequences, OTOH, allow the viewer to more faithfully serve as a spectator, with fewer mediating removes between him and what's going on. And from a rockistish viewpoint, protracted shots reduce the ability to hide the stuntdoubles from viewers -- meaning that Uma has to have trained a buttload. This verisimilitude is an important point to me, that a star is actually performing these acrobatics, and again building up the image of being there (e.g. less mediation). (Of course, Hollywood is the reverse of the HK system, where martial arts champs become actors, so here's an inherent problem (see: Uma's (sometimes visible) difficulty with her swordwork b/c of her height.).)

But the problem likely isn't solely with Quarantino per se, but Hollywood grabbing onto the udders of the HK cash cow?
-- Leee

I am holding Tarantino personally responsible for the debacles in Iraq and the Occupied Territories and am having a ceremonial sword specially made to cleave him neatly into two pieces which I will then have fried by a short-order chef who looks a bit (wink! wink!) like Charlie Chan and served up to his gormless fans in between two pieces of tasteless American bread.
-- Momus

too many gems to sort through from Come anticipate Kill Bill with me

Eternal Sunshine better be comin' (the one that doesn't spend its last 20 mins going GET IT?)

KB should rank below old Mannix episodes.

14) Before Sunset (Linklater, 2005), 113 points

i was also hoping that Julie Delpy's character would reveal herself to be her character in Killing Zoe and would lead Ethan Hawke into a death spiral of heroin, bank robbery, and depravity.
-- Elvis Telecom

this was excellent. I watched it immediately after watching before sunrise for the first time; before sunrise annoyed me a lot, in a slightly embarrassed "god people in their early 20's in the mid-90's are so cliched" way, but I can imagine, had I seen it when it came out, it could have meant a lot to me. But Before Sunset is extraordinary. It's much more natural, for one thing. And even though you know exactly how it will end, maybe that's part of the charm of the thing. One of the best movies of last year, of course.
-- kyle

Can't find any of Morbius's snipes about Sunset

the characters are sort of supposed to be cliched. and potentially annoying.

how abt Armond W's "Linklater shoots Paris like it's Hoboken"

this would suggest that he doesn't understand the movie

http://www.mamacitaonline.com/swill/swill_hawke.html

FWIW he (and I) also liked Shaolin Soccer, almost as much, if not AS much.

xpost Julie Delpy is so freaking pretty, I'm going to hurl

13) Ghost World (Zwigoff, 2001), 115 points, 1 first-place vote

Myself and Thompson agree on Ghost World. Very well played, funny and interesting - but the subtext and ending are very poor. Fundamentally the films message appears to be if you are a misanthropist and mess with people you will end up with no friends (no disagreement there). So I worry about the film - and Enid in particular - being cluthced to the bosom of a certain kind of adolescent & post-adolescent girl because the ending is so vague. I certainly read it as a hopeful ending which is more than this character deserves. Where is the mystery bus going? Maybe it would be better to see her six moths later on the streets of some big faceless city...
Very interesting movie though. Oh and Nick - the final scene with Buscemi is back at his mothers with him undergoing therapy.
-- Pete

yowza. i mean, i heart thora and all...
-- jess (dubplatestyl...), November 18th, 2001 7:00 PM.
birch is weighty melons girl from Am Beauty right?
-- Alan Trewartha (alantrewarth...), November 18th, 2001 7:00 PM.
thora birch is what i imagine all my crushes to look like. (bad black dye job + glasses = swoon.)
-- jess

12) 25th Hour (Lee, 2002), 117 points, 1 first-place vote (MINE)

i had to stop myself crying three times (i had company), at 'fuck new york', at under the bridge, and at the dream sequence.. and i dont cry much in movies. wait, maybe i dunno. but you get my point.
-- mitch lastnamewithheld

Mark, remember that the 25th Hour monologue wasn't written by Lee, but by Benioff, the screenwriter--I would imagine that it owes as much to a vaguely similar monologue in Do the Right Thing as to the Scorses models you mention. Anyway it's wonderfully realized visually: the imagery that's referenced as grotesque the first time around reappears as elegaic the second time around. I'm not sure which shot you're referring to toward the end, but the one (throwaway?) shot that gets me is
*spoilers*

in the "25th hour" fantasy where Norton sits for a passport photo. There's a shot, held for just four or five seconds but an eternity in this context, of the man running the photo shop. There's something in the countenance and speech of this kindly eccentric (his ears and mouth riddled with studs, suggesting some of kind of Hell's Angel settled down) that's extremely generous, that cuts through the (hilarious) New Yorker's vision of the Rest of the America that is the bulk of that remarkable conclusion. I dunno, the whole sequence and that shot in particular must have been difficult to pull off--without enough little odd bits of business it would've seemed too ludicrous, too vain...with too much detail it would've seemed like a real forking-paths narrative which was NOT the point--but Lee and Benioff did it.

In this film the criticism of the harsh drugs laws is part and parcel with the shots of the WTC site and the backstories of the broker and the school teacher--something like a sum total of America's mistakes and abuses, responsibilities and blindnesses, fissures and reconciliations. I found the WTC stuff moving and totally germane, not least because it would have been this huge FACT that would continue to come 'round and smack the characters in the face. Philip Seymour Hoffman's stunned "whoah" when he sees the site from above felt like the kind of line that risked risked ridicule (for its seriousness/earnestness/"clumsiness") to achieve truth.

The Russian mobsters verged on cartoonish Scorsese territory, and that one scene threatened to make real some of the xenophobia expressed in the monologue. Oh well.

By "Godard's cartoon swiftness" what do you mean exactly?
-- amateurist

11) Lost in Translation (Coppola, 2003), 126 points

tim ernst's gaijin cartoon books adapted to film, featuring two vapid, xenophobic, ugly americans. "japan is a wacky country! they reverse their Rs and Ls! haha engrish!" if this was set in let's say New York, the characters would stand out as even more unlikable, but as is, the setting steals the show, diverting the attention wisely away from the characters and plot. sofia provides visuals and her soft camera tone carries over seamlessly from the 70s suburban michigan of her last film which is impressive, but there is a real lack of depth here, these losers aren't very lovable or redeemable. kevin shields's new songs are pretty good, especially the one early in the film (the 2nd song on the score). i'm gonna get a pirated copy on dvd and see it again, but as is, i was pretty disappointed.
-- gygax!

I'm not really sure how I feel about it. On the one hand, yeah, it's a beautiful movie to look at (we saw it because Nancy is going to Tokyo this winter and didn't really need an excuse to drool over the landscape for two hours), but also yeah, it's a deeply shallow movie. It seemed to suck any of Scarlett J's actual life right out of her (check out her interview in Mass Appeal from a few months back if any of you are still harboring more of a crush on Thora Birch), and just replaced it with this blanked out gauziness, the uber-Trust Fund Hipster. You don't feel sorry for her treatment at the hands of her husband because he's just so fucking awful to begin with; you want to shake and say "what the fuck are you doing here in the first place??" (Yes, I guess the subtext is that their marriage is slowly falling apart - "I don't know who he is anymore" - but why the fuck would she end up with such a awful "arty" hipster schlub in the first place. And why should we care when she's such a tabula rasa! If I wanted to watch something that focused at least 50% of the time on viewing the vacuous, shallow lives of twentysomething BFA's desperately trying to enter into show biz at a distance well...I could have never left NYC.) The laughs are few and far between and usually, like gygax sez, at the expense of those wacky foreigners and their keeerazy habits. Bill Murray's character is the character he played in Rushmore stripped of any remaining will to live (and personality.) He is rapidly approaching a kind of apothesis of "the sad clown"; soon his face is going to be frozen in that kind of winsome grin with the saggy eyes. Still, with my fragile emotional state these days (and the fact that I AM Bill Murray), it was hard not to feel a little twinge at the end. More tellingly, however, I didn't even remember I saw it when I first opened this thread.
-- gabbo giftington

Heh, like I said.

Is the "Ratcatcher" here the same as the one in the 90's poll??

Yeah, it was the same film.

This was easily the most bizarre of ILX's old school film polls.

It might have been the most bizarre, but out of them all, it easily contains the highest number of films that I've actually seen.

Just noticed this. Wow, I've missed a lot of these.

whenever I see that photo upthread of All The Real Girls I think it's an ad for polio research.

I threw this one a ballot: https://www.fandor.com/keyframe/the-best-films-of-the-decade-so-far-2010-2014

I'll have to 'finish' this year before i can even think about that time frame.

*last year

Yeah, can we wait a few months? (just found out I'm going to Göteborg Film Fest so I'll get to see so many great 2014 films in a few weeks, yayyayyay!!!)