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

everyone in the world hated it except for j hoberman, who thought it was the best movie since citizen kane. i wanna see it.

She still is for anyone with taste!

9) Memento (Nolan, 2000) 134 points, 1 first-place vote

Even the director doesen't know quite how the real story goes. His brother (who wrote the short story) refuses to tell him.
-- Will

anything involving lettering of any sort is such a mistake, I don't know anyone who doesn't eventually get it covered. I'm so glad I didn't do that, not that I don't want to get the one on my stomach covered up anyway.
-- Allyzay (tattoo...), November 12th, 2003 2:46 PM.
but Memento!!! Best tattoos ever!!
-- TOMBOT (find.hi...), November 12th, 2003 2:48 PM.
There are things I agree with you on in theory and things I agree with you on in actuality. If you showed up covered in Memento tattoos, you will find that that is very much a theoretical agreement.
-- Allyzay (eeee...), November 12th, 2003 2:51 PM.

8) Amelie (Jeunet, 2001) 179 points, 3 first-place votes WTF

Justify your dislike of Amelie... 'cause my love for it increases the more I think about it, and I can't help but think that anyone that doesn't feel the same way must secretly be a heartless, soulless automaton (no I don't actually think that).
I laughed throughout, not smirky knowing chuckles but helpless giggles and huge exhalations I might even tentatively call guffaws. And (and don't think that this is a common occurance because, um, it's not) I cried. Yes, actually did, when she guides the blind man down the street, giving him eyes, leaving him bathed in joy (see? you see the stupid phrases the movie makes me use?).
And I also want to bring up that debate between people that watch movies as if they're just plays put to film (fuck David Mamet by the way), and people for whom the visuals of movies are most important while plot can be fucked for all they care (and although it's prob. obvious which camp I feel like I belong to, I don't really think that's the right way to think about things, just my favorite way); and how maybe Jeunet's movies might appeal more to the latter, focusing as they do on the mechanics of immediate situation.
-- Dan I.

But is it not a valid criticism when Amelie in fact does copy many of the devices (people turning into a puddle of water, etc.)used on Ally McBeal? If I wanted to associate Amelie with an unhip television show just for the hell of it, I'd talk about how it was like the West Wing.
-- Nicole

7) Yi Yi (Yang, 2000), 187 points, 2 first-place votes.

6) The Royal Tenenbaums (Anderson, 2001), 240 points

it is much better than rushmore, which i still love but seems far too strained and cynical compared to the sloppy beauty of tenenbaums. bottle rocket is quite good but something stops it from being really perfect, although at this point i prefer it to rushmore also in that sloppy beautiful way, also the jokes are better but honestly tenenbaums is so far above them both it's not even a comparison, one of the most wonderful films i have ever seen.
-- ethan

upon first viewing i privately decided it was possibly my favorite film i'd ever seen, i've viewed it four times since. um did this happen with anyone else? also more generally do you require time or general social/critical acceptance to truly love a film (tenenbaums reviews mostly lukewarm, 'it's good but no beautiful mind/monsters ball/lotr/amelie!', meanwhile everyone i know who's seen has basically said it was enjoyable but disposable)? in high school whenever 'best movies ever' were discussed in class most kids always just seemed to name the most recent passable film they'd seen, am i just afraid of being short-sighted like that? i feel like i'm going to be proved wrong in a few months and look back and say 'oh how sillyi was' or something, it's terrible. also is royal tenenbaums a great film?
-- ethan

Margot Tenembaum reminded my mom of me, especially the scene where she was with her frontier family in fishnets and black eyemakeup and chopped her own finger off.
-- Ally

Don't get me wrong, I really, really wanted to love The Royal Tenenbaums. I loved Rushmore, and Wes Anderson, so I guess I had very high expectations. But something about Tenenbaums just struck me as sloppy - the story seemed to start out well, but then the story started to degrade. It struck me more as a sketch or a portrait rather than a finished film...I don't know if that's what Wes Anderson was aiming for, but it really started pissing me off after a while. I thought Gene Hackman's brilliant performance was the only thing that really held the story in place; he was like a much-needed backbone for an otherwise (I hate to say it) spineless film. One of the things I like best about Wes Anderson's style is his talent for character development, but for so many of the characters, the development, the empathy just wasn't there. Perhaps it was just because he had so many characters to work with this time around. Anyway, I thought The Royal Tenenbaums was good, but not great.
-- geeta

It won't be and there's enough wrong here nevertheless

Spirited Away will clearly (and deservedly) win.

I could go for that. Too lazy to look, what were the #1s in the previous polls again? Blue Velvet for '80s, I sort of remember.

5) City of God (Meirelles/Lund, 2002)

seriously, this is the best comment on City of God that Google turns up:

My joint fave magic movie moment of 2003 was the torture / shooting of the small Brazilian street kids in City Of God, although I realise that saying it like that makes me look like some kind of sadist paedophile.
-- udu wudu

the followup to that movie moments thread:
camera follows a suitcase being wheeled through hollywood, onto an elevator, down a hallway and into an apartment where it is laid on the floor and unzipped, revealing four feet and eleven inches of gauge to the delight of three eager, big-dicked gentlemen.
^^--intro to weapons of ass destruction 2. highly recommended.
-- brian badword

http://www.ocean-films.com/themoodforlove/secret/images/img_menu.jpg

4) In The Mood For Love (Wong, 2000), 260 points

Finally, "In the Mood for Love" by Wong Kar Wei was a wonderfully melancholy moodfilm of quiet lives and missed opportunities, as visually *rich* a movie as any I've seen since the Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Even a twilight gale-blasted Tottenham Court Road seemed romantic after seeing it.
-- Stevie T

3) Spirited Away (Miyazaki, 2001) 279 points, 1 first-place vote

SPIRITED AWAY -- or This Week In Acid Casualty Anime Fairy Tales That Will Haunt Your Dreams For A Long Time But Make You Want To Watch Them Over And Over Again

So, I got back from my week long stay in British Columbia (Vancouver, Victoria, Nanaimo) last night, only to be whisked away to a friend's birthday party and then to a showing of the just-off-the-racks DVD for this little gem of an anime movie called Spirited Away by Hayao Miyazaki.

Oh.. my.. god. Not to underrate the surreal values of most anime flicks, but this one takes the cake, only because it's disguised as a fairy tale free of violence. And, while, compared to most anime flicks, this is indeed relatively violence-free, the images from this movie will never ever leave my brain -- partially to will, and partially not.

Keep in mind that I'm hardly a movie kinda guy, much less an ANIME kinda guy, and I think this is just one of the movies of the year. Maybe anime connoisseurs will balk at my recommendation... but whatever. And with almost all movies, I recommend the Japanese dialog with English subtitles.

Mind you, I still don't understand most of "Spirited Away", and probably never will. (And that pic at the top really doesn't even touch the surface of what horrific wonders and wonderous horrors are contained within)
-- Donut Bitch

Miyazaki believes in the audience feeling genuine, powerful emotions, terror, confusion, unease, gladness, love. Like in early Disney, eg Pinnochio, not today where it's all filtered for you into a low-key blandness.
I saw Spirited Away several times and it stayed fresh while each time suggesting more to me. Finally i think it's an allegory of the horror of having to grow up and go to work. Chihiro being in fear of her life conveys the death of innocence that we fight against.
-- pete s

90s: Pulp Fiction
80s: Blue Velvet
70s: Taxi Driver

I guess I'd be surprised if something like Spirited Away joined this company.

(XPOST!)

what are 2 and 1 then?

2) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Gondry, 2004), 406 points, 3 first-place votes

the opening credits, so perfectly timed, of joel crying his eyes out in the car, that's everything. the entire centre of the movie is rooted in joel's anguish. there's a quote near the beginning where he's remembering their last major fight and is chasing her down the street and she disappears and he says something like (major paraphrase): "great - the perfect end to the perfect piece of shit story!" things have gotten so bad between them that on some level its clear that he BELIEVES what he's saying. he's that frustrated, that lost. and of course it rings true because most of us have been in that situation, where we've ended relationships and felt so separated from the love that was there in the beginning that our only logical recourse is to assume that we dreamt it.

what's so perfect about the second last scene is that the film's conceit allows kaufman to construct a direct bridge between that terrible frustration (in the form of their lacuna tapes) and the couple's excitement in meeting each other for the 'first' time. that's where you get your answers i think, in the way they happily relent to each other even in spite of knowing what's probably in store. it's hamfisted but its also stupidly powerful, the way their hopefulness and curiosity is enough to wash away their better judgement.

my interpretation of this scene was similar to jody's. i heard the voices in the background as analogous to the baggage that we carry with us into new relationships. they represent all the hurts and fears that you're left with whenever you part ways with someone, things you can ultimately get over but never totally leave behind. and even though they're with you when you meet the next person (and the next, and the next), they're never enough to keep you from trying again.

if joel and clementine end up in a loop, it's probably because they have that luxury! i don't infer anything overtly misanthropic from that, just the obvious: love is a difficult thing to say no to.
-- mark p

I fail to see how Kirsten Dunst dancing in her underwear in this movie expanded upon KD dancing in her underwear in 'Bring it On.' Then again, BiO was a fairly flawless performance, which she would be hard-pressed to improve upon.
I thought Kate Winslet in this movie had as much charisma as a sack of stale pototoes. God, and her hair could only be surpassed in its unfecthingness by Katie Holmes' locks in 'Pieces of April.' Did the two movies retain the same hair stylist perhaps?

I will say that Mark Rufallo's return to the stoner role suits him well—so well that I suggest that he never undertake to play a non-stoner.

Elihjah Wood? Please.

Can someone please acknowledge how utterly stupid this film was? Oh, OK, let's have an office where we erase peoples memories, but let's do the actual work of the memory erasing in peoples homes, and cart around our supplies in what looks like a stolen van.
-- Mary

I do rate Inland Empire, and it tops 2006 as an A minus.

http://www.celluloid-dreams.de/content/images/kritiken-filmbilder/mulholland-drive/mulholland-drive-1.jpg

1) Mulholland Dr. (Lynch, 2001), 454 points, 4 first-place votes

Finally saw MD last night, I took the advice of many and decided not to try and too much make sense of it all, just strapped myself in and went along with the ride. My "date" took me by surprise afterwards by declaring that it had all made sense to her, tears still streaming down her face.
The whole thing still lodged deep in my psyche where I suspect it will remain for a while. The Spanish "Crying" (by no means a mere rehash of Blue Velvet's Orbison moment) had me gripping the sides of the seat with a lump in my throat and eyes damp, yet I couldn't really understand why. As someone who doesn't necessarily demand a plot, let alone a logical one, but would rather immerse himself in atmosphere and beautiful imagery, it was some kind of perfection. I haven't seen all the reference points that Edna talks about, but I was put in mind of Bunuel and Polanski's "The tenant". But no-one can create menace quite like David Lynch.
-- Tag