the 50 most awesome movies of the 2000s: 10-1 Oct 08 '11    Write an essay on this topic. Tweet Popular Products in Movies Under the Tuscan Sun From $9 Casablanca From $3 The Bottom Line We're heee-eeeeere! And we've arrived, finally! Before you go back and initiate yourselves with everything that's preceded this point--- best to be informed, no?--- here's a quick rundown of my personal honorable mentions, presented alphabetically. A few of these came damn close, but didn't quite make the final cut. ABOUT SCHMIDT (2002, Alexander Payne). A patented Payne portrait of a man on the edge; great subtle work from Nicholson, an actor not known for his subtlety. ADAPTATION (2002, Spike Jonze). Appealingly batsh*t, endlessly labyrinthine examination of art and the creative process. BEFORE SUNSET (2004, Richard Linklater). A gorgeous love letter to fans of Linklater's original "Before Sunrise"; the rare sequel that doesn't nullify the events of the previous film, but enriches them. CLERKS 2 (2006, Kevin Smith). Thank you, Kevin, for allowing these characters to bow out gracefully, instead of trotting them out for an unfunny retread; our beloved Dante and Randall get the cinematic sendoff they deserve. IDIOCRACY (2006, Mike Judge). Pointed, a little on-the-nose, but disturbingly prescient; also, really funny. KING KONG (2005, Peter Jackson). The only Peter Jackson fantasy epic that even came close to this list. A crackling, giddy, exciting adventure. THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND (2006, Kevin Macdonald). A savage, chilling meditation on evil; Forest Whitaker is a force of nature, plain and simple. MUNICH (2005, Steven Spielberg). More than just a punchline in "Knocked Up"; also a haunting, sometimes devastating thriller. PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST (2006, Gore Verbinski). The kind of dark, slyly funny, gloriously thrilling adventure all of the "Pirates" movies should have been. SIN CITY (2005, Robert Rodriguez). Arguably the single coolest-looking film of the decade, this was a difficult one to leave off; steel-jawed comic book action by way of smoky noir looks good on Rodriguez. Loses points for inspiring "The Spirit", though. SUPERMAN RETURNS (2006, Bryan Singer). The single hardest film to leave off this list; Singer's vision for Superman was singular, brilliant, melancholy, and poignant all at once. THANK YOU FOR SMOKING (2006, Ivan Reitman). The only movie that might be able to teach you how to argue; also, really, really funny. WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY (2007, Jake Kasdan). A big, gift-wrapped present to those of us who continue to watch all of those awful musician biopics while still getting tired of their bullsh*t. Points for skewering targets who right well deserve it; more points for having insidiously catchy novelty tunes. And, you know, probably a bunch more. So, without further ado, you may now breathe that collective sigh of relief; here are my top ten movies of the decade. 10. WALL-E (2008, Andrew Stanton) An astonishing feat--- it wasn't enough for "WALL-E" to be Pixar's best film, or the best animated film of the decade and possibly all time. It's also the deepest, most artful, most profound, most romantic cautionary tale of the decade; "WALL-E" is as damning as it is innocent, after all, concerned with the direction in which we're all heading. But more important than all that, perhaps, is the simple artistry of it all; "WALL-E" is so impeccably made, and so thoroughly courts its atmosphere, that it's length, wordless opening section is even more engrossing than "There Will Be Blood", a fascinating film that also remains dialogue-free for a good portion of its runtime. And like the best Pixar movies, "WALL-E" spends that time forging insistently humane relationships that make us think, giggle, and weep, all in the same fell swoop. Artistry of the highest order, "WALL-E" is transcendent entertainment. 9. THE MIST (2007, Frank Darabont) A sterling example of genre filmmaking functioning as high art, "The Mist" is a crackling creature-feature through and through. But, as I've said before, the best horror yarns aim a mirror at humanity and force us to examine, and perhaps none accomplish this finer than "The Mist". Make no mistake, it's a forceful, eerie, and breathlessly tense creature feature, a treat for genre fans even at surface level. But as the titular fog chokes the small-town grocery, fear chokes the hearts of the town's denizens, and factions begin to emerge--- faced with something bigger than themselves, the people divide, dissent, and allow the inside to become as primal and violent as the outside instead of unifying. The fact that it delivers the purest, most delicious genre goods possible, while conveniently offering us, through the filter of this small-town grocery under fire from otherworldly creatures, a dead-on example of precisely how society reacts to tragedy is nothing short of staggering. Plus it features the ending of all endings, cruelly engineered to rip your heart out "Temple of Doom"-style, so there's that. 8. GONE BABY GONE (2007, Ben Affleck) A nervy, snarling thriller, "Gone Baby Gone" practically defines the overused adjective "gritty"; every frame of the Ben Affleck (!)-directed yarn seems caked in a layer of grime that reinvents the mere notion of lip-service buzzwords like "seedy underbelly". The Boston of Affleck's films seems at odds with the Boston of Affleck's youth, but that's okay, as long as he's producing art like this (and the also-excellent "The Town"). For "Gone Baby Gone" isn't strictly a really good mystery, although it is that; "Gone Baby Gone" is an unsettling narrative cat-and-mouse the likes of which Hollywood hasn't bothered with since, like, "The Fugitive", it's a dynamite actors' piece that gives loads of lauded thesps their chance to shine (Morgan Freeman even plays against type as morally-ambiguous instead of morally-stalwart, and a seething Ed Harris produces those Ed Harris-y chills on the forearm - and those are just the supporting roles), and it's a harrowing morality play that offers no easy answers, even as it delivers the dramatic goods. It may leave you quivering, but it'll make you think, and excite you; hell, "Gone Baby Gone" may be one of the most concise, definitive statements on how good a movie can be. 7. OBSERVE & REPORT (2009, Jody Hill) Unfairly dismissed for being a Seth Rogen comedy about the type of delusional, aggressive archetype usually reserved for the likes of Danny McBride (indeed, Hill's prior film, "The Foot Fist Way", casts McBride as a similar character, but it lacks this flick's panache), "Observe & Report" functions best as the comedic take on "Taxi Driver" promised us by the filmmakers. Scorcese's grimy, urbane psychodrama will always have a spot on my top ten films of all time list, but Hill's darkly comic slant on the material has the benefit of shock value on its side. A comically inflated Rogen, playing against type as abrasive (prior to "Observe", his in-stock character was arguably the affable stoner), grounds the film in a comic tone, but the script has other plans, veering into moments of gasping shock and jarring violence. There may not be a moral, per se, but Hill is singularly committed to yanking comedy audiences out of complacency by not romanticizing his main character's shenanigans, and by suiting up and diving headfirst into his psyche. Ultraviolence, the looming threat of sexual antagonism, depression, and real-life consequences bleaken the film's landscape, and as hilarious as the film is in its unerring commitment to crudity, it takes us to some dark places we hardly escape. The results are unpredictable, flinching, sometimes sad, and always brilliant. (Props to Hill, too, for casting old archetypes in new lights - Anna Faris plays her wide-eyed ditz to the hilt, with the caveat that her casual alcoholism and rampant promiscuity are both damaging to herself and others, and dropping Ray Liotta into a comedy and not telling him it's a comedy was a masterstroke.) 6. 25TH HOUR (2002, Spike Lee) As melodramatic as it is wrenching, Spike Lee's "25th Hour" turns the screws slowly. In its prison-bound subject Monty (Edward Norton, exhibiting some of the fire that made him an excellent actor-to-watch in "American History X"), we're treated to a thoroughly-realized character that achieves the rare balance of not being someone that the average viewer will ever be able to relate to, but who's dread and disappointment make him utterly empathetic. Watching this nebulous, loosely-structured plot (more a series of vignettes, really) unfold is paramount to the film's success; as the sun descends and the narrative's inevitable destination looms closer and closer, our hearts sink, and we feel bad for a man that, really, we probably shouldn't feel that bad for. That it all culminates in that bravura Brian Cox-narrated ending montage is all icing on the cake - for what it's worth, it's one of the most beautiful, emotionally devastating sequences in all of film - but even before it ends on its ultimate strong note, "25th Hour" manages singular power even as it fills with dread and pity. 5. THE DEPARTED (2006, Martin Scorcese) As a film, "The Departed" is more than a little bit messy; the well-oiled plot machinations play without a hitch, of course, but it's a film that has a kitchen-sink feel to it. Brief interludes are introduced and go nowhere; plot threads are abandoned and picked back up on a whim; scenes don't necessarily flow into each other, but collide with jarring jump cuts. And yet, "The Departed" is thrillingly alive - the narrative's twists and turns and double-crosses boast all the delicious melodrama of Shakespeare, the performances pop and interact with each other like a vinyl of modal jazz music, and there's an operatic splendor in the way that everything plays out, scenes peaking like glorious soprano notes, speeches and lines cresting and falling like arias. It's a singular achievement, and it bests all but "Mean Streets" in Scorcese's oft-vaunted gangster-film repertoire, simply by having purpose, and by being a big, cinematic reminder of the power of cinema, of pure narrative. (This is DiCaprio's shining moment, too; for two and a half glorious hours, he shows us forcefully exactly why Scorcese looks at him with the same eyes he once looked at DeNiro.) 4. NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (2007, Joel and Ethan Coen) Flawless as pure composition, "No Country For Old Men" isn't merely the best movie the Coen bros have ever made, although it is; the day after its release, it was also on the shortlist of the greatest thrillers of all time. And the greatest westerns of all time. And the greatest dramas. You know what, scratch that: with its braid-tight narrative structure, its unbearable suspense, its thematically rich downbeats rife with home-spun wisdom and ruminations on age and fate, and its superlative performances - Anton Chigurh, as a character, is the dead-eyed, nightmare-haunting vessel that Hannibal Lector ceased being post-1991 - "No Country For Old Men" is, quite frankly, one of the greatest films of all time. 3. ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (2004, Michel Gondry) It wouldn't merely be enough for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", working as it does from a typically high-concept screenplay courtesy of Charles Kaufman, to be a visually sumptuous flight of fancy. Fortunately, in the capable hands of Kaufman and Gondry, "Eternal Sunshine" carries with it a pregnant weight that simply no other film has ever been able to replicate. As Jim Carrey's lovelorn protagonist retreats into his own psyche to retrieve the memories of his relationship with Kate Winslet (in the performance that launched a million incurable crushes, which is kind of exactly what makes the film work), Gondry and Kaufman allow dramatic tension to hinge on the fatalistic, abstract fear of losing those memories. It's a stunning rumination on love and loss; the laughs are there, and the cleverness permeates the entire production, but in its quieter moments, "Eternal Sunshine" confronts us with the stark reality of lost love and the importance of memory in shaping the psychological landscape. And sure, it breaks our heart a thousand times over, but it mends it a thousand and one times, and the result is pure heaven. 2. CHILDREN OF MEN (2006, Alfonso Cuaron) I was convinced that "Children of Men" was an awesome film pretty early on. Within its first 35 minutes, the screenplay digs where traditional dystopian thrillers might zag; action hits hard and out of nowhere, and there's a bullet-riddled car chase sequence that stops the heart with its breathlessness and, in the event of a certain casualty, its audacity. But what makes it a great film is the sum of its parts: its a film that fully realizes the implications of its concept, that illustrates tonally the gravity of a world where women can no longer bear children, and a film punctuated with too many brilliant sequences to count. And, even though its world is a dramatic construct, it so thoroughly inhabits it that, when a moment of breathtaking awe is introduced into a chaotic action sequence, the film has so thoroughly earned it by that point that there's nothing you can do but wide your eyes, and hold your breath, and let your eyes well up at how glorious it is. It's such a potent, powerful, relevant film, one that functions as perfectly as a movie (complete with the most gripping suspense modern filmmaking has ever seen fit to grace us with) as it does art. And so, that was that, I thought when the lights came on in that Boston theater in 2006. That's the best film I've seen all decade, and probably will see. Honestly, I was tempted to grant it pole position even as I write this list in 2011, given how many people will groan at my actual number 1. But there's no getting around it, and two years after being moved to tears by "Children of Men", the lights went down at 12:37 on a Friday morning, and I saw my new favorite film of the decade. 1. THE DARK KNIGHT (2008, Christopher Nolan) Accuse me of whatever you will. Accuse me of being an unapologetic Batman geek - which, in all fairness, you'd be right about. Accuse me of being blinded by Nolan simply making a better-than-average comic-book movie - well, that you'd be incorrect about. And that's simply because I don't view "The Dark Knight" as a comic-book movie - it's melodrama, it's an actioner, a thriller, a detective mystery, a horror film, and an awe-inspiring crime drama, but "comic book movie", while technically accurate, is far too reductive. What mere comic book movie addresses real-life consequences to fantastical problems? What mere comic book movie takes a microscope to the shifting, morphing allegiances of the sheepish public? What mere comic book movie is injected with the pure dramatic rush of the greatest crime dramas? "The Dark Knight" isn't "X-Men" or "Fantastic Four", or even Richard Donner's "Superman"; it slides much more comfortably next to "The Godfather", "The Departed", and "Heat" in its bravura sequencing, it's blurred lines of hero and villain, and its pure zest for excellent filmmaking. There's no reason to go into every little notion of Heath Ledger's perfect portrayal of The Joker, or to discuss Nolan's stunning, labyrinthine script; it all exists as a matter of public record, and with "The Dark Knight", Christopher Nolan has finally mined the dark and spectacularly damaged Bruce Wayne for the dramatic goods that have always been there. Nolan buffs out the rubber nipples and extracts the quip-dispensing villains of previous Batman movies. What remains is a towering achievement in filmmaking, and quite possibly the greatest American film of its scale since the 1970s. Hope you enjoyed! You may commence arguing about which "Lord of the Rings" film I should have included now.

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