christopher sepesy

8Jan10

10 Best Films of the Decade In 1990, when trying to compose this same list about the entire 1980s, films critics unanimously (and correctly) went all the way back to 1980 to choose Martin Scorsese’s RAGING BULL as that decade’s best film. There was an almost universal fear at that time the the prior decade had such a dearth of legitimate masterpieces that the very future of film was suspect. Then came the 1990s of Soderbergh and Tarantino (and Eastwood and Spielberg and Kubrick and Scorsese again …) and those fears were put to rest. Perhaps we should be fearful again. Of course I’m being entirely too pessimistic. I have been rather critical this entire decade that we wouldn’t even be able to get ten films to be named as authentic masterpieces, but looking back across the span of the decade I’m finding I’m surprised, and pleasantly so. Masterpieces? A few. But I’m seeing an even bigger slice of “Very Good Films” that I hadn’t realized were adding up. The 2000s, by any measure, were not good times. Political unrest, economic collapse and the resulting blight, and the now worldwide daily threat of terrorism have all contributed to a pernicious global malaise. In other eras of bad times the cinema served as sometime-tonic/sometime-oracle, such as when Fred and Ginger attempted to dance away the Great Depression or when Robert DeNiro’s Travis Bickel heightened vigilante style to eradicate the most banal hypocrisies of the 1970s. That didn’t happen in the 00s, and perhaps it couldn’t – the 24-hour tuned-in society has so many other stimulant progenitors that it no longer looks solely to cinema as the primary reflector of its fears, trusts and dreams. And if we are to use as a primary indicator most of Hollywood’s major output of the decade, or, at least that portion on which the studios spent the most money, it is treating cinema as nothing more than a giant amusement park, a “Coney Island of the NO-Mind,” if you will. Sequel after sequel, remake after remake. And everything “works.” The New Yorker recently pointed out there are now two cinemas – the mall cinema of mass, and the art cinema of class. While “popcorn cinema” has always been around, it wasn’t always necessarily bad, and films considered to be a shade or two more “artistic” weren’t always instantly labeled elite or only for certain subsets (remember, Ingmar Bergman wanted his films to be seen by everybody). Unfortunately the current state of cinema is showing the chasm between the two widening. I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised – the same year that gave the world Barrack Obama also gave it Sarah Palin – but it is disconcerting when any attempt at finding common ground is made. Which brings me to my task at hand. These kinds of subjective lists are never easy, but even more difficult when filtered through the current rubric. Tomas Alfredson’s LET THE RIGHT ONE IN (2008) boasts some of the decade’s finest cinematography and a great twist on an established genre, but one of the ten best? Maybe in the Top 60. Likewise, Charlize Theron gives one of the best performances of the decade as serial killer Aileen Wuronos in MONSTER (2003), but the film overall is not as complete as several others. And, yes, James Cameron’s AVATAR (2009) really is going to change the face of cinema forever (in what ways remains to be seen), but where’s the original thread of a story? I have done my best to whittle down all the criteria I employed to come up with this final ten. This has given rise to my needing to give special nomination to two subsets, scripts and performances, which I feel need recognition. Accordingly, along with Ms. Theron, big props to Julie Christie in AWAY FROM HER; Javier Bardem in BEFORE NIGHT FALLS; Daniel Day-Lewis in THERE WILL BE BLOOD and GANGS OF NEW YORK; Julianne Moore in FAR FROM HEAVEN; Marian Cotillard in LA VIE EN ROSE; Ulrich Muhe in THE LIVES OF OTHERS; Mickey Rourke in THE WRESTLER; Don Cheadle in HOTEL RWANDA; Adrien Brody in THE PIANIST; Diane Keaton in SOMETHING'S GOTTA GIVE; Johnny Depp in PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN; Anamaria Marinca in 4 MONTHS, 3 WEEKS, 2 DAYS; Tom Wilkinson in IN THE BEDROOM and MICHAEL CLAYTON; Rachel McAdams in MEAN GIRLS; Cillian Murphy in THE WIND THAT SHAKES THE BARLEY; Heath Ledger in BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN and THE DARK KNIGHT; Jake Gyllenhall in BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN and JARHEAD; Sean Penn in MILK; Ben Kingsley in HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG and SEXY BEAST; Jackie Earl Haley in LITTLE CHILDREN; Ellen Burstyn in REQUIEM FOR A DREAM; George Clooney in UP IN THE AIR: Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman in CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR; Casey Affleck in The ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD; Emile Hirsch in INTO THE WILD; Natalie Portman in CLOSER; and David Strathairn in GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK. Further, for their remarkable scripts, huge thanks to Cameron Crowe for ALMOST FAMOUS; Aaron Sorkin for CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR; Christopher and Jonathan Nolan for MEMENTO; Todd Field for IN THE BEDROOM and LITTLE CHILDREN; Russell Gewirtz for INSIDE MAN; Jim, Kristen and Naomi Sheridan for IN AMERICA; Steve Kloves for WONDER BOYS; Kenneth Lonergan for YOU CAN COUNT ON ME; Noah Baumbach for THE SQUID AND THE WHALE; Brad Bird for THE INCREDIBLES; Todd Haynes for FAR FROM HEAVEN; Tony Gilroy for MICHAEL CLAYTON; Denys Arcand for THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS; Julian Fellows for GOSFORD PARK; Josh Olson for A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE; Guillermo Arriaga for 21 GRAMS; Larry McMurtry and Diana Osana for BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN; Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor for SIDEWAYS; Brian Helgeland for MYSTIC RIVER; Rian Johnson for BRICK; David Hare for THE HOURS; Braulio Montovani for CITY OF GOD; William Monahan for THE DEPARTED; Stephen Gaghan for TRAFFIC; Shane Black for KISS KISS BANG BANG; Michael Arndt for LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE; Andrzej Wajda for KATYN; Sophia Coppola for LOST IN TRANSLATION; Pedro Almodovar for TALK TO HER; Charlie Kauffman for ADAPTATION and ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (with Michel Godry and Pierre Bismuth); Jean-Pierre Juenet and Guillaume Laurant for AMELIE; and to Joel and Ethan Coen for NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, which is perhaps the new gold standard in adapting a script from an existing work (now ranking with DOUBLE INDEMNITY and THE GODFATHER, PART II). I want to offer kudos to Hiyao Miyazaki for SPIRITED AWAY, and the entire Pixar team for The INCREDIBLES, RATATOUILLE, UP, and WALL-E, for again opening the world of animation into the realm of wonder and intelligence; to Sasha Baron Cohen and Judd Apatow & Crew for mining new veins of comedy – their contributions in this area will further help to define the decade; and to the whole company behind CASINO ROYALE (2006) for breathing new life into as used (-and abused) a formula as there ever was (props also to Soderbergh and Clooney, again, for their Ocean’s series; to Nolan, again, for The Dark Knight and Jon Favreau for Ironman; and to Paul Greengrass for the amazing Bourne films). Some films have devoted followings I just don’t get, but I can at least see these films having some very fine moments (Big Fish, Moulin Rouge, Zodiac). Others come off as simply flat (Gladiator, Cold Mountain), and yet others, while hits, are simply terrible (Juno, A.I.). I’ll be glad to argue these later. In the meantime, here is my carefully-as-possible considered list. From all vantages, I see these titles holding up in the long run as the finest made in the decade now past. 1. MULHOLLAND DRIVE (David Lynch, 2001) – The best film of the 2000s. Lynch came damned close to defining the Reagan 80s with Blue Velvet in 1986, edged it a little farther in the 90s with Twin Peaks, but he was at least working with a knowledge of those times because he was living in them. With this film, he surpasses every filmmaker’s strongest dream and makes a prophecy. Made pre-9/11, Lynch provides a double-edged nightmare, seemingly as a return to Nathaniel West’s Hollywood, circa turn-of-the-millennium. But as it unfolds as “film-as-puzzelbox,” it becomes increasingly clearer as a bellwether of the times, even as it sometimes seems to be lost in its own cinematic kind of nightmare. Duplicity, mendacity, confusion, the horror of identity, real or imagined -- all here are presented in bold relief as a perfect, albeit unfortunate, preface to the Bush-Cheney era, where Lynch’s fevered, horrific visions sometimes became daily realities. This is the best glitter-in-the-gutter film ever (rumor has it some of it was inspired by Bruce Springsteen’s “Jungleland”), it is this uncompromising great director’s best film, and its mystery is going to be viewed for years to come with as palpable a sense of foreboding as any film ever has. Not even Norma Desmond’s misty madness knew this depth of terror. 2. THERE WILL BE BLOOD (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007) – Classicism refreshed. If Paul Thomas Anderson had only made 1997’s Boogie Nights, he would have still ranked as one of the top talents not just emerging from that decade, but perhaps ever. This film cements his status, near or, arguably, at the top of his generation. Anderson, as filmmaker, is most gifted as a storyteller. Yes, he has a very good and distinct visual style, and many want to designate him as the new Altman because he makes ensemble casts work well. But I see him fitting in much more comfortably within the ranks of the great cinematic tellers of tales, where story ranks first, and all else follows. Like Huston with The Maltese Falcon, Kubrick with Barry Lyndon, or Richard Brooks with Elmer Gantry, Anderson takes an almost minor novel and from it mines cinematic magic. Because of this we are all illuminated. And don’t discount that this 90+-year-old story, about the simultaneous rise of oil profits and religious fanaticism, doesn’t fit perfectly within the years of Enron and Promisekeepers. Superior filmmaking. 3. THE LORD OF THE RINGS (Peter Jackson, 2001-3) – I know this is in three parts, as are the books, but I consider them to be one big movie. There was a lot riding on Jackson’s handling of this beloved opus, and he delivers in spades. You really need to look no farther than that. This is a monumental undertaking, lovingly – and intelligently – handled. Plus it is a prime display of cinema’s magical ability to showcase the realms of fantasy and, from that, create sheer joy. Like The Wizard of Oz and Close Encounters of the Third Kind before it, it evokes genuine awe from its audience, so much so that no other film(s) of the decade even comes close. 4. THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY (Julian Schnabel, 2007) – Anyone who wants to see the refractive power of cinema must watch this film. In a decade filled with endless sequels or, worse, remakes, here is as original a work of what cinema can be, all the while keeping itself grounded in as grim a story as can be. Schnabel begins filming the story of Jean-Dominique Bauby, a paralyzed stroke victim who can only communicate by his one unaffected blinking eye (adapted by Ronald Harwood from Bauby’s autobiography). When he decides to quit filming the story as a straight narrative and begins to take his camera into Bauby’s inner-consciousness, we are treated to a cinematic experience as we have never known, and an emotional trip from which we will never really recover. I accept that films like Avatar are going to change cinema; let’s have films like this do so, too. (Runner-up: Synecdoche, New York (2008)) 5. THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS (Wes Anderson, 2001) – What is it about this film that makes it so unforgettable and makes some of us yearn for more? It’s smartness? It’s boldness? Or is it its boldness in hitting us, square-in-the-nose, with its smartness? True, Gene Hackman has never been better, and that’s quite a statement. Neither has damned-near anybody else in the cast. But it’s with what they have to work from whence the wonder flows. Within a decade (and after decades) in which humor is forced and rarely beyond the range of sophomoric, sentimentality is spoon-fed like so much pablum, and “the family” must be presented and preserved as the ne-plus-ultra component of American society (or, at least so long as it makes The American Family Association happy), this film about “a family of geniuses” takes on what seems to be all of American hypocrisy at once, and never flinches. How refreshing, no? Plus, it set, at least in part, a good deal of the tone of ironic wit that continued through the remainder of the decade. Keep every “golden glowing” moment you have, mainstream cinema – I’ll take Hackman firing off brilliant, stinging witticisms in a go-cart any day. 6. MUNICH (Steven Spielberg, 2005) – Gandhi once said that the philosophy of “an eye for and eye” leaves the whole world blind. In this clinical re-telling of the 1972 Munich Olympics tragic killing of the Israeli team by Palestinian terrorists and its aftermath, Spielberg pulls no punches in showing the price of vengeance and retribution, but he also doesn’t seem to be making any judgment. In this atypical move – and movie -- he allows his viewer to make his or her own decision on things, he simply provides the story. He also makes his most mature film since Schindler’s List and one of his best films in decades. The “what makes the monster and what makes the man” theme has rarely been presented so well or so unforgettably. Bravo, Mr. Spielberg. 7. (TIE) THE NEW WORLD (Terrence Malick, 2005) and THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD (Andrew Dominik, 2007) – The de-mystification of primitive American history, only to be matched by the de-mystification of American myth, only then to have both venture into the genuine mystic realm of how real stories become greater than any fiction because of their humanity. We already knew Malick’s ability to turn his camera into a poet’s pen from Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line. With The New World he surpasses the first and at least matches the latter. Dominik is somebody to watch. Neither of these films got the audiences each deserved in theaters. I hope that will change with home viewings. Both films also boast the decade’s finest cinematography, from Emmanuel Lubezki and Roger Deakins, respectively. 8. LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA (Clint Eastwood, 2006) – This film should be required viewing for everyone who hears the word Muslim and experiences fear or revulsion. In short, it shows that enemies, of our own making, are not the far-removed devils we want them to be. They fear, they hate, and, yes, they love, too. Clint Eastwood, whose naturalistic lyricism always makes me consider him to be Hemingway with a camera, was 70 when the decade began, and already had the masterpieces The Outlaw Josey Wales, A Perfect World and Unforgiven behind him. The 2000s saw him provide nine more titles, among them Million Dollar Baby, for which he received his second directing Oscar, Grand Torino, Invictus, Mystic River, which could nearly occupy this slot, and this film, the best of all. He’s now 80 and in pre-production on his next. Top that. 9. BEFORE SUNSET (Richard Linklater, 2004) – This is a follow-up film, not a sequel, set in real time, about two characters Linklater created in 1995’s Before Sunrise, showing them in Paris nine years after their initial chance meeting on a train ride from Vienna. The young man is now a published author on a book tour. The young woman comes to his lecture. His book is about a chance meeting in his youth, and “the girl who got away.” What goes on from there is the most languid, luscious and luminous script in years, by Linklater, Kim Krizan, and the two stars, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. This film is a valentine to all romantics and to all lovers of what cinema can be when it’s good. No transforming robot, no cartoon super hero or villain, and no exploding anything ever hit the heartstrings as genuinely as this film does, and it does so through 80 minutes of pure conversation and the wonder of language. Somewhere Truffaut and Malle are smiling. C’est magnifique. 10. THE LIVES OF OTHERS (Florian Henckle von Donnersmarck, 2007) – It is 1984 at the height of the cold war in East Germany. This story takes us into what artists have to do in order to create and avoid the Stasi systems of surveillance and suppression. In this bleak, colorless atmosphere, with as cold and colorless a palate, comes a redemptive tale about loyalties and truth and the power of love and art. Call it cliché if you will, but this film takes a classic thematic device and turns it into a revelation. Quite beautiful. SUPER-DUPER Honorable Mention; or, There’s Only Room For Ten, Dammit!: Joel and Ethan Coen’s NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN; Tony Gilroy’s MICHAEL CLAYTON; Michel Gondry’s ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND; Michael Haneke’s CACHE; Werner Herzog’s GRIZZLY MAN; Abas Kiarostami’s THE WIND WILL CARRY US; Martin Scorsese’s THE DEPARTED Honorable Mention: Todd Field’s IN THE BEDROOM and LITTLE CHILDREN; Clint Eastwood’s MYSTIC RIVER; Christopher Nolan’s MEMENTO; Alfonso Cuaron’s CHILDREN OF MEN; Gus van Sant’s ELEPHANT; Edward Yang’s YI-YI; Quentin Tarantino’s KILL BILL, 1 and 2 and INGLORIOUS BASTERDS; Spike Lee’s INSIDE MAN and THE 25TH HOUR