Best of 2000s
Archived Posts from this Category
Thursday 14 Jan 2010
Poll: Chinese Films of the Decade
Running on Karma (dir. Johnnie To and Wa Ka Fai)
Over on the dGenerate Films website, the results of weeks of emailing Chinese film experts and tabulating of ballots to determined the top Chinese language films of the last 10 years. I’m kind of whateverz about the top pick, which I’ve reflected upon already, but I think results are quite interesting. I didn’t expect West of the Tracks to place so highly, and didn’t realize Devils on the Doorstep had so much support as well. But the showing for Oxhide was truly amazing – and heartening. I still need to write at length what I think about that film as well as it’s equally astounding sequel.
I didn’t submit a top ten list to the poll to avoid conflict of interest, but for what it’s worth here’s what mine would have looked like:
Before the Flood (Yu Yan and Li Yifan)
Crime and Punishment (Zhao Liang) – still waiting to see Petition though
Hero (Zhang Yimou)
Kung Fu Hustle (Stephen Chow)
Oxhide (Liu Jiayin)
Platform (Jia Zhangke)
Running on Karma (Johnnie To and Wa Ka-Fai)
The Wayward Cloud (Tsai Ming-liang)
West of the Tracks (Wang Bing) – sort of the 800 pound gorilla whose massiveness can’t be denied
Yi Yi (Edward Yang)
See what everyone else voted by going here
Tuesday 05 Jan 2010
Top 50 of the ’00s (as seen on Twitter)
For those not following, here’s the rundown:
50: ANCHORMAN: THE LEGEND OF RON BURGUNDY (04 McKay) The purest, most protean offering from the Judd Apatow juggernaut.
49: HERO (’02, Zhang) Up there with TRIUMPH OF THE WILL among great propaganda movies. (The ‘08 Olympic ceremonies could have this spot 2)
48: CACHE. Former #1 of ‘05 4 me, but I’ve lost interest in Haneke’s puppet-stringing along of his audience no matter how masterful
47: WOMAN ON THE BEACH (06) My favorite Hong Sang-soo film b/c it goes furthest beyond the psychosexual self-flagellation of prickish males
46: WEST OF THE TRACKS (04 Wang Bing) The SHOAH or SATANTANGO of the ’00s? Europe/Asia say yes, US has no clue – I’m somewhere in between
45 KUNG FU HUSTLE (04) Not as deliriously funny as Chow’s 90s work but more consistent, world audience-friendly, and still crazy inventive
44 GRIZZLY MAN (05 Herzog) Rarely has a filmmaker revealed so much of himself (boorishly & brilliantly) by sifting through another’s work
43 WHEN THE LEVEES BROKE (06) 25th HOUR is great, but Spike Lee’s 4 hr Katrina doc is like a Mahler symphony: 1 long cumulating heartbreak
42 BEFORE THE FLOOD (05 Yan Yu, Li Yifan) docu inspiration for STILL LIFE, w/o the arthouse dressing. Sometimes raw is better than cooked.
41 PAPRIKA (06 Satoshi Kon) like an anime Cronenberg movie, and even more chockfull of animation styles than SPIRITED AWAY
40: MOOLAADE (04 Sembene) A feel-good movie on female genital mutilation: one of many contradictions from this African JOHNNY GUITAR Continue Reading »
Friday 11 Dec 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: Now on Twitter
I haven’t had much time to pursue the Best of the Decade Derby in the latter half of this year, but it would only be right to give it some kind of closure. So this week I made some time to sort through a long list of films from the past 10 years, and compiled a list of top 50 films of the decade. (One proviso: there were so many good films that I wanted to include, that I decided to restrict the list to one entry per director.)
I’ll post the list before the end of the month on this site – but for now I’m counting them down on my Twitter feed. You can follow @alsolikelife.
For now, here’s a list of films that I had planned to do Best of Decade derby entries on with friends and colleagues. We’ll just have to reflect on what they might have been like…
Battle in Heaven
Before Sunset
The Death of Mr. Lazarescu
Fat Girl
Kings and Queen
Punch Drunk Love
Regular Lovers
Syndromes and a Century
There Will Be Blood
Two Lovers
The Wayward Cloud
The Wire – I would have done a roundtable podcast pondering whether it deserved inclusion among the best films of the decade (there are some critics I know who think so)
Sunday 01 Nov 2009
The New York Film Festival: 18 films from top to bottom
This year’s NYFF was the tenth that I’ve attended, and it left me feeling more exhausted and less entralled by what I saw than I have in past years. Maybe because I was more in tune to what others were saying about these films (thanks Twitter and Indiewire), to the extent that it was encroaching on the space between me and these films. My burnout got to the point that I had to do a very geeky thing to put it into perspective: conduct a historical evaluation of how many great movies I saw for each of the past 9 years I’ve attended NYFF. Continue Reading »
Wednesday 26 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby Serial Killer Showdown: Zodiac vs. Memories of Murder with Andrew Grant and Vadim Rizov
On this installment of BoDD we’re delving into the case of not one but two serial killer movies to determine which one is a better candidate for Best of the Decade. In one corner, we have Bong Joon-ho’s Memories of Murder, a critical and box office smash in Korea that flopped in the U.S., though not without a few raves by a handful of critics who caught it. In the other corner, David Fincher’s Zodiac, which also flopped in the U.S., though well received by a critical contingent.
In this lively podcast, I discuss both films with Andrew Grant, aka Filmbrain, of the popular blog Like Anna Karina’s Sweater, and Vadim Rizov, film critic and contributor to the Indie Eye blog at IFC.com. We discuss our experiences watching both films, as well as Bong’s and Fincher’s’ defining characteristics, what made Memories a commercial success and Zodiac a flop with their respective target audiences, the juggernaut that was Korean cinema in the early half of this decade, and other topics. Also listen to find out which film is the #2 pick of the decade for which podcast interviewee…
Click to play (right click to download)
Friday 21 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: A.I. liveblog with Keith Uhlich and Michael Joshua Rowin
Keith Uhlich in Black
Michael Joshua Rowin in Blue
Me in Green
OPENING REMARKS:
KU – I saw it at the Ziegfeld on opening night. I remember a Rex Reed quote pertaining to another film he saw, where he maintained, “I’m not affected by the audience.” Well, when I saw A.I., it was the last 30 minutes or so when the hatred of the audience was palpable, I could feel the audience seething in dead silence, and it really affected me.
So I didn’t like the movie when it first came out. But there was some discussion of it on the Brian De Palma Forum that was interesting.
So I saw it again on my own and this time it not only worked but it really turned Spielberg around for me. This film convinced me that Spielberg was worth my complete, devoted attention.
MJR: I was in college. I was a huge Kubrick-head. I had a professor at the time who was great, but he was going on about A.I. and how he would never see it because it was Kubrick’s project but Spielberg took it over, and Spielberg just wasn’t worthy. I was impressionable and thought the same, and frankly I hadn’t liked Spielberg since I saw E.T. as a kid. His name to me meant schmaltz, big budget corporate spectacle. So I never saw it when it came out. I also heard from my brother and other people that they hated it.
And then, later on, when I was a little older I came across other people I respected and had an appreciation of Spielberg and really liked A.I. I came around and checked it out – it was just a couple years ago. And I was blown away in ways that were deeply emotional and philosophical. But I was also profoundly agitated by certain things that were going on that I felt were classic Spielberg manipulation.
Also, one thing I want to put out is that Spielberg is the Michael Jackson of cinema - someone who has an innate brilliance in putting together the elements of mass entertainment into something truly exceptional. I’ll get into that more as we watch the movie.
KBL: I saw this opening night at the Sony Lincoln Square. I had read the reviews by A.O. Scott and Jonathan Rosenbaum which were highly favorable. Especially Rosenbaum’s which actually argued against what many other critics were saying, that Spielberg doing Kubrick was a disaster. Instead he claimed that they compensated for each other, Spielberg’s heart joined with Kubrick’s brain, or something. Anyway I saw it in a packed theater and near the end, like with Keith’s initial experience, the feeling among the audience was one of disbelief and ridicule. It was one of those rare weird experiences where you’re on a completely different wavelength than the people around you, and in a way I kind of felt like David in this movie, just alienated. But I left feeling like my mind had been blown, that a Hollywood movie had presented a slew of ideas about the nature and the future of the human race I had never thought about before.
CONTINUE TO THE FULL LIVEBLOG Continue Reading »
Monday 17 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: Video Essay on L’Intrus for the Reverse Shot Claire Denis Symposium
Reverse Shot has just published another of their storied auteur symposiums, where pieces on just about every film by a director are given serious critical appreciation by a talented host of young writers. I’ve contributed to past symposiums, including one on Hou Hsiao Hsien last year. This time they’re casting a much-deserved spotlight on Claire Denis, who I think is doing some of the most amazing work of any director working at the moment.
For this symposium I wanted to contribute a piece on L’Intrus, given that it’s a solid contender for my own “best of decade” list – only to find out that several other would-be contributors proposed to write on the same film. The honor eventually went to Genevieve Yue, who offers a lengthy, erudite essay that’s simply fantastic to read, and does much to elucidate a film that at times is as impenetrable as it is hypnotic.
Meanwhile, my way to get at L’Intrus was to do an appreciation via video essay. What I didn’t expect was how difficult this film would be to penetrate and elucidate, especially in a video essay format. This is probably the most challenging time I’ve had with a video essay and I owe thanks to several people for their encouragement, including Michael Baute, Daniel Kasman, Ryland Walker Knight, and of course Michael Koresky and Jeff Reichert of Reverse Shot. The results, well, here they are:
Friday 07 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: Looney Tunes: Back in Action liveblog with Keith Uhlich
In searching for the ten best films of the decade, I’ve taken a special interest in two genres that I feel are routinely given short shrift when generally thinking about the “best” films: animation and comedy. So I was happy to follow the recommendation of Keith Uhlich to watch Looney Tunes: Back in Action as part of the Best of the Decade Derby. Keith assures me that this film is highly likely to make his own top ten list (I think I know Keith well enough to predict what his list will look like: A.I., Five, Generation Kill, The House of Mirth, Inland Empire, Miami Vice, The New World…). It was fun listening to Keith take on a personal tour through Looney Tunes, especially after having watched The Incredibles, two films that seem diametrically opposed in their philosophies towards form, structure and sensibility in mainstream feature animation, as different as, say, the classic era of Warner Bros. vs. Disney. Given that I’ve been increasingly seduced by classical Hollywood form and craft (something that my re-watching of The Mad Songs of Fernanda Hussein shook me out of, at least momentarily), it was good for Keith to remind me of how when I was a kid I preferred the manic anarchy of Warner Bros. over the impeccable prettiness of Disney. This opposition was definitely on Joe Dante’s mind when he made this film, as Keith’s liveblog comments (with my occasional interjections) bear out: Continue Reading »
Tuesday 04 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: Lost in Translation video essay with Stephanie Zacharek
Another video essay for the Film in Focus Rewatch series. This one’s on Lost in Translation, which many considered the best film of 2003 and one of the best of the decade. I personally wouldn’t go quite that far, but I’m glad to have someone like Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com to make the case in this video essay, by honing in on one moment and exploring what makes it, and Sofia Coppola’s direction, beautiful and unique among American films.
Also be sure to check out Stephanie’s recent interview with Dennis Cozzalio of Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule, where she dishes on her development as a film critic, what it’s like to be one half of a film critic couple, and films both recent and past that have brought out her true sensibilities as a critic.
Monday 03 Aug 2009
Best of the Decade Derby: Encounters at the End of the World roundtable podcast with “Werner Herzog”
When I took an open call for documentary suggestions for Best of the Decade Derby back in March, there was a strong showing of enthusiasm for Werner Herzog’s recent works: White Diamond, Grizzly Man and Encounters at the End of the World. We picked the latter for a Best of the Decade group screening followed by a discussion – We talked about how Herzog imposes his vision on the documentary format, the tragic humor of suicidal penguins, and which of Herzog’s many movies are our favorites. At the end, we were visited briefly by none other than “Werner Herzog” himself!
Podcast audio is here (right click to download). A big thanks to participants Ben Simington, Gina Telaroli and Daniel Kasman.