The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

19.  


Rachel Weisz won an Oscar for her performance in "Constant Gardener" but the real heart of this movie is Ralph Fiennes.  He's made a career playing memorable baddies (Goeth in "Schindler's List", Voldemort in "Harry Potter", 'arry in "In Bruges"), but he gives his best and most subtle performance playing the kindhearted Justin.  Ralph breaks your heart by playing Justin restrained.  In one particularly moving scene, as he identifies the body of his dead wife, he quietly comforts his companion instead of shedding his own tears.

Fiennes' performance reflects the tone of the movie.  Fernando Meirelles ("City of God") doesn't let the pharmaceutical conspiracy sub-plot push the movie into melodrama.  There is clearly a political message here, but it becomes much more powerful as a backdrop to the story we really care about:  Fiennes finding out what happened to his wife.  Moreoever, Meirelles allows the secondary characters who move this sub-plot along to develop without defining them as soon as they appear on screen, making the revelation of their true nature infinitely more effective.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

20.  


Post-modernism is a difficult term to define, especially as it pertains to film.  As I understand it, post-modernism in cinema means a deconstruction of the medium, a process that actively reminds the viewer they are watching a contrived piece of art.  This seemingly contradictory principle yielded films like "Breathless", a stylistic revolution in its time but virtually unwatchable from an entertainment standpoint.

Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman gave the 2000s its first, and maybe only, mainstream post-modern movie.  "Adaptation" is about the writing of its own screenplay.  Sure, not everything that unfolds actually happened, but that is precisely the point.  Kaufman, arguably the most auteur of any working writer, proves the ultimate power of the screenplay (and its creator) by writing himself into an adaptation of "The Orchid Thief".  Brilliantly, he still adapts "The Orchid Thief" to some extent and simultaneously details his difficulties in writing that adaptation, tying the two very different stories together as a study of writing.  Kaufman deconstructs the process and weaves it into the fabric of the movie.  Brilliant.  If only he hadn't literally deconstructed his next work.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

21. 
Nolan's Batman films should be the standard against which comic book franchises are measured.  This second installment pushed the genre to new limits, becoming the first major motion picture to integrate IMAX footage with traditional 35 mm.  Heath Ledger's performance is astounding, a complete immersion into a psyche.  


Nolan keeps things grounded.  He's smart and disciplined, putting his $185 million to good use.  He favors special effects over computer-generated visual effects.  Almost everything here is done for real, or at least, without relying on CGI.  With the exception of the helicopter crash, nothing here looks fake.  Nothing.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

22.


I marvel at this adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho, a book made infamous by the extremely detailed misogynistic violence.  Mary Harron interestingly decided to show very little gore and presumably copyright issues prevented her from delving too much into the brand obsession of the 80s.  Instead, she focuses on her greatest asset:  Christian Bale.

Bale's breakout (for the second time) performance launched his career as one of the top leading men of this generation.  The strongest aspect of Bale's portrayal is his ability to make the audience root for Patrick Bateman, despite his behavior.  He finds the comedy in the role, an aspect most actors would dismiss but Bale sinks his teeth into it.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

23.

You might be saying, "In fuckin' Bruges on your list?" That's right.  To me, Martin McDonagh has usurped Tarantino's thrown as the king of loquacious hit men on celluloid.  One of the main differences between the two auteurs is that McDonagh writes better.  His dialogue crackles with the same wit that Tarrantino brought to Pulp Fiction but without calling attention to itself.  QT's characters often seem like vessels for his dialogue instead of fleshed out human beings.  With In Bruges, McDonagh wisely get his audience rooted in his characters by giving them depth (even the maniacal Ralph Fiennes), which makes the ironic situations and fabulous zingers that much more poignant.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

24.


A guilty pleasure. Rarely do Sci-Fi movies explore the interesting aspects of space, instead favoring man's true final frontier as another two dimensional battlefield. Sunshine holds a deep respect for both the beauty and danger of space that keeps it grounded in a level of realism unaccustomed to a genre marked by its fantastical elements. These realistic details (an oxygen garden that catches fire in an accident) up the ante for the audience. We believe in the peril inside and outside the ship .

With the Sun at center of both the story and the film's thematic elements, Danny Boyle utilizes his overt visual style to examine the nature of light. The result is some of the most avant-garde (and effective) footage seen in recent big budget films. Sunshine is an excellent example of a heavily stylized director focusing his talent for a purpose.

The Top 25 Movies of the Decade

25.

Shortly after 9/11, Sony bumped up the release date for their $100 million epic about the incident in Somalia that left 19 American soldiers and seemingly 10 million Somalis dead. The film's accelerated release date was the first of many elements exploiting America's newfound patriotism. Is "BHD" jingoistic? Maybe, but I have trouble accusing a film of glorifying war when I leave the theater scared shitless of getting drafted. Is it racist? Sorta. The "skinnies" get very little screen time when they're not being tore up by America's finest and little explanation of their plight makes it into the film.

So why is it number 25? "BHD" is the most immersive war film ever made. That's all you see. Ridley Scott weaves an impressive display of warfare on a scale that has never gotten its due. That's what people seemed to miss. The pure assault on the senses, the overwhelming amount of action, created a strangely objective view on war.