C. Adolph Moores Top Ten Films of the Decade (The Aughts)

As I am always one to be fashionably late - whether to work, parties, dinners or funerals - I felt it would be in keeping with my inimitable style to offer my top ten films of the prior decade list after the turn of 2009. A hearty "fuck you" to convention and a nice jab with a sharp stick into the eye of my critical contemporaries.

That and the fact I am inherently lazy, absolutely burned out on the cinema and have been sick as a dog for the past ten days. But the ague has receded, the drink has been poured anew and I am ready to summate the best and worst of this last pathetic decade with quick wit and lashings of my acerbic tongue.

Outside of the ten gems I am about to list, the aughts were perhaps the darkest times of my life so far. I spent eight years of them in Alabama, a sentence more appropriate for child molestation or hog stealing than simply tagging along on a spousal career move.

I watched Al Gore lose one of the most winnable elections ever in 2000 to a guy who could barely scrawl his name in the dirt with a twig and then, four years later, watched as that same mouth breather won the presidency again on a groundswell of fear, Jeebus, greed and idiocy votes that made me wonder whether my entire country had succumbed to mass hysteria or the ravages of unchecked gonorrhea.

As a nation, we seemed to be writing policy in crayon.

But let's not forget how most of this nonsense started. If the election of a born-again frat boy, dry drunk wasn't enough to ensure a major shift to a more theocratic America, a few Muslim shitbags decided to really get the ball rolling by slamming some airliners into the WTC.

That fucking day.

When Americans finally got their collective shit together and realized we best drop our myopic, toy-filled playtime for a moment, cease the childish bickering amongst ourselves and pay some fucking attention to what the hell was going on around us.

It lasted about 48 hours. Then, like we always do, instead of looking at the problem rationally, creating viable options and alternatives and setting out to resolve the problem at hand, we lost our collective shit, declared "war" on a tactic, turned on the lizard brain, let Ted Nugent and Toby Keith symbolically direct international policy and tromped the earth in search of ass to kick.

And with all this; the endless wars of empire abroad, methods that guarantee endless future Jihad recruits, the deaths and suffering of millions of innocent people, preemptive war doctrines, preventive detention, the rape of the U.S. Constitution, the beginnings of a police and surveillance state here in this country, the expansion of executive power, the legitimization of torture, the sponsorship of religious mercenaries (Xe), black sites, ad nausea... there are still those who believe we must go further down the path.

To keep us safe from those big bad terrorists out there. Those menacing cave dwellers who travel by mule, pray fourteen fucking times a day and wipe their ass with their hand. I'm wetting my pants under the bed just thinking about their omnipotent power. How have we survived this long with those superhuman warriors of Allah posed against us?

Those who are too dangerous to be held in our federal prison system or tried in our criminal courts. Those who actually pose less of a fatality risk than a lightning bolt or a fast food burger.

We have become a bunch of cringing pansies.

No one can now convince me that the terrorists haven't already won this endless "war".

And all because they wisely knew that the only enemy big, dumb and mean enough to defeat the mighty United States of America resided right within its own citizenry.

The enemy is us and has always been - from our first disproportionate overreaction to our current cowardice in not dragging Joe Lieberman's carcass behind horses through the streets of D.C. whilst pelting him with rotten fruit and stones.

Here's a sentiment not nearly expressed enough: Fuck you, Connecticut. If you re-elect that traitorous Zionist one more time I'm going to come up there and just start punching people in the mouth.  

But don't believe me in any of this. I was one of those idiots who thought 9/11 was a criminal matter best handled through the international intelligence community and the rule of law.

But no, no, you're right. Let's keep trying it your way. Keep hammering the wasp's nest with the bludgeon. War is always the best answer. It's just been so goddamn successful thus far. I can't wait to catch the sequels in Yemen and Iran.

The practice of the eternal wrong.

Oh, and come to find out, on the home front, the 7+ years of bottomless war financing, creative accounting and predatory greed did not bankrupt the nation. Apparently, it was the forced loans to minority homebuyers that crushed us. Who knew?

And the right keeps a straight face through all of this.

Bring on the plate spinners and elephants! Cue the calliope!!!

It's bread and circuses for everyone!

But now we have Obama in office and its all going to be better. Yup. And that lying, bait-and-switch, testicularly-challenged, neo-liberal, blue-dog lovin', smooth-talking, anti-progressive, corporatist motherfucker can suck my fat, social-democratic knob.

Thanks for the hopiness® and changiness®, Asshole 

I guess my gist is this:

Shitty.Fucking.Decade.

But we were supposed to be talking about film, weren't we? And for all the rest of the shit stew we had to swallow by the ladleful in the aughts, film turned out to be not so bad. Surprisingly, since the target audience for Hollywood seems to be regressing toward the womb with each passing year. Pretty soon movies will consist of nothing more than a movie star du jour coming on screen and jangling his keys in front of the audience for 120 minutes. 

Enough of my griping. Let's get on with it. There were some interesting consistencies (or coincidences perhaps) among the ten films I selected. Many were relatively political. I think that was demanded as a true reflection of the decade. Four were from 2006. As is my preference, most were dark and difficult, sometimes torturous on the audience. Guy Pearce showed up in two of them. And as a tip of my hat to what seems to be the future of arty cinema, I included more Latinos than you'd find at a cockfight held behind a raging dung fire in Chiapas. The best films in the world and the most talented filmmakers are pouring out of Mexico and South America. That's a good thing. I have also included a list of very good movies that just barely missed the cut as well as an honorable mention roll at the end of the piece. All should be seen and praised.

Without further ado:

The Ten Best Films of the Decade (2000-2009)

Memento (2000) - Weird, twisting bit of chronological gimmickry from Christopher Nolan and his brother Jonathan (the two who have revived the Batman franchise) that has Guy Pearce as a violently, vengeful widower with a rare form of short term amnesia. He remembers the goal of wanting to find his wife's killer, but forgets the immediate actions he has taken and conversations he has had in his investigation. This leads to some harrowing situations, plenty of mistrust and a bevy of body tattoos that act as reminders and notes in his pursuit of the killer. The film's most fascinating idea is that our protagonist may just be a deranged, murderous psychopath who made all this shit up in order to feed his bloodlust.  

Babel (2006) - Powerfully interwoven internationalism from director Alejandro González Iñárritu, who also provided the brilliant 21 Grams (also in this list) and Amores Perros this decade. The story loosely connects four separate families - Afghani, American, Japanese and Mexican - via a single bullet shot from a rifle. Most impressive is the iconography used by Iñárritu, which will surely be commonplace in the next decade and beyond; small Afghani boys with weapons, Brad Pitt traveling in some third world shit-hole, an elderly Mexican woman trying to cross the border into the U.S. and a young, sexually confused Japanese chick stripping out of a schoolgirl outfit. Prescient. Very prescient.

21 Grams (2003) -  While we're all lovin' on Alejandro González Iñárritu, let's squeeze in an appreciation for this bleak, soul wrenching masterpiece of his from three years earlier. Another film which plays havoc with the narrative continuum and takes a nice break from linear storytelling. All to powerful ends. A traffic accident connects the three leads (Benicio Del Toro, Sean Penn, Naomi Watts) in very peculiar ways as each is concurrently going through depression, grief, denial and self-discovery. A deep, consistently surprising meditation on how lives intersect and effect others. Acting is top notch throughout. Very moving and exhaustingly good.

Cidade de Deus (City of God) (2003) - Fernando Meirelles' near cinema verite style glimpse inside the slums of Rio de Janeiro where the lives and directions of two youths are shown over a period of three decades ('60s-'80s). One is an aspiring photographer (who narrates the story), the other, a gangster who rises to power in the lawless slum. Reminiscent of Luis Buñuel's Los Olvidados but much more ambitious in scope and vision. The brutal, crushing poverty and hopelessness is both frightening and gripping. Makes one appreciate their lot in life. Inferior TV sequel Cidade dos Homens (City of Men) was rather disappointing.

The Proposition (2005) - Dusty, violent, savage western from Australia, set in the late 19th century. The film, directed by John Hillcoat (The Road) from a Nick Cave (yes, from the Bad Seeds) screenplay, sees Guy Pearce as a captured member of a gang of outlaw brothers who have been causing mayhem and murder in the Outback. The territory's lawman (Ray Winstone) strikes up a deal with Pearce wherein he will spare his life and his younger brother's (also captured) if he goes out and brings in the rest of the gang, dead or alive. Hyper-violence, betrayal and weird strains of justice ensue. Not for the squeamish. Cool soundtrack from Cave.

Children of Men (2006) - A pretty fair glimpse of what the world's going to look like in about 15 years if the Republicans ever gain total control of the government again. Indiscriminate bombings, ash filled skies, troops on every street corner with automatic weapons, rampant infertility, a general sense of defeatism and doom and perhaps most ghastly, more appearances by Julianne Moore in feature films. Set in 2027 London, the youngest human on earth has died at the age of eighteen. An unexplained defect has caused sterilization amongst the entire population. Society is careening out of control and the future seems lost. A world weary bureaucrat (Clive Owen) joins his underground activist ex-wife in trying to save a young, inexplicably pregnant woman from various, dangerous sects and the government itself. Great Orwellian stuff with a creepily realistic feel and look.

The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006) - Ken Loach's historical masterpiece dealing with the early turbulent years of the formation of the IRA as seen through the eyes of two Irish brothers. As with all Loach films, class struggle and the continual fight against the abuses perpetrated by the powerful are at the forefront. In 1920s Ireland, the English "black and tans" represented these indignities. Through guerilla tactics and terror, the small bands of IRA fighters were able to force a temporary peace and a treaty which was viewed by many as a traitorous appeasement. Thus causing political divides which exist to this day. The film provides a fascinating gaze into the initial call to arms and the perfidy, compromises and betrayals which followed. Leftist filmmaking at its best.

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) - Another strange, ambitious, ironic, funny, touching, quirky bit of pop filmmaking from Wes Anderson (Rushmore) who has a great sense of comedic editing style and a devilishly clever ear for classic rock soundtracks. It's bubble gum and popcorn for grownups and it's a lot of goddamn fun. The story deals with the Tenenbaum clan, a wealthy N.Y. family of eccentrics with three child prodigies for offspring (Luke Wilson, Ben Stiller, Gwyneth Paltrow), a good timing philanderer for a patriarch (Gene Hackman), a stalwart matriarch (Anjelica Huston) and an orbiting bunch of crazies as workers and friends of the family. Surprising is how Anderson can take all this chaotic, cynical nuttiness and make it so utterly charming and warm. Timing, timing, timing. Excellent narration from Alec Baldwin.

Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) (2006) - If anyone who didn't gripe about the Bush Administration's use of illegal surveillance or the FISA fiasco wants to see what happens when shit like that is allowed to go unchecked, just watch this film and take a look back at the East German surveillance state before the wall fell. A nation where everyone is suspect, speaking out against government decisions and abuses is viewed as tantamount to treason and individual rights and civil liberties are continually eroded in order to preserve the precious security of the nation and its citizenry. Sound familiar? Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's (I love that name!) admonishing reflection on the tactics of the Stasi is not only a political siren but a deeply nuanced story of obsession, envy, ideals of privacy, corruption and self-deception. Ulrich Muehe is devastating as the Stasi captain assigned to eavesdrop on a writer and his actress lover. It is a performance of astonishing minimalism in a film which is already emotionally distant and icy cold to the touch. Paced beautifully at 137 minutes. Muehe died a year after the film's release. Interestingly, Muehe was under surveillance by the East German government in the 1980s and his wife was an actual Stasi informant.

There Will Be Blood (2007) - Absolute masterpiece from Paul Thomas Anderson, loosely based on Upton Sinclair's Oil, is a harsh look at the greedy, power-mad nature of unchecked capitalism and the sort of misanthropic, egomaniacal beasts who thrive on it. Daniel Day-Lewis gives the best film performance of the last 15 years as the cynical, hate-filled oilman, Daniel Plainview - the sort of man that Woody Guthrie warned you about - who buys up some desolate California land and builds an oil dynasty around it. As he has no other interests or soul, his entire being and energies are focused simply on pulling oil from the ground and making money. Not to purchase nice things or build up the town or enrich the lives of others, mind you, but more so to simply lord his wealth over his competitors and those whom he feels have crossed him. It is an epic story of the lust for power and money leading to the inevitable emptiness and loss of humanity at the end of that pursuit. It also slays religion magnificently. God-awful soundtrack from Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood is the film's only flaw. I drink your milkshake!!! 

Films That Just Missed The Cut:

The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada

No Country for Old Men

Inland Empire

Lost in Translation

Vera Drake

Syriana

Munich

Synecdoche, New York

A Very Long Engagement

Honorable Mention:

Amores Perros

Best in Show

Shadow of the Vampire

Away From Her

In the Bedroom

Amelie

The Devil's Backbone

The Piano Teacher

The Pianist

The Pledge

Talk to Her

The Magdalene Sisters

The Man on the Train

The Others

Punch Drunk Love

Stevie

Whale Rider

Dogville

The Dreamers

Open Water

Swimming Pool

Downfall

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

The Machinist

The Sea Inside

The Constant Gardner

Spider

Good Night and Good Luck

United 93

The Departed

Letters from Iwo Jima

Pan's Labyrinth

Bad Education

Brick

Half Nelson

Lars and the Real Girl

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Michael Clayton

Eastern Promises

The Orphanage

The Road

The Man Who Wasn't There

Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Comments

[Lance Lyle]

Dear Sir.,

As usual, your taste in movies is nearly impeccable (in stark contrast to your manifold intellectual failures, neatly displayed by your gassy fulminations at the top of this article).

That said, I'd remove "Babel" and "Children of Men" from your top ten and add "A Very Long Engagement" and "The Assassination of Jesse James..."

And if you still haven't seen "Lilya-4-Ever," make that one a priority.

But that's a very minor quibble on my part. This list is by far the best of an endless series I have recently read, most of which lead one to seriously question the author's sanity. Unless you think "Slumdog Millionaire" really deserved to win Oscars.

Pots of, well, something or other,

LML

[C. Adolph Moores]

My bubble hath burst!
And here I thought my gassy political fulminations were startlingly more acute than my snobbish film taste.

[jjmitch21]

Chip, I know this is a very late response, but Best in Show sucked ass! It was horribly boring. Sure, it makes fun of dog fanciers, but it was a total fucking No Show for entertainment.