Ok everyone (all five of you) so begins the countdown of my favorite flicks from 2000-2009. A couple of quick housekeeping notes before we go on.

• These are nothing but what I feel the best films are from 2000-2009. The films I feel are the most relevant, lasting, entertaining, and valuable films of the last ten years. What I think is merely the funniest film of the last 10 years is probably not on this list. The film I’ve watched more than any from the last 10 years might not be on this list. But these represent what I feel the BEST 25 films of the last 10 years are.
• Andrew Brenner should be counting his down too. Definitely check his out. He has taste, ours just doesn’t always overlap. Check his out as well if you are so inclined.
• We (as in Andrew and I) will be counting down five each Wednesday, with the final five on Wednesday Dec 30, 2009.
• I still plan to return to my countdown of my top 100 favorites of all time at some point in the next decade. Be on the lookout.
• These posts are written with the intent to preserve the key aspects of the story of the films as spoiler-free if you’ve not seen them. Feel free to read if you haven’t.

Without further adieu…

25. SHAUN OF THE DEAD – 2004

Here the cast is, each with their own interpretation of what a zombie walk looks like.

This one isn’t world-changing, life-changing, or anything much more than fun. But it’s very smart. It’s parody without being directly on the nose, and before you know it you’re wrapped up in a flick that is both a romantic comedy and a zombie movie. And despite the pitfalls that could come with such a setup, it’s not silly. Although, there’s a pun right there in the title. What’s not to love?

If you aren’t familiar with the charm of Simon Pegg, this is a perfect introduction. Pegg, with his Director Edgar Wright, wrote this film along with 2007’s entertaining “Hot Fuzz” as the first film in their “Blood and Ice Cream” trilogy. Blood and Ice cream is a complex reference to the famed Three Colors trilogy of Polish Director Krzysztof Kieślowski. If pardoy comic films referencing an acclaimed art-house series of foreign films seems odd, well, it’s just because Pegg and Wright are just that smart. They know film conventions better than Las Vegas knows actual conventions. And in this film, every trick of the trade is on display.

Yes, the subject of this parody is zombie films, but it’s also wrapped up in a fairly traditional romantic comedy, with entertaining and rewarding technical factors that should please fans of film, not just fans of popcorn movies. This is the rare, intelligent comedy that also features gore and scatological humor.

Is it a zombie movie? An action movie? A love story? A comedy? Yes, it is all of these things. The fact is it’s not a bad example of any of them.  It’s really well above average in all of these categories which makes for an excellent overall film. There are sequences that are truly, laugh-out-loud funny. There are sequences that are truly memorable. They really put a lot of thought into this film, it will reward you for watching it, I promise.

24. GLADIATOR – 2000

IS THIS NOT WHY YOU ARE HERE?!?!?

I’ll admit, this one makes this list for mostly visceral reasons. It’s been called “Rocky on downers” and its washed-out style is purposefully bleak.  And if you choose to view this film through that lens, the film can feel that way as well. But I choose to view it as a story of redemption and expectations. And viewed through that lens, the movies looks anything but bleak. Some call it the worst Best Picture winner of all time, I’m wondering if those people saw “Titanic”.

The cast is near-perfect for this film, Russell Crowe went from flabby, uptight middle aged man pushed to the brink in “The Insider” to epic badass bound for revenge here. Say what you will about the guy, but the man can act. He plays Maximus the General as a man oozing natural leadership qualities.  When faced with true adversity, those same qualities carry him through. He’s an animal in some ways, and fully human in others. This role won him a Best Actor Oscar because he plays pushed to the brink just as well with anger, sadness, and quiet acceptance.

Joaquin Phoenix is also perfect as the perennially disappointing and perpetually conniving Commodus. He inspires a lot of hatred, but you can’t help but see him as truly pathetic as well. And as his father the Emperor, Richard Harris is what Richard Harris does so well—loveable, sweet, kind, and caring. You don’t even think about all the horrors perpetuated in the name of Rome under his rule because he is such a sweet old man, thus making his son all the more disappointing and evil for his actions. But the film doesn’t just drop each of the main players into archetypal roles—Harris is quick to admit his failures as a father, Maximus knows the beast within and is able to tame it from time to time, but also kills with a lusty fire in his eyes when he feels like it. These aren’t one-dimensional characters in bedsheets and armor vamping around with the traditional British/Roman accent. The fact that they aren’t owes largely to the talent of the actors playing the characters.

The film also features a who’s whom of aging British actors playing their roles with aplomb—Oliver Reed in his last on-screen performance, Derek Jacobi, David Hemmings, et al. And Djimon Hounsou, unfortunately following his excellent performance in “Amistad” as, yet again, a slave fighting for freedom. Historical Dramas, like history, are fairly unkind to those with darker skin.  But Houston and the British vets all add nuance to characters that would otherwise be merely typical.

You’ve probably seen this one, and if you have it’s one of those love it or hate it kinds of movies. It isn’t historically accurate, nor does it claim to be. And there are more-advanced and better films from an Effects standpoint. But for it’s breadth of production, fantastic cast, entertaining story, and visceral inspiration, there are few films that are its equal from the last decade.

23. SIDEWAYS – 2004

These men are not irresponsibly drunk, yet.

Well this one is mostly depressing. But it’s also often incredibly enjoyable, sometimes lively, sweet, and even a little charming.

Those sentences describe this film, but they may as well be words used by the main character to describe a wine. And they may was well be used by a viewer to describe the main character. Such is the wonderfully complex nature of wine, the character, and this film.

Titles are important to a film, and this one is called Sideways for what I can only gather are myriad reasons. One, it’s ostensibly about a bachelor party trip to California wine country in which things go, well, sideways. Two, it refers to how important titling a glass sideways is when evaluating particular vintages of wine. Three, it’s in reference to where the main character is going in life. Certainly not forward, and not back (there isn’t much further back he can go) but sideways. Just completely off the tracks.

Paul Giamatti is a wonderful actor, and never before or since has he played a character that is more human. He plays a man with several unlikable characteristics (including visiting his mother just so he can steal money from her) and yet he plays him in such a human way you can’t help but pity him and wish him well.

His character, for good and bad, is revealed in many ways, from a sequence in which he takes his time reading on the toilet only to proclaim that the reason for his delay was traffic, to hilarious rants and actions involving wine he perceives to be below his palette. That he’s the “hero”, the moral center, in this film is but one of the ways in which it leaves a lasting impact. It also does a masterful job of developing three other ensemble roles, including two for women (a somewhat-rare feat in modern cinema) as three dimensional humans, warts and all.  We laugh with them, we question their decisions, we cry with them and for them. This is another smart film, especially writing wise. The characters make decisions that don’t make logical sense, but make absolute sense with what we know about them.

This movie never fails to make me laugh, and it never fails to make me sad and cringe in emotion, and it never fails to make me just a little happy too. Some people would say the same about wine, I guess.

22. IN BRUGES -  2008

An F-Bomb is likely no more than 10 words away.

Another admission, “In Bruges” is on the list mainly because it is eerily reminiscent of one of my all-time favorite films, Nicholas Roeg’s horror masterpiece “Don’t Look Now”. “In Bruges” is not a horror film, per se, which is to say it’s not a film in the horror genre, but it’s absolutely a film about the horrors of facing up to your actions and the horror that can emerge when true self-analysis is undertaken.

It’s a movie about two hitmen, one a rookie one a veteran, sent for some Rest and Relaxation to Bruges, Belgium after a botched job in Ireland. Bruges is, as one of them points out like a tour guide, “the best-preserved medieval city in Belgium!” And other than awesome things to look at (and this movie will most likely make you want to go to Bruges) there isn’t much else to say about Bruges. It’s…well it’s almost like purgatory. And that’s the way the film treats it, like a character unto itself, where these men are sent without intent to repent for their sins, but a place that can’t help but inspire the sort of self-analysis that leads to that. In Bruges they have little to do other than sit in their hotel, meet odd characters, and fester in their own self-pity.

The film is incredibly well-written and directed in his first foray into film by popular Irish playwright and director Martin McDonagh. It’s clear he came from the stage, the film plays in long silences and limited set-pieces, and thrives on the inter-personal interaction between the hitmen (played wonderfully on both accounts by Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell) and the characters that pop up in such a places as Bruges. That such an accomplished actor as Ralph Fiennes plays a bit part as the boss who sends the hitmen to Bruges speaks to the quality of the director.

There’s definitely some existential dialogue in the film, and then there’s definitely some truly funny dialogue as well (Colin Farrell, in particular, can’t stand Bruges or anything in it, including himself, which often makes for quite humorous and memorable interactions). It reminds me of “Don’t Look Now” which uses back alley canals and doorways to create remarkable suspense and horror in Venice, in that it uses the looming medieval churches and expansive squares in Bruges to play on those existential feelings and ennui over the human condition. The film is titled “In Bruges” because the story is truly about what for these characters, at this time in their lives, being in Bruges means, and what affect it has on them. Bruges is as much a character as they are, the place defines them directly, and indirectly. It’s a fantastic bit of writing and filmmaking.

Unlike art house films that would be more obtuse with plot, character, action, etc, this film is entertaining and rewarding to watch. The music is great, the acting is top notch, and it’s shot incredibly well. There are other films on this list where the setting plays as much a part as the characters, but I am not sure there are any this well-layered and affecting.

21. LOST IN TRANSLATION – 2003

"I think I left the stove on..."

The previous films on this list have, in various ways, confronted elements of the human condition. None of them does it in as real a way as “Lost in Translation” does. If “Gladiator” is a near-cartoon, this one is a near-documentary.

Director Sophia Coppola is famous for being, well, related to famous. And seemingly terribly miscast in “The Godfather Part III” (though my feelings are it wasn’t the mistake others feel it is, more on that…probably never.). But here, as a director, she excels by not getting in the way of the characters and their story. By letting them luxuriate in the open, twist in the wind, and marinate in their emotions. There’s a famous shot in “Taxi Driver” where Robert DeNiro’s character is on the phone having an incredibly cringe-inducing conversation. The camera pans away from the conversation–it’s too much for even the audience in a legendarily-violent film to bear. “Lost in Translation” features several such moments, and the camera stays right on the characters. Right on the withered face of Bill Murray, who is playing a character that is so little a stretch from what he appears as an actor that it’s hard to tell where the lines of reality and fiction are drawn. There are more lines in on his aging-comic withered face than there are drawn between what is real to him, and reality for his character.

That’s only one of the reasons “Lost In Translation” works so wonderfully. This film accurately captures what it feels like to feel lost and alone, and at the same time welcomed in the presence of someone feeling the same way. It’s two people without a net running across a tightrope hand in hand; two people without a paddle laughing, and using their arms to swim upstream. Like in “In Bruges” the milieu, here Tokyo, plays an important role. 25 story dinosaurs run across buildings. Endless mazes of pachinko machines hum and ring behind every turn. Adventures aren’t sought, they just happen in the everyday. And two ships passing in the night stop and dance together. And it’s lovely, absolutely lovely, with touches of sadness, grief, boredom, and depression.

It’s filmed impeccably. It’s acted superbly. It’s not terribly funny, but contains moments of comic genius (it is Bill Murray after all). Nothing happens, and yet everything happens, and our characters take as it finds them. Enough cannot be said about Bill Murray’s Oscar-Nominated performance here. He’s playing a funny guy who is just too tired and sad to be funny, and yet he can’t hide the twinkle that pops up in his eyes from time to time. In another film, you just know this character would’ve undergone some cut and dried transformation, so that the smoldering comic genius you catch hints of here would become a conflagration of hilarity. But real life isn’t nearly as cut and dried as cinema would have it. And neither is this film.

If you’ve seen it, you”ll no doubt remember the moment the picture here captures. I love that the film leaves it to speculate on what might have been said there, and I suspect each of us has our own interpretation, based on who we are and what we’ve encountered. I suspect that interpretation, like this film, can change depending on when we set out to determining it, based on where we are in life. Books can do that–affect us in different ways depending on when we read them. Only the best films can have that kind of  lasting impact. This one does.