I'll pull a Roger Ebert. I’ve picked my favorite ten films of the decade, but I can easily choose another ten great ones here, in no particular order. They are all well worth viewing if you’ve time to kill.
In the Bedroom (2001): an intense drama concerning how the tragedy of a murdered son can break apart a seemingly strong, upper-class family Set in rural New England, Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek, as the well-off parents, give two of the strongest performances of the last ten years. This one comes just a hair short of my top ten.
The Hurt Locker (2009): my pick for the best film of 2009. I knew it was a great movie about ten minutes in—it captures the absolute intensity of Operation Iraqi Freedom in a way that every other film since 2003 has failed to. Jeremy Renner gives one of the best performances of the year as a soldier who thrives on the life-or-death challenges of disarming bombs in
Wonder Boys (2001): easily one of the most observant and sarcastic movies I’ve watched about the writing process. Michael Douglas plays a washed-up, marijuana-dependent novelist/literature professor who hasn’t authored a thing in nearly a decade. Tobey Maguire gives a very mature performance as the kid who threatens to surpass his mentor.
Stranger Than Fiction (2006): Will Ferrell turns in a great performance, working outside the now-boring confines of his “Frank-the-Tank” personality. He plays an IRS agent who starts hearing voices, only to find out that the voice is that of a real-life author. The kicker: she’s writing a book where he’ll be killed off in the final pages. Maggie Gyllenhall, Emma Thompson, and Dustin Hoffman are all phenomenal supporting players.
Y Tu Mama Tambien (2001): the story of two sex-crazed best friends from different economic backgrounds who, almost accidentally, set off on a road trip with a woman twice their age to discover themselves. The final scenes reveal a couple of interesting plot twists that change both characters’ lives in ways they couldn’t have imagined at the outset. And, for once, the voiceover actually is actually useful for putting the story in a broader context.
American Beauty (2000): Kevin Spacey gives a wonderful performance as Lester Burnham, the father of a family that’s falling to pieces. To make things better, he tries to relive his youth by quitting his white-collar job, flipping burgers, lifting weights, and getting high as fuck all the time, much to the chagrin of his wife and only daughter. And Chris Cooper, as the homophobic neighbor with a major secret to hide, steals most of the scenes he’s in.
Starting Out in the Evening (2007): another great movie about writing. Leonard Schiller (Frank Langella, always outstanding) is an ailing author who wrote four books earlier in his life that are now out of print. A grad student played by Lauren Ambrose becomes very close to Schiller and tries to use her master’s thesis to bring the author’s work back from the dead.
The Squid and the Whale (2005): Noah Baumbach proved to be a whiz at writing smart, cutting dialogue with this film. After watching his 1995 comedy Kicking and Screaming, I checked out this pic, a study of a family in complete crisis. With the dissolution of a marriage between Bernard and Joan Berkman (Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney, both excellent), their two kids must take sides in a brutal divorce.
Before Sunset (2004): this talky romantic film is the sequel to Richard Linklater’s impressive 1995 pic, Before Sunrise. This time, the camera follows Jesse and Celine (Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy) through Paris as they talk intelligently about how their lives have changed in the ten years they were apart. But their reunion finds both dissatisfied with their lives to a degree. It’s a brilliantly written and well-acted film, even if it’s not quite as lighthearted as the earlier picture.
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