Our top 10's of 2000 - Time to throw down - Page 8

Evan
Anson and I had similar comments about the film. Probably it's biggest weakness IMHO.

If it were "live" I would probably have resorted to heckling them off the stage with "ENOUGH ALREADY".

Okay, I wouldn't be that rude. Instead I would have said "Fire all Zig. For Great Justice."

Jesus Son is NOT a 2000 film simply because it SUCKS!


ok, that had nothing to do with reality, just throwing the curveball. Yea, I'm saying we default to Academy standards and must be careful about the IMDb years. I know there are different sides to the debate and I'm not looking to win, I just want to have some standard cut-off point. Somewhere between the first draft of the script and the DVD release.

So Jesus Son is pretty good, huh? Guess I have another film to consider for my list. This thread is a bit like the AFI thread in that it gives a good, solid "to see" list for the year. I may not love all the contenders, but going through the top list makers here has helped me get more out of my theater going dollar.

I'm going to go back and retabulate as soon as I watch Wonder Boys (membership has it's privledges so to speak ). Dancer in the Dark next week on DVD, hurray.

I'll also get some final tab done right before the Oscars, just so we can see how our top 10 fare in the awards.


And, btw, if anybody notices films that are being thrown about as 2000 films when by AA standards they aren't, please let us know. I haven't made sure on each film or anything, I've been trusting the list makers to do that, although I have taken a few out of consideration that I knew were wrong for sure.


BTW, I have yet to see a 2001 film. Seems weird that I have somehow managed to avoid them all. Hopefully, Mood for Love will break that streak.

Jason, I realize that it may have hit NA at some point in 2000, but with a 2001 NY/LA opening I would say it belongs on the 2001 list.

Here's one very good reason why - come next year when Oscars are being discussed and best films of the year are being figured, ITMFL is going to be brought up. Heck, it may get a Foreign Language nomination. Then we will be sitting here having this same damn debate over when it came out, etc.

We have to have SOME standard of grouping. Otherwise we will have films being the best film of 2-3 different years, and to me that is kinda dumb. I'm not saying that the Academy standard is the end-all, be-all. But I am saying that no matter what standard we use, we should agree upon it. If we were to use the IMDb standard then people would be saying "I couldn't see it that year, it belongs in year X instead."

We could use the first NA release, the first world release, the first festival release, the first UK release, but whatever we use it seems to me that we should be using the same standard. And since each standard has faults in the logic, I'm going with Academy standards because they are famous and films tend to gear releases toward meeting those standards.

We all realize that many of us will not get to see all of the list at the same time. Making ITMFL a 2000 flick doesn't cure that. It can kick ass on next year's list just as well as it could this year's.

If someone has a BETTER cutoff point that makes better sense FOR EVERYONE participating, then I'm all ears. But at this point I think any cutoff point is going to divide things differently. If we aren't comparing from the same group of films, then this whole thread makes little sense.

Welcome, Bobak. Lists are always welcome, especially if you've just joined us.

If you decide to modify your list after seeing some films you've missed, PLEASE just go back to your original list you just posted and EDIT it. When you do, you might want to put a "last modified" date there as well.

Also, I like to come in and post a new post notifying everyone reading along that my list changed, just don't repost your list. I'm trying to keep each person's list in it's original spot in the thread.

For everyone,

I just watched Wonder Boys which barely bumped Vampire out. Man, WB, SotV, and Contender were very, very close for me. I think WB made it just because of the laughs. I still may go back and rearrange things as I'm not totally settled with the bottom of my list.

I do feel good about at least the top 10+, maybe even 15 films. That is, that they are really strong and accomplish some really good goals, even if some of them have flaws. It was a really good year for small or low-key films, maybe even above normal. If only the big boys could have kept up and won over critics AND mainstream audiances.

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"We keep you alive to serve this ship. So row well, and live."

"This is the new cut. Y'all be bad. Woo, woo, woo.

Ric,

1) I just did the same thing. I watched The Rock Criterion in DTS on the new Denon 3801 (coolness, although the film is falling quickly in my book). Then I wanted just to demo a bit of Almost Famous on the system while I still had the projector on. Over an hour later and my demo had run almost the whole movie and only the fact that I had to be somewhere kept me from the end. But in all fairness, I think the films I have above it on my list would have the same effect once I get them in the house.

It did make me feel better about dinging some of these quality films to the bottom of the list, or even off. I was starting to think it might be fond memories or something, but for me AF is the real deal.

PS - for those in the Oldman thread, I should give Hoffman a bit more credit. He still has similar nuances, but his AF character is a bit of a change from other stuff he's done.

2) I'm not sure about a cut-off date. Maybe after Traffic, CTHD, Before Night Falls, Pollock have all had a few weeks on DVD. That should be about the last of them. Then maybe we can archive it, or I could simply streamline it down to our lists for posteriety sake.

Now I know some of you are saying that even given till July there will be some good 2000 films you won't catch. But that is probably a bit true for all of us every year, so I will simply trust your efforts to get to MOST of the big ones.

After all, no money is being awarded and there is no shame in saying Dude, Where's My Car is your #1...ok, there's a little shame. The whole point of the thread is to get a pulse of what people think of films. The totalling I have been doing is just to give us a view of our collective feelings to go with the many individual looks at film.

So if you don't see Traffic till it plays on Starz! in November it just won't get to be on the list here I guess (and why did you WAIT so long?


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"We keep you alive to serve this ship. So row well, and live."

"This is the new cut. Y'all be bad. Woo, woo, woo.

Hey, don't look at me John, Ric brought it up.
I guess we ride it out till all the people chiming in feel satisfied and are ready to move on.

I mean, I think it's safe to say that if we were to ask in 5 years what the top 10 of 2000 were, the lists would be quite different and then we would have 5 other threads going too. At some point it's just going to seem natural for everyone to be moving on to summerizing 2001. Like I said above, that will probably be after the last big 2000 films hit DVD for those of us who missed some first runs.

I won't put a clampdown on it though.


I just endured Dancer in the Dark, which I found to be both inventive, creative, and powerful, but also a bit manipulative on the story side of things. Too much "a blind bunny gets killed by a croc and orphans are thrown to the snow...do you feel sad now?" Well, hell yeah I do.

But despite that aspect the ability to weave musical elements into what I assume to be a Dogme film, and even more so one with such bleak settings, certainly shows Lars' desire/ability to push the boundries of what can be done with film. I certainly felt the same need to escape into those numbers as Bjork did whenever they mercifully arrived.

So it's going on my list somewhere, I have to look at my list now. Roughly in the 7-10 range I'm guessing. BTW, the Dancer disc looks and sounds fantastic, I thought. DTS surround was nicely done, although my late night viewing meant that when the louder musical numbers kicked in I had to be quick on the draw with the remote. Haven't messed with the extras yet, but if this film is your cup of tea then New Line should be making you happy.

And hey, Charlies Angels is only about a week away, so some lists should change when that streets. I sure could have used it tonight as a chaser.