Andy's Completely unscientific list of movies he was glad he saw in years patterned 200n

[andrewducker]

Said list having been compiled by performing an IMDB search for movies scoring over 7 on the IMDB with more than 10,000 votes during 2000-2009 and then listing the ones that I thoroughly enjoyed.  I'm bound to have missed a few though.  And to have liked something you hated.

Feel free to tell me what I should have liked, providing you don't mind me telling you that, actually, the Hellboy movies didn't do much for me.  You can also feel free to tell me why I shouldn't have liked something, should you really be that bored.

300
A History of Violence
About A Boy
Almost Famous
American Psycho
Atonement
Audition
Avatar (to be confirmed)
Battle Royale
Blood Diamond
Brick
Burn After Reading
Charlie Wilson's War
Closer
Crash
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Downfall
Enchanted
Equilibrium
Finding Nemo
Finding Neverland
Gosford Park
Harry Potter
High Fidelity
Holes
Howl's Moving Castle
In Bruges
Inglourious Basterds
Iron Man
Juno
Kill Bill
King Kong
Kung Fu Hustle
Kung Fu Panda
Let The Right One In
Lilo & Stitch
Lust, Caution
Memento
Monster's Ball
Moon
Mulholland Drive
Old Boy
Once
Paris, je t'aime
Persepolis
Phone Booth
Quills
Ratatouille
Requiem For A Dream
Serenity
Sexy Beast
Shaun of the Dead
Shrek
Star Trek
Synecdoche, New York
Syriana
The 40 Year Old Virgin
The Aviator
The Bourne Identity
The Devil's Backbone
The Dark Knight
The Emperor's New Groove
The Fall
The Fountain
The Hours
The Incredible Hulk
The Last King of Scotland
The Last Samurai
The Lord Of The Rings
The Prestige
The Queen
The Reader
The Triplets of Bellevue
Tropic Thunder
Unbreakable
V For Vendetta
WALL-E
Watchmen
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Zodiac

Comments

[the-gardener.livejournal.com]

Avatar (to be confirmed)

I don't think one can say that one has enjoyed something one has not yet seen....

[andrewducker]

Absolutely. Hence "to be confirmed".

I'm just expecting to love it, as I've loved every James Cameron movie I've seen.

[laserboy.livejournal.com]

Piranha II: Flying Killers? Seriously?? :P

[andrewducker]

There's a reason I said "That I said" :->

[drjon.livejournal.com]

You can also feel free to tell me why I shouldn't have liked something...

Because you'll wake up one morning and find that a sockpuppet snake god has chewed your genitals off...?

[andrewducker]

If he didn't want V made into a movie then he shouldn't have signed the contract...

[drjon.livejournal.com]

I hope the thought comforts you as the divine yarn closes in for the cruellest nom of all...

[blearyboy.livejournal.com]

Good list in general, but I?ll let someone more eloquent explain why 300 is a dreaful film:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2008/oct/09/reel.history.300

[andrewducker]

They gloriously explain why it's ahistorical. But as an action epic it's _great_!

[blearyboy.livejournal.com]

Urgh, I honestly thought it was like watching an infomercial for abdominal toning equipment while someone repeatedly poked you in the eye. However, your defence of Lilo & Stitch below is spot on. Probably my favourite animated film of the decade which is saying something when you consider that this is the decade of Pixar.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I always found complaints about the historical accuracy of 300 a bit strange. It's a story narrated as an exaggerated legend by David Wenham's character, so I thought the OTT nature of everything fitted perfectly.

[andrewducker]

Exactly! It's a legend, not reality.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

A legend involving capes and jockstraps.

[andrewducker]

Those are the best legends!

[red-phil.livejournal.com]

Man, you see a lot of movies.

From your list I have only seen:
300, Almost Famous, Burn After Reading, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Finding Neverland, Harry Potter, Howl's Moving Castle, In Bruges, Iron Man, Kill Bill, King Kong, Memento, Serenity, Shaun of the Dead, Shrek, The Aviator, The Bourne Identity, The Dark Knight, The Incredible Hulk, The Lord Of The Rings, The Prestige, The Reader, V For Vendetta, Watchmen

And I'd agree that they were good with the exceptions of:
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Kill Bill, King Kong and The Incredible Hulk
None of which really grabbed me.
They weren't bad, just not great.

[andrewducker]

I was rather taken by the recent Hulk, but I can understand it's not everyone's cup of tea :->

[red-phil.livejournal.com]

Ah, it was the previous hulk I saw.
I believe 2 came out within a year or two of each other. I saw the 1st one.

[andrewducker]

Ang Lee's one was in 2003, the new one was in 2008. It was a lot more fun.

[poisonduk.livejournal.com]

AND you screamed like a girl at King Kong - I was sat beside you and almost dropped my popcorn!!!

[laserboy.livejournal.com]

I liked the Leader being suitably camp. Anyone that obsessed with the Hulk's body has something else going on, and they went there gloriously. Hurrah!

[andrewducker]

And that's only a movie every two months!

[red-phil.livejournal.com]

How many of those did you see in the cinema?

I only saw these at the cinema
300, Harry Potter, Kill Bill, Serenity, The Dark Knight, The Lord Of The Rings, Watchmen

I saw other stuff not on you list. but I can't remember what.

[andrewducker]

I'm in an odd situation where there's a cinema a 5 minute walk from my office, and the nearest video rental place is significantly further away.

Lilo & Stitch

[skington.livejournal.com]

OK, so you've got this weird-looking alien, and after all sorts of travails the moral is that family should stay together, no matter how different each member is, because family is far more important than that, can transcend such apparent superficial differences, and we're better off staying together as we were.

And to back this up, they refer to the Ugly Duckling, whose point is that if you end up as the odd-one-out, you probably didn't belong there, and eventually you'll find the family you should have been in, a family of people just like you.

It was bad enough when the Disney Little Mermaid didn't have her die at the end, but this was simply viciously contemptuous. Bah.

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[andrewducker]

But Stitch _does_ find a family that are just like him. He has Lilo, who is _spiritually_ his family. Lilo also didn't fit in with the friends she had, but she finds the friend she belongs with - Stitch.

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[ninebelow.livejournal.com]

all sorts of travails the moral is that family should stay together

Stich - an orphan - finds a family in two sisters who love each other. What is objectionable about that?

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[skington.livejournal.com]

It's not objectionable. But it's not the plot of the Ugly Duckling.

Stitch arrives in an established family, and starts off causing trouble. If you decide that the Ugly Duckling is a book you should use to make decisions, then the obvious consequence would be for Stitch to leave the family and look for a better one.

It turns out that that would have been a bad idea, and in the end they work out their differences and end up a happy family. That's fine! But it's not the plot of the Ugly Duckling; it's the opposite of the plot!

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[andrewducker]

I don't understand why you think it should have the same plot as The Ugly Duckling...

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[skington.livejournal.com]

Because they spend all the time in the film reading from the Ugly Duckling, and then they say "Hey, our life is exactly the same thing!"

But it's not!

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[andrewducker]

Wow. We clearly saw two different movies. There's a (very short) scene where Stitch asks what it is, and she explains it's about being lost before being found by your family - and later on he looks at it when he's alone and cries, but I didn't take it to be at all central to the movie - just a way of symbolising his alienation. No more than Stitch's Godzilla impression halfway through meant that he'd had to end the movie by walking slowly into the sea until he vanished beneath the waves.

Re: Lilo & Stitch

[laserboy.livejournal.com]

Agreed. Lovely film.

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

Films starting with 'The' should NOT be filed under 'T' unless the second word also begins with T! :P

[andrewducker]

I agree! I just did it in the order the search found them, if I'd had more time/inclination I'd have reordered those ones.

[simont]

I always thought that in record stores, the band "The The" should be filed at the start of the alphabet. :-)

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

No Battle Royale or Audition? No Let The Right One In?

[andrewducker]

My eyes seem to have glazed over on lots of foreign titles on the IMDB. Because, yes, all three of those are great. Although I'd be careful who I recommended the first two to :->

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I'd love to reccomend Audition to someone who knows nothing about it. :-D