Dynamic Top Tens of 2009

[aox]

01 Police, Adjective (Porumboiu)

Damn. I had a chance to see this, but opted out when I had four different friends say it was terrible (except, apparently, for one specific scene.)

[gyorgys]

OT, but Amazon announced a blu-ray of Porumboiu's Police, Adjective, by courtesy of IFC (Criterion?).

[swo17]

01 Police, Adjective (Porumboiu)

Damn. I had a chance to see this, but opted out when I had four different friends say it was terrible (except, apparently, for one specific scene.)

This doesn't surprise me, especially if your friends went in expecting a fast-paced cop movie. But the fact that it's not made for mass consumption makes it all the more special to me. It's definitely a film that benefits from reflection and multiple viewings. When I watch it at this point, I find it poignant and hilarious, but more in theory than in any sort of setup/punchline kind of way.

[aox]

Well, back on the Netflix Queue it goes then... thanks.

[joshua]

1. Still Walking- Koreeda Hirokazu
2. The Beaches of Agnès- Agnès Varda
3. 24 City- Jia Zhang-ke
4. Tokyo Sonata- Kurosawa Kiyoshi
5. The Headless Woman- Lucrecia Martel
6. Summer Hours- Olivier Assayas
7. Mother- Bong Joon-Ho
8. City of Life and Death- Lu Chuan
9. Shirin- Abbas Kiarostami
10. Fados- Carlos Saura

also enjoyed:

Accident- Chaeng Pou-Soi
Bad Biology- Frank Henenlotter
Bellamy- Claude Chabrol
The Embodiment of Evil- José Mojica Marins
The Good, the Bad, the Weird- Kim Jee-woon
Julia- Erick Zonca
Limits of Control, The- Jim Jarmusch
Lorna's Silence- Dardenne Brothers
My Dear Enemy- Lee Yoon-Ki
Of Time and the City- Terence Davies
Pontypool- Bruce McDonald
Revanche- Götz Spielmann
Secret of the Grain, The- Abdel Kechiche
35 Shots of Rum- Claire Denis
Three Monkeys- Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Tulpan- Sergey Dvortsevoy

disliked or outright hated:

Grace- Paul Solet
Inglourious Basterds- Quentin Tarantino (Top Secret! without the laughs.)
Martyrs- Pascal Laugier (A miss-mash of themes from better movies capped off by a lunk headed open ending that is not really all that open.)
Not Quite Hollywood- Mark Hartley
Public Enemies- Michael Mann (When it comes to understanding what it is that attracts folks to Michael Mann's films, I completely miss the boat.)
Thirst- Park Chan-Wook
Watchmen- Zach Snyder

[reno dakota]

I'm very late to this, but here is mine:

1. Police, Adjective. (Porumboiu)
2. The Time That Remains (Suleiman)
3. Bright Star (Campion)
4. White Material (Denis)
5. A Prophet (Audiard)
6. I Am Love (Guadagnino)
7. Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl (de Oliveira)
8. Dogtooth (Lanthimos)
9. The White Ribbon (Haneke)
10. The Hurt Locker (Bigelow)

[paranoid-knight2008]

01. Adventureland (Greg Mottola)
02. The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow)
03. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
04. A Single Man (Tom Ford)
05. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
06. Mary and Max (Adam Elliot)
07. Halloween II (Rob Zombie)
08. 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
09. Julia (Erick Zonca)
10. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans (Werner Herzog)

I'm kinda late. But oh well. Haha

[matrixschmatrix]

I'm kinda late. But oh well. Haha

Yep.

1. Where the Wild Things Are
2. Fantastic Mr. Fox
3. The Informant!
4. Moon
5. Inglorious Basterds
6. Coraline
7. Public Enemies
8. Up
9. Star Trek
10. A Serious Man

[Timec]

1. Fantastic Mr. Fox
2. Everlasting Moments
3. O'Horten
4. A Serious Man
5. Lorna's Silence
6. Ponyo
7. Everyone Else
8. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans
9. Wendy and Lucy
10. Revanche

[Professor Wagstaff]

Gonna jump on this bandwagon too.
1) Up in the Air (Reitman)
2) Adventureland (Mottola)
3) The Hurt Locker (Bigelow)
4) In the Loop (Iannucci)
5) Bright Star (Campion)
6) A Serious Man (Coen Brothers)
7) Drag Me to Hell (Raimi)
8) Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call-New Orleans (Herzog)
9) Summer Hours (Assayas)
10) Fantastic Mr. Fox (Anderson)

[hearthesilence]

Top Ten:
1. The Hurt Locker
2. Summer Hours
3. 35 Shots of Rum
4. The Limits of Control
5. The Beaches of Agnes
6. Of Time and the City
7. 24 City
8. Me and Orson Welles
9. Police, Adjective
10. The Fantastic Mr. Fox

Everyone Else by Maren Ade was at the NYFF in 2009 and would've made my list, but it didn't get a theatrical release in the U.S. until 2010.

I'm not so big on Inglorious Basterds or A Serious Man anymore - I still like many of the performances and especially like some of the set pieces in Tarantino's film, but I have mixed feelings about them as a whole.

FWIW, when Scorsese spoke at the Mean Streets screening at Lincoln Center, he said that he didn't watch many new films anymore, partly because he was so busy (especially when he was making Hugo), but he did single out two: Police, Adjective (as well as the Romanian New Wave in general) and Enter the Void.

[Perkins Cobb]

1) Summer Hours
2) The White Ribbon
3) Still Walking
4) Up in the Air
5) Inglourious Basterds
6) Adventureland
7) A Serious Man
8) Police, Adjective
9) The Bad Lieutenant Port of Call: New Orleans
10) A Single Man

[tarpilot]

.

[hearthesilence]

Forgot about The Limits of Control - definitely deserved a better reception.

[mfunk9786]

Is The Limits of Control that movie with the black guy that I saw on Mr. Skin?

[tarpilot]

I'm pretty sure you don't have to waste bandwidth to see a naked Paz de la Huerta. She's probably strolling freely by your window right now

[Lars Von Truffaut]

1) THE WHITE RIBBON (Haneke)
2) ANTICHRIST (von Trier)
3) MOON (Jones)
4) WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE (Jonze)
5) FISH TANK (Arnold)
6) FANTASTIC MR. FOX (Anderson)
7) A SERIOUS MAN (Coen)
8) INGLORIOUS BASTERDS (Tarantino)
9) BROKEN EMBRACES (Almodovar)
10) THE LIMITS OF CONTROL (Jarmusch)

[dustysomers]

1. A Serious Man
2. 35 Shots of Rum
3. Up
4. The White Ribbon
5. Two Lovers
6. The Informant!
7. Mother
8. In the Loop
9. The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus
10. Adventureland

[puxzkkx]

1. Everyone Else (Ade) ... A
2. Melody for a Street Organ (Muratova) ... A
3. The White Ribbon (Haneke) ... A
4. About Elly (Farhadi) ... A-
5. Lourdes (Hausner) ... A-
6. Dogtooth (Lanthimos) ... A-
7. Can Go Through Skin (Rots) ... B+
8. Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (Chazelle) ... B+
9. The Informant! (Soderbergh) ... B
10. Orphan (Collet-Serra) ... B
11. The Milk of Sorrow (Llosa) ... B
12. Mother (Bong) ... B
13. Whip It! (Barrymore) ... B
14. Avatar (Cameron) ... B
15. An Education (Scherfig) ... B-
16. Nothing Personal (Antoniak) ... B-
17. The Day God Walked Away (van Leeuw) ... B-
18. The Double Hour (Capotondi) ... B-
19. District 9 (Blomkamp) ... B-
20. The Strength of Water (Ballantyne) ... B-
21. The Girl (Edfeldt) ... B-
22. In the Loop (Iannucci) ... B-
23. Sweet Rush (Wajda) ... C+
24. Slovenian Girl (Kozole) ... C+
25. Antichrist (von Trier) ... C+
26. Hadewijch (Dumont) ... C+
27. Father of My Children (Hansen-Løve) ... C+
28. I’m Glad My Mother Is Alive (Miller & Miller) ... C+
29. Precious (Daniels) ... C
30. I Travel Because I Have To, I Come Back Because I Love You (Aïnouz & Gomes) ... C
31. Watchmen (Snyder) ... C
32. Applause (Zandvliet) ... C
33. [REC] 2 (Balagueró & Plaza) ... C-
34. Splice (Natali) ... C-
35. Paper Man (Mulroney & Mulroney) ... C-
36. Air Doll (Kore-eda) ... C-
37. The Private Lives of Pippa Lee (Miller) ... C-
38. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Oplev) ... C-
39. Aching Hearts (Malmros) ... C-
40. Inglourious Basterds (Tarantino) ... D
41. Grace (Solet) ... D
42. Lesbian Vampire Killers (Claydon) ... D
43. Blessed (Kokkinos) ... F
44. Obsessed (Shill) ... F

[bnowalk]

1. 35 Shots of Rum by Claire Denis
2. A Serious Man by Joel & Ethan Coen
3. In the Loop by Armando Iannucci
4. The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans by Werner Herzog
5. Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl by Manoel de Oliveira
6. The Limits of Control by Jim Jarmusch
7. Police, Adjective by Corneliu Porumboiu
8. Wild Grass by Alain Resnais
9. Inglourious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino
10. Up by Pete Docter

Honorable Mentions

The White Ribbon (Haneke), Fantastic Mr. Fox (W. Anderson), The Informant! (Soderbergh), The Road (Hillcoat)

Still haven't seen: Around a Small Mountain, A Single Man, Tetro, Two Lovers

[wigwam]

Life During Wartime
Hadewijch
Fish Tank
The Limits of Control
Harmony and Me
Antichrist
My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done?
La nana
A Perfect Getaway
Beeswax

as of 7/20/12

[kiddish]

Great:
01. White Ribbon

Pretty Good:
02. Police, adj.
03. Up

Not Bad:
04. A Serious Man
05. Dogtooth
06. A Prophet
07. Fish Tank
08. Inglourious Basterds
09. Fantastic Mr. Fox
10. Everyone Else

Also enjoyed:
District 9
Star Tek
Up in the Air

Might Take Another Look Someday:
Hurt Locker
Where the Wild Things Are
35 Shots of Rum
Mother
Adventureland
Avatar
Broken Embraces
Limits of Control
Antichrist
Father of My Children

Would Not Watch Again:
Bad Lieutenant: New Orleans

[repeat]

Yet to see some highly potential game-changers, but the current top ten... alphabetically:

1. Around a Small Mountain (Jacques Rivette)
2. Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl (Manoel de Oliveira)
3. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
4. Father of My Children (Mia Hansen-Love)
5. Hadewijch (Bruno Dumont)
6. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
7. The Portuguese Nun (Eugène Green)
8. The Sound of Insects (Peter Liechti)
9. Together (Nicolás Pereda)
10. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)

Also very good: Mundane History (Anocha Suwichakornpong)
Might have made it with some editing: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu)

(edit: moved 35 Shots of Rum to the 2008 list where it belongs according to my own rules, and to make room for The Portuguese Nun!)

[gcgiles1dollarbin]

-

[YnEoS]

1. Antichrist
2. Love Exposure
3. Moon
4. Inglourious Basterds
5. Fantastic Mr. Fox
6. Up
7. Un prophète
8. Mundane History
9. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
10. The Bad Lieutenant - Port of Call: New Orleans