Tag: Dogville

Guy’s top 50 of the decade: #1-10

And then there were ten.

Before I wrap up the list that I’ve trickled out over the last five days, I suppose I should write a few words on the decade that was. I entered the 2000s as a 16 year-old boy in Johannesburg who thought he knew a lot about movies. I left it as a 26 year-old man in London who knows a lot more than he did then — but realizes that he knows a lot less. There is still so much to see that I’ve barely touched upon — from this past decade alone.

Probably no filmgoing decade in my lifetime will be as crucial to me as the one that passed, in terms of the shift and growth in my sense of how to read (and write) film.

I may have already known that I loved movies, but in the 2000s I gained a sharper sense of how to love them, what I really respond to in a film — and the 50 titles gathered here (along with many, many others) helped fine-tune that notion.

With that kind of personal learning curve attached to the decade, it’s hard to stand back and judge how it might stack against previous ones; strong, weak or average, it’ll always feel like my decade. As I compiled the list, however, did arrive at the conclusion that it started better than it finished. Sheer mathematics supports this personal view — the top 10 films I’m about to reveal all landed in the decade’s first half, and I don’t think that’s merely down to the advantage of distance.

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January 6, 2010
Guy’s top 50 of the decade: #11-20

Okay, so I wasn’t expecting “Wolf Creek” to be the most popular inclusion — though in putting it out there, I was glad to see the number of fellow cheerleaders I have for that one. Such sharing is the principal joy of doing such lists.

I doubt that any titles in today’s group of ten are quite as contentious, though one received a far rougher ride from some major critics upon release than I think it deserved, and has rather disappeared from view in recent years. Keen-eyed readers will also notice my list’s first overlap with Kris’s best-of-decade collective — ironically, on a film that tends to divide opinion rather than unite it.

Several of you have asked, in comments and via email, about the films that would fill out my Top 100. I thought 50 films more than enough for me to write up, but since some readers are treating the project as the kind of playlist I had hoped for, I could be persuaded to offer an alphabetical, titles-only list of the also-rans.

The list continues after the cut.

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January 5, 2010
The best films of a decade

This column has been the elephant in my living room for months.

Putting together a list of the year’s best films is easy. It’s fresh. It’s in your mind. It’s, in many ways, the expected culmination.

Putting together a list of the decade’s best films is a different chore altogether. Yearly rankings fly out the window as a proper gauge, because tastes shift and impacts either dwindle or deepen. Revisiting films is called for, but fitting in the works you missed along the way is also imperative. It can be maddening.

And the truth is, you can’t see everything. All you can do is try to be as honest about how you feel as you can. And even then, no list can be definitive on a personal level, let alone authoritative.

And so the whittling begins, and in many ways, the process is the reward. The ultimate collective is a mere reminder of the journey through 10 years of film product. But some things stuck out along the way.

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December 21, 2009
Risk addiction

After some initial resistance, I’m getting chattier on Twitter lately. Yesterday, in a “best of 2000s” frame of mind, an enjoyable back-and-forth with some of you started after I idly asked which actor or actress has had the greatest decade on film.

The suggestions came in thick and fast, some mathematically going by awards stats, others opting for more abstract criteria. Some names came up with particular frequency: it’s hard to argue with the choice of Kate Winslet, though with the peerless exception of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” I wish she had more stone-cold masterworks under her belt.

Johnny Depp was a popular choice, as was Sean Penn. I liked many more outré suggestions, including a shout-out for Patricia Clarkson, though will admit to scratching my head over two people’s advocation of Clint Eastwood. (If we’re counting people who only appeared four films this decade, I’ll stick with Daniel Day-Lewis.)

But I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people who plumped for the same name I’d consider for the honor: Nicole Kidman. The actress has been at the receiving end of a lot of media snark lately, be it in a professional or personal capacity, but clearly she still commands respect for her adventurous script choices and rarefied taste in auteurs.

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November 30, 2009
REVIEW: “Antichrist” (***1/2)

Edinburgh International Film Festival

“I am the greatest director in the world,” Lars von Trier declared in an already notorious Cannes press conference following the unveiling of “Antichrist” in May. Unable to resist such shameless baiting, most critics either responded with affectionate exasperation (“Oh, Lars!”) or, as one suspects von Trier preferred, tomato-faced indignation.

What few did, however, was entertain the possibility that he might be telling the truth. It’s a conclusion that, even on the imperfect evidence of “Antichrist,” this viewer is willing to consider.

Few contemporary filmmakers are as adept at arousing feeling as Lars von Trier – by which I refer not merely to the ingenious media-provocateur act he performs to market his work, but the actual excesses and polarities of emotion he mines within his own cinema.

Von Trier’s best films arouse equal measures of devotion and resentment because they engage human empathy with no concessions whatsoever to conventional artistic standards of restraint or good taste; like their psychologically frail heroines – Bess in “Breaking the Waves,” Selma in “Dancer in the Dark,” Grace in “Dogville” – they teeter on the brink of self-destruction simply because they feel too much.

I must slightly temper that argument upfront by admitting that “Antichrist,” as mercurial and bruising as it so often is, is not one of von Trier’s very best. Though it by and large meets the criteria described above – and its unnamed anti-heroine is a fascinating, near-parodic amalgamation of physical traits and psychological symptoms from all the director’s women – it lacks the emotional breadth of “Breaking the Waves,” or the formal and ideological conviction of “Dogville.” Unusually for von Trier, for all the film’s sledgehammer brutality in its concluding chapters, it’s rather coy about what it actually wants to say.

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June 23, 2009
Back in the spotlight

UPDATE: Sorry, my fascination is unending. The Guardian’s Xan Brooks comes out in full support of the film:

I stumble out in a daze, momentarily unsure whether I loved it or loathed it. Abruptly I realise that I love it. Von Trier has slapped Cannes with an astonishing, extraordinary picture – shocking and comical; a funhouse of terrors (of primal nature, of female sexuality) that rattles the bones and fizzes the blood before bowing out with a presumptuous dedication to Andrei Tarkovsky that had sections of the crowd hooting in fury … Pound for pound, (“A Prophet”) is surely the strongest film of the competition so far. Why, then, is it “Antichrist” that keeps me awake last night, whirling like a dervish in the darkness of the room?

EARLIER: Somehow I get the feeling that Lars Von Trier went to bed last night a very satisfied man. After the deafening indifference that greeted “The Boss Of It All” and “Manderlay,” he arrived at Cannes with one objective more crucial than any other: to prove that his work could still inspire feeling and discussion. Point proven.

Whether or not “Antichrist” is as awful as some people seem to think — and indeed, not everyone does think so — is beside the point. For all his genius (and I do think he is one of the most extraordinary filmmakers of his time), Von Trier shamelessly thrives on attention; when his work is ignored, as has been the case these past six years, his own creative mojo appears to flag. Much has been said about how “Antichrist” is the product of a recent bout of severe depression; perhaps his rediscovered capacity for provocation signals a renewed willingness to engage, and a more fruitful creative period to come.

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May 18, 2009
New WTF still from Von Trier’s ‘Antichrist’

I go back and forth with Lars Von Trier. Lots of respect for “Breaking the Waves,” hated “Dancer in the Dark,” “Dogville” topped my list in 2004 (though shamefully I’ve yet to see “Manderlay”), etc., etc. But I can’t wait to see “Antichrist.” This new still from the film totally freaks me out but I can’t look away. What’s most striking, however, is how classy the composition is. I thought about linking rather than posting, since “NSFW” is arguable, but I figured screw it (no pun intended):

(Courtesy: filmz.dk)

March 24, 2009