Hollywood Reporter Critics Pick the 50 Best Films of the 21st Century

True. We should note this as a sub-fallacy (Sorites) or iteration of the Continuum Fallacy. "Either a precise line can be drawn, or no line can be drawn at all!" (thus Jada can never be made bald if Chris plucks just one of her hairs).



I will say that there is, on a significant number of occasions, an attempt is made to proceed in good faith, to be subtle, but another poster sees it as an "incursion," and then the collision follows rather directly. And if another poster knows this, it is very easy to get a thread shut down by exercising the "Heckler's Veto." That is, pick a fight and wait for the thread to get shut for being political (and, if you can get away with it, accuse the other person of "playing politics").

What more could I ask for beyond an affirmative response? I'm not saying you're wrong, but lamenting the nature (to an extent my own nature) which drives such interventions.

I dunno, I see people screaming at each other at sites that do massive traffic (e.g., discord, Reddit, Twitter). The real challenge is bringing in new blood into an old-fashioned BBS. It would be smart, IMO, to PM the occasional poster in r/movies to join in a conversation here. This place needs a bit of select marketing.



Regrettably, it seems the masses (in the main) like a BIG watering hole. We don't want to choose between VHS and BETA. We just want THE format. Thus, even people who hate Twitter can't leave, because that's the place to do bite-sized pontificating. Even so, I think you get something out of a forum like this that you don't get out of a freeway of conversation. I think there are thousands of people who would get a real kick out of places like this if they could be talked into connecting.

Sure, but we're still doing politics. We're just less direct about it, and thus less clear which (paradoxically) invites others to infer the attempt to say something much more provocative between the lines. There are no perfect solutions. My point here is that you've been driven to a practical solution. The challenge is not to conflate that with a principled position which denies reality. You haven't perfected the wheel. Rather, you're using wheel weights as counterbalances to govern a raving user base. The danger of counterweights is that they can introduce wobbles of their own. Thus, you're always stuck striving to get the balance right.

So long as we all recognize and appreciate our respective imperfections, what more can be asked? It is the myth of perfection which invites the wobble of a false sense on inherent righteousness.

I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying that there is a price. The frog is always looking up at us from the bottom of the mug.

And I think, at least to some degree, this might be true for some critics or some people who vote in these things. Something which, it should be clear by my stance regarding all things art, I also am no big fan of.



I was particularly adamant in regards to my dislike of Get Out making the bottom of the Sight and Sound list. And it was way way at the very bottom. And I also think Get Out is a pretty good movie. But.....why exactly is it in the company of all of these other (imo) obviously better movies. Even as a genre piece, it is way way inferior to at least a hundred horror movies that I would have been fine being there.


I have my own theories, one of them being that it is a movie that, on top of being pretty clearly well made and conceptually kind of brilliant, speaks very very strongly to our current culture. Its maybe even a perfect articulation of what many people in the black community feel about their current status in America, and their frustration with not only racism and police brutality, but also the sometimes cloying stink of pandering white liberal guilt. It is one of the more prescient horror films probably ever made, and I should probably just be glad that horror got a little more rep on the Sight and Sound list and just shut up. Who cares that it might have mostly got there because of it's timeliness.



But I also think when it comes to the films strength as a 'film', it's mostly meh. Competent, maybe even better than that, but it's no Potemkin. It's not even Texas Chainsaw Massacre or (for a more modern example) The Lighthouse.


This is because I'm way way more interested in the tactile joy of the filmed image itself. The creative energy that shoots out of a great, unique movie. That is what is interesting to me. And Get Out doesn't offer a lot of that kinda juice.



But....I also understand that it's not up to me to determine what movies people are affected by or what movies people think matter. I allow them this autonomy. And if one of their criteria is they think it must matter as a political statement....that counts. That is what art is about. They create it, we digest it, and we all decide if it matters or not. For whatever ****ing reason we choose to.



And, as much of a hardliner I am in the 'artistic integrity' of a film, and I am as hardlined as it gets, I understand that this my line. Not any one else's. And while its fun to debate what 'line's are the most important when it comes to a films value or worth, bantering back and forth about what we care about and what we think is total shit, it's super annoying when some people seem to refuse to even accept the basic premise that people can draw a line for themselves.


Because seriously, where is the threat in that? Why does that mangle some peoples brains? It's absolutely baffling to me. Unless there is something wrong with people that aren't you getting movies that are finally for them.

A very low-quality list. Obviously, they included Black Panther as the best superhero movie for political reasons. I haven't watched most movies there but I suspect these biases also play a large role in other choices, which means the list is not only constrained to the tastes of those who made the lists but also contaminated by politics.,

Among these best movie lists, I think the only ones that have some degree of objectivity are the IMDB movie rating list. That is because they aggregate the opinions of all the kinds of people who saw the movies and include the negative ratings as well as the positive ones, so they give you an idea of how likely the average movie person is going to react to a movie.

The IMDB lists also include movies of genres and countries that a couple of movie critics are simply unaware of. So, they are a broader representation of what people in general like.

The top 50 best movies of the 21st century from the IMDB are:

1. The Dark Knight (2008)
2. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
3. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
4. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
5. Inception (2010)
6. City of God (2002)
7. Spirited Away (2001)
8. The Pianist (2002)
9. Parasite (2019)
10. Gladiator (2000)
11. The Departed (2006)
12. Whiplash (2014)
13. The Prestige (2006)
14. The Intouchables (2011)
15. Memento (2000)
16. Django Unchained (2012)
17. WALL·E (2008)
18. The Lives of Others (2006)
19. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
20. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
21. The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
22. Oldboy (2003)
23. Inglourious Basterds (2009)
24. Coco (2017)
25. Joker (2019)
26. Avengers: Endgame (2019)
27. Your Name. (2016)
28. 3 Idiots (2009)
29. Requiem for a Dream (2000)
30. Toy Story 3 (2010)
31. Capernaum (2018)
32. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
33. The Hunt (2012)
34. Amélie (2001)
35. Hamilton (2020)
36. Incendies (2010)
37. Up (2009)
38. A Separation (2011)
39. Snatch (2000)
40. Like Stars on Earth (2007)
41. 1917 (2019)
42. Top Gun: Maverick (2022)
43. Downfall (2004)
44. Dangal (2016)
45. Batman Begins (2005)
46. The Father (2020)
47. The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
48. Green Book (2018)
49. There Will Be Blood (2007)
50. Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

I watched nearly all of these and I liked all of them. Although some like the Batman movies were just like "it was good, but not really great" but overall its a pretty good list (it does not have all of my favorites from the century as well but it covers a lot of great movies).

Also notice there are lots of superhero movies rated higher than Black Panther.

Only one super-hero movie on the list


I wonder which one ?

The top 50 best movies of the 21st century from the IMDB are:

1. The Dark Knight (2008) - A good film, but #1? No.
2. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
3. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Fellowship is the best of the three.
4. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
5. Inception (2010) It was OK
6. City of God (2002) Sure.
7. Spirited Away (2001) Sure.
8. The Pianist (2002) Interesting how you can can get away with sodomizing teenage girls, smack Oscar hosts, and still get an Oscar.
9. Parasite (2019) Really?
10. Gladiator (2000) I liked it, but #10?

11. The Departed (2006) Good. A rip-off and cliche Boston white-trash stuff, but good.
12. Whiplash (2014) LOL, no.
13. The Prestige (2006) Good movie.
14. The Intouchables (2011)
15. Memento (2000) Good movie.
16. Django Unchained (2012) Nah.
17. WALL·E (2008) Good one.
18. The Lives of Others (2006)
19. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) It was good.
20. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
21. The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
22. Oldboy (2003) Good.
23. Inglourious Basterds (2009) Nah.
24. Coco (2017)
25. Joker (2019)
26. Avengers: Endgame (2019)
27. Your Name. (2016)
28. 3 Idiots (2009)
29. Requiem for a Dream (2000)
30. Toy Story 3 (2010) Good one.
31. Capernaum (2018)
32. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) Good one.
33. The Hunt (2012)
34. Amélie (2001)
35. Hamilton (2020)
36. Incendies (2010)
37. Up (2009) Cute.
38. A Separation (2011)
39. Snatch (2000)
40. Like Stars on Earth (2007)
41. 1917 (2019) It was... ...OK
42. Top Gun: Maverick (2022)
43. Downfall (2004)
44. Dangal (2016)
45. Batman Begins (2005)
46. The Father (2020)
47. The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
48. Green Book (2018)
49. There Will Be Blood (2007) How the hell this so low?
50. Pan's Labyrinth (2006) Good one.

If this is really a top 50 for our century, I think the top 10 video games which prove to be much stronger than the top 10 films...

I bet it's gonna be one of those damned black superheros, innit?


Who ever told them they had any right to save the world?

Not a fan?

__________________
IMDb
Letterboxd

Letterboxd's top 250 > IMDb's top 250

The rankings aren't definitive, all I see here is a list of 500 movies in two locations.

Not sure why that's being said to me as I'm not the one in this thread who argued that.

My point is simply that I find Letterboxd's top 250 higher quality as, while it has its fair share of mediocrity, the ratio of this to the classics on there (including some lesser known films) is better than IMDb's top 250. It's not a great "best films ever" list by any means, but the quality of it is higher than what I usually see of user decided lists (which isn't high praise from me, but still fairly good praise).

I wasn't critcising you, I should've been more detailed in my comment.

What I meant was, as a casual movie fan I don't see either list as definitive and that I don't place much importance on the rankings in them. What I see, rather, is a list of 500 movies spread through two locations, that I will equally search for additions to my own personal will-see list.

But since you mention it, now I got a better insight into the quality of one list verses the other.

Aye, gotcha. Thanks for the clarification

Generally, I don't pay much attention to user decided lists (at this point, I already have enough movie lists bookmarked which will last me a while). Besides, I'm pretty sure I've already seen over 200 films on each list. If I were to use one list for recommendations though, I'd definitely pick Letterboxd's list since it aligns much more with my taste.

Was thinking of a different film. Oopsie.

Yeah, to be clear, I'm doing a sort of "best possible version of the thing" thing here. Which I think is a good intellectual habit. And I mention it because I know, at this point a lot of people (understandably) dismiss things out of reflex when they hear one of those buzzwords, or if something smells enough like one of these complaints.

Whether or not it describes any particular incarnation of the idea is another matter. Like most things there's a reasonable or unreasonable version. And yes, when someone trots out the same complaints out of reflex and shows little interest in going beyond that, that's generally going to be the unreasonable kind.

It's a fine line, can't really respond in general when it's so case-by-case. I will say that while the above sometimes happens, it also sometimes happens that people proceed in a way that has the veneer of good faith but is actually pretty provocative. Obviously there's some intuition involved there.

Anyway, for my part I have (publicly and privately) pointed out to people that occasionally they've said something that isn't politics itself, but effectively corners the other person because any substantive response they could give would be political, which necessarily amounts to the same thing.

This kind of ambiguity and difficulty is why I emphasize overall posture so much, and talk so much about how important it is that people want to abide by the results rather than just reluctantly agree to: because no ruleset will survive an onslaught of (pretty intelligent, for the most part) people actively trying to find ways around them. Either we have general buy-in on what's being attempted and it mostly works, or we don't and it doesn't.

Disarming people by agreeing with them is definitely one of my favorite moves. It's the last thing anyone expects on the Internet!

Anyway I've made the concept of dueling tradeoffs a huge part of my entire life/belief system(s), so I'm generally always going to be willing to admit there's some kind of cost/risk to whatever choice we're making. I'll just go on to articulate why I prefer that cost/risk to the alternatives.

I'll say two things to this: the first is that I don't want a highly trafficked site if it gets there by letting people scream at each other. The second is that I strongly suspect that "works" either only for a time, or (I'm more confident about this part) only beyond a certain threshold of activity.

I agree, forums are something else. I've opined on why before, on how their very layout and nature and all that encourages more thoughtful, longform responses, and also how social media sites explicitly encourage the opposite.

I won't delude myself into thinking some grand forum resurgence is right around the corner. Social media isn't going anywhere anytime too soon. But I wouldn't be surprised if there's a bit of a rebound as people sour on social media over time, something which is clearly already happening. There might be a lot of "yeah, the early Internet got this right the first time" stuff over the next decade or two. We'll see. If not, if it stays small, that's fine too. Can't make people want the good stuff, you can just try to find and keep the people that already do.

Indeed, we are still kinda doing politics, but that's okay, because removing politics is not the actual goal. The actual goal is creating a culture conducive to discussions about movies. The ostensible removal of politics is just a means to that end.

I have it on good authority that my limiting all your forum freedoms only sets us back a buck-oh-five or so.

That's all well and good, but IF the idea is correct, if people are choosing films for reasons of perceived social good rather than artistic quality...and if they publish those choices with the veneer of it being about artistic quality...then they're being fundamentally dishonest, and using their platform to amplify that dishonesty. And that seems like a totally reasonable thing to be annoyed by. It definitely annoys me sometimes, though I thankfully retain the ability not to say so at every single example of it or be mad about it through the majority of my waking hours.

Agreed, but isn't somewhat angry about this just expressing their own line? Serious question: what's the difference between someone trying to invalidate another person's criteria, and merely expressing their own in response?

My response will depend on whether you recognize any line whatsoever as being potentially invalid, I guess. Like you I respect people's decision to find value in art pretty much however they'd like to. The value of art is in the interaction of minds: if you think of something beautiful and profound in response to a work of art that the creator never intended, that reaction is still part of its value.

That said, I think there are some outer boundaries beyond which it's reasonable to question someone's reaction, particularly professional critics. If a film critic gave a romantic comedy a bad review and just straight-up said it was because they just broke up with someone that morning...sure, they're a person and their reaction is valid yadda yadda, but that's bad criticism. It violates the implied contract the critic has with the reader. It reminds me of video games that get review-bombed because they have onerous DRM, or because people are mad at Ubisoft for something. I'm just a guy trying to see if the game is fun and I can't, because people are flooding the zone with things unrelated to the quality of the game. They've hijacked an implied relationship for another end.

I don't think it's a coincidence that this stuff happens most with "official" lists from established publications, or with professional critics. It's almost never some random forum post or Letterboxd rating, because that doesn't have the same implied relationship.

Sure. We're kind of like children - "I'm not touching you!!!!"

Very true. We cannot legislate healthy dialogue. You have to have background conditions which go beyond the official rules. Without good will, mutual respect, trust, a willingness to be changed by the other person, the most we can hope for is eristic sparring. If you're not willing to "take the L" in a conversation, you're not entering into a conversation in good faith. At bottom, so much just centers around face. If the other person loses face (or feels that they would have to lose face to give a direct and honest answer), then we're more likely to work to preserve face than anything else.

Couldn't agree more.

A little heat can be good if it is accompanied by light. But you have to tend a fire carefully. It can keep you warm or burn down your house.

Fair enough, but we also talk politics to each other, culturally, through movies. They provide us with touchstones, common topics, examples, platitudes, etc. If the point, function, theme of a film is markedly political, then that is a move in a larger game. Not talking about what is quite obviously there is not always healthy.



There was, for example, an episode of The Practice where one of the associates with good pro-choice credentials established nevertheless railed against the Roe Decision because it shut down what should have been a cultural discussion/fight about how to legislate the issue (through congress). You can't get to the resolution phase without going through the differentiation phase. The Supreme Court put a lid on it, but the water was still boiling.



And there is a "status quo" bias that goes along with the rule of not speaking of politics. If we must accept, without comment or question, the political coding of our times, then were are implicated in unwilling agreement with that coding. If we were, for example, watching a 1950s film and were struck by the patriarchal coding of a narrative, a feminist critique would face the glass ceiling of "It's not ladylike to talk about politics."



On the other hand, if political discussion were encouraged here, this place might likely just turn into another echo chamber as some majority (or most vocal minority) formed and ran off all the undesirable. To really get people to talk to each other, the advisable first step is not to lead with politics.



I do get it. Today's politics are imbalanced, extreme, and just ugly. We don't do politics well. The din outside is so loud that I get why you want a quiet tavern. I get the desire to just limit conversation to films. Can we just have a reprieve here?



Even so, we will still want to talk about what we think matters and you will still want conversations to stay in hand as you see fit. It's cops and robbers, dogs and cats, oil and water. The tension will always be there, so the real question is not how to keep a lid on it, but how to do the log-rolling needed for endless equilibrium dynamics. Your recompense is that you can always throw rowdy clients out on their ear or just shut down the tavern.

Query#1: Is that the wokiest woke list you have ever seen?
Answer: Yes
Query#2: Does Siddon see woke boogeymen around every corner?
Answer:Yes
Query#3: Is this list worthwhile?
Answer: Yes, it lists movies that the viewers may not have seen and may want to check out. Always a good for most cinephiles, being introduced to movies they were unaware of..
Query#4: What is politics place in a movie forum?
Answer: Whoa...wait a second are you trying to get me killed? I have never lived through a more divisive time in my life and I am 61 years old. We are all split up into factions. It feels to me like keeping the plebs fighting amongst themselves is if not a goal, then the result of social media and the distrust of the mainstream media. Questioning the motives of any media organization is second nature now. We, in the first world, have never lived a more luxurious, lengthy and peaceful life. Yet we some how feel that there are others that are at our throats. It is an illusion. Do I think strange, nefarious forces are at work in the world. Oh heck yeah! But they probably aren't who or what you think they are? The likelihood that your attention has been drawn one way or another is not up for question. It has. Try not to kill each other. be kind to each other while our cyber overlords rule this world. All hail, Lord Bezos!

Yes this is what I said only put much more succinctly.