# What do you think of the films 177 critics picked as the best of the 2000s? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 30, 2017, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706 "2017-05-30T06:51:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2017, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/21 "2017-05-30T20:18:35Z")
> [@Sefton](#): > > I’m glad _The Lives of Others_ is on the list. I enjoyed it a lot, but I don’t know anyone else who’s seen it. It’s one of the about twelve DVDs I own. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2017, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/22 "2017-05-30T20:58:30Z")
I’ve seen _The Lives of Others_ and I agree with its inclusion. I think I’d also include _Rogue One_. It might have been slightly late for this list, but deserves some recognition as the best Star Wars movie since the OT. ---
**Author:** ![mikecurtis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mikecurtis/32/3284_2.png) [@mikecurtis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mikecurtis)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2017, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/23 "2017-05-30T21:17:59Z")
I didn’t see _Slumdog Millionaire_ on any of those lists! So I judge them incomplete! mc ---
**Author:** ![igor\_frankensteen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/839c29/32.png) [@igor\_frankensteen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/igor_frankensteen)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2017, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/24 "2017-05-30T22:16:56Z")
Wow. I counted, and I’ve only seen twelve of the hundred on the critics list. Many of the ones they liked, were the kind of film I pass on as soon as I hear about them, because they seem to me to be so obviously created to make certain kinds of people say “oh my! what an important film!” even though they have no real clue what it’s all about, save that it’s overly dramatic. Some films that are favorites of mine, didn’t appear on any of the three lists: Stranger Than Fiction The Invention of Lying I found the Hobbit films to be mostly dreadful, especially since I had high hopes that they would be designed to match up with the LOTR films (they weren’t at all), and because they added all manner of subplots in, which in addition to having nothing to do with the book, contradicted the whole spirit of the tales. Most especially the love affair between the Elf and the dwarf. More than anything else, what will make me do a classic spit take upon seeing a film garner high praise, is when the film utterly fails to accomplish it’s own stated goals. In particular, when there is a plot hole the size of a large nation state, and no one appears to recognize it, or worse, ignores it. Several famously lauded films of the last century worked as examples for this (I can’t recall a good example of such a disaster this century) , such as Thelma and Louise (1991) and Blade Runner (1982). In the first, the director never managed to make a case for why both women would choose suicide at the end (fairly important plot element), and in the latter, the director spent the opening half hour emphasizing how hard it was to tell robot from human, and then for the rest of the picture, insisted on showing the robots eyes as glowing in the dark. This century, Avatar failed this test to a lesser degree, when Michelle Rodriguez’ character decides to turn traitor for no apparent reason, or at least not a sufficient, believable one. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2017, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/25 "2017-05-30T23:51:57Z")
> [@](#): > > I found the Hobbit films to be mostly dreadful… Did anyone say that they weren’t? I’m not sure of the relevance, here. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/26 "2017-05-31T03:36:02Z")
I have seen 64 of the 100, including 18 of the top 20 and 30 of the top 35 (so only 34 of the “bottom” 65). I should probably try to see those other five toute de suite, since it’s not that many. > [@igor\_frankensteen](#): > > I’m not seeing much to explain what parameters they used for their choices. > > Film critiques have always been tricky and even problematic for me, because of a seemingly inescapable phenomenon of how people come to be hired AS critics. Quite simply, the amount of in depth knowledge they have about film making plays a part; the depth of passion that they bring to the whole experience of watching films plays a part; and the egotism needed to be decisive about bashing sensitive peoples’ efforts publicly plays a part. > > Too often, that adds up to the same thing I dislike about Oscar decisions: critics as a group, tend to choose “Filmy-films” to heap praise upon, to the extent that people watching them have to work VERY hard to understand why in the hell they chose as they did. > > I’m not JUST talking about how many popular films get short shrift for being popular. I’m talking about how experts often have so much interest in minutia of a craft, that they lose sight of the bigger picture, and end up chastising the rest of us for failing to do likewise. > > Anyway. I could go on for many boring pages about my problems with the critics and awards voting I’ve observed over the years, but this isn’t the place. As for this particular list, I can’t comment on the majority of the films because I haven’t seen them. The best I can do is say that I think there are better Miazaki films than Spirited Away in my opinion, though that one is very good. And I’m VERY glad that Frozen doesn’t appear anywhere on the list, since I found it to be boring in the extreme, and annoying for the same reasons why many critics praised it while it was in theaters. > > I’ll take a look at the OPs list later today. Will be interested to hear what you think! I think you had a trenchant analysis there of what is behind critics’ choices. I almost think maybe there should be two classes of critics? I think there should be scholars who point to “filmy-film” greatness, but also those with good taste and an engaging writing style that can appreciate solid entertainment. I would say this list is very much a mix of more esoteric and more mainstream choices. _Spirited Away_ is definitely \*my \*favorite Miyazaki film, although my teenage kids disagree with me (I think they like \*Totoro \*best). [Here’s my ranking](http://www.flickchart.com/Charts.aspx?director=Hayao+Miyazaki&user=SlackerInc) of the six of his films I’ve seen. > [@Chronos](#): > > Of those I’ve seen, the only one I strongly disagree with is _AI_. The message most people took away from the movie is very different from what’s actually there, which leads me to conclude that they didn’t communicate it very well. I’m very interested in hearing you expand on this. I think I agree that a lot of people took a different message from it than I did; but I adore this film. I wonder though if by your lights, I took the “true” message or the wrong one? > [@Sefton](#): > > I’m glad _The Lives of Others_ is on the list. I enjoyed it a lot, but I don’t know anyone else who’s seen it. Seems there are several of us here who like it! > [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > I had to stop perusing the list once I saw \*Margaret \*at number 3. Holy crap. I hated that film so much I had to come here and post about it at the time. It actually, _actively_ pissed me off :mad: (I’m mostly kidding. That movie is a piece of dreck but most of the items on the list deserve to be there). Do you have a link to the thread where you complained about it? Because that is one of my very favorite films. I’m dying to see the director’s cut, although it sucks that the “extra” scenes are not in Blu-ray quality. > [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > Could have used more sci-fi. I just re-watched _Edge of Tomorrow_ (2014) last weekend and I’d put that movie in the top 100, easy. A few other sci-fi movies I’d nominate: > > _District 9_ (2009) > _The Martian_ (2015) > _Interstellar_ (2015) > > I’m sure I could come up with more after investigation. > > Some movies I didn’t love on the list: All the Wes Anderson stuff, Crouching Tiger, Ratatouille, The Assassination of Jesse James…, Dogville. > > _Ratatouille_ is probably the most egregious addition for me. I’d probably put Frozen, Brave and a few other Disney flicks above it. I agree that more sci-fi would have been nice. I’d agree with almost all your suggestions except _Interstellar_; and I’d add \*Gravity \*(although I think that one is only “great” if you see it in 3D on a big screen), _Solaris_, and _Ex Machina_, plus _Pitch Black_ and the first Chris Pine _Star Trek_. I personally really like \*Avatar \*and \*Prometheus \*as well, although I know many genre fans do not. In the low-budget indie SF space, let’s include _Primer, Moon,_ and _Code 46_. Others I really liked from this era that might or might not count as SF: _Contagion, Melancholia, Another Earth, Paprika, Serenity,_ and the aforementioned _Rogue One_. And a few of the better superhero films could be on the list, like the second _X-Men_ movie, _Deadpool_, and _The Amazing Spider-Man_ (yes, I’m the guy who prefers the first Andrew Garfield outing to all the other Spidey flicks). Oh, and the first \*Avengers \*and _Iron Man_ films. > [@blindboyard](#): > > The year 2000 is not in the 21st century. Not. > > Spring Breakers is on the list. > > Under the Skin is on the list. > > Two very diverse choices which are idiotic for different reasons. List is terrible. The year 2000 is in the 21st century if most people say it is. 😛 (I always wonder if people who take this line were actually insisting on Dec. 31, 1999 that the truly big celebration was the following year, as far as they were concerned.) The two movies you listed would not be in my top 100. But they are both very interesting films. _Under the Skin_ contains a scene that as a parent I found appalling (and the editor of Slate walked out as a result of it), but which I have to grant contains an incredibly powerful image that haunted me for a long time afterward. > [@MovieMogul](#): > > _Gerry_ (2002) Talk about an obscure one–I hardly ever find anyone who has seen this, even online. It is so cool! But only for very select tastes. > [@Chronos](#): > > Best Picture winners that got left off: > 2000 _Gladiator_ > 2001 _A Beautiful Mind_ > 2002 _Chicago_ > 2003 _The Return of the King_ > 2004 _Million Dollar Baby_ > 2005 _Crash_ > 2006 _The Departed_ > 2008 _Slumdog Millionaire_ > 2010 _The King’s Speech_ > 2011 _The Artist_ > 2012 _Argo_ > 2014 _Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)_ > 2016 _Moonlight_ > > Wow, I didn’t realize that the list would be that long. In fact, only four Oscar Best Picture winners _did_ make the list. Only one _nominee_ even shows up from 2000, 1 from 2001, 1 from 2002, 1 from 2003, none from 2004, 1 from 2005, none from 2006, and at that point I got bored and stopped counting. > > At this point, I think the makers of this list really need to explain their methodology. It’s almost like it’s a list of the top 100 underappreciated films, or something, except that they do have four Oscar winners on there. That’s pretty wild. It’s true though that Oscars don’t line up that well with critical acclaim. > [@mikecurtis](#): > > I didn’t see _Slumdog Millionaire_ on any of those lists! So I judge them incomplete! > > mc I (sorry) thought \*Slumdog \*was a great example of how the Oscars often get it wrong. > [@igor\_frankensteen](#): > > Some films that are favorites of mine, didn’t appear on any of the three lists: > > Stranger Than Fiction > > The Invention of Lying _Stranger Than Fiction_ is a great one. Have you seen _Ruby Sparks_? It has a somewhat similar premise (an author dreams up the perfect girlfriend, and she suddenly becomes real–and he finds he can rewrite her when they have conflicts, but then wrestles with the ethical implications of this). I liked it a whole lot. The _Invention of Lying_, I wanted to like so much, and I found it delightful at first, but it just didn’t sustain itself all the way through, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/27 "2017-05-31T06:17:17Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > I think I’d also include _Rogue One_. It might have been slightly late for this list, but deserves some recognition as the best Star Wars movie since the OT. _Rogue One_ was a happy surprise for me as well. The only weakness for me was Felicity Jones – she just didn’t provide her character with much “oomph.” (She’s easy on the eyes, but that’s another story…) ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 9:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/28 "2017-05-31T09:21:57Z")
Chronos noted all the the Oscar winners that weren’t on the BCC’s 100, and SlackerInc quoted his list of those winners not on the BBC’s 100. They wondered why _Moonlight_ wasn’t on it. Well, it wasn’t even released at the time the BBC’s 100 was created. Look at the date on it. That was three months before the movie was released. I’m never surprised by the fact that other people’s lists of what they consider the greatest films don’t match my personal preferences or anybody else’s lists. There are no definitive lists of the best films. If you look at vast numbers of such lists, you can get a reasonable idea of what you might find to be interesting, but that’s the best you can do. You will never agree completely with anyone else or with any attempt to combine the preferences of many other people, regardless of whether they are critics, people in the film business, or ordinary filmgoers. That’s how any art form works. Among other things, it’s very hard work to see even every film that might eventually show up on someone’s list of the best of the year. I see one or two new films every week. Despite this, I’ve only seen about half of the films in the BBC’s 100. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/29 "2017-05-31T09:44:19Z")
I’ve seen six of the films on that list. > [@Terminus\_Est](#): > > Last time I checked, we still had 83 years and 7 months to go in this century. Calling this list the best of the 21 century seems somewhat presumptuous, denying that there will ever be any better films produced in the future. Quite a bit of navel-gazing, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/30 "2017-05-31T10:07:42Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > I’ve seen six of the films on that list. You’ve missed a lot of great movies! ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/31 "2017-05-31T14:38:29Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Which reminds me - _Silver Linings Playbook_? Good but not great, I’d say - although it was interesting to see De Niro and Cooper as father and son, and not as mentor-and-mentee/frenemies/business rivals, as they’d been in _Limitless_. > [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > Could have used more sci-fi. I just re-watched _Edge of Tomorrow_ (2014) last weekend and I’d put that movie in the top 100, easy. A few other sci-fi movies I’d nominate: > > _District 9_ (2009) > _The Martian_ (2015) > _Interstellar_ (2015)… Good catches, and I agree. Also ought to be on the list: _Calvary_ (2014), starring Brendan Gleeson. A very powerful black comedy about a small-town Irish priest whose life is threatened in the confessional by a member of his flock. Gleeson really earned an Oscar for that one. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/32 "2017-05-31T15:34:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **SlackerInc** : > > I’m very interested in hearing you expand on this [about _AI_]. I think I agree that a lot of people took a different message from it than I did; but I adore this film. I wonder though if by your lights, I took the “true” message or the wrong one? Well, there’s mundane stuff like the identity of the creatures at the end. I’m pretty sure that they were meant to be far-future robots, but if that’s what they were supposed to be, then they really shouldn’t have made them look like stereotypical aliens, because that’s what a lot of folks thought they were. But more importantly: The whole point of David was that he was supposed to be a robot capable of love. And a lot of folks seem to think he was a success: They think that he really did love his mother. But his actual emotions towards her were purely selfish, to a horrifying degree, so much so that he’s willing to (effectively) destroy her soul just to be able to spend one more day with her. Meanwhile, the robots that existed before him, like Gigolo Joe, clearly _were_ already capable of love. It’s not explicit, but I think it’s a safe bet that the replacement of loving robots like Joe with loveless robots like David was actually what led to the apocalypse that killed off all of the humans. On science fiction movies: At least one of _Gravity_ or _The Martian_ should have been on the list, and which one depends on what you’re looking for. _Gravity_ was more of an arty symbolic movie that happened to be SF, while _The Martian_ was more straight-up. _The Avengers_ also deserved a mention, but I guess they figured they’d filled their superhero quota by including _The Dark Knight_ (although _TDK_ was a very good superhero movie, it was also a very different kind of superhero movie than _Avengers_). ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2017, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/33 "2017-05-31T22:10:16Z")
Counted and I’ve seen 88 on the list. But then again, it’s pretty much my job to see films like many of the ones mentioned. Looking more closely, I’d say hands down the worst film mentioned, IMHO, is **Moulin Rouge!** (which I know has its perverse following). ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/34 "2017-06-01T04:04:58Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Well, there’s mundane stuff like the identity of the creatures at the end. I’m pretty sure that they were meant to be far-future robots… Yes. Spielberg and others on his production team have been quite emphatic about that. > [@MovieMogul](#): > > …Looking more closely, I’d say hands down the worst film mentioned, IMHO, is **Moulin Rouge!** (which I know has its perverse following). Heh. I named _Moulin Rouge_ in another thread as a movie I hate hate hated. It’s rare that I won’t even finish a movie, but that was one. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/35 "2017-06-01T09:46:22Z")
I’m not remotely surprised that there are many films on this list that I think are pretty good but not great. First, note that there are 102 films on the list. Second, note that the list is apparently supposed to cover everything from the beginning of 2000 to about halfway through 2016. _Toni Erdmann_ is included which premiered at Cannes on May 14, 2016, while no other film from 2016 is included. Since this is a film critics’ list, I’ll assume that they saw any movies that premiered at film festivals before the date of the list (August 23, 2016). So 102 movies over 16.5 years comes to about 6.18 films per year. There aren’t 6 or 7 great films per year. I would say that there are 2 or 3 great films per year. That’s enough that over the past century (and there are certainly few great films before a hundred years ago) there have been maybe 250 great movies even if we stretch the term “great” a little. A list this long naturally includes a lot of movies that are pretty good but not great. This list is decent but no more definitive than any other. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/36 "2017-06-01T12:05:11Z")
[Here you go](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=662113) , **SlackerInc**. Most people did not agree with me. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/37 "2017-06-01T15:22:56Z")
Looked to me like there were several people who agreed with you about _Margaret_. Or was it just the same person several times? Anyway, de gustibus…but I was entranced throughout the film. And, again, I would love to see the extended version if it were the same Blu-ray quality, which it’s not…I may see it anyway at some point though. (Oh, hang on: Amazon’s got it streaming in HD for ten bucks! Woo hoo!) I remember wishing while watching it that it had been made as a premium cable TV show instead ofa movie, because I wanted to spend much more time in that universe and with those characters. > [@MovieMogul](#): > > Counted and I’ve seen 88 on the list. But then again, it’s pretty much my job to see films like many of the ones mentioned. > > Looking more closely, I’d say hands down the worst film mentioned, IMHO, is **Moulin Rouge!** (which I know has its perverse following). Yeah, Luhrman can make pretty images, but I can’t get through his films. > [@Chronos](#): > > Well, there’s mundane stuff like the identity of the creatures at the end. I’m pretty sure that they were meant to be far-future robots, but if that’s what they were supposed to be, then they really shouldn’t have made them look like stereotypical aliens, because that’s what a lot of folks thought they were. > > But more importantly: The whole point of David was that he was supposed to be a robot capable of love. And a lot of folks seem to think he was a success: They think that he really did love his mother. But his actual emotions towards her were purely selfish, to a horrifying degree, so much so that he’s willing to (effectively) destroy her soul just to be able to spend one more day with her. Meanwhile, the robots that existed before him, like Gigolo Joe, clearly _were_ already capable of love. It’s not explicit, but I think it’s a safe bet that the replacement of loving robots like Joe with loveless robots like David was actually what led to the apocalypse that killed off all of the humans. > > On science fiction movies: At least one of _Gravity_ or _The Martian_ should have been on the list, and which one depends on what you’re looking for. _Gravity_ was more of an arty symbolic movie that happened to be SF, while _The Martian_ was more straight-up. _The Avengers_ also deserved a mention, but I guess they figured they’d filled their superhero quota by including _The Dark Knight_ (although _TDK_ was a very good superhero movie, it was also a very different kind of superhero movie than _Avengers_). I thought it was clear that the far-future beings at the end were descendants of AI robots. The rest of what you wrote about _AI_, we do see differently. David was obsessed, for sure; but I still felt he was a tragic and sympathetic figure. I never got any impression that he was supposed to be the first ever robot to feel love–just that he happened into a weird snafu that others of his kind never faced (either their siblings would not come back from the brink of death, or they’d actually be returned to the factory and destroyed). I don’t believe in a soul, or believe that I have to suspend that disbelief for the sake of this movie (like I would if I were watching a movie about ghosts or the afterlife), so I’m not feeling your “destroyed her soul” outrage. And I actually didn’t specifically see a need for an “apocalypse that destroyed all the humans” (or at least, I didn’t recall it that way). I thought humans were simply superseded by the descendants of AI robots. However, Wikipedia says it was only two thousand years that David waited (rather than the millions I was imagining), so I guess you must be right. However, given the flooding in the beginning and the glaciers along the way, I’m seeing it as most likely some kind of self-caused armageddon. (I actually don’t enjoy thinking about that too hard, because I don’t believe global warming or any climate condition is harsh enough to kill off humans–if we do die out, it will be because of the creation of a world-destroying weapon like a super-plague, an artificial singularity, or–most likely–nano weapons that turn us all into [grey goo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_goo).) I’m surprised you are calling \*Gravity \*an “arty, symbolic movie”. I see it as being in the same class as _The Martian_ in terms of being a near-future, hard-SF NASA story (even more near-future than _The Martian_), but with a lot more action. _The Dark Knight_ is another widely praised film that I consider wildly overrated. I actually don’t like any of the Christopher Nolan Batman films, and in fact only his first two films (_Following_ and _Memento_) would get a strong recommendation from me. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/38 "2017-06-01T17:16:39Z")
Well, the movie doesn’t use the word “soul”, but they do say that there’s some sort of a pattern of a person imprinted on the Universe that can be used to reconstruct that person… but that having once done so, that pattern is irretrievably lost. That sure quacks like “destroying a soul” to me. And _Gravity_ is arty and symbolic by comparison to _The Martian_, though there are plenty of movies that are a lot artier than either. They’re a lot more similar than they are different, and I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. In fact, they’re similar enough that you can justify putting only one of them on a list like this, whichever one you consider better, and which one you consider better is going to depend on your tastes. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/39 "2017-06-01T18:20:17Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > They’re a lot more similar than they are different, and I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. In fact, they’re similar enough that you can justify putting only one of them on a list like this, whichever one you consider better, and which one you consider better is going to depend on your tastes. Huh, I don’t see it that way. I mean, that’s definitely one way you could approach a list like this, for sure. At the extreme end, you try to include one example of every genre and subgenre. But if it were up to me, if I believed there were seven movies about gay Argentinian cattle ranchers in the 1930s that were among the 100 best films of the past 17 years, I’d put them all on the list, even if it meant some major subgenre (action comedy, let’s say) got pushed just barely off. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2017, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706/40 "2017-06-01T18:53:03Z")
I’ve seen nine of the movies on that list. While several were enjoyable, and 1 or 2 I’d consider seeing again, none jump out as “classics”. If “Mulholland Drive”'s appearance at number 1 signifies that it was the consensus #1 among 177 film critics, then we need a better class of film critics. And yeah, picking “best of the 2000s” in 2016 is like citing something that happened in 2001 as the “crime of the century”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-of-the-films-177-critics-picked-as-the-best-of-the-2000s/787706.md?page=3)