It’s not a justification I’d make, and if it were up to me, the list would probably end up consisting mostly of science fiction (including both recent “individual stranded in space by an accident and must use wits to survive and get back” movies, because both were very good). But it’s a justification that could be made, and often does seem to be, on lists like this.
Are people finding it hard to read this bit?
“The best that cinema has had to offer since 2000 as picked by 177 film critics from around the world.”
I assume they’re reading it, but feel we should wait until 2100? That seems extreme.
I see a list with several movies I was so bored by I didn’t bother to finish (Mulholland Drive, WALL-E, Melancholia, The Return, Ratatouille, Zodiac), some decent movies, many I’ve never heard of, and pretty much my least favorite movie ever, Lost in Translation.
Even if that wasn’t there, it’s pretty clear that there’s an implied “so far” at the end of the OP. Christ, this place sometimes…
Yeah, it’s not about “The Century”, it’s about “recently”, with the arbitrary cutoff for “recent” chosen at a nice round year.
I like Mulholland Drive, but it’s such an obvious darling among people who work in the film industry. I don’t know how a film critic could call it the best film of the 21st century without feeling just a little ashamed of themselves.
I’ve seen 86. MovieMogul mentioned a few omissions I’d agree with, also noticed the clear snub of Academy choices. I suppose they wanted to demonstrate their critical superiority. Any such list will be controversial and potentially infuriating to anyone who loves movies, I remember the AFI top 100 generating much discussion, civil and otherwise 
Ultimately lists are nothing to take too seriously. Best case they motivate you to see films you haven’t heard of to try to gut them out to figure out what’s so great about them. Same survey next year sees new favorites “elevated.” Great art isn’t always immediately recognized. Often never.
My list might have a Dardennes, a Mike Leigh, definitely some documentaries, definitely some Greek New Wave, definitely a Gus Van Sant, definitely a Naomi Kawase, more (or better!) female directors, definitely a Fabián Bielinsky, definitely my favorite Québec filmmaker named Denis…wait for it…Côté.
Most of these I strongly agree with. Generally, if I go to the arthouse I’ll like 7/10 and if I go to the plex I’ll like 3/10 and that ratio has been pretty solid for a long time. I’d never avoid either, though. With that said, it’s no favoritism to fill the list with Coens, Jarmusches and both flavors of Andersons. There are many, many, excellent American movies. Neither am I wistful for some golden past that never was; there have been plenty of duds in every decade of the past 100 years. Films are getting better, not worse.
Here’s a few more unranked, let’s call them “worth seeings” for various reasons:
2046 - (2004) Kar Wai Wong
Adaptation (2002) Spike Jonze
A Man Called Ove (2015) Hannes Holm
American Psycho (2000) Mary Harron
Amores Perros (2000) Alejandro González Iñárritu
Best In Show (2000) Christopher Guest
Brick (2005) B12 Rian Johnson
Brodre (2004) Susanne Bier
Calvary (2014) McDonagh
Cave of the Yellow Dog (2005) Byambasuren Davaa
Celda 211 (Cell 211)(2009) Daniel Monzón
Chevalier (2015) Athina Rachel Tsangari
Cloud Atlas (2012) Wachowski-Tykwer
Control (2008) Anton Corbijn
Curling (2010) Denis Côté
Der Untergang aka Downfall (2004) Oliver Hirschbiegel
Dogtooth Kynodontas (2009) Yorgos Lanthimos
El Aura (2005) Fabian Bielinsky
Elle (2016) Paul Verhoeven
Enemy At The Gates (2001) J-J Annaud
Enter The Void (2009) Gaspar Noë
Entre Les Murs (2008) Laurent Cantet
Gangs of New York (2002) Martin Scorsese
Gascoigne (2015) Jane Preston DOC
Gegen die wand (Head-On )(2004) Fatih Akim
Ghost World (2001) Terry Zwigoff
Gomorrah (2008) Matteo Garrone
Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) George Clooney
Habemus Papam (2011) Nanni Moretti
Happy Go Lucky (2008) Mike Leigh
Herb And Dorothy (2008) Megumi Sasaki DOC
Hunger (2008) Steve McQueen
Insomnia (1997) Erik Skjoldbaerg
Innocence (2004) Lucile Hadzihalilovic
Irréversible (2002) Gaspar Noé
Jagten (The Hunt) (2012) Thomas Vinterberg
Juno (2007) Jason Reitman
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) Shane Black
Kitchen Stories (Salmer fra kjøkkenet)(2003) Bent Hamer
Kontroll (2003) Nimród Antal
Krugovi (2013) Srdan Golubovic
L (2012) Babis Makridis
La Môme (La Vie en Rose)(2007) Olivier Dahan
Last Life In the Universe (Ruang rak noi nid mahasan)(2003) Pen-Ek Ratanaruang
Layer Cake (2004) Matthew Vaughn
Le Grand Soir (2012) Delépine-Kervern
L’Enfant (2005) Dardennes
Little Miss Sunshine (2006) Dayton-Faris
Man On Wire (2008) James Marsh DOC
Me And You And Everyone We Know (2005) Miranda July
Mogari no mori (The Mourning Forest) (2007) Naomi Kawase
Mongol (2007) Sergei Bodrov
Monsieur Lazhar (2011) P. Falardeau
Moon (2009) Duncan Jones
Mortel Transfert (2001) Jean-Jacques Beineix
Mud (2012) Jeff Nichols
Nanayomachi (2008) Naomi Kawase
Night Watch (2004) Bekmambetov
Nightwatching (2007) Peter Greenaway
Papurika (2006) Satoshi Kon
Paranoid Park (2007) Gus Van Sant
Polisse (2011) Maïwenn Lobesco
Riding Giants (2004) DOC Stacy Peralta
Sharasojyu (2003) Naomi Kawase
Sieranevada (2016) Cristi Puiu also The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005) Cristi Puiu
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004) Kerry Conran
Somm (2012) DOC Jason Wise
Spun (2002) Jonas Akerlund
Starred Up (2013) David Mackenzie
Steak (2007) Quentin Dupieux
Sukiyaki Western Django (2007) Takeshi Miike
Super Troopers (2001) Broken Lizard
Survive Style 5+ (2004) Gen Sekiguchi
Sweet Sixteen (2002) Ken Loach
Take Shelter (2011) Jeff Nichols
Takva (Man’s Fear Of God) (2006) Özer Kiziltan
Tamala 2010: A Punk Cat In Space (2003) Tol
Team America: World Police (2004) Parker-Stone
The Bothersome Man (Den brysomme mannen)(2006) Jens Lien
The Broken Circle Breakdown (2012) Felix van Groeningen
The Man Without a Past (2002) Aki Kaurismäki
Tim’s Vermeer (2013) Penn-Teller DOC
Volver (2006) Pedro Almodovar
Winter’s Bone (2010) Debra Granik
Back quickly to credit Chronos for pointing out the dearth of Academy noms, and to add to the love for The Lives Of Others. I have a mantra for when I’m not manning up enough in life. I retreat to a quiet place and repeat Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck over and over. This gives me great strength for some reason.
Edited to add Jeff Nichols to the “definitelys”, he’s one to watch. (See how quickly things change?)
Exactly. Which is a worthy endeavor!
Impressive!
A Facebook friend commented “Lists are mostly a controversy starter. That’s fine. I still like them.” I couldn’t agree more.
Word to most of that. The lists I linked in the OP contain two Mike Leigh joints (heh). Another Year is #5 of the 2010s, and Happy Go Lucky is #7 of the '00s (both are on my all-time Top 50).
And as for female directors, I’m sure I’m missing someone, but on first glance the most egregious omissions I see are Kelly Reichardt’s Wendy and Lucy, Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right, and Mary Harron’s American Psycho. At least they did feature Sarah Polley’s Stories We Tell (although I personally prefer her earlier Take This Waltz) and Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation.
I enjoyed looking at your alphabetical list. Some that I want to pick out specifically:
Adaptation (2002) Spike Jonze
So great. I pretty much worship Jonze and Kaufman both.
Dogtooth Kynodontas (2009) Yorgos Lanthimos
I loved this so much, it was surprising and very disappointing how little I was able to get into his more recent and much more celebrated film The Lobster.
Ghost World (2001) Terry Zwigoff
Great movie. It’s weird that it’s the only one of his films that he actually wrote. Also strange that his short filmography includes this, the masterpiece Crumb, the IMO underrated Art School Confidential…and Bad Santa.
Irréversible (2002) Gaspar Noé
Oof. This one went a little far for me. And that’s not easy.
Me And You And Everyone We Know (2005) Miranda July
Love her! Have you also seen The Future?
Take Shelter (2011) Jeff Nichols
I got into some serious debates on the IMDb boards (sigh, RIP) about the ending of this movie. Do you take it literally? I do.
I don’t think that the BBC critics’ list deliberately snubbed Oscar winners. Let’s go through all the Oscar winners which didn’t get mentioned. Again, this doesn’t include Moonlight, because at the time the article was written it hadn’t even played at film festivals, let alone in most theaters. I’ve made a note of the rating in the IMDb Top 250 if the rating was below 8.0:
Gladiator
A Beautiful Mind
Chicago 7.2
The Return of the King
Million Dollar Baby
Crash 7.8
The Departed
Slumdog Millionaire
The King’s Speech
The Artist 7.9
Argo 7.7
Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) 7.8
The people whose votes get counted in the IMDb Top 250 aren’t film critics, but they also aren’t average movie goers. They’re more like film buffs who’ve been going to movies for a long time and have seen a fair amount of movies from before they were even born, but they haven’t seen anything close to the number of films that critics usually have. If the IMDb Top 250 was created using the votes of average film goers, it would be almost entirely films from the past ten years and would include a large number of films that made a lot of money but got no respect from any film reviewer at all.
I included the ratings for anything that was below 8.0 because to get into the IMDb Top 250, it takes at least an 8.0 rating. So the films with ratings below that are those that the average film buff would consider pretty good but not remotely classics. Thus what we have left are seven films that won Best Picture since 2000 that didn’t make the BBC critics’ list but might be considered great films by average film buffs. This doesn’t strike me as very interesting. Yes, the favorites of critics are different from those of Oscar voters which are different from those of film buffs which are different from those of random movie goers which are different from those of any other list maker on the Internet or anywhere else.
Yeah, those are mostly what I’d consider undeserving Oscar winners, so it’s no outrage for them not to be on the list. The best of that group, for my money, is actually the one that tends to get notoriously (and IMO unfairly) tagged as undeserving of its statuette: Crash.
What cinches it for me, though, is not the dearth of Oscar winners, but the dearth of nominees. It’s not hard to get nominated for Best Picture, but most of these movies didn’t even do that.
I think that’s a matter of the nominees for Best Picture being so overwhelmingly American films which most of the time the film critics of the world (and that’s who voted in the BBC critics’ list) don’t think are quite as good as non-American films released the same year.
Absolutely, I even bought her records in the 90’s.
…
Absolutely!
It’s even easier since 2009.
A lot of people insist that it is not a science-fiction movie at all, and that what we see at the end is still one of his delusions despite it being the only case where others are around. Drove me nuts!
I’m so certain you’re right that I never even considered there might be another camp. As we learn from the movie, being right isn’t always cake and champagne. I took great personal solace from this 
Oh boy, is there. Online, it appears to be a majority, even. The two blog posts that come up on the first page of Google results to “take shelter ending” are both in that other camp:
Here’s a Reddit thread with lots of people taking the side we think is wrong. I’m not sure whether they are a quantitative majority, but they tend to be so aggressive in their certainty, as in this example:
I’m sorry to be late to this thread, but… just to be clear, did you interpret the final scene to be reality? Consensus seems to be that it’s clearly a dream / nightmare / vision, a sort of poetic epilogue to the story. Same as all the other visions in the film, including other visions that also feature his wife and daughter.
A friend I watched it with loved it precisely because he thought the ending was a huge twist and that Curtis was a true prophet all along. I had to explain to him for 20 minutes that this wasn’t the case, and that nothing in the film remotely even suggested that. I know I sound like a dick, but I really don’t understand how people can miss this.
Obviously you can see how I would find posts like that infuriating. Someone is wrong on the Internet! Aggressively, dismissively wrong! :mad:
Here on the SDMB there was a majority more on our side (along with several people who weren’t sure what to think), but the final post on that thread represents the other side.
In 2011, the filmmaker Jeff Nichols said the ending is “specifically designed to be ambiguous.”
However, Wikipedia has a distinct section in its article about the movie, discussing the ending, and here Nichols is again quoted, five years after the movie came out:
So I wonder if he was being a little disingenuous in his earlier comments? He’s still being coy five years later, clearly not wanting to turn off either segment of his audience: because you and I can read that and think “yeah, he obviously meant it the way wee see it” and those on the other side will think the same about their interpretation!
But if you go back to that 2011 quote and expand it for context, there’s a little more that can be teased out:
[spoiler]
So my first reaction is to say that if “these two people are on the same page and are seeing the same thing”, how can it not be real? The idea that they are experiencing a shared delusion is way too far out there (one thing I agree with one of those blog posts about).
OTOH, “the possibility of hope”? Sure didn’t look like it–as you said, no champagne or cake. How would you interpret that part?[/spoiler]
Those statements don’t look inconsistent to me. He knew exactly what he meant, but he didn’t want it to be 100% clear exactly what he meant.
Lists like this latest top 100 will sell you a consensus to support the reality they posit, but that consensus is fragile at best and always subject to review. The consensus also will vary among your co-workers, IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, your local movie club, among professional critics, among film study teachers, and at Karagarga, hence the “reality” will be different too. Some critics are in high school and there are even experienced critics that will bluster about walking out of a film, which never inspires confidence in their opinions. Siskel and Ebert watched thousands yet often one (or both!) was “wrong” (That was the real power of that show.) The only thing I presume about pro critics is that they’ve seen a lot of movies. What makes their opinions interesting is that they occupy the spaces between the Dunning-Kruger certainty of my letter carrier and the sphinx-like “I know one thing; that I know nothing” of the artists themselves. No surprise to see artists be ambiguous or let the work speak for itself. It’s our job to interpret, not theirs. Like any award or critique (including this!) the subtext is always “look how much I know” which is of course the opposite of what the truly knowledgeable say.
Re: Take Shelter (spoilers, obviously)
This isn’t outrageous (other than the insulting 6/10 rating!) if the entire finale takes place in his imagination while hospitalized, it’s actually kinda interesting. In any case, it’s courageous enough for Jeff Nichols to mirror prophets with the mentally ill without taking a categorical stand. There are any number of movie directors I’d love to sit down and ply with a few beers. It can be maddening (heh) to not find a single critic that interpreted, for example, Paranoid Park the way I did. So yeah, bring me Gus Van Sant and some sodium pentothal. I might’ve walked out of his film after 25 minutes, but having gutted it out, I’m pretty sure that’s the effect Van Sant crafted. Paranoid Park is my dark horse to be the next Citizen Kane of critical opinion. Who knows? Nobody, I guess…