My List of The 21st Century’s Greatest Films

So here’s my individual list of the 21st Century’s Greatest Films of BBC’s Culture. In fact, it is if I was asked to do it when they asked many film critics to do this time consuming, hair splitting, gut wrenching exercise.

It is fucking hard to try to pick only ten films out of sixteen years of cinema. The worst thing in this is that I have so many films to catch up that I don’t know how full time film critics who watch many films a day can pick ten. This is beyond me.

At first I looked back at my list of the best films of the decade 2000-2009 as a starter,  then I got back to my ratings of five and four stars and a half.

Finally, I let my judgment and my cinematic memory decide which film has to be on the list and in which position. Sometimes, my tastes got over my judgment and other times it was the overall quality of the film that won it all.

Final words : are haters are gonna hate.

(Click on the links to read my full reviews)

Magnolia

Magnolia (P.T. Anderson, 1999)

An epic mosaic of several interrelated characters in search of happiness, forgiveness, and meaning in the San Fernando Valley.

The ensemble cast of P.T. Anderson’s Magnolia include a lot of his previous films stars and even more bigger names Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tom Cruise, William H. Macy, Jason Robards, John C. Reilly, Alfred Molina, and Luis Guzman. This tortuous story reminds of the great films especially Nashville of the late Robert Altman. One of Anderson’s masters, in fact he was assistant-director on the set of Altman’s latest films because of insurances obligations. The Martin Scorsese influence has been highly palpable with Anderson’s near-masterpiece Boogie Nights. This film mixed the Scorsese rise and fall characters of Raging Bull, GoodFellas, and Casino. Technically the ever moving camera of Cinematographer Robert Elswit represents a great achievement.

Top films of Paul Thomas Anderson by LMdC

Of the many young directors that made films in the last 15 years, Anderson is one of the few that has the talent and the mastery to make entertaining masterpieces. He is the perfect blend of the heritage of Martin Scorsese and Robert Altman as long as Erich von Stroheim and Orson Welles. There Will Be Blood stands as one of the greatest films of all time as it is now in my Top 10. His use of camera movement reminds of the greatest films of Jean Renoir and Max Ophüls. His next film, The Master will be in theatres in 2013, until then let’s take a look at his already rich filmography.

Boogie Nights

Boogie Nights (P.T. Anderson, 1997)

Jean Renoir once said that "everything that is recorded with a microphone and filmed with a camera together is Cinema. There isn't any criteria to dismiss any work of this kind."

When I discovered Anderson's There Will Be Blood in theater back in 2007, I immediately knew that I was in presence of a great filmmaker's work. All of his films reflect the grammar of his masters. When you look at There Will Be Blood you feel like you were watching a modern made version of Erich von Stroheim's Greed and even Orson Welles' Citizen Kane. His Magnolia feels like an interpretation of Robert Altman's particular ensemble narratives. For Punch Drunk Love I have some difficulties to identify to whom he applies the grammar and the narratives but it still a one of a kind picture.