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Archive for April 2008

The Best Films of 2004

by Christopher Beaubien • April 24, 2008 • Start the Discussion!

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Kill Bill Vol. I & II (dir. Quentin Tarantino)
The Fog of War (dir. Errol Morris)
Kinsey (dir. Bill Condon)
Spiderman 2 (dir. Sam Raimi)
Ripley’s Game (dir. Liliana Cavani)
Million Dollar Baby (dir. Clint Eastwood)
The Incredibles (dir. Brad Bird)
Finding Nemo (dir. Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich)
Baadasssss! (dir. Mario Van Peebles)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (dir. Michel Gondry)
Vera Drake (dir. Mike Leigh)
Closer (dir. Mike Nichols)
Hotel Rwanda (dir. Terry George)
Fahrenheit 9/11 (dir. Michael Moore)
Young Adam (dir. David Mackenzie)
Sideways (dir. Alexander Payne)
Before Sunset (dir. Richard Linklater)
The Aviator (dir. Martin Scorsese)
The Assassination of Richard Nixon (dir. Niels Mueller)
Intimate Strangers (dir. Patrice Leconte)
A Home at the End of the World (dir. Michael Mayer)
Moolaadé (dir. Ousmane Sembene)
3-Iron (dir. Ki-duk Kim)
Undertow (dir. David Gordon Green)
King of the Corner (dir. Peter Riegert)
The Libertine (dir. Laurence Dunmore)
House of Flying Daggers (dir. Yimou Zhang)
Collateral (dir. Michael Mann)
The Terminal (dir. Steven Spielberg)
Dear Frankie (dir. Shona Auerbach)
Maria Full of Grace (dir. Joshua Marston)
Primer (dir. Shane Carruth)
Brothers (dir. Susanne Bier)
Melinda and Melinda (dir. Woody Allen)
When Will I Be Loved (dir. James Toback)
Spartan (dir. David Mamet)
Yesterday (dir. Darrell Roodt)
Darwin’s Nightmare (dir. Hubert Sauper)
My Summer of Love (dir. Pawel Pawlikowski)
The Woodsman (dir. Nicole Kassell)
Down to the Bone (dir. Debra Granik)
Mean Creek (dir. Jacob Aaron Estes)
In the Realms of the Unreal (dir. Jessica Yu)
The Polar Express (dir. Robert Zemeckis)
Turtles Can Fly (dir. Bahman Ghobadi)
The Ladykillers (dir. Joel and Ethan Coen)
Friday Night Lights (dir. Peter Berg and Josh Pate)
Cellular (dir. David R. Ellis)
Howl’s Moving Castle (dir. Hayao Miyazaki)
The Passion of the Christ (dir. Mel Gibson)
Finding Neverland (dir. Marc Forster)
Palindromes (dir. Todd Solondz)
Napoleon Dynamite (dir. Jared Hess)
The Bourne Supremacy (dir. Paul Greengrass)
Tanner on Tanner (dir. Robert Altman)
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (dir. Wes Anderson)
Secret Window (dir. David Koepp)
The Clearing (dir. Pieter Jan Brugge)
Saved! (dir. Brian Dannelly)
The Notebook (dir. Nick Cassavetes)
Shaun of the Dead (dir. Edgar Wright)
The Machinist (dir. Brad Anderson)
Shrek 2 (dir. Andrew Adamson and Kelly Asbury)
Helboy (dir. Guillermo del Toro)
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (dir. Gore Verbinski)
Vanity Fair (dir. Mira Nair)
My Mother (dir. Christophe Honoré)

The Best Films of 2003

by Christopher Beaubien • April 23, 2008 • Start the Discussion!

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The Son (dir. Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne)
The Barbarian Invasions (dir. Denys Arcand)
Lost in Translation (dir. Sofia Coppola)
City of God (dir. Fernando Meirelles)
Whale Rider (dir. Niki Caro)
American Splendor (dir. Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini)
House of Sand and Fog (dir. Vadim Perelman)
Northfork (dir. Michael and Mark Polish)
Owning Mahowny (dir. Richard Kwietniowski)
Matchstick Men (dir. Ridley Scott)
Girl with a Pearl Earring (dir. Peter Webber)
The Man on the Train (dir. Patrice Leconte)
The Five Obstructions (dir. Jørgen Leth and Lars von Trier)
Monster (dir. Patty Jenkins)
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (dir. Peter Weir)
Lilya 4-Ever (dir. Lukas Moodysson)
The Triplets of Belleville (dir. Sylvain Chomet)
Mystic River (dir. Clint Eastwood)
Intermission (dir. John Crowley)
All the Real Girls (dir. David Gordon Green)
The Station Agent (dir. Thomas McCarthy)
The Saddest Music in the World (dir. Guy Maddin)
Touching The Void (dir. Kevin Macdonald)
May (dir. Lucky McKee)
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring (dir. Ki-duk Kim)
School of Rock (dir. Richard Linklater)
The Shape of Things (dir. Neil Labute)
The Company (dir. Robert Altman)
Japanese Story (dir. Sue Brooks)
Together (dir. Kaige Chen)
Dogville (dir. Lars von Trier)
Love Actually (dir. Richard Curtis)
Thirteen (dir. Catherine Hardwicke)
Capturing the Friedmans (dir. Andrew Jarecki)
Bad Santa (dir. Terry Zwigoff)
The Cooler (dir. Wayne Kramer)
Shattered Glass (dir. Billy Ray)
The Mother (dir. Roger Michell)
I’m Not Scared (dir. Gabriele Salvatores)
Dopamine (dir. Mark Decena)
The Return (dir. Andrei Zvyagintsev)
My Architect (dir. Nathaniel Kahn)
Elephant (dir. Gus Van Sant)
Big Fish (dir. Tim Burton)
Free Radicals (dir. Barbara Albert)
Down with Love (dir. Peyton Reed)
Identity (dir. James Mangold)
Tarnation (dir. Jonathan Caouette)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (dir. Peter Jackson)
The Dreamers (dir. Bernardo Bertolucci)
Open Water (dir. Chris Kentis)
Hulk (dir. Ang Lee)
Nathalie… (dir. Anne Fontaine)
Osama (dir. Siddiq Barmak)
Looney Tunes: Back in Action (dir. Joe Dante)
The Matrix Reloaded (dir. Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski)
Peter Pan (dir. P.J. Hogan)
Elf (dir. Jon Favreau)
Swimming Pool (dir. François Ozon)
Tupac: Resurrection (dir. Lauren Lazin)
The Last Samurai (dir. Edward Zwick)
The Corporation (dir. Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott)
Seabiscuit (dir. Gary Ross)

The Best Films of 2002

by Christopher Beaubien • April 22, 2008 • 1 Comment

Adaptation. (dir. Spike Jonze)
Punch-Drunk Love (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)
Spirited Away (dir. Hayao Miyazaki)
Lovely and Amazing (dir. Nicole Holofcener)
Invincible (dir. Werner Herzog)
13 Conversations About One Thing (dir. Jill Sprecher)
The Grey Zone (dir. Tim Blake Nelson)
Talk To Her (dir. Pedro Almodóvar)
Songs From The Second Floor (dir. Roy Andersson)
The Quiet American | Rabbit-Proof Fence (dir. Phillip Noyce)
Frailty (dir. Bill Paxton)
Auto Focus (dir. Paul Schrader)
Y Tu Mamá También (dir. Alfonso Cuarón)
One Hour Photo (dir. Mark Romanek)
Bowling for Columbine (dir. Michael Moore)
Last Orders (dir. Fred Schepisi)
All or Nothing (dir. Mike Leigh)
Tully (dir. Hilary Birmingham)
The Man from Elysian Fields (dir. George Hickenlooper)
25th Hour (dir. Spike Lee)
About Schmidt (dir. Alexander Payne)
Minority Report (dir. Steven Spielberg)
Frida (dir. Julie Taymore)
Changing Lanes (dir. Roger Michell)
The Kid Stays in the Pictures (dir. Nanette Burstein)
In America (dir. Jim Sheridan)
Solaris (dir. Steven Soderbergh)
Ivansxtc. (dir. Bernard Rose)
Dirty Pretty Things (dir. Stephen Frears)
About a Boy (dir. Chris Weitz)
The Pianist (dir. Roman Polanski)
Charlotte Sometimes (dir. Eric Byler)
Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself (dir. Lone Scherfig)
Raising Victor Vargas (dir. Peter Sollett)
Far From Heaven (dir. Todd Haynes)
Femme Fatale (dir. Brian DePalma)
The Good Girl (dir. Miguel Arteta)
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (dir. Laetitia Colombani)
Irreversible (dir. Gaspar Noé)
The Hours (dir. Stephen Daldry)
Better Luck Tomorrow (dir. Justin Lin)
Stevie (dir. Steve James)
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (dir. George Clooney)
Blue Car (dir. Karen Moncrieff)
Signs (dir. M. Night Shyamalan)
Insomnia (dir. Christopher Nolan)
Metropolis (dir. Rintaro)
24 Hour Party People (dir. Michael Winterbottom)
The Cat Returns (dir. Hiroyuki Morita)
Secretary (dir. Steven Shainberg)
Personal Velocity: Three Portraits (dir. Rebecca Miller)
Sunshine State (dir. John Sayles)
Catch Me If You Can (dir. Steven Spielberg)
Gangs of New York (dir. Martin Scorsese)
Pumpkin (dir. Anthony Abrams and Adam Larson Broder)
8 Women (dir. François Ozon)
Oasis (dir. Chang-dong Lee)
Morvern Callar (dir. Lynn Ramsay)
Hero (dir. Yimou Zhang)
Manito (dir. Eric Eason)
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (dir. Peter Jackson)
The Bourne Identity (dir. Doug Liman)
Bend It Like Beckham (dir. Gurinder Chadha)
Secret Things (dir. Jean-Claude Brisseau)
Unfaithful (dir. Adrian Lyne)
Eight Legged Freaks (dir. Ellory Elkayem)
XX/XY (dir. Austin Chick)
Naqoyqatsi (dir. Godfrey Reggio and Philip Glass)
Panic Room (dir. David Fincher)
Red Dragon (dir. Brett Ratner)
Lost in La Mancha (dir. Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe)
Spider (dir. David Cronenberg)
Love Liza (dir. Todd Louiso)
Chicago (dir. Rob Marshall)
Real Women Have Curves (dir. Patricia Cardoso)
Biggie and Tupac (dir. Nick Broomfield)
In My Skin (dir. Marina de Van)
People I Know (dir. Daniel Algrant)
Gerry (dir. Gus Van Sant)
Spiderman (dir. Sam Raimi)
Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (dir. Chan-wook Park)
Blood Work (dir. Clint Eastwood)
Hukkle (dir. György Pálfi)

The Best Films of 2001

by Christopher Beaubien • April 21, 2008 • Start the Discussion!

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Wit (dir. Mike Nichols)
Mulholland Drive (dir. David Lynch)
Ghost World (dir. Terry Zwigoff)
Innocence (dir. Paul Cox)
Waking Life (dir. Richard Linklater)
In The Bedroom (dir. Todd Field)
Gosford Park (dir. Robert Altman)
Storytelling (dir. Todd Solondz)
Read My Lips (dir. Jacques Audiard)
The Piano Teacher (dir. Michael Haneke)
A Beautiful Mind (dir. Ron Howard)
The Royal Tenenbaums (dir. Wes Anderson)
Monsoon Wedding (dir. Mira Nair)
Monster’s Ball (dir. Marc Forster)
Fat Girl (dir. Catherine Breillat)
Millenium Actress (dir. Satoshi Kon)
Donnie Darko (dir. Richard Kelly)
The Majestic (dir. Frank Darabont)
Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (dir. Zacharias Kunuk)
Moulin Rouge! (dir. Baz Luhrmann)
Bully (dir. Larry Clark)
The Son’s Room (dir. Nanni Moretti)
How I Killed My Father (dir. Anne Fontaine)
Lost and Delirious (dir. Léa Pool)
Nowhere in Africa (dir. Caroline Link)
Metropolis (dir. Rintaro)
Amelie (dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
The Deep End (dir. Scott McGehee and David Siegel)
Kandahar (dir. Mohsen Makhmalbaf)
L.I.E. (dir. Michael Cuesta)
The Pledge (dir. Sean Penn)
What Time Is It Over There? (dir. Ming-liang Tsai)
Black Hawk Down (dir. Ridley Scott)
Artificial Intelligence: AI (dir. Steven Spielberg)
Monsters Inc. (dir. Pete Docter)
Joy Ride (dir. John Dahl)
The Man Who Wasn’t There (dir. Joel and Ethan Coen)
Spy Kids (dir. Robert Rodriguez)
From Hell (dir. Albert and Allen Hughes)
The Anniversary Party (dir. Alan Cumming and Jennifer Jason Leigh)
Me Without You (dir. Sandra Goldbacher)
Shrek (dir. Andrew Adamson)
Intimacy (dir. Patrice Chéreau)
Human Nature (dir. Michel Gondry)
Startup.com (dir. Chris Hegedus and Jehane Noujaim)
The Cat’s Meow (dir. Peter Bogdanovich)
Psycho Beach Party (dir. Robert Lee King)
Winged Migration (dir. Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud)
The Score (dir. Frank Oz)
The Others (dir. Alejandro Amenábar)
Millennium Mambo (dir. Hsiao-hsien Hou)
Ocean’s Eleven (dir. Steven Soderbergh)
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (dir. Peter Jackson)

The Best Films of 2000

by Christopher Beaubien • April 20, 2008 • Start the Discussion!

American Psycho (dir. Mary Harron)
You Can Count On Me (dir. Kenneth Lonergan)
Werckmeister Harmonies (dir. Béla Tarr)
Panic (dir. Henry Bromell)
The Terrorist (dir. Santosh Sivan)
Yi Yi (dir. Edward Yang)
Shadow of the Vampire (dir. E. Elias Merhige)
Quills (dir. Philip Kaufman)
Girl on the Bridge (dir. Patrice Leconte)
Requiem for a Dream (dir. Darren Aronofsky)
Almost Famous (dir. Cameron Crowe)
Traffic (dir. Steven Soderbergh)
Sexy Beast (dir. Jonathan Glazer)
George Washington (dir. David Gordon Green)
Wonder Boys (dir. Curtis Hanson)
Code Unknown (dir. Michael Haneke)
Memento (dir. Christopher Nolan)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (dir. Ang Lee)
Unbreakable (dir. M. Night Shyamalan)
Chicken Run (dir. Nick Park)
Dinner Rush (dir. Bob Giraldi)
The Claim (dir. Michael Winterbottom)
My Dog Skip (dir. Jay Russell)
Amores Perros (dir. Alejandro González Iñárritu)
Diamond Men (dir. Dan Cohen)
The Gleaners & I (dir. Agnès Varda)
Maelström (dir. Denis Villeneuve)
Dancer in the Dark (dir. Lars von Trier)
The Cell (dir. Tarsem)
Under the Sand (dir. François Ozon)
High Fidelity (dir. Stephen Frears)
The Contender (dir. Rob Lurie)
Best in Show (dir. Christopher Guest)
Pollock (dir. Ed Harris)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (dir. Joel Coen)
Faithless (dir. Liv Ullmann)
In the Mood for Love (dir. Kar Wai Wong)
The Emperor’s New Groove (dir. Mark Dindal)
The Dish (dir. Rob Sitch)
The Widow of Saint-Pierre (dir. Patrice Leconte)
Ginger Snaps (dir. John Fawcett)
The Crimson Rivers (dir. Mathieu Kassovitz)
Everything Put Together (dir. Marc Forster)
Tigerland (dir. Joel Schumacher)
The Isle (dir. Ki-duk Kim)
Cast Away (dir. Robert Zemeckis)
Space Cowboys (dir. Clint Eastwood)
Dr. T & the Women (dir. Robert Altman)
Gladiator (dir. Ridley Scott)
Chuck & Buck (dir. Miguel Arteta)