The Defining Naughts Movie

[Piobaire]

I'm not really sure if there is a defining anything of that decade. Maybe I was getting too old to feel that way. However, I'll toss out Boiler Room. A crappy movie but it really defined some things of the time, namely that money wasn't something earned but rather something acquired.

 

[LawrenceMD]

memento - movie in the naughts had to be so wildly clever that even if you know the twist you still get fooled/entertained. sadly this whole premise (some variant of amnesia + backward story telling) was replicated often in the 00's from comedy (adam sandler 50 first dates, to torture Appreciation masked in art Irreversible, and action/adventure movies like Matrix, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) to less effect.

 

[AR_Six]

Lost In Translation, for me...

I guess you could make a case for LOTR being the biggest movie(s) of the decade but I don't know if that's "defining".

 

[Piobaire]

Originally Posted by LawrenceMD

memento - movie in the naughts had to be so wildly clever that even if you know the twist you still get fooled/entertained. sadly this whole premise (some variant of amnesia + backward story telling) was replicated often in the 00's from comedy (adam sandler 50 first dates, to torture Appreciation masked in art Irreversible, and action/adventure movies like Matrix, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) to less effect.

I thought of the Matrix but think first one was from the 1990s.

 

[Johdus Fanfoozal]

Originally Posted by LawrenceMD

memento - movie in the naughts had to be so wildly clever that even if you know the twist you still get fooled/entertained. sadly this whole premise (some variant of amnesia + backward story telling) was replicated often in the 00's from comedy (adam sandler 50 first dates, to torture Appreciation masked in art Irreversible, and action/adventure movies like Matrix, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) to less effect.
Memento is probably my favorite of the decade, but it had more to do with style, technique and story-telling rather than something that captured a time. Same with other faves City of God, Oh Brother Where Art Thou and Mulholland Drive It was a decade dominated by 9/11 and its aftermath. And I'd argue that no feature film was able to capture that suitably. But one documentary did and yet on the surface it had nothing to do with 9/11: The Fog of War.

 

[aphextwin07]

Harry Potter, because it was there the whole decade. lol.

no but really though, my favorites from this decade were probably Lost in Translation and Idiocracy (best comedy of ALL-TIME!)

also it's too early to say there is a defining film from this decade because not enough time has passed since.

 

[aphextwin07]

Originally Posted by Johdus Fanfoozal

It was a decade dominated by 9/11 and its aftermath. And I'd argue that no feature film was able to capture that suitably.


um, hello????? Team America??? pure gold.

 

[Imhoff]

My nominations for your consideration:

-Lord of the Rings Trilogy
-The Fountain
-Spirited Away

 

[munchausen]

Originally Posted by Piobaire

I'm not really sure if there is a defining anything of that decade. Maybe I was getting too old to feel that way. However, I'll toss out Boiler Room. A crappy movie but it really defined some things of the time, namely that money wasn't something earned but rather something acquired.

Boiler Room is an ok movie and in retrospect it might well have caught the Zeitgeist more than anything. I remember being in law school barely paying my bills and running into guys from college driving new Audis telling me they could get me a loan with no money down right now and thinking "there's something really fucked up going on here."

 

[Sesame Seed]

The Brown Bunny

Pseudo-intellectual meets pseudo-existential. The borders between film and pornography are blurred. Gallo represents today's filmmakers with nothing to say, Sevigny represents the hipster resurgence. Crap.

 

[Ambulance Chaser]

Originally Posted by Johdus Fanfoozal

It was a decade dominated by 9/11 and its aftermath. And I'd argue that no feature film was able to capture that suitably.
Minority Report encapsulated a lot of the liberty vs. security debate that occurred post-9/11 and was a brilliant piece of filmmaking to boot.

 

[tagutcow]

Originally Posted by Ambulance Chaser

Minority Report encapsulated a lot of the liberty vs. security debate that occurred post-9/11 and was a brilliant piece of filmmaking to boot.

I agree it was a great movie, but I felt that attempts to make it seem topical to post-9/11 politics were kludgy at best.

 

[Piobaire]

Originally Posted by Ambulance Chaser

Minority Report encapsulated a lot of the liberty vs. security debate that occurred post-9/11 and was a brilliant piece of filmmaking to boot.

Good choice.

While I personally could not stand the movie, I'm surprised No Country For Old Men has not been mentioned. I remember quite a few people here taking issue with the fact I disliked the movie.

 

[Johdus Fanfoozal]

Originally Posted by Ambulance Chaser

Minority Report encapsulated a lot of the liberty vs. security debate that occurred post-9/11 and was a brilliant piece of filmmaking to boot.

Good point. Never thought of it in the context of post-9/11, but it's there.

 

[Benzito]

Perhaps not the film that captures the national or international sentiment, but . . .

Swingers, if it came out in the 2000s (b/c it boosted or updated the Favreau and Vince Vaughn buddy type movie that was copied dozens of times since then, even by the same two actors).

Late 2000s, has to be Knocked Up or Superbad (same reason - you can't turn around without seeing Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, Michael Cera, etc.).

X-Men, Spiderman, or Batman Begins (whichever came first), which led to damn near every Marvel comic book hitting the big screen in the past few years.