Top Ten of the Decade Part II

2020 brings with it the conclusion of the previous decade and the beginning of a new one. In celebration of this transition, I asked our contributors to put together lists of their respective top ten films from the previous decade (2009-2019). I left the definition of “top” to each individual in order to create more diversity in the lists; some of our writers used the term “best”, some used the term “favorite”, and some (like me) attempted to blend the two. We’ll be publishing these lists over the next two weeks and at the end of it all, Kent, Richard, and I will be releasing our own lists in podcast form. Enjoy today’s entry by Megan Spell and make sure you check out all of the lists over the coming days. -BG

2009 was the first year I remember being consciously interested in movies. I had friends over for the Oscars, I had peer-pressured most people in my life to spend countless hours at the local Regal, and I began to get into reading film criticism and listening to podcasts, of course. The past ten years have represented essentially my entire young adult life, so when Brian asked for a best of the decade list, I thought it would be a nearly impossible task. It was.

10. Baby Driver (Edgar Wright, 2017) /Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2017) (tie)
I can’t let 2017 die. My first draft of this list had 26 films, seven from 2017. Baby Driver and Phantom Thread represent the two types of ways I obsess over movies. Baby Driver, I saw five times in theaters. Phantom Thread just kind of kept poking at the back of my brain over and over. And to be honest, I just really needed an Edgar Wright and a PTA on my list.

9. Parasite (Bong Joon Ho, 2019)
I was hesitant to include a film from 2019 due to recency bias, but after watching a few times, I cannot find any flaws with Parasite. Bong Joon Ho has made a perfect thing; intimate, funny, truly shocking, and surprisingly approachable. I tend to dissolve into “you just haveeee to see it” blubbering to nearly everyone I have come in contact with this year.

8. Everybody Wants Some!! (Richard Linklater, 2016)
This is the first of my “Real Meg Sh*t” choices. To breeze right past Boyhood and Before Midnight to praise Linklater’s frat boy slice of life movie…even I kind of hate myself for it. But this is my “pop on to feel good” film, and I find it is severely overlooked for being viewed as “Dazed and Confused Pt. 2”. While I think they make a good pair, EWS stands on its own.

7. Get Out (Jordan Peele, 2017)
One of my most repeated mantras is the best dramatic films contain funny aspects, because sometimes in real life, even in tragedy, there are lighter moments. The same applies for horror. If it is all just unrelentingly terrifying and dark, it doesn’t feel like life, it feels like fiction. So, the genius of Get Out is that while it is ostensibly science fiction, it is the horror movie of the decade that hits the best for me. It handles so much so effortlessly; it shifted the cultural conversations around satire and horror and the next generation of filmmakers. On top of all that, it’s just a great time.

6. Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again (Ol Parker, 2019)
The fact that this is on my list is a testament to my stubbornness, and the fact that it’s not in the top five is a testament to my restraint. I have nothing intelligent to say about MM! HWGA. But movies are an audio-visual medium, and I love to listen to ABBA and see attractive people dance around Europe. Any defense I could mount for this movie would crumble under the slightest inquiry, so I am glad this is a one-sided review.

5. Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, 2014)
Ralph Fiennes was determined to get on my list. I cut A Bigger Splash (and that scene from Hail, Caesar) under duress. I know it is so horribly predictable for a “film person” to praise a Wes Anderson movie, but I can’t help myself. This is the first since Tenenbaums that has been an A+ for me, and potentially even more rewatchable.

4. What We Do in The Shadows (Taika Waititi, 2014)
Ah, the nonsense continues. I refused to get out of here without proper comedic representation, and after having a friend shoot down my argument for Spy (three times), WWDITS stands alone as the only true comedy on the list. It is endlessly rewatchable, since it is so jam packed with jokes. The only movie from this decade that has permeated into my friend group vernacular in a significant way. Leave me to do my dark bidding on the internet.

3. Call Me by Your Name (Luca Guadanino, 2017)
I am not Brian Gill and thus, I do not like to cry. I can sometimes find it hard to identify with a character enough to be moved to tears. That being said, after watching Call Me by Your Name, every time, I cry. The ability of Timothee Chalamet to convince me that I, too, was once a young man in northern Italy who found and lost love, is inexplicably masterful. Such a beautiful and playful and honest movie. It haunts me. I could gush about it until the end of time.

2. The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)
When this exercise started, I thought The Social Network would be my number one with a bullet. Incredibly directed, written, and acted and wildly relevant 10 years later. The score is constantly playing in my office. The Eduardo/Zuckerberg fight is one of my most-watched Youtube clips. I have a serious long-term relationship with this film. These were the first Oscars that I remember being invested in, and my social life has been all downhill from there.

1. Lady Bird (Greta Gerwig, 2017)
The best films, my favorites, I feel some sort of ownership stake in them; none so much as Lady Bird. While not exactly paralleling my high school experience, it feels so universal to being a teenager and being so confidently lost and stubbornly wrong, all the time. Making all the right mistakes that everyone makes and is forgiven for in time and in maturity. I feel Lady Bird in my bones and after watching I feel it become more and more a part of me. There could be no other number one.

Top Ten of the Decade Part I

2020 brings with it the conclusion of the previous decade and the beginning of a new one. In celebration of this transition, I asked our contributors to put together lists of their respective top ten films from the previous decade (2009-2019). I left the definition of “top” to each individual in order to create more diversity in the lists; some of our writers used the term “best”, some used the term “favorite”, and some (like me) attempted to blend the two. We’ll be publishing these lists over the next two weeks and at the end of it all, Kent, Richard, and I will be releasing our own lists in podcast form. Enjoy today’s entry by Sean Blanford and make sure you check out all of the lists over the coming days. -BG

Hundreds upon hundreds of films have been released between 2010 and 2019 and coming up with a list of my ten favorites was a grueling endeavor. Whether they be action films that culminate a series, award winners, or films that have gained cult status over time, these ten (well, technically, eleven), are movies that have resonated with me on a level above the rest. In deciding my favorites, the main criteria I used was simple: how the film made me feel when I first watched it, how it has resonated with me over time, and rewatchability. To name honorable mentions would be a massive list in and of itself, but the last four films on my chopping block were 2012’s Silver Linings Playbook (David O. Russell), 2017’s Raw (Julia Ducournau) and Thelma (Joachim Trier), and 2018’s Hereditary (Ari Aster). So, without further ado, here is my list of my favorite films of the last ten years.

10.) Avengers: Infinity War (2018)/Avengers: Endgame (2019)
Our editor (one Mr. Brian Gill) said if we have something that we feel we can’t separate that we can include both films on the list, and it’s difficult to take one without the other. Taking six hours to culminate eleven years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the combination of Infinity War and Endgame was a satisfying way to wrap up this chapter which began with Iron Man back in 2008. It will be strange to go forward without Robert Downey, Jr.’s Iron Man or Chris Evans’ Captain America, but we can look back on these two films and say that with great performances, amazing visuals, and a multitude of holy *bleep* moments, Kevin Feige and the Russo brothers got it right. 

9.) Parasite (2019)
There are films that will appear later on this list that will have had the opportunity to resonate more over time, but the 2019 Palme D’or winner has had such an impact on me that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since I first watched at TIFF back in September. It takes a craftsman with the utmost confidence in their skills to tell an engrossing story that has no true protagonist or antagonist, but writer/director Bong Joon Ho accomplished just that. Much more than a film about classism or how we treat those around us than anything else, Parasite crosses multiple genres flawlessly without a second wasted or an average performance in sight.

8.) Black Swan (2010)
Everyone loves an underdog story, but Black Swan took that framing device and said, “what if the underdog slowly started to lose her mind?” Some will make the argument that a great film should be about the whole and not the sum of its parts, but without Natalie Portman’s haunting performance as ballet dancer Nina Sayers, this would have been a lesser film. She was more than deserving of her Best Actress Oscar win, one of the best performances of her entire career.

7.) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part II (2011)
The second film on my list that serves as the culmination of a beloved franchise, Hallows not only has the biggest worldwide box office numbers of the franchise (the only film to cross one billion dollars), but it’s also one of the best. This started the trend of beloved young adult novels that split the final book into two films, which was a wise decision because it gave more opportunity to stay true to the source material. We watched Danielle Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson grow up in front of our eyes, and while the Fantastic Beasts films may be dragging the Wizarding World series down into the mud, we can look back on Deathly Hallows Part II and say they stuck the landing.

6.) Carol (2015)
While Black Swan was built on the amazing performance of Natalie Portman, Todd Haynes’ Carol had two in the effervescent and dynamic Cate Blanchett as the titular Carol, as well as Rooney Mara’s quiet and understated Therese. Based on the novel The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith, this is one of the best love stories of the decade with an amazing score by Carter Burwell (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) and cinematography by Edward Lachman.

5.) The LEGO Movie (2014)
Without question, one of the best animated films of the decade wasn’t even nominated for a Best Animated Feature Oscar. Visually dynamic, well-written, and an overall well-crafted kid’s movie that was perfect for the whole family, Emmett, Wyldstyle, and the entire crew of this film deserved better. I guess they made up for it by nominating the earworm Everything is Awesome for best song, but I digress. Spawning multiple sequels and spinoffs to varying degrees of success, The LEGO Movie can be enjoyed by anyone between the ages of 5 and 85 and is just as good the tenth time as it the first.

4.) Mad Max Fury Road (2015)
From the most visually dynamic animated film of the decade to quite possibly the most eye-catching live action film, Mad Max Fury Road brought back the character of Max Rockastansky (last seen in the 1985 film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome) and ramped everything up to eleven. As much as this is Max’s (Tom Hardy) film, you sink your teeth more into the story of Furiosa (Charlize Theron). This is the type of film that 4K was created for, and it is just as good in the Black and Chrome edition as it is in color.

3.) Scott Pilgrim vs the World (2010)
Ask a hundred people what the biggest cult film of the last ten years is and I’d bet a good portion would point to Scott Pilgrim because of how ahead of its time it was. The best video game film not based on an actual video game, this is just a fun movie, plain and simple. In my eyes this is one of the most rewatchable films of the decade.

2.) Ex Machina (2015)
I was really torn between my final two, and Ex Machina is more a 1A than a 2, but something had to go in this spot. Coming out of the gates strong in his directorial debut, Alex Garland was able to create a fully immersive environment around three central characters and a shoestring budget for a film of this genre (15 million dollars), and all three leads knocked it out of the park. This really put both Alicia Vikander and Oscar Isaac on the map as A-list stars.

1.) Your Name. (2016/2017)
I bet you didn’t see this one coming. I can go on for hours (and pages) on my love for this film, which I found good enough to see in theaters four times in the span of a month (in both English and Japanese). This film’s hand-drawn animation must be seen to be believed. Multiple viewings are a must to get the full weight of the film, but you’ll want to watch it over again because of the visual stylings and overall story. Much more than your traditional body swap film, Your Name. is my favorite film of the 2010’s.

Five Favorite Christmas Movies

One of the many traditions associated with the holiday season is the viewing of Christmas movies. I've got a group of friends who get together every Monday leading up to the big day to watch a few of the classics. I have found, though, that while I love the Christmas season and most of the stuff that comes with it, I don’t love a lot of the traditional holiday classics. I’ve never been overly impressed with It’s a Wonderful Life or White Christmas, have soured on Christmas Vacation over the last decade, and have always loathed A Christmas Story. I do have a few favorites, however; a set of movies that I’m sure to mix in with the classic holiday specials and The Office Christmas episodes every year. Here are my top five.

5. The Santa Clause (1994)
I liked this movie well enough as a kid then mostly forgot about it for 20 years. Then, when my son got super into Christmas a few years back (as kids are delightfully wont to do), I threw this movie on and it’s remained a stalwart of our Christmas rotation ever since. Santa Clause has a strong conceit, a few jokes that work for adults, and a classic “rediscovering the spirit of Christmas” storyline that feels genuine rather than forced.

4. Love Actually (2003)
A solid romantic-comedy with a Christmas background, Love Actually also qualifies as one of my favorite chick-flicks of all time. The interweaving of the lives of the ensemble cast is excellent and the realistic good feeling of the movie allows you to look past the far-fetched connections and questionable relationships. Is it weird that the future Rick from The Walking Dead quietly lets his best friend’s wife know that he’s into her? Yes. Does it bother me within the movie? Nah, not really. We get some stellar performances as well, particularly from perpetually overlooked Liam Neeson. And there's always something awesome about an (almost) all British cast. Hugh Grant for life.

3. Elf (2003)
I have found that there is a large anti-Elf contention out there trying to keep Elf-awareness down, but I will not be silenced. Here's how great Elf is: I know lots of people (some family members included) who hate Will Ferrell. HATE him. To a man, those haters will happily sit and watch Elf any time it comes on TV. Likewise, lifelong Ferrell that I am, I would call this one of my favorite Ferrell movies. Just like Caine in The Muppet Christmas Carol, Ferrell absolutely goes ALL OUT for his role in a children's movie and that performance makes the film. There’s an infectious energy to this movie that jives well with the feeling of the holiday season, too, and I love it for that.

2. The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
Am I correct in assuming that no one doesn't like the Muppets? There's no one out there with a secret vendetta against Kermit or Fozzy, right? (Editor’s note: I know one person who doesn’t like the Muppets and I do not trust him, obviously.) Because no matter how old I get, the Muppets still hold some awesomeness for me. While all the Muppet movies are good, The Muppet Christmas Carol is, in my opinion, the crowning achievement of the pre-Jason Segel franchise. It's a wonderful blend of music, classic literature, and general silliness capped off by a surprisingly strong performance by Michael Caine. Caine, who's been known to take a paycheck and mail in a performance from time to time, plays Ebenezer Scrooge like he's in a big-time stage adaptation of the Dickens novel. Just absolutely goes all in for a kid's movie starring a puppet and you gotta love that.

1. Home Alone (1989)
Absolutely no question in my mind that this is the best holiday movie of all-time. If I see a Christmas movie list like this and it doesn't contain Home Alone, I scoff in anger and immediately disregard its validity. Whether watching alone, with a group, or with my kid, there are numerous moments that make me laugh out loud despite the fact that I've seen this movie upwards of 50 times. I LOVE it. Home Alone is INSANELY quotable, too, with a litany of lines that I can and do quote in everyday life. As I've gotten older my viewing of Home Alone has changed some and I appreciate different elements. For instance, the Wet Bandits’ plot, I think, is genius and the Bandits themselves are incredible characters. Pesci and Stern just CRUSH those roles. “Maybe he killed himself” is one of the funniest lines of the movie and Stern delivers it with such earnestness. Knowing that the scene with Candy and O’Hara in the back of the Budget van is completely improvised, too, adds to my great appreciation for the film. And as I get older, I feel the pain of Kevin’s attacks on Marv and Harry so much more deeply. My son loves this movie so much that we have to put a limit on the number of times he can watch it in one holiday season and then won’t let him watch it between New Year’s and Thanksgiving. Even still, it remains my absolute favorite and a true hallmark of the holidays around our house.