It seems appropriate that we get a list of the greatest films of this century on the heels of a heated summer movie season where critics and movie fans were at odds with one another. Fans levied complaints that critics worked as a collective in panning Suicide Squad – to the extent a petition was started to shut down Rotten Tomatoes, the aggregate scoring website for films and television shows – and yet ignored well-reviewed mainstream releases like The Nice Guys. Even a surefire blockbuster like Star Trek Beyond, described as being “classic Star Trek,” and yet its positive reviews and box-office earnings thus far show a disconnect.
The phrase “contemporary cinema” gives way to a wide range of varying opinions on what exactly is a great film. We look at the Oscars as a standard bearer in deciding quality when in fact it boils down to a simple popularity contest as if deciding the king and queen at the senior prom. Entertainment is cyclical, after all. In the 1990s, film took a giant leap ahead of television with young directors like Quentin Tarantino, David Fincher, and Paul Thomas Anderson. Now, television has edged ahead with series like Game of Thrones, The Americans, and most of the original programming on Netflix. But we are not near the death of cinema – far from it. Great films come out every year. Not just great films, but greater diversity in the types of films and the people making them.
Recently the editors of BBC Culture, commissioned a poll of critics to determine the 100 greatest films of the 21st Century. Last year, the editors asked critics to name the greatest American films of all time. Interestingly enough, the film that registered No. 1 in this latest poll was listed at No. 21 in last year’s top 100, above the likes of Star Wars, The Wizard of Oz, and Raging Bull.
Just as the American Film Institute has its 100 Years…100 Movies, which was originally polled in 1997 and again ten years later for a 10th Anniversary Edition, many new classics on this list are destined to be mentioned with old classics.
Film is an ever-changing medium and the Top 25 listed below (visit BBC Culture for the complete list) is a good indication that cinema is not dying as many critics have feared. Whether or not moviegoers will seek these movies out is something else entirely.
1. Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001)
2. In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-wai, 2000)
3. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)
4. Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, 2001)
5. Boyhood (Richard Linklater, 2014)
6. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004)
7. The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick, 2011)
8. Yi Yi: A One and a Two (Edward Yang, 2000)
9. A Separation (Asghar Farhadi, 2011)
10. Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2013)
10. No Country For Old Men (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2007)
12. Children of Men (Alfonso Cuarón, 2006)
12. Zodiac (David Fincher, 2007)
14. The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer, 2012)
15. 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu, 2007)
16. Holy Motors (Leos Carax, 2012)
17. Pan’s Labyrinth (Guillermo Del Toro, 2008)
18. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke, 2009)
19. Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller, 2015)
20. Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman, 2008)
21. The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, 2014)
22. Caché (Michael Haneke, 2005)
22. Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola, 2003)
24. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2012)
25. Memento (Christopher Nolan, 2012)
