My 10 Favorite Movies of the 2000s, Introduction

Yearly and Decade-ly top ten lists are these fun-but-kinda-subjective things that crop up somewhere around the targeted realm of December 31st/January 1st but seem odd and wrong in August. I don’t care. I wasn’t in the damn mood to compile a top ten list in December, but I am now.

In a way, it’s more pleasurable to do now, because no one cares anymore about ranking the best movies of the past decade.

Anyways, let me quickly give ten Honorable Mentions, in alphabetical order, to:

The 40-Year Old Virgin (2005, Judd Apatow)

About Schmidt (2002, Alexander Payne)

Hidden (2005, Michael Hanake)

No Country For Old Men (2007, Joel and Ethan Coen)

The Reader (2008, Stephen Daldry)

Snow Angels (2008, David Gordon Green)

The Squid and The Whale (2005, Noah Baumbach)

Storytelling (2001, Todd Solondz)

Waking Life (2001, Richard Linklater)

Where The Wild Things Are (2009, Spike Jonze)

And then my OFFICIAL Top 10:

1. Adaptation (2002, Spike Jonze)

2. There Will Be Blood (2007, P. T. Anderson)

3. Sideways (2004, Alexander Payne)

4. Spirited Away (2001, Hayao Miyazaki)

5. Ghost World (2000, Terry Zwigoff)

6. Punch-Drunk Love (2002, P. T. Anderson)

7. Talk To Her (2002, Pedro Almodovar)

8. Closer (2004, Mike Nichols)

9. Synecdoche, New York (2008, Charlie Kaufman)

10. Together (2000, Lukas Moodysson)

Cool. So I’m gonna take these one by one, and write a blog about them. I’m not gonna do them in the right order, and I’m not gonna do them in a row. But I’m gonna do them.

Books or Movies? Part 2

Having just re-read my post from last week, I’m not in much of a mood to elaborate, expand, or continue hacking away at those futile, back-and-forth, should-I-or-shouldn’t-I thoughts that I allowed myself to be beaten up by. They’re annoying.

But their annoyingness is not the reason I don’t want to discuss the issue anymore. The reason is because I know I’m going to continue trudging along on this path, and no matter how much I go on and on about fear, and what if I suck, and man, technology annoys me, I know I’m going to keep on. So uh, matter closed for now.

It’s just that (You: “Didn’t he say the matter was closed?”) I’m a bit bummed because I got this thing I think I have talent for, and I’d like to commit myself to learning its craft, accepting myself as a novice, but the Who-Where-How aspect of it is tripping me up. Is filmmaking still a learn-it-yourself thing, a snag a book on lighting from the library, find a camera, and film something-anything, kind of thing? I’m considering applying to some film schools in order to take my time and really learn the technical side of this, but . . . is that a good idea? Med students go to med school, lawyers go to law school, etc. Hmm.

I suppose the answer is that I just have to write, but Good Lord can it be difficult to sit down, shut off the Internet, shut off the itunes, and fall down into that deep part of the soul that you know have to go to, to get anything worthwhile.

Blah.

Fitzgerald said it take a genius to whine appealingly, so since I’m not a genius I’ll quit whining right now and promise not to write any more entries like this.