Best Movies of the Decade

Our planet has only been spinning through this new decade for a month and people are already referring to the Aughts as the worst decade ever, calling the years from 2000-2009 the “Lost Decade.” Perhaps they are referring to September 11th, the two wars we started, tsunamis, Katrina, the economic collapse… But BananaWho is interested in the things that will not be lost in the films that will stand the test of time.

BananaWho polled forty of its finest film friends to determine the top films of the last decade. Those polled submitted ten films apiece, and all of them are accounted for below, with the exception of The Wire, One From the Heart’s re-release and CowTV, as none of these fit the criteria. It was excruciating not to tamper with the data, but all findings below are raw and true. Take a gander and see where your picks fell in the scheme of things.

(Titles in italics indicate films that won an Academy Award in their respective category, i.e. Best Picture, Best Documentary Feature, Best Animated Feature, or Best Foreign Film.)

14 Mentions
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)

13 Mentions
There Will Be Blood (2007)

12 Mentions
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

8 Mentions
City of God ★ No Country for Old Men

7 Mentions
Adaptation ★ Almost Famous ★ Spirited Away ★ Kill Bill (Vols. 1 & 2)

6 Mentions
Punch-Drunk Love ★ Synecdoche, NY

5 Mentions
Amélie ★ American Psycho ★ The Dark Knight ★ The Diving Bell and the Butterfly ★ Grizzly Man
Lost in Translation ★ Memento ★ Mulholland Drive

4 Mentions
All the Real Girls ★ The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford ★ Children of Men ★ The Incredibles ★ Inglourious Basterds ★ Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring ★ The New World ★ Old Boy ★ Requiem for a Dream

3 Mentions
Birth ★ In the Mood for Love ★ The Lives of Others★ Michael Clayton ★ Silent Light ★ United 93 ★ Wall-E

Double Mention:
A Serious Man ★ Amores Perros ★ Antichrist ★ Big Fish ★ Bowling for Columbine ★ Caché ★ Capturing the Friedmans ★ The Constant Gardener ★ Dancer in the Dark ★ The Departed ★ Dogville ★ The Fall ★ A History of Violence ★ Hurt Locker ★ The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou ★ Man on Wire ★ Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World ★ Minority Report ★ Monster ★ Morvern Callar ★ No Direction Home ★ O Brother, Where Are Thou? ★ Pan’s Labyrinth ★ Talk to Her ★ The Triplets of Belleville ★ Waking Life ★ Wet Hot American Summer ★ Y Tu Mamá También ★ Zodiac

Single Mentions:
2046 ★ 25th Hour ★ 28 Days Later ★ 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days ★ The 40-Year-Old Virgin ★ 8 Women ★ A Lion in the House ★ A Very Long Engagement ★ Anchorman ★Apacalypto ★ Avatar ★ Badassss!!! ★ Before Sunset ★ Best of Youth ★ Black Dahlia ★ Blow ★ Brokeback Mountain ★ Bug ★ Chop Shop ★ A Christmas Tale ★ Closer ★ Code 46 ★ The Contender ★ The Darjeeling Limited ★ Dear Zachary ★ The Devil and Daniel Johnson ★ The Descent ★ Donnie Darko ★ Elephant ★ Fantastic Mr. Fox ★ Far from Heaven ★ The Five Obstructions ★ Fog of War ★ Freddy Got Fingered ★ Ghost World ★ Gladiator ★ Goodbye, Lenin! ★ Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire ★ High Fidelity ★ House of Sand and Fog ★ I Heart Huckabees ★ I’m Not There ★ In America ★ In Bruges ★ In the Bedroom ★ Inland Empire ★ Into Great Silence ★ Into the Wild ★ Junebug ★ Juno ★ Lady Chatterly ★ The Last King of Scotland ★ Le Temp du Loup ★ Lord of the Rings: Return of the King ★ Lord of the Rings: Two Towers ★ Love Actually ★ The Man Who Wasn’t There ★ Margot at the Wedding ★ Me, You, and Everyone We Know ★ Millenium Mambo ★ Million Dollar Baby ★ The Motorcycle Diaries ★ Moulin Rouge! ★ My Winnipeg ★ Mysterious Skin ★ Mystic River ★ Napoleon Dynamite ★ Notes on a Scandal ★ Nowhere in Africa ★ Old School ★ Phoebe in Wonderland ★ Pineapple Express ★ Planet Earth (Series) ★ The Prestige ★ Primer ★ The Princess and the Warrior ★ The Proposition ★ Public Enemies ★ Rain ★ Saraband ★ Saw ★ Secretary ★ Sin City ★ Slumdog Millionaire ★ The Son ★ Spanglish ★ Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Spring ★ Stranger Than Fiction ★ Sunshine ★ Supersize Me ★ Tale of the Two Sisters ★ Team America: World Police ★The Pianist ★ The Piano Teacher ★ Together ★ Traffic ★ Tropical Malady ★ Up the Yangtze ★ V for Vendetta ★ War of the Worlds ★ White Diamond ★ Wit ★ Wonder Boys ★ Wreckmeister Harmonies ★ You Can Count on Me ★ Youth Without Youth

Based on this data, the most successful filmmaker of the decade is Charlie Kaufman, by a landslide. Kaufman wrote three of the films that earned a total of 25 mentions out of 40 people, including Synecdoche, NY which he also directed. P.T. Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love and There Will Be Blood gave him 19 mentions, Wes Anderson 18, the Coen Brothers 13, and Quentin Tarantino and Christopher Nolan tie for 11 mentions apiece.

These results would also indicate that people love symmetry. P.T. Anderson has worked with the DP Robert Elswit on all of his movies to date, and has never once wavered from his conviction that all shots should be completely centered and symmetrical. The symmetry is obvious in Wes Anderson’s films as well, and even though this is a device that is generally pooh-poohed by most filmmakers, it seems to strike a chord in viewers like you.

2001 and 2007 were far and away the most successful years for films between 2000 and 2009, although There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men account for the spike in mentions despite an average number of individual films named. The results would indicate a general love of films that are older. Perhaps films become dearer to us with the years and multiple viewings.

So to recap: If you want your film to be considered among the best of the decade, release it early on, make it with American money, stress symmetry, change your last name to Anderson, and have Charlie Kaufman write the screenplay!

Thanks to everyone who participated and Happy 1st Birthday BananaWHO!

-Christianne Hedtke