Yesterday, IndieWire released a list ranking the 100 best films of the decade so far. As expected, everybody has an opinion on the list. Certainly a few placements and inclusions are head-scratchers, but given that any list that is an aggregation of a small group’s opinion is going to neither have a personal voice nor any authoritative weight, it’s expected.
You can read the list here, and view it as a Letterboxd list here.
My overall take is that it’s a pretty solid list for acknowledging high-pedigree films and highlighting a few underappreciated gems. The coverage is a good blend of indie and mainstream with a solid spread across genres and audience sizes. I’ve seen about half of the films, and I’d like to get that closer to all 100. I commend anyone trying to organize and articulate their thoughts on picking favorites from a huge body of work.
Nonetheless, I’d like to highlight a few places I disagree (and agree). So below are my opinions on a few entries that did and didn’t hit the mark:
5 Films Ranked Too High
- Armageddon Time (#17) – Watch this film and you, too, can learn that racism and antisemitism are bad. Armageddon Time is attractive but a deeply dreary coming-of-age story. I guess I just don’t click with James Gray. Shout out to surprise twist villain Fred Trump for giving us one of the stupidest moments of 2020s cinema to date. (Read my review here.)
- Beau is Afraid (#82) – While I admire any film with this much chutzpah, I found the actual experience of watching Beau is Afraid, with its endless flagellation and anxiety and Freudian symbols (not to mention endless runtime) to be exhausting. (Read my review here.)
- A Different Man (#51) – It’s fine as a bitter, grungy indie with some nice performances and remarkable prosthetic makeup for the budget, but, I mean… The Substance is right there with practically the same pitch and infinitely more interesting presentation. The latter manages to transcend its thematic obviousness by being freaking huge in a way A Different Man never is. (Read my mini-review here.)
- Nope (#12) – I’m open to the idea that I received Nope a little bit too coldly on my first watch, but I haven’t read a compelling take that it’s anywhere near top-15 of the decade so far. It has some great images but a turgid pace and a confused creative identity. (Read my review here.)
- We’re All Going to the World’s Fair (#80) – Such a minor and lo-fi film that I don’t think anyone would have thought to include on a list like this if not for the breakout success of Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow. I admire that it has a vision, and I like some of its ideas in the abstract, but it’s such a drifting nothing of a film in execution. Hunter at Kinemalogue is fuming. (Read my review here.)
5 Films Ranked Too Low
- Babylon (#97) – It’s Damien Chazelle’s gross-out Singing in the Rain meets Boogie Nights, and just as good and messy and self-contradictory as that sounds. It lost a metric ton of cash, but I’m glad Chazelle won’t spend perpetuity in director hell. (Read my review here.)
- Between the Temples (#89) – I won’t lie; I’m just glad it’s on the list at all. But I’d still put the hilarious Between the Temples a few notches higher. It’s one of the magnificent indie squirm-dramedies of the past few years featuring a wonderful Jason Schwartzman and Carol Kane. (Read my mini-review here.)
- Dune: Part Two (#95) – You’re telling me Austin Butler got that bald just to get ranked number ninety-five? Are you smoking spice? (Read my review here.)
- Sinners (#65) – Honestly “number sixty five” feels about right, until you see some of the films that got placed above it. Lower than Barbie? It’s a messy but satisfying and significant film. Please continue to give good directors money and creative freedom to go hog wild, Hollywood. (Read my review here.)
- The Substance (#91) – I’ve already written and spoke about it too many times, but it’s one of the films of the decade. (Read my review here.)
5 Films Ranked About Right
- The Fabelmans (#52) – Like Nope, I suspect I might have come in a little too cold on The Fabelmans in retrospect, though I maintain it is clunkier than its reputation. Unlike Nope, The Fabelmans is a film with every bit of para-text lifting it upwards; it is important simply because it is Steven Spielberg outlining how cinema fits into the tapestry of life. (Read my review here.)
- Licorice Pizza (#35) – I’m surprised this one has left as big a mark as it has. I wonder if the director was anyone other than PT Anderson that it would have a reputation so lofty (though Aftersun is #3 on this list, so maybe). But I do think it’s a terrific film, if exceedingly “Dan-core”(i.e. aligned with my own storytelling and aesthetic preoccupations). (Read my review here.)
- Megalopolis (#100) – The canon must include outrageous, ponderous boondoggles by aging legends. Even if they’re barely good. We are entitled to the riches of their Emersonian minds. (Read my mini-review here.)
- Tar (#4) – I personally might slide it a spot or two lower, but Tar seems to be on of the few works of uncontroversially great cinema this decade: outstandingly constructed, rich with ideas, engagingly plotted, and anchored by a candidate for the performance of the decade. (Read my review here.)
- A Thousand and One (#73) – Pretty much all the nice stuff people say about Armageddon Time I actually feel about A Thousand and One — it delicately handles the way that racial and class identity informs everything we do, with touching lead performances and a moving arc. It’s a bit slight to be truly great, but is sharply made. (Read my mini-review here.)
5 Disappointing Omissions
I’m taking it as a given that all ten of my favorites of the decade through the end of 2024 should be on here. That’s house money. The six films from my ten favorites that are missing on IndieWire’s list are: Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.; Emma.; Falcon Lake; Pearl; Puss in Boots: The Last Wish; and Shithouse.
Here are five others that should be there:
- Here – Late Zemeckis can be a challenging watch (see: Welcome to Marwen), but the famed technical entertainer has gradually become an introspective auteur. (Yes, I’m going to pretend Pinocchio didn’t happen with that statement.) I’m increasingly convinced I underrated Here’s multi-century single-shot meditation. (Read my review here.)
- The Holdovers – Alexander Payne’s touch isn’t quite as golden as it was in the ’90s and early ’00s, but with The Holdovers he gave us a throwback that will become a holiday staple if this is a just world. Paul Giamatti is simply one of the best comic actors in a generation. (Read my review here.)
- May December – So layered with ironies that it’s tough to know where to start. But let’s lead with “dark comic faux-soap opera that makes fun of the very idea of its own existence.” Name a more iconic duo than “neurotic mom” and “Julianne Moore” — I’ll wait. (Listen to our podcast discussion here.)
- Nosferatu – Utterly spectacular, frighteningly funny, filled with more rats than Capitol Hill (sorry). Creepy, demonic fellas in spooky old castles with dubious intentions are why cinema exists. Georges Melies could’ve told you that 125 years ago. (Read my review here.)
- What Do We See When We Look At the Sky? – If an outlet named “IndieWire” publishes a list like this, What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? is exactly the type of movie that belongs on the list: unheralded but undeniably great. This Georgian (the country) slice of slow-cinema, quasi-silent, magical realist romantic comedy is truly unlike anything else happening in movies and truly delightful. (Read my review here.)
5 Films I’m Excited To See
- Eephus (#85) – The more I read, the more I’m convinced that this is exactly the film I hope it will be: Ham on Rye if it were about baseball.
- I’m Thinking of Ending Things (#21) – One thing I’ve learned about myself the past few years is that I’m a sucker for metafiction, for why-do-we-tell-stories cinema (see: Asteroid City being one of my favorites of the decade). Charlie Kaufman can be dour for me, but I’m cautiously optimistic this will click for me.
- Sorry, Baby (#77) – An enigmatic debut dramedy with tonal swerves and cringe humor? Hell-to-the-yes. Count me in.
- Zola (#59) – I kinda hated Janicza Bravo’s debut Lemon (there’s a fine but important distinction between inducing squirms and degrading your film subjects), but it at least had some style, and Zola, inspired by a well-told Twitter thread, has stuck around with enough good buzz that I should check it out.
- Time (#8) – A documentary in part about the reckoning of the passage of time while a father is in prison missing his kids’ lives wrecked me once in Daughters. I’m willing to be wrecked again.
Dan is the founder and head critic of The Goods. Follow Dan on Letterboxd. Join the Discord for updates and discussion.