The Best Films of the 2000s and more.
Posts tagged Animation
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010)
Aug 23rd
Starring: Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ellen Wong
Director: Edgar Wright
Country: USA
Genre: Action, Romance
“Michael Cera and Jason Schwartzman engage in an epic kung-fu sword battle” must not have been the most convincing pitch to get this film green lit. But compared to most of the action movies released in the last half decade, Scott Pilgrim‘s “alternative” cast provides some of the most cohesive and exciting fight scenes years. This is no doubt due to the immense talent of Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz.)
Scott Pilgrim is a young man with some typical girl problems in a less than typical world where video game noises and comic book exclamations make the mundane extraordinary. When Scott falls in love with the new girl in town, Ramona, he quickly learns (the hard way) that in order to date her he must defeat her seven evil exes.
It’s so rare that it’s just to call a film ‘refreshingly original’. Only a person that is truly in love with movies and, in this case, their subject matter can create something as kinetic and satisfying a film like this. This is absolutely a film meant to please as anyone interested in it knows, (to some extent) what they’re in store for. Happily, Wright delivers the goods plus more. The comedy is fierce, the action is amped, and the entertainment is off the charts. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World might go down as the most criminally unseen film of the summer.
A Town Called Panic (2009)
Jul 28th
Director: Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar
Country: Belgium
Genre: Animation, Adventure
Absolutely wonderful.
If there’s one characteristic of animated films over the last decade it’s that they are consistently surprising. This feature-length (short though it may be) is an extension of a four minute short from 2000, by the same name. The animation mirrors that of Robot Chicken, though creates characters all its own. The film follows Cowboy, Indian and Horse in their outrageous escapade to retrieve their home from crazy sea dwellers. What’s most striking about this whimsical stream-of-consciousness adventure is that it has the same mentality as a story written by a child. It’s almost as if the filmmakers adapted a one-page story written when they were seven – it really accentuates the naive imagination. This film is sure to rack up the laughs and plaster smiles on the faces of everyone who watches it.
Mary and Max (2009)
Jul 14th
Starring: (voices) Philip Seymour Hoffman, Toni Collette, Eric Bana
Director: Adam Elliot
Country: Australia
Genre: Animation, Drama
Best adult animation of the decade.
Add to the long list of great animations this decade the story of Mary and Max - a tale of companionship between two unlikely friends: a lowly eight-year-old Australian girl and a middle-aged New York man with Asperger’s syndrome. As you can probably tell, this isn’t your run-of-the-mill Disney animation. It starts off quirky with Amelie-style storytelling, then gets continually darker as the film wears on. The story is told, essentially, through the pen pal letters they write to each other over years and years, and with each letter we get a deeper glimpse into their psyche. It’s not an easy movie to endure, but it is incredibly effecting and even has some adorable and touching moments. Philip Seymour Hoffman lends his voice to Max giving the afflicted man the authenticity required by the role. Though it’s on a quaint scale, this is some luscious animation and should be a film that everyone should look into.
American Splendor (2003)
Jun 28th
Starring: Paul Giamatti, Hope Davis, Judah Friedlander
Director: Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini
Country: USA
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Most original mix of reality and fiction of the decade.
Biopics are a dime a dozen. Most of the time they are overly dramatized excuses for an actor to be a candidate for Best Actor. But American Splendor takes a far different approach. It’s part documentary, part adaptation of a graphic novel, part dramatized biopic. It’s a movie about a movie being made about a man who has written a comic book about himself. The funny, and perhaps most impressive thing is, it never comes off self-indulgent. Harvey Pekar, the film’s subject, is known for his blatant truth-telling and the film stays true to that. It blends animation with interview footage and traditional scripted scenes. Paul Giamatti puts in a splendid performance as the depressed hygiene-handicapped comic book writer.
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Jun 27th
Starring: (voices) Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Joan Cusack
Director: Lee Unkrich
Country: USA
Genre: Animation
Best emotional closure to a long running flawless series (of the decade.)
The Individuals at Pixar are evil sorcerer’s who brainwash us into loving their films by implanting messages in the short films that appear before the features. That’s the only explanation for eleven box office successes in a row. This third installment of the hugely popular series, like the previous two films, etches its own unique mark on cinema history. It weaves together emotion and entertainment flawlessly with a story that tackles a number of important themes, (which some people will surely claim to be ‘too subversive for a children’s film’, but that’s Pixar for you.) Toy Story 3 will certainly please fans of the series, giving emotional closure to an adventure that started fifteen years ago, while simultaneously introducing these lovable characters to a whole new generation. This is probably the greatest adventure of the series, and that’s saying a lot considering the climax of Toy Story 2.
The Incredibles (2004)
Mar 28th
Starring: (voices) Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, Jason Lee
Director: Brad Bird
Country: USA
Genre: Animation, Action
If it’s Pixar, it must be one of the best.
The Incredibles marked numerous deviations for the super giant animation studio Pixar. They had never had a film center around humans before and it marked the first time that they brought in a non-Pixar director to take the reins. Brad Bird (who directed one of my favorites, Iron Giant,) steps in with super strength and successfully crafted not only an awesome superhero movie, but one of the most exciting action flicks of the decade. It pays homage to the superheroes that inspired the film, but effectively create hella characters all their own. The voice acting is spot on, the score is super exciting, the animation is luscious, and the script is smarter than most superhero films actually based on source material. The Incredibles is, in one word, ‘Inrediawesome’.
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
Mar 18th
Starring: Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Country: USA
Genre: Action
Swords don’t kill people… Uma Thurman does.
If you want a lesson in cool, pop in any film of Tarantino’s. Kill Bill is quite astonishing as it became almost instantly iconic, and with good reason. It’s a no-holds-barred samurai slaughter fest set to one of the most emulated and replicated soundtracks this decade. Definitely not for the weak of heart, or stomach, Uma Thurman plays the determined [censored], a former member of a deadly assassin squad, hell-bent on revenge toward her former squad members. There isn’t much to be said about Kill Bill that hasn’t been said before. The final fight scene between [censored] and the Crazy 88 is epic. Tarantino not only knows how to create character, but has the skill necessary to present the character with as much glory as possible. It’s because of this that his films tend to become elevated to a mythological status. While his dialogue is usually great fun, it was awesome to see him put it on the back burner for some balls to the wall action.
