A Decade of Cinema: 2000-2009

[numbersix]

Well folks, with only a few major releases left in this decade, I suppose it's about time we started talking about this decade of cinema. Was it better or worse than previous decades? What were the best films, the worst films, the best performances, and who will lead us into the next decade of cinema?

I may as well use this opportunity for some shameless self-promotion. I spent last month working on a series of articles looking back on the major movie events of the decade. Have a look, post some comments, let me believe my effort wasn't wasted!

2000 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-1-2000/
2001 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-2-2001/
2002 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-3-2002/
2003 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-4-2003/
2004 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-5-2004/
2005 http://www.screenhead.com/reviews/scree ... rt-6-2005/

[Shrykespeare]

Better or worse than the 90's? Tough to say. Every time you leave a decade, you want to think you've just left the best decade of movies yet...

One thing's for sure.... with so many movies being released every year (between 400-500, I think), there's no doubt that there are certainly more BAD movies being released than ever before, but I like to think that the number of good, great or fantastic movies has increased as well.

With the advancement of CGI, the rebirth of 3D and the creation of IMAX, the film experience is certainly better than it's ever been. But are the movies themselves better? I would have to say yes.

Without getting into major lists, I would say that the ones who will lead us into the next decade are Christopher Nolan, Wes and Paul Thomas Anderson, Peter Jackson, QT, and, of course, Steven Spielberg, provided he can rebound from Indy IV. The jury's still out on James Cameron and Michael Bay, and Roland Emmerich and M. Night Shyamalan can go straight to Hades.

For actors? Well, there's no doubt that most of Hollywood's most popular actors are now in their 40's: Depp, Pitt, Law, Downey, Fiennes, even Vaughn, Carrey and Sandler, just to name a few. Whereas the best actresses are, in my opinion, Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Keira Knightley, Scarlett Johanssen and Kate Winslet, among others. Angelina is a good actress if she does more serious drama and less Wanted-type films. Sandra Bullock, it seems, is in for the long haul, and Meryl Streep will NEVER be out of work, thank God.

Good articles, Spanny. Keep up the good work!

[W]

I don't really think any decade is really "better" than another, just different in themes, technology, and actors/esses. Depp is going to be there for a long time to come as is Downey considering he's still got a few years left with Iron Man. Christian Bale is going to get another chance considering he's still the Caped Crusader. Will Smith isn't going to continue to be on vacation forever. Who knows when people will tire of Vaughn, Sandler, and Carrey? It's quite possible that Paul Rudd will take over for them (or at least ascend to their ranks). For newcomers, I think its safe to say that Shia is a lock. You can't count out any of the three Twilight main actors considering their star power at this moment.

I read the 2000 on for now. I think there's a couple of themes started that year that I'd have went into, but you didn't. Seeing as its a matter of opinion, there's not really a right or wrong.

I'd have went into X-Men starting off the comic films full blast. Spider-Man would take it to a whole new level financially, but X-Men really kicked the decade off with it.

Also, Scary Movie kicked off the parody genre in a new way and is responsible for some of the worst films of the decade.

[numbersix]

Good articles, Spanny. Keep up the good work!

You got the wrong guy, there, Shryke!


W, I didn't include X-Men and comic book movies mostly because it wasn't a particularly new phenomenon, as Batman had been a major franchise throughout the 90's. Sure, they took it to a new level, but I kind think that movies of comic books is kind of a regular occurrence in every decade.

The same goes for Scary Movies. Parody movies had been around for years, and all the makers of the Scary Movie films did was take over from Leslie Nielsen spoofs like Spy Hard and Dracula Dead and Loving It.

[frendo]

Better or worse than the 90's? Tough to say. Every time you leave a decade, you want to think you've just left the best decade of movies yet...

One thing's for sure.... with so many movies being released every year (between 400-500, I think), there's no doubt that there are certainly more BAD movies being released than ever before, but I like to think that the number of good, great or fantastic movies has increased as well.

With the advancement of CGI, the rebirth of 3D and the creation of IMAX, the film experience is certainly better than it's ever been. But are the movies themselves better? I would have to say yes.

Without getting into major lists, I would say that the ones who will lead us into the next decade are Christopher Nolan, Wes and Paul Thomas Anderson, Peter Jackson, QT, and, of course, Steven Spielberg, provided he can rebound from Indy IV. The jury's still out on James Cameron and Michael Bay, and Roland Emmerich and M. Night Shyamalan can go straight to Hades.

For actors? Well, there's no doubt that most of Hollywood's most popular actors are now in their 40's: Depp, Pitt, Law, Downey, Fiennes, even Vaughn, Carrey and Sandler, just to name a few. Whereas the best actresses are, in my opinion, Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Keira Knightley, Scarlett Johanssen and Kate Winslet, among others. Angelina is a good actress if she does more serious drama and less Wanted-type films. Sandra Bullock, it seems, is in for the long haul, and Meryl Streep will NEVER be out of work, thank God.

Good articles, Spanny. Keep up the good work!

I think your examples here Shrykey made me think that the 2000's were NOT a better time. QT did his best work in the 90's, as did Shyamalan (6th Sense was from '99). Spielberg did his best work in the 90's,and his worst in the 2000's. James Cameron has done nothing in this decade except Imax and Avatar. There's no jury, Michael Bay's movies are commercial fodder that always have racist undertones. And Emmerich's best film was prob still Independence Day, which was 90's. And I think the theater experience isn't really more enjoyable now as it is just louder now. The best experiences I had in a theater were still 90's (seeing audience reactions halfway thru From Dusk Til Dawn on opening night was a great one, btw), since they had better stories and not as many were just vehicles for effects. The actors is up in the air, but most of the ones you mentioned started in or were better in the 90's.

[mateostarr]

Sometime next year I am going to make a thread outlining my 50 favorite films of the decade. But right now I have way too many movies to catch up on in order to formulate such a list.

[Buscemi]

This decade is actually worse than the 1990's. The acting got worse, the writing got worse, the directing got worse, the visual effects got worse, almost everything got worse.

Examples:
-studios stopped taking chances and instead started remaking everything in sight
-spoof movies
-the decline of practical visual effects and the rise of bad CGI
-Megan Fox
-people casting Kate Hudson and Ryan Reynolds in comedies when they have no comedic timing
-the Twilight series
-people still giving Michael Bay and Ronald Emmerich work
-Paris Hilton's acting career
-Marvel thinking that any comic book idea would make a good movie
-putting Americans into UK films to bump up the international box office
-the Weinsteins getting a second shot at fucking up a studio
-giving The Lonely Island and The Whitest Kids U'Know movies
-giving every single rapper a movie
-putting movies on demand BEFORE their theatrical release
-cutting horror movies down to PG-13 then making the fans wait for the unrated version
-the Twilight movies
-Akiva Goldsman is still getting work

Many more reasons coming up.

[Shrykespeare]

On the other hand, this decade saw the rise to glory for Pixar, whose movies will be watched 100 years from now. That's gotta be worth something.

[undeadmonkey]

You must be insane saying visual effects got worse, even if you dont like movies such as marvel's slew of films. the only reason there are so many now, is because they actually look realistic.

[NSpan]

it's easy to say that the 90s were "better" than the 00s--but, then again, the cream of the 90s has had time to rise to the top... some of the best movies didn't make much noise at the box office, but we've since embraced them as "classics"... and the more forgettable movies were, well, forgotten...

i think we need more time and perspective before we can really start objectively comparing these last two decades... even then, i think two side-by-side exhaustive "best of" lists would be necessary to make the call...

[becs]

I would say in general visual effect became better due to the level of quality available, but became more generally careless. We can look at the cheesy effects of movies from the 80's and 90s but in general at that time the majority were labors of love or were groundbreaking for their time. For the reason that it is both of those things to James Cameron, I will probably see Avatar, despite that it looks like Fern Gully 2.0

Other than that, I also see the '00s as worse than the '90s for the sheer volume of sequels and remakes. Those two along with the spoofs probably make this decade the least original/creative of all time.

[Buscemi]

The thing with today's visual effects is that almost everything looks fake and cheapened. With the rising cost of visual effects (due to CGI), shouldn't they look real? As in, you actually think that buildings are being destroyed (scale models were usually better), certain creatures are real (anamotronics were usually better) and people are actually being killed (Faces Of Death was usually better).

More reasons why this decade of cinema sucked:
-more and more directors misuse digital cameras (most movies shot digitally look like shit)
-Akiva Goldsman and Diablo Cody win Oscars
-Denzel Washington wins an Oscar for the worst role of his career
-Maxim starts making movies
-theatrical sequels to straight-to-video and TV movies
-indie filmmakers copying the Garden State formula to create even more mediocre indie films
-original horror getting the shaft (Trick 'r Treat, Inside, Martyrs and [Rec] go straight-to-video, Let The Right One In, Teeth and numerous foreign and indie horror never gets past limited release, High Tension is released dubbed and edited and The Poughkeepsie Tapes remains unreleased)
-Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King sweeping the 2003 Oscars (it didn't deserve even half of its wins)
-filmmakers misusing 3-D
-Hannah Montana movies
-the rise of Shawn Levy's career (just because you've got an uncle who works with Christopher Guest and the American Pie guys doesn't mean you should get a career)
-Grindhouse failing at the box office and ending any attempt to bring back the double feature
-Saw IV, Saw V and Saw VI
-Hollywood killing the careers of talented foreign directors (Hideo Nakata, Susanne Bier, Walter Salles, Chen Kaige, etc.)
-Zach Braff
-Dane Cook
-Dax Shepard
-Jon Heder post-Napoleon Dynamite
-typecasting good and decent actresses in the same roles
-Music Ventures (the company that makes every music score sound like Hans Zimmer)
-DreamWorks ripping off Pixar every year
-Uwe Boll
-the poor management of 20th Century Fox
-the poor management of MGM
-UMD
-digital copies
-the lax attitude towards piracy
-quote whores
-online critics
-substandard DVD's of library titles (why hasn't the special edition of The Hitcher come out in the US?)

[mateostarr]

Damn Buscemi you have a lot of issues with the film industry.

I would say the special effects obviously improved and will always improve over time. I also think that acting has improved dramatically.

[undeadmonkey]

why do you even like movies and keep up with the film industry, dude?

[Shrykespeare]

-online critics

Umm.

Dear Kettle: the Pot has you on speed-dial.