Film Hollywood Reporter's top 50 films of the century

[Rooney in Paris]

This time, I'm even gonna include the link right from the start!

What's the most outrage gonna be for? Scorsese, Mann or James Gray not making the list makes my heart a little bit sad.

The most conspicuous, surprising (including to us) and, surely to some readers, infuriating, thing about our list is how many masters are missing. After all our deliberating, point tallying, reconsidering, revoting, retallying and re-deliberating, none of the following directors cracked the top 50 films or 15 honorable mentions: Clint Eastwood, Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Terrence Malick, Spike Lee, Gus Van Sant, Jean-Luc Godard, David Cronenberg, Michael Mann, Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh, Alexander Payne, Jim Jarmusch, James Gray, Jia Zhangke, Abbas Kiarostami, Jafar Panahi, Asghar Farhadi, Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Hou Hsiao-Hsien. Ditto polarizing though prolific auteurs like Woody Allen, Roman Polanski and Lars von Trier.

This wasn’t the result of any kind of “out with the old, in with the new” intention. In some cases — Scorsese, Spike, Godard — we felt their best work was pre-21st century. In Spielberg’s case, there were several films that had love (including Minority Report and West Side Story), but none that united all six of us in full-throated enthusiasm. In other cases, as in Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby, Malick’s The New World and The Tree of Life, and Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, there were ardent supporters but also just-as-ardent detractors.

In other words, we didn’t reverse-engineer the list by starting with great directors and pulling from their filmographies; we allowed the titles to emerge organically, via memory and good old-fashioned brainstorming. (Five directors — or six if you count the Coens separately — ended up with two films apiece on the list: Jane Campion, Joel and Ethan Coen, Alfonso Cuarón, David Fincher and Richard Linklater. For more stats and specifics about the results, read this breakdown.)

 

[Scandi Red]

Much better than the TV series ranking. I've only seen about 1/3 of the picks, but a lot of them are either on my to-watch list or highly rated by people who's tastes are similar to mine.

Moonlight and Boyhood are too high though.

 

[Chairman Steve]

Me: Wow this is quite the snooty film buff hipster list of movies. Where are the judges based fr…

*sees Hollywood Reporter*

…that explains everything.

 

[Iker Quesadillas]

Pretty bad list, mostly because of the absences. The actual movies on the list are mostly fine. But the politics of these things are always so blatant and annoying.

 

[Salt Bailly]

Inside Llewyn Davis finally getting the props it deserves

 

[HookedOnAPhelan]

Happy to see Zodiac so high up.

 

[Dirty Schwein]

Just another hipster list, missing so many classics. Mainstream doesn't instantly mean shit. How can a top 50 list not include Godfather?

Also, Get Out in the top 10

Finally, no Con Air, Face/Off or The Rock?

 

[Ainu]

Once again I can't take this list seriously when it has utterly baffling and inexplicable omissions. How on earth do you end up with a list that includes A Serious Man and Inside Llewyn Davis but doesn't even have No Country for Old Men in the honorable mentions? You're basically going out of your way to create a contrarian list at that stage.

 

[Iker Quesadillas]

Just another hipster list, missing so many classics. Mainstream doesn't instantly mean shit. How can a top 50 list not include Godfather?

Also, Get Out in the top 10

Finally, no Con Air, Face/Off or The Rock?

It's a list of 21st century movies.

 

[Dirty Schwein]

Just another hipster list, missing so many classics. Mainstream doesn't instantly mean shit. How can a top 50 list not include Godfather?

Also, Get Out in the top 10

Finally, no Con Air, Face/Off or The Rock?

Oh it was this century... then No Country For Old Men had to be in there.

 

[Ainu]

Just another hipster list, missing so many classics. Mainstream doesn't instantly mean shit. How can a top 50 list not include Godfather?

Also, Get Out in the top 10

Finally, no Con Air, Face/Off or The Rock?

It's this century only, so it obviously doesn't qualify. I mean, if it was all-time, this list would be even more farcical than it already is, by a million miles!

And yeah they did your boy Nick Cage dirty.

 

[Dirty Schwein]

It's a list of 21st century movies.

Yeah just realised. Still a hipster list. Get Out? Get the feck out of here

 

[Dirty Schwein]

Either this list is underwhelming or films this century have been.

 

[Salt Bailly]

MCU 1 - 0 Scorcese

 

[Solius]

Another all over the place list but Zodiac is excellent. Enjoyed Manchester By The Sea as well.

Inside Llewyn Davis was fine, but second place

 

[V.O.]

Either this list is underwhelming or films this century have been.

Nah, it's just 70% hipster contrarianism 30% box ticking.

Not so much as a mention for any of The Lives of Others, Memories of Murder, No Country for Old Men, The Pianist, The Prestige, Oldboy... but Black Panther is right there in the top 50, along with random Romanian movies nobody has ever seen.

 

[Dirty Schwein]

Nah, it's just 70% hipster contrarianism 30% box ticking.

Not so much as a mention for any of The Lives of Others, Memories of Murder, No Country for Old Men, The Pianist, The Prestige, Oldboy... but Black Panther is right there in the top 50, along with random Romanian movies nobody has ever seen.

Yeah wtf is that about

 

[Rooney in Paris]

MCU 1 - 0 Scorcese

Another all over the place list but Zodiac is excellent. Enjoyed Manchester By The Sea as well.

Inside Llewyn Davis was fine, but second place

People get sooooo caught up on rankings, why does it matter?

Zodiac is a masterpiece. Along with There Will be Blood, Children of Men and Silence, up there with my favourites of the past 20 years.

 

[Solius]

People get sooooo caught up on rankings, why does it matter?

Zodiac is a masterpiece. Along with There Will be Blood, Children of Men and Silence, up there with my favourites of the past 20 years.

If it doesn't matter then why rank them? Just say here are 50 films we liked this century.

 

[Raoul]

If it doesn't matter then why rank them? Just say here are 50 films we liked this century.

Precisely. The rankings are obviously little more than clickbait.

 

[Iker Quesadillas]

Once again I can't take this list seriously when it has utterly baffling and inexplicable omissions. How on earth do you end up with a list that includes A Serious Man and Inside Llewyn Davis but doesn't even have No Country for Old Men in the honorable mentions? You're basically going out of your way to create a contrarian list at that stage.

It's not contrarian, and it's perfectly explainable. It's just politics, a conscious attempt to create an 'inclusive' canon for a certain type of Western audience.

10 of the 50 movies are directed by women (Bright Star, Pariah, Things To Come, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, Wendy and Lucy, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Marie Antoinette, 35 Shots of Rum, The Power of the Dog, and The Gleaners and I). 7 of the 50 movies are LGBT-heavy (Weekend, Pariah, Moonlight, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Brokeback Mountain, The Power of the Dog, and Call Me By Your Name). 7 of the 50 movies are "black" films in one way or another (Black Panther, Pariah, Summer of Soul, I Am Not Your Negro, Moonlight, Get Out, and Lovers Rock). 2 of the 50 movies + 1 one of the 15 'honorable mentions' are about abortion (Vera Drake, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days). There are maybe 2-3 more straight romantic movies than there are LGBT romantic movies.

There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these movies (at least the ones I've seen). But when you have this kind of editorial bent, and you're limited to 50 movies, you'll be forced to exclude a lot of stuff. This is, without a doubt, a big reason why every single director they list in the "not in top 50 or honorable mentions" is a man.

 

[The Corinthian]

There's a lot to disagree with on that list.

 

[The Corinthian]

Some glaring omissions - There Will Be Blood, No Country for Old Men, The Assassination of Jesse James, The Proposition (all neo-Westerns ).

Then there's movies like Prisoners, Incendies, A History of Violence, Eastern Promises, Lord of the Rings, Silence, Tree of Life, The Master. There's so many movies missing.

It's just a bit of a crap list.

 

[Withnail]

I've seen less than 10 of them and those wouldn't exactly be top of my list.

 

[The Corinthian]

MCU 1 - 0 Scorcese

 

[Chairman Steve]

As said before, it’s loaded with hipster contrarianism. I’m surprised they didn’t put at least two of Terrence Malick’s movies on there but I guess they didn’t want to give themselves away that easily

 

[Ainu]

It's not contrarian, and it's perfectly explainable. It's just politics, a conscious attempt to create an 'inclusive' canon for a certain type of Western audience.

10 of the 50 movies are directed by women (Bright Star, Pariah, Things To Come, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, Wendy and Lucy, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Marie Antoinette, 35 Shots of Rum, The Power of the Dog, and The Gleaners and I). 7 of the 50 movies are LGBT-heavy (Weekend, Pariah, Moonlight, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Brokeback Mountain, The Power of the Dog, and Call Me By Your Name). 7 of the 50 movies are "black" films in one way or another (Black Panther, Pariah, Summer of Soul, I Am Not Your Negro, Moonlight, Get Out, and Lovers Rock). 2 of the 50 movies + 1 one of the 15 'honorable mentions' are about abortion (Vera Drake, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days). There are maybe 2-3 more straight romantic movies than there are LGBT romantic movies.

There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these movies (at least the ones I've seen). But when you have this kind of editorial bent, and you're limited to 50 movies, you'll be forced to exclude a lot of stuff. This is, without a doubt, the reason why every single director they list in the "not in top 50 or honorable mentions" is a man.

Don't really want to get into all that, it's possible you're right. However, that still doesn't explain my example as anything other than pure contrarianism, as it's the same director (or directors in this case) for all three movies. The two movies that got the nod are pretty good, but No Country for Old Men is clearly THE movie by the Coen brothers that would come up in almost any conversation about their number 1 movie this century. A panel of voters to collectively overlook it, without overlooking them as directors entirely, isn't exactly believable. Hence, pure contrarianism.

 

[Iker Quesadillas]

çThe two movies that got the nod are pretty good, but No Country for Old Men is clearly THE movie by the Coen brothers that would come up in almost any conversation about their number 1 movie this century. A panel of voters to collectively overlook it, without overlooking them as directors entirely, isn't exactly believable. Hence, pure contrarianism.

There's various lists that rank Inside Llewyn Davis or A Serious Man higher than No Country. The Guardian ranked ASM higher; Rolling Stone ranked ILD higher. A poll of critics by the BBC had ILD just one spot above No Country (10 and 11). It's not really super contrarian.

 

[Ainu]

There's various lists that rank Inside Llewyn Davis or A Serious Man higher than No Country. The Guardian ranked ASM higher; Rolling Stone ranked ILD higher. A poll of critics by the BBC had ILD just one spot above No Country (10 and 11). It's not really super contrarian.

It's not about ranking it higher, it's about not even having No Country for Old Men anywhere in sight. As you said, BBC still had it up there. Anyway, don't want to keep going on about it, I simply don't buy that they're being genuine.

 

[sullydnl]

Respect the Zodiac placement.

 

[Kazi]

Wall-e is goated

 

[Dirty Schwein]

The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent should be number 1

 

[Scandi Red]

It's impossible to please everyone with these lists. 50 entries is nothing.

Hollywood has been a mess for most of this century. You'd expect half the list to be foreign films and arthouse.

 

[Rooney in Paris]

If it doesn't matter then why rank them? Just say here are 50 films we liked this century.

They want to generate buzz and clicks. You can just look at it as their 50 favourite films if you choose to.

 

[HTG]

Saw Black Panther and stopped scrolling. That movie was so incredibly pointless.

 

[Mickeza]

Zodiac really is a cracking film so happy it is that high.

 

[decorativeed]

Inside Llewyn Davis finally getting the props it deserves

It's a good film, but is it the best the Coen brothers movie since 2000? I'm not sure many would say so.

Also: Marie Antoinette was absolute shite, wasn't it? I don't recall anyone having anything positive to say about it then, and it's been almost entirely forgotten since.

 

[decorativeed]

Saw Black Panther and stopped scrolling. That movie was so incredibly pointless.

It wasn't pointless at all. The point is the entire reason it made the list though, because beyond it, there was nothing that set it apart from the other MCU origin movies. Both Coogler and Boseman had made better films before it.

 

[HTG]

It wasn't pointless at all. The point is the entire reason it made the list though, because beyond it, there was nothing that set it apart from the other MCU origin movies. Both Coogler and Boseman had made better films before it.

I judge movies based on the movie itself and not the stuff around it. And this movie was pointless. Absolutely nothing sets it apart from anything else. It’s devoid of meaning and sense. I know some people think it’s revolutionary because it made American war propaganda accessible for black people. But that’s besides the point for me.

 

[Salt Bailly]

It's a good film, but is it the best the Coen brothers movie since 2000? I'm not sure many would say so.

I think only NCFOM is its only challenger. Which is a film I like but don't love. I have more of a soft spot for Intolerable Cruelty.