A top ten films of the decade article is a difficult one to write. What is the criteria to go by: is it commercial success, do you take a retrospective look based on which ones have gone on to be best selling DVDs (a la Shawshank Redemption) or should you measure by which won the most gongs and artistic plaudits?
So in the end the zavvi Top Ten Films of the Decade list is a personal choice and as a result we know it's not going to be to everyones tastes - so we're happy to find out whether we've got it right or wrong.
Tell us your views and post your alternative top ten lists below. The most compelling list backed up by a reason on your number one wins a DVD or Blu Ray of your choice.
10. In the Loop
The feature length follow up to the excellent BBC series The Thick of It. Dissects international politics leaving no satirical stone unturned whilst also elevating swearing to an art form and having lots of fun along the way.
9. Maradona
Incredible documentary about the world’s greatest ever footballer. Maradona has lead and continues to lead a fascinating life, he has a Church dedicated to him, in Naples he’s adored and even Fidel Castro seems awestruck by him. Worth it for the footage of him at his peak – a true footballing genius.
8. City of God
This Brazilian favela epic ranks up with some of the classics in terms of Gangster movies the fact that it uses child actors set in the real life background of poverty and despair lifts it to a different emotional level.
7. Lost in Translation
The trailer for this film sold it as ‘a comedy with Bill Murray’, there were a lot of people who left the cinema disappointed. This is a slow moving, touching and charming film about loneliness that catapulted an amazing Scarlett Johansson to stardom.
6. Memento
A film that confused most people on first viewing and as a result a DVD classic. A brilliant thriller and serious brain teaser about a man with short term memory loss chasing his wifes killer. Director Christopher Nolan subsequently went on to make the best Batman movie of the decade: The Dark Knight.
5. Team America: World Police
As with South Park, this is pretty much a satirical assault on everyone. It’s crude, rude and incredibly funny with many highlights, none better than ‘Matt Damon’.
4. Battle Royale
From one film lacking in PC credentials to another. It’s a film about a society sick of deteriorating standards sending a class of badly behaving kids in Japan to an island. There they’re given weapons, fitted with exploding neck braces and told to fight it out for themselves till the last child standing. It’s a shocking and wild ride.
3. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Michel Gondry and amazing script writer Charlie Kauffman combine to bring a stunningly original film about relationships and memory – an allegory about how we alter our own perceptions about past relationships once they’re over. It features brilliant performances from Kate Winslet and more surprisingly Jim Carrey as the couple who attempt to wipe out memory of their romance but find out that what first attracted them to each other cannot be erased.
2. Mulholland Drive
This is the film that David Lynch had been trying to make for 20 years. Visually stunning, intriguing, mixing light with extreme dark and a narrative structure that bounces all over the place. It’s confusing, challenging and a lot of people won’t get it, but that’s the way Lynch likes it.
Also features the acting performance of the decade by Naomi Watts as aspiring actress Betty.
1. Pans Labyrinth
Guillermo Del Toro made Hell Boy, a real comic book-guy favourite and so when he said he was making a film about the darkest days of the Spanish civil war it seemed a strange next step.
In fact he managed to produce a film that is a twisted fairytale: a thriller at human level and an exploration into the darkest realms of fantasy in a subterranean world. This is a battle between good and evil that’s played out in the minds eye of a young girl trying to escape the horror of war.
It’s visually stunning, incredibly imaginative and features some of the scariest, creepiest creatures ever seen on film.
So, that’s our list of the Top Ten Movies of the decade. Love to hear your thoughts and what your list would be…..
