MC Consensus - Top Films by Female Directors (2000-present)

[Spinal]

Indiewire recently posted a list (http://www.indiewire.com/2017/05/best-films-directed-by-women-21st-century-1201830875/3/) of the 25 best 21st century films directed by women. But I don't care what Indiewire thinks. I want to know what Match Cut thinks.

Submit your ten favorite films from 2000-present and in a week or so I will give you a top 25. IMDb dates will be used.

The point system is as follows

1st Place-10 points
2nd Place-8 points
3rd Place-7 points
4th Place-6 points
5th Place-5 points
6th Place-4.5 points
7th Place-4 points
8th Place-3.5 points
9th Place-3 points
10th Place-2.5 points

There will be no restrictions on short films. Only lists of 10 films will be counted. If you list less than 10, I will ignore the post. If you list more than 10, I will use the first 10. If you do not rank your films, I will assign the most points to the film listed first, and proceed from there down the line.

EDIT: If you want to edit your list, please make a new post as I have started counting.

You may begin now.

[Melville]

1. Bright Star (Campion)
2. Lost in Translation (Coppola)
3. Trouble Every Day (Denis)
4. Mustang (Deniz Gamze Ergüven)
5. The Selfish Giant (Clio Barnard)
6. Monster (Patty Jenkins)
7. In My Skin (Marina de Van)
8. Jesus Camp (Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady)
9. American Honey (Arnold)
10. White Material (Denis)

HMs: Bastards (Denis), Enough Said (Holofcener), Friday Night (Denis)
Marie Antoinette (Coppola), Wendy and Lucy (Reichardt)

I'm guessing Top of the Lake wouldn't count, but I'd put it pretty high up on the list.

[Spinal]

1. Fat Girl
2. Mustang
3. Me and You and Everyone We Know
4. The Lure
5. Monster
6. Friday Night
7. Lost in Translation
8. The Babadook
9. Zero Dark Thirty
10. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night

[baby doll]

The Day I Became a Woman (Marzieh Meshkini, 2000)
À ma soeur! (Catherine Breillat, 2001)
The Holy Girl (Lucrecia Martel, 2004)
Innocence (Lucile Hadzihalilovic, 2004)
Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, 2006)
Les Plages d'Agnès (Agnès Varda, 2008)
White Material (Claire Denis, 2009)
La Folie Amlayer (Chantal Akerman, 2011)
We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay, 2011)
Night Moves (Kelly Reichardt, 2013)

This is just off the top of my head, so there's probably a few I'm forgetting.

[Spinal]

Waiting for someone to list Speed Racer.

[Grouchy]

Waiting for someone to list Speed Racer.
Hahahah!

[Ezee E]

1. Zero Dark Thirty
2. American Psycho
3. The Babadook
4. Hurt Locker
5. Winter’s Bone
6. Fish Tank
7. Lost in Translation
8. Deliver Us From Evil
9. Across the Universe
10. The Woodsman

[Grouchy]

1. Wendy and Lucy
2. The Beaches of Agnes
3. We Need to Talk About Kevin
4. The Holy Girl
5. Toni Erdmann
6. Trouble Every Day
7. Cloud Atlas
8. The Milk of Sorrow
9. Persepolis
10. The Love Witch

Damn that took a while.

[Russ]

Hey Spinal, I know I've pimped Jessica Hausner's Hotel before, and if there's any way you can lay your hands on it, well...let's just say it's right up your alley.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X2oRYw4BsE

[Spinal]

Thanks! I will try to track it down.

[transmogrifier]

1. Rain (Christine Jeffs)
2. American Splendor (Shari Springer Berman)
3. Friends with Money (Nicole Holofcener)
4. Lost in Translation (Sophia Coppola)
5. Zero Dark Thirty (Kathryn Bigelow)
6. Winter's Bone (Debra Granik)
7. Monsoon Wedding (Mira Nair)
8. A Very Ordinary Couple (Roh Deok)
9. The Wonder Years (Kim Hee-Jung)
10. Whale Rider (Niki Caro)

[transmogrifier]

Wow, I assumed Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini had dropped off the face of the earth after the amazing American Splendor, but it turns out they were just making Movies That Exist:

2007: The Nanny Diaries (Scarlet Johannson, Laura Linney, Paul Giamatti)
2010: The Extra Man (Kevin Kline, Paul Dano, Katie Holmes)
2012: Girl Most Likely (Kristen Wiig, Annette Bening, Matt Dillon)
2015: 10,000 Saints (Ethan Hawke, Asa Butterfield, Hailee Stanfield)

What are these things even?

[Peng]

It kills me that Beau Travail just misses the year cut-off.

1. Cloud Atlas (2012)
2. Lost in Translation (2003)
3. Toni Erdmann (2016)
4. Cameraperson (2016)
5. Selma (2014)
6. Things to Come (2016)
7. Everyone Else (2009)
8. The Square (2013)
9. American Psycho (2000)
10. Breathe (2014)

[Stay Puft]

1. 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis, 2008)
2. Things to Come (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2016)
3. Trouble Every Day (Claire Denis, 2001)
4. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel, 2008)
5. Window Horses (Ann Marie Fleming, 2016)
6. Father of My Children (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2009)
7. Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt, 2016)
8. A Simple Life (Ann Hui, 2011)
9. Speed Racer (Lana & Lilly Wachowski, 2008)
10. The Selfish Giant (Clio Barnard, 2013)

HMs: Red Road (Andrea Arnold, 2006); Bends (Flora Lau, 2013); Goodbye First Love (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2011); All Is Forgiven (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2007); Bastards (Claire Denis, 2013); Mustang (Deniz Gamze Ergüven, 2015); Toni Erdmann (Maren Ade, 2016); The Arbor (Clio Barnard, 2010)

[Pop Trash]

1. American Psycho
2. Innocence
3. Lost in Translation
4. Bright Star
5. Wendy and Lucy
6. Tomboy
7. Zero Dark Thirty
8. The Babadook
9. Stories We Tell
10. Selma

[Mysterious Dude]

1. Bright Star (2009, Jane Campion)
2. Tomboy (2011, Céline Sciamma)
3. Sister (2012, Ursula Meier)
4. Wadjda (2012, Haifaa al-Mansour)
5. The Selfish Giant (2013, Clio Barnard)
6. Monster (2003, Patty Jenkins)
7. Meek's Cutoff (2010, Kelly Reichardt)
8. Home (2008, Ursula Meier)
9. Ramchand Pakistani (2008, Mehreen Jabbar)
10. Grbavica (2006, Jasmila Žbanić)

Honorable mention:
Waitress (2007, Adrienne Shelly)
Winter's Bone (2010, Debra Granik)

[Sycophant]

I feel like there's something I'm trying to remember that just isn't coming to me. Until it does (or doesn't):

1. Stories We Tell
2. Me and You and Everyone We Know
3. Persepolis
4. Meek's Cutoff
5. Speed Racer
6. Selma
7. Half Nelson
8. Hurt Locker
9. The German Doctor
10. The Queen and I

[transmogrifier]

This thread could well be my viewing list for the rest of the year. So much stuff I haven't seen.

[Watashi]

I'm kinda embarrassed how little I've seen. This only reminds how I've never seen a film by Claire Denis. Where do I start?

[Dukefrukem]

How do we handle the Wachowski sisters in this consensus?

[Spinal]

How do we handle the Wachowski sisters in this consensus?

I leave that up to you.

[Thirdmango]

https://letterboxd.com/danadanger/list/directed-by-women/

List that can help you find stuff.

[Thirdmango]

https://letterboxd.com/kelssa/list/female-filmmakers/

Another good list which has a couple more films I've seen than the previous one.

[Thirdmango]

1. The Hurt Locker (2008)
2. 13th (2016)
3. American Splendor (2003)
4. Selma (2014)
5. Friends with Kids (2011)
6. The Brass Teapot (2012)
7. Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (2012)
8. Wayne's World (1992)
9. Sleeping with Other People (2015)
10. TiMER (2009)

[Thirdmango]

Wow, I assumed Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini had dropped off the face of the earth after the amazing American Splendor, but it turns out they were just making Movies That Exist:

2007: The Nanny Diaries (Scarlet Johannson, Laura Linney, Paul Giamatti)
2010: The Extra Man (Kevin Kline, Paul Dano, Katie Holmes)
2012: Girl Most Likely (Kristen Wiig, Annette Bening, Matt Dillon)
2015: 10,000 Saints (Ethan Hawke, Asa Butterfield, Hailee Stanfield)

What are these things even?

I saw Girl Most Likely and here's my review of it at the time 3.5 stars

Watched Dec 17, 2013

Thirdmango’s review published on Letterboxd :
This seems to be pretty well despised here on letterboxd but I didn't think it was that bad. It was fun, had some funny jokes and pretty well did it's thing. There was some influence of American Splendor in this movie and each of the actors did a fine job in their parts. This movie isn't going to win any awards or be all that well remembered but I enjoyed it while I watched it. I really liked seeing that Darren Criss has some range in his acting. The brother was a little annoying and it wasn't clear whether or not he had mental problems but the actor did a good job. It's a little weird at times but still fun.

[Spinal]

8. Wayne's World (1992)


Only doing a poll for films since 2000.

[dreamdead]

I'm kinda embarrassed how little I've seen. This only reminds how I've never seen a film by Claire Denis. Where do I start?

Friday Night is likely her most accessible. Nothing tops Beau Travail, but for the purposes of not alienating you to her film style, I'd start there. I can't remember much of Trouble Every Day, but do know that many of her followers regard that film as one of her best.

Incidentally, Spinal, this consensus led me to finally watch Fat Girl. Holy mother. I was expecting that ending. Totally appropriate and the final ten minutes were tense even before the reveal. But my goodness.

[Thirdmango]

1. The Hurt Locker (2008)
2. 13th (2016)
3. American Splendor (2003)
4. Selma (2014)
5. Friends with Kids (2011)
6. The Brass Teapot (2012)
7. Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (2012)
8. Wayne's World (1992)
9. Sleeping with Other People (2015)
10. TiMER (2009)

1. The Hurt Locker (2008)
2. 13th (2016)
3. American Splendor (2003)
4. Selma (2014)
5. Friends with Kids (2011)
6. The Brass Teapot (2012)
7. Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (2012)
8. Sleeping with Other People (2015)
9. TiMER (2009)
10. Take This Waltz (2011)

[Spinal]

I'm starting to count these. This means you will need to make a new post if you want to make an edit.

You still have plenty of time to add new ballots.

[TGM]

Is there like a list somewhere of all the films made by female directors since the 2000s or anything like that?

[Spinal]

Is there like a list somewhere of all the films made by female directors since the 2000s or anything like that?

Check out Thirdmango's link on the previous page.

[Yxklyx]

1. Wendy and Lucy (Kelly Reichardt)
2. Breathe (Mélanie Laurent)
3. The Kids are Alright (Lisa Cholodenko)
4. We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay)
5. The Forest for the Trees (Maren Ade)
6. Humpday (Lynn Shelton)
7. The Selfish Giant (Clio Barnard)
8. Bend It Like Beckham (Gurinder Chadha)
9. Winter's Bone (Debra Granik)
10. The Holy Girl (Lucrecia Martel)

[dreamdead]

1. Paju
2. Bright Star
3. Everyone Else
4. Wendy and Lucy
5. Fat Girl
6. Friday Night
7.Monsoon Wedding
8. Stories We Tell
9. Enough Said
10. Lost in Translation

Many films still to see: Cameraperson, Toni Erdmann, The Headless Woman, The Selfish Giant...

[PURPLE]

1. Marseille (Schanelec, 2004)
2. Goodbye, First Love (Hansen-Løve, 2011)
3. La Ciénaga (Martel, 2001)
4. L'intrus (Denis, 2004)
5. The Days Between (Speth, 2001)
6. Alle Anderen (Ade, 2009)
7. Passing Summer (Schanelec, 2001)
8. Bright Star (Campion, 2009)
9. Eden (Hansen-Løve, 2014)
10. The Headless Woman (Martel, 2008)

[dreamdead]

Edited in TCoMC:


1. Paju
2. Bright Star
3. Everyone Else
4. Wendy and Lucy
5. Fat Girl
6. Friday Night
7.Monsoon Wedding
8. Take Care of My Cat
9.Stories We Tell
10. Enough Said


Also, the New York Times critics (Dargis and Scott) listed the top 25 of the 21st century (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/09/movies/the-25-best-films-of-the-21st-century.html?hpw&rref=arts&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0), and their female directed films were The Gleaners and I, White Material, The Hurt Locker, and Wendy and Lucy...

[Spinal]

I'll count these soon. If you want to get a list in, try to do it in the next day or so.

[Spinal]

I have a list of 25 films. It's a pretty interesting group.

However, the list could use a bit more separation. I'm going to keep the poll open for another couple of days to see if I can get a few more votes.

If not, the presentation may look a little different. It could be something like the top 10 films ranked, and then 15 other films recommend by Match Cut or something like that.

[StanleyK]

1. Trouble Every Day (Claire Denis)
2. La Ciénaga (Lucrecia Martel)
3. The Holy Girl (Lucrecia Martel)
4. Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola)
5. Bright Star (Jane Campion)
6. Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola)
7. Old Joy (Kelly Reichardt)
8. The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel)
9. Monster (Patty Jenkins)
10. We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay)

Not the most interesting list, but hopefully it'll help.

[Spinal]

Last call.

[Spinal]

Before we get to the ranked portion of our list (Top 15), I will present 11 additional films that have been recommended by Match Cut. These films will be presented in alphabetical order.

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/028780_25_zpsgr9qxefn.jpg
Here's me. Well, the guy playin' me anyway. Even though he don't look nothin' like me. But, whatever.

American Splendor

Year: 2003
Director: Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini

An original mix of fiction and reality illuminates the life of comic book hero everyman Harvey Pekar.


Nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay (Berman and Pulcini) at the Academy Awards.
Won the FIPRESCI Prize at Cannes (Un Certain Regard) "for their original approach to fiction and reality, combining two medias, that of cinema and graphic novels, in an innovative fashion."
Nominated for 5 Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature, Best Director and Best Screenplay.
Won Best Film and Best Screenplay at the National Society of Film Critics Awards.
Won Best First Film at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards.
Won the Grand Jury Prize (Dramatic) at Sundance.
Won Best Adapted Screenplay by the Writers Guild of America.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Shari20Springer20Berman_zps40e 0djfh.jpg

"Harvey was very interested in the working man, but not necessarily in a polemical way. We thought that Harvey’s love of naturalism in his comics was wedded to the 1970s movies, like Fat City, Midnight Cowboy, and Deer Hunter, part of which was shot in Cleveland. We wanted to recreate that 1970s movie look in the narrative portion of the movie; it had to be underlit, with an earth tone. The film stocks now are very different. They are really vibrant. We had to do a lot of stuff to the film stock to degrade it, so that it would look more like the ’70s. We flashed the film and used a tobacco filter. It worked out beautifully."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/film2_zpsddthwcz7.jpg
Our lives are not our own. From womb to tomb, we are bound to others.

Cloud Atlas

Year: 2012
Director: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski and Tom Tykwer

An exploration of how the actions of individual lives impact one another in the past, present and future, as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and an act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution.


Nominated for LGBT Film of the Year by the Gay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association
Nominated for Outstanding Film - Wide Release at the GLAAD Media Awards
Nominated for 10 German Film Awards including German Film of the Year, Outstanding Feature Film and Best Direction.
Named Worst Film in the Village Voice Film Poll


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/1200px-Wachowskis2C_Fantastic_Fest2C_ Cloud_Atlas_zpscisbxyix.jpg

"Power is something artists have been writing about since The Iliad. Okay, power is a part of the human experience. You see power dynamics trying to be understood in The Iliad, and you see them in The Master. It’s still the same excavation of power. Foucault gave us insight into power in the postmodern world, and now we understand it in a different way than Homer did, but power will be a subject in the human story, I think, as long as we’re human. [Laughs.] And so when we first read David Mitchell’s book, I thought it was an unbelievable examination of incredibly varied perspectives, and also the relationship between the responsibility we have to people we have power over, and the responsibility we have to the people who have power over us. Are we meant to just accept their conventional construct of whatever they imagine the world to be? Or are we obliged in some way to struggle against it? In the reverse, what is the obligation of the person whose life we have power over? Are they obliged to struggle against that conventional relationship? This is stuff of good stories."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/innocence2006pic_zpsajvzdshc.j pg
Obedience is the only path to happiness.

Innocence

Year: 2004
Director: Lucile Hadzihalilovic

A year in the life of the girls in the third dormitory at a secluded boarding school, where new students arrive in coffins.


Won Best Director at the San Sebastián International Film Festival
Won the Bronze Horse at the Stockholm Film Festival
Won the People's Choice Award (International Competition) at the Istanbul International Film Festival
Won Best Feature Film at the Neuchâtel International Fantastic Film Festival


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/lucilehadzihalilovic_zps1urh45 zb.jpg

"There is a sense of threat, or anxiety. The suspense suggested to some people who watched the film that at some point a group of men would burst in and rape these little girls, shatter this idyll. But nothing happens. For me the threat comes from within the girls – it is the threat of growing up, the fear of the outside world. The school is a contradiction, it is almost a utopian prison. But the references to punishment, to banishment or entrapment - it all comes from the girls, not from the adults. The arrival of Iris in the coffin, and her observations, suggests at first the threat will come from the school, but it does not, and we move on to Alice’s perspective and then Bianca’s. The story, like the suspense, is never resolved. There are no answers. If you try to find answers perhaps you have missed the point of the film. So many people ask me 'so why does Iris arrive in a coffin?' Why not? It seemed right. It is from the point of view of children. There is both reality and fantasy."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/00001_zpszi9xa59n.jpg
You know Dr. Mauro's wife? She saw Our Lady of Mercy with Jesus and the guardian angels. And she's Jewish. It must be true. Jews don't go around seeing things.

La Ciénaga

Year: 2001
Director: Lucrecia Martel

The life of a self-pitying Argentine bourgeois family set in the high plains of northwestern Argentina.


Won 3 categories including Best First Film at the Argentinean Film Critics Association Awards. Nominated for 5 others including Best Film, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay (Martel).
Won the Alfred Bauer Award at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Won 4 awards including Best Director at the Havana Film Festival.
Won the NHK Award at Sundance.
Named Best Latin American Film by the Uruguayan Film Critics Association.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Lucrecia_Martel_28cropped29_zp s1kgvnab1.jpg

"I was raised on stories where fantastical things cohabitated with everyday life. For me this has nothing to do with the 'magical realism' often discussed in Latin American literature and culture. I don’t agree with this idea that there exists some sort of layer of magic over reality. Because this assumes that there is a concrete reality and every now and then something magical appears. In contrast, our real experience is based in the intermingling of reality and the fantastical. As a child, and even today, I have always been captivated by the form not only of stories and storytelling, but also of conversation and the way people pause and leave space for someone to intervene. All the ways that, especially when you’re a child, you’re charmed and steered just by words alone."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/184913_full_zpstzbqkcde.jpg
You think you deserve that pain but you don't.

Me and You and Everyone We Know

Year: 2005
Director: Miranda July

A lonely shoe salesman and an eccentric performance artist struggle to connect.


Won 4 awards at Cannes including Best Feature Film (Prix Regards Jeune) and the Golden Camera.
Nominated for 2 Independent Spirit Awards - Best First Feature and Best First Screenplay (July).
Won a Special Jury Prize at Sundance "for originality of vision."
Won Best First Feature in the Village Voice Film Poll.
Named the 5th best film of the decade by Roger Ebert.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/MV5BMTYwOTE3MjU0MV5BMl5BanBnXk FtZTYwMDcxNDU0._V1_UX214_CR002 14317_AL__zpswezzjz0m.jpg

"Someone once said to me at first they thought that maybe the people [in Me and You and Everyone We Know] weren't quite real. Or it was a little surreal, because they were so honest sometimes. And then after talking to me for a while they realized that I'm like that. That sometimes I just say exactly what I'm feeling, or, um, show it. And so that yeah, a whole world of people like that is a little bit different. I'm amazed at how precocious children are. I mean, it's like fascinating to me. Most kids are this way that if you just sort of ask them almost any question, they'll just answer it. And in looking for these kids, often in the audition I would... You know, like when I met Brandon [Ratcliff], I would just ask him questions and he was so forthright and had such kind of command over his answers that wonderfully like childlike in the honesty, but also so poised I knew he could really like carry much of the movie. When I watch it, I'm amazed that I'm still so mesmerized by Brandon, who's six. I'm kind of stunned because of course I was there. You know, I was directing him. And yet there's things he does that I don't really understand where they came from."

[Spinal]

I just realized that I lied slightly. Because I didn't pay attention to the fact that I was letting Excel alphabetize the word "The ...", there will be a couple of films that aren't technically alphabetized correctly. I will be appointing an independent prosecutor to get to the bottom of how this negligence was allowed to happen.

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/mustang-cannes-film-festival_zpsw5gliq6i.jpg
The house became a wife factory that we never came out of.

Mustang

Year: 2015
Director: Deniz Gamze Ergüven

When five orphan girls are seen innocently playing with boys on a beach, their scandalized conservative guardians confine them while forced marriages are arranged.


Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.
Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Golden Globes.
Nominated for Best Film not in the English Language at the BAFTAs.
Won Label Europa Cinemas award at Cannes.
Won 4 César Awards including Best Original Screenplay (Ergüven and Alice Winocour) and Best First Film. Nominated for 5 others including Best Film and Best Director.
Won Best European Film at the Goya Awards.
Won the Freedom of Expression Award from the National Board of Review.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/1481809094498_0570x0400_148180 9784343_zps6fsnbzpb.jpg

"At the beginning, I felt the need to move away from true stories and from the naturalism that is so dominant in today’s cinema, because this is after all a very dark subject matter. So I felt like I needed to bring in some kind of light. But of course the girls’ situation is so real that I didn’t want to imprison the characters in that reality. And there was also the desire to depict these girls as heroines, like when Nur breaks the chairs after being accused of doing something disgusting and screams: 'Then these chairs are also disgusting, because they touched our asses!' The wish to adopt a fable-like style became all the more apparent when we got together with the actresses. I wanted to portray these girls like a five-headed monster. They were like supernatural, otherworldly creatures for me with their long hair, which was reminiscent of a horse’s mane."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/hero_TheBabadook-2014-1_zpszzzlk9ud.jpg
You are nothing. You're nothing! This is my house! You are trespassing in my house!

The Babadook

Year: 2014
Director: Jennifer Kent

A single mother, plagued by the violent death of her husband, battles with her son's fear of a monster lurking in the house, but soon discovers a sinister presence all around her.


Won Best Direction in a Feature Film from the Australian Directors Guild.
Won 3 categories at the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Awards including Best Film, Best Direction and Best Original Screenplay (Kent). Nominated for 3 others.
Won 4 categories at the Australian Film Critics Association Awards including Best Film and Best Director. Nominated for 2 others including Best Screenplay.
Won 4 Fangoria Chainsaw Awards including Best Limited-Release/Direct-to-Video Film and Best Screenplay.
Named Best First Feature in the Indiewire Critics' Poll.
Named Best First Film at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards.
Named Best First Feature in the Village Voice Film Poll.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/220px-Jennifer_Kent2C_Paris_CinC3A9m a_2014_28cropped29_zpsdlpabjhd .jpg

"I was an actor, and an actor’s job is to sit in the skin of another human being and make them real, so I really felt for Amelia. But I didn’t want to make her too good, either. Her colleague gives her the opportunity to go home and look after her sick child, but she lied about her sick child, and she goes to the shopping mall and goofs off! So I just wanted her to be human. I didn’t just want to look at the light. As human beings, we’re curious creatures, and when anything goes wrong, we feel like we’ve done something wrong. But it’s actually the nature of existence, that there’s night and day. There’s shitty weather and there’s good weather, and that’s true of humans as well. We have to integrate all those difficult parts of ourselves."

[Spinal]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Beaches_of_Agnes_zpslgyejr0z.j pg
Before we were cardboard, we were flesh and blood.

The Beaches of Agnès

Year: 2008
Director: Agnès Varda

Agnès Varda explores her memories, mostly chronologically, with photographs, film clips, interviews, reenactments, and droll, playful contemporary scenes of her narrating her story.


Won Best Documentary Film at the César Awards.
Nominated for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary by the Directors Guild of America.
Won Best Non-Fiction Film at the National Society of Film Critics Awards.
Won Best Documentary by or About Women at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards.
Won Best Foreign Film, Not in the Spanish Language at the Argentinean Film Critics Association Awards.


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"I like to combine a handmade piece of film with a professionally made image. And these images all fit, because I am the person who is putting them together. In many American films, there are clear-cut categories of work: The producer does this, the screenwriter this, the director this and the editor this. I love the idea that my films are handmade, and I do a little bit of everything. There are producers, but I work with them. When there are business discussions, I am part of those discussions. I like to write, I like to shoot and I do the editing day after day with the editors. While I don't always know how to work with Avid, or the editing systems, I do think that choices have to be made every day, and I like making those choices. I believe in what is called cinema d'auteur, and I think you should get the feeling, when you're watching a film, that it was shaped by the vision of one person. I prefer a film that gives you the feeling that there's somebody behind the film, holding the film together and inventing something."

[Grouchy]

I didn't realize Mustang was made by a woman. It would've made my list.

[Spinal]

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All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.

Things to Come

Year: 2016
Director: Mia Hansen-Løve

A philosophy teacher soldiers through the death of her mother, getting fired from her job, and dealing with a husband who is cheating on her


Won Best Director at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Won Best Director at the Bucharest International Film Festival.
Nominated for Foreign Language Film of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards.


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"I needed to feel connected to youth to deal with this subject of aging. I needed to feel strong. The subject matter of the film—facing difficult situations at a time of your life when it’s really not easy to reinvent yourself and start from scratch—actually terrifies me. It does. I’m not a computer; I’m not a robot. When you make a film about something, whatever it’s about, it affects you. If it’s sad, it makes you sad. I’m really like a child with that, and I guess many artists are. You’ve got to live with it for the two next years, you’ve got to talk about it, it’s going to be part of your life. It exists in the most real way. So when I start working on a film I’ve got to be sure I’m strong enough, that I have what I need in order to face whatever the film is about. More than any of my previous films, this film scared me."

[Ezee E]

Surprised that Miranda July hasn't gotten to do more work since her movie.

[Spinal]

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We hear you're a girl. We're gonna check that.

Tomboy

Year: 2011
Director: Céline Sciamma

A family moves into a new neighborhood, and a 10-year-old named Laure deliberately presents as a boy named Mikhael to the neighborhood children.


Won the Teddy Jury Award at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Won Best Feature Film at the Torino International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival.
Won Best Feature (Audience Award) at the San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival.
Won Best Feature at the Philadelphia International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival.


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"When I begin to write, each time I ask myself: has it been told yet? And sometimes you can come up with a story that hasn't really been told. There have been movies around this subject, but not ones about schoolgirls with this ambiguity – I haven't seen any anyway. It is the part of the process that most excites me when I'm making a movie. And of course it's also political. When you make a film it's always a balance between, this subject really matters to me in an intimate way, in a political way and, also, it's an opportunity of fiction. That's the kind of balance I'm looking for."

[Spinal]

Surprised that Miranda July hasn't gotten to do more work since her movie.

I read her novel, The First Bad Man, recently. It's really good.

[Spinal]

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Never ask for what oughta be offered.

Winter's Bone

Year: 2010
Director: Debra Granik

An unflinching Ozark Mountain girl hacks through dangerous social terrain as she hunts down her drug-dealing father while trying to keep her family intact.


Nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay (Granik and Anne Rosellini).
Won 3 awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including Best Woman Director and Outstanding Achievement by a Woman in the Film Industry ("for directing, writing, and producing Winter's Bone").
Won 2 awards at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Nominated for 7 Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature, Best Director and Best Screenplay.
Won Best Narrative Feature (Audience Award) at the San Francisco International Film Festival.
Won the Grand Jury Prize (Dramatic) at Sundance. Also won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award.
Won Best Movie by a Woman at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards.


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"In my lowest day, if someone does something unexpected on a subway train, or if someone is especially touching, something they’re doing… Three mariachis walk on a train in some godforsaken part of the greater New York area. I’m like, 'Where did you come from? Do you have family?' My mind is just whirring. 'What’s it like to cross over and stand on a train? Where do you go at night? Do you live with 40 other men in a sort of weird place?' What keeps me going, I think, is that I’ve always been curious about people’s lives. We’re all born onto a very narrow path, and some of us, it’s like a tic. There’s always this wonderment. 'What’s it like on your path? What are your questions? How do you make humor? What’s your version of funny? How do you cope?' It’s like wondering how other people make a go of it. Once people get under your skin, you get an affection for them."

[Spinal]

The previous 11 films were well-supported by Match Cut, but grouped too closely together for ranking to have much significance.

From here forward, the final 15 films will be ranked.

[Ezee E]

Look at the logline for Debra Granik's next movie:

A father and his 13 year-old daughter are living in a paradisiacal existence in a vast urban park in Portland Oregon when a small mistake derails their lives forever.

[Ivan Drago]

Look at the logline for Debra Granik's next movie:

A father and his 13 year-old daughter are living in a paradisiacal existence in a vast urban park in Portland Oregon when a small mistake derails their lives forever.

Sounds like a low-budget indie.

[Spinal]

#15

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Do you think I'm masculine?

Everyone Else

Year: 2009
Director: Maren Ade

While on a Mediterranean vacation, a seemingly happy boyfriend and girlfriend find their connection to one another tested as they bond with another couple.


Won 3 awards at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Nominated for 3 German Film Awards including Outstanding Feature Film and Best Direction.
Won 2 awards at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema including Best Director (International Official Selection).
Placed 5th in the Village Voice Film Poll for Best Film. Placed 2nd for Best Screenplay (Ade).


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"After the rehearsals I changed several things in my mind about how to direct the scenes. I found the idea of the ending with them. Some things have never changed, like the first evening, when Gitti is defending Chris. But there are other scenes like towards the end when Chris screams at Gitti. I asked Lars to just say what his character would like to tell her and I took some lines from what he improvised. At the rehearsals we looked at films and talked a lot. I had to find out that they had to become their own couple, and not the couple that I wrote. What I found so interesting about them is that it's not so clear who is the stronger one. We rehearsed the scenes, then you see that this sentence is not interesting. Or this is a sentence that Chris doesn't have to say. For Gitti's character, the way Birgit says, 'Sometimes I have the feeling I admire you more.' Small things that I thought were important for what is the picture that they make together."

[Spinal]

#14

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When you're in the middle of a story, it isn't a story at all but rather a confusion ...

Stories We Tell

Year: 2012
Director: Sarah Polley

A film that excavates layers of myth and memory to find the elusive truth at the core of a family of storytellers.


Won Best Documentary Screenplay (Polley) from the Writers Guild of America.
Nominated for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary by the Directors Guild of America.
Nominated for Documentary of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards
Named Best Documentary by the National Board of Review
Won Best Non-Fiction Film at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards
Won Best Canadian Film at the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards
Won Best Documentary by or About Women at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards
Won Best Documentary (Local or International) at the Australian Film Critics Association Awards
Named Best Documentary Feature Film by the Alliance of Women Film Journalists. Also nominated for Best Woman Director and Best Woman Screenwriter.


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"I think the story in itself wasn’t the impetus to make the film — it didn’t feel like enough. It’s a good story for the people involved, but I didn’t think it would make a good film. The impetus was the storytelling around it: the fact that after it happened, in the year following these revelations coming out, we were all telling stories about it, to our friends, to each other. Some of us were trying to do something creative with it — to write it, like Dad or Harry — and it was so interesting to see how the stories were beginning to diverge from each other, and how the story would get told back to me like a third, fourth-hand version of it. Someone would come up at a party and say, 'Hey, I heard this story about you,' and then they would tell a story that would bear very little resemblance to what had happened to me, or was emphasizing totally different details. I became really interested in these bizarre, human urges to make a narrative out of a very confusing mess of details, and how deep that goes — like our need to create a narrative in order to make some sort of sense of life."

[Spinal]

#13

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There's unscrupulous people out there getting kids to do their dirty work ...

The Selfish Giant

Year: 2013
Director: Clio Barnard

Two thirteen year-old working-class friends in Bradford seek fortune by getting involved with a local scrap dealer and criminal.


Nominated for Best British Film at the BAFTA Awards.
Nominated in 7 categories at the British Independent Film Awards including Best British Independent Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay (Barnard).
Won the Label Europa Cinemas award at Cannes.
Won British Film of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards.
Nominated for Best First Screenplay by the Writers' Guild of Great Britain


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"In a way, with The Selfish Giant I embraced the language of realism. But I still don’t believe in it. That’s why I wanted it to be a fable. To be in the tradition of realist fables. In a way, [previous film] The Arbor was an experiment, a kind of formal interrogation. Whereas in The Selfish Giant, I kind of accepted an existing form and worked within it. I worried a bit that one might contradict the other when I was in the process of doing The Selfish Giant, but I think what I see subsequently is that in a way, there are similarities. That’s why it was very important to me to keep this connection to Victorian fairy tale. How can it be a fairy tale, a fable, but also be authentic? There’s a gap."

[Spinal]

#12

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I guess it was better to hear a flat-out lie than to know the truth at 13.

Monster

Year: 2003
Director: Patty Jenkins

The life of Aileen Wuornos, a Daytona Beach prostitute who became a serial killer.


Named Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("Writer and director Patty Jenkins brings light to this dark tale of a woman whose tragic story is never condoned but deftly brought to life in all its complexity.")
Won Best First Feature at the Independent Spirit Awards. Also nominated for Best First Screenplay (Jenkins).
Nominated for Outstanding Film - Wide Release at the GLAAD Media Awards.
Nomiated for Best Screenplay at the Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards.
Earned numerous awards for lead actress, Charlize Theron, including the Academy Award for Best Actress.


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"I felt sort of guilty that I didn't feel more interested in shooting the sex scenes. Everybody was talking about how we were going to do this, and I was like, God, [the way we're] shooting that scene, it's not about the sexuality at all. Maybe I'm making this big mistake, but I just don't think [focusing on] that is appropriate. I don't think the physicality of their sex has anything to do with the movie. There's not nudity. It's not hot. But at the end of the day, I ended up understanding this was the right thing to do. It's about the love. It's not about the sexuality. As for approaching it, [Theron and Christina Ricci] are pros. They blew me away. They're unbelievable. And they both walked away from it saying it was great, saying that it was the best sex scene they ever filmed because of the fact that we approached it about the love, which grounded it all in character. Both of them expressed to me separately that working on other films before, [directors] had been like, 'And then lick her, and lick the guy, and do this...' and it became this physical thing that they were aware of. But here we were grounded in character."

[Spinal]

#11

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We will not wait any longer!

Selma

Year: 2014
Director: Ava DuVernay

A chronicle of Martin Luther King's campaign to secure equal voting rights via an epic march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in 1965.


Nominated for 2 Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
Nominated for 4 Golden Globes, including Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Director.
Named Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("This is a film that flies the flag high for American film, inviting audiences to rise above the breathless shame of our nation's past and come together as one as we look to the future.")
Won 4 awards from the African-American Film Critics Association including Best Picture and Best Director.
Won 2 awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including Best Woman Director. Nominated for 2 others, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Nominated for 5 Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature and Best Director.
Won Film Director of the Year from the Gay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association.
Won the Freedom of Expression Award from the National Board of Review.
Won 2 categories at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards including Best Movie by a Woman and Best Female Action Star (Oprah Winfrey)[?!]


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"I was approaching it from my point of view as a woman filmmaker: The idea of showing a bombing, showing a blast, showing any kind of detonation might be different from that of a male director who might be more interested — and this is just based on what I've seen for many, many years — might be more interested in the physicality of the blast, the gusto of that violence. I was much more interested in reverence for the girls. It was important to me that you hear their voices. You hear what their concerns are at that moment as four little black girls walking down a staircase in what should be a safe place, in their sanctuary, in their church. They're talking about hair. They're talking about Coretta Scott King's hairstyle. They're talking about what little black girls talk about — getting your hair wet and keeping it pressed and doing all that kind of thing. You start to come into their world just as they are taken out of the world. And so from there, what is the next thing to show? Is it shrapnel? Is it fire? For me it was the fabric of their dresses and their patent leather shoes, all of the things that remain from the souls that were lost."

[Spinal]

#10

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I mean it's got so bad that half the people on TV, inside the TV, they're watching TV.

We Need to Talk About Kevin

Year: 2011
Director: Lynne Ramsay

Kevin's mother struggles to love her strange child, despite the increasingly vicious things he says and does as he grows up.


Nominated for 3 BAFTA Awards including Best British Film and Best Director.
Won Best Woman Director from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists. Nominated in 3 other categories including Best Adapted Screenplay (Ramsay and Rory Stewart Kinnear).
Won Best Director at the British Independent Film Awards. Nominated in 5 other categories including Best British Independent Film and Best Screenplay.
Won Best Film at the Evening Standard British Film Awards.
Won 3 awards at the Hawaii International Film Festival including Best Film and Best Director.
Won British Film of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards. Nominated in 4 other categories including Director of the Year.
Won Best Film at the London Film Festival.
Won Best Movie by a Woman at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards. Nominated in 3 other categories.
Won Best Film Screenplay from the Writers' Guild of Great Britain.


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"I felt like it was good to keep my independence from a movie studio to make this kind of movie. Besides I don’t think any studio would have taken it. It was very run and gun in a way but very, very planned. We shot in CinemaScope. Producers always say, ‘Oh my gosh, CinemaScope, you mean more landscape?’ Because it’s so expansive, but to me it’s fantastic because you can do two shots instead of one single. It was like a western for them. They normally only use that in westerns. And that’s wonderful because it’s like this epic in the every day. Using that in a family drama and making it very epic was important to me. But it also saves a lot of time and money because of the size of the frames. I could make the war between Kevin and Eva in the frames."

[Spinal]

#9

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Well, everyone's a coward about something, you know?

The Hurt Locker

Year: 2008
Director: Kathryn Bigelow

During the Iraq War, a Sergeant recently assigned to an army bomb squad is put at odds with his squad mates due to his maverick way of handling his work.


Won 6 Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director. Bigelow was the first woman to win the latter award.
Nominated for 3 Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Director.
Won 6 BAFTA Awards including Best Film and Best Director.
Won Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("Marked by the bravura direction of Kathryn Bigelow and grounded in Mark Boal's taut, unsentimental script, this grippingly real story detonates an emotional portrait of combat and camaraderie abroad, and alienation at home.")
Won 6 awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Won Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures from the Directors Guild of America.
Won Director of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards. Also nominated for Film of the Year.
Won Best Film and Best Director at the National Society of Film Critics Awards.
Won Best Film and Best Director at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards.
Won Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures at the PGA Awards.
Won 4 awards at the Venice Film Festival.
Named Best Film in the Village Voice Film Poll.


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"For some individuals—some soldiers, some contractors—combat provides a kind of purpose and meaning beyond which all else potentially pales in comparison. Again, for some individuals, I think it’s very interesting to look at that. And you can also say that about firemen, police officers. There are individuals who choose to walk into a burning building to save lives, and that’s what these men are doing. I see them as extraordinary portraits, regardless of how you feel about the conflict. I think of the film, in a way, as non-partisan. It’s not commenting, as Mark [Boal] said when he was working on the script. There’s that old saw about how there’s no politics in the trenches. And when he went over there, sure enough, there’s nobody talking about politics. They’re talking about whether they’re gonna survive, or 'What’s your favorite beer?'"

[Spinal]

#8

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I want my pain to be inflicted on others.

American Psycho

Year: 2000
Director: Mary Harron

A wealthy New York investment banking executive hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he delves deeper into his violent, hedonistic fantasies.


Nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay (Harron and Guinevere Turner) at the Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards.
Nominated in 2 categories at the London Critics Circle Film Awards including Director of the Year.
Won Special Recognition from the National Board of Review "for excellence in filmmaking."
Won Best Movie from the International Horror Guild.


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"I had already cast Christian Bale to play the role, and I was standing in my kitchen in the East Village, and I got a phone call saying, 'You should sit down. Leonardo DiCaprio wants to be in your movie, and we’re going to pay him twenty million dollars.' I told them that was the stupidest thing I’d ever heard. He’s not right for the role, and he has a fifteen-year-old-girl fan base. You can’t cast him coming off Titanic. I think he’s a great actor, but he wasn’t right for it; Patrick Bateman is a very specific character. Christian Bale had something, an authority and a darkness, whereas DiCaprio is more of a poetic actor. Some actors can draw from their own darkness. Both Bale and Lili Taylor have this fathomless place in them; when you look at them you can go far into them. They can both play very saintly and very bad. I mean, Christian Bale played Jesus in something. Christian is also a great comic actor and he brought that to the role. We had a very similar take on the character. I think, being partly British, he thought the role of Bateman was funny and approached it with humor. He loved the patheticness of the character, how embarrassing Bateman was. Trying to be cool and failing so badly."

[Spinal]

#7

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I'm the motherfucker that found this place. Sir.

Zero Dark Thirty

Year: 2012
Director: Kathryn Bigelow

A chronicle of the decade-long hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden after the September 2001 attacks, and his death at the hands of the Navy S.E.A.L.s Team 6 in May 2011.


Nominated for 5 Academy Awards including Best Picture.
Nominated for 4 Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Director.
Nominated for 5 BAFTA Awards including Best Film and Best Director.
Won Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("Director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal chronicle the world's greatest manhunt with the electric intensity of a glance, the politics of personality and the very real question of what it takes to find the truth.")
Won 8 awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including Best Picture and Best Director.
Nominated for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures by the Directors Guild of America.
Won Best Director in the Indiewire Critics' Poll.
Won 3 awards from the National Board of Review including Best Film and Best Director.
Won 3 categories at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards including Best Film and Best Director.
Nominated for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures at the PGA Awards.
Won 3 categories at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards including Best Movie by a Woman, Best Female Images in a Movie and Best Equality of the Sexes.


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"I think it was very important to us, and certainly from the script, to really give the audience a sort of 'you are there' feel to this piece. In other words, peel back the curtain of the intelligence hunt and get a glimpse of what it might be like to actually try to find a very sharp needle in a very big haystack, and to do it in a way that feels like it’s unfolding in real time in front of you and around you. You’re inside it, especially with the raid itself. The raid was the most challenging logistically, because we had to shoot in low light conditions to replicate a moonless night, and then no light conditions to use the night vision goggles, which were real night vision lenses that we adapted to our camera lenses, and they only work in zero light conditions. You have about 100 crew members and 22 Seals traipsing around a pitch black, rubble-strewn set which was kind of interesting. But again, the desire was to make it feel like you are there. I don’t mean a lot of subjective camera, but nonetheless a kind of sense that it feels real and that it’s unfolding around you in real time."

[Spinal]

#6

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She'd rather save a man than be with God, I think.

The Holy Girl

Year: 2004
Director: Lucrecia Martel

16-year-old Amalia looks to save the soul of a middle-aged doctor.


Won a special mention at the Reykjavik International Film Festival "for its unique personal vision and sense of form."
Won 2 categories at the ClarÃ*n Entertainment Awards including Best Director - Film.
Nominated in 4 categories at the Argentinean Film Critics Association Awards.
Earned an honorable mention at the São Paulo International Film Festival.


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"For me, a film is not just storytelling but an attempt for me to share some perceptions with the viewer. A film for me is a mechanism to show thought, but I interpret thought as a mix of perception and emotion. In the world of cinema, in particular of cinema students and writers, there’s this idea that cinema is about storytelling. I don’t share that view. I believe that cinema is a lot more than that; I believe that storytelling is just the starting point; it’s like a device you use to share a lot more than the story itself."

[Spinal]

#5

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I want my first time to be with someone I don't love.

Fat Girl

Year: 2001
Director: Catherine Breillat

Two sisters confront their sexual attitudes and experiences while on a family holiday.


Won France Culture Award (French Cineaste of the Year) at Cannes.
Won the Manfred Salzgeber Award at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Won Best Film at the Chicago International Film Festival.
Won the MovieZone Award at the Rotterdam International Film Festival.


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"For me, the initial rape is that of the virginity of the young girl, the sister, who does not get to own her own virginity. Society wants to know if a young girl is a virgin or not. I think that is a rape. The older sister is the real rape in the film because she is in a position where you have to combine sentimentality with the physical act. This kind of sexual act is very normal, but she feels the boy must be the love of her life. It’s just a summer love, but she thinks it’s not normal, not normal enough. We give so much emphasis to the sexual acts of a young girl that she wants him to tell her lies. When she agrees to have sex with him, she agrees because she thinks it’s love. But she’s really accepting this rationale because of his lies. I think this is mental rape, the worst rape — because it’s a rape in which the woman gives up her self-esteem, a rape that does not even show up as a rape, because everyone lives like that — lives for romantic love. That’s why I say that Fat Girl is like a sitcom. It’s completely ridiculous that we live for lies. Actually, it’s not ridiculous, it’s not funny. It’s terrible. I say it’s like a sitcom, but since I go into the truth of sentimental emotion, in that way it isn’t really like one. It is more tragic and more comic. You have to think about it."

[Spinal]

#4

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Look into my eyes
You see trouble every day
It's on the inside of me
So don't try to understand ...

Trouble Every Day

Year: 2001
Director: Claire Denis

Shane and June are honeymooning in Paris in an effort to nurture their new life together, a life complicated by Shane's mysterious and frequent visits to a medical clinic where cutting edge studies of the human libido are undertaken.


Unlike the other films on this list, Trouble Every Day received no notable awards upon its release, and also inspired what can generously be called 'mixed' reviews. It currently sits at 49% on Rotten Tomatoes.
According to Wikipedia: "Later, the film developed a small following who admire it for its themes of existentialism and its unique take on the horror genre as well as gender roles."


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"I don’t at all like the idea of a screenplay being a cage and that inside the cage you have to direct the actors. It seems to me that a screenplay is a kind of take-off and that the best moment is to see the characters taking off. They can turn left, or right, loop the loop, whatever. And at the same time you’re always a bit afraid. As long as they don’t crash. Because if filming means you have to control everything, I’d shoot myself. You already have to control the framing, the colours, the costumes, the sets and all that."

[Grouchy]

How the hell do the two Bigelow movies maintain such a good reputation?

[Spinal]

#3

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/wendy-and-lucy-2_zps5vrrmcd1.jpg
Sir, I'm not from around here. I can't be an example.

Wendy and Lucy

Year: 2008
Director: Kelly Reichardt

Over the summer, a series of unfortunate happening triggers a financial crisis for a young woman and she soon finds her life falling apart.


Won Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("Director, co-writer and co-editor Kelly Reichardt trusts the simplicity of a well-plotted, emotional story to reach its audience, infusing this minimalist movie about a woman and her dog with quiet moments that do not beg for sympathy.")
Nominated for 2 Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature.
Won Best Picture at the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards.
Nominated for 3 awards by the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including Best Woman Director and Best Woman Screenwriter (Reichardt).
Won the Palm Dog at Cannes.


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"We’re making these films out of nothing, so we know from the beginning when we’re working on a story that it has to mostly be exteriors because there are no lights, and to keep the apparatus small so we can have movement and that there aren’t going to be a ton of characters. They’re small stories because we don’t have the money for anything [else]. And I’m a minimalist. I really just want it to be manageable so that I can focus. I enjoy watching bigger films, but it’s just so not my way. I want to avoid, I guess, as much of the film industry as possible. It brings me to cast people I know and that I already have relationships with, there’s no real division between cast and crew. We’re all just sort of in it together. I can’t really picture doing anything that’s you know, the crowd scene. It’s just too much action for me."

[Spinal]

#2

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/lost-in-translation_zpsm4w6aot6.jpg
I guess every girl goes through a photography phase. You know, horses... taking pictures of your feet.

Lost in Translation

Year: 2003
Director: Sofia Coppola

A faded movie star and a neglected young woman form an unlikely bond after crossing paths in Tokyo.


Won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay (Coppola). Nominated for 3 others, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Won 3 Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical and Best Screenplay. Nominated for 2 others, including Best Director.
Won 3 BAFTA Awards. Nominated for 5 others, including Best Film, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay.
Won Movie of the Year at the AFI Awards. ("Lost in Translation is only the second feature film by Sofia Coppola, yet it presents a unique voice in American film.")
Won Best Foreign Film at the César Awards.
Nominated for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures by the Directors Guild of America.
Nominated for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in International Film by the Directors Guild of Great Britain.
Won 4 Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature, Best Director and Best Screenplay.
Won a Special Achievement Award from the National Board of Review "for writing, directing and producing." (Coppola)
Won Best Director at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards.
Won 2 awards at the Venice Film Festival.
Named Best Film in the Village Voice Film Poll.
Won Best Original Screenplay from the Writers Guild of America.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Sofia-Coppola-It-sounde-001_zpswgtaf02v.jpg

"There’s a painter called John Kacere who does paintings of girls in different underwear, so [the opening shot is] taken from one of his paintings. When I started the movie, I had a reference book of different images that came to mind with the movie. I always collect reference pictures to make a book that I can show, and they were just snapshots around Tokyo, looking out the taxi and seeing neon lights going by, and I used to stay at the Park Hyatt Tokyo, so there were pictures of the view from the hotel bar. And the redheaded singer [in the film] was actually a singer I saw performing at the Park Hyatt Tokyo, and we got the manager to track her down."

[Spinal]

#1

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Bright-Star_zpsdvzmrakg.jpg
My sister has met the author and she wants to read it for herself to see if he's an idiot or not.

Bright Star

Year: 2009
Director: Jane Campion

The three-year romance between 19th-century poet John Keats and Fanny Brawne near the end of his life.


Won 2 awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including Best Woman Screenwriter (Campion). Nominated for 5 others, including Best Woman Director.
Won 3 awards from the Australian Film Institute. Nominated for 8 others, including Best Film, Best Direction and Best Original Screenplay.
Nominated for 4 British Independent Film Awards including Best Director.
Nominated for Best Foreign Film at the César Awards.
Nominated for British Film of the Year at the London Critics Circle Film Awards.
Nominated for Best Movie by a Woman at the Women Film Critics Circle Awards.


http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p485/joelharmonpdx/Jane_Campion_zpsvz5tdagz.jpg

"I thought there was no way to tell the story that is a birth-death biopic. I wouldn’t do it. Because it would be too generalized within two hours, unless you found some really crazy way to do it, like that Bob Dylan one, the Todd Haynes one. [I’m Not There.] Which is, I thought, great, and very interesting. Unless you take an extremely different view of [a subject], it just wouldn’t work for me. The part of this story that was so accessible to me was the love story. Plus the fact that the letters were real; I could read what Keats actually wrote to Fanny. And when you read them, you think, 'Well, this is what she was reading in 1819 or whatever.' You think, 'Oh my God. What an incredible girl to handle it, in a way, so well.' Because they’re very full-on. I think I would have been intimidated, and been… [Makes nervous noise.] I admire her courage and loyalty to accept the full-on blast of his affections. I think also there’s something that interested me about the tenderness and delicacy and gentleness of the story that’s not at large in cinema much today."

[Spinal]

1. Bright Star (42.5)
2. Lost in Translation (41.5)
3. Wendy and Lucy (31)
4. Trouble Every Day (28.5)
5. Fat Girl (23)
6. The Holy Girl (22.5)
7. Zero Dark Thirty (22)
8. American Psycho (21)
9. The Hurt Locker (19.5)
10. We Need to Talk About Kevin (18.5)
11. Selma (18)
12. Monster (17)
13. The Selfish Giant (16.5)
14. Stories We Tell (16)
15. Everyone Else (15.5)

(all others listed below received between 12.5 and 15 points)
American Splendor
Cloud Atlas
Innocence
La Ciénaga
Me and You and Everyone We Know
Mustang
The Babadook
The Beaches of Agnes
Things to Come
Tomboy
Winter's Bone

For comparison, here is Indiewire's poll results:

1. Lost in Translation
2. Toni Erdmann
3. We Need to Talk About Kevin
4. American Psycho
5. The Hurt Locker
6. Monsoon Wedding
7. Whale Rider
8. The Babadook
9. Stories We Tell
10. Selma
11. American Honey
12. The Arbor
13. Wendy and Lucy
14. Persepolis
15. The Kids are All Right
16. Lovely and Amazing
17. The Beaches of Agnes
18. No Home Movie
19. Breathe
20. Bend It Like Beckham
21. Pariah
22. Monster
23. Cameraperson
24. 35 Shots of Rum
25. Tomboy

[Spinal]

How the hell do the two Bigelow movies maintain such a good reputation?

I feel the same about American Psycho.

[Winston*]

Never even heard of The Holy Girl. Sounds good.

Didn't like that Claire Denis film that much, though willing to give it another go. Suprised that's the one that would catch on. I like White Material and Beau Travail.

[Melville]

I'm surprised how similar the results were to my list. Normally my favorites place pretty poorly in these consensuses. Nice to see the love for Bright Star especially.

And I dig the directors' quotes. Thanks for putting this together, Spinal.

[Melville]

I'm kinda embarrassed how little I've seen. This only reminds how I've never seen a film by Claire Denis. Where do I start?
Trouble Every Day, clearly. It's pretty dissimilar from her other stuff, but it shares Beau Travail's focus on fleshy physicality. Her stuff about postcolonial Africa (Chocolat and White Material) is really good too. And you should see Beau Travail if only for the ending. You've probably seen it posted on here multiple times, but as a moment of transcendence it's even better in context.

[Spinal]

Also noteworthy to me is how few of these films involve the director working with someone else's screenplay.

Apart from Bigelow's films and Selma, I believe every other film on the list involves a director working on a script they wrote themselves, or collaborated on with a partner.

[StanleyK]

Extremely surprised that Lost in Translation didn't get #1 (thought that was a cinch). Slightly less so that there was no love for Marie Antoinette.

[StanleyK]

Also noteworthy to me is how few of these films involve the director working with someone else's screenplay.

Apart from Bigelow's films and Selma, I believe every other film on the list involves a director working on a script they wrote themselves, or collaborated on with a partner.

That's likely because almost all these movies are independent, which tend to attract writer-directors more so than Hollywood.

[baby doll]

Extremely surprised that Lost in Translation didn't get #1 (thought that was a cinch). Slightly less so that there was no love for Marie Antoinette.One of these days I'll have to try to get my thoughts down on Sofia Coppola, because I can't think of any director I have more conflicted feelings about. The Virgin Suicides had its moments but didn't completely win me over. I don't understand the appeal of Lost in Translation at all: the characters are boring and they don't do anything for two hours, though seeing the film a second time in 2012, I found it less racist than I'd remembered. Marie Antoinette, I thought, was a major step forward, both in terms of subject and style (particularly the sound mix). Somewhere seemed at once a confirmation that Coppola had turned a page and a reversion to her earlier work: the bored rich guy thing still bores me but Elle Fanning's scenes are wonderful, and in light of The Bling Ring (probably her emptiest film after Lost in Translation), I'm tempted to give most of the credit for this to Fanning herself.

[Melville]

I don't understand the appeal of Lost in Translation at all: the characters are boring and they don't do anything for two hours
They find a fleeting connection in the midst of their spiritual isolation. I don't know why you'd want them to do more than that.

[Spinal]

They definitely go to karaoke. I remember them going to karaoke.

[baby doll]

They find a fleeting connection in the midst of their spiritual isolation. I don't know why you'd want them to do more than that.Finding a connection etc. is great for them, but on my end as a spectator, it's not very dramatic.

[Pop Trash]

Finding a connection etc. is great for them, but on my end as a spectator, it's not very dramatic.

Oh please. You could say the same thing about In the Mood for Love or the Before trilogy. You're the last person on here that I thought would make that complaint.

[baby doll]

Oh please. You could say the same thing about In the Mood for Love or the Before trilogy. You're the last person on here that I thought would make that complaint.Well, as Roger Ebert would say, it's not what a film is about but how it's about it. The characters in Linklater's Before films have wit and charm, and Wong's film is so elliptical and enigmatic that it's often impossible to tell what the characters are really feeling, which makes the movie endlessly fascinating. By comparison, the characters in Lost in Translation are affluent zombies.

[Pop Trash]

By comparison, the characters in Lost in Translation are affluent zombies.

Well, as Roger Ebert would say, one man's affluent zombie is another man's well-heeled wraith.

[PURPLE]

Claire Denis, for me, is a very difficult filmmaker to connect with. There's a lot of cold characters in her films, and she oftentimes has an extremely opaque approach, there's rarely any humor, and there's that certain je ne sais quoi that often doesn't connect, and she has a certain fascination with things that I hate watching films about, so if you combine these five aspects together you get some films that just repulse me: Trouble Every Day, and I Can't Sleep.

Following on that, you get some films that I don't connect with that others love, and I can't necessarily explain why I don't, even when the latter is full of details that I love in individual moments: Friday Night and 35 rhums.

Above that, there's White Material, which to me lacked all of the things that I love about Denis but I think it's a bit less distinct and so I am not quite as pushed away by it...

And then you have these amazing, textured, creative, layered, unpredictable, and unique films: Beau Travail, Chocolat, and Nenette and Boni. They're amazing, and she would be one of the best female filmmakers on the strength of those alone.

And then there's L'intrus, which is staggeringly complicated in a narrative, aesthetic, and thematic sense. There would be no surprise whatsoever if everyone else unanimously called it the greatest film directed by a human, or a woman - except that it's clearly not the kind of film that is "easy to love". It's too great. It only gets better on repeat viewings, because its density and its complexity, so it can never do well in a consensus.

Trouble Every Day, though, is probably the film I like least from any director that I really like, and I will never understand how anyone can like it, and if someone asked me when they should watch it in watching Denis' films I would say, "Never; pretend it doesn't exist; watch L'intrus four times instead". And somehow it's #4 on this list! Crazy. But clearly not everyone is on the same page...

[origami_mustache]

A few of my favs not mentioned....

Girlhood (Céline Sciamma, 2014)
Hanezu (Namoi Kawase, 2011)
Certain Women (Kelly Reichardt, 2016)