And now, on the day I've joined facebook... my 100 favorite movies continued...


37. WONDER BOYS (Curtis Hanson)
I remember this film as part of an advantageous double feature: left to my own devices on a winter night, an empty house with no one around, I rented both DANCER IN THE DARK and WONDER BOYS. After the sledgehammer depression of the otherwise brilliant DANCER IN THE DARK, I needed WONDER BOYS. Bouncy and cocksure, WONDER BOYS proved to be the best possible chaser I could encounter at the moment.

Really, there are a lot of haters that this one could silence. People who claim Michael Douglas has only one performance should watch this, as he’s really having a great time as the beleaguered, pot-smoking, procrastinating professor sitting on thousands of unpublished pages as he learns that he’s impregnated the dean’s wife (Frances McDormand, typically great). Those who think Tobey Maguire is boring can take in his Dustin Hoffman-like livewire turn here as the promising writer with a labrynthe death wish. And of course, Katie Holmes, shortchanged in the arc department here, still gets a number of affecting moments as the whipsmart, panties-clad crush.


Also see: DECONSTRUCTING HARRY (Woody Allen)
Another film about doomed writers, DECONSTRUCTING HARRY really isn’t one of the best Woody Allen pictures. But it’s still fairly different and clever than some of his works, as Allen essentially plays himself, a man who begins walking through his own personal hell as his characters start coming to life and the lines separating reality and fiction blur. It’s funny, but mostly very meanspirited, biting Allen, one of the best of his later films.


36. DEATH RACE 2000 (Paul Bartel)
Hell yes. Remake this? Perish. DEATH RACE 2000 still kicks an unholy amount of ass. See!- badass David Carradine as the masked Dr. Frankenstein! See!- a young Sylvester Stallone steal ever scene he’s in! See!- a futuristic sport that awards participants for running over totally innocent pedestrians! See!- retro ultra-violence, as only producer Roger Corman can provide! See!- Tits! It’s more than just a good time... it’s a religion.


Also see: SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS (Daniel Minahan)
For more casual murders of everyday people, see this inspired comedy. Told as overlapping episodes of a hit show called THE CONTENDERS during a marathon, SERIES 7 follows the adventures of the pregnant Dawn, as she fights to retire from THE CONTENDERS program, a show that forces contestants to kill or be killed. The sight of everyday people being given firearms and being forced to kill isn’t nearly as surprising as the ease in which they do it, argues this sick black comedy, which nails every reality show landmark with expert ease (particularly considering it as made before the current “reality” craze). One of the best aspects of the reality format (the film is shot on video) is that the actors’ performances are so immediate and so real that I was immensely disappointed to see one of them, the old lady, appear in a commercial recently, therefore shattering my reality (and gasp!- she was playing a “real person” giving a testimonial to a medical product!). In that vein, the movie loses a bit now that I recognize the final reel performance of the great Will Arnett of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT.


35. MEAN STREETS (Martin Scorsese)
I had thought highly of Scorsese’s gritty street opera when I had first saw it, but it wasn’t until I caught it on a bill with RAGING BULL and TAXI DRIVER when I realized how personal it was. MEAN STREETS isn’t just young Italians in New York City. MEAN STREETS are your streets, my streets. They are the places where our friends are, even if we don’t want to admit it. They are the areas you’ve been to but don’t want to visit, yet accidently end up at again. The sense of community in MEAN STREETS is something that has never made New York City seem so small and intimate.


Also see: DRUNKEN ANGEL (Akira Kurosawa)
It’s appropriate that Scorsese wants to remake this Kurosawa film, as it has the same affection for it’s surroundings. It’s urban crime atmosphere paints a portrait of a landscape that’s as much of a character as any other. DRUNKEN ANGEL is a heartfelt story of an alcoholic doctor and the reckless gangster he’s forced to rehabilitate, and like MEAN STREETS, the moral ambiguity on display makes you forget exactly who’s redeeming whom. Now why isn’t this on DVD?


And also see: HUSTLE AND FLOW (Craig Brewer)
“You know it’s haaaard out here for a pimp!!” Morally, I find much of HUSTLE AND FLOW objectionable. I did the first time I caught it, after a couple of days ruminating and re-evaluating the “good time” I had watching it. Yet, even with these reservations of the questionable ethics and misogyny of filmmaker Craig Brewer, I sat down again and caught it and remained wrapped up again in the steely desperation of uneducated, overmatched DJay and his desire to make more of himself than a woman-abusing pimp. Particularly enthralling is how the camera never turns it’s eye away from the creative process at points, crafting some exciting sequences out of the construction of an otherwise pedestrian crunk anthem.


34. ALL THE REAL GIRLS (David Gordon Green)
ALL THE REAL GIRLS means a lot to me. It’s one of those films that strikes a chord in me emotionally, to the point where I miss watching it like I would miss a former lover whom I’ve lost contact with. As a still-blossoming angel, Zooey Deschanel is luminous, and it’s easy to see why lothario Paul Schneider instantly falls head over heels in love with her, for his very first time. At moments, David Gordon Green’s prose concerning the uneducated Midwest is a bit too poetic, but the beauty on display in the intimate love affair between the leads and the landscape is heartbreaking. Also, there’s a character named after Strong Bad.


Also see: Y TU MAMA TAMBIEN (Alfonso Cuaron)
From romantic intimacy to purely sexual longing. Alfonso Cuaron’s endlessly intoxicating fable of two young boys who are forced to come of age during a sloppy dual courtship of a rebellious older woman packs the heat through a series of sweaty sexual encounters that fuel the film. The handheld camera during the film’s many sexually stimulating scenes reflects the bumbling awkwardness of the two leads as well as the frustration of their female partners, which adds a very intimate layer to an already smoldering film about being gloriously young and sexually untamed despite the reckless emotions of others.


33. GHOST WORLD (Terry Zwigoff)
I saw GHOST WORLD at the right time: during high school, when I was soon to be scuttled off into the outside world without a plan. It immediately struck a chord to me: without ever reading the source material, what the phrase “ghost world” means to me is a place between leaving high school and entering the real world, a place in which many souls find themselves in limbo. The film begins at the start of the deterioration of the friendship of the protagonists, and it soon spirals out of control very realistically, until one loses their way amid a sea of unrealistic expectations and listless esoterica. It’s a grand tragedy, one with an ending that frustrates me highly; I feel robbed of closure, feeling that I must selfishly know what happens, even if I know it won’t make the film better. Whenever you’re rooting for more about the characters at the expense of the film they inhabit... well, that’s true love.


Also see: THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN (Judd Apatow)
I just saw this film during the making of this list, so it wasn’t really eligible, but surely it’s been earmarked for a later top forty position. Like GHOST WORLD, it’s the story of a man who loses himself in his own world: he’s not just a virgin to sex, but to social interactions. Like GHOST WORLD, it’s not a melodramatically theatrical tragedy, but rather a portrait of people we see everyday, who merely fall between the cracks, feeding themselves with their lack of self-awareness. In the hands of another actor, Andy Stitzer would have been a punchline, a socially inept retard, but Steve Carrel plunges unforseen depths in crafting a very real and utterly loveable, standup protagonist.


Also see: AMERICAN SPLENDOR (Sheri Springer, Robert Pucini)
In the vein of GHOST WORLD, also based on a non-superhero comic book, this fairly ordinary tale of an ordinary guy going through an ordinary life is a unique portrait of Americana, made wholly real through not only a great Paul Giamatti performance as Harvey Pekar but also a moving turn by Hope Davis as his sweetheart. As the multifaceted four-color world of comic books enliven Pekar’s life and blur the separation of real life and fiction, so too, does the film, which features both Giamatti and Pekar as well as a moment that features a stage play of AMERICAN SPLENDOR.


32. OUT OF SIGHT (Stephen Soderbergh)
I didn’t know Steven Soderbergh. I figured George Clooney was a two bit TV actor (and a terrible Batman, for the record). Jennifer Lopez was Selena. Elmore Leonard was just another best-selling author. I was not prepared for OUT OF SIGHT, which I imagined was another half-baked PULP FICTION ripoff. I was not prepared for such a deft, often hilarious and crazily sexy film, one that I would like far more than Tarantino’s genre-crossing Best Picture nominee. To this day, I can’t bear Jennifer Lopez in anything, but somehow, I can still love watching her cagey federal marshal Karen Sisco (although I missed Carla Gugino’s work as the character in the short-lived show- thanks a lot, ABC-Disney) engage in a sexual tete-a-tete with Clooney’s suave Jack Foley (who’s hot enough here to totally gayify me if I were forced to watch this one hundred times in a row, something I’m not sure I’d hate). Nevermind the colorful supporting cast, including sly work from Ving Rhames, Steve Zahn, Don Cheadle, Dennis Farina, Isaiah Washington, Catherine Keener, Michael Keaton, the immortal Luis Guzman and an unrecognizable Albert Brooks.


Also see: GET SHORTY (Barry Sonnenfeld)
Although I could have mentioned JACKIE BROWN, using Michael Keaton’s Ray Kinsella and his appearance linking the films (despite them being from two different studios- very cool), I figured everyone knows that’s a pretty good movie, and the presence of Tarantino as director elevates that film to something that will ever be forgotten. So I went with this ten year old film, which, from what I can ascertain, has been slightly tainted by a remarkably poor reception for it’s recent sequel, BE COOL (which I have yet to see). Really, John Travolta is one of the most overrated screen presences in Hollywood history, and I’d be hard-pressed to come up with a really great performance by him, but he usually has an uncanny ability to develop chemistry with loaded ensembles, and that’s never been on better display than it was here. Like OUT OF SIGHT, the film is helped by a wildly colorful supporting cast, including the ferocious Dennis Farina, the sexy Rene Russo, the always-amusing Danny DeVito, the badass Delroy Lindo, and a very funny performance from Gene Hackman. One reason to hate BE COOL without having seen it? Harvey Keitel, who cameos in GET SHORTY, appears in BE COOL as a different, unrelated character, rendering Michael Keaton’s hard work meaningless. Thanks a lot, Harv.


31. YOU CAN COUNT ON ME (Kenneth Lonergan)
I hadn’t seen this, and I probably wasn’t ever going to. It seemed like a tiny film about small events that I really could care less about, one that I would like if I saw, but was no rush to catch it. And then my sister recommended it, my sister with decent taste, but one that never went out of her way to catch a small movie. She said it reminded her of me, and that I should see it as well. When I started watching it at her behest, I suddenly realized that wasn’t the best thing.

Mark Ruffalo, who I remembered from Ton Fontana’s short-lived but neat UPN show THE BEAT, is essentially a screw-up, reduced to living from paycheck to paycheck to support a druggie girlfriend that he barely knows. When he comes to town to meet up with his professional sister, she is extremely upset to see his life in a mess, and pissed to know he did some drug time without telling her. It’s a messy revelation, and the way he recoils and the manner in which she chews him out felt like so many moments with my sister, to the point where it’s stunning that Ruffalo and sister Laura Linney aren’t related. The film lives up to it’s title as Ruffalo finds himself needing the support of his sister, and she finds a reservoir of love within his embrace as she begins a self-destructive sexual relationship with her boss (Matthew Broderick). It’s an emotionally gorgeous film, one that drives me to tears every time and makes me realize the importance of my sister in my life, the most important family member to me.


Also see: IGBY GOES DOWN (Burt Steers)
YOU CAN COUNT ON ME features some great performances, one of them from Rory Culkin, yet another talented Culkin brood. Which brings me to the best of the Culkin-as-lead films (although THE GOOD SON kicks ass, and I never saw MEAN CREEK). IGBY GOES DOWN features Kieran Culkin as the classic rich ne’er-do-well brat floating from one private school to another and burning his parents’ money. Kinda like me, without the rich thing, or the private element of school. But mostly like CATCHER IN THE RYE, which is to also say it’s fairly universal. Also an excellent exhibit on how it seems the new millennium has ushered in nothing if not a new, perpetually stoned Bill Pullman.


And also see: TWO GIRLS AND A GUY (James Toback)
Again on the personal tip: I caught TWO GIRLS AND A GUY on IFC with a friend one late night, and we were immediately sucked in. First it was the noticeably improvisational nature of the film, the performances and the hotness of Heather Graham and Natasha Gregson Wagner. And then, it became something entirely different, because there was a point where Downey Jr.’s character became full of a certain type of bullshit, and it started to dawn on me: I was watching myself. Seeing Downey Jr. tapdance around lie after lie poorly enough, stuttering and stammering as each line of BS intertwined with another even though it was essentially fruitless and the two women (who he had cheated on with each other) knew it... well, my friend saw it too, and to this day it’s a point of derisive laughter between us. A week after I saw it, an ex-fling IMed me on Instant Messenger, saying, “OMG, I saw a movie the other day and TOTALLY thought about you!” It wasn’t a surprise when she told me what it was.


30. HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS (Takashi Miike)
Most neophytes consider Takashi Miike’s films as being full of twisted, grotesque, juvenile violence involving psychosexual behavior between twisted protagonists. Well, what accounts for the sweetness within this lightly R-rated family comedy? HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS is a joyful gagfest about an extended family that decides to use their house as an inn for passing drivers, only to have their coincidental deaths become a continuing theme as they end up burying body after body through a series of hilarious song and dance routines. KATAKURIS has a go-for-broke insanity that brings a lot of energy to the table, to the point where the story becomes secondary to the intentional, energetic camp level on display.


Also see: SOUTH PARK: BIGGER, LONGER AND UNCUT (Trey Parker and Matt Stone)
Among subversive but still genuine musical comedies in recent history, the SOUTH PARK also stands out as a truly great movie that actually improves by leaps and bounds over an already groundbreaking television show. We all knew Trey Parker and Matt Stone were gifted satirists with a love of song, but who knew they had this, the greatest animated musical Disney wishes they had the balls to make, in them? The story, featuring a Terence and Philip movie so offensive and inappropriate to children that it triggers a war between Canada and America, uses a number of wonderfully colorful supporting characters (including educator Mr. Mackey, the irrepressible Isaac Hayes-voiced Chef and, Satan) to illuminate salient points about the culture of blame instilled in the current generation of parents as well as the control our media has over what should and shouldn’t be censored. And yes, George Clooney voiced the doctor who replaces Kenny’s heart with a baked potato.


29. MEMENTO (Christopher Nolan)
It’s not very often when I realize I want to see a movie again right after I’ve first seen it, but once the opening riff on David Bowie’s “Something In The Air” introduced the credits on Chris Nolan’s second film, I wanted to stay seated for the very next screening. I wanted to see how many times Teddy had actually duped Leonard, and vice versa. I wanted to piece together the notion that perhaps Leonard Shelby wasn’t Leonard Shelby at all. I wanted to find out how long Natalie had been pulling strings. And I wanted to acknowledge the potential that there was more than one reading to the whole damn thing (something that the DVD and website have already debunked- booo!). More than anything else, I wanted to savor the really great work from Guy Pearce as the loner vigilante at the heart of the film, afflicted with memories he doesn’t want and the failure to replace them. One of the elements I found interesting about the performance is that if you listen to Pearce’s speech patterns, they are purposely didactic in a way that suggests him running down a list of things to say, possibly because of the repetition developed from such a disease, and possibly because of an adherence to routine. It’s just a small element of a film that I love, the best in Chris Nolan’s filmography dedicated to loner heroes with shady ethics.


Also see: THE PLEDGE (Sean Penn)
I had a great college roommate once, a guy who I really got along with. He was a nice fella, and had great taste in music and movies. However, one thing rankled me: he constantly mentioned THE PLEDGE as the worst film ever made. He acknowledged that what he said was hyperbole, but also that he never hated a film so much. How this is possible I could never understand. Take away Jack Nicholson’s beautifully obsessive lead portrayal, and you’ve still got a chilly, elliptical filmmaking style from Sean Penn, who seems to be peeling each scene away from the next, as well as absorbing cameos from the likes of Benicio Del Toro and Mickey Rourke, and a chilling ending that frustrates seekers of closure but makes more than perfect sense within the context of the story.


28. MEET THE FEEBLES (Peter Jackson)
I am not a puppet movie connoisseur, but it’s fairly easy to acknowledge my favorite. Peter Jackson’s piss-take on the Muppets is a wickedly funny and truly grotesque romp featuring an all-star revue called the Feebles preparing for a bigtime television special as they battle against STD’s, porn producers, drug addictions, Vietnam hallucinations and ultimately, one truly pissed hippo. MEET THE FEEBLES features puppets puking, fucking, shooting up and taking dumps, but the best bit is a DEER HUNTER-inspired flashback to Vietnam involving puppets in modern warfare. Also points for the show-stopping "Sodomy" number that brings the house down, foolishly ensuring me Peter Jackson would never mention this movie in public after his huge LOTR success (and yet he did during his Oscar speech!).


Also see: TEAM AMERICA: WORLD POLICE (Trey Parker and Matt Stone)
I confess to spending the majority of TEAM AMERICA’s runtime thinking, “This isn’t as good as MEET THE FEEBLES.” Then again, that’s silly, because I don’t sit through stuff and go, “If only this were more like ONG BAK.” And before it hits the one hour mark and you realize you’ve been sitting through one long joke, TEAM AMERICA is funny at points and uproarious in others. Maybe it’s the musical numbers, which are spotty but mostly successful. Maybe it’s the puking scene, which is a stunner. Maybe it’s the graphic puppet sex scene, which is oddly more erotic than anything found in the films TEAM AMERICA lampoons. Whatever it is, TEAM AMERICA may be a bit behind CANNIBAL THE MUSICAL and SOUTH PARK in terms of hilarity, but it’s still more often than not hilarious.


And also see: STRINGS (Anders Ronnow-Klarlund)
Okay, I actually haven’t seen this, but it felt like it was something I’d have to plug here. It just came out on DVD and supposedly it’s a very dark Danish fantasy told with puppets. And at this point, I feel like I’m not a stranger to that. From what I've heard, it involves magical kingdoms and HAMLET-type royal tragedies. In other words, a movie Craig Schwartz would have made.


27. SPIDER-MAN 2 (Sam Raimi)
I’ve learned a lot of powerful lessons from unlikely sources growing up. Perhaps the greatest lesson I’ve ever picked up, however, are Stan Lee’s bold words for the beleaguered Peter Parker: “With great power comes great responsibility.” Parker learns this in the first SPIDER-MAN film, of course, but I feel that this is the film that cements it. Let’s face it, for all it’s indulgences, SPIDER-MAN 2 features many small, tender (if occasionally obvious) moments that establish the world of a harried youth, trying to find his way despite a cluttered schedule where he screws up at work, misses the Lizard’s class and struggles to hide his affections for the pretty redhead (Kirsten Dunst- still miscast, but Raimi makes it work). Oh, yeah, and that saving the world bit. Raimi conveys this theme with a universal sense of disappointment: we know Peter can never begin to lead a happy life because of the responsibilities he’s chose to serve.

Alfred Molina’s work as Doctor Octopus is alternately threatening and heartfelt, while JK Simmons’ J. Jonah Jameson remains the most perfect representation of a comic character in the films so far. Still, there are little bursts of unabashed emotion that work the best. Peter’s revelation to Mary Jane that he can see her now that he’s given up Spider-Man, the Ditkovich girl coming over for a slice of cake and especially the very powerful and somewhat surprisingly scene in which Aunt May walks away from Peter after he’s confessed about being responsible for Uncle Ben’s death.... it’s appropriate Dashboard Confessional is on the soundtrack, because SPIDER-MAN 2 is probably the greatest, most epic emo song ever, put on film.


Also see: THE ROCKETEER (Joe Johnston)
Lost in the discussion of great superhero pictures is this ultrafun throwback to an earlier time, a Disney picture that sadly didn’t get the attention it deserved (very similar in many ways to SKY CAPTAIN AND THE WORLD OF TOMORROW- see that one too). Bill Campbell is stunt flyer Cliff Secord, who finds his life drastically altered when he finds a secret government prototype for a propulsive jet device that enables the wearer to take flight. When he finds it’s the work of the Nazis (led by Timothy Dalton), he has to save his beautiful girlfriend Bettie (intentional shades of Bettie Page, courtesy of Jennifer Connelly) by suiting up and wearing one of the coolest movie helmets in film history (which protects his head from rough landings, although it’s never discussed what saves his legs from being burnt off by the giant flames shooting from his rocketpack). The flying moments are exhilarating, bound to capture the imagination of anyone who’s legitimately desired the ability to fly in real life. As far as performances, the standout is a wonderfully warm Alan Arkin as the inventor Peavy.