You kick Checkers!
And you're prejudiced,
and you have a potty-mouth!
Best Movies of 2002
This is a list of the Best Movies of 2002 according to John Farr. I find his site hard to navigate, so I create summary lists like this one.
English-language movies:
28 Days Later
About Schmidt
About a Boy
Adaptation
All or Nothing
Bloody Sunday
Dirty Pretty Things
Insomnia
One Hour Photo
Path to War
Rabbit Proof Fence
Raising Victor Vargas
Road to Perdition
Skins
Sweet Sixteen
The Bourne Identity
The Count of Monte Cristo
The Gathering Storm
The Hours
The Magdalene Sisters
The Pianist
Thirteen
Foreign-language movies:
Behind the Sun (Portuguese)
Chi-hwa-seon: Painted Fire (Korean)
City of God (Portuguese)
Distant (Turkish)
Dolls (Japanese)
Good Bye Lenin! (German)
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (French)
Hero (Mandarin)
Infernal Affairs (Cantonese)
L'Auberge Espagnole (French)
Oasis (Korean)
Russian Ark (Russian)
Talk To Her (Spanish)
Ten (Farsi)
The Clay Bird (Bengali)
The Cuckoo (Russian)
The Lady and the Duke (French)
The Man Without a Past (Finnish)
The Son (French)
The Twilight Samurai (Japanese)
When the Last Sword is Drawn (Japanese)
Yossi & Jagger (Hebrew)
English-language documentaries:
7 Days in September
9/11
Ansel Adams: a Documentary Film
Bowling for Columbine
Bukowski: Born into This
Decasia: The State of Decay
Dig!
Dogtown and Z-Boys
Elaine Stritch: At Liberty
Lost in La Mancha
My Flesh and Blood
Prisoner of Paradise
Smothered
Spellbound
Stevie
The Agronomist
The Last Game
Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election
Tibet: Cry of the Snow Lion
Foreign-language documentaries:
Balseros (Spanish)
Blind Spot (German)
To Be and To Have (French)
Movies Watched -- Return to Seoul (2022)
In Korean. 119 minute running time so 20 minutes too long … this wasn’t terrible, it would appeal to adoptees from Korea (or other parts of east Asia), but I wouldn’t recommend it. John Farr did: “Freddie is a wild, restless creature, unsure of who she is even before arriving in Korea. This latest adventure only adds to her dislocation, but it’s clear she’s searching for something.” Yeah, it’s OK, but not good enough for me to recommend.
Best Movies of 2001
This is a list of the Best Movies of 2001 according to John Farr. I find his site hard to navigate, so I create summary lists like this one.
English-language movies:
61*
And the Band Played On
Ghost World
Gosford Park
Hedwig and the Angry Inch
L.I.E.
Memento
Monsoon Wedding
Mulholland Drive
Tape
The Deep End
The Incredible Adventures of Wallace and Gromit
The Others
Wit
Foreign-language movies:
All About Lily Chou-Chou (Japanese)
Amélie (French)
Baran (Farsi)
Elling (Norwegian)
I’m Going Home (French)
La Cienaga (Spanish)
Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (Hindi)
Late Marriage (Georgian)
Mostly Martha (German)
Musa, the Warrior (Korean)
My Father and I (French)
Nine Queens (Spanish)
No Man’s Land (Bosnian)
Nowhere in Africa (German)
Pauline and Paulette (Dutch)
Safe Conduct (French)
Spirited Away (Japanese)
The Devil's Backbone (Spanish)
The Piano Teacher (French)
The Road Home (Mandarin)
The Son’s Room (Italian)
The Tunnel (German)
Time Out (French)
Under the Skin of the City (Farsi)
Y Tu Mama Tambien (Spanish)
English-language documentaries:
New York in the Fifties
Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures
Startup.com
War Photographer
Foreign-language documentaries:
Children Underground (Romanian)
Movies Watched -- Hit the Road (2021)
In Farsi. 93 minute running time so the right length, but I only made it ten minutes in before going to fast forward, I couldn’t bear the bratty kid or obnoxious family … I guess it was a story about smuggling their older son abroad, out of Iran, no reason given … there was probably a lot of humor in this, but I didn’t get it because I’m not Iranian … this was a John Farr reco (“this portrayal of a loving family coping under stress also contains a measure of hope and affirmation”), but I certainly don’t recommend it.
Best Movies of 2000
This is a list of the Best Movies of 2000 according to John Farr. I find his site hard to navigate, so I create summary lists like this one.
English-language movies:
Almost Famous
Best in Show
Billy Elliot
Bread and Roses
George Washington
Girlfight
High Fidelity
Innocence
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Our Song
Pollock
Requiem for a Dream
Sexy Beast
Snatch
Songcatcher
The Contender
Traffic
You Can Count on Me
Foreign-language movies:
A Matter of Taste (French)
Amores Perros (Spanish)
Bread and Tulips (Italian)
Code Unknown (French)
Coronation (Spanish)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (Mandarin)
Gloomy Sunday (German)
Il Mare (Korean)
In the Mood for Love (Cantonese)
Italian for Beginners (Danish)
Lumumba (French)
Songs from the Second Floor (Swedish)
The Circle (Farsi)
The Day I Became a Woman (Farsi)
The Fast Runner (Inukitut)
The Taste of Others (French)
The Widow of Saint-Pierre French)
Under the Sand (French)
With a Friend Like Harry (French)
Yi Yi (Mandarin)
English-language documentaries:
Chuck Jones: Extremes and In-Betweens – A Life in Animation
Dark Days
Half Past Autumn
Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport
Napoleon: Soldier, Emperor, Lover, Statesman
Ring of Fire
Sidney Poitier: One Bright Light
Sound and Fury
The Ballad of Ramblin' Jack
The Endurance
The Filth and the Fury
Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election
World War II: The Lost Color Archives
Foreign-language documentaries:
Calle 54 (Spanish)
Paragraph 175 (German)
The Gleaners and I (French
Movies Watched -- Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (2021)
In Japanese. 121 minute running time so at least 21 minutes too long. Three separate short stories, all of them sort of weird and pointless? Japanese culture is very strange after all.
The Chinese characters (the Japanese have adopted a lot of Chinese characters) on the box say “coincidence and imagination,” which I guess turned into “fortune and fantasy.” This was a John Farr reco (“smart, subtle filmmaking”), but you can definitely give it a miss. Oh, this is the same guy who made the terrible “Drive My Car” movie … I’m not fan.
She swallowed his right testicle…
Best Movies of 1999
This is a list of the Best Movies of 1999 according to John Farr. I find his site hard to navigate, so I create summary lists like this one.
English-language movies:
A Civil Action
American Beauty
Being John Malkovich
Boys Don't Cry
Dick
Election
Magnolia
October Sky
Ratcatcher
Spring Forward
The Blair Witch Project
The Cider House Rules
The Insider
The Iron Giant
The Sixth Sense
The Straight Story
The War Zone
Topsy-Turvy
Toy Story 2
Tumbleweeds
Foreign-language movies:
After Life (Japanese)
All About My Mother (Spanish)
Audition (Japanese)
Children of Heaven (Farsi)
East / West (French)
Farewell, Home Sweet Home (French)
Himalaya (Dolpo)
In China They Eat Dogs (Danish)
It All Starts Today (French)
Kadosh (Hebrew)
Leila (Farsi)
Not One Less (Mandarin)
Peppermint Candy (Korean)
Princess Mononoke (Japanese)
Running Out of Time (Cantonese)
The Color of Paradise (Farsi)
The Emperor and the Assassin (Mandarin)
The Wind Will Carry Us (Farsi)
English-language documentaries:
American Movie
Genghis Blues
Not for Ourselves Alone
One Day in September
Return With Honor
Foreign-language documentaries:
My Best Friend: Klaud Kinski (German)
The Specialist: Portrait of a Modern Criminal (French)
Movies Watched -- Blue Jean (2022)
97 minute running time so the perfect length … lesbian life in Newcastle (northeast England) during the 1980s when the Thatcher admin was apparently actively anti-homosexual … this is a W.D. By movie (written and directed by the same person, i.e., someone’s baby) … I enjoyed it … it helped that the star, Rosy McEwen, is stunningly beautiful … Blue is the Warmest Color remains the greatest lesbian love story movie of all time, but this was good enough to get a green-go. This was a John Farr reco and now I recommend it too.
Movies Watched -- May December (2023)
117 minute running time so about 17 minutes too long, but I liked this one … I’m sort of shocked to admit it … Todd Haynes and Julianne Moore like working together for sure … she looks amazing for 63 … Natalie Portman is 42 and looks worse than Julianne … hapa husband was a simple-minded hunk and all their 1/4 Korean “children” were beautiful … I liked the story and the acting was good … I might upgrade this to a green-go later depending on the other 2023 movies that I watch. This was a John Farr reco.
I am secure.