Best of the iDecade: Screen gems

Let's face it: Even the most over-confident film critic should have a problem with the "best" designation for no other reason than it is doubtful he or she has seen every film released in a given time span.

I prefer the designation "10 favourite films." In this difficult decade, these are the movies that swept me away. They gave me the greatest pleasure in the watching followed by warm anticipation at the thought of seeing them again. In order of most recent:

Let the Right One In (2008)

The best horror movie of the past couple of decades came from nowhere -- or to be more specific, Sweden. Befitting its 12-year-old hero, it's a chaste love story between Oskar and his new friend Eli, who only looks like a 12-year-old girl but is in fact a vampire creature of indeterminate age. When most filmmakers work from the Dracula template, they emphasize the vampire, the comely victim or the Van Helsing-like adversary. This movie contemplates the devoted vampire enabler Renfield, Oskar's true literary ancestor.

My Winnipeg (2007)

Obviously, Guy Maddin's "docu-fantasia" literally hit me where I live. (When I think of the sequence he did on back lanes, I invariably visualize my back lane.) But Maddin's wildly imaginative exercise in mythologizing his hometown resonates not just in the Winnipegger's experience, but with anyone from an oddball hometown, or for that matter anyone with a mother.

Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

Spanish writer-director Guillermo del Toro offsets grim reality of life in fascist Spain with a young girl's (Ivana Baquero) beautiful, scary fantasy realm that affirms the power of imagination, even in the face of ultimate horror.

Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Director Edgar Wright and star Simon Pegg take the trappings of the George Romero zombie pic and overlay them with the fixtures of the romantic comedy. They then apply high standards of cinematic sophistication as well as ribald lad humour. No easy trick, that.

The Incredibles (2004)

While the decade featured a plethora of really well-done superhero movies (including Spider-Man and X-Men 2) Brad Bird's Pixar entry captured the genre's kinetic thrills with the added attraction of smart satire and full-bodied domestic comedy.

Oldboy (2003)

A man is locked in a hotel room for 15 years without knowing why. Upon getting his freedom, he engages in a quest for an answer and, oh yes, bloody vengeance. South Korean director Park Chan-wook gives us an amazing, stylish mystery/melodrama wrapped in the bloody packaging of a revenge movie.

Far From Heaven (2002)

A lush pastiche of the classic Douglas Sirk melodrama (with a particular shout-out to All That Heaven Allows, 1955), director Todd Haynes updates that glorious template with an interracial love affair between Julianne Moore and Dennis Haysbert, and a homosexual subplot involving Moore's closeted hubby (Dennis Quaid).

Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-2003)

Peter Jackson's screen rendition of JRR Tolkien's vast fantasy is a perfect storm of visual effects, stalwart actors and gifted storytellers coming together to realize a movie epic that, a decade earlier, would not have been possible.

Mulholland Drive (2001)

Is the first half of the movie a fantasy while the second half grim reality, a la Lost Highway? David Lynch's erotic, enigmatic noir fantasy is a tantalizing puzzle that captures the seduction and delusion pumping through L.A.'s bloodstream.

Amelie (2001)

As much a fantasy as Lord of the Rings, Jean-Pierre Jeunet's charming tale is about the random acts of kindness perpetuated by the film's elfin heroine (Audrey Tautou). Released in 2001, when we needed it most, this is the rare feel-good movie that doesn't make you feel foolish for falling under its whimsical spell.

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 19, 2009 C3