Movie Year in depth: the 2000s: 2001

[Tha1ChiefRocka]

The year 2000 will always be remembered as the year that two different movies about Mars came out. And, to this day, I still cannot get them separated in my head.

I think I like Red Planet with Val Kilmer better than Mission to Mars with Gary Sinise though.

Also check out Eminem in "Da Hip Hop Witch".


Link

[Applerill]

I guess I should also post that, as part of my own “scary movie week”, I’m going to see The Boondock Saints for the first time, since it truly will be a scary experience to watch it on full volume in my apartment as a 30-year-old on a day when my landlord is supposed to stop by.

[cestuneblague]

Yeah I actually wanted to start this series to give the perspective of what it actually felt like at the time compared to how the movies have held up (or not), but it seems weird to do 2000 considering I think I only saw maybe one movie in the theater (hey, kind of like 2023 up until today!) and wasn't following movies as closely as the rest of the decade. But it's interesting how well it's looked up in retrsopect cause at the time it was famous for having so many flops and underwhelming "prestige-minded" movies that are really completely forgotten today. I mean, remember "Dinasour"? Or how "Hollow Man" ended Paul Verhoeven's hollywood career (perhaps by his own self-sabatoge)? or yes even the two Mars movies, or old-man-river Space Cowboys? Or of couse the John Travolta scientology foray Battlefield Earth? The rare Sandler flop of Little Nicky (which is a good reminder "weird" does not automatically = good? Even Unbreakable was considered a huge dissapointment back in the day, though it's obviously grown in stature (though personally find it still flawed). Again it was also the start of really underwhelming oscar-bait contenders, again movies like Legend of Baggar Vance, Pay it Forward, Finding Forrester, Proof of Life, Thirteen Days that nobody remembers anymore, as well as the first big Cormac McCarthy adapation in All the Pretty Horses that there were big hopes for but got a complete shrug when it was actually released. Pollock kind of started the neglibile trend of making movies about enigmatic artists and ignoring their relationship with the work in favor of basically high-brow romantic melodrama. And of course Chocolat got a lot of snark for saying that it was contractually obligated for a Miramax film to get a Best Picture nomination every year, especially since it seemed to take the place of the beloved Almost Famous (which although was not a commercial success, again many thoughts that was the bias against it). So yeah at the time it was considered one of the most dissapointing years in movies in the terms of the North American release schedule, considering how strong the late 90s were.

I think what stuck was interesting in kind of how it both did and did not represent a starting point for the 2000s eventually unfolded. Obviously Gladiator was the big breakout hit and inspired a lot of these sword-and-sandal films to be later greenlit, but they all dissapointed near the middle of the decade. American Psycho had the similar controversy as Dogma of being constantly dropped by distributors before Lion's Gate picked it up, which became known for it's willingness to embrace hard-to-market hot-button films before the aftermath of their really expensive Crash oscar campaign turned them into just another Hollywood studio. I also remember the controversy around Scary Movie, which even in hollywood was shocked this film was rated a hard X, but obviously us 13-14 year olds at the time were dying to see it. It was also the waning days of when you could base a really successful movie solely on it's marquee name's star power, obviously think of movies like Me, Myself and Irene, Erin Brockovich, What Women Want and especially Cast Away. Also slightly refereshing it was the last year before sequels and franchises, or just movies based on previously successful IP, came to dominate the scene and you could actually have a movie be a success and still be a stand-alone property.

But I think the three films that really were

* Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: If you don't really remember 2000 it's kind of impossible to understand how huge and buzz-y this movie really was, especially how shocking at the time it could be a huge box office success in US despite being subtitled. Think Parasite x 5. It really kind of opened the floodgates for Asian Cinema kind of taking over the international film scene in the decade, though a lot of the notable 2000 movies that are even mentioned here didn't really get wider releases until later (or until the rise of DVD's. Again 2000 was kind of the last year of the VHS actually thriving)

* X-Men: Yes, did start the Superhero franchise being viable again, though I think it wasn't until Spiderman came out a couple years later that really cemented how

* Traffic: The Drive of the 2000s. Pretty much defined the narrative and visual aestethic of "serious-minded" 2000s movies: relentless tripod-allergic shaky cam, large ensemble doing multiple concurrent storylines that kind of ran into each other throughout the running time and a take on it's Important Issue that you couldn't tell if it was "enigmatic" or just "coy".

So yeah I think 2000 has really looked better in retrospect as a lot of the smaller films got more recognition, which became possible in the DVD and eventual streaming age, though it was a good indicator of how Hollywood was about to fall off a cliff in terms of movies that were just, ya know, purely entertaining.


So I guess for a top ten? Hadn't seen as much from 2000, but I guess it would go something like

* George Washington (what the fuck happened to David Gordon Green)
* Yi Yi
* The State I Am In (Never commerically released in NA theaters)
* In the Mood for Love (2001 NA)
* Ginger Snaps (2001 NA)
* Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
* Werckmeister Harmonies (2001 NA)
* La Commune (Paris, 1871) (2004 (NA)
* High Fidelity
* Dark Days

Still need to get on the likes of Eureka and Ritual, good things to save for a cold New England winter.

[cestuneblague]

We really don't need to do a seperate thread for each year, so instead I'm just going to change the original forum heading to


2001


... and discuss.

[MadhattanJack]

[Applerill]

Yeah, aside from posting faves, I guess the most obvious thing to point out about this year rather than the one prior is that it's probably the FINAL year where you can view the cinema in regards to "The End of History" or whatever. I had a really great time seeing Shrek in theaters as a child about to turn eight, but what I think about the most from that primordial experience (aside from the fact that my brother "ironically" farting lost appeal really fast) was how it was probably the last movie I saw in theaters completely unaffected by 9/11. Another example that I didn't see until recently (at Suedeswede's request) was Legally Blonde, which I didn't realize this whole time was also released well before 9/11. It ended up being much more shallow to my MILFy brain in part because of that connection to Fukiyamism.

On a side note, I also remember when Fellowship came out, I thought it would be boring, so I forced my mom to watch Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius The Movie THREE times in a row as I waited for them to finish. I feel like that experience might've fucked my mom up psychologically over the years

Anyway, to make a quick top 30 here:

1. Mulholland Drive
2. Amelie
3. The Piano Teacher
4. Hedwig and the Angry Inch
5. Batang West Side
6. Ghost World
7. Los (James Benning)
8. Royal Tennenbaums
9. How High
10. What Time is it There?
11. Monster's Inc.
12. Bully
13. Fat Girl
14. Freddy Got Fingered
15. Dog Days
16. Bridget Jone's Diary
17. AI: Artificial Intelligence
18. Y Tu Mama Tambien
19. Fellowship of the Ring
20. Where Does Your Hidden Smile Lie?
21. Children Underground
22. Vanilla Sky
23. Habit (Gregg Bordowitz)
24. Wet Hot American Summer
25. The Sweetest Sound (Alan Berliner)
26. La Cienega
27. Remembrance of Things To Come (Chris Marker)
28. Pokemon 3: The Movie
29. Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back
30. Donnie Darko

[Applerill]

Though I guess it's also worth noting the "classics" of 2001 that I HAVEN'T seen:

Scary Movie 2
Shaolin Soccer
Rat Race
Pootie Tang (sorry everyone )
In the Bedroom
Domestic Violence
Southern Comfort (a film Rosenbaum adored about the death of a very macho trans dude)
Band of Brothers
Happiness of the Katakuris/Visitor Q
The Man Who Wasn't There
Trouble Every Day
Josie & the Pussycats
Ocean's Eleven
Waiting For Godot
Glitter

[CA Dreamin]

@cestuneblague, "perspective of what it actually felt like at the time compared to how the movies have held up..." Well, like you, my perspective of 2000 was purely through the eyes of a kid. I saw only two movies in the theaters that year, The Perfect Storm and Chicken Run, both on the impulse of those boomers I call parents. Once they arrived on cable TV, it wasn't long before I saw Cast Away, Dude Where's My Car, The Emperor's New Groove, Meet the Parents, Gladiator, Shanghai Noon, Road Trip, The Patriot, X-Men, Remember the Titans, etc. So basically my relationship with cinema at the time was what you would expect from a pre-teen...casual mainstream entertainment, with a natural curiosity towards films deemed edgy for a pre-teen. For whatever reason, my parents did not object to me watching Gladiator nor The Patriot, but they thought Dude Where's My Car was risque (which ones are rated R and PG-13, again?). And let's just say a friend and I watched Road Trip on HBO after school one day before any adults were in the house. Fun times. But anyway, out of all the 2000 films I've seen, I didn't see the vast majority of them until 2006 or later (2006 was the year I really started following cinema). So I can't really answer the question, but if you say 2000 was considered disappointing at the time, I'll take your word for it. Judging from the big box office earners and the award-type films that year, I can see why folks at the time would feel disappointed. It's been pointed out here that many 2000 films that are highly-regarded today, were kind of under the radar at the time. Nobody was talking about the Asian films Yi Yi and In the Mood For Love, but everyone was talking about Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Yup, I remember that. As for Traffic, it popularized the shaky cam look, but Magnolia had done the hyperlink multiple story-line thing just the year before. But yes, later films such as 21 Grams and Crash seem more influenced by Traffic.

One other thing this thread made me realize was how animation style shifted in 2000. Between Disney and Dreamworks, they produced Chicken Run, Road to El Dorado, and The Emperor's New Groove in 2000, three films that used the traditional hand-drawn look or the claymation style, both of which were phased out over the next several years. Even though these films were enjoyable, they didn't perform as well at the box office as Dinosaur, the CGI-animated release of 2000 (which I haven't seen). The 2001 success of Monsters Inc. and Shrek cemented the CGI look as the dominant look in animation that has continued ever since. (I'll post more about 2001 later)

[LedZep]

One movie which defines my view of the early 2000s is Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Pulse. It's a great movie, but also very much of its time. It still has those grimy, dark 90s aesthetics and the themes of isolation, fear of the unknown, surveillance, mysteries of the Internet, etc. But in a lot of ways it's visually slightly updated for the early 21st century (the use of CGI). While I wouldn't say the movie is dated, some of its visuals certainly are. Much like post-grunge or something just better lol. And yet, despite working with the instruments and perspective of its time, it's a smart movie which presents the moral and philosophical questions in a timeless manner. The idea of an apocalypse and a dystopian world is turned on its head - it's not an earthquake or a catastrophe of any kind, it's human separation through depression and loneliness. The main themes of internet, digital/virtual connections, AI and the topic of isolationism on the Internet have become more relevant than ever. Add a cool techno-ghost story and you've got a fascinating movie.
_________________
Finally updated the overall chart

2020s
90s

[Olli]

My Top 10 of 2001 Films

1. The Lord of the Rings – The Fellowships of the Ring 10/10
2. Monsters Inc. 10/10
3. Donnie Darko 9/10
4. Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain (Die fabelhafte Welt der Amelie) 8/10
5. K-Pax 8/10
6. From Hell 8/10
7. Frailty (Dämonisch) 7/10
8. 3000 Miles to Graceland (Crime is King) 7/10
9. Ghost World 7/10
10. Tanguy 7/10