Five best movie villains of the 2000s

Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men is on the list…click through for the rest. (via @tcarmody)

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Ebert’s favorite films of the 2000s

Even though it’s on The Naughtie List, I missed Roger Ebert’s list of the best films of the decade. It’s an interesting list; several items on there that you didn’t see on a lot of other lists.

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The Noughtie List highlights, pt 5

It’s Jenni, the curator of The Noughtie List. This is my last segment of highlights, but you can still email me if you find anything interesting to add. You can find my past highlights here: part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4.

If you don’t have time to check out the 350+ lists, I’ve put together a smaller creme de la creme collection that I haven’t included in my past highlights.

• An American Film Geek’s Best Of The Decade
• Apple: Best [——-] Of The Decade
• Deaths Of The Decade
• The Decade Of DVR
• The Decade That Was: 50 Fill-Ins
• The Decade We Had
• Digital Ramble: All For Naughts
  (Jason was interviewed here about the list)
• Even Retired, Jordan Is Still the One to Beat
• Fifty Most Important Recordings
• The Google Decade Ends
• History Of Online Video
• The I-Decade
• The I-Decade Part 2: Defining The Noughties
• Living In The Memory
• Noughtyisms: The Best Words Of The Decade
• The Oh Decade: Culture Of Innovation Remains Robust Long After Dot-Com Bust
• Twenty Most Memorable Trailers
• Watch out Avatar: These movies have stood the test of time
• We Love the Aughties: An End-of-Decade Clip Party
• You Aught To Remember

• The 2000s

The Noughtie List highlights, pt 4

Hey guys, It’s Jenni. The Noughtie List is getting quite long, up to 255 at last count. The year is ending in a matter of days, but there is still time to email me anything you have come across. You can find my past highlights here: part 1, part 2 and part 3.

Technology changed alot of things this decade, the “mega-novel” in particular. Time we would have spent reading is now replaced with blogs, tweets, forums and other internet time wasters. This decade is When Lit Blew Into Bits. BTW Jason, this article is heavy in David Foster Wallace prophecy.

What new species of books, then, have proved themselves fit to survive in the attentional ecosystem of the aughts? What kind of novel, if any, can appeal to readers who read with 34 nested browser tabs open simultaneously on their frontal lobes? And, for that matter, what kind of novel gets written by novelists who spend increasing chunks of their own time reading words off screens?

Many books mentioned in this article are on The Millions list of Best Fiction, which goes in depth on why each book was chosen plus excerpts.

Most of you probably don’t want to even think about a Decade Of Food after gorging yourself with yummys the past few days. This mini timeline covers food scares, the rise of organic, blogging chefs and people’s obsession with cute food. (Thanks, Peter!)

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The Noughtie List highlights, pt 3

It’s Jenni and I have some more favorites off The Noughtie List. I’m still accepting any “best of the 2000s” lists you happen to find, just email me. If you missed any past highlights, check out part 1 and part 2.

New York Magazine invited a select few to design covers for the 00’s issue. In the end, they chose one for the newsstand, one for subscribers and now have all the submissions online to view. The gallery includes photos showing the creative process of Todd St. John, who built a wooden sculpture of 00’s for the subscription cover.

Horror movies are generally not that great, but this list reminded me there are some worth having potential nightmares over. (Thanks Jon!) Anyone who hasn’t seen the number one movie, should definitely watch it. For those with Netflix, it’s available to stream instantly. If you’re looking for something more themed for this week’s festivities, AMC has a list of the best holiday movies.

Christian Annyas lists movie title stills of the 2000s in his very thorough collection. It made me realize how many movies still opt for the black screen with white type. Which in turn made me more curious about the art of the title sequence.

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Lines that defined the decade

Jenni, I don’t want to step on your toes here, but I’m hoping that Scott Lamb’s excellent One-Liners of the Decade — from “Wassap!” to “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job” to “I drink your milkshake” — ends up on the Noughtie List.

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The Noughtie List highlights, pt 2

Hi there again, it’s Jenni. You may have noticed some slight changes to the list. We’ve made it easier to tell whether something has been recently added to the list; there is a red asterisk next to links less than three days old. Also, if you are curious, there is a counter that says how many links are listed. Nice.

Last week I highlighted defining the decade. This week I’m going to jump around the list a bit and highlight some of the cool finds that have come in through the inbox and my research.

One of the things to have come out of this decade is great TV shows. The quality of these shows were often better than movies. This decade is when TV became art.

But as this decade began, it had already begun to dawn on viewers that television was something that you could not just merely enjoy and then discard but brood over and analyze, that could challenge and elevate, not just entertain.

It feels like there was more music than ever produced and which albums, groups, and songs made the biggest impact is hard to choose. The lists vary dramatically about the number one album of the decade. Simon Reynolds dissects this musically fragmented decade.

More and more good-to-excellent music is getting produced but that very fact is thwarting the emergence of the great, smothering it. The bigger the spread, the more “we” are spread. And the less impact any given record can have.

I was told by readers (thanks Matt & Eric) that Greg Wyshynski aka Puck Daddy has a great collection of hockey Top 10, including the 10 best hockey games. But my favorite is the 10 best hockey fights, which includes video. Enjoy.

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The Noughtie List highlights, pt 1

Hey guys, it’s Jenni, the curator for The Noughties List.

First, I would like to thank everyone who have already submitted some great links. And please, don’t be shy with emailing links or any other suggestions for me. For my first post I wanted highlight defining the decade.

During the decade, people spent their time trying to name it. From what I gather, most English speaking countries have decided on “Noughties.” The US on the other hand, can’t seem to make it’s mind on what to call the decade, but many consider this The Worst Decade Ever .

When end of a decade approaches, everyone takes a moment to look back at those 10 years. There were many “oh ya..” moments for things I forgot about. Last August, Kottke posted Momus’ “one man’s view” on the decade. It’s worth a read if you haven’t read it, or read it again cause it’s really well thought out. And lastly, an opinion of the 2000s by those who were born in 2000.

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Introducing the Noughtie List

As several of you guessed, the December project I mentioned the other day is a collection of lists and articles that summarize the past ten years, i.e. the decade, i.e. the 2000s, i.e. TEN YEARS, MAN, TEN!! We call it the Noughtie List.

The list is curated by Jenni Leder, an art director and fellow internet enthusiast from Dallas, TX. She would love to hear your Noughtie List suggestions, feedback, comments, etc. via email. Jenni will be posting some of her favorite finds to the front page from time to time as well.

A special thanks to Rex Sorgatz for letting us borrow the idea; his list of 2009 lists is well underway and worth a look for those who are only slightly nostalgic.

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Word of the decade?

The American Dialect Society has put its annual call out for nominations for the 2009 word of the year *and* also for the word of the decade.

What is the word or phrase which best characterizes the year or the decade? What expression most reflects the ideas, events, and themes which have occupied the English-speaking world, especially North America? Nominations should be sent to [email protected]. They can also be made in Twitter by using the hashtag #woty09.

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Y2K, no big deal

I contributed a short essay to Newsweek’s 2010 project for the Overblown Fears list: Y2K.

Despite the media hype, the biggest story about the Y2K computer bug is that nothing happened. Trains didn’t spontaneously derail. McDonald’s didn’t roll back to turn-of-the-century pricing (no Happy Meals for a ha’penny). And the banks didn’t lose all of our money; we’d have to wait another eight years for that.

Farhad Manjoo recently did a 2-part piece on the lessons of Y2K for Slate.

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Movie originality and success

Prompted by my post about how few non-adapted/sequel/franchise films there are on the list of the top-grossing films of the 2000s (9 out of 50), kottke.org reader Keith took a look at the Best Picture Oscar nominees for the decade and noticed that the percentage of original properties was actually lower (7 out of 45). From his email:

This leaves 7 that are original. Gladiator, Gosford Park, Lost in Translation, Crash, Babel, Little Miss Sunshine, Juno, and Michael Clayton.

You’ll note that 7/45 (15.556%) is worse than 9/50 (18%). So it seems that the box office appreciates originality more than the Academy. Take from this what you will. I might suggest that this is a poor way to truly gauge originality, as the top 50 box office grossers of the decade is a pretty high bar (500 million+), and seems to demand some kind of familiarity in order to attract the rapid widespread viewing needed for a big theatrical run. Alternately, it builds into the argument that most creativity is follow-on. I would venture a guess that if we dove deeper, into say, every movie that made at least $100 million in the decade, the ratio of original properties would be a bit more palatable.

Thanks, Keith! Also interesting is a comparison between the top grossing films of the 2000s and those for the 1990s and the 1980s. You don’t have to delve too far to see how much has changed. Of the top 15 films in the 1990s, 7 are original properties: Independence Day, The Lion King, Sixth Sense, Armageddon, Home Alone, Ghost, and Twister. For the 1980s, a consensus on the top 10 grossing films is difficult to come by, but using the Wikipedia one yields 5 original properties out of the top 10: ET, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Ghostbusters, Beverly Hills Cop, and Back to the Future (other lists I saw included Top Gun and Rain Man but also Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (adapted)).

Clearly sequels, adaptations, and franchises ruled in the 2000s much more than in the 1990s or 1980s. But if you go back to the 1970s, only 2 or 3 of 10 top-grossing films are original: Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and perhaps The Sting. So maybe the 2000s were a return to old ways for Hollywood?

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Paste Magazine’s best of the decade

They’ve got lists for books, movies, documentaries, video games, memes, comedians, and more.

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The 2000s according to Wikipedia

Wikipedia gets into the 2000s roundup game with a main article and a number of topic-based summaries, including fashion, film, and sports. From the fashion page:

In hip hop, the throwback jersey and baggy pants (popular in the ’90s to 2004) look was replaced with the more “grown man” look which was highly popularized by Kanye West around the year 2005.

If you say so. More interesting is the chart of the 20 highest grossing movies from the film page (the top 3 each grossed $1 billion+ worldwide):

1. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
2. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
3. The Dark Knight
4. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
5. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
6. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
7. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
8. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
9. Shrek 2
10. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
11. Spider-Man 3
12. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
13. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
14. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
15. Finding Nemo
16. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
17. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
18. Spider-Man
19. Shrek the Third
20. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Only one movie on the list was made from an original screenplay: Finding Nemo…the rest are all sequels or adapted from books, TV shows, amusement park rides, etc. Out of the top 50, only nine are not franchise films.

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From Wassap! to Obama, a decade in review

As part of Newsweek’s extensive 2010 project (more on that next week), they’ve produced a 7-minute video showing the highlights from the past decade.

Wassup! Wassup! What a decade. (thx, jr)

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Top movies of the 2000s

From The Times in the UK, the top 100 films of the decade. Before you look, see if you can figure out which one of the following is not in the top 5:

Grizzly Man
Cache
No Country for Old Men
Team America: World Police
There Will Be Blood

I’ve seen 58 out of the 100.

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Best music of the 2000s

From Largehearted Boy, a roundup of lists of best music of the 2000s.

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Summing up the 2000s

The blog You Aught To Remember is counting down all the of the memorable people, ideas, and trends of the 2000s. Some recent entries include the demotion of Pluto, World of Warcraft, the Red Sox winning the World Series, and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

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Music videos of the decade

Antville has a list of the 100 best music videos of the decade, the first 50 or so are embedded right on the page. (via fimoculous)

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This decade’s lost species

From the Guardian, a list of species that became extinct or critically endangered during the 2000s. (via @ettagirl)

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Best NBA players of the 2000s

I’m not exactly sure what I expected from such a list, but this wasn’t quite it. Kobe at #3 and Shaq is #6? Hrm.

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The top 200 albums of the 2000s

Pitchfork continues their look back at the 2000s with the top 200 albums of the decade. Here are the top 20.

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Pitchfork’s songs of the decade

As part of their review of the music of the 2000s, Pitchfork listed the top 500 tracks of the past decade. Here are the top 10:

10. Arcade Fire, “Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)”
9. Animal Collective, “My Girls”
8. Radiohead, “Idioteque”
7. Missy Elliott, “Get Ur Freak On”
6. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, “Maps”
5. Daft Punk, “One More Time”
4. Beyonce [ft. Jay-Z], “Crazy in Love”
3. M.I.A. [ft. Bun B and Rich Boy], “Paper Planes (Diplo Remix)”
2. LCD Soundsystem, “All My Friends”
1. OutKast, “B.O.B.”

Be sure to click through for the extensive explanations. It would easy to nitpick specific selections, but that’s a pretty good top 10.

Gorilla vs. Bear also shared their top songs and albums of the decade.

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The 2000s, summed up

Momus is first out of the gate with a summary of the 00s, what he calls a “mister narrative of the decade”…a one-man master narrative.

Other things that looked dead or dying this decade: I personally stopped going to the cinema. Why sit behind someone’s head in a fleapit when you can download all you need to see and project it at home? Copyright effectively died, overtaken, de facto, by events on the internet. Magazines and newspapers ended the decade looking very unhealthy indeed, although books seemed strong. Young people got a lot less interested in cars, leading some to label Japan a post-car society. Detroit pretty much collapsed. The polar ice caps melted rapidly; climate change is a fact. Banks — having invented what they thought were clever ways to spread risk around, and play with planet-sized sums of entirely fictional money — looked pretty shaky.

Embedded in Momus’s post is a video called Rise of the Rest, the title of which was borrowed from Fareed Zakaria.

From the video:

In ten years, the number one English speaking country in the world will be USA India China.

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Best TV of the decade

Variety polled members of the Television Critics Association for their picks for the best TV of the past decade. Here are their choices for drama series and comedy series:

Drama: Friday Night Lights, Lost, Mad Men, The Sopranos, The West Wing, The Wire.

Comedy: 30 Rock, Arrested Development, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Daily Show, Everybody Loves Raymond, The Office.

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