My Best of the Oughts

Majikthise has her best of the oughts list. Now I have mine.

1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2. Lost In Translation
3. Kill Bill Vols 1 & 2
4. Million Dollar Baby
5. Requiem For A Dream
6. Mystic River
7. Before Sunset
8. Memento (even with the plot flaw)
9. The Incredibles
10. Sideways

Go over to the old site to see my best of the 1990s list. Bitterspice has a new review of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind here.

Update: Phoebe Evergreen asked what the plot flaw was in Memento. You can see my attempt to answer in comments, which word limits cut off. Essentially, I responded to IMDB.com's defense of Leonard Shelby's remembering his own short term memory problem by saying that true cases of the condition they're describing obliterate memories of everything following onset, diagnosis included. Some patients, who come to the condition via chronic alcoholism (the usual route, as I understand it), may remember a doctor telling them something about memory loss before their defect became profound.

Further, Leonard Shelby's coping method would probably prove more debilitating than helpful, because amnesia patients confabulate fantasies and long term memories to create false short term memories. As a consequence, he couldn't guarantee his own reaction to the tattoo that's supposed to let him know who he is and what, in general, he's doing.

That said, without this plot element "Memento" has no story. And because it was a fast paced, intelligent, witty and altogether involving story that kept me guessing until the end and haunted me long afterwards, I'll grant it the one conceit that made it all possible.

Good night, Ms. Evergreen, wherever you are.