slabinskia

Since we only have another 6 months left in this decade, I thought I would post this. What would you say the best movies this decade were and how do they stack up against the 90s ? Please give some insight in your reply other than just listing titles.

DarkestPhoenix

Okay, 90s had some of the best 80s movies in 90-92 (Point Break, bitch!), so 90s wins.

The 0Ts have a bunch of cool looking CGI, so they got that going for them, but in the FUTURE it may not hold up.

PopcornTreeCt

2000s

Children of Men
City of God
There Will Be Blood
United 93
Almost Famous


1990s

Pulp Fiction
Leon
Boogie Nights
True Romance
The Matrix

- tough call for me. But I think overall, there were more better movies in the 90s versus the 00s

DarbyD53

When I look at my All-Time Favorite list The 90's have 5 and the 00's have the other five. I have to say over all I've enjoyed how the 00's have had alot of comic movies that I've enjoyed a ton. With that said I must go with the 90's. Idependence Day, Shawshank, Forrest Gump are in my Top 5 all-time then a childhood fav TMNT ranked 6th.

So 90's

RyoHazuki

90s easily. Not even close.

The first half of the 00s was really weak imo.

Travis McClain

Let's just take some of the franchises:

Batman
1990s
Batman Returns (1992)
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)
Batman Forever (1995)
Batman & Robin (1997)

2000s
Batman Begins (2005)
The Dark Knight (2008)

Tough call, really. I love Mask of the Phantasm and always enjoyed Forever. Still, the Nolanverse seems to be the definitive cinematic Batman so far. 2000s win by virtue of not having fat to trim.

James Bond
1990s
Goldeneye (1995)
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
The World Is Not Enough (1999)

2000s
Die Another Day (2002)
Casino Royale (2006)
Quantum of Solace (2008)

Gonna go with 2000s, even though I love me some Goldeneye.

Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park (1993)
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
Jurassic Park III (2001)

I think we can really just call 1993 the winner on this one.

Mission: Impossible
Mission: Impossible (1996)
M:I-2 (2000)
m:i:iii (2006)

For some people, 2000 is the last year of the 1990s; for others, it's the first year of the 2000s. Regardless, I think it's the only year in this series that mattered.

Star Trek
1990s
Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991)
Star Trek Generations (1994)
Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
Star Trek: Insurrection (1998)

2000s
Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)
Star Trek (2009)

1990s; The Undiscovered Country and First Contact rock.

Star Wars
1990s
Star Wars Trilogy - Special Editions (1997)
Star Wars Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999)

2000s
Star Wars Episode II - Attack of the Crohn's (2002)
Star Wars Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005)

Excluded Star Wars: The Clone Wars because it's just the first few episodes of the TV series. I give my nod to the 2000s on this. Not sure the Special Editions really added anything relevant, and plot holes aside, I really did enjoy Revenge of the Sith.

I would give my nod to the 2000s just based on this quick-glance look at some of the tentpole franchises. I may have been more excited about movies that came out in the 1990s, but I find myself more impressed by the releases of the 2000s.

Of course, this is just one tiny segment of releases. I think indie films have gotten better, too, trying less to be different just to be different or trying to be more mainstream to bring in a larger audience and now just telling the story they want to tell. 1990s comedies seemed to be on a track of escalating shock humor; in the 2000s, it seems that the 2000s have restored a sense of storytelling to the genre (thank you, Judd Apatow). And, in the 1990s, it seemed that books and comics were adapted very loosely, using just the characters and basic premise as a starting point for telling a new story they could market to a pre-existing fan base; many of those of the 2000s have been much more faithful to the source material.

wm lopez

I going with 90's.
TITANIC is still number 1 box-office of all-time.
And I hated all the green,teal tinted cinematography of the 2000's movies.

Travis McClain

Only if you don't adjust for inflation. And, if we're deferring to box office totals, then the 2000s have absolutely annihilated all previous decades. Seven of the ten highest-grossing movies on IMDB's "All-Time Worldwide Box Office" list are from this decade. Of course, that list is also not adjusted for inflation.

Defiant1

Notable and memorable movies of the 00s for me:

LOTR Trilogy ('01-03)
Pirates of the Caribbean ('03)
Tropic Thunder ('08)
X2 ('03)
Nolan/Bale Batman ('05 & '08)
Jason Bourne Trilogy ('02, '04, & '07)
Brokeback Mountain ('05)
Transformers ('07)
Gladiator ('00)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon ('00)
Hero ('02)
House of Flying Daggers ('04)
Moulin Rouge! ('01)

I'd say my memorable movies of the 90s would be about the same in terms of quantity and quality so I call it a draw, IMHO.

Moleman1138

TOP 10 of 00s

Kingdom of Heaven, LOTR Trilogy, Star Trek, Gladiator, Atonement, WALL-E, Revenge of the Sith, Finding Nemo

Top 10 of 90s

T2, Shawshank, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Titanic, Phantom Menace, Matrix,


It's tough, 5 movies from 00s make up my top 10 of all time, but then there's classics like T2 and Shawshank.

mcnabb

no message

nightwing82

I think overall I like more movies from the 90s. Plus my favorite movie, Grosse Pointe Blank, was in that decade.

DonTHX1378

The 90's I have to agree were a better decade for film.
Best films of the 90's-
1. Pulp Fiction
2. Goodfellas
3. Schindler's List
4. Silence of the Lambs
5. Fargo
6. Boogie Nights
7. The Thin Red Line
8. Fight Club
9. The Shawshank Redemption
10. Natural Born Killers

From the 2000's so far
1. Almost Famous
2. The Dark Knight
3. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
4. Gangs of New York
5. Lord of the Rings Trilogy
6. A History of Violence
7. Munich
8. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
9. The Departed
10. Casino Royale

DRG

From a horror perspective, the 90s had a long stretch (1992-1996) where there wasn't much theatrical horror released... apart from big budget things like Interview with a Vampire and Wolf, and the occasional franchise film like Jason Goes to Hell or Curse of Michael Myers, horror was mostly relagated to the direct-to-video market. Things definitely picked up in late '96 after Scream became a surprise hit.

Now in the 00s it's rare to go a few weeks without a horror release... you can usually count on about a dozen releases in the January-March span, and around Halloween time its typically congested with releases.

Of course, with quantity comes an inevitable drop in quality. Unlike the horror boom in the 80s, where most of the cash-in releases were low budget 'indie' productions, this time around we're getting a lot of generic studio product. At least the bad 80s flicks had a certain charm to them... the bad 00s ones with their CGI effects just feel robotic to me. But this doesn't let the 90s off the hook... even with the drop in available films we still had to endure a lot of junk. The Mangler, anyone? Hellraiser 4?

If the 00s are guilty of anything, it's riding trends into overkill. At the beginning of the decade, the 'haunted house' type movies seem to be dominant. Then there was the run of Asian remakes... The Ring, The Grudge, Dark Water. Then there's the brutal 'torture' movies... Saw, Hostel, Wolf Creek. Recently the remakes seem to be king: Friday the 13th, My Bloody Valentine, Last House on the Left...

If I were to hold up the best 10 from the 90s to the best 10 from the 00s, the 90s would probably come out on top. But if I were to go to 25 or more, the 00s would reign because frankly I'd have a hard time finding that many movies from the 90s, especially if I'm excluding things that didn't see theatrical release here. It flat-out sucked having to see the really good horror from that decade (often foreign) on VHS for the first time.

Ash Ketchum

As someone who's been going to the movies regularly since well before most of you were born, I have to say I haven't found American movies as exciting or interesting as they were before the onslaught of the Spielberg/Lucas blockbuster juggernaut, which dictated the style and content of mainstream American cinema. B-movies became A-movies and the bread-and-butter genre films I'd always liked (westerns, crime thrillers, war, etc.) were displaced by big-budget big-star action spectacles with tons of explosions and glass-breaking and special effects and none of the small-scale pleasures such films traditionally had.

There've been a few bright spots (early Oliver Stone, some Walter Hill, Tarantino, a handful of Seagals and Van Dammes), but I've found most of the interesting genre films in the last 20 years to be those from Hong Kong and Japan. In the '90s I got heavily into Hong Kong action films, both period martial arts films like ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA and IRON MONKEY and contemporary action thrillers like John Woo's A BULLET IN THE HEAD and HARD-BOILED. I also got heavily into anime, which had quite a whirl of creative activity in the '90s, from NINJA SCROLL and GHOST IN THE SHELL to PRINCESS MONONOKE and the first POKEMON movie. I also went back and discovered earlier gems in these genres. Plus there were great new live-action Godzilla and Gamera movies from Japan in the '90s.

The 2000s have seen a slump in creativity in pretty much all the areas I've outlined. There've been a few American films I've liked--maybe two or three a year--plus a handful of anime features and TV series that were impressive (e.g. TOKYO GODFATHERS, GHOST IN THE SHELL 2, “Samurai Champloo” and “Naruto”), but not much from Hong Kong and not much in the way of live-action from Japan.

I'm happiest when there's some new creative approach applied to a time-honored genre and it's not so overblown as to lose its edge, e.g. COLLATERAL, 300, KILL BILL VOL. 1, PUNISHER WAR ZONE. Or when someone decides to just make a good ol' genre film like they used to, e.g. THE BOURNE IDENTITY, BANK JOB and APPALOOSA.

Travis McClain

I applaud your open-mindedness and all, but I seriously never expected the phrases in bold to appear together. Ever.

GenPion

The 90's were probably better, but both decades are great for film with their ups and downs. So for me it's still a draw.

inri222

This is a tough one. These are some of what I thought were the best films of those decades.
I am sure there are many I left out.

2000's
------
Inland Empire
Let the Right One In
Clean
Werckmeister Harmonies
Bad Education
24 Grams
Lost In Translation
Elephant
In the Mood for Love
Yi Yi
Mulholland Dr.
Talk to Her
Traffic
There Will Be Blood
Eastern Promises
No Country for Old Men
A History of Violence
Irreversible
Spider
Dogville
Battle Royale
Dancer in the Dark
L'Enfant
Paranoid Park
Volver
Babel
Broken Flowers
Cache
Fargo
The Time of the Wolf
The Piano Teacher
4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days
Code Unknown

1990's
------
The Straight Story
The Eel
Wild at Heart
Live Flesh
Satantango
Fireworks
Insomnia
Lost Highway
Fear & loathing in Las Vegas
eXistenZ
Cure
Crash
I Stand Alone
M. Butterfly
Sonatine
Secrets & Lies
Hate
Naked Lunch
The Player
Taste of Cherry
Pulp Fiction
The Idiots
Barton Fink
The Piano
Short Cuts
Breaking the Waves
Naked
Europa
Man Bites Dog
Fargo
Funny Games
The Sweet Hereafter
71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance
All About My Mother
Benny's Video
The Silence of the Lambs
The Double Life of Veronique

Michael Corvin

Tough call:

2000s
Almost Famous
Memento
LOTR
Bourne Films
The Dark Knight
Wall-e
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Snatch
Finding Nemo

1990s
Braveheart
Toy Story
Swingers
Jurassic Park
Saving Private Ryan
Shawshank Redemption
T2
Pulp Fiction
The Matrix
Fight Club
LA Confidential
the Big Lebowski
The Lion King
Aladdin
12 Monkeys
The Usual Suspects

Although I absolutely love Almost Famous and Memento, I guess it isn't such a tough call... 1990s.

zcsh3

I usually end up liking films from the 00's more. There is just something about the way the movies are made that make them appeal to me more. Maybe I am really weird, but the like brightness or clarity of the shot makes the movie appeal to me more. I really don't know how to describe it

Solid Snake

That's a bit shallow, no? Every decade has a look. Of course...it also depends on the presentation allowed on the DVDs now. Enter The Dragon to me has such an amazing visual quality doesn't look that old. While Pulp Fiction has a less stellar picture and it's in the 90s.

On topic:
I think to me...I'd side with the 00s. If not in greatness but preference. A lot of the films I like in this period are comic book films..cuz well I like me some Super Heroes and whatnot it's the time for me to go all nuts. THOUGH I shall admit that films like Leon, Pulp Fiction, and etc are much better films than what we get in this decade.

So honestly...the 90s were better. the 2000s is good but the 90s had a great pace in quality. The earlier section of the 2000s dragged...like a lot.

mcnabb

I went through my DVD collection, and realized the 00's have really sucked. I have very few movies from this decade.

The top 5 90's are just pure classics:

1. Goodfellas - This movie is right under The Godfather for mob films.
2. The Silence of the Lambs - part thriller, part character study, part drama, all great.
3. Heat - One of the most underatted movies of its time, how great is this cast?
4. Apollo 13 - Ron Howards best movie, and the fact that we know what is going to happen, but still keeps you on the edge of your seat at the end.
5. A Few Good Men - "You can't handle the truth!"

Honorable mention: Titanic, Unforgiven, Pulp Fiction, Shawshank Redemption, Saving Private Ryan, T2, The Matrix, Braveheart, The Fugitive, Jerry Maguire, The Sixth Sense.

As for this decade? I have The Dark Knight, Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Cast Away, A Beautiful Mind, Minority Report and wow thats all from my collection!

hasslein

The best thing that came out of 00 decade was the return of the costume epic, although almost all were pretty bad.

Moonstone

I'll say the 90's cause I loved Red October and T2 along with a few others that I thought were good and that held up well when watching them on disc, this decade I only really liked Hot Fuzz, the rest were okay when I originally saw them but after watching them on disc I didn't enjoy them as much.

Artman

2000's, not even close really imo. Gladiator, LOTR, HP, Batman, X-Men franchises... certainly just looking at the big budget movies I don't see how it compares.