The 100 Best Films of the Decade

100 The Devil Wears Prada (David Frankel, 2006)
Meryl Streep begins her own populist career reinvention (soon to be followed by Mamma Mia!) by playing a tyrannical and thinly disguised version of Vogue editor Anna Wintour in this satirical yet soft-centered account of life among the fashionistas.

99 Battle Royale (Kinji Fukasaku, 2000)
The worst school kids in Japan are dumped on an island, fitted with exploding neckbraces, equipped with weapons and told to fight it out between themselves. Deliberately lacking in PC credentials but ultimately, it’s a provocative and challenging film.

98 Crash (Paul Haggis, 2004)
This surprise Oscar champ of 2004 inspired myriad syrupy “We are all, like, totally connected” imitators (see The Air I Breathe), and yet the savvy narrative chicanery and superlative performances (including Sandra Bullock’s racist housewife) lift this LA-set ensemble far above the crowd.

97 Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Park Chan-Wook, 2005)
The third of Park Chan-Wook’s fervid, savage revenge trilogy, Lady Vengeance ends with a sombre acknowledgement of the futility of revenge. But not before buckets of blood have been spilt.

96 Morvern Callar (Lynne Ramsay, 2002)
One of Scotland’s most acclaimed and offbeat filmmakers, Ramsay (Ratcatcher) here transforms Alan Warner’s cult novel into a thing of woozy, meditative beauty. Samantha Morton stars, in the title role, as the emotionally withdrawn checkout girl who profits from her boyfriend’s suicide.

95 Amores Perros (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2000)
This smouldering powder keg of a movie launched a new generation of Mexican talent. Gael Garcia Bernal stars in the first of three stories which are linked together by a shattering car crash.

94 An Inconvenient Truth (Davis Guggenheim, 2006)
A user-friendly slideshow about global warming, combined with a revealing personal profile of presenter Al Gore, becomes a box office behemoth, an Oscar winner, and a brand leader for all future eco docs.

93 House of Flying Daggers (Zhang Yimou, 2004)
Probably the most satisfying of the big budget martial arts crossover movies of the past decade, it combined ridiculously ambitious action set pieces with lush, colour-saturated imagery.

92 Dirty Pretty Things (Stephen Frears, 2002)
A Nigerian doctor (Chiwetel Ejiofor) in London double-jobs as a cab driver and hotel porter while uncovering an illegal trade in human organs. This quietly polemical work humanises the immigration debate.

91 Lantana (Ray Lawrence, 2001)
This intelligent drama is so much more than a murder mystery — it’s an impeccably acted exploration of human relations at their trickiest. Meticulously constructed and rewardingly realist in tone.

90 Wedding Crashers (David Dobkin, 2005)
It could've been a frat-boy sex comedy but Wedding Crashers achieves that miraculous balance of crude and cute, wild and witty. Two charismatic central turns help, from Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn, playing the eponymous cads with sex on the brain but romance on the cards.

89 School of Rock (Richard Linklater, 2003)
This boisterous love letter to loud guitars and three-chord choruses represents the last good performance from star Jack Black. It’s an irrepressible ode to the joy of power-chords played by grown men in PVC trousers.

88 The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson, 2001)
A career high from which Anderson (Fantastic Mr Fox) has never quite recovered, here he directs a knockout ensemble (including Gene Hackman and Bill Murray) as a dysfunctional family of New York eccentrics.

87 Time and Winds (Reha Erdem, 2006)
A lyrical portrait of village life in rural Turkey — slow-burning but inexorable in its power. Nothing is hurried about the rhythms of the lives captured here, but we are left with the feeling that each passing moment is precious.

86 The Orphanage (Juan Antonio Bayona, 2007)
The ultimate in post-Sixth Sense kiddie horror, this superlative Spanish chiller stars Belén Rueda as a woman battling an entire orphanage of creepy pre-teen ghosties who might just have kidnapped her dying son.

85 The Piano Teacher (Michael Haneke, 2001)
Two of the most uncompromising voices in European cinema, director Michael Haneke and actress Isabelle Huppert collaborate on a harrowing, deeply disturbing exploration of female sexual repression and masochism.

84 Hotel Rwanda (Terry George, 2004)
Ten years after the Rwandan genocide, George’s bracing drama was the first mainstream movie to tackle the subject. Don Cheadle gives a duly Oscar-nominated turn as the Hutu hotelier Paul Rusesabagina who risks his own life to save hundreds of vulnerable Tutsis.

83 The Wind that Shakes the Barley (Ken Loach, 2006)
A stirring and sympathetic portrait of the early days of the Irish Republican Army that carries the stark warning: an armed struggle soon loses touch with its ideals. The naturalistic, committed performances are the film’s main strength.

82 Yi Yi: A One and a Two (Edward Yang, 2000)
An insightful, exquisitely controlled family drama set in modern day Taipei, this is Yang’s masterpiece.

81 In The Loop (Armando Iannucci, 2009)
The savagely perceptive political satire based on the television series The Thick Of It elevates swearing to an art form. It’s the Sistine Chapel of profanity. Lean, mean and painfully funny.

80 Me, You and Everyone We Know (Miranda July, 2005)
A gorgeous, feather-light debut from American visual artist July, the film depicts a burgeoning romance between the quirky Christine (July again) and shoe salesman Richard (John Hawkes). Subplots involving chatroom debacles, bashful perverts and teen sex lessons create a nicely demented tone.

79 Le Grand Voyage (Ismael Ferroukhi, 2004)
A devout Muslim father and his secular son make a pilgrimage together — in itself, it’s not a groundbreaking premise. But the picture’s climax, actually filmed in Mecca, is extraordinary.

78 About Schmidt (Alexander Payne, 2002)
Possibly the last great Jack Nicholson performance of the decade (and no, hamming it up in The Departed doesn't count). He stars as a superannuated actuary searching for meaning in an empty middle-American existence. The tear-stained finale is heartbreaking.

77 Bowling for Columbine (Michael Moore, 2002)
Moore’s documentary, the best of his career, and made before he became a global brand, is a breathlessly entertaining two-hour tirade against lax American gun laws. Highlights include interviews with Marilyn Manson and a sadly enfeebled Charlton Heston.

76 Control (Anton Corbijn, 2007)
Manchester post-punk band Joy Division are brought to life thanks to a punchy, often blackly funny script and an incendiary debut from Sam Riley, playing lead singer Ian Curtis.

75 Talk to Her (Pedro Almodóvar, 2002)
One of Almodóvar’s most ambitious and accomplished films focuses on the tribulations of a comatose dancer (Leonor Watling) and those who surround her. It thus features an array of flash forwards, flash backs, surprise twists, plus a giant rubber vagina.

74 Pan’s Labyrinth (Guillermo Del Toro, 2006)
One of the darkest periods in recent Spanish politics is woven into a twisted fairytale, a battle between good and evil that plays out in the imagination of a little girl trying to escape the ugly realities of the real world. Stunning.

73 The Beat That My Heart Skipped (Jacques Audiard, 2005)
A gifted director, a roaming restless camera, and a young white-hot French actor (Romain Duris) combine to tell the wrenching tale of a small time hoodlum with ambitions to be a concert pianist, and a string of Russian mobsters in his way.

72 The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow, 2008)
The cinematic equivalent of a Semtex detonation, this Iraq-set movie is a sensory wallop that ignores political sermonising. Meticulously researched by journalist Mark Boal, it follows a busy bomb-disposal team in Baghdad.

71 Monsters, Inc. (Pete Docter/David Silverman/lee Unkrich, 2001)
Pixar at its most hallucinogenic follows fourth dimensional monsters Sulley and Mike (John Goodman and Billy Crystal), who harness terrified children’s screaming power for industrial energy. They nonetheless learn that love contains more power than fear.

70 The Class (Laurent Cantet, 2008)
Former teacher and novelist François Bégaudeau plays a version of himself in a doc/drama hybrid set in an inner city school. Without being sanctimonious or sentimental, the film makes piercing observations about multicultural France.

69 Persepolis (Vincent Paronnaud, Marjane Satrapi, 2007)
Satrapi’s bestselling autobiographical graphic novel makes the transition to the big screen seem effortless. A child’s-eye view of the Iranian revolution, this is playfully disarming rather than didactic; the animation pleasingly simple and stylised.

68 Memento (Christopher Nolan, 2000)
Formally intricate and expertly executed, Memento is a devious brainteaser of a film. Guy Pearce is a haunted man doomed by short-term memory loss to live forever in the present, who carries clues to his past in the tattoos on his body.

67 Gomorrah (Matteo Garrone, 2008)
A sprawling, multi-stranded descent into a modern day Naples terminally infected with the disease of organised crime, this is a film full of striking imagery, sardonic wit and sobering truths.

66 City of God (Fernando Meirelles, Katia Lund, 2002)
Vital, kinetic and visceral, this Brazilian favela epic sent shockwaves through audiences. The cool and the camaraderie of crime in the face of extreme poverty is powerfully evoked, as is the terrible cost to young lives.

65 Waltz with Bashir (Ari Folman, 2008)
The 1982 Israeli-Lebanon war is seen through the prism of animation in a deeply personal account of one soldier’s struggle with his own memories. Folman, an army veteran, depicts traumatic war stories with unflinching honesty and a dreamlike palette.

64 L'enfant (Jean-Pierre Dardenne/Luc Dardenne, 2005)
The plot is seemingly preposterous — local Belgian tearaway Bruno (Jérémie Renier) sells his girlfriend’s baby on the black market for a new leather jacket. But in the hands of fraternal film-making masters, it becomes a tour de force of guilt and desperation.

63 There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)
“I, drink, your, milkshake!” The climactic quote, from Daniel Day Lewis’s embittered protagonist is already immortal, as is the performance. While the entire devastating movie, about oil prospecting in the early 20th century, is endlessly re-watchable.

62 Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (Adam McKay, 2004)
Unreconstructed juvenile chauvinism goes head to head with the march of feminism in a 1970s San Diego newsroom. It’s a world where men wear flammable trousers and aftershave called Sex Panther. Will Ferrell’s finest moment.

61 Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, 2001)
The master storyteller and animator creates a deliciously loopy adventure for ten-year- old Chihiro (Rumi Hiragi) when a tedious drive to a new town is interrupted by a deadly detour into the spirit world. Like the Wizard of Oz, minus the sentiment.

60 The Squid and the Whale (Noah Baumbach, 2005)
Exemplary US Indie about two brothers growing up in mid-1980s New York and dealing with their academic parents acrimonious divorce. A witty and acrid semi-autobiographical script from Baumbach, plus pitch-perfect casting, give this coming-of-ager unexpected depths.

59 Être et Avoir (Nicolas Philibert, 2002)
A rural schoolhouse holding just 12 students and a single ageing teacher in the Auvergne may not seem like a recipe for must-see documentary. Yet Philibert is so finely attuned to the tender relationship between teacher and pupils that the subsequent school year becomes as gripping as any blockbuster.

58 Shaun of the Dead (Edgar Wright, 2004)
Shaun is determined to win back his girlfriend Liz and nothing, not even the fact that streets of suburban North London are full of zombies trying to eat his brains, will stop him. Although there’s always time for quick pint in the Winchester.

57 The Consequences of Love (Paolo Sorrentino, 2004)
Sorrentino’s super-stylish debut is an art-house mafia movie about a middle-aged businessman and Cosa Nostra cash-mule called Titta (Toni Servillo). When his quiet romance with a local waitress fails, Titta takes out his frustrations on his Sicilian paymasters. Big mistake.

56 Volver (Pedro Almodovar, 2006)
A family and the ghosts that haunt it, a body in the freezer and Penelope Cruz in screen-melting vamp mode. This tragicomic melodrama is drenched in colour and full of evocative imagery; it’s a rich confection from Almodóvar.

55 Chopper (Andrew Dominik, 2000)
Actor Eric Bana displays a near-wreckless virtuosity as the violent and self-deluded Australian criminal, Mark “Chopper” Read, in an off-kilter adaptation of Read’s quasi-autobiographical writings. Through self-mutilation, murder and megalomania, Bana somehow always retains audience sympathy.

54 Bad Santa (Terry Zwigoff, 2003)
Billy Bob Thornton buys his Christmas spirit in bulk from the discount liquor store and drinks away his hatred of children in order to face his job as a department store Santa. Take a wild guess whether he’s naughty or nice.

53 Milk (Gus Van Sant, 2008)
“Best Actor” winner Sean Penn, surrounded by firebrand talent including Emile Hirsch and Josh Brolin, stars in a timely movie that brings the selfless (and ultimately fatal) activism of gay campaigner Harvey Milk to the mainstream. Released, ironically, just as California passed the anti-gay-marriage bill Section 8.

52 The Constant Gardener (Fernando Meirelles, 2005)
A John Le Carré thriller brought to life by the Brazilian director Meirelles, this is storytelling that is charged with energy and idealism. Ralph Fiennes is tremendous as the conflicted widower driven to make sense of his wife’s murder.

51 The Son’s Room (Nanni Moretti, 2001)
Moretti, of Dear Diary fame, dumps his previous penchant for on-screen clowning with an emotionally punishing account of a psychiatrist (Moretti) dealing with the sudden death of his son. There are light moments, especially with his neurotic clients, but this mostly made for weeping.

50 The Lord of The Rings: The Return of the King (Peter Jackson, 2003)
The final and most satisfying Rings movie snagged a record $1.1 billion at the box office, plus 11 Oscars, and cemented the trilogy’s reputation as one of the great all-time franchises.

49 Knocked Up (Judd Apatow, 2007)
Ambitious career girl Katherine Heigl and stoner scruff Seth Rogen get more than a phone number at the end of their night together. It’s gleefully rude and deliriously funny, but the film’s ultimate strength comes from its unexpectedly soft centre.

48 Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton/Valerie Faris, 2006)
A Hollywood honcho’s dream ticket, this heartfelt family drama cost only $6 million but grossed over $100 million. The story of a ramshackle road trip to California in a clapped out VW van set the quirky tone for future indies, such as Juno.

47 My Summer of Love (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2004)
Heady, intoxicating and a little crazy — the teenaged crush is explored in all its deranged intensity, with two sterling central performances from Natalie Press and Emily Blunt.

46 Traffic (Steven Soderbergh, 2000)
Soderbergh and screenwriter Stephen Gaghan somehow achieve the impossible by making a single star-laden movie (step forward Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas) about the human cost of the drugs trade that’s even better than the six-hour Channel 4 mini-series that inspired it.

45 Touching the Void (Kevin Macdonald, 2003)
In 1985, two climbers attempted to scale the west face of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes. This documentary, about endeavour and survival, is as tense as a thriller.

44 Under the Sand (François Ozon, 2000)
Charlotte Rampling dazzles as a woman in denial about her husband’s death. An uncharacteristically subtle and sensitive work from Ozon.

43 The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan, 2008)
A rare example of a film franchise in which the director’s vision triumphs over the tendency to churn out a homogenous brand. A chilling, brilliant swan song for Heath Ledger as the Joker.

42 The Incredibles (Brad Bird, 2004)
Superhero-mania gets a wryly affectionate drubbing with an ironic adventure from Pixar

41 Children of Men (Alfonso Cuarón, 2006)
Staggeringly accomplished photography from Emmanuel Lubezki brings an urgency to this dystopian vision of a near future where humankind has become infertile. An outstanding film which somehow slipped through the net.

40 Syriana (Stephen Gaghan, 2005)
George Clooney produces and stars in a withering account of petrol politics in the Middle East. Fine performances from Matt Damon, Christopher Plummer and William Hurt, plus a cracking sense of pace, help to mollify a core message of bleak corporate cynicism.

39 Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola, 2003)
Strangers in a strange place become soul mates for a few stolen days. Bill Murray is gloriously hang dog as a movie star in crisis; Scarlett Johansson is utterly disarming as the neglected newlywed.

38 Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001)
Lynch at his brash elliptical best with Naomi Watts as Betty, an aspiring actress who becomes the unwitting star of her own twisted film noir.

37 In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar Wai, 2000)
Heart-stoppingly lovely and exquisitely sad, elegantly erotic and impeccably stylish — this romantic tone poem is a thing of real beauty.

36 Capturing the Friedmans (Andrew Jarecki, 2004)
Bizarre and compelling, Andrew Jarecki’s documentary began as a portrait of New York clown David Friedman but segued into an analysis of Friedman’s pressured family life — complete with brother Jesse and father Arnold, both convicted paedophiles.

35 Y Tu Mamá También (Alfonso Cuarón, 2002)
Two teenage boys and an older woman in crisis take a road trip to an elusive “perfect” beach in this sexually charged Mexican comedy drama. Cuaron’s restless camera-work gives an unexpected depth to the story.

34 Finding Nemo (Andrew Stanton/Lee Unkrich, 2003)
The Pixar trademarks are all there — rapid-fire badinage, ravishing visuals, and sympathetic characters. But this tale of a timid clownfish tracking his kidnapped son carries, like a subaqueous Searchers, a genuinely mythic uppercut.

33 Monsoon Wedding (Mira Nair, 2002)
There are few directors better than Mira Nair at capturing the mercurial tensions of domestic life. And with this vivid, richly textured portrait of a Punjabi wedding she is at her absolute best.

32 Gladiator (Ridley Scott, 2000)
The sheer audacity! Taking a dead genre — the sword’n’sandals movie — and not just reviving it, but creating an Oscar-winning box-office sensation into the bargain.

31 Iraq in Fragments (James Longley, 2006)
Remarkable photography and a glimpse of Iraq on the streets rather than from inside an armoured vehicle — this little-seen film is one of the decade’s most impressive documentaries.

30 Irreversible (Gaspar Noé, 2002)
Yes, this scandalous revenge drama boasts a vile nine-minute rape sequence and a hideous opening mutilation. But it’s also a moral movie that refuses to sanction violence and remains, for strong stomachs at least, unforgettable.

29 Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 2000)
The film that introduced the surreal genius of writer Charlie Kaufman to the world, this endlessly inventive riff on the nature of identity and celebrity is a milestone in moviemaking.

28 The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel, 2007)
The true story of Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby who, after a stroke, was left paralysed and able to communicate only through blinking his left eye. The film takes us inside Bauby's wrecked body and charms us with his still rebellious wit.

27 Sideways (Alexander Payne, 2004)
A sozzled road trip in Californian wine country leads to a mid-life crisis for divorced failed writer and wine buff Miles (Paul Giametti), best man to sleazy charmer Jack (Thomas Haden Church).

26 Minority Report (Steven Spielberg, 2002)
A pinnacle for Spielberg and star Tom Cruise, this near-future sci-fi depicts a world of psychic crime- stoppers but is rooted in old fashioned film noir.

25 Dancer in the Dark (Lars Von Trier, 2000)
This musical melodrama was as emotionally subtle as a coach load of orphans and kittens driving off a cliff — and yet there was something about the florid excesses that gelled perfectly with star Bjork's heart-wrenching score.

24 28 Days Later... (Danny Boyle, 2002)
Danny Boyle and Beach novelist Alex Garland re-imagine the zombie movie for the 21st century. Here, the zombies move with lightning speed, and are fuelled not by the dark arts but by rage itself.

23 Man On Wire (James Marsh, 2008)
This lyrical documentary tells the story of Philippe Petit, who strung a wire between the twin towers of the World Trade Centre and danced on it, for no reason other than to create something beautiful for the people far below.

22 Far from Heaven (Todd Haynes, 2002)
The social facades of 1950s Connecticut slowly crack apart in a gorgeous Technicolor-style melodrama. Julianne Moore is riveting as the homemaker whose life is upended by her husband’s homosexuality and her own feelings for gardener Dennis Haysbert.

21 Good Night, and Good Luck (George Clooney, 2005)
This ode to a past era of challenging TV journalism is authentic down to the last swirl of late-night cigarette smoke. David Strathairn impresses as Edward R. Murrow, the television journalist locking horns with Senator Joseph McCarthy.

20 Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001)
Head-tripping sci-fi goes to high school in an Eighties-set psychological thriller with dark Lynchian overtones. Jake Gyllenhaal plays the titular teen — a possible paranoid schizophrenic who may just have the key to time travel.

19 United 93 (Paul Greengrass, 2006)
Shattering, sobering and uncompromising, Greengrass’s masterful drama set onboard one of the 9/11 hijacked planes is resolutely unsensational — and is all the more powerful for it.

18 Let the Right One In (Tomas Alfredson, 2008)
The biggest vampire movie of 2008 was Twilight, but its bloodless inanities were exposed by this Swedish chiller. Here Kare Hedebrant plays a bullied pre-teen whose burgeoning relationship with an equally alienated girl-vampire radically alters his dull suburban existence.

17 Brokeback Mountain (Ang Lee, 2005)
This achingly sad love story gave Heath Ledger a chance to explore hitherto unsuspected depths. It’s a hugely powerful performance — his inarticulate yearning is almost painful to watch.

16 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004)
Testing the limits of narrative convolutions and visual technique, Gondry directs an ingenious script about memory-wiping. A central tempestuous romance between Jim Carrey’s Joel and Kate Winslet’s Clementine, however, is never once overshadowed.

15 Downfall (Oliver Hirschbiegel, 2004)
One of the most extraordinary cinematic explorations of failure, disappointment and thwarted ambition ever made, this tale of Hitler's final days features a savage, dazzling performance by Bruno Ganz.

14 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu, 2007)
The tale of an illegal mid-term abortion in Ceausescu’s Romania was never going to be easy. And though the details are harrowing, Mungiu, a former journalist, has such compassion for his heroines Otilia and Gabita that the pain is almost palatable. Almost.

13 This Is England (Shane Meadows, 2007)
Meadows’s most personal film is a real treat, combining the director’s impeccably observed comedy with a gathering storm cloud of ominous ill will and violence. Honest, authentic and ultimately shattering.

12 The Lives of Others (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2006)
A mercilessly efficient account of Stasi surveillance in mid-1980s East Germany is anchored by a haunting performance from Ulrich Mühe, who died from stomach cancer just after the film’s release.

11 Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (Larry Charles, 2006)
The decade’s favourite sexist, anti-Semitic, racist homophobe, Borat picked at the scabs of America’s intolerance and hypocrisy. Sacha Baron Cohen’s status as the most fearless man in comedy is unlikely to be challenged in the near future.

10 Hunger (Steve McQueen, 2008)
Provocative London-born artist McQueen directs a revelatory Michael Fassbender in a movie that purports to tackle the infamous 1981 IRA hunger strikes but is actually a hypnotic meditation on the ineffable mystery of human life. Achingly profound.

9 The Queen (Stephen Frears, 2006)
Compassionate and intelligent, witty and wicked, this account of what happened behind the Palace gates after the death of the Princess of Wales is a crown jewel of a movie. Helen Mirren is a very human HM.

8 Casino Royale (Martin Campbell, 2006)
The high camp of the Brosnan era Bond is ditched, and Fleming’s hero returns rebooted (and Bourne-ified), with an intense turn from Daniel Craig, and some breakneck set-pieces. An opening parkour-style chase through Madagascar sets the tone.

7 The Last King of Scotland (Kevin Macdonald, 2006)
Forest Whitaker gives one of the great performances of the decade as Idi Amin. He nails the Ugandan dictator’s deadly charm — he’s a charismatic monster; part amiable buffoon, part stone-cold killer.

6 Slumdog Millionaire (Danny Boyle, 2008)
Twelve years after Trainspotting, Boyle produces a dizzying Mumbai-set romance that redefines the possibilities of a progressive yet commercially successful national industry. Oscars abound.

5 Team America: World Police (Trey Parker, 2004)
The South Park creators launch an assault on pretty much everyone, from North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il to poor, hapless Matt Damon. It’s jaw-droppingly offensive and wildly funny.

4 Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog, 2005)
Party nature documentary, part philosophical tract, Herzog’s eerie account of the life and brutal death of mildly unhinged bear-watcher Timothy Treadwell is a monumental piece of cinema — emotionally satisfying, intellectually stimulating, but primal to the core.

3 No Country for Old Men (Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, 2007)
The alchemic combination of the Coen brothers’ eloquent precision and Cormac McCarthy’s vivid nihilism makes for a bleakly compelling cycle of violence. The only thing more terrifying than Javier Bardem’s haircut is the clinical efficiency of his murders.

2 The Bourne Supremacy / The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass, 2004, 2007)
The action movie is dragged, kicking and back-flipping, into the Noughties courtesy of Matt Damon’s amnesiac superspy and director Greengrass’s film-making élan. Marrying jittery docu-style camera work with healthy political cynicism, Greengrass transformed Bourne into an anti-Bond for the PlayStation generation.

1 Hidden (Cache) (Michael Haneke, 2005)
It is only as the decade draws to a close that it becomes clear just how presciently the Austrian director Michael Haneke tapped into the uncertain mood of the Noughties. The film’s twin themes resonate perfectly with the defining concerns of the time: tacit national guilt about a questionable foreign policy, in the film it’s France’s occupation of Algeria, but it’s not hard to piece together the parallels with more recent conflicts. Plus, as round-the-clock surveillance became a part of our daily lives, here was a film that captured the creeping paranoia that resulted from the eyes of unseen strangers invading private life.

Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche star as Georges and Anne Laurent, the successful couple whose charmed life is disrupted by a series of covertly captured videotapes of their family and home. The campaign pertains to some unspoken and long suppressed event. Auteuil and Binoche are both excellent — their brittle, abrupt performances etch out the fracture lines in their crumbling relationship. But the film’s brilliance comes from two striking, perplexing moments in the film. The first is a shockingly violent suicide that catches the audience off guard. The second is the film’s ambivalent ending — a long shot of a meeting on some steps which could signal the end of the family’s torment, or the beginning of something worse. There have been rumours of an American remake with Ron Howard, of all people, directing. Hopefully common sense will prevail.