The Fighter- Brotherly Love

Not since The Dark Knight have I gone into a movie with such high expectations, and left thinking that it was even better than expected. The Fighter was that good. With a great underdog story, fantastic acting (especially from Christian Bale), a lot of emotional moments, and a surprisingly high level of comedy, you really need to get yourself to a theater and see this right away.

Spoiler alert...Below are more in depth thoughts on The Fighter. So before reading any further, watch the movie, bring a cake to some crack heads, then read what I have to say.

This is not just my Christian Bale bias right? That was unbelievable performance. From the two minute clip during the credits of the real Dick Eklund you could tell how spot on Bale was with his portrayal of the cracked out ex-boxer. Seriously, how good is this guy with accents? I've heard him do so many and they always make me forget that he is from Wales. "Let me see, a cracked out dude from Lowell with no teeth? Yeah I got that accent in my back pocket."

Bale had me feeling bad for Dicky, wanting to punch his lights out, and laughing hysterically at everything he said for the entire movie. That's not to say that the other performances weren't also great. Mark Wahlberg and Amy Adams were fantastic as the leading couple. Of course they didn't have as difficult a role as Bale, but both did a stellar job making me care about whether Micky Ward succeeded.

Funniest movie of the year? I haven't seen many this year, but it's hard to imagine laughing more than I did at The Fighter. Literally every time the seven butt ugly sisters came on screen, I lost it. Between their hair, their faces, and their ridiculous comments in ridiculous accents, I just couldn't handle it. There's no way they went into making this movie thinking it would be this funny. Add to that both Bale and Adams who had terrific comedic moments throughout, and you have yourself a great comedy if you wanted to label it as such.

But at the end of the day this was a movie about two underdog brothers. One, a former boxer turned crack addict, who would do anything to live vicariously through his little bro's success. And two, the little brother boxer that has never received any attention because big bro Dicky knocked down Sugar Ray Leonard once upon a time. It was great seeing Amy Adams's character convince Micky to do it without his mom and brother, because I knew that he would have success that way, but when he demanded to bring Dicky back on as his trainer once out of jail, that's when I was sold. Really Micky's love of his brother, and the fact that they fought for the title together, made this such a great story. Thankfully Dicky turned his life around, and got new teeth, while in the big house. With big bro in his corner, Micky won the welterweight championship of the world and everything is good.

Not being a boxing fan, I was glad that I had no idea what was going to happen heading into Micky's title fight. Knowing that it was a true story, my gut told me that Micky would lose. I was both surprised and excited when that Englishmen hit the ground for good.

I give it an A, and I give Christian Bale's performance an A+. If he doesn't finally win an Oscar for this I am going to throw a fit.

Harry Potter- Catching Up For Quidditch

Spoiler alert...Below are a some thoughts on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One, as well as the series as a whole. So head to the theater to watch the movie, pour yourself a tall butter beer, then read what I have to say.

Thursday night, or early Friday morning, I made my way to the midnight showing of the most recent installment of the Harry Potter saga. But you've never once mentioned Harry Potter to me before, my seven readers might be thinking to themselves. That is true. I have never read a single one of the books, and I had only seen parts of the first movie some four or five years ago, but with the opportunity to experience one of my favorite things, I had to go for it.

The aforementioned favorite thing is watching long run stories in short periods of time. I've done it time and time again with television series. Whether it was catching up on numerous seasons of Sons of Anarchy, Dexter, etc., I've always enjoyed the challenge. The Kid has done it with movies before as well, as I took down all six Star Wars in a week, and pummeled through the long Lord of the Rings series within a couple of days.

This time around I had to take in the previous six Harry Potters before heading out to the theater to catch number seven on Thursday at midnight. With classes, work, volunteering for more work, and my job reviewing tv eps on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, I thought it might be impossible. Oh yeah, and I had to borrow the movies themselves, which threw a chink in the chain when the Half Blood Prince box ended up with no disc in it. To make a longer story still long, I started Friday night with the Sorcerer's Stone and finished Half Blood Prince by Thursday morning and was ready to take in the first part of the final installment.

Before getting into my slightly negative review of last night's Deathly Hallows Part One, I want to go over what I have loved about the entire series as a whole, so as to not get murdered by the four readers I have that are huge HP fans.

There is definitely a reason why the books and movies are so popular. This is great story telling at its finest. The plots have all been engaging and original, the characters are all very intriguing, with some easy to hate and others easy to love, and it really just does one of the best jobs I've seen at creating such a ridiculous fictional world that feels absolutely real while watching it.

Some would argue that the best tv comes when a series can tell a great serialized story, while making each individual episode as entertaining (and self-contained) as possible. The same can be said of a film saga. The long-running story of Harry Potter has been absolutely fantastic, but I've been more impressed with how each book installment tells its own story within the story. Each one has seemed to wrap up so nicely, yet lead itself perfectly into what may come next.

And that's exactly my major problem with Deathly Hallows Part One. It left me feeling completely "hehhh?" I mean, rightfully so. It was half of a story after all. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was meant to be read (or watched) all together. Splitting it up like this, and making me wait months until seeing the second half of the story, was a bad move.

What would have been better? Putting them together as one movie, of course. Too long? I agree, so cut out a lot of it like you apparently did for all of the other movies. Now I know the die hard book readers will probably disagree with me, because they're so happy that this one has stayed true to the original story, but there were many parts of Deathly Hallows Part One that were much more unnecessary than in the other films. It was slow and tended to drag at times.

Unless Part Two is an action-packed two and a half hours of greatness, I would have rather they cut about an hour out of each and make one three hour film. I could definitely find an hour out of Part One to cut, and the story wouldn't lose that much at all. But if the goal was to stay as close to the book as possible on the last go around, and appease its most loyal of fans, apparently it did that.

And now to some rankings...

Movies

1. Goblet of Fire
2. Half-Blood Prince
3. Prisoner of Azkaban
4. Order of the Phoenix
5. Sorcerer's Stone
6. Chamber of Secrets
7. Deathly Hallows Part One

Characters

1. Dobby the House Elf
2. Draco Malfoy
3. Fred and George Weasley
4. Albus Dumbledore
5. Luna Lovegood
6. Ron Weasley
7. Lord Voldamort
8. Hermione Granger
9. Severus Snape
10. Rubeus Hagrid

Inception- Dreams Are So Much More Than Wishes

The heat in my non-air conditioned house got so bad last night that I was forced to take myself to the movies. So below are my Spoiler-free thoughts on Christopher Nolan's Inception, along with plenty of other nonsense.

First I'd like to note that this was really good. For a two hour and 22 minute movie, I did not once feel like it was moving slowly. Although it in no way deserves to be compared to Inception, Public Enemies, which I saw in theaters, was two hours and twenty minutes of falling asleep moments.

The idea was clever. The execution was fantastic. Leo's performance was great as expected.

Here's how I broke down the movie right afterwards, as far as organization. The first twenty minutes were there to eff your brain up. The next 40 minutes or so were the background and set up you needed to both understand what you just saw at the beginning of the film and what you were about to see in the rest of it. Then the final hour and twenty minutes worked as like a finale-esque double episode of television.

Those first twenty minutes or so were as confusing as all heck though right? It might not have helped that I went into this thing almost as fresh as possible. I can even remember watching the trailer with much detail. As they jumped around in time and space and consciousness and dreamspace throughout the beginning, it was freaking me out.* It was all worth it once I got a grasp on what was going on and how it was being done.

*The fact that it was the IMAX Experience didn't help with my freak out mode. This thing was awesome. My first IMAX experience with an actual movie. Gigantic curved screen...I felt like I was on Soarin' at Epcot during a couple of the trailers.

I'm not going to discuss specifics in this spoiler-free review, so I'll just say that the rest of this thing was done really well.

Most of the auxiliary characters didn't bring much to the table, other than being necessary to the final job. So just a few notes on the more notable players. For someone as highly touted as Leo is, I haven't seen much of his stuff. It's strange because I always love him when I do see his work. This was no different as I envied and sympathized for Cobb at different points of the work.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who I've grown to love mainly because of his unbelievable 'Make em Laugh' performance during his Saturday Night Live monologue, was good in this. As Jack stated to me last night, "I could have played JGL's role." He was responsible for the one comedic moment of the movie (kissing Ellen Page and then stating it was "worth a shot"), but other than that he was as straight as they come.

Speaking of Miss Page. I liked her. I wanna say this was the first I've seen her. I never got to Juno because it was getting hyped so hard and most people I talked to said it was vastly overrated. Here she was interesting if slightly dull.

After reading numerous tweets about how much people were going to be thinking about this movie on Friday. I have to say that I'm not in the same boat. I thought everything came together rather nicely at the end. I wasn't left with any questions, other than the spinning top at the end (which I absolutely feel was starting to wobble).

As far as other Nolan movies I've seen. After only one watch (which probably is not fair), I wouldn't put this above Dark Knight, Batman Begins or the Prestige. That's not to say that I didn't love it. Those three movies are probably all in my top 50 all time.

Good work once again Mr. Nolan. Here's hoping the third Batman installment is another great piece by you.

Couple other notes

-I can't believe that was Tom Berenger! (well I can believe it because I said it right when I saw him on screen) A lot has happened since Major League I guess.

-Michael Caine and Christoper Nolan go together like Lamb and Tuna Fish. Both Batmans, Prestige and Inception. A small role here, but always nice to see him.

-Ellen Page's character must have played a lot of Goldeneye on 64 with that giant snow world on the third level. How come we saw all these levels and not a single one in the movie was a beautiful, tropical paradise? What's wrong with these architects?

Peyton Manning the Card Player

It takes a pretty momentous occasion to get me to blog about a sporting event these days. Sure when my favorite athlete on my favorite team wins his fourth NFL MVP award, I'll write something up to proclaim my love for him. When that same team wins the AFC Championship and is on their way to their second Super Bowl in four years I'm not that inclined to post. But, when said favorite athlete dissects the (stat-based) best defense in the league in a fashion that seems eerily familiar, The Kid gets inspired.

I am not alluding to Joe Montana, Johnny Unitas or any other great quarterback of years past. Peyton Manning's stunning performance from yesterday's championship game was oh so similar to the day Brett Maverick had when he sat down to play poker with Annabelle Bransford, Angel The Spaniard and the rest of the card players in Crystal River.

Just as Rex Ryan and the rest of the J-E-T-S were running their mouths the week up to Sunday's game, Annabelle seemed to never shut up, while Angel and the young gunfighter seemed to think they easily had what it took to take out Maverick in this game of cards. In order to be allowed into the game of five card draw, Brett had to promise to lose for at least an hour. While watching the game yesterday it seemed as though Peyton and head coach Jim Caldwell made a similar promise to the New Yorkers. We promise that we will lose, for at least an hour. And they did, 17-6.

Just as Maverick explains (after taking pot after pot from the fools) he was simply learning their tells while losing. As Angel, Annabelle and the gang stole pots from Brett, he simply smiled and waited until he had enough information to take them all for all that they were worth. This is exactly what Peyton did to the Jets. As he was rushed and blitzed from all angles, he never panicked. He merely took the sack when he needed to, stayed patient, and figured out exactly how the Jet defense was playing him.


After falling to the ground on his own a few times, instead of fumbling or throwing picks like the quarterbacks before him did against the Jets, Peyton turned things around as he ended the first half with a 58 second drive that brought the Colts within four points, at 17-14. While Maverick figured out that Annabelle twirled her hair when she was bluffing, Peyton similarly figured out exactly how to slice through the vaunted Jets D by getting the ball in perfect position for Austin Collie to make three easy catches on his way to the endzone.

Angel continued to shuffle his front cards to the back and his back cards to the front and Maverick kept on getting richer. Come the second half, Peyton took advantage of the corner backs that couldn't cover, lighting up the defense by connecting with Pierre Garçon on a total of 11 catches for 151 yards and a touchdown. All in all Peyton took over the game and routed the Jets, 30-17, finishing with 377 yards, three tds and no picks.

Now don't get me wrong, the parallels aren't all there. No one came in during the middle of the game and threatened to kill Peyton if he didn't throw some interceptions, which then led to a huge fight in the parking lot where Peyton beat up seven dudes with weapons. But hey they can't all be winners kids.

The Blind Side- Love the True Story

It's been a while since my last post, and it might be a while until my next one. After all, late December/early January is the bleakest time in the world of new television. With the holidays upon us I found myself watching nothing but Christmas movies (mostly Santa Clause 2 and 3) and Modern Family's Undeck the Halls over and over again. No matter how many times I view it, Jay Pritchett's "You too are total innocentes!" continues to be a delight.

As I returned to my life on the road, I found myself traveling to Blacksburg, VA for a tournament at Virginia Tech. Sure in the past I have had to endure the viewing pleasure of What Happens In Vegas and Destiny's Child Live In Concert with this group of inidividuals, but today was different. Someone got their hands on a dvd screener of The Blind Side, which has been in theatres since late November.

I heard about the story of Michael Oher a while back and was highly interested when I saw the trailer. Michael Oher is the starting left guard for the Baltimore Ravens. The Blind Side tells the story of how he made it out of the Memphis projects, because a rich, white family took him in and made him a part of their family. Personally, I love a good true story more than a fictitious one because, for the most part, the people the audience connects with actually exist in this world.

Sandra Bullock plays Leigh Anne Tuoy, the woman that takes the homeless Oher in, gives him food and clothes and helps him to earn a Division I football scholarship to Ole Miss. I thought I might be annoyed by Bullock's performance before in this, but I was wrong. I've seen her play the scared heroin in Speed and The Net. I've also seen Bullock play the hapless romantic lead in While You Were Sleeping and Two Weeks Notice. This was the first time I've really been impressed by her acting chops. She did a fantastic job portraying a woman that knew how to get exactly what she wanted, but also had the compassion to take care of a young, black kid from the ghetto.

Whether it was Pistol: The Birth of a Legend or Invinceable, I've often found myself disappointed in the window of life a sports biopic uses. As good as The Pistol is as a film, I want to see more of Pistol Pete. If you don't want to take the time to say anything about his LSU or NBA days, how about a bit more about his days after eighth grade? Yeah I know, it's a story, but it's a story about a real person and that makes me want to see more. In this particular case, I think The Blind Side used the perfect amount of time for the story of Michael Oher. The reason? It's current. He's just entered the NFL. We're watching that part of his life happen right now. He was at Ole Miss only a year ago. Many sports fans saw him excel at the college level on his way to All-American status. The only important storyline America should be curious about is how the heck this family helped him make it to where he is today. And they did that tremendously.

Without mentioning many more details of the movie, I'll just say that i was extremely emotional throughout the entire thing. Quinton Aaron, who played Oher, was terrific at playing a troubled, but genuinely caring human being. I wanted to see him succeed in everything he did.

Jae Head, with the exception of a few moments from Bullock, was the only source of comic relief in the movie. He played Bullock's son, a young kid that adored Oher, helped him with his football training, and did most of the negotiating with the college coaches that were recruiting Oher. Head was almost identical to his character in Friday Night Lights, that loved and adored Tim Riggins. He's great at this character.

The Blind Side was a great movie, but as I look into the future I have a tough time thinking about it as a sports movie. Football was the backdrop for this film about a kid making something out nothing. With that in mind, I think that my only major problem with the film is the beginning. The cold open is really well done, as Bullock monologues about Lawrence Taylor's career ending hit on Joe Theisman. It makes it seem as though the movie is all about teaching this kid how to play football and how to protect a quarterback and that was not this movie at all. I don't think it was the right message to shove in the audience's face to start the movie.

Brothers- Good Trailer, Good Movie

There's a lot to be said for making a fantastic trailer (see Whopper trailer). I first saw the trailer for Brothers at the theater this summer. I was in awe. Tonight was the first time since the summer that I sat down and decided it would be nice to take in a movie. When I went to see what was out, I saw that Brothers was playing and there was no decision to be made. I was there.

Now there are good trailers and then there are good movies. Brothers had both. There are many things that came together to make this movie good. Here are some of them. It started off with the setting of a normal family, and for some reason (the personalities, the writing, etc.) I fell in love with Sam, Grace, Maggie and Isabelle. It does help when Grace, the wife and mother, is played by the fantastic Natalie Portman. The ability to get attached so quickly, especially to Sam, gives the audience a comfort that they will need to bring about certain other feelings later on in the film.

After Sam, played by Tobey Maguire, leaves to go back to the war in Afghanistan we start to see both stories simultaneously as they cut back and forth. It feels as if Sam's (quote un quote) death comes immediately after he leaves and that's when the next phase comes into play. Uncle Tommy, who has recently been released from prison, comes in to help the family in what seems as a way to make up for all the screwing up he has done over the years. It's either that or to prove that Sam wasn't the only one who could be counted on. Jake Gyllenhaal portrays utter coolness in the role of Tommy and builds an unbelievable rapport with the children, Maggie and Izabelle. As Tommy does more and more for Grace and the kids, I fell more and more in love with the idea of the being a family together. We saw Sam being good with the kids before he left for war, but not this good. To me, it was this conflict for the audience to decide who deserved the family more that got the juices flowing.

What was surprising to me was how much I also enjoyed the war scenes. Right after Sam's chopper goes down and Grace hears word on his death, we see that Sam is alive. He is captured and imprisoned. You have to sit on the edge of your seat to wonder how he is going to get out alive. You, well I guess I, was so intrigued by every move he made in that it was going to reveal more and more about his character. At first he was so calm and confident, but by the end of his stay in Afghanistan he did one particularly awful thing. It was to save his own life and get back to his family, but is that right? Would you have done something different in that situation? Would I? Probably not. It was this event that kept him alive long enough to get him saved, but it was also probably mainly this event that made him the way he was when he returned.

Back at the ranch we had a fantastic scene between Tommy and Grace. After the two make fun of who each other were in high school (Grace a cheerleader and Tommy getting drunk and into fights), they share a moment with some pot and then lock lips with a big smooch. It ended there and they both knew that it was wrong and left the scene immediately. Both vulnerable, and both knew that the mature thing was to not move forward even though they made a much better couple than Grace and Sam did.

What's this? Sam finally comes home after being rescued by his fellow Marines. The dude is messed up from the word go. Within the first half of a day back he comes up with "did you eff her?" to Tommy. I saw the way you guys were out there skating. Are you joking? How is that your first thought? I know you're messed up, but isn't that the last thing you suspect to have happened, not the first?

After Sam has major troubles throughout his time back, we get to the great scenes that we saw in the trailer way back when. Sure the dinner scenes in Talladega Nights and Step Brothers were fantastic, but this one may have taken the cake. Izabelle has had it with Maggie getting all of the good birthday presents, and she really can't stand how scary and boring her daddy has been acting. As she viciously takes her frustrations out on a balloon, by rubbing it to make a loud noise, Sam seems to get upset as well. Him snapping at her, and popping the balloon in her face, leads to these comments by the little girl...

"Why couldn't you stay dead?!?"
"You're just mad 'cause Mommy would rather sleep with Uncle Tommy than you!"
"Uncle Tommy and Mommy have sex all the time!"

Then upstairs she tells her mom...

"I don't like Dad. I'd rather have Uncle Tommy around."
Maggie chips in, "Me too."

*Ending Spoiler Alert From Here On Out*

The scene that we all were waiting for. Sam loses it, pulls a gun out and points it at Tommy. After hearing police sirens (that Tommy called ahead of time) he walks out to the driveway where we see him screaming and yelling about "WHAT HE'S DONE!!!" This is what drove the entire trailer to that fantastic level. After firing the gun once in the air to get the cops to back off, he points it at his head. I literally held my breath for the next 15-20 seconds as I waited for him to pull the trigger. I thought he was gonna do it. I thought to myself, what a fantastic job by not putting the fact that he kills himself in the trailer. But then he lowers the gun and gets taken into custody.

I was then waiting for something big to happen. Some big revelation that would make the movie even better than what the trailer made it out to be. But it kind of quickly leveled off and ended. Sam's in treatment at some prison/hospital I'm assuming and he gets to see Grace. He finally tells her that he killed the other marine in Afghanistan. Are we supposed to assume that he's on the road to recovery now? That's he basically all better? What about Uncle Tommy and Grace? Are we just supposed to be okay with them never mentioning their feelings for each other again? He'll go on being just Uncle Tommy forever? I needed a little more on that end of things at the end.

All in all it lived up to the trailer, but didn't go above and beyond what I was expecting.

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 13)

Here is the 13th and final installment of Not Our First Rodéo. I hope all three of you that watched most of it, enjoyed it. If there wasn't actual enjoyment then I hope there was simple fascination. I loved every second of planning, filming, editing and acting in Not Our First Rodéo. The DVD version of the movie is in the works and will include a deleted scene, a deleted trailer and a few deleted outtakes that didn't make it online. The original motion picture soundtrack will also be used on the DVD. If anyone would like a copy of the DVD, contact by email at quietpoolperspective@gmail.com

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 12)

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 11)

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 10)

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 8)

So my week long battle with the WMG has ended. Although I did slip an Eric Clapton song by them, they wouldn't allow me to pair it with any other song in the world (this is what tripped me up for so long). I am pleased with what I ended up with during the Animal kingdom section, as i went with a Boz Scaggs mini-medley. In the original movie another mini-medley is used, a fantastic blend of the Four Season's 'Walk Like a Man' and 'Let's Hang On.'

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 7)

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 6)

So Part 6 is when I began to run into problems with the ridiculous WMG. They find it necessary to delete the audio any time you use one of their songs on YouTube. Hmmm, wouldn't it make sense to do what Sony does, and use this as free advertising? Sony not only let's you use their song, but makes a pop up ad show on screen telling you what the song is, who sings it and where you can buy it. The WMG just blocks you from having any fun what-so-ever. Needless to say, I had a lot of trouble getting a song to work with this particular part of the movie. The result is a less effective song choice with the particular segment. Luckily the first beginning of this is so classic that it doesn't matter.

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 5)

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 4)

To the left we have Pops and Ttime (wearing his kimono) getting some snacks during intermission. Why does Ttime have a kimono? Oh because he went to Japan when he was in high school because he is a big nerd. Watch part four of Not Our First Rodéo and enjoy.

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 3)

Here we have part three of 'Not Our First Rodéo.' What kind of premier would it have been without someone in a three piece, light blue suit from Salvation Army? A pretty lame one. Add to that Jayj with completely slicked back hair and a white tie, that sure is something. I don't know what it is, but it's something. Thanks to The Bonz and JJ for keeping it classy. Watch part three and enjoy.

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 2)

Now part two has more of a Home Alone 1 feel, but the question I have is what is with that mean airplane captain? Is his name Gil? As you see I went with the standard black suit for the premier. To spice it up I got the semi faux hawk thing going on. Watch part two below and enjoy.

Not Our First Rodéo (Part 1)

After the "Whopper" trailer, another trailer starring JJ and The Bonz ensued. For undiscolsed reasons, it will not be posted here. "Not Our First Rodéo" began next and it starts off with a bang. There was plenty of popcorn, candy and soda going around. If you've seen "Home Alone 2," some parts may look familiar. Watch part one and enjoy.

That's a Whopper

JJ, The Bonz, Ttime, Jon the bon and myself returned from Florida on July 12th. From then until now I have been working around clock to make the first Quiet Pool Productions film. Don't get me wrong I went to work everyday and took some time to watch Big Brother, Entourage and True Blood, but other than that I was eating and breathing Pinnacle Studio. Last weekend "Not Our First Rodéo" premiered at Casa Forcella and it was a huge success.

Since Google got rid of large video uploading, I will be using YouTube, which only allows for 10 minute segments. The first installment of the "Not Our First Rodéo" experience is the trailer for "Whopper: The Jerry Griffin Story."

Enjoy the show.

Top Movies- 90s vs. 00s

With a couple of the Sports Guy's recent podcasts touching on the topic of movie of the decade, it got me thinking a bit. One of the points made was that the 00s didn't have as many great/iconic movies as the 90s. At first I thought, "isn't it too early to grade the 00s since we haven't had enough time to reflect on the films?" I then went ahead and took a look at our trusty Imdb Top 250.

These are the movies from the 90s in the imdb top 50

1. Shawshank Redemption
5. Pulp Fiction
6. Schindler's List
15. Goodfellas
20. Fight Club
22. Usual Suspects
24. Silence of the Lambs
27. The Matrix
32. Se7en
35. Leon
37. American Beauty
39. American History X
42. Forrest Gump

...pretty unbelievable list

And here are the movies from the 00s in the top 50.

7. The Dark Knight
13. LotR- Return of the King
17. City of God
21. LotR- Fellowship of the Ring
25. Up
29. Memento
33. LotR- Two Towers
43. Wall-E
45. Amelie

...that is a pretty pathetic list. Three out of the nine are Lord of the Rings. Not that Return of the King wasn't great, but the first two? Come on. Two Pixars that are not in the same realm as Toy Story and Monsters Inc.

Either there is a flaw in the imdb system, or the 90s dominated the 00s in movies.