2003 in film.

Top ten box-office films of 2003:

1. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
2. Finding Nemo
3. The Matrix Reloaded
4. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
5. Bruce Almighty
6. The Last Samurai
7. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machine
8. The Matrix Revolutions
9. X2
10. Bad Boys II

What are your top three films for 2003? We will keep a running tally and eventually have some sort of bracket. For me it would be:

1. Lost in Translation
2. Elephant
3. Dogville

What are some of the forgotten gems from the year? What is overrated? What did you discover at a young age and what did you discover later?

YEARS IN FILM • forum.chorus.fm

 

1. House of 1000 Corpses
2. Elephant
3. A Mighty Wind

 

I want to give The Room a special mention. It feels too weird to put it in the top 3 because it's objectively terrible, but I've definitely spent more time thinking about it than anything else in this list.

1. Lost in Translation
2. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
3. Kill Bill Vol. 1

Honorable mentions:

Big Fish
A Mighty Wind
Bad Santa
Dogville
Finding Nemo
All the Real Girls
School of Rock
Pirates of the Caribbean (the rest of the series sucks, but I maintain the first one is a great adventure flick)

 

Oh man House of a 1000 Corpses rules, I was struggling to to find a number 3 because it wasn't on any lists.

going to give Elephant a watch but for now

1. Dogville
2. Lost in Translation
3. House of a 1000 Corpses

There's so many movies from this year I remember seeing on low quality pirated DVDs my dad got from his pilot friend who brought them back from Singapore. Master & Commander to my minds recollection is the darkest movie I've ever seen, just all black, people walking in front of the handycam, no idea what was going in the night battles.

 

1. Return of the King
2. Memories of Murder
3. Oldboy

These three could have been assembled in basically any order and I would be cool with it

 

Memories of Murder
Kill Bill
Big Fish

HM: Oldboy, The Station Agent, Bad Santa, and The Room

 

1. House of 1000 Corpses
2. Kill Bill Vol. 1
3. Monster

 

1. Lost in Translation
2. Kill Bill
3. All the Real Girls

 

1. Lost in Translation
2. Memories of Murder
3. Elephant

 

1. Old Boy
2. Kill Bill Vol. 1
3. Big Fish

4. Lost in Translation
5. Return of the King
6. Dogville
7. Tokyo Godfathers
8. 21 Grams
9. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring
10. Matchstick Men


Also love Pirates of the Caribean, Bad Santa, Gozu, Memories of Murder, Elf, Haggard, Time of the Wolf, School of Rock and House of 1000 Corpses.

 

1. House of 1000 Corpses
2. Return of the King
3. Elephant

 

It is an incredibly special film.
I just checked Tommys wiki and apparently, he has a another self written/directed/produced film in post.


Im happy he's made another film, but im doubtful whether anything could capture the magic of his first.

 

1. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
2. Finding Nemo
3. Kill Bill: Volume 1


Honorable mentions:

Lost in Translation
The Station Agent
Old Boy
School of Rock
Elf
Love Actually
Tokyo Godfathers
The Fog of War

 

1. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
2. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
3. The Station Agent

 

The first two for this year were locked in long ago but picking my third choice was a bit more difficult but regardless they are the following -

1. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
2. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
3. X2

The following in bold were contenders for that third spot with the rest being other notable releases I enjoy; Kill Bill: Vol. 1, The Last Samurai, Monster, Open Range, Finding Nemo, School of Rock, Mystic River, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Bad Santa, Shattered Glass, The Matrix Reloaded, One Missed Call, Holes, Final Destination 2, Intolerable Cruelty, Matchstick Men, Runaway Jury, and Underworld.

 

1. Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
2. Kill Bill: Volume 1
3. Finding Nemo

 

Me seeing people pick films that aren’t Return of the King:

 

We need a miracle to correct this.

 

I was sure Lost in Translation was going to sweep

 

same

we are doomed once the mcu starts

 

I'd be kinda surprised if anything MCU actually won one of these. Maybe something like Guardians? I think The Dark Knight or Spider-Verse probably have the best shot in terms of comic book movies.

 

Going for a Korean top three.

1. Oldboy
2. Memories of Murder
3. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... And Spring

Oldboy is a visceral, exciting and horrifying film abut revenge, that manages to be both comic and utterly bleak. I saw it in the cinema a few years ago, for (I guess?) the 15 year anniversary of it with a friend who'd literally never heard of it before, which was great fun. Having Spike Lee remake this a decade later, with Josh Brolin is one of the more confusing Hollywood decisions in recent years.

Memories of Murder is an unsettling, uncomfortable film about violence, and vigilante justice. It's a film also about structural rot, with the incompetent police force rotten from top to bottom, unable to set aside their own prejudices, and violent instincts to find the killer.

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... And Spring is a meditative, slow moving films, about an older monk and a child living on a temple in a lake. The film is made up of five segments, spanning a lifetime, with the last two dialogue-free. It's a contemplative film, and nothing like what Kim Ki Duk would do prior, or post this.

For some honourable mentions;

Sticking in Korea, there's the iconic horror film A Tale of Two Sisters, which would prove hugely influential for the next decade or so of mainstream horror.

A couple of quiet, slow moving Taiwanese films, Tsai Ming-liang's Goodbye Dragon Inn, about the final showing of 60s Wuxia classic Dragon Inn at a crumbling cinema, and Hou Hsiao-hsien's Cafe Lumiere, which feels like a tribute or sorts to Ozu.

From China, there's the very underrated Blind Shaft, about a pair of men who murder people in China's unregulated mines, pass it off as an accident and then extort the bosses for cash. Bleak, but a fascinating look at rural China.

From Russia, I really like Andrey Zvyagintsev's The Return, about two young boys and the sudden arrival of their mysterious and sinister father, who takes them on a trip.

From Mongolia, we have the debut of one of my favourite film-makers, Byambasuren Davaa with The Story of the Weeping Camel, which like most of her films is either a documentary with a little bit of narrative thrown in, or a narrative film with a huge documentary aesthetic, about life on the steppes of Mongolia.

A couple of good animated films, Satoshi Kon's Tokyo Godfathers, which is much more grounded than his previous work. There's also The Triplets of Belleville, which is a mostly dialogue-free film, with plenty of wonderful imagery and imagination.

From America, I'm a big fan of the Coen's Intolerable Cruelty, their screwball farcical romance. Big Fish, something different from Tim Burton, is also a romantic film, and a film of tall tales and fantasy.

From France, there's Haneke's Time of the Wolf, which is a rare thing in that it's a Haneke film that's actually post-apocalyptic, as opposed to just feeling like one. François Ozon's Swimming Pool is a fun, psychosexual film about a middle aged writer and a young woman in a little French chalet in the countryside.

Finally, there's the charming Goodbye Lenin, about a woman who awakens from a coma after the Berlin Wall falls, and her son has to put up an elaborate ruse to keep her from finding out.

 

Surprised and intrigued to see House of 1000 Corpses popping up so much - I'm vaguely aware of it, but I didn't have any idea that it was particularly loved or well regarded.

 

i would not be surprised at all given this site

 

1. Dogville
2. Elephant
3. Oldboy

very strong top 3. There are plenty of years where Lost in Translation and Memories of Murder would be listed but I couldn’t quite put them in. Master and Commander is often overlooked but I rewatched it recently and it really holds up.