The Ten Most Influential Films Of The Last Ten Years

The Ten Most Influential Films Of The Last Ten Years

By Brendon Connelly/April 16, 2009 8:55 am EST

Are these the ten most influential films of the last ten years? I think they might just be. Disappointingly, I really don’t like four of them. I’ve also cheated and only included English language films.

The full list will come after the break, and then after that will come the comments section for your contributions.

Here’s the list in no particular order. I’ll follow up with my ideas on why these films might turn out to be so darned influential.

There all manner of other films that have pioneered small advances – for example,the anamorphic zoom lenses put to task on He’s Just Not That Into You were a genuine benchmark in camera technology and, like Coraline, that film hit screens in just the last few months. I didn’t dare include it because I thought I’d get lynched for a dropping light, fluffy rom-com into the list.

I was also tempted to include Soderbergh’s Che double bill, for proving that the Red One is capable of incredibly high digital image quality at a low price and with low fuss – but no one film in particular really seems to have started that ball rolling so Knowing, for example, could have been cited as equally important.

The Blair Witch Project is not on the list because I think we’re approaching the end of its period of influence and I wouldn’t say the same for any of the ten I picked.

That’s my ten, then, and I think I’m sticking with them.

Ten years wrapped up and then finally, I suppose, comes a question: Which of these films would have been kicked off to make room for Avatar had it already hit the silver screen?