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Daren in Brief - DECADE'S BEST I
by Daren Foster

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Daren in Brief
Decade's Best I

by Daren Foster

If you ask me, the third week in November is a little early to be summing up Best Of movies and TV Lists. With nearly 6 weeks left in the final year of the decade, who’s to say there won’t be a mad rush of 10 or 15 stunningly magnificent movies that will absolutely alter what we think of as a fixed cinematic landscape? (A less likely scenario in terms of television since networks don’t tend to roll out new offerings this late in the season).

Yet I will forge on nonetheless, rolling out my Top 20 Movies and Top 10 TV Shows over the course of the next few weeks, from bottom to top in a fashion to heighten the suspense as the world breathlessly awaits to hear what I think. All with the caveat that things may change as I see the likes of Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox or Pedro Almodóvar’s Broken Embraces.

First, I want to note two late bumps from my movie list. 2001’s Y tu mamá también, a sun drenched Mexican sex.. romp? Well not a romp exactly. More of a sweaty, disturbing roll in the hay which introduced the los hermanos Cuarón to the wider movie going public. Then there is You Can Count On Me from 2000. A quietly potent drama about a barely functional family featuring the best ensemble acting that springs immediately to mind. Laura Linney. Mark Ruffalo. Matthew Broderick. Check, check and check.

And now to the list:

#20) The Fountain (2006)

Writer-director Darren Aronofsky took a slight step out from under the unrelenting bleakness of his previous films like Pi and Requiem for a Dream without sacrificing any of the ingenious, low budget creativity that had made them so engaging to watch. The Fountain is a loopy, multiple storied narrative that explores themes of love and mortality in the present, the Spanish conquistador in the New World past and Arthur C. Clarke/Stanley Kubrick future. Hugh Jackman shoulders the load admirably, showing no signs of the song-and-dance man, Wolverine franchise movie whore he has become over the last couple years. Aronofsky also embraced the mushy mainstream with his next movie, The Wrestler, in such a movie-of-the-week fashion, I had to keep reminding myself that this was the same guy who did The Fountain.