The 21st Century’s Most Acclaimed Films

is an annually updated amalgamation of critics' end-of-year, end-of-decade, all-time, and miscellaneous lists/ballots relating to films released from 2000 onwards. It contains, based on TSPDT's calculations, the 1,000 leading films (critically-speaking) from 2000 to 2019. It has been compiled from the multiple lists/ballots of 3,573 critics/sources.



As per the January update of the

1,000 Greatest Films

, this year's

21st Century’s Most Acclaimed Films

listing has also been influenced (even more so, of course) by the plethora of best-of-2010s lists that bombarded the internet. The net result was a swap of 56 films between the first two decades of this century, i.e. the number of films from 2000-2009 on this listing reduced by 56, to make way for 56 films from 2010-2019. Not to be underestimated,

BBC Culture's

poll to find

has also given many female-directed films from this century a boost.







In summary, a total of 81 films came and went for this edition, including 32 entrants from 2018 and 2019. Some notable movements were as follows-:



- Terrence Malick's

The Tree of Life

entered the top five.

- Apichatpong Weerasethakul becomes the first director with two films in the top ten after

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives

rose 13 spots, from 23 to 10.



- Holy Motors

(Leos Carax),

Mad Max: Fury Road

(George Miller),

Boyhood

(Richard Linklater),

The Social Network

(David Fincher),

Under the Skin

(Jonathan Glazer),

Amour

(Michael Haneke),

Moonlight

(Barry Jenkins),

The

Act of Killing

(Joshua Oppenheimer),

Toni Erdmann

(Maren Ade) and

The Master

(Paul Thomas Anderson) were all major benefactors of the end-of-decade polls, and are all now comfortably positioned within the Top 50.

- The highest entrant, no surprises here, was Bong Joon-ho's

Parasite

.

- The biggest climber within the Top-1000 was another South Korean product: Hong Sang-soo's

Right Now, Wrong Then

, which featured in many end-of-decade ballots.

- The biggest climber within the Top-250 was Lucrecia Martel's

Zama

.







TSPDT's 50 Most Critically-Acclaimed Films of 2019 (based only on 2019 end-of-year ballots)



According to

TSPDT's

numbers (and seemingly everybody else's), Bong Joon-ho's all-conquering, Oscar-winning

Parasite

was clearly the most critically-acclaimed film of 2019. Fantastic to see four film women filmmakers in the top ten, including - for mine - the best film (that I've so far seen) from 2019:

Portrait of a Lady on Fire

.





1. PARASITE Bong Joon-ho

2. ONCE UPON A TIME... IN HOLLYWOOD Quentin Tarantino

3. THE IRISHMAN Martin Scorsese

4. THE SOUVENIR Joanna Hogg

5. MARRIAGE STORY Noah Baumbach

6. PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE Céline Sciamma

7. UNCUT GEMS Benny Safdie & Josh Safdie

8. PAIN AND GLORY Pedro Almodóvar

9. LITTLE WOMEN Greta Gerwig

10. THE FAREWELL Lulu Wang



————————————————————————————





Directors with the most films in the 21st Century list:









Breakdown of 1,000 films by Year:



2000 = 64 (-7)

2001 = 54 (-9)

2002 = 68 (-3)

2003 = 59 (-11)

2004 = 71 (+1)

2005 = 48 (-7)

2006 = 63 (-6)

2007 = 55 (-6)

2008 = 55 (-5)

2009 = 48 (-3)

2010 = 51 (+1)

2011 = 50 (+1)

2012 = 47 (+2)

2013 = 45 (+2)

2014 = 46 (+4)

2015 = 43 (+5)

2016 = 38 (+3)

2017 = 39 (+6)



2018 = 34 (+10)

2019 = 22 (+22)





Breakdown of 1,000 films by Decade:





2000-2009 = 585 (-56)

2010-2019 = 415 (+56)









Breakdown of 1,000 films by Country (Top 10 in bold):



Argentina 13 (+2), Australia 11 (+1), Austria 8 (-2), Belgium 7, Brazil 8 (+1), Cambodia 2,

Canada 20

, Chad 1, Chile 5,

China 21 (+3)

, Colombia 2 (+2), Czech Republic 1, Denmark 8 (-1), Ethiopia 1, Finland 4,

France 121

,

Germany 25

, Greece 3, Hong Kong 7 (-1), Hungary 3, India 3 (-1), Indonesia 3, Iran 13 (-1), Iraq 1 (+1), Ireland 8, Israel 4 (-1),

Italy 19 (-2)

,

Japan 22 (-3)

, Mali 1, Mauritania 1, Mexico 7, Nepal 1, Netherlands 3, New Zealand 5 (+1), Norway 2, Philippines 3, Poland 2, Portugal 14 (+5), Romania 9 (-1), Russia 8 (-1), Saudi Arabia 1, Senegal 1, South Africa 1,

South Korea 26 (5)

,

Spain 22

, Sweden 12, Switzerland 3, Taiwan 8, Thailand 7, Turkey 5, Ukraine 1,

United Kingdom 97 (+2)

, Uruguay 1,

USA 415 (-17)

.





For those that disagree with the inclusion of made-for-television content in the

21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films

listing, listed below are the seven titles that would be included to replace

Li'l Quinquin

,

The Century of the Self

,

The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear

,

The Wire

,

When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts

,

O.J.: Made in America

,

a

nd

Twin Peaks: The Return

-:





Exhibition

(Joanna Hogg, 2013)



Fast Five

(Justin Lin, 2011)



Knight of Cups

(Terrence Malick, 2015)



The Last Black Man in San Francisco

(Joe Talbot, 2019)



Time of the Wolf

(Michael Haneke, 2003)



House of Sand and Fog

(Vadim Perelman, 2003)



The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

(David Fincher, 2011)





Please Note-:

Disappointingly, due to time constraints, I was unable to include all the end-of-decade lists contributed by many of you good people. These will be included for next year's update, so expect to see 2010-2019 films get a further little kick along in the 2021 edition.



Begin browsing the 2020 edition of

.





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⊡

1. IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE Wong Kar-wai2. MULHOLLAND DR. David Lynch3. YI YI Edward Yang4. THERE WILL BE BLOOD Paul Thomas Anderson5. THE TREE OF LIFE Terrence Malick6. SPIRITED AWAY Hayao Miyazaki7. ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND Michel Gondry8. CACHÉ Michael Haneke9. TROPICAL MALADY Apichatpong Weerasethakul10. UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES Apichatpong WeerasethakulCéline Sciamma's11. KNIVES OUT Rian Johnson12. ATLANTICS Mati Diop13. US Jordan Peele14. MIDSOMMAR Ari Aster15. TRANSIT Christian Petzold16. AD ASTRA James Gray17. THE LIGHTHOUSE Robert Eggers18. HIGH LIFE Claire Denis19. MONOS Alejandro Landes20. HUSTLERS Lorene Scafaria21. BOOKSMART Olivia Wilde22. THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANCISCO Joe Talbot23. A HIDDEN LIFE Terrence Malick24. BAIT Mark Jenkin25. JOKER Todd Phillips26. UNDER THE SILVER LAKE David Robert Mitchell27. ASH IS PUREST WHITE Jia Zhangke28. HONEYLAND Ljubomir Stefanov & Tamara Kotevska29. FOR SAMA Waad al-Kateab & Edward Watts30. VITALINA VARELA Pedro Costa31. HER SMELL Alex Ross Perry32. JOJO RABBIT Taika Waititi33. LONG DAY'S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT Bi Gan34. 1917 Sam Mendes35. DOLEMITE IS MY NAME Craig Brewer36. WAVES Trey Edward Shults37. APOLLO 11 Todd Douglas Miller38. SYNONYMS Nadav Lapid39. I LOST MY BODY Jérémy Clapin40. AMERICAN FACTORY Steven Bognar & Julia Reichert41. HAPPY AS LAZZARO Alice Rohrwacher42. CLIMAX Gaspar Noé43. BORDER Ali Abbasi44. BEANPOLE Kantemir Balagov45. AN ELEPHANT SITTING STILL Hu Bo46. IN FABRIC Peter Strickland47. MARTIN EDEN Pietro Marcello48. TOY STORY 4 Josh Cooley49. A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD Marielle Heller50. GIVE ME LIBERTY Kirill Mikhanovsky8 - Christopher Nolan, Martin Scorsese, Claire Denis, Richard Linklater7 - Quentin Tarantino, Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, Steven Spielberg, Jia Zhangke, Wes Anderson6 - Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Jean-Luc Godard, Frederick Wiseman, David Cronenberg, Hong Sang-soo, Bong Joon-ho5 - Edgar Wright, Denis Villeneuve, Darren Aronofsky, Clint Eastwood, Alfonso Cuarón, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Jean-Pierre Dardenne & Luc Dardenne, Gus Van Sant, Abbas Kiarostami, James Gray, Michael Haneke, Mike Leigh, Noah Baumbach, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Olivier Assayas, Paul Thomas Anderson, Pedro Almodóvar, Pedro Costa, Spike Lee, Steven Soderbergh, Tsai Ming-liang, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Lars von Trier, Jafar PanahiThanks again to everyone who contributed to the compilation of this edition (and previous editions for that matter) and to everyone who has contacted me with their ongoing support. Your enthusiasm and assistance is very much appreciated. Please email your feedback (good, bad, or ugly) to bill@theyshootpictures.com