1. The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl (Ray Müller, 1993) It doesn’t answer the eternal question, “Did she sit on Hitler’s face?” but this hilarious portrait proves that evil doesn’t have to be banal: It can also be insane entertainment.
2. Happiness (Todd Solondz, 1998) Marks the welcome return of Louise Lasser to films that can match her anguishing drollery.
3. Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999) Anybody who doesn’t adore this movie is brain-dead.
4. Crash (David Cronenberg, 1996) A banquet of prosthetically augmented homoerotica and disfigurement fetishism that made me want to smash into a Buick the minute I left the theater.
5. Go (Doug Liman, 1999) Pulp Fiction for people with an actual sense of humor.
6. Flirting with Disaster (David O. Russell, 1996) I like everything this director does. He’s probably a monster.
7. Summer of Sam (Spike Lee, 1999) John Leguizamo’s the only one of those one-man bores who can actually act in a movie with more than one character in it.
8. Fight Club (David Fincher, 1999) A brilliant film about consumer society that stupid people think is more violent than the average episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
9. The New Age (Michael Tolkin, 1992) Judy Davis and Peter Weller as the Laurel and Hardy of dysfunction.
10. Ed Wood (Tim Burton, 1994) A loving re-creation of a time when failure in the movie business had its compensatory charms for raving eccentrics who drank too much.
