02-07-2025
A beloved Hong Kong film has ranked fourth place in the New York Times' 100 best movies of the 21st century
We all love a good list, and the New York Times has recently dropped a banger. They rounded up over 500 influential directors, actors, and big names from Hollywood and all over the world to vote on the best film released since 2000, and gathered the results to give us a list of the best 100 movies of the 21st century – and a Hong Kong film ranked within the top 10.
Out of the many stellar films picked by industry experts, such as City of God, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, The Favourite, and Y Tu Mamá También, Wong Kar-wai's In the Mood for Love has been ranked as the fourth best movie made within this century. The smouldering movie, filled with silent longing, cigarette smoke, and repressed desire, is undoubtedly the most widely known of Wong's works around the world. It also helps that a moody, charming Tony Leung Chiu-wai and the beautiful Maggie Cheung, clad in a rotation of the best cheongsam dresses to ever be captured on film, are there to grace viewers' screens for an hour and 40 minutes.
Director Sofia Coppola was among the names who voted for In the Mood for Love, saying of her choice: 'It really blew my mind that you could make films … as a poetic medium that doesn't have to spell everything out.' Another Hong Kong-related mention to make the list is Ang Lee's martial arts epic Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, starring the inimitable Chow Yun-fat and Michelle Yeoh, which ranked at number 16. Notably, the only other animated movie in the top 10 spots is Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, a fantastical adventure that deals with the loss of innocence, bravery, and humans' corruption of nature, all wrapped up in spellbindingly gorgeous visuals and a stellar soundtrack.
Topping the New York Times' 100 best movies of the century is Bong Joon-ho's 2019 black comedy thriller Parasite. For those that have yet to see it – and there are probably very few of you out there – the Oscar-winning picture follows a poor Korean family that worms their way into the lives of a wealthy household, in an unsettling but at times wildly funny social satire. See below for the list of top 10 movies, and visit the New York Times for the full list.
10 best movies of the 21st century, according to the New York Times:
Parasite by Bong Joon-ho, 2019
Mulholland Drive by David Lynch, 2001
There Will Be Blood by Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007
In the Mood for Love by Wong Kar-wai, 2001
Moonlight by Barry Jenkins, 2016
No Country for Old Men by Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, 2007
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind by Michel Gondry, 2004
Get Out by Jordan Peele, 2017
Spirited Away by Hayao Miyazaki, 2002
The Social Network by David Fincher, 2010
