Terrance Malick's incredibly divisive masterpiece. The Tree of Life is incredibly self indulgent yet somehow overcomes all of its art house trappings to become an exercise in spiritual story telling. Not many movies try to tackle subjects as expansive as spirituality and the nature of belief but Malick succeeds as much as one director can in handling his story. To see how brilliant The Tree of Life really is you only have to look at a movie like Prometheus that tried to tackle similar themes and failed. The vague characterization is one thing that helped the message communicate with an audience. A Malick film is rarely ever an actor's showcase since he has always been a director who focuses more on his startling eye for visuals to tell his stories. With The Tree of Life his visual characteristics more prominently displayed than they've ever been before to brilliant effect.
11. Barton Fink (1991)
The most fully realized of all the Coen Brother's movies. Barton Fink is the perfect blend of what makes their movies some of the most beloved of the past 25 years. It has their trademark quirky humor and wit while presenting characters and plotlines that go way out of the ordinary. The story of a lonely writer who can't think of any solid ideas to write about has been done many times before but never as well as in Barton Fink. The film uses a very simple story of Barton trying to cure his writer's block to explore the nature of the creative process itself. Every detail mirrors this from the set design of Barton's peeling wallpaper to the mysterious friendship he develops with John Goodman's character Charlie. The Coen's have made many brilliant films but Barton Fink is their most well told yet.