stronger one, which Adaptation explores via the introduction of Kaufmans twin brother Donald, an affable guy who woos pretty women and effortlessly knocks out screenplays about sympathetic serial killers. The first two-thirds of Adaptation plays much better than the somewhat spirit-deflating final third (which becomes a dopey Hollywood version of the story), but philosophically the movies all of a piece. Jonze and Kaufman play around with the paralyzing multiplicity of their choices in life and art, and discoverironicallythat the rigidity of conventional storytelling can be liberating.45. Audition (2001)Given Takeshi Miikes notoriety as the prolific source of extreme J-horror, newcomers to his work could be forgiven for spending the first hour of Audition thinking theyd walked into the wrong theater. Nothing shocking here, just a subtle, gently comic, even Ozu-like story of a widower who uses his position as a TV producer to audition actresses to be his girlfriend. Then he finds a prim, mysterious young woman to play the part, and the movie shifts gears dramatically. Beyond the mayhem and horrors that follow lies a female revenge tale thats simultaneously psychotic and righteous, as she executes a hell hath no fury scenario worthy of Medea. Ideally, Audition should be watched with no knowledge of Miike or the twists to come, but even for the jaded horror junkie, its as bracing and original as the genre gets.44. 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days (2007)The sudden emergence of Romania on the international scene was one of the great revelations of the 00s, and no film better typified the urgency and political bite of the movement than Cristian Mungius agonizing drama about two women seeking an illegal abortion during the Ceausescu regime. Anamaria Marinca is especially fine as a friend who escorts her pregnant roommate through a harrowing series of obstacles, from a suspicious hotel clerk to a creepy black-market abortionist who extracts payment beyond money. And this is before the procedure itself, which has its own set of dangers. 4 Months plays out like a thriller in real time, and tours unforgettably through an era where fear, paranoia, and repression prevailed over the citizenry.43. Brokeback Mountain (2005)It can be prohibitively difficult to separate the considerable aesthetic merits of Brokeback Mountain from the culture-wide wave of controversy, snickering jokes, and embarrassed tittering it unleashed upon its 2005 release. Honestly, it was as if Americans had never seen a serious film about gay cowboys before. Four years on, its much easier to extract Ang Lees tragic romance from the hype. In a powerfully internal lead performance, Heath Ledger plays a tormented ranch hand who stumbles into a passionate affair with rodeo cowboy Jake Gyllenhaal while tending sheep one summer. Over the next two decades, their forbidden bond looms over their doomed attempts to conform to societys narrow conception of masculinity. Brokeback Mountain attains a devastating cumulative power as time, circumstances, and Ledgers profound ambivalence and self-loathing conspire to keep these two lovers apart. Though the seemingly incongruous juxtaposition of cowboy iconography and homosexuality made Brokeback Mountain a pop-culture phenomenon, it endures as a powerful, universal