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While we disagree with David Lynch -- he said that there were so many good movies at the Cannes Film Festival that the jury needed to hand out extra awards -- we found a few nuggets. The following is a top five, in order: Bowling for Columbine: A documentary winning the top prize, the Palme D'Or? Zut alors! It didn't happen, but it should have. Armed with a budget that most nonfiction filmmakers would envy, Michael Moore puts our nation's obsession with guns in the crosshairs and hits the bull's-eye. A bank that gives away a gun with every new account? How we wish it weren't true. Absurdities abound as Moore shows how we became the gun-murder capital of the world. The film strays on a few tangents. But it never lets us forget that while we face a new foreign enemy, we are still better at killing ourselves. Sweet Sixteen: Director Ken Loach gets a nod here for finding naturalistic young actors Martin Compston and William Ruane. The story arc lands where it should in this bleak landscape. Sure, you need subtitles to figure out what the Scottish lads are saying, but Loach proves fluent in lower-class struggles. Ma's in jail, and Liam (Compston) is heading that way if he can't free himself from the tentacles of his gangster-pal, who has no self-control. The title of the movies is ironic. This ain't John Hughes. 24-Hour Party People: This film could be about Manchester's drive to get on the musical map. But it works better as a study of one impressario's ego. Tony Wilson, played with aplomb by Steve Coogan, was one of the founding fathers of the punk new-wave movement of the late '70s and '80s: his Factory Records signed Joy Division, which gave way to New Order. Among the drugs, sex and rock and roll, everybody and everything bled red ink. Director Michael Winterbottom has a thing for pioneers. Seeing these bonehead trailblazers will keep you laughing while you dust off your Sex Pistols records. Punch-Drunk Love: Paul Thomas Anderson's first comedy doesn't quite know what it wants to be, and that's OK. Adam Sandler uses his hair-trigger temper from previous mainstream comedies to more human effect. He's an enterprising lug who sells knick-knacks and collects frequent-flier miles through a promotional offer. Then he meets the girl of his dreams (Emily Watson) and the girl of his nightmares (Mary Lynn Rajskub), a sex-line operator who will not let him off the hook. Anderson, who mined the collective despair of Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley in "Magnolia," explores a quirkier side of this much-maligned suburb. Demonlover: The host country gets its due with a good-bad story that ends about five times. Olivier Assayas' take on corporate greed in the world of cyber porn has no characters to like. Its intrigue is muddled by cheap cuts between dreams and reality. And its sadomasochistic angle is straight out of a 1980s cable movie. So why extol the wretchedness of a wretched movie? Because we were entertained.
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