List-journalism is always about provoking readers. And I’m falling for it when it comes to the New York Times ranking the top 100 films from the last 25 years.

Obviously the Coen Bros masterpiece No Country for Old Men deserved a very high ranking. It landed at number 6. Which, fine.

But the ranking of foreign-language films is frankly offensive. Amélie (41) was a little amuse bouche of a film. Somehow it outranks the absolutely devastating masterpiece The Lives of Others by Donnersmarck (48). To see Y Tu Mama Tambien rank all the way up at 18, when Cuarón’s far more moving, straightforward, and substantial film Gravity is in the 90s makes no sense. Michel Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is overrated into the top ten (8). That spot should go to Denis Villeneuve’s film Arrival, which they rank at 29. Weirdly, the top three spots are given to There Will Be Blood (3), Mulholland Drive (2), and Parasite (1), a film I don’t think most critics understand.

Some films I’d have included that were left out: Drive (2011), Goon (2011), and Spiderman 2 (2004) — (go back and watch Spiderman 2. Almost every shot conveys something about the relationship of one character to another. It’s better than the one superhero movie they did choose, The Dark Knight, of course). I might have picked Children of Men for the top slot. I would have included The Squid and the Whale rather than Frances Ha from Noah Baumbach. And I’d have ranked it in the top 30. The female equivalent of Master and Commander — endlessly rewatchable period fare — is Pride and Prejudice featuring Michael Macfadyen brilliantly cast as a mountainously austere Mr. Darcy. And though he loathes everything I write, I’d be wrong not to note that the list is also missing Whit Stillman’s Love and Friendship.