The Elevator Pitch

Writers are hopeless at summarising their work in any less words than the work itself. Listen to some poetry readings, and the introduction is longer than the poem. Artists do better at taking care of business. Damien Hirst might not be much of a painter, but he's a helluva entrepreneur. Movie makers have to be money raisers. The one minute - or one line - pitch is sometimes the only chance you get to sell your work to a promoter, publisher or producer. So I thought I'd get some practice in by coming up with an elevator pitch for some of my favourite movies of 2009, a few of which have already been reviewed at greater length on these pages.

The Wrestler

Has-been grapples with what-might-have-been.

Moon

Man talks to his selves in a room on the moon.

An Education

Slum landlord grooms young swot for marriage.

Creation

Darwin & daughter vs God & wife.

Synecdoche: New York

All the world's a stage and then you die.

Let the Right One in

Vampire girl falls for Swedish boy.

Broken Embraces

Gay director ravishes favourite actress with camera.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Foursome ends happily ever after.

Where the Wild Things Are

Wolf boy made monster king and then goes home for tea.

Slumdog Millionaire

Street kid wins girl in TV quiz show.

Frost / Nixon

Playboy takes on politician in blinking contest.

A Serious Man

Life is hard and that's funny.

Watchmen

Men in capes don't save the world.

The songs that defined a decade... The seventies

1. 'Paranoid' by Black Sabbath (1970)

If Led Zeppelin had been a singles group, they'd get my vote, but the ultimate metal band were Black Sabbath, and they had a chart-topping single all over the world with their debut 'Paranoid'. Harder and louder than anything before it - or anything since - Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler set the mood of a new decade, channelled through the voice of Ozzy Osbourne, a lyric so bleak it's brilliant.

2. 'Brown Sugar' by the Rolling Stones (1971)

Any number of Rolling Stones tracks stake a claim on great single status, but 'Brown Sugar' is their best riff of all, coupled with a lascivious Mick Jagger vocal and lyric that is truly nasty. This appears on one of their greatest albums - 'Sticky Fingers' - and a mesmerising movie - 'Gimme Shelter' - and is the epitome of what they are best at - hard blues-based rock you can shake your maracas to. Its live debut was at Altamont which ended the previous decade on a sour note, but this single kicked off the new one as the greatest rock'n'roll band meant to go on - and did, for a few more years at least.

3. 'Maggie May' by Rod Stewart (1971)

The biggest pratt in showbusiness - check the video - sure could write a song when he put his little mind to it. This number is based on the traditional Liverpudlian song of the same name, and was originally the B-side of the equally fine 'Reason to Believe' but became the A-side by default of airplay. According to Rod, it tells the true story of his first sexual experience with an older woman at the Beaulieu Jazz festival. Since then, Rod has concentrated on younger chicks, as he no doubt calls them. But for all his idiocy, this launched the solo career of what at the dawn of the decade was a singer-songwriter who could rock the house, not just the bedsit. Hence my failure to make space for a minstrel in the Carole King / James Taylor / Joni Mitchell, although most were album rather than singles artists. 'Heart of Gold' by Neil Young was in the reckoning as his only top ten hit but I like him too much to have him represented by such an unrepresentatively whiny dirge.

4. 'Walk on the Wild Side' by Lou Reed (1972)

I'd liked to have included a Velvet Underground song in my sixties selection but if they released a single, it sonly sold to their friends and relatives. That said, if based on the 'influential' criterion alone, The Velvets were a seminal sixties band, and can claim to be more influential now than The Beatles and Stones combined. The album 'Transformer' was produced by David Bowie - not the last time he'll appear in this list - and made Lou Reed a radio star, despite the distinctly un-radio-friendly lyrics that deal with transexuality, rent boys, oral sex and hard drugs. In doing so, it harked back to the Factory scene of the sixties, Andy Warhol always ahead of his time.

5. 'All the Young Dudes' by Mott the Hoople (1972)

David Bowie was the most significant artist of the seventies, reviving the careers of Lou Reed and Iggy Pop, defining the glam rock look and sound, before leaving it behind, ending the decade with Eno in Berlin having reinvented himself several times in between. If there is one song that encapsulates the early seventies, it is this one - written on the hoof to save Mott the Hoople from going under, it is a hymn not to youth but youthful self-destruction, a dark anthem if ever there was one.

6. 'Autobahn' by Kraftwerk (1974)

So far ahead of their time, it took the rest of the world 15 years to catch-up, Kraftwerk have had as much influence over the music of the last two decades as The Beatles while retaining the anonymity of machines. Listen to any of the early house or hip-hop records and you'll hear a Kraftwerk sample in there somewhere. Tune into the electropop sounds of the post-punk era and it's just Kraftwerk with the bpm turned up. Not content with creating a wholly new music, they matched it with a new aesthetic, while their stageshow broke all of the conventions of the time, then and now.

7. 'No Woman, No Cry' by Bob Marley (1975)

Reggae was the first 'world music' to become chart music internationally and Bob Marley, promoted by Chris Blackwell of Island Records, was largely responsible for it. He'd spent a decade with The Wailers in Jamaica developing not just his music but its message such that by the time he arrived on the world scene, he did so with the presence of an icon, not an ingenu. In reality, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer had long been exploring how their music could be evolved for a wider market and by what means they could broadcast it beyond the Caribbean. 'No Woman, No Cry' was Bob Marley's first hit as a solo artist in 1975; re-released in its 'Live 1975' version after his premature death, it propelled the 'Legend' compilation to the top of the charts; it has now sold over twenty million copies.

8. 'Anarchy in the UK' by The Sex Pistols (1976)

If punk is to be represented by one song, this is it - spat from the TV into our living rooms, it feels like an assault now; three decades ago, it was a declaration of war. No single before or since has had its visceral power. Forget your Claptons and Becks, Steve Jones is the greatest rock guitarist of all time. Hearing Johnny Rotten's vocal is like being shouted at by a lunatic and finding yourself agreeing with him, whatever it is he's trying to say. As well as being the man behind the melody line, this is the only Pistols record Glen Matlock lent his bass to while Paul Cook had an unerring knack for maintaining the beat amidst the chaos that invariably surrounded the band live. If rock music produces another record of this power, intensity and impact I'll eat my grandmother.

9. 'I Feel Love' by Donna Summer (1977)

Most of disco hasn't dated well, sounding limp compared with the electronic dance music that followed. Giorgio Moroder's all-synthesised backing tracks still sounds like the future, not some idea of the future from the past. When Brian Eno heard it in Berlin working with David Bowie, he declared it would define the future of dance music for the next fifteen years. Thirty, more like.

10. 'Wuthering Heights' by Kate Bush (1978)

One of those rare songs that seems to come out of nowhere, sounds like a classic but is like nothing else you'd heard before. If there is a girl out there who has the talent to write and perform such a work before her teenage years are over, let her step forward now. Written in a few hours after seeing the film of the Emily Bronte novel, Kate Bush confirmed her special genius already established five years earlier when she wrote 'The Man With the Child in His Eyes' as a thirteen year old; it became her second single, and would sit just as prettily on this list. I've failed to make a Devon connection in my seventies selection, but Kate lives out near Start Point; she likes to be left alone, and so do I.

The songs that defined a decade... The noughties

Okay, this might go a bit dad at the disco, but I've set myself a task, so I'm going to see it through...

1. 'Yellow' by Coldplay (2000)

No, I don't like it either, despite Devon being centre of the musical universe in the noughties, Coldplay and Muse being the UK's bona fide international stadium filling acts, and Will Young being the reality show star it's almost okay to like - but not quite. However, it's hard to deny that this record did define the sound of mainstream - it is hardly Indie in label or inclination - lite rock for the decade, and many imitators followed, posh lads with pianos crooning yearningly vague lyrics like this one.

2. 'I Can't Get You Out of My Head' by Kylie Minogue (2001)

Being a child of the eighties, I really didn't think I'd be proclaiming a Kylie track as not just one of the defining songs of the decade more than twenty years after her debut, but a dance-pop classic to be enjoyed on its own terms, preferably on a crowded dancefloor. Written by Cathy Dennis (a solo star of the early nineties) and Rob Davis (formerly guitarist with Mud, and composer of 'Groovejet (If This Ain't Love)' which was another contender in this genre, as were The Scissor Sisters, who have their own Kylie connections), the single went to number one in forty countries, and has soundtrack'd many a great night out at the discotheque. Oh, and 'Spinning Around' deserves a mention too, if only for those gold hot pants.

3. 'Lose Yourself' by Eminem (2002)

With hip-hop and r'n'b becoming the commercial mainstream of the decade, my list might seem a little light on rap, but this track broke all records (number one in twenty-four countries, the most successful rap song of all time) crossed all boundaries (it's been used as a motivational piece in primary schools and is a perennial at sporting events) won both an Oscar and a Grammy and deservedly so. It is also the lead single off the soundtrack to 8 Mile, that rare thing - a movie about music that works for the non-fan.

4. 'Hey Ya!' by Outkast (2003)

Outkast became a pair of solo acts joined at the hip only by a shared moniker, so this could equally be described as an Andre 3000 solo track, and although the duo were born in hip-hop, this is closer to funk, but what it is first and foremost is POP, leaping out of the speakers and asking you to dance. For the visually inclined, the video is also a masterpiece of its kind, featuring a cast of Andres dressed as jockeys and golf caddies mimicking The Beatles' 1964 debut performance on The Ed Sullivan Show.

5. 'White Flag' by Dido (2003)

Again, not a track that would ever trouble my stereo, but at the time it provided the musical accompaniment to many a yuppie dinner party. It must have a secret place in more CD collections than I care to contemplate, 'Life for Rent' (the album it was the lead single off) selling over ten million copies worldwide and being in the top ten selling titles of the decade. I blame Eminem's 'Stan' for making her famous, and almost regret not including it in place of 'Lose Yourself' to do Dildo without having to give her a slot of her own. Others in the 'boring music for boring people' slot include the comeback of Take That - if your Granny likes it, it's probably not very good but 'Patience' is a consummate pop song - and James Blunt, may he be stuck in Sesame Street hell forever.

6. 'Crazy in Love' by Beyonce featuring Jay-Z (2003)

R'n'B has been the dominant sound of the decade and few would deny that Beyonce is the queen of the genre, while Jay-Z is not only her husband but hip-hop's premier artist-entrepreneur; between them, their record sales are well into nine figures; together, they are black America's second couple, next to the Obamas. As for the record, it really is an arse-shaker and take it from me, that really is a compliment.

7. 'I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor' by The Arctic Monkeys (2005)

There's only space for one indie anthem of the noughties, but this one earns its right to decade defining status on several counts. For a start, it demonstrated the power of the internet to hype a band from nowhere to chart topping status, barely touching the sides of the mainstream media in the process. More importantly, it was our first listen to Alex Turner, the best British lyricist since Morrissey. An honourable mention to The Strokes for 'Last Nite' without this, the careers of the likes of The Arctic Monkeys, The Kaiser Chiefs ('I Predict a Riot') and The Libertines ('Can't Stand Me Now') and Franz Ferdinand ('Take Me Out') - not to mention the American contingent such as The Killers ('Mr Brightside') and Kings of Leon ('Sex on Fire') - might never have happened.

8. 'Crazy' by Gnarls Barkley (2006)

One of those songs that came from nowhere and stayed around forever, Crazy was the first song to top the charts by download sales alone, a good couple of years before the MP3 was the dominant medium for the purchase of music. Gnarls Barkley is a collaboration between Danger Mouse and Cee-Lo. Nothing in their previous careers prepared them for success on this scale and they've failed to repeat it, but if this is all they're remembered for, remembered they will be - after nine weeks at number one, they deleted it from the catalogue to save us from the unlikely event of getting bored by it.

9. 'Rehab' by Amy Winehouse (2007)

Somewhere around the middle of the decade, a bunch of girls were doing retro soul, jazz and ska and as good as 'Frank' was, Amy Winehouse seemed like just another chip off that block. Then came 'Back to Black' and for all its musical reference points, you realised you were dealing with a true original with a talent for words, tunes and their delivery. The title track itself could have taken this spot and both 'Tears Dry on Their Own' and 'Love is a Losing Game' will be torch song standards if they're not already. But it's 'Rehab' that both transcends celebrity culture and subverts it, truly a song for our times.

10. 'Pokerface' by Lady Gaga (2009)

I had a moment of conscience here - how can you represent the noughties without a single act born out of a reality TV show? Then I remembered the rules and forgave myself. These songs aren't just meant to define the decade now, but forty years from now. When we look back, I suspect most of the Simon Cowell acts will have thankfully faded from memory, may he be buggered with a ten-foot barge pole. Girls Aloud with 'Biology' came into serious consideration, but more for the Xenomania songwriting and production than what the girls made of it. Girls are very now, of course - Florence and the Machine, Bat for Lashes, Lily Allen, Duffy etc - but the true original among them to my eyes and ears is Lady Gaga and it's no coincidence she's also the one with international reach who goes across genres and defines not just a sound but a look, the Madonna of our times. She wears rubber, scares your parents and if she doesn't have a cock, she probably wears one on a regular basis. Dishonourable mentions in the minx category also go to 'Hit Me Baby (One More Time)' by Britney Spears and 'Umbrella' by Rhianna, both top pop videos, even without the sound turned down. Respect to Dizzee Rascal for this year's most fun single 'Bonkers' but until he breaks America, he doesn't count as decade defining.

The songs that defined a decade... The sixties.

1. 'I Want to Hold Your Hand' by The Beatles (1964)

This isn't a list of the best songs of the decade, remember, but the singles that defined it. This number was not only The Beatles' biggest selling single, but also the one that broke the American market, the number one of that infamous top five that accompanied their first transatlantic trip. It's also the number in which Bob Dylan heard the refrain as 'I get high...' inspiring him to our boys their first joint. They were quick learners, those Liverpudlians.

2. 'Like a Rolling Stone' by Bob Dylan (1965)

Talking of Dylan, even his most vehement detractors find it difficult to argue against his being one of the defining personalities of the decade. There's an argument for choosing one of his earlier protest songs - 'The Times They Are A-Changin', say or 'Blowin' in the Wind' - but they were never chart hits and besides, as a pop phenomenon this was his pinnacle. At over six minutes in length, it broke all the rules of radio play, its impressionistic and yet accusing language was hardly typical pop fodder, and yet yet it hit the top ten all over the world. More importantly, that opening snare shot kicked open the doors of the minds of a generation to a different way of being, described in sound by Mike Bloomfield's spiky guitar and Al Kooper's swirling organ riff. It regularly, and rightly, tops lists of the best singles of all time.

3. 'Make it Easy on Yourself' by 'The Walker Brothers' (1965)

Many would argue for 'The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore', an equally great song from the following year, but this was their first hit single and had teenage girls pursuing Scott Walker and his supposed brothers wherever they went. It was composed by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, probably the best non-performing writing team of the era, for Dionne Warwick and has been recorded by many other artists since, but this is the defining rendition. Scott now spends his time hanging out in betting shops and backstreet boozers or beating lumps of meat in his avant-garde recordings, released in album form once a decade or so, but for all the qualities of his later solo albums, this was his great pop moment.

4. 'I Got You (I Feel Good)' by James Brown (1965)

The Godfather defined the black music of the era - funk, soul and rhythm 'n' blues - and still seems somehow more current than his contemporaries. With 99 charting hits, there's plenty to choose from, but this was both his biggest smash and signature tune, concise in single form but lending itself to extended workouts on stage.The screams, hollers, drum beat and horn riff have all been sampled numerous times. If there's one artist of the sixties who is truly still setting the agenda for the mainstream of today - dominated by r'n'b and hip-hop - then it's James Brown.

5. 'Good Vibrations' by The Beach Boys (1966)

If we're keeping it simple with our Beatles choice, we've got to go for one of Brian Wilson's mini pop symphonies by The Beach Boys to show how musically complex pop was to get within a couple of years of the puppy love songs typical of the early decade. I'm not saying this is my favourite of their songs - that would be 'God Only Knows' - or even my favourite track of theirs of this type - 'Heroes and Villains' - but while many would advocate going with one of their earlier surf sound classics, but this sums up the ambition of the times when the best composers aspired to out-do each other with every release, create a pure pop masterpiece and top the charts both sides of the Atlantic.

6. 'I'm a Believer' by The Monkees (1966)

The first - and best - of the manufactured boy bands were put together as an American rival to The Beatles, and made a clutch of classic singles, written by some of the best songwriters of the day, before claiming their independence and drifting towards the psychedelic obscurity of 'Head'. All four members had musical talent and creative ambition, qualities no longer priorities to those assembling X-factor style pop acts. The Monkees TV series is a repository of sixties fashion, humour and music and still bears watching today. This number, the biggest selling hit of 1967, was written by Neil Diamond, one of the several Brill Building writers who developed successful recording careers in their own right, and demonstrates that even teeniebop pop can be great.

7. 'River Deep, Mountain High' by Ike and Tina Turner (1966)

Phil Spector has claims on being the producer of the decade and many consider this to be his best work, himself included. Ike Turner might be credited on the label, and ran his revue like Spector governed the studio - but was paid to stay away during recording. It's flop Stateside caused Spector to withdraw from the music industry and lose himself in paranoia and conspiracy. In the UK, it reached number three, justifying its inclusion as a bona fide hit. Many other Spector productions were contenders, but this was his peak, despite some contending that backing black voices with a white pop sound had passed its sell-by date by 1966, the height of the civil rights era.

8. 'Purple Haze' by Jimi Hendrix (1967)

With only one slot available for some riff-driven rock'n'roll there are some tough choices to be made. 'Satisfaction' by The Rolling Stones and 'My Generation' by The Who are each contenders. Both bands certainly had a hand in defining the decade, although arguably didn't hit the heights of their creativity or international fame until the seventies. As well as being the greatest guitarist of his generation - indeed, of all time - Hendrix is the bridge between English and American psychedelia and defines the Summer of Love.

9. 'Waterloo Sunset' by The Kinks (1967)

It's been called the most beautiful song of the rock'n'roll era and the greatest ever written about London but even though it is born of urban loneliness, which has never sounded more romantic, its tone is more that of an English pastoral. Almost thirty years later it became the lodestone of the Britpop movement ,but although some came close, none managed to match its perfection and although he kept up his run of classsic singles into the early seventies, Ray Davies didn't either.

10. 'I Heard it Through the Grapevine' by Marvin Gaye (1968)

If Phil Spector epitomised the master-slave model of pop hit production, Tamla Motown established a new business model, run and staffed by black musicians, collectively making records for a burgeoning multi-racial market that broke the traditionally segregated audiences of both radio station and concert hall. Again, there are many contenders from the Motown repertoire, but this one stands out. It was also recorded by The Miracles, The Pips and the Isley Brothers before finally becoming a hit for Marvin Gaye. Berry Gordy hated the track and it might never have been a hit if it weren't for only relenting unprecedented demand from DJs and the public for it to be released off the 'In the Groove' album which was later renamed to bear its title.

Top ten reasons why lists are rubbish...

1. It is no coincidence that 'best of' lists proliferate at this time of year. They are written by drunken hacks, filing copy from the pub.

2. Lists are the lowest form of cultural commentary, produced by those with nothing to say for those for whom nothing is worth reading.

3. Lists are either produced by self-elected experts (to show how cool or clever they are) or by an aggregate of public opinion (for which the term 'lowest common denominator' was invented.)

4. Lists are invariably produced by men. Only men have both the time and inclination. Only men are that nerdy and that inane. All men are on the autistic spectrum and should be prescribed Ritalin at birth.

5. Women do produce lists, but of a far more practical kind than 'the best Spurs XI' or 'Bob Dylan's studio albums in order from 1 to 42' lists men favour e.g. shopping lists, Christmas present lists, DIY to-do lists, wedding planning lists for the year after next in anticipation of an engagement that never comes, potential name lists for babies yet to be born.

6. Lists have been the saviour of land-fill TV. Got a three-hour gap in the schedule? Knock up a best-of programme on your Apple Mac compiled from stock footage and a bunch of C-list celebrities talking out of their arses.

7. Lists attempt to objectify the subjective. They are the equivalent of ancient rulers carving their decrees in stone. Only written up by the sad and lonely and posted on their blogs hoping for the attention they'll never receive.

8. Lists are most fun when written by committee, a process usually lubricated by alcohol. It's not true that men don't like to express their emotions. They get very heated about which Bob Dylan album is the best - 'Blood on the Tracks' or 'Blonde on Blonde'. The thought that anyone can consider the Manchester United treble winning team to be superior to the Tottenham Hotspur double winning team has been known to reduce a man to tears.

9. You can measure a list maker's ego by the title of his list. 'My favourite...' is modest. 'My recommended...' even considers its audience. 'Top ten...' shows some delusions of grandeur. 'Best ever...' is the province of the ego maniac, only exceeded by 'Countries to invade next' lists, traditionally the territory of blood-thirsty dictators who invariably spent many of their waking hours drawing up lists, usually of enemies to eliminate and town squares requiring their statue.

10. The rule of lists is that they should be a top 10, 50 or 100 and cover the year, decade, century or millennium e.g. the best 10 madrigal performances of the last 1000 years. If you can't think of a tenth that's worthy, you read a rival list and crib of that. If you have more than ten, it's time to kill your darlings...

Now I've got that off my chest, time to have fun compiling a few lists...