New Additions in Bold, Favorite film in italics
18 Alfred
Hitchcock-Family Plot, Torn Curtain, Rebecca, 39 Steps, North by
Northwest, Saboteur, The Wrong Man, Strangers on a Train, Shadow of a
Doubt, Topaz, The Birds, Psycho, Lifeboat, Spellbound, Vertigo, The Man
Who Knew Too Much (both versions), Rear Window
14
Stephen Spielberg-Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, ET, Temple of Doom,
Color Purple, Last Crusade, Schindler's List, Jurassic Park, Bridge of Spies,
Saving Private Ryan, Catch Me If You Can, Terminal, War of the Worlds,
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
14
Woody Allen-Hollywood Ending, Curse of the Jaded Scorpion, Manhattan,
Annie Hall, Small Time Crooks, Sweet and Lowdown, Mighty Aphrodite,
Manhattan Murder Mystery, Melinda and Melinda, Midnight in Paris,
Sleeper, Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, Bullets Over
Broadway
10 Billy Wilder-Spirit of St. Louis, Some Like
it Hot, The Apartment, Irma la Douce, Double Indemnity, Sabrina, Ace in
the Hole, Major and the Minor, 1,2,3, The Front Page
10 Clint Eastwood-Mystic River, Unforgiven, Bronco
Billy, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Invictus, Gran Torino,
White Heart Lonely Hunter, Play Misty for Me, J. Edgar, Bridges of Madison County
9
Joel and Ethan Coen-Oh Brother Where Art Thou, Ladykillers, Man Who
Knew Too Much, Intolerable Cruelty, Big Lebowski, Fargo, No Country for
Old Men, Burn After Reading, True Grit
9 Mike Nicholls-Primary Colors, The Birdcage, The Graduate, Working
Girl, Charlie Wilson’s War, What Planet Are You From?, Postcards from
the Edge, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolff, Regarding Henry
9 Jay Roach-Austin Powers I-III, Meet the Parents, Mystery Alaska, Dinner for Schmucks, The Campaign, Game Change, Trumbo
9 Martin Scorsese-Color of Money, Age of Innocence, Goodfellas, Aviator, The Departed, Gangs of New York, Shutter Island, Hugo, Wolf of Wall Street
8 Howard Hawks-Sgt. York, Bringing Up Baby, Big Sleep, Ball of Fire, Rio Bravo, His Girl Friday, Gentlemen Perfer Blondes, Monkey Business
8 Rob Zemeckis-Forrest Gump, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Back to the Future I-III, Contact, Romancing the Stone, Flight
7 Vincente Minelli-Meet me in St Louis, American in Paris, The Pirate, Brigadoon, The Band Wagon, Kismet, The Sandpiper
7 Rob Altman-Mash, McCabe and Mrs Miller, California Split, Buffalo
Bill and the Indian, The Player, Dr. T and the Women, Prairie Home
Companion
7 Steve Soderbergh-Erin Brockovitch, Ocean’s 11, Ocean’s 12, Full Frontal, Good German, Ocean’s 13, Informant
7 Ivan Reitman- Ghostbusters, 6 Days 7 Days, Old School, Space Jam, Fathers Day, Beethoven, Beethoven’s 2nd, Ghostbusters II
7 Chris Columbus-Mrs. Doubtfire, Home Alone, Home Alone 2, Stepmom, I Love You Beth Cooper, Rent, Pixels
7 Terry Gilliam-Time Bandits, Brazil, Fisher King, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Brothers Grimm, Baron Munchhausen, 12 Monkeys
7 Ron Howard-Apollo 13, Beautiful Mind, Da Vinci Code, Frost/Nixon, Angels and Demons, The Paper, Cocoon
7 Bryan Singer-Usual Suspects, X-Men, X2, Superman Returns, Valkyrie, X-Men Days of Future Past, The Apt Pupil
7 Tim Burton-Batman, Batman Returns, Ed Wood, Charlie and the Chocolate Factor, Alice in Wonderland, Edward Scissorhands, Corpse Bride
6
Frank Capra-It Happened One Night, Arsenic and Old Lace, Mr Smith Goes
to Washington, Mr Deeds Goes to Town, Meet John Doe, It's a Wonderful
Life
6 Stanley Donen-Take Me Out to the Ballgame (most sources insist that he
really was the director, not Bugsy Berkley), On the Town, Singing in
the Rain, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Charade, Bedazzled
6 Stanley Kramer-Defiant Ones, Inherit the Wind, Judgment at Nuremberg, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad Wold, Ship of Fools, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
6 Barry Levinson-Tin Men, Rain Man, Sleepers, Good Morning Vietnam, Man of the Year, Wag the Dog
6 Mel Brooks-Spaceballs, High Anxiety, Young Frankenstein, The Producers, Blazing Saddles, History of the World Part I
6 Roland Emmerich-ID4, Stargate, The Patriot, Day After Tomorrow, 2012, White House Down
6 Rob Reiner-Stand and Deliver, Princess Bride, Rumor Has It, American President, Ghosts of Mississippi, Misery
6 Gore Verbinski-Pirates of the Caribbean 1-3, Weatherman, The Mexican, Rango
6 Brett Ratner-After the Sunset, Rush Hour 2, Family Man, X-Men 3, Red Dragon, Tower Heist
6 Frank Oz-Bowfinger, In and Out, Stepford Wives, The Score, What About Bob, Housesitter
6 Peter Segal-Naked Gun 33 1/3, Tommy Boy, My Fellow Americans, Anger Management, 50 First Dates, Get Smart
6 Wes Anderson-Rushmore, Royal Tannenbaums, The Life Aquatic, Darjeerling Limited, Grand Budapest Hotel, Moonrise Kingdom
6 Johnothan Demme-Silence of the Lambs, Melvin and Howard, Manchurian Candidate, Married to the Mob, Rachel Getting Married, Rikki and the Flash
5 Orson Welles-Citizen Kane, Lady of Shanghai, Othello, Magnificent Ambersons, Touch of Evil
5 John Ford-Stagecoach, The Searchers, The Hurricane, How Green was my Valley, The Whole Town's Talking
5 Tony Scott- Enemy of the State, Déjà Vu, Crimson Tide, Top Gun, Taking of Pelham 1,2,3; Unstoppable
5 George Lucas-Star Wars I-IV, American Graffiti
5 Peter Weir-Witness, Dead Poet’s Society, The Truman Show, Master and Commander,Year of Living Dangerously
5 Christopher Nolan-Batman Begins, Dark Knight, Dark Knight Rises, Inception, Interstellar
5 Blake Edwards-A Shot in the Dark, Pink Panther, Return of the Pink Panther, Great Race, What Did You Do in the War Daddy
5 Sydney Pollack-Sabrina, Out of Africa, Tootsie, The Interpreter, Slender Thread
5 Adam McKay: Anchorman, Talladega Nights, Step Brothers, The Other Guys, Anchorman 2
5 Robert Rodriguez-El Mariachi Trilogy, Spy Kids and Lava Girl, Sin City
5 Curtis Hanson- LA Confidential, Wonderboys, In Her Shoes, Lucky You, 8 Mile
5 Barry Sonnenfeld-Men in Black I, II, Wild Wild West, Big Trouble, MiB III
5 Cameron Crowe-Almost Famous, Jerry MaGuire, Vanilla Sky, Elizabethtown, We Bought a Zoo
5 Joel Schumaker-Time to Kill, 8 MM, Batman and Robin, Batman Forever, The Client
5 John Glenn-5 Bond films
5 Tom Shadyac-Liar Liar, Bruce Almighty, Patch Adams, Evan Almighty, Ace Ventura
5 John Lynn-Whole Nine Yards, Trial and Error, Sgt Bilko, Whole Ten Yards, My Cousin Vinny
5 Peter and Bobby Farrelly-Kingpin, Dumb and Dumber, Fever Pitch, Shallow Hal, Osmosis Jones
5 John Lasseter-Lady and the Tramp, Toy Story 1, Cars, Toy Story 2, Cars 2
5 Jon Favreau-Elf, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Cowboys and Aliens, Chef
4 Sidney Lumet: Network, 12 Angry Men, Murder on the Orient Express, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
4 David Lean-Lawrence of Arabia, Bridge on the River Kwai, Passage to India, Summertime
4 John Huston-Beat the Devil, Key Largo, African Queen, Man Who Would be King
4 Alexander Payne-Election, Sideways, Descendants, Nebraska
4 James Cameron-Terminator, Terminator 2, Titanic, Avatar
4 Terrence Young-Wait Until Dark, 3 Bond films
4 Harold Lloyd-Safety Last, Feet First, The Freshman, Kid Brother
4 Guy Hamilton-4 Bond movies
4 Kevin Smith-Chasing Amy, Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Dogma
4 Penny Marshall-Awakenings, Rennisance Man, Big, League of their Own
4 Christopher Guest-For Your Consideration, Mighty Wind, Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman
4 Sam Raimi-Spiderman 1-3, Oz: The Great and Powerful
4 Ernst Lubitsch-Shop Around the Corner, Ninotchka, Merry Widow, Trouble in Paradise
4 Lasse Holstrom-What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, The Hoax, Cider House Rules, Shipping News
4 Michael Moore-Roger and Me, F 411, Sicko, Capitalism: A Love Story
4 James Mangold-3:10 to Yuma, Walk the Line, Kate and Leopold, Knight and Day
4 D. Herek-Mr. Holland’s Opus, Three Musketeers, Mighty Ducks, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventures
4 John Turtletaub-Cool Runnings, National Treasure, National Treasure 2, Last Vegas
4 JJ Abrams-Super 8, Star Trek, Star Trek into Darkness, Star Wars VII
4 Sam Weisman-George of the Jungle, Dickie Roberts Former Child Star, Out-of Towners, Mighty Ducks 2
4 Dennis Dungan-Happy Gilmore, Beverly Hills Ninja, Big Daddy, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry
4 Spike Lee-Do the Right Thing, Bamboozled, 25th Hour, School Daze
4 David O Russell-Three Kings, Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle, Joy
4 Bill Condon-Gods and Monsters, Kinsey, Dreamgirls, Mr Holmes
4 Shaun Levy-Cheaper by the Dozen, Big Fat Liar, Night at the Museum 2, The Internship
Showing posts with label Alfred Hitchkock. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alfred Hitchkock. Show all posts
Thursday, December 24, 2015
Friday, April 29, 2011
Shadow of a Doubt review
Hey Friends. I'm excited to announce two articles in the pipeline for publication at the great website www.toptenz.net as well as an upcoming interview with Chris Gethart.
Be sure to cick on my artice 20 Greatest Actor/Director Pairings of All Time. I think it's one of my better ones
Here's a review of a Hitchcock film "Shadow of a Doubt" and how it's a product of its era:
So many Hitchcock films are great in their own right, that a lot of the films beyond “Birds,” “Psycho,” “North by Northwest,” “Rear Window,” “Rebecca” (only because it won Best Picture) and “Vertigo” easily get lost in the shuffle.
Shadow of a Doubt is another uniquely great film of Hitchcock that is definitely worth watching. It made a strong impression on me as a child and I only recently rediscovered it. The film features Joseph Cotton (primarily known for appearing alongside Orson Welles in “Third Man” and “Citizen Kane”) and Teresa Wright.
Cotton plays a serial killer by the name of Charlie with a need to lay low, so he crashes with his sister and her family for a while. His sister’s oldest child (Wright) is also named Charlie and feels a special connection to her uncle because she’s named after him and she’s also just plain bored with her parents. Like those Disney heroines who sing about how they can’t fully blossom into adulthoods under the boring old status quo, she philosophically muses about how her parents just don’t get life in a somewhat meandering monologue that’s obviously designed solely to justify her later attachment to Charlie. He would be the Prince Charming if we go with the Disney analogy and if that sounds kind of creepy because he’s they’re related, it sort of is. Relative to the usual levels of Freudian undertones you find in Hitchkock, the pairing can safely be read as just an innocent relationship between a girl and her favorite uncle.
In fact, I’d call this Hitchkock’s most innocent film in some ways. The film was released in 1943. This was right around the time that American cinema was being heavily encouraged to produce homespun American films (i.e. Mrs. Miniver, Going My Way, Meet me in St. Louis) to encourage the nation why America was so special and worth fighting for. I really see similarities here. I think it was Judy Garland’s daughter Lorna Luft who said on one of the AFI specials that “Meet me in St Louis” is such a great film because you just want to live there. I felt the exact same way about this film. The Newton household (and the town of Santa Rosa, for that matter) is a very charming and attractive place even though there’s a serial killer living in it. It helps put you at ease that he’s not really actively killing people while staying there. The signs of malice in Charlie don’t really manifest themselves into anything dangerously until well over halfway through the film which gives Hitchcock plenty of time to spend in a dreamy Vincente-Minelli-like world where we witness young Charlie meet her young friends in the park or the family engaging in the kind of dinners together that might have even been rare back then.
It’s a great film because this makes it all the more jarring when Cotton’s Uncle Charlie finally unleashes some of his murderous proclivities at the sweet, innocent niece. The drama creeps up on you but it’s a doozy.
Be sure to cick on my artice 20 Greatest Actor/Director Pairings of All Time. I think it's one of my better ones
Here's a review of a Hitchcock film "Shadow of a Doubt" and how it's a product of its era:
So many Hitchcock films are great in their own right, that a lot of the films beyond “Birds,” “Psycho,” “North by Northwest,” “Rear Window,” “Rebecca” (only because it won Best Picture) and “Vertigo” easily get lost in the shuffle.
Shadow of a Doubt is another uniquely great film of Hitchcock that is definitely worth watching. It made a strong impression on me as a child and I only recently rediscovered it. The film features Joseph Cotton (primarily known for appearing alongside Orson Welles in “Third Man” and “Citizen Kane”) and Teresa Wright.
Cotton plays a serial killer by the name of Charlie with a need to lay low, so he crashes with his sister and her family for a while. His sister’s oldest child (Wright) is also named Charlie and feels a special connection to her uncle because she’s named after him and she’s also just plain bored with her parents. Like those Disney heroines who sing about how they can’t fully blossom into adulthoods under the boring old status quo, she philosophically muses about how her parents just don’t get life in a somewhat meandering monologue that’s obviously designed solely to justify her later attachment to Charlie. He would be the Prince Charming if we go with the Disney analogy and if that sounds kind of creepy because he’s they’re related, it sort of is. Relative to the usual levels of Freudian undertones you find in Hitchkock, the pairing can safely be read as just an innocent relationship between a girl and her favorite uncle.
In fact, I’d call this Hitchkock’s most innocent film in some ways. The film was released in 1943. This was right around the time that American cinema was being heavily encouraged to produce homespun American films (i.e. Mrs. Miniver, Going My Way, Meet me in St. Louis) to encourage the nation why America was so special and worth fighting for. I really see similarities here. I think it was Judy Garland’s daughter Lorna Luft who said on one of the AFI specials that “Meet me in St Louis” is such a great film because you just want to live there. I felt the exact same way about this film. The Newton household (and the town of Santa Rosa, for that matter) is a very charming and attractive place even though there’s a serial killer living in it. It helps put you at ease that he’s not really actively killing people while staying there. The signs of malice in Charlie don’t really manifest themselves into anything dangerously until well over halfway through the film which gives Hitchcock plenty of time to spend in a dreamy Vincente-Minelli-like world where we witness young Charlie meet her young friends in the park or the family engaging in the kind of dinners together that might have even been rare back then.
It’s a great film because this makes it all the more jarring when Cotton’s Uncle Charlie finally unleashes some of his murderous proclivities at the sweet, innocent niece. The drama creeps up on you but it’s a doozy.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
The Increasingly Vague Distinction between Hollywood and Foreign films
It's funny that no one is even noticing that if the Oscars follow the Golden Globes, Slumdog Millionaire will be the closest we've come to a foreign film winning the best picture Oscar.
Slumdog Millionaire was filmed entirely in India, directed by a British director (and co-directed by an Indian director), and is half-English, half-Urdu. It also utilized an entirely foreign crew and its subjects are foreign. The only non-foreign element at play is that it was produced by an American company, Fox Searchlight.
We've traditionally had easier defined boundaries between a foreign film and a non-foreign film, but in this globalized era, ownership of a movie by a single country is a little harder to define. The best directors in the world such as Brazilian Fernando Meirelles (City of God), Chinese director Ang Lee, and Mexicans Alfonso Cuaron (Y tu Mama Tambien), Rob Rodriguez (El Mariachi), and Alejandro Inarritu Gonzalu (Amores Perros) have eventually used their money to come to Hollywood and made English-language films with American actors. When Alejandro Inarritu Gonzalu won the Golden Globe for best picture with Babel, he suggested in his acceptance speech that his film was a true global picture that belonged to the people and crews among three different continents.
Experimentation works both ways however. In 2006 (2007 was technically when the ceremony was held), two of the five directors nominated for best foreign-language film, Mel Gibson for Apocolypto and Clint Eastwood for Letters of Iwo Jima, were American. Woody Allen who has had a decades-long love affair with New York, packed up shop and moved to London recently for the filming of Match Point.
The spread of filmmakers and film making ideas across borders, however, has been going on forever. And the American film industry would never have eclipsed the emerging film industries in France, Italy, and Russia if it weren't for the contributions of foreigners. In other words, this has been going on forever. Most of the great American directors from our Hollywood Golden age have come from other countries, Billy Wilder came from Austria, Otto Preminger and Ernst Lubitsch came from Germany, and Frank Capra came from Italy. This was all the more ironic considering that Frank Capra's film exemplified the ideals of Americana better than any other filmmaker to this day. He made the quintessential film about how good triumphs over evil if our constitution is enforced in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." With the exception of Frank Capra, however, these directors were Jews who were persecuted in Nazi Europe so were exiled to America. Directors who weren't forced out of their homeland tended to stay in their own countries and made films in their own languages. Even our two biggest directors of the Golden Age of Hollywood, Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchkock were influenced by the German film industry. Alfred Hitchkock interned (yeah, like college internship) with the German film industry before working in the British film industry, and Orson Welles used a German cinematographer, Greg Tolland (Tolland worked with another of other American directors as well).
More recently, Czech director Milos Forman (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus, The People vs Larry Flint, Man on the Moon) one two Oscars and because he had made some films in Czech, he technically was the first non-English language director to win an Oscar. At the same time, most of his filmography (or at least the films he's famous for are American) is American. In 1987, "The Last Emperor" won best picture and might be considered the first foreign film. The film, about the exiled Emperor of China, utilized Japanese and Mandarin in its dialogue in addition to English and was filmed in China. It was was directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, an Italian director who had made his name in Italian-language films and earned him a best director nomination. The film was bankrolled by a British studio.
It's important to clarify here that British films aren't really considered foreign films. It's not just because of the similar language but because the flow of actors between both countries are pretty interchangeable. British directors David Lean and Oliver Reed have won Oscars for their entirely British films and many found it somewhat curious that the American film institute listed Lawrence of Arabia as the 5th best American film ever made when virtually no part of the production had anything to do with America. David Lean is, after all, is a British institution. Even more curious, the British film institute's list of 100 Greatest British films of all-time has entries which are decidedly Un-British. There is a such thing as a British film industry and certain films like the Bond series, the works of David Lean, Oliver Reed, and Richard Lester, The Red Shoes, Room with a View, etc. are considered quintessentially British films. The British Film Institute's list, however, included films such as Shakespeare in Love or Braveheart, whose only qualifications are that the films are set in Britain and revolve around British history. If we take this definition of where films are set and to what degree they revolve around the country's history and culture, then surely Slumdog Millionaire is foreign because it is a landmark film in presenting images of Indian modern-day life to audiences in the UK and US who knew very little about it.
My vote is that Last Emperor is foreign, Bernardo Bertolucci was the first foreign director to win an Oscar, and that Slumdog Millionaire will be #2. What's yours?
Slumdog Millionaire was filmed entirely in India, directed by a British director (and co-directed by an Indian director), and is half-English, half-Urdu. It also utilized an entirely foreign crew and its subjects are foreign. The only non-foreign element at play is that it was produced by an American company, Fox Searchlight.
We've traditionally had easier defined boundaries between a foreign film and a non-foreign film, but in this globalized era, ownership of a movie by a single country is a little harder to define. The best directors in the world such as Brazilian Fernando Meirelles (City of God), Chinese director Ang Lee, and Mexicans Alfonso Cuaron (Y tu Mama Tambien), Rob Rodriguez (El Mariachi), and Alejandro Inarritu Gonzalu (Amores Perros) have eventually used their money to come to Hollywood and made English-language films with American actors. When Alejandro Inarritu Gonzalu won the Golden Globe for best picture with Babel, he suggested in his acceptance speech that his film was a true global picture that belonged to the people and crews among three different continents.
Experimentation works both ways however. In 2006 (2007 was technically when the ceremony was held), two of the five directors nominated for best foreign-language film, Mel Gibson for Apocolypto and Clint Eastwood for Letters of Iwo Jima, were American. Woody Allen who has had a decades-long love affair with New York, packed up shop and moved to London recently for the filming of Match Point.
The spread of filmmakers and film making ideas across borders, however, has been going on forever. And the American film industry would never have eclipsed the emerging film industries in France, Italy, and Russia if it weren't for the contributions of foreigners. In other words, this has been going on forever. Most of the great American directors from our Hollywood Golden age have come from other countries, Billy Wilder came from Austria, Otto Preminger and Ernst Lubitsch came from Germany, and Frank Capra came from Italy. This was all the more ironic considering that Frank Capra's film exemplified the ideals of Americana better than any other filmmaker to this day. He made the quintessential film about how good triumphs over evil if our constitution is enforced in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." With the exception of Frank Capra, however, these directors were Jews who were persecuted in Nazi Europe so were exiled to America. Directors who weren't forced out of their homeland tended to stay in their own countries and made films in their own languages. Even our two biggest directors of the Golden Age of Hollywood, Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchkock were influenced by the German film industry. Alfred Hitchkock interned (yeah, like college internship) with the German film industry before working in the British film industry, and Orson Welles used a German cinematographer, Greg Tolland (Tolland worked with another of other American directors as well).
More recently, Czech director Milos Forman (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus, The People vs Larry Flint, Man on the Moon) one two Oscars and because he had made some films in Czech, he technically was the first non-English language director to win an Oscar. At the same time, most of his filmography (or at least the films he's famous for are American) is American. In 1987, "The Last Emperor" won best picture and might be considered the first foreign film. The film, about the exiled Emperor of China, utilized Japanese and Mandarin in its dialogue in addition to English and was filmed in China. It was was directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, an Italian director who had made his name in Italian-language films and earned him a best director nomination. The film was bankrolled by a British studio.
It's important to clarify here that British films aren't really considered foreign films. It's not just because of the similar language but because the flow of actors between both countries are pretty interchangeable. British directors David Lean and Oliver Reed have won Oscars for their entirely British films and many found it somewhat curious that the American film institute listed Lawrence of Arabia as the 5th best American film ever made when virtually no part of the production had anything to do with America. David Lean is, after all, is a British institution. Even more curious, the British film institute's list of 100 Greatest British films of all-time has entries which are decidedly Un-British. There is a such thing as a British film industry and certain films like the Bond series, the works of David Lean, Oliver Reed, and Richard Lester, The Red Shoes, Room with a View, etc. are considered quintessentially British films. The British Film Institute's list, however, included films such as Shakespeare in Love or Braveheart, whose only qualifications are that the films are set in Britain and revolve around British history. If we take this definition of where films are set and to what degree they revolve around the country's history and culture, then surely Slumdog Millionaire is foreign because it is a landmark film in presenting images of Indian modern-day life to audiences in the UK and US who knew very little about it.
My vote is that Last Emperor is foreign, Bernardo Bertolucci was the first foreign director to win an Oscar, and that Slumdog Millionaire will be #2. What's yours?
Sunday, March 23, 2008
How to make a top 100 Films of All-Time List
I think the film critic community is fairly consistent about what they can agree upon are the classics. It you want to make a top 100 films of all time list, and this is a widespread of hobby among people and an obligation by any media outlet remotely related to the coverage of the entertainment industry (a great deal of film lists can be found at www.filmsite.org), this is the recipe:
First, put Citizen Kane, Casablanca, Godfather at the top, next be sure to include the following: Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, All About Eve, Schindler's List, Pulp Fiction, Grapes of Wrath, Streetcar Named Desire, Apocolypse Now, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus, Chinatown then be sure to throw in:
-No less than 4 Hitchkock Films (the preferred entries include Rear Window, Psycho, Vertigo, and North by Northwest
-2 or 3 John Huston films
-2-5 Kubricks
-The 3 definitive Capra films (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It Happened One Night, It's a Wonderful Life)
-Some mention of Robert Altman, Howard Hawks and John Ford
-2 or 3 David Lean films (Must include Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence)
-Kazan and Brando's 2 masterpieces (Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront)
-3 or 4 films from the Arthur Freed MGM musical era and a couple other musicals (suggestions include Cabaret, Swing Time, Moulan Rouge, Chicago, Yankee Doodle Dandy, or Oliver!)
-3-5 Scorsese films
-4 or 5 Westerns
-A horror film or thriller of some sort
-A couple of the classic blockbusters (Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Rocky, Back to the Future, etc)
-About 6-8 war films
-Some of the counter cultural films of th 60s and 70s (good examples include Network, Bonnie and Clyde, Days of Heaven, Easy Rider, Badlands, Midnight Cowboy, and Cool Hand Luke)
-Film noir
-Some silents, including Chaplain and hopefully DW Griffith and Buster Keaton
-At least 4 Billy Wilder films
-Two or three Sidney Lumet films
-Some comedic films but must keep it appropriately high-brow: The Marx Brothers, Woody Allen, Tootsie, some of Mel Brooks' early work is permissible here, Ernst Lubitsch, Preston Sturges, Cameron Crowe, and as of late, Coen Brothers entries have become acceptable. Kevin Smith, the Farrelly Brothers, and most Saturday Night Light films will disqualify your film from any level of credibility. Don't even think about including Garden State or Napoleon Dynamite. Some Like it Hot, Dr. Strangelove, and The Apartment should be mentioned.
-A mix of Spielberg's heavier and lighter films (i.e. an acceptable combination might be Munich, Schindler's List, ET, Jaws, Raiders)
-Some sci-fi: Star Wars, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Metropolist (if it's including non-English films) are musts, but other entries could include Blade Runner, Brazil, Aliens, etc.
Other guidelines:
-Any film with an Oscar nomination except Around the World in 80 Days is acceptable to put on your list
-Ernst Lubitsch and Preston Struges are optional but help to fill out the comedy entry
-A cartoon, likely produced by Disney, won't hurt
-Other recommended films but not required: Amadeus, The Great Escape, Manchurian Candidate, Do the Right Thing, King Kong, The Jazz Singer, Platoon, Shawshank Redemption OR Forrest Gump (rarely should you include both since their fan bases are mortal enemies of each other), The Third Man, The Lost Weekend, Philadelphia Story, American Graffiti, Conversation, Giant, Network, French Connection, Ben Hur, Mutiny on the Bounty, Adventures of Robin Hood, and Tootsie.
-There should be room for some of your personal favorites as long as they're not too outlandish
First, put Citizen Kane, Casablanca, Godfather at the top, next be sure to include the following: Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, All About Eve, Schindler's List, Pulp Fiction, Grapes of Wrath, Streetcar Named Desire, Apocolypse Now, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus, Chinatown then be sure to throw in:
-No less than 4 Hitchkock Films (the preferred entries include Rear Window, Psycho, Vertigo, and North by Northwest
-2 or 3 John Huston films
-2-5 Kubricks
-The 3 definitive Capra films (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It Happened One Night, It's a Wonderful Life)
-Some mention of Robert Altman, Howard Hawks and John Ford
-2 or 3 David Lean films (Must include Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence)
-Kazan and Brando's 2 masterpieces (Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront)
-3 or 4 films from the Arthur Freed MGM musical era and a couple other musicals (suggestions include Cabaret, Swing Time, Moulan Rouge, Chicago, Yankee Doodle Dandy, or Oliver!)
-3-5 Scorsese films
-4 or 5 Westerns
-A horror film or thriller of some sort
-A couple of the classic blockbusters (Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Rocky, Back to the Future, etc)
-About 6-8 war films
-Some of the counter cultural films of th 60s and 70s (good examples include Network, Bonnie and Clyde, Days of Heaven, Easy Rider, Badlands, Midnight Cowboy, and Cool Hand Luke)
-Film noir
-Some silents, including Chaplain and hopefully DW Griffith and Buster Keaton
-At least 4 Billy Wilder films
-Two or three Sidney Lumet films
-Some comedic films but must keep it appropriately high-brow: The Marx Brothers, Woody Allen, Tootsie, some of Mel Brooks' early work is permissible here, Ernst Lubitsch, Preston Sturges, Cameron Crowe, and as of late, Coen Brothers entries have become acceptable. Kevin Smith, the Farrelly Brothers, and most Saturday Night Light films will disqualify your film from any level of credibility. Don't even think about including Garden State or Napoleon Dynamite. Some Like it Hot, Dr. Strangelove, and The Apartment should be mentioned.
-A mix of Spielberg's heavier and lighter films (i.e. an acceptable combination might be Munich, Schindler's List, ET, Jaws, Raiders)
-Some sci-fi: Star Wars, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Metropolist (if it's including non-English films) are musts, but other entries could include Blade Runner, Brazil, Aliens, etc.
Other guidelines:
-Any film with an Oscar nomination except Around the World in 80 Days is acceptable to put on your list
-Ernst Lubitsch and Preston Struges are optional but help to fill out the comedy entry
-A cartoon, likely produced by Disney, won't hurt
-Other recommended films but not required: Amadeus, The Great Escape, Manchurian Candidate, Do the Right Thing, King Kong, The Jazz Singer, Platoon, Shawshank Redemption OR Forrest Gump (rarely should you include both since their fan bases are mortal enemies of each other), The Third Man, The Lost Weekend, Philadelphia Story, American Graffiti, Conversation, Giant, Network, French Connection, Ben Hur, Mutiny on the Bounty, Adventures of Robin Hood, and Tootsie.
-There should be room for some of your personal favorites as long as they're not too outlandish
Sunday, January 06, 2008
Best Picture Oscar Winners
This has been kind of a labor of love for me that I've been chipping away a bit at each day. I got the inspiration from 79bestpictures.blogspot.com, a very creatively planned-out blog. An asterick means I haven't seen the whole thing from start to finish. I've seen Lawrence of Arabia pretty much all the way to a point near the end, I'm pretty sure. All I know is I was watching that for hours on end and it still didn't end.
Anyway, I've got just a few more pictures to go.
No Country for Old Men (2007)-Massively overrated film. I know the Coens have been in kind of a slump with Intolerable Cruelty (good but not great and even worse, not ambitious), Man Who Wasn't There (technically good but had no soul), and Ladykillers (misguided and crass) but let's not award them for the first thing they do that's good. But that's assuming that this is a good film. If it has a plot, the film doesn't really care much about it. Or characters. It basically offers three things: 1) an innovative choice for the villain's weapon 2) a couple very good actiing performances (Tommy Lee Jones and Javier Bardem) and 3) cool scenery.
Departed (2006)-I wrote about Departed so much in other entries that just click on departed down below for a couple interesting posts on Departed and the Indiscriminate Nature of the Gun and how I think as a genre film, Departed might be in danger of not having a long shelf life because it's such a straight genre film. Departed, though, was my third favorite picture of the year (behind Little Miss Sunshine on Flags of Our Fathers)
2003-2005-Haven’t seen any of these three best picture winners but I have seen 10 of the 12 other best picture nominees from these three years. I’m not ashamed of it either. A picture has to appeal to me to get me to see it. I rarely see a picture that I don’t want to see unless I like it. I gave up on Lord of the Rings after Part I.
Chicago (2002)-Chicago won because it successfully revived a lost genre that was very integral in the history of film. Some might argue that Moulan Rouge did that the year before, but Moulan Rouge was more like a musical on crack. It was a lot of glitz and glamour, songs burst out of characters with little motive, and the average shot length was a disorienting 1.5 seconds in the musical numbers. To me, Chicago was much more in the spirit of the film musical and worked a lot better.
A Beautiful Mind (2001)-2001 was a very week year and A Beautiful Mind was deservedly the best of them. I felt that despite being at the center of the film’s marketing campaign (as in the love scenes were featured in the trailers) the romantic subplot between Connelly and Crowe was pretty weak, but other than that it was a film I liked. It dealt with issues of how to deal and cope with life after success. Most of the movie wasn’t about a man’s rise to greatness. He accomplished the greatness early in the film, and he had to deal with rediscovering himself.
Gladiator (2000)-Gladiator had everything that I like to see in a best picture or a best picture for that matter: an epic feel, a grand ambition, big production values, a marquis star, pathos, and theme that’s relevant to the present. Gladiator’s theme was about perceptions of power and how power through the masses is dependent only on what those who are in power chose to filter to the masses. The emperor and Aerelius derived their power through a mandate from the masses and that was dependent on what the people saw in the arena. You could have somewhat easily drawn parallels between the Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and the Colliseum with Bill Clinton, Kenneth Star, and CNN. Traffic might have been a more innovative picture and when that happens it really hurts the legacy of the best picture and inspires hatred never before seen by movie buffs (see Forrest Gump, English Patient, Dances with Wolves, Shakespeare in Love).
American Beauty (1999)-I lost my objectivity as a film critic when I saw this. I wasn’t a film critic back then, of course, but just the same. The film was just depressing beyond belief and affected me to the point where I really couldn’t make a judgement on it. It captured the uniformity and despair of suburban life to such a realistic extent it was scary and gave me less hope in finding meaning of my own suburban existence. Some might think that’s silly to become so affected by just a movie, but if I didn’t get so much into movies in the first place, than I wouldn’t want to be a film critic. Ironic.
Shakespeare in Love (1998)-Like Gladiator, my film professor told me it had a very poetic theme: that love can exist on stage and be created through art. It’s a self-reflexive postmodern romantic comedy so it can be seen as the evolution of the post-modern comedy. It’s a good film, but in terms of grandeur, I felt it lacked the greatness of a best picture oscar winner.
Titanic (1997)-While something like L.A. Confidential was hailed by film critics as the better picture in retrospect, Titanic was just a massive unstoppable phenomenon at the time, and I like it today in retrospect. It broke every box office record conceivable and was just something like “The Ultimate Movie.” At the same time, it wasn’t really included on many “best of the century” lists in the next couple years and a lot of mega blockbusters have come along since then with equally big production values. The closest big budget blockbuster in recent years to have a chance of getting the attention of the Oscars as a picture (not just a technical awards extravaganza) was King Kong and it only won the technical awards, and wasn’t even considered for anything like story, actor, director, or picture. The times are now different than when Titanic was around: You can be a big budget high money grosser or an oscar winner, but not both.
Forrest Gump (1994)-Forrest Gump is a sentimental favorite that plays on emotion and nostalgia rather than innovative reworkings of genre material. A critic who thinks with his head will favor Pulp Fiction 9 times out of 10 over Forrest Gump. The problem with Forrest Gump is it’s not a film people want to see twice which is why its shelf life withers in comparison to Shawshank Redemption and Pulp Fiction, but we have to put ourselves back into 1994 when Forrest Gump was both the must-see movie of the year for the movie going public and an enormous critical hit. I’ve written about this in other posts and have even published an article on this.
Schindler’s List (1993)-“The Color Purple” aside, Schindler’s List was Spielberg’s coming out party as a serious filmmaker. The truth though is that among the academic community and art house types, Spielberg is considered the #1 person to blame for the supposed decline in the state of film because it can be argued that his enormous commercial success (mainly Jaws & Indiana Jones) had the accidental effect of restructuring Hollywood towards relying more on one big blockbuster to carry studios’ loads and leading to this sequelitis-infected blockbuster-oriented era we’re currently living in. Schindler’s List was Hollywood’s way of saying, “You know, you really are a good filmmaker after all.” The art house community still hasn’t caved in despite the fact that Spielberg made the two most revered films of the 90s in Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, but oh well.
Unforgiven (1992)-This could arguably be considered the only Western ever to win a best picture Oscar. Most sources will tell you that three Westerns throughout film history have won best picture awards: 1930’s Cimarron, and 1990’s Dances with Wolves (which I’ve seen about 2/3 of) are frontier stories but aren’t really true Westerns in my opinion. This is a shame, considering The Searchers and High Noon are the two best Westerns ever made, and there are a small handful of Westerns that might be considered better than Eastwood’s film, but it’s a very small number. Eastwood’s picture stands out as a great personal statement from a former actor reflecting on the genre that made a name out of him. It’s a very intelligent and concise film on many levels.
Silence of the Lambs (1991)-This film is the reason I didn’t follow the Oscars in any capacity whatsoever until approximately 1999. During the 1992 Oscar ceremony, I was 8, and my mom said I was not adult enough to watch the Oscars but I did and the short clips of Silence of the Lambs the ceremony showed were enough to scare the hell out of me. From there, I concluded that the Oscars were about terrifying and disturbing movies that I was too young for. Nevertheless, this movie still scares the hell out of me and is a film I find disturbing on a base emotional level, but I suppose that’s a testament to the power of the film, I suppose. I have more of a Frank Capra attitude on films and prefer their power to uplift people, rather than scare the shit out of them with disturbing images of guys who want to eat and torture each other, but, yeah, I suppose there’s a wide range of films out there, even the films on the darker end of the spectrum and it’s better than a film like Sin City that’s dark and nihilistic just because it’s cool. I would just find it odd that in the glamorous eternally optimistic Tinseltown, people would vote for a film about a disturbed cannibal of all things. If Silence of the Lambs won an Oscar, what’s next? Resident Evil?
*Dances with Wolves (1990)-I’ve seen about 2/3 of the film, so I’m not the true expert, but it looks like a film that’s like a serious evening at an upscale theater where you pay upwards of $100 a seat: a rich cinematic experience provided you’ve got the patience to stay with it. It’s essentially an epic. If you watch it on TV, you’d probably call it boring because you’re not getting the full experience. For his part, Kevin Costner, knew it was a risky project, but he said he liked the epic and I applaud him for that. Of course, people will always compare it to Goodfellas and it will suffer for that, but now that Scorsesee has his Oscar, can’t we put it all behind us?
Driving Miss Daisy (1989)-This film certainly doesn’t feel like a best picture winner and raises the question of whether there’s a certain requirement of a picture to deserve the honor of best picture. History has shown that there’s an incredibly wide range of pictures to get the honor and no real formula. Still, I tend to think that all the best pictures have a boldness in vision which includes a certain thematic gravity. I feel like Driving Miss Daisy brushes on ageism and interracial themes but at too much of a distance to feel like a profound statement has been made. I am pretty sure that in this decade’s Oscar-oriented November and December templates, Driving Miss Daisy would never have stood a chance at a nomination. It would be considered a pleasant character-driven film that would get some good reviews but would get drowned out by more ambitious films. Matchstick Men, Interpreter, The Weatherman, and Secondhand Lions are films that come to mind in this category. This is made all the more odd when we consider how great of a year 1989 was with Crimes and Misdemeanors, Henry V, Dead Poets’ Society, and Do the Right Thing.
Rain Man (1988)-I think this film also lacks a little bit of the ambition I spoke of with Driving Miss Daisy but the acting is so impeccable here that it puts the film on a different level. Dustin Hoffman gives the performance of a lifetime and Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman have such convincing chemistry. Another thing to consider is that Barry Levinson was on a role at the time with hits like Diner and Good Morning Vietnam, and in a decade increasingly oriented toward testosterone-laced blockbusters, Levinson’s films brought a deeper exploration to the masculine hero.
*Platoon (1986)*-I’ve only seen parts of this film. We watched it during a couple periods of my 11th English class in the last week of the school year. It felt like a very gritty war film that put the viewer into his point of view.
Out of Africa (1985)-A good epic film that features one of Robert Redford’s great performances. Sidney Pollack is only the 2nd best director named Sidney from the last 30 years, and it’s a shame that the great Sidney Lumet never won an Oscar.
Chariots of Fire (1981)-I’ve reviewed this film before, but essentially I felt it was a film that didn’t get the credit it deserved. My theory: Too often we expect a sports film to feature characters set against each other, and the fates of the two protagonists, who were rivals to some extent, do not end up in a climactic moment where they must compete over the same medal. I felt the film was a great character study and the stylized tone made for a great period piece.
Annie Hall (1977)-Woody Allen never made a truly great film in my opinion. He made a number of very good films. Annie Hall isn’t my favorite film of his: I appreciated some of the innovative gimmicks he uses to tell his story, but I found the storyline annoyingly disjointed.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)-I’ve seen the film two or three times, and this time, I'm just going to nitpick: Somehow the ending doesn’t seem right to me. I mean, do we really think that Chief is self-conscious enough to know what he’s doing? Remember: everyone but Randall McMurphy was, in fact, retarded. In a symbolic sense, there’s a lot to be read into this story with themes of oppression of independent-minded people, but in practicality, does the story really make sense? What makes the evil Nurse Ratched tick? In real life, why would she care about lobotomizing Murphy?
French Connection (1971)-Well, if anyone’s going to accuse the academy of being high brow, don‘t forget they gave an Oscar to the movie with the most kickass car chase ever. It’s a neat movie and I once attended a Q & A with William Friedkin about the film, so having heard his opinions on what he was trying to do I now respect the film that much more. Nowadays however, stories about cops are a dime a dozen from Shoot ‘em Up to We Own the Night to Narc to The Recruit to Training Day to whatever, but Friedkin’s film stands out for being a product of its era, at the very least.
In the Heat of the Night (1967)-The film competed against counter-culture pictures such as Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, which might have made In the Heat of the Night the less hip choice. I think, however, that this film marginally deserves to be considered one of the greats. Of the four Sidney Poitier films I've seen, it has his most meaningful performance. I don't say "best" because he's pretty much the same in everything but more that it's a great use of Sidney Poitier (Not to knock Poitier's acting, but I don't see him an actor giving a performance as a civil rights pioneer carrying the weight of African-American actors on his back and making choices designed to give blacks dignity on screen. That's at least at least how he's been framed historically). The film has a palpable sense of danger, two strongly defined characters, two great performances, and a chemistry between the two leads that is definitely something.
Sound of Music (1965)-Julie Andrews + Adorable Children + Sweeping vistas + Music + Backstory involving Nazis and WWII = Oscar. What else can you say?
My Fair Lady (1964)-With Born Yesterday, Bringing Up Baby and Philadelphia Story going unrecognized, I think My Fair Lady was a career achievement award for George Cuckor than it was recognition for an innovative film. The film has some great musical numbers and great performances by Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison but does fall a little short of the bar expected of an Oscar-winning musical. I also wonder if it is fair to judge My Fair Lady on the fact that the songs, one of the film’s main strengths, weren’t originally written for the film, anyway.
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)*-An epic among epics. Peter O'Toole imbues Lawrence of Arabia with traits of an uneasy man who's been pinned for a loser his whole life but who's also taking the biggest risks of his life. It's a performance where you're just trying to think "What's making this guy's head tick." Let me just say, holy crap, is this a long movie. Watching it was like a marathon that I dropped out of at mile 21.
West Side Story (1961)-This is a film for the ages as far as I’m concerned and as the kind of musical innovative enough to break the mold of its genre to be deserving of a best picture (unlike My Fair Lady). For someone who isn’t in to musicals, I’m sure that they can appreciate the quality of the dance sequences even if it’s not their thing.
Apartment (1960)-According to Cameron Crowe’s book “Conversations with Billy Wilder,” When Billy Wilder accepted his Oscar, the guy handing it to him said “you know, you’ll probably never top this one” and he was probably right. The Apartment is not only an absolutely amazing film and personal favorite that I could go on for hours about, but it’s one of the few comedies to ever win best picture and that’s hard to do. I’ve also never seen a comedy that so effortlessly provided social commentary and satire. I'm not really someone who is strongly aware of mise-en-scene (the way the scene is framed in th camera) when I'm watching a movie, but this is one of the first instances where the art of it jumped out at me. Particularly, the way the cubicles in the Office call to mind a modern-day equivalent of Fritz Lang's Metropolis.
Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)-Like Apartment and West Side Story, I’m not judging them on the level of Oscars but films among the best ever made and this transcends the question "did it deserve an Oscar." For me, the question is can you possibly shower it with enough Oscars and praise? It is my second favorite war film (we’ll get to the first in a couple minutes) and easily one of my 20 favorite films of all time, approximately. The protagonists are so interesting, with Alec Guiness forming such an interesting contrast to William Holden and such startling similarities with Sessuye Hayakawa, (Guiness and Hayakawa give two amazing performances too). The score and scenery is top notch, the ending is one of the most shocking I've ever witnessed.
Around the World in 80 Days (1956)- I can't help but acknowledge the sentiments that the selection of this picture almost single-handedly strips the "best picture" club of its integrity, but I think in examining why this film was so unfit to join the ranks of Oscar-winning films, then we get somewhere in terms of establishing what we expect from the Best picture winner. Perhaps, the lack of a theme? The lack of importance? Was it too enjoyable? Too little dramatic tension? The cameos cheapen the experience? In any case, it's certainly an enjoyable film of considerable scale if you don't think too hard about what the award means. I think of it as a spectacle of places and people and there's the certain extravagance to it that classic film buffs might look back to the olden pictures for with nostalgia.
From Here to Eternity (1953)-My favorite war film. Some might dismiss too loose of a narrative with two stories that have little to do with each other, but I think it paints interesting portraits of five unique characters and it's a very captivating epic. Montgomery Clift's character in particular makes such a strong impression. What would prompt a man to that level of stubborness, that he won't box or play the trumpet unless he does it his way? I often think when I watch it, that that trait is parallels the entire military structure.
Greatest Show on Earth (1952) - Greatest Show on Earth is grouped in with Around the World in 80 Days as one of those films that should never be uttered in the same sentence with the other winners but I found it a very good story and I think there's a lot more to be remembered from the film than the train crash scene. It is somewhat of an ensemble piece and I'm not sure if the way that, say, James Stewart isn't really relevant to the story but takes up screentime in a pleasantly time-consuming way is what makes the film feel irrelevant.
American in Paris (1951) - American in Paris was pretty much MGM and the Arthur Freed Unit at the top of their game. Gerswhin's score, Minelli's escapist sensibilities, and Gene Kelly's charm are the perfect combination, and Levant and Caron are good additions as well, although the guy who replaced Maurice LeChavilier as the French man was really quite a pushover. The problem which couldn't have been anticipated back in 1951 was that in 1952, an even greater film came out, "Singing in the Rain," which is now remembered as the highwater mark of the MGM Musical era, but again they didn't have a time machine, so let's not fault them. Also, worth noting: 1951 was one of the most competitive years in film history with three other films from AFI's top 100 (A Place in the Sun, Streetcar Named Desire and African Queen) coming out that year, so American in Paris gets a bad rap for that.
All About Eve (1950) - A cynical and twisted picture that's so marvelously done. These days, to explore the dark side of human nature, filmmakers need to incorporate murder or some other crime into a plot. I love how All About Eve is so dark yet no one is really doing anything "wrong" in a sense. Anne Baxter stands out as the conniving Eve who's loved by everyone except for the one person who's career she is destroying. Ironic that this came out in the same year as Sunset Boulevard which is the only other dark satire of Hollywood that comes close to this one.
Gentlemen’s Agreement (1947) - I've seen this film twice and each time it hits me in a very funny way. I like the thematic content but the actual storyline becomes dull somewhere along the way. Gregory Peck might have given one of the best performances in cinematic history in To Kill a Mockingbird but he's a little dry and unconvincing here. When he talks about how someone's trying to pick a fight "with his girl," like he's John Trovolta in Grease, it just makes me cringe. It's a film with too much exposition and talking away as well. It's certainly curious how Elia Kazan never came under fire in the way Stanley Kramer did for having films that were overly preachy.
How Green was my Valley (1941)-Yes, it beat Citizen Kane, but it's actually one of John Ford's best films and shows the master at his best. Orson Welles revered John Ford and watched Stagecoach 30 or 40 times in preperation for making Citizen Kane, so I imagine if his masterpiece was going to lose out at the Oscars, he wouldn't have wanted it to lose to anyone but John Ford.
Rebecca (1940)-Hitchkock did stick entirely to one genre which was a self-created one, but in within his work he takes his Hitchkockian qualities and makes textbook examples of other genres with a Hitchkockian spin: Strangers on a Train is a perfect example of noir, Psycho is the precursor to all those horror movies that flood our theaters, and the lavish Oscar-winning book adaptation is Rebecca. In other words, I think that while other Hitchkock pictures might have been better, Rebecca might have been the film with the most grandeur to it. It also helps that Joan Fontaine and Lawrence Olivier turn in two of the best performances of Hitchkock protagonists I’ve seen and Mrs. Danvers is quite a villain. I’d probably rank Rebecca as one of my top five or six Hitchkock films.
Gone with the Wind (1939)-Gone with the Wind WAS the biggest picture ever. It outranks Titanic in terms of intake when you adjust for inflation and THEN you have to realize how little a ticket cost back in the day as well. It might be argued that until Gone with the Wind, movies weren't that big of a deal. All the things from Gone with the Wind, the music, the color, the scope and scale of the images on screen, the performances, and most importantly the impact of the story and dialogue took audiences to a level they'd never seen before. That doesn't mean it's the one must-see film we all should be dying to see in present day because it's so awesome, but it still gets plenty of commendation which is important because nothing really can compare to Gone with the Wind in terms of public impact. I notice that lists generated by users, like the 2 online top 100 polls polling internet critics and regular movie fans as well as the imdb top 250, it doesn't rank particularly high.
The Life of Emile Zola (1936) - A fairly run-of-the-mill 30's film. I wouldn't call it anything particularly special. I'd say it's interesting if you're interested about learning about the person of Emile Zola. Good crib notes for a history essay.
It Happened One Night (1934) - Like Gone with the Wind, it's impact on the general public can't be underestimated. This film single-handedly made Columbia Pictures and Frank Capra's career. The film was the pinnacle of screwball comedies: Through a romance of two different classes, it gave hope to audeinces struggling during the Depression but the movie didn't just connect to audiences back then, I think more than Gone with the Wind, even, It Happened One Night is timeless. It's handling of the battle-of-the-sexes theme still reads well today and it's a great deal of fun. Truly, an underrated film.
Grand Hotel (1933)-See "Grand Hotel" tags. I absolutely adore this movie.
Anyway, I've got just a few more pictures to go.
Best Picture Winners I’ve Seen:
No Country for Old Men (2007)-Massively overrated film. I know the Coens have been in kind of a slump with Intolerable Cruelty (good but not great and even worse, not ambitious), Man Who Wasn't There (technically good but had no soul), and Ladykillers (misguided and crass) but let's not award them for the first thing they do that's good. But that's assuming that this is a good film. If it has a plot, the film doesn't really care much about it. Or characters. It basically offers three things: 1) an innovative choice for the villain's weapon 2) a couple very good actiing performances (Tommy Lee Jones and Javier Bardem) and 3) cool scenery.
Departed (2006)-I wrote about Departed so much in other entries that just click on departed down below for a couple interesting posts on Departed and the Indiscriminate Nature of the Gun and how I think as a genre film, Departed might be in danger of not having a long shelf life because it's such a straight genre film. Departed, though, was my third favorite picture of the year (behind Little Miss Sunshine on Flags of Our Fathers)
2003-2005-Haven’t seen any of these three best picture winners but I have seen 10 of the 12 other best picture nominees from these three years. I’m not ashamed of it either. A picture has to appeal to me to get me to see it. I rarely see a picture that I don’t want to see unless I like it. I gave up on Lord of the Rings after Part I.
Chicago (2002)-Chicago won because it successfully revived a lost genre that was very integral in the history of film. Some might argue that Moulan Rouge did that the year before, but Moulan Rouge was more like a musical on crack. It was a lot of glitz and glamour, songs burst out of characters with little motive, and the average shot length was a disorienting 1.5 seconds in the musical numbers. To me, Chicago was much more in the spirit of the film musical and worked a lot better.
A Beautiful Mind (2001)-2001 was a very week year and A Beautiful Mind was deservedly the best of them. I felt that despite being at the center of the film’s marketing campaign (as in the love scenes were featured in the trailers) the romantic subplot between Connelly and Crowe was pretty weak, but other than that it was a film I liked. It dealt with issues of how to deal and cope with life after success. Most of the movie wasn’t about a man’s rise to greatness. He accomplished the greatness early in the film, and he had to deal with rediscovering himself.
Gladiator (2000)-Gladiator had everything that I like to see in a best picture or a best picture for that matter: an epic feel, a grand ambition, big production values, a marquis star, pathos, and theme that’s relevant to the present. Gladiator’s theme was about perceptions of power and how power through the masses is dependent only on what those who are in power chose to filter to the masses. The emperor and Aerelius derived their power through a mandate from the masses and that was dependent on what the people saw in the arena. You could have somewhat easily drawn parallels between the Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and the Colliseum with Bill Clinton, Kenneth Star, and CNN. Traffic might have been a more innovative picture and when that happens it really hurts the legacy of the best picture and inspires hatred never before seen by movie buffs (see Forrest Gump, English Patient, Dances with Wolves, Shakespeare in Love).
American Beauty (1999)-I lost my objectivity as a film critic when I saw this. I wasn’t a film critic back then, of course, but just the same. The film was just depressing beyond belief and affected me to the point where I really couldn’t make a judgement on it. It captured the uniformity and despair of suburban life to such a realistic extent it was scary and gave me less hope in finding meaning of my own suburban existence. Some might think that’s silly to become so affected by just a movie, but if I didn’t get so much into movies in the first place, than I wouldn’t want to be a film critic. Ironic.
Shakespeare in Love (1998)-Like Gladiator, my film professor told me it had a very poetic theme: that love can exist on stage and be created through art. It’s a self-reflexive postmodern romantic comedy so it can be seen as the evolution of the post-modern comedy. It’s a good film, but in terms of grandeur, I felt it lacked the greatness of a best picture oscar winner.
Titanic (1997)-While something like L.A. Confidential was hailed by film critics as the better picture in retrospect, Titanic was just a massive unstoppable phenomenon at the time, and I like it today in retrospect. It broke every box office record conceivable and was just something like “The Ultimate Movie.” At the same time, it wasn’t really included on many “best of the century” lists in the next couple years and a lot of mega blockbusters have come along since then with equally big production values. The closest big budget blockbuster in recent years to have a chance of getting the attention of the Oscars as a picture (not just a technical awards extravaganza) was King Kong and it only won the technical awards, and wasn’t even considered for anything like story, actor, director, or picture. The times are now different than when Titanic was around: You can be a big budget high money grosser or an oscar winner, but not both.
Forrest Gump (1994)-Forrest Gump is a sentimental favorite that plays on emotion and nostalgia rather than innovative reworkings of genre material. A critic who thinks with his head will favor Pulp Fiction 9 times out of 10 over Forrest Gump. The problem with Forrest Gump is it’s not a film people want to see twice which is why its shelf life withers in comparison to Shawshank Redemption and Pulp Fiction, but we have to put ourselves back into 1994 when Forrest Gump was both the must-see movie of the year for the movie going public and an enormous critical hit. I’ve written about this in other posts and have even published an article on this.
Schindler’s List (1993)-“The Color Purple” aside, Schindler’s List was Spielberg’s coming out party as a serious filmmaker. The truth though is that among the academic community and art house types, Spielberg is considered the #1 person to blame for the supposed decline in the state of film because it can be argued that his enormous commercial success (mainly Jaws & Indiana Jones) had the accidental effect of restructuring Hollywood towards relying more on one big blockbuster to carry studios’ loads and leading to this sequelitis-infected blockbuster-oriented era we’re currently living in. Schindler’s List was Hollywood’s way of saying, “You know, you really are a good filmmaker after all.” The art house community still hasn’t caved in despite the fact that Spielberg made the two most revered films of the 90s in Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, but oh well.
Unforgiven (1992)-This could arguably be considered the only Western ever to win a best picture Oscar. Most sources will tell you that three Westerns throughout film history have won best picture awards: 1930’s Cimarron, and 1990’s Dances with Wolves (which I’ve seen about 2/3 of) are frontier stories but aren’t really true Westerns in my opinion. This is a shame, considering The Searchers and High Noon are the two best Westerns ever made, and there are a small handful of Westerns that might be considered better than Eastwood’s film, but it’s a very small number. Eastwood’s picture stands out as a great personal statement from a former actor reflecting on the genre that made a name out of him. It’s a very intelligent and concise film on many levels.
Silence of the Lambs (1991)-This film is the reason I didn’t follow the Oscars in any capacity whatsoever until approximately 1999. During the 1992 Oscar ceremony, I was 8, and my mom said I was not adult enough to watch the Oscars but I did and the short clips of Silence of the Lambs the ceremony showed were enough to scare the hell out of me. From there, I concluded that the Oscars were about terrifying and disturbing movies that I was too young for. Nevertheless, this movie still scares the hell out of me and is a film I find disturbing on a base emotional level, but I suppose that’s a testament to the power of the film, I suppose. I have more of a Frank Capra attitude on films and prefer their power to uplift people, rather than scare the shit out of them with disturbing images of guys who want to eat and torture each other, but, yeah, I suppose there’s a wide range of films out there, even the films on the darker end of the spectrum and it’s better than a film like Sin City that’s dark and nihilistic just because it’s cool. I would just find it odd that in the glamorous eternally optimistic Tinseltown, people would vote for a film about a disturbed cannibal of all things. If Silence of the Lambs won an Oscar, what’s next? Resident Evil?
*Dances with Wolves (1990)-I’ve seen about 2/3 of the film, so I’m not the true expert, but it looks like a film that’s like a serious evening at an upscale theater where you pay upwards of $100 a seat: a rich cinematic experience provided you’ve got the patience to stay with it. It’s essentially an epic. If you watch it on TV, you’d probably call it boring because you’re not getting the full experience. For his part, Kevin Costner, knew it was a risky project, but he said he liked the epic and I applaud him for that. Of course, people will always compare it to Goodfellas and it will suffer for that, but now that Scorsesee has his Oscar, can’t we put it all behind us?
Driving Miss Daisy (1989)-This film certainly doesn’t feel like a best picture winner and raises the question of whether there’s a certain requirement of a picture to deserve the honor of best picture. History has shown that there’s an incredibly wide range of pictures to get the honor and no real formula. Still, I tend to think that all the best pictures have a boldness in vision which includes a certain thematic gravity. I feel like Driving Miss Daisy brushes on ageism and interracial themes but at too much of a distance to feel like a profound statement has been made. I am pretty sure that in this decade’s Oscar-oriented November and December templates, Driving Miss Daisy would never have stood a chance at a nomination. It would be considered a pleasant character-driven film that would get some good reviews but would get drowned out by more ambitious films. Matchstick Men, Interpreter, The Weatherman, and Secondhand Lions are films that come to mind in this category. This is made all the more odd when we consider how great of a year 1989 was with Crimes and Misdemeanors, Henry V, Dead Poets’ Society, and Do the Right Thing.
Rain Man (1988)-I think this film also lacks a little bit of the ambition I spoke of with Driving Miss Daisy but the acting is so impeccable here that it puts the film on a different level. Dustin Hoffman gives the performance of a lifetime and Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman have such convincing chemistry. Another thing to consider is that Barry Levinson was on a role at the time with hits like Diner and Good Morning Vietnam, and in a decade increasingly oriented toward testosterone-laced blockbusters, Levinson’s films brought a deeper exploration to the masculine hero.
*Platoon (1986)*-I’ve only seen parts of this film. We watched it during a couple periods of my 11th English class in the last week of the school year. It felt like a very gritty war film that put the viewer into his point of view.
Out of Africa (1985)-A good epic film that features one of Robert Redford’s great performances. Sidney Pollack is only the 2nd best director named Sidney from the last 30 years, and it’s a shame that the great Sidney Lumet never won an Oscar.
Chariots of Fire (1981)-I’ve reviewed this film before, but essentially I felt it was a film that didn’t get the credit it deserved. My theory: Too often we expect a sports film to feature characters set against each other, and the fates of the two protagonists, who were rivals to some extent, do not end up in a climactic moment where they must compete over the same medal. I felt the film was a great character study and the stylized tone made for a great period piece.
Annie Hall (1977)-Woody Allen never made a truly great film in my opinion. He made a number of very good films. Annie Hall isn’t my favorite film of his: I appreciated some of the innovative gimmicks he uses to tell his story, but I found the storyline annoyingly disjointed.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)-I’ve seen the film two or three times, and this time, I'm just going to nitpick: Somehow the ending doesn’t seem right to me. I mean, do we really think that Chief is self-conscious enough to know what he’s doing? Remember: everyone but Randall McMurphy was, in fact, retarded. In a symbolic sense, there’s a lot to be read into this story with themes of oppression of independent-minded people, but in practicality, does the story really make sense? What makes the evil Nurse Ratched tick? In real life, why would she care about lobotomizing Murphy?
French Connection (1971)-Well, if anyone’s going to accuse the academy of being high brow, don‘t forget they gave an Oscar to the movie with the most kickass car chase ever. It’s a neat movie and I once attended a Q & A with William Friedkin about the film, so having heard his opinions on what he was trying to do I now respect the film that much more. Nowadays however, stories about cops are a dime a dozen from Shoot ‘em Up to We Own the Night to Narc to The Recruit to Training Day to whatever, but Friedkin’s film stands out for being a product of its era, at the very least.
In the Heat of the Night (1967)-The film competed against counter-culture pictures such as Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, which might have made In the Heat of the Night the less hip choice. I think, however, that this film marginally deserves to be considered one of the greats. Of the four Sidney Poitier films I've seen, it has his most meaningful performance. I don't say "best" because he's pretty much the same in everything but more that it's a great use of Sidney Poitier (Not to knock Poitier's acting, but I don't see him an actor giving a performance as a civil rights pioneer carrying the weight of African-American actors on his back and making choices designed to give blacks dignity on screen. That's at least at least how he's been framed historically). The film has a palpable sense of danger, two strongly defined characters, two great performances, and a chemistry between the two leads that is definitely something.
Sound of Music (1965)-Julie Andrews + Adorable Children + Sweeping vistas + Music + Backstory involving Nazis and WWII = Oscar. What else can you say?
My Fair Lady (1964)-With Born Yesterday, Bringing Up Baby and Philadelphia Story going unrecognized, I think My Fair Lady was a career achievement award for George Cuckor than it was recognition for an innovative film. The film has some great musical numbers and great performances by Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison but does fall a little short of the bar expected of an Oscar-winning musical. I also wonder if it is fair to judge My Fair Lady on the fact that the songs, one of the film’s main strengths, weren’t originally written for the film, anyway.
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)*-An epic among epics. Peter O'Toole imbues Lawrence of Arabia with traits of an uneasy man who's been pinned for a loser his whole life but who's also taking the biggest risks of his life. It's a performance where you're just trying to think "What's making this guy's head tick." Let me just say, holy crap, is this a long movie. Watching it was like a marathon that I dropped out of at mile 21.
West Side Story (1961)-This is a film for the ages as far as I’m concerned and as the kind of musical innovative enough to break the mold of its genre to be deserving of a best picture (unlike My Fair Lady). For someone who isn’t in to musicals, I’m sure that they can appreciate the quality of the dance sequences even if it’s not their thing.
Apartment (1960)-According to Cameron Crowe’s book “Conversations with Billy Wilder,” When Billy Wilder accepted his Oscar, the guy handing it to him said “you know, you’ll probably never top this one” and he was probably right. The Apartment is not only an absolutely amazing film and personal favorite that I could go on for hours about, but it’s one of the few comedies to ever win best picture and that’s hard to do. I’ve also never seen a comedy that so effortlessly provided social commentary and satire. I'm not really someone who is strongly aware of mise-en-scene (the way the scene is framed in th camera) when I'm watching a movie, but this is one of the first instances where the art of it jumped out at me. Particularly, the way the cubicles in the Office call to mind a modern-day equivalent of Fritz Lang's Metropolis.
Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)-Like Apartment and West Side Story, I’m not judging them on the level of Oscars but films among the best ever made and this transcends the question "did it deserve an Oscar." For me, the question is can you possibly shower it with enough Oscars and praise? It is my second favorite war film (we’ll get to the first in a couple minutes) and easily one of my 20 favorite films of all time, approximately. The protagonists are so interesting, with Alec Guiness forming such an interesting contrast to William Holden and such startling similarities with Sessuye Hayakawa, (Guiness and Hayakawa give two amazing performances too). The score and scenery is top notch, the ending is one of the most shocking I've ever witnessed.
Around the World in 80 Days (1956)- I can't help but acknowledge the sentiments that the selection of this picture almost single-handedly strips the "best picture" club of its integrity, but I think in examining why this film was so unfit to join the ranks of Oscar-winning films, then we get somewhere in terms of establishing what we expect from the Best picture winner. Perhaps, the lack of a theme? The lack of importance? Was it too enjoyable? Too little dramatic tension? The cameos cheapen the experience? In any case, it's certainly an enjoyable film of considerable scale if you don't think too hard about what the award means. I think of it as a spectacle of places and people and there's the certain extravagance to it that classic film buffs might look back to the olden pictures for with nostalgia.
From Here to Eternity (1953)-My favorite war film. Some might dismiss too loose of a narrative with two stories that have little to do with each other, but I think it paints interesting portraits of five unique characters and it's a very captivating epic. Montgomery Clift's character in particular makes such a strong impression. What would prompt a man to that level of stubborness, that he won't box or play the trumpet unless he does it his way? I often think when I watch it, that that trait is parallels the entire military structure.
Greatest Show on Earth (1952) - Greatest Show on Earth is grouped in with Around the World in 80 Days as one of those films that should never be uttered in the same sentence with the other winners but I found it a very good story and I think there's a lot more to be remembered from the film than the train crash scene. It is somewhat of an ensemble piece and I'm not sure if the way that, say, James Stewart isn't really relevant to the story but takes up screentime in a pleasantly time-consuming way is what makes the film feel irrelevant.
American in Paris (1951) - American in Paris was pretty much MGM and the Arthur Freed Unit at the top of their game. Gerswhin's score, Minelli's escapist sensibilities, and Gene Kelly's charm are the perfect combination, and Levant and Caron are good additions as well, although the guy who replaced Maurice LeChavilier as the French man was really quite a pushover. The problem which couldn't have been anticipated back in 1951 was that in 1952, an even greater film came out, "Singing in the Rain," which is now remembered as the highwater mark of the MGM Musical era, but again they didn't have a time machine, so let's not fault them. Also, worth noting: 1951 was one of the most competitive years in film history with three other films from AFI's top 100 (A Place in the Sun, Streetcar Named Desire and African Queen) coming out that year, so American in Paris gets a bad rap for that.
All About Eve (1950) - A cynical and twisted picture that's so marvelously done. These days, to explore the dark side of human nature, filmmakers need to incorporate murder or some other crime into a plot. I love how All About Eve is so dark yet no one is really doing anything "wrong" in a sense. Anne Baxter stands out as the conniving Eve who's loved by everyone except for the one person who's career she is destroying. Ironic that this came out in the same year as Sunset Boulevard which is the only other dark satire of Hollywood that comes close to this one.
Gentlemen’s Agreement (1947) - I've seen this film twice and each time it hits me in a very funny way. I like the thematic content but the actual storyline becomes dull somewhere along the way. Gregory Peck might have given one of the best performances in cinematic history in To Kill a Mockingbird but he's a little dry and unconvincing here. When he talks about how someone's trying to pick a fight "with his girl," like he's John Trovolta in Grease, it just makes me cringe. It's a film with too much exposition and talking away as well. It's certainly curious how Elia Kazan never came under fire in the way Stanley Kramer did for having films that were overly preachy.
How Green was my Valley (1941)-Yes, it beat Citizen Kane, but it's actually one of John Ford's best films and shows the master at his best. Orson Welles revered John Ford and watched Stagecoach 30 or 40 times in preperation for making Citizen Kane, so I imagine if his masterpiece was going to lose out at the Oscars, he wouldn't have wanted it to lose to anyone but John Ford.
Rebecca (1940)-Hitchkock did stick entirely to one genre which was a self-created one, but in within his work he takes his Hitchkockian qualities and makes textbook examples of other genres with a Hitchkockian spin: Strangers on a Train is a perfect example of noir, Psycho is the precursor to all those horror movies that flood our theaters, and the lavish Oscar-winning book adaptation is Rebecca. In other words, I think that while other Hitchkock pictures might have been better, Rebecca might have been the film with the most grandeur to it. It also helps that Joan Fontaine and Lawrence Olivier turn in two of the best performances of Hitchkock protagonists I’ve seen and Mrs. Danvers is quite a villain. I’d probably rank Rebecca as one of my top five or six Hitchkock films.
Gone with the Wind (1939)-Gone with the Wind WAS the biggest picture ever. It outranks Titanic in terms of intake when you adjust for inflation and THEN you have to realize how little a ticket cost back in the day as well. It might be argued that until Gone with the Wind, movies weren't that big of a deal. All the things from Gone with the Wind, the music, the color, the scope and scale of the images on screen, the performances, and most importantly the impact of the story and dialogue took audiences to a level they'd never seen before. That doesn't mean it's the one must-see film we all should be dying to see in present day because it's so awesome, but it still gets plenty of commendation which is important because nothing really can compare to Gone with the Wind in terms of public impact. I notice that lists generated by users, like the 2 online top 100 polls polling internet critics and regular movie fans as well as the imdb top 250, it doesn't rank particularly high.
The Life of Emile Zola (1936) - A fairly run-of-the-mill 30's film. I wouldn't call it anything particularly special. I'd say it's interesting if you're interested about learning about the person of Emile Zola. Good crib notes for a history essay.
It Happened One Night (1934) - Like Gone with the Wind, it's impact on the general public can't be underestimated. This film single-handedly made Columbia Pictures and Frank Capra's career. The film was the pinnacle of screwball comedies: Through a romance of two different classes, it gave hope to audeinces struggling during the Depression but the movie didn't just connect to audiences back then, I think more than Gone with the Wind, even, It Happened One Night is timeless. It's handling of the battle-of-the-sexes theme still reads well today and it's a great deal of fun. Truly, an underrated film.
Grand Hotel (1933)-See "Grand Hotel" tags. I absolutely adore this movie.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Digging up Shirley MacLaine and Warren Beatty's past
The last week, I've been going to the Central Library of
Arlington, VA and looking up stuff in the Virginia Room (which is their county
archives), for a grad school study project, and while I was there I thought,
what the hell, I'll look up info on Warren Beatty and Shirley MacLaine. They
are part of my hometown but I’ve never known much about their connection.
It was an interesting reveal.
So first let’s get the two last names out of the way. They’re both Beattys but Shirley MacLaine must
have been found enough of her middle name back then to include it in the
yearbook because she’s listed as Shirley MacLean Beatty. She later substituted her middle name for her last name on the spot at one of her first theater auditions because a casting director couldn't pronounce "Beatty" and altered the spelling.
The two had no other siblings growing up and were pretty
close. A positive relationship has been alluded to in interviews the two have
given as adults although Shirley wishes her brother was less of a philanderer.
Both siblings were noted to be trouble makers in their pre-adolescent days
which must mean they did some truly outrageous things (considering all kids are
pretty capable of mischief). They would evidently lie on the street and stop
traffic and play neighborhood pranks that were reported to their dad. Their dad
was a principal of an Arlington middle school and admitted to being a little
ashamed of their antics.
Shirley was a cheerleader at W-L and participated in ballet in high scchool. She went to Broadway the
summer before her senior year where she had bit roles. The next summer after
graduation she went back to Broadway and landed a role in the Pajama Game that
got her discovered by Alfred Hitchcock. Soon she was cast in the film “The
Trouble with Harry” within one year of graduating W-L. Not long after that came
“Around the World in 80 Days” which was one of the most expensive and
profitable films Hollywood had made to date and led to an extensive career that
earned her five Oscar nominations and one win among many other accolades.
Beatty was a star football player in high school and the class president senior
year. His high school yearbook pictures are a lot more amusing to look at than
his sister's because of his crew cut. He was also his senior year class
president.
He got into the theater the summer before his senior year when his sister
recommended he do it as a stagehand at the National Theater in D.C. Still, it was his football playing that stuck
out. He got somewhere in the ballpark of 10 scholarship offers but he turned
them down to study acting at Northwestern University.
So that’s the story so far. There are obviously many more files in the library,
so I look forward to doing some more digging…
Thursday, January 18, 2007
A very dissapointing list of movies i've seen by directors
I recently found that if you look at my list of movies by director (minimum is 4 films by any one director), i'm really somewhat dissapointed at my output of films that i've seen. I've prided myself and having a diverse background with a lot of different eras of film, and not necessarily having seen all the best movies (i haven't seen Saving Private Ryan or Apocolypse Now or even The Godfather. I haven't seen Sunset Boulevard but i've seen Double Indemnity for example and having a mix of the classics and some of the fringe films. Like one day i felt like watching a Scorsesee film. I'd seen Goodfellas and rather than go to the conventional choice of Raging Bull or Taxi Driver, his two next most famous films, I chose Color of Money becuase i wanted to see the performance from Paul Newman that won him an oscar and pool sounded fun). And when people call into question my credentials as a film person for not having seen enough films (they'll usually be like "you've never seen _____?!"), i don't really care, i don't feel pressure to see all the great movies at once. However, by these standards, i feel a little embarrassed. How can i call myself an expert on Clint Eastwood when i've only seen three of his films (Bronco Billy hehe, Unforgiven and Mystic River), or really anyone beyond Alfred Hitchkock, Stephen Spielberg and Woody Allen.
In my defense, however, I do have at least one or two films by pretty much every major director: Eastwood (3), Capra (3), Ford (2), Kubrick (3), Sidney Lumet (3), Fellini (1), Renoir (2), Bergman (1), Godard (1), Trouffant (1), Malick (2), etc.
And the guys i like like Sam Mendes, Rob Marshall, and Wes Anderson i've seen pertty much everything they've made. Someone suggested i do percentages and i've seen 100% of Mendes and Marshall and 75% of Wes Anderson (all except Bottle Rocket).
So i definitely feel encouraged to watch a little more. Right now i just checked out Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil so i can bump Eastwood up to 4 and i thought i might watch another Billy Wilder movie cause he's really my favorite and I just checked out this great movie "Conversations with Billy Wilder.
Also, if you can tell I'm a child of the 90s, based on all those bad and mediocre 90s films which i might otherwise not have watched.
Also, let me just say I never intended to watch more of Ivan Retiman than Rob Zemeckis, Vincente Minelli or Martin Scorsesee, or more Frank Oz than Rob Altman.
18 Alfred Hitchkock-Family Plot, Torn Curtain, Rebecca, 39 Steps, North by Northwest, Sabetour, The Wrong Man, Strangers on a Train, Shadow of a Doubt, Topaz, The Birds, Psycho, Lifeboat, Spellbound, Vertigo, The Man Who Knew Too Much (both versions), Rear Window
12 Stephen Spielberg-Color Purple, Raiders of the Last Ark, Jurassic Park, Temple of Doom, The Last Crusade, The Terminal, Catch Me If You Can, Schindler's List, Hook, ET, Jaws, War of the Worlds
12 Woody Allen-Hollywood Ending, Curse of the Jaded Scorpion, Manhattan, Annie Hall, Small Time Crooks, Sweet and Lowdown, Mighty Aphrodite, Manhattan Murder Mystery, Melinda and Melinda, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, Bullets Over Broadway
7-Ivan Reitman: Ghostbusters, 6 Days 7 Days, Old School, Space Jam, Fathers Day, Beethoven, Beethoven’s 2nd
7 Rob Altman-Dr. T and the Women, McCabe and Mrs Miller, MASH, Prairie Home Companion, The Player, Buffalo Bill, California Split
7-Rob Zemeckis-Back to the Future I-III, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Romancing the Stone, Forrest Gump, Contact
7 Joel and Ethan Coen-Oh Brother Where Art Thou, Ladykillers, Man Who Knew Too Much, Intolerable Cruelty, Big Lebowski, Fargo, No Country for Old Men
7 Billy Wilder-Spirit of St. Louis, Some Like it Hot, The Apartment, Irma la Douce, Double Indemnity, Sabrina, Ace in the Hole
6 Mel Brooks-Spaceballs, High Anxiety, Young Frankenstein, The Producers, Blazing Saddles, History of the World Part I
6 Vincente Minelli-Meet me in St Louis, American in Paris, The Pirate, Brigadoon, The Band Wagon, Kismet
6 Frank Oz-Bowfinger, In and Out, Stepford Wives, The Score, What About Bob, Housesitter
6 Frank Capra-Meet John Doe, Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Arsenic andOld Lace, It Happened One Night, It's a Wonderful Life, Mr Deeds Goes to Town
6 Mike Nicholls-Primary Colors, The Birdcage, The Graduate, Working Girl, What Planet Are You From, Charlie Wilson's War
5 Martin Scorsesee-Color of Money, Age of Innocence, Goodfellas, Aviator, The Departed
5 George Lucas-Star Wars I-IV, American Graffiti
5 Stanley Donen-Take Me Out to the Ballgame (most sources insist that he really was the director, not Bugsy Berkley), On the Town, Singing in the Rain, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Charade
5 Joel Schumaker-Time to Kill, 8 MM, Batman and Robin, Batman Forever, The Client
5 Orson Welles-Citizen Kane, Lady of Shanghai, Othello, Magnificent Ambersons, Touch of Evil
5 John Glenn-5 Bonds
5 Sidney Pollack-Slender Thread, Sabrina, Out of Africa, Interpreter, Tootsie
5 John Huston-Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Key Largo, Beat the Devil, Man Who Would be King, African Queen
5 Robert Rodriguez-El Mariachi Trilogy, Spy Kids and Lava Girl, Sin City
5 Barry Levinson-Man of the Year, Sleepers, Rain Man, Tin Men, Good Morning Vietnam
5 Terry Gilliam-Adventures of Baron Muchenhassen, Time Bandits, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Brothers Grimm, Fisher King
5 Jay Roach-Austin Powers I-III, Meet the Parents , Mystery Alaska
5 Gore Verbinski-Pirates of the Carribean 1, 2, 3, Weatherman, The Mexican
5 Howard Hawks-Sgt. York, Bringing Up Baby, Big Sleep, Ball of Fire, Rio Bravo
4 Harold Lloyd-Safety Last, Feet First, The Freshman, Kid Brother
4 Guy Hamilton-4 Bond movies
4 Peter Weir-Witness, Dead Poet’s Society, The Truman Show, Master and Commander
4 Peter and Bobby Farrelly-Can't remember anymore
4 Kevin Smith-Chasing Amy, Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Dogma (pretty much everything except Clerks)
4 Steven Herek-Mr. Holland’s Opus, Three Musketeers, Mighty Ducks, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventures
4 Steve Sodebergh-Erin Brockovitch, Ocean’s 11, Ocean’s 12, Full Frontal
4 Brett Ratner-After the Sunset, Rush Hour 2, Family Man, X-Men 3
4 Peter Segal-Naked Gun 33 1/3, Tommy Boy, My Fellow Americans, 50 First Dates
4 Chris Columbis-Mrs. Doubtfire, Home Alone, Home Alone 2, Stepmom
4 John Lynn-Whole Nine Yards, Trial and Error, Sgt Bilko, Trial and Error, Ball of Fire
4 Tony Scott-Enemy of the State, Déjà Vu, Crimson Tide, Top Gun
4 Sydney Pollack-Sabrina, Out of Africa, Tootsie, The Interpreter
4 Barry Sonnenfeld-Men in Black I, II, Wild Wild West, Big Trouble
4 Bryan Singer-Usual Suspects, X-Men, X2, Superman Returns
4 Clint Eastwood-Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Unforgiven, Bronco Billy, Mystic River
4 Christopher Guest-Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman, A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration 4 John Lasseter-Lady and the Tramp, Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Cars
4 Wes Anderson-Darjeerling Limited, Rushmore, Royal Tannenbaums, Life Aquatic
4 Ernst Lubuitsch-Trouble in Paradise, Merry Widow, Ninotchka, Shop Around the Corner
4 Johnothan Demme-Married to the Mob, Silence of the Lambs, Melvin and Howard, Manchurian Candidate
4 Tim Burton-Ed Wood, Batman Returns, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Batman
4 Roland Emmerich-Stargate, ID4, The Patriot, Day After Tomorrow
In my defense, however, I do have at least one or two films by pretty much every major director: Eastwood (3), Capra (3), Ford (2), Kubrick (3), Sidney Lumet (3), Fellini (1), Renoir (2), Bergman (1), Godard (1), Trouffant (1), Malick (2), etc.
And the guys i like like Sam Mendes, Rob Marshall, and Wes Anderson i've seen pertty much everything they've made. Someone suggested i do percentages and i've seen 100% of Mendes and Marshall and 75% of Wes Anderson (all except Bottle Rocket).
So i definitely feel encouraged to watch a little more. Right now i just checked out Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil so i can bump Eastwood up to 4 and i thought i might watch another Billy Wilder movie cause he's really my favorite and I just checked out this great movie "Conversations with Billy Wilder.
Also, if you can tell I'm a child of the 90s, based on all those bad and mediocre 90s films which i might otherwise not have watched.
Also, let me just say I never intended to watch more of Ivan Retiman than Rob Zemeckis, Vincente Minelli or Martin Scorsesee, or more Frank Oz than Rob Altman.
18 Alfred Hitchkock-Family Plot, Torn Curtain, Rebecca, 39 Steps, North by Northwest, Sabetour, The Wrong Man, Strangers on a Train, Shadow of a Doubt, Topaz, The Birds, Psycho, Lifeboat, Spellbound, Vertigo, The Man Who Knew Too Much (both versions), Rear Window
12 Stephen Spielberg-Color Purple, Raiders of the Last Ark, Jurassic Park, Temple of Doom, The Last Crusade, The Terminal, Catch Me If You Can, Schindler's List, Hook, ET, Jaws, War of the Worlds
12 Woody Allen-Hollywood Ending, Curse of the Jaded Scorpion, Manhattan, Annie Hall, Small Time Crooks, Sweet and Lowdown, Mighty Aphrodite, Manhattan Murder Mystery, Melinda and Melinda, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, Bullets Over Broadway
7-Ivan Reitman: Ghostbusters, 6 Days 7 Days, Old School, Space Jam, Fathers Day, Beethoven, Beethoven’s 2nd
7 Rob Altman-Dr. T and the Women, McCabe and Mrs Miller, MASH, Prairie Home Companion, The Player, Buffalo Bill, California Split
7-Rob Zemeckis-Back to the Future I-III, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Romancing the Stone, Forrest Gump, Contact
7 Joel and Ethan Coen-Oh Brother Where Art Thou, Ladykillers, Man Who Knew Too Much, Intolerable Cruelty, Big Lebowski, Fargo, No Country for Old Men
7 Billy Wilder-Spirit of St. Louis, Some Like it Hot, The Apartment, Irma la Douce, Double Indemnity, Sabrina, Ace in the Hole
6 Mel Brooks-Spaceballs, High Anxiety, Young Frankenstein, The Producers, Blazing Saddles, History of the World Part I
6 Vincente Minelli-Meet me in St Louis, American in Paris, The Pirate, Brigadoon, The Band Wagon, Kismet
6 Frank Oz-Bowfinger, In and Out, Stepford Wives, The Score, What About Bob, Housesitter
6 Frank Capra-Meet John Doe, Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Arsenic andOld Lace, It Happened One Night, It's a Wonderful Life, Mr Deeds Goes to Town
6 Mike Nicholls-Primary Colors, The Birdcage, The Graduate, Working Girl, What Planet Are You From, Charlie Wilson's War
5 Martin Scorsesee-Color of Money, Age of Innocence, Goodfellas, Aviator, The Departed
5 George Lucas-Star Wars I-IV, American Graffiti
5 Stanley Donen-Take Me Out to the Ballgame (most sources insist that he really was the director, not Bugsy Berkley), On the Town, Singing in the Rain, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Charade
5 Joel Schumaker-Time to Kill, 8 MM, Batman and Robin, Batman Forever, The Client
5 Orson Welles-Citizen Kane, Lady of Shanghai, Othello, Magnificent Ambersons, Touch of Evil
5 John Glenn-5 Bonds
5 Sidney Pollack-Slender Thread, Sabrina, Out of Africa, Interpreter, Tootsie
5 John Huston-Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Key Largo, Beat the Devil, Man Who Would be King, African Queen
5 Robert Rodriguez-El Mariachi Trilogy, Spy Kids and Lava Girl, Sin City
5 Barry Levinson-Man of the Year, Sleepers, Rain Man, Tin Men, Good Morning Vietnam
5 Terry Gilliam-Adventures of Baron Muchenhassen, Time Bandits, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Brothers Grimm, Fisher King
5 Jay Roach-Austin Powers I-III, Meet the Parents , Mystery Alaska
5 Gore Verbinski-Pirates of the Carribean 1, 2, 3, Weatherman, The Mexican
5 Howard Hawks-Sgt. York, Bringing Up Baby, Big Sleep, Ball of Fire, Rio Bravo
4 Harold Lloyd-Safety Last, Feet First, The Freshman, Kid Brother
4 Guy Hamilton-4 Bond movies
4 Peter Weir-Witness, Dead Poet’s Society, The Truman Show, Master and Commander
4 Peter and Bobby Farrelly-Can't remember anymore
4 Kevin Smith-Chasing Amy, Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Dogma (pretty much everything except Clerks)
4 Steven Herek-Mr. Holland’s Opus, Three Musketeers, Mighty Ducks, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventures
4 Steve Sodebergh-Erin Brockovitch, Ocean’s 11, Ocean’s 12, Full Frontal
4 Brett Ratner-After the Sunset, Rush Hour 2, Family Man, X-Men 3
4 Peter Segal-Naked Gun 33 1/3, Tommy Boy, My Fellow Americans, 50 First Dates
4 Chris Columbis-Mrs. Doubtfire, Home Alone, Home Alone 2, Stepmom
4 John Lynn-Whole Nine Yards, Trial and Error, Sgt Bilko, Trial and Error, Ball of Fire
4 Tony Scott-Enemy of the State, Déjà Vu, Crimson Tide, Top Gun
4 Sydney Pollack-Sabrina, Out of Africa, Tootsie, The Interpreter
4 Barry Sonnenfeld-Men in Black I, II, Wild Wild West, Big Trouble
4 Bryan Singer-Usual Suspects, X-Men, X2, Superman Returns
4 Clint Eastwood-Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Unforgiven, Bronco Billy, Mystic River
4 Christopher Guest-Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman, A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration 4 John Lasseter-Lady and the Tramp, Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Cars
4 Wes Anderson-Darjeerling Limited, Rushmore, Royal Tannenbaums, Life Aquatic
4 Ernst Lubuitsch-Trouble in Paradise, Merry Widow, Ninotchka, Shop Around the Corner
4 Johnothan Demme-Married to the Mob, Silence of the Lambs, Melvin and Howard, Manchurian Candidate
4 Tim Burton-Ed Wood, Batman Returns, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Batman
4 Roland Emmerich-Stargate, ID4, The Patriot, Day After Tomorrow
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