Notes on the Empire Magazine Top 300 Poll

In 2014, Empire Magazine compiled a reader poll of the 301 greatest films of all time  (you can play it in quiz form here, the list is unavailable but the final composited total is here).

 Here are some notes on the list:

1.   The Empire subscriber base is likely dominated by film aficionados who came of age in the 1990s. This can be seen in the high rankings of the films of Quentin Tarantino’s and Frank Darabont’s films, the ranking of Scorsese’s 1990 film “Goodfellas” over his earlier masterpieces, the high rankings of “Fight Cub,” “The Matrix” and the fact that Kevin Smith is even mentioned at all, shows that this is likely a group of voters that primarily came of age during the 1990s. Tarantino’s debut “Reservoir Dogs” (which didn’t really bring anything to the table that “Pulp Fiction” would do two years later) clocks in at #75. Additionally, David Fincher’s hits “Se7en” and “Fight Club” and the David Fincheresque “Usual Suspects” all place extremely high.
2.   It’s also worth noting that after the big triumvate of “Raging Bull” “Taxi Driver” and “Goodfellas”, the only other pre-2000 Scorsese work listed here is “Casino” which isn’t particularly memorable unless you were forming your filmic vocabulary in that decade. A more preferable choice for a film that defined Scorsese pre-2000 is “Mean Streets.”
3.  This is clearly a male voting body that grew up in the 1990’s. Tarantino and Fincher’s 90’s work are both hyper-masculine celebrations of violence whereas heady science fiction stuff like “Contact” gets ignored in favor of something like “The Matrix” which revels in bullets and special effects. Romantic comedies and musicals are both given much less weight than they would ordinarily. Among the older Westerns, the 1969 film “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” makes the cuts which is a celebration of masculine strength. Another 1969 film which won the best picture that year and generally does about as well on these kinds of lists, “Midnight Cowboy” gets omitted entirely and that’s a film that celebrates masculine weakness. Well-regarded films such as “Ghost” or “In the Name of the Father” from the time period where many of the films are skewed towards stand no chance of making it. "English Patient" is another outliar. I might say the same about the 2012 version of "Les Mis" but as Key and Peele reminded us, it's got Wolverine in it.
4.  Then again, Tim Burton who was one of the most successful film directors of the decade in terms of box office pull, innovation, and cultural clout seems to have retreated from memory. Edward Scissorhands clocks in at 170 while his masterpiece “Ed Wood” isn’t even mentioned at all. Batman is 288 and that’s more likely due to the presence of superhero tastes than Burton’s touch. Perhaps, his gothic flights of imagination are easier to get invested in as kids and  they detached from him as an adult despite the fact that “Big Fish” (which ranks on IMDB’s Top 250) and “Ed Wood” are both considered great films that aren’t particularly relevant to a children’s audience.
5. One would think that a year later in the post-truth era, movies that either champion political truth like “The Candidate,” “All the President’s Men” or “Spotlight” or that satirize news absurdity like Elia Kazan’s “A Face in the Crowd” or “Network” might rise a bit in the rankings. “All the President’s Men” and “Network” are both on AFI’s Top 100. “All the President’s Men” doesn’t even make the list!
6. It’s also clear that this voting body has been selectively exposed to the past. “Scarface” makes the list because the poster is on everyone’s dorm room. “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Wizard of Oz” our TV staples around Christmastime whereas Frank Capra’s other masterpieces don’t make the cut. Similarly, “Cool Hand Luke” has become a very quotable film and as such beat out 1967 films such as “Bonnie and Clyde” and “In the Heat of the Night” that had previously ranked higher on many lists. And don’t forget the cannon of John Hughes whose films are popular at summer parties and clubs.
7.  It seems the artsier the group of film experts, the more dismissive they are of Spielberg. However, if you’re pragmatic enough to realize that Spielberg’s films are as essential as Sergio Leone, David Lynch, Martin Scorsese, and Quentin Tarantino. Whereas “Schindler’s List” ordinarily tops these types of lists, these voters selected “Jaws” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark” 8^th and 9^th. “Schindler’s List” represents Spielberg’s high-brow ambitions, whereas “Jaws” and “Raiders” represent Spielberg sticking to his forte.
8.  For a voting body that rewards the hyper-violent and special-effects laden, it is refreshing to see a couple of Terrence Malick’s films make the list in “Tree of Life” and “New World.” His films stand entirely against any cinematic trends to make narratives faster and tighter.
9. Old-school blockbusters like "Superman" "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn" and particuarly "Die Hard" finally get their due as smartly made blockbusters unashamed to dig into their deep mythologies. I know this is hard to believe but some 15 years ago, there was virtually nothing indicating "Die Hard" was a classic among any serious segment of the population. This also could explain Tim Burton's "Batman" making the list.

If the AFI 100 Greatest Films series added 18 new entries

In 1997, the American Film Institute released a landmark list of the 100 greatest English-language films in the history of cinema. This was what single-handedly turned me on to classic films. Before that point, I had no idea how any of the few older films I had seen were considered against the greats. If you had asked me to guess the top 100 before seeing the list, I might have guessed films like the Vincente Minnelli film Kismet (which is, in fact, considered one of his worst but I liked it plenty), The Pink Panther, Lion King, Back to the Future (which DOES deserve to be on the list), An American Tail, or Cool Runnings.

My own personal experiences aside, the AFI's list deserves acclaim for being balanced, comprehensive, and very much in line with popular opinion, cultural impact and critical standing. In 2007, the AFI rereleased their list with members revoting. Although ten years and a whole batch of new films had passed between lists, only four films released since 1997 made the new cut: Titanic, Saving Private Ryan, Sixth Sense, and Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring. Instead of adding new entries, the AFI spent most of their energy amending the catalogue of films from the original time period, 1996-1996, to correct oversights such as the General, Do the Right Thing, Cabaret, Shawshank Redemption, 12 Angry Men, Blade Runner and 12 others.

So the scenario I'm exploring today is what if the AFI voted to add 18 new films to the original 122 that have been included in either of the lists. This way, no classic films have to be bumped out. I'm only interested in films that overlap with the most recent film to be featured so far which was Lord of the Rings, so no films after 2001 will be considered and since 18 films were added from the existing time period, I'm picking that number.

Here would be my predictions in order of likelihood.

1. The Conversation (1974) dir. Frances Ford Copolla-Starring Gene Hackman as a secretive surveillance official with a crisis of conscience, the film is timeless and especially thematically relevant. It was a Best Picture nominee (competing against Copolla's other masterpiece Godfather II) and widely considered to be on par with Copolla's other films that have landed on the AFI list.

2. Back to the Future (1985) dir. Rob Zemeckis- It's a favorite of mine, but it's very clearly a favorite of a generation and a venerable time capsule of film making in the 80's. The AV Club's Inventory named it the film that defined the 80's in their list of twelve films that defined their decades. Beyond that, it combines the best of several 80's genres (teen movie, scifi, comedy of misadventures) and hits that sweet spot between audience favorite and respectable classic. It's one of the first blockbusters to expand into a trilogy and simultaneously enjoys the status of a cult film today: Something that's endlessly rewatched, celebrated, and dissected.

3. Touch of Evil (1958) dir. Orson Welles-After making Citizen Kane at the ripe age of 26, widely considered to be the best film of all-time, Welles saw his career get severely roadblocked by Hollywood and the bitter vendetta of the Hearst empire and as such, must of his talent as a director was severely dampened by studio influence. Towards the end of his career he made one of his best works: A riff on Othello that was adapted from the short story "Badge of Courage." The film was heavily tampered with by the studio (Universal) and buried in the back half of a double feature with no promotion. In the last few years of the 20th Century as the best of the century lists rolled out Touch of Evil gained popularity just as the director's cut was released. It made lists by Entertainment Weekly, Guinness book of Films, the National Society of Film Critic's A-List and Tim Dirks' website filmsite.org. Beyond that, its a stunning film that I'd count as two or three of my favorites.

4. Alien (1979) dir. Ridley Scott- Like Back to the Future, Alien hits the sweet spot between audience favorite and critical darling and transcends the genre trap of sci-fi. That Sigourney Weaver earned an Oscar nomination for a genre part is a testament of how iconic that character became. It's also fair to say Alien was boundary-pushing. It also ranks #36 on the greatest films of all-time by Time Out Magazine.

5. His Girl Friday (1940) dir. Howard Hawks- Cited by both Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper as one of the ten most glaring omissions of the 1997 list, His Girl Friday is the quintessential screwball comedy that many other romcoms consciously or unconsciously borrowed from. Although another of Hawk's screwball comedies, "Bringing Up Baby", made the list, "His Girl Friday" is a sharper work that showcases Cary Grant as a strong character who can match wits with the best of them which is how he deserves to be remembered. The film might owe its effectiveness to the fact that it was adapted from a film ("The Front Page") in which both leads were men. How's that for gender equality.

6. Big Sleep (1946) dir. Howard Hawks- If I'm not mistaken, Hawks only has one film in the AFI top 122 and if that's the case, that's downright baffling when one considers the sheer contribution of landmark films he made in nearly every genre. Big Sleep, for example, is one of the earliest trailblazers of film noir in its American form which is even more impressive when considered that few other films pushed the form's boundaries as far in terms of a labryrinthine story, an unapolagetically raw hero and risque dialogue.

7. Badlands (1973) dir. Terrence Malick- Malick made two films in the 1970's that grew his legend as he went into reclusion for 20 years before he made another pair of films that were both hailed as masterpieces. Malick is a director who has a unique style with incomparable cinematography that would make any comprehensive list of American films incomplete without his name on it. Badlands was the film which introduced his style to the world and its antiheroes- a pair of lovebirds on a killing spree- helped define the counterculture of the 70's.

8. The Awful Truth (1937) dir. Leo McCarey- A screwball comedy and melodrama that that won Best Director for Leo McCarey, The Awful Truth is an unconventional love story in that its about divorce. Time Magazine said it was "possibly the greatest love story ever made."

9. LA Confidential (1997) dir. Curtis Hanson -The star-studded modern-day noir stands the test of time as a relatively pure recreation of a genre that's near-dead. It was ranked among the top-rated films of the 90's when I conducted a poll of over 100 people and it seems to be reserved with classic status.

10. How the West was Won (1963) dir. John Ford-The film was the last of John Ford's Best Picture nominees and it could be argued that, in terms of scope, it was his ultimate masterpiece. The film was a grandiose spectacle on the level of David Lean and Cecille B. DeMille, and it borrowed a page from D.W. Griffith's "Intolerance" in the way it intertwined stories from different time periods.  It had the appeal of Best Picture winners "Around the World in 80 Days" or "Greatest Show on Earth" but unlike those two, it could actually be considered a work of art.

8 more
11. Being There  (1979), directed by Hal Ashby, starring Peter Sellers, starring Peter Sellers, Shirley MacLaine, Melyn Douglas, Jack Warden
12. The Exorcist (1973), directed by William Friedkin, starring Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Lee J Cobb, Linda Blair, Jason Miller
13. Almost Famous (2000), directed by Cameron Crowe, starring Patrick Fugit, Frances McDormand, Jason Lee, Kate Hudson, Zooey Deschanel, Philip Seymour Hoffman
14. Night of the Hunter (1955), directed by Charles Laughton, starring Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, Peter Graves, Lillian Gish, James Gleason
15. The Matrix (1999), directed by Andrew and Lana Wachowski, starring Keanu Reeves, Hugo Weaving, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Gloria Foster
16. Terms of Endearment (1983) directed by James L Brooks, starring Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger, Jack Nicholson, John Lithgow, Danny DeVito
17. East of Eden (1955), directed by Elia Kazan, starring James Dean, Raymond Massey, Julie Harris, Burl Ives, Jo Van Fleet
18. Blue Velvet (1986)-directed by David Lynch, starring Isabella Rossellini, Dean Stockwell, Dennis Hopper, Kyle MacLachlan, Laura Dern, Hope Lange

Jamestown's 400th Anniversary & The New World Review

As a Virginia, I'm actually very excited that Jamestown is celebrating its 400th Anniversary. Time Magazine did a big feature on it and I agree with Time Magazine's assertion in the opening paragraph that Jamestown doesn't get the attention that Plymouth had.

As Virginians, we studied Jamestown closely in our history books, and as Americans, Jamestown is studied to a lesser degree. In pop culture, Jamestown might be best known as the inspiration for two movies set ten years apart.

The first Pocohantas was a 1995 cartoon from Disney starring, among others, Mel Gibson (it now seems like poetic justice, considering his Euro-centric views, that he played a character who learned to be less ignorant) and Christian Bale (which is also ironic considering Bale starred in the New World). It was a typical Disney musical that didn't really distinguish itself from the ones that came before it ("Aladdin" "Beauty and the Beast") or after it ("Mulan"), but it might be the one I have the warmest memories of because of the material. It also did win an oscar for its song (as well as best score) "Colors of the Wind," which its predecessors "The Lion King", "Aladdin", and "Beauty and the Beast" all did, so it wasn't really anything special for Disney at the time.

Exactly 10 years later in 2005, The New World told the story in epic fashion. Those who are passionate about the Jamestown story were incredibly fortunate to have Terrence Malick chose this subject as his material for only his fourth film ever. It was my favorite film of that year.

Malick takes on the story with that sense of imagination while he grounds the visual look with ameticulous attention to historic detail. Thats one thing that really stands out and keeps things interesting during the picture's slower parts, especially for for people who are familiar with Eastern Virginia, seeing this movie is to see exactly what yourhometowns looked like 400 years ago.

A lot of the story, however, is very abstract. The score brilliantly alternates between baroque piano music, what one would imagine to be the music of the Native American tribe, and a serene silence in which nothing but the sounds of nature can be heard. Time seems abstract and sometimes journal entries from John Smith's journal are laid out as voice-over.

I later heard a lecture from a historical consultant for the film who told us that the film was supposed to be like a dream and it was meant to play to an audience who was already familiar with the story. The names John Rolfe, John Smith, and Pocohantas are never mentioned once he said. It would figure then that Terrence Malick saw himself as not a storyteller but a reinterpreter of a story that stands either as historical truth or myth. And by myth, I do mean myth. According to some history majors at the lecture I attended, there was a lack of literate people in the Jamestown colony and there is good evidence to suggest that John Smith's journals were embellished to the point where he might not have even ever met Pocohantas. I found that fascinating.