The script is nothing short of astonishing in its brilliant sense of self-awareness and its ability to continually reinvent itself story-wise and the performances are surprisingly deep and heartfelt for a movie with such a brainy concept. But more than anything else I was delighted by the direction and production by Gondry, for never have I been so convinced stylistically that what I was watching was indeed the inner workings of a person's mind and memories.
100. Enter The Void (Gaspar Noe, 2009)
Visually- insanely brilliant. Story-wise- completely incomprehensible.
99. Irreversible (Gaspar Noe, 2002)
Explores the consequences of a horrific crime in an intelligent manner and like Enter the Void, maddeningly beautiful in terms of cinematography and production. The use of sound especially in this film is incredible.
98. Black Christmas (Bob Clark, 1974)
On par with Halloween in terms of sheer creepiness. The spooky, uncomfortable tone is kept consistent throughout and leads to a still effective climax in the final third. While the story itself is kinda wonky, the implications of the ending and the lack of a reveal for who the killer really was is just downright unnerving.
97. Inside (Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo, 2007)
The goriest, weirdest, and most French horror movie I've ever seen. Kudos to the excellent cinematography.
96. The Birds (Alfred Hitchcock, 1963)
It might have an absurd premise, but Hitchcock is able to evoke a sense of extraordinarily unsettling terror by giving no rational cause for the attacks and by staging some bizarrely realistic (at times) scenes involving the titular creatures.
95. The Fog (John Carpenter, 1980)
Like The Birds, this post-Halloween flick makes so much out of so ordinary a thing. There are scenes of such gloriously simplistic nail-biting tension I'm surprised the movie isn't more well-known. Everything from the eerie effects and production design to the creepy cinematography and sound design contribute to a wonderfully old-fashioned thriller that still gives me the chills. Special praise goes to the classic synthesizer score provided by Carpenter himself as he did for Halloween.
94. A Fish Called Wanda (Charles Crichton, 1988)
This film is the perfect melding of John Cleese's Fawlty Towers humor- critiquing and satirizing English and American sensibilities. And he uses a wonderfully adept cast to execute his jokes. Kevin Kline shines as an awesomely idiotic American and Jamie Lee Curtis does unexpectedly well in her comedic scenes. Ultimately the movie is just plain hysterical from start to finish and does exactly what I wanted more of out of the Monty Python series- mixing droll and sly humor with absurd visual gags.
93. Silent Movie (Mel Brooks, 1976)
This is one of the few comedies that still manages to make me laugh consistently every time I watch it. Yes, of course it's absurd, it's Mel Brooks, but I think it's his best, most classically old-school funny in terms of jokes and gags.
92. The Wise Kids (Stephen Cone, 2011)
This is a very sweet and poignant little movie and discusses religion in a surprisingly mature way. It's far from perfect in terms of writing and its budget limitations show significantly in its lack of solid technical credits, but its heart is in the right place and ultimately it comes across loads better story-wise than a lot of the teen crap out there nowadays.
91. What's Eating Gilbert Grape (Lasse Hallström, 1993)
If you don't cry at this movie then there's something wrong with you.
90. The Myth of the American Sleepover (David Robert Mitchell, 2010)
This film manages to capture one of the most honest and real-world glimpses of how American teenagers operate and live their lives. It's incredibly simple and subtle, yet still reveals so much about the nature of youth and the fragility of our relationships as we're growing up.
89. We Need To Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay, 2011)
This is one the few films that quite literally made me wanna throw up. Keep in mind it had nothing to do with any truly graphic or violent imagery, it was purely because of the mood and style of the film. Everything was brilliantly uncomfortable and able to put the viewer in the mind of Tilda Swinton's protagonist. With some wonderful ambiguities in regards to the plot and the characters, the movie ultimately makes some rather bold and incredibly dark statements regarding the nature of family and especially motherhood while also commenting on the responsibilities of being a parent.
88. The Kids Are All Right (Lisa Cholodenko, 2010)
I'll say this now, I'm far from convinced that the message this movie is trying to send is all about how straight men can cure women of their lesbianism. My main issue with the semi-controversy regarding this particular movie is that at no point is it ever overtly stated what Moore's sexuality is. The manner in which her character is portrayed definitely lead me to believe that she was previously one of those free-thinking freely new-agey sexual women who didn't care about the gender of the person she was sleeping with. Then when she met Bening she decided to settle down and raise a family. When Ruffalo shows back up and reintroduces the world she had been a part of, she's excited emotionally and sexually and chooses to have a fling with him. That's how I personally read that whole aspect of the film. I'm not discounting the possibility that there are some underlying 'issues' to be had with how sexuality is being defined in this movie specifically, just that I didn't recognize it, either because it wasn't there or because it wasn't exactly the point of the film itself. That being said, I enjoyed the hell out of this movie. The performances, the writing, the strikingly bright and pretty cinematography, it all adds up to one of those wonderfully awkward family dramedies in the vein of Little Miss Sunshine. No one's perfect, they all say and do the wrong stuff, they all drive one another insane, but ultimately they're all just trying to do their best in a weird world where shit oftentimes just kind of happens and they have to deal with it all. It even, I suspect, is completely aware of the relative unlikability of some of its main characters and their social standing. They're basically rich white people complaining about their lives, but there are so many wicked barbs that are thrown out and nifty moments that are clearly meant to skewer and satirize the stupid stuff going on, as if to say "Shut up, you've got it pretty good and have no right to bitch and moan." And at the end of the day, pretty much everyone gets that. Bening forgives Moore because she has to for the sake of their children. Ruffalo needs to be told that he's no longer welcome because he essentially instigated the whole main issue in the first place. They all have to recognize that life isn't perfect and that not only are solutions not easy to come by but sometimes that the best answer is to simply acknowledge that a wrong has been made and that one just needs to move on from it.
87. Rabbit Hole (John Cameron Mitchell, 2010)
Another one of those dark, depressing, bittersweet, and poignantly intimate looks at the inner workings of a family in pain that I love so dearly. There's just something so honest in these kinds of films that I fundamentally connect and empathize with. While this one is perhaps a little too simplistic in the way it considers grief and some of the darkly comic moments don't work all that well, the performances are staggeringly good and it gets all of the important scenes of emotional revelation just right.
86. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Mike Nichols, 1966)
This is a deceptively simple film featuring what is a very stagey dramatic storyline because it only has four main characters and a limited number of locations. I personally love movies that take place in as few a number of settings as possible because they tend to be able to restrict the actors more in terms of movement, forcing them to rely more heavily on body language and genuine emotional acting and to focus on dialogue a great deal more than usual. And this film does that perfectly. The performances are the key to this story and each actor holds their own while Nichols directs with his usual visual panache and style. The cinematography especially in this film is very striking in terms of lighting and camera movement but never does it draw attention to itself, instead complementing the action on screen.
85. Up (Pete Docter, 2009)
Hands-down my favorite Pixar film. Makes me cry. Every. damn. time.
84. Radio Days (Woody Allen, 1987)
Although this is one of Allen's lesser works in terms of genuine emotional and thematic depth, there is enough of a love for the era in which it takes place that one cannot help but feel a powerful sense of nostalgia for it as well. While most of the audience obviously didn't live through that time, the evocation of characters and locations and events feel staggeringly real but never in a heavy handed or unnecessarily melodramatic way. Everything has a funny or sweet or poignant feeling to it in this movie making it an absolute delight to just watch and fall in love with.
83. Manhattan (Woody Allen, 1979)
Allen tries desperately hard to make his protagonist more than merely likable in this film, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but ultimately the strength of the script and the performances balance out whatever relative weaknesses there may be in the movie. At times it may feel like he's treading old ground (especially Annie Hall) but really this is Allen at his best- sarcastic yet kind of poignant, depressing yet weirdly hopeful, romantic but mostly bittersweet.
82. Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (John Hughes, 1987)
This is Hughes' best work, his most heartfelt and poignant, his most well written, his funniest. I'm not a big fan of his teenager-centric works and I think this film more clearly shows his ability to handle more mature material. The characters are adults and thus are far more convincing than the wise-beyond-their-years kids in stuff like The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles. While those movies attempted to show the difficulties of growing up they far too often devolved into unrealistic situations that made it hard to sympathize with the protagonists. This film, though still somewhat absurd, has a more honest sensibility to it and the restrictions of the plot itself force the audience to focus on the more subtle aspects of the two main characters. While movies like Ferris Bueller's Day Off veered into madcap silliness, Planes, Trains, & Automobiles feels more grounded and genuine.
81. Crimes & Misdemeanors (Woody Allen, 1989)
This movie has the perfect balance between comedy and drama and it leaves the best kind of ambiguity in one's mind about how it should be taken. Is it a consistently compelling examination about existentialism and how we regard one another in different kinds of relationships? Or is it instead a completely sarcastic look at life and death in a classic Woody Allen-like way? I prefer to go with the former, but there are scenes and moments in the film that are strikingly humorous and force a different kind of perspective on the characters and their circumstances in the plot. It's also worth mentioning that Martin Landau gives a ridiculously good performance in this film that is staggeringly poignant at times, it probably should've gotten him the Oscar.
80. Hannah & Her Sisters (Woody Allen, 1986)
This is Allen's most family-oriented film, by which I mean it explores the nature of familial relationships more than his other movies do. One of my favorite subject matters to observe and analyze in films is that of the family and how we treat one another within that framework. While my own work and my personal tastes tend to lead me to prefer films that discuss families in a more serious manner, this particular movie does more or less manage to do just that while simultaneously handling comedic material and looking at some romantic liaisons as well. As usual Allen handles his large ensemble cast very well and each separate character is surprisingly well realized script-wise for such a relatively short movie. It's funny, it's sad, it's charming, it's poignant. It's one of Allen's very best.
79. Murphy's Romance (Martin Ritt, 1985)
This is honestly one of the simplest, sweetest, and most romantic films I've ever seen. It's not fall down funny by any means, it's all very light-hearted comedy but the performances are the key in any movie like this and everyone's so perfectly genuine and earnest and honest that you buy the mild sappiness. And even then some of the cheesy bits toward the end feel oddly real. There's nothing terribly complicated in this movie, but it has such a human way of looking at relationships and people that you get strangely into it.
78. Annie Hall (Woody Allen, 1977)
This is Allen at his best and his most focused. It's incredibly heartfelt, very funny, and very bittersweet. I personally find there to be something incredibly poignant about the last few moments of this particular film where they both meet one another again after some time and have found another person to be with romantically. It's the perfect summation of how love can be lingering and forces us to consider ourselves and how we view our relationships to each other, especially after they have ended. 'Is there something more here and would it be right of us to attempt to explore it?' Their conclusion is no and so they leave it at that, but Annie still sings that song and it reminds us that there is still some unexplored territory there and that it kind of sucks that they won't have the chance to see where it'd take them in another life.
77. Barking Dogs Never Bite (Bong Joon-ho, 2000)
The first mention on this list of a South Korean film; I cannot emphasize enough how much I appreciate this particular country's relatively new and increasingly popular output of incredibly compelling, often offbeat, and yet insanely well-made movies. This particular one is a weird and very twisted dark comedy loosely inspired by the novel A Dog of Flanders. This may not be the best South Korean film to watch for a first-timer because it IS pretty out there and sometimes the protagonists aren't terribly sympathetic, but it's definitely one of the more simplistic and most clearly evident of the usual touches of a South Korean movie. It is an exhilarating and bizarre little flick and though it may not be challenging or exploring much thematically, it's still a wild ride that provides plenty of fun surprises and interesting character moments.
PS- If you like dogs at all, I beg you, DON'T watch this movie.
76. The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939)
There really isn't much to say about this movie that hasn't already been said a thousand times before by other people. It was revolutionary on virtually every level of cinematic achievement upon its release and it remains a remarkably enjoyable film even today. It's wonderfully imaginative, fun, funny, nostalgic, entertaining, and surprisingly poignant.
75. Return To Oz (Walter Murch, 1985)
Yes, I do indeed prefer this film over the 1939 original. I do so for one very simple reason- this movie is absolutely insane. The images shown on screen are so creepy, so bizarre, and so freakishly imaginative that I just love it. It also has a wonderfully subtle underlying exploration of Dorothy's psyche and strongly emphasizes the possibility that she is indeed quite mad (albeit in a Alice in Wonderland like way). It remains largely and unfairly unseen by most because of its reputation as being so significantly different from the original film, but it's still worth it to check it out once at least.
PS- Yes, THE Walter Murch directed the movie (pretty cool huh?)
74. The Blues Brothers (John Landis, 1980)
I seriously cannot think of a movie that's more entertainingly fun than this. It's so unabashed in its excess and sense of absurdity that you pretty much can't help but smile from start to finish. I dare you not to laugh at all the jokes and to get up and dance and sing along to some pretty awesome musical numbers. This is what going to the movies for a good time is all about.
PS- My personal favorite song and the one that I think best embodies the spirit of the city of Chicago is John Lee Hooker's Boom Boom.
73. Mary Poppins (Robert Stevenson, 1964)
This movie WAS my childhood and I'll never forget it. In fact I think the movie pretty much defines certain aspects of childhood itself, especially in regards to how parents tend to overlook and criticize the formative and imaginative years of being a kid. But really the movie is simply a dazzling spectacle more than anything else, it's full of so much joy and spirit and, for its time, some fairly revolutionary effects.
72. As Good As It Gets (James L. Brooks, 1997)
I find this movie to be one of the most romantic films I've ever seen. And it's all thanks to both the writing and the performances. Nicholson's character of Melvin in any other movie would be the worst kind of protagonist, but his nuanced and subtle portrayal of the changes in his personality over the course of the story makes him wonderfully compelling, if not fully sympathetic on an emotional level. And Helen Hunt too holds her own against him, crafting a sharp and intelligent foil and romantic interest for Melvin. On the page her character is more or less an older version of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, in the sense that she often gets little reward personally from the changes she invokes in Melvin, but thanks to Hunt's performance and Brooks' usual strong writing, she instead comes across as a genuine woman with her own faults and a willingness to challenge the vitriolic and often hateful behavior of Melvin, but only ever to the degree that he doesn't cross a line and that she has some stake in what's happening to him. By the end of the film they've, of course, grown appreciative of one another and their presences in each other's lives, and when that consideration grows into actual love it feels real and natural instead of ham-fisted and arbitrary. It's dark and witty and romantic and sweet, this movie is the kind of romantic comedy I enjoy the most- an intelligent and emotionally genuine one.
71. About Schmidt (Alexander Payne, 2002)
This is hands-down Nicholson's best performance. The movie is incredibly dark at times but also ultimately hopeful and Payne's writing is as strong as ever. The focus on character is staggeringly well done and the manner in which the movie captures the reality of a mid-life crisis is painful and compelling and sympathetic all at the same time.
70. A Tale of Two Sisters (Kim Ji-woon, 2003)
This is a completely indecipherable film upon first viewing and yet I still loved it. There is an incredible ambiguity to the film's plot that I think intentionally disorients the viewer in order to place them in the very confused and possibly insane mind of the protagonist. The lines between past and present, fantasy and reality, and even the identities of specific characters constantly blur and one never knows precisely what's going to happen next or indeed what has happened in the first place. There are answers story-wise to pretty much all of the questions a viewer might have by the end of the film and they do logically make sense. But they aren't the point of the movie which is why it's structurally acceptable for the director to pull the wool over the audience's eyes in the way that he does. No, instead this movie is above all else about characters and ideas rather than plot, which is what is most striking about it considering it's a fairly traditional horror film. There is a poignant consideration at the core about family and how we view ourselves within different kinds of relationships with our siblings and parents.
69. The Host (Bong Joon-ho, 2006)
This movie is awesome. It's funny, it's heartbreaking, it's gross, it's terrifying, it's thrilling, and it's actually kind of poignant and meaningful in regards to how it depicts the disintegration of an already dysfunctional family. The tone shifts so constantly from scene to scene and moment to moment it becomes virtually impossible to determine what's going to happen next. It's one of the few reasons I think South Korean films/directors are the next big thing in cinema, it's unpredictable and unexpected but in the best possible ways.
68. Menace II Society (The Hughes Brothers, 1993)
This is an astonishingly well written and directed film. I love the Hughes Brothers and their style in pretty much all of their movies, but this film in particular draws attention to their meticulous detail and use of visuals (in terms of cinematography, editing, sound, production design, etc). The story is quite bleak, but instead of falling into the usual abyss of melodrama and misogyny and absurdly gritty uber-violence like so many other hood/gang-related films, Menace II Society opts instead to be surprisingly subtle in its emotional content. This is quite an achievement given the realism of the style and tone, but it all adds up to an invigoratingly honest look at urban life.
67. The Devil's Rejects (Rob Zombie, 2005)
Yes, I did indeed choose a Rob Zombie film for this list. It's THAT actually good. For a horror movie this film is actually kinda subversive and oh so much more disturbing than people give it credit for. Yes it's gritty and disgusting and gruesome and weird, but it's also, strangely enough, kinda compelling and poignant in the way it depicts its wonderfully depraved lead characters as a family. Even after all the horrible shit they do to their victims and all the gross stuff they say to one another, they're still a family. We never exactly sympathize with them, but we ARE kinda on their side by the end of the movie weird as it may seem. Setting all that bizarre shit aside there's also a wickedly funny and dark sense of humor at the core of the movie that gets you laughing when you should be cringing. This film walks and crosses and utterly destroys so many lines of decency and humanity, it's kinda glorious because of it. Zombie revels in bad taste and tackiness, but he's always so awesomely aware of it all that he constantly winks at the audience but never in a a clumsily overt or meta way. There's also the actual production of the film which is surprisingly well done given the relatively low budget- there are moments and scenes and sets that are straight out of the 70's in a cool retro way that only serve to add to the atmosphere of the entire movie. And finally- the soundtrack- it's one of the grooviest, just balls-out awesome purely rock-based movie soundtracks ever.
"Have fun scraping all them brains up off the road."
66. The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly (Sergio Leone, 1966)
Hands-down just one of the best classic westerns. It's dark and weird and gritty and thrilling and epic and fun and bizarrely compelling from beginning to end. It's one of the most exhausting films to watch in one sitting too because it's over three hours and simply jam-packed with so much stuff (action, visuals, music) and yet when it's all over you feel like you've been on one incredible ride. Leone is also one of the best directors ever in my opinion, his combination of visual aesthetics with symbolic imagery and use of music and cinematography are astoundingly well done.
65. Sounder (Martin Ritt, 1972)
This is a small, simple film that is just wonderfully written and acted. It's moving and direct and honest in its depiction of a struggling Black family in the South during the 1930's. Cicely Tyson and Paul Winfield play the leads. Enough said.
64. The Year of Living Dangerously(Peter Weir, 1982)
Long before he went kinda insane and started saying stupid shit (and even during his bouts of wackiness) Mel Gibson was a good actor (and still is a good director in my opinion). Case in point- this film. Also starring Sigourney Weaver (a very underrated actress in my opinion) and featuring an Oscar-winning performance by Linda Hunt (a woman portraying a Chinese-Australian male dwarf, go figure), this movie has pretty much been long forgotten by most people and very unfairly so. It's a pretty striking and daringly politically-minded film that was almost impossible to make because of its frank discussion of some very touchy socio-political themes at the time. Simply put it's one of the best films on the moral and ethical implications of journalistic integrity and takes a very dark and honest look at how Western and Eastern values tend to clash in indirect and unintentional ways and just how ethnocentric European and American entities in foreign countries can be and what kind of damage such thinking can do both physically and emotionally. This is a smart and fairly intense film considering it combines such heady subjects with a surprisingly welcome and well-done romantic subplot between Weaver and Gibson.
63. The Bridge On the River Kwai (David Lean, 1957)
It's a classic, what else can I say? The combination of performances with the direction and the production add up to both an awesomely epic film as well as a surprisingly intimate character study.
62. The Nun's Story (Fred Zinnemann, 1959)
Audrey Hepburn's best performance. A simple story about the nature of religion and morality set against the backdrop of World War II. Beautifully directed and acted, it's one of the few examinations on faith that I think is both fair-minded and genuine in its depiction.
61. -All of the James Bond Films (Various Directors, 1962-Present)
So this may seem a bit...absurd, but so what. I do genuinely enjoy/like/appreciate pretty much every damn James Bond movie. Sure, I admit several of them are unbearably dated and ridiculously silly and sometimes just downright incredulously dumb, but I've got a soft spot for them. Except Moonraker. Moonraker's just unforgivable. Anyway, the point is, I honestly feel like the entire Bond franchise is just one of the best action-adventure series ever. They're fun and exciting and stylish and some of them are even heartfelt and romantic and dramatic and poignant. I also appreciate their contemporaneous relevance to their respective eras, the way in which each film endeavors to exemplify the year in which it came out. It kept them fresh and interesting and, in retrospect, perfect microcosms of the time in which they were made. And really it's pretty damn hard to criticize a series that's been this long-running and able to reinvent itself in so many new and different ways. My blog already has a post that details my personal countdown of my favorite films in the series (in order from worst to best), so I won't repeat myself here by rewriting the whole list. Instead I'll just give the highlights.
Moonraker- the absolute worst (James Bond is in space. And there's a lasergun battle. Enough fucking said.)
Goldfinger- the most iconic and classic of them all, it gets everything right
Tomorrow Never Dies- my personal favorite, it's the first one I saw in theaters and so it's a guilty pleasure
Casino Royale- the absolute best, most well-written and directed, elevates Bond to a whole 'nother level of amazing
60. The Color Purple (Steven Spielberg, 1985)
Yes, I know that the majority of the lesbian relationship between Celie and Shug is left out, but at least Spielberg owned up to it somewhat later and admitted he simply wasn't sure he could do that aspect of the novel justice because of the moderately more sentimental and optimistic tone and style he was taking with the film and that if he were to make the movie today he would've endeavored to depict the relationship in a more honest and direct way rather than simply hinting at it. And besides, it's still rather groundbreaking for a film of its kind (namely one with a focus on African-American history as well as a mainstream, big-budget Hollywood movie) to depict as much of the relationship as it did, especially in the middle of the 80's when LGBT storylines were mainly all about AIDS and depressing coming out stories. Ultimately though, this movie isn't even that much about the damn lesbian relationship, it's about the trials and tribulations Celie endures throughout her life because of her race and the expectations of her based on her gender by the men around her. The movie's heartfelt and sweeping and grand in its scope, and in classic Spielbergian fashion, its solidly focused on its main story throughout, never deviating and always on point from both a plot perspective and a visual one. I honestly don't know sometimes how he's able to mount so perfectly pretty much every one of his films given the wide variety in genre and style and story they each have. This is largely one of his most unfairly forgotten and unappreciated films.
59. Born On the Fourth of July (Oliver Stone, 1989)
This features one of Tom Cruise's genuinely good performances (as in he actually gets me to feel emotional towards him) and the movie itself is a very striking and powerful recreation of 1960's America and the Vietnam war as well as a very well-focused character study about the effects of the war itself on one individual. Though it can be a little less than subtle in its blunt and proud declarations of liberal-minded political mentalities, the basic story arc for Cruise's protagonist is mostly sound and based in some very primal human emotions rather than plot contrivances and manipulations. Everything in the movie feels largely natural in its depiction of the psychological downward spiral a person would most likely go through in their efforts to make some sense of the horrors they've seen in war. Effective, emotional, and pretty epic; it should've won more Oscars than it did.
58. The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978)
This is one of the very best films to explore the effects of war mainly because its story is so beautifully simple. A small group of friends are seen before, during, and after their involvement in Vietnam. And that's it. One hour is spent in each timeframe. And that's it. You get to know all the characters so intimately thanks to the, of course (it's De Niro AND Walken AND Streep), very good performances as well as some very strong writing. This is also called the movie that defined the weirdness that is Christopher Walken, which, in some ways, is kind of unfortunate because that reputation tends to overshadow his underrated genuine acting ability. He's one of those classic American actors who, when he wants to, can really knock a performance out of the park and make you want to laugh and cringe and cry all at the same time. Yes, the Russian roulette scenes are technically somewhat historically inaccurate, but that's beside the point, they serve an extremely important dramatic purpose in the story and for that I can forgive and simply go along with it. It's unfortunate that Cimino was never able to replicate the success and brilliance of this one film in his other efforts later.
57. The Last Emperor (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1987)
An incredibly epic and satisfyingly poignant and emotional biopic about a pretty remarkable individual and the rather odd life he was forced to lead as the world, politics, and society changed around him over the years. It's gorgeous to watch from a visual perspective and the acting is quite impressive. Simply put- the entire film is very deserving of its numerous Oscar wins.
56. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Miloš Forman, 1975)
What else can be said about this movie that hasn't already been said? It's just a perfect classic film. Everything from the acting (Fletcher's performance is stupidly still kinda underrated despite her Oscar win) to the direction to the writing. It's all just brilliant. The contemporaneously relevant themes of conformity and censorship and the individual's rights versus society's still pack quite an impressive punch considering the relative age of the film. It holds up quite well and the ending still gets yours truly to tear up when I watch it. There's just something so poignant and strangely uplifting and understandably depressing about Chief's final actions. And yes, I'm well aware of the issues many people take with the POV shift from the book, but honestly, I don't give a shit. It's a movie OF the book, not the book itself. Liberties are allowed to be taken and perspectives can be changed however the writer wants them to be. If the same damn message is being conveyed, albeit in a different way, who gives a flying fuck? The movie is still amazing and I love it dearly.
55. Doubt (John Patrick Shanley, 2008)
Really the only thing off about this movie is the fact that it feels stagey at times. I personally don't mind movies that take place in limited locations, but I can certainly understand where audiences would object to the notion of a film feeling like a theater production. Ultimately there are enough moments and scenes though that open up the production design and the cinematography to show more of the outside world that it's mostly forgivable. The performances, the writing, and the direction are all top notch. Every character, every scene, every line of dialogue is just perfect. It handles a very difficult and murky subject matter in such a stellar way that it's kind of astounding. There are no easy answers in the story and there's no distinctly given sense of right or wrong. The ending is so maddeningly ambiguous you can't help but smile and cry at the same time at the implications of it all. I only wish Viola Davis had won her damn Oscar like she should've.
54. Cabaret (Bob Fosse, 1972)
This is simply the very best movie musical ever. Everything from the direction to the production to the acting to the incredible choreography to pretty much every musical number, it all just works so perfectly. Gone is the artificial and stagey feeling of so many other musical films, replaced instead with a realistic design and a superb focus on character and story rather than the songs and dancing alone. And more than anything else, I especially love the unpredictability of the plot, it all seems so natural and fresh that it's impossible to know what precisely is going to happen next.
53. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (Nicholas Meyer, 1982)
It's simply one of the very best sci-fi adventure films. It's incredibly well-paced and, for a sci-fi movie, very well-written and focused on character as well as plot and action. Of course it's a little dated in the effects area, but so what? Trek has always been a bit behind in its early years in terms of budget and visuals, but by golly do they try their hardest to make their shows and movies as good looking as they can. Ignore the semi-fuckery that is Star Trek Into Darkness and just look at Wrath of Khan as an adventure film on its own, separate from the continuity of the rest of the series, and one can easily see how appealing this and later Trek movies like Voyage Home and First Contact actually are to mass audiences. Wrath of Khan walks perfectly the thin line between incomprehensible Trek (meaning story and characters that are so densely plotted and over-complicated you need a Trek encyclopedia to figure out who's who and what's going on) and audience-pleasing Trek (meaning story and characters that are clear and concise but that also don't talk down to new viewers of the franchise). At the end of the day Wrath of Khan satisfies wonderfully both Trekkies/Trekkers and newcomers alike, which really is quite a difficult thing to do. Kudos to director Meyer for effectively reigniting all of Star Trek in general by adding some much needed freshness of story and style.
52. Contact (Robert Zemeckis, 1997)
This is just one of the best science fiction films mainly because it's based almost completely on Carl Sagan's pretty much completely scientifically accurate book about what first contact with aliens would be like. Sure there are the necessary fictional assumptions and creative liberties taken in certain areas to heighten the dramatic content of the story, but that's true for pretty much any given sci-fi movie. Most of all though I love Sagan's willingness to explore the religious component of science and especially how ambiguous and non-judgmental he actually is in regards to the importance of faith to the majority of the world and how that often affects scientists' perceptions of how their work is seen by outsiders and people who don't fully understand certain aspects of the scientific method itself. The only misstep I think the movie takes is in the rather over the top depiction of religious extremism exemplified by Jake Busey's character. Ultimately the movie is brilliantly focused on character more than anything else, especially in its first act which builds up quite well Jodie Foster's character.
51. Gosford Park (Robert Altman, 2001)
The attention to detail in this film, historical or story-wise, is nothing short of astounding. I've watched the movie maybe half a dozen times since it came out and every time I find something new that a character does in the background or a line that someone lets slip and it all forces you to reexamine certain aspects of the story from a new perspective. The production, the acting, even the music are all impressive, but it's Altman's handling of the enormous ensemble cast that never ceases to amaze me. Each major or minor character feels like a genuine, fully rounded person and they each have some stake in the story. It's simply a very well-mounted movie and an enjoyable one and a pretty fascinating one to watch.
50. The Right Stuff (Philip Kaufman, 1983)
What a gloriously appropriate film to talk about today as we are in the midst of some pretty watershed historical events of our own. This movie is one of the few films that genuinely doesn't make me wanna barf at all the sappy lovey dovey proud-to-be-an-American patriotic nationalism that is so obnoxiously common in the old US of A. It's not that I'm not proud to live in America or that there's something to hate about this country, it's just that I personally get annoyed by people who so aggressively love their own nation and think that it's okay to spit in other people's eyes and tell them it's unacceptable for them to not agree about the awesome amazingness that is America. I don't aggressively love anything really and for other people to insist that I should and that I'm weird or evil or wrong because I don't is just plain dumb. ANYWAY. Like I said. This is actually one of the few films that kinda does make me proud to be an American. And it's not even that the movie is particularly uber-flag waving or anything, in fact it's that the movie is so matter of fact and fun and positive about its historical events. Rather than treat a pretty major piece of our history with steadfast seriousness, this film has a rather poignant and sweet sense of humor about it all. That, combined with all the usual incredibly impressive Hollywood-level recreations of people and places, makes this just such an enjoyable film to watch. It may be three hours long but the time really does fly as you learn and laugh and cry a little at all the extraordinary trials and tribulations a small group of men and their families and their co-workers had to go through in order to achieve just one astounding reach-for-the-stars-like goal.
49. Amadeus (Miloš Forman, 1984)
This movie is just perfect. Every shot, every performance, every set, every scene, every piece of music. It all just flawlessly fits together to create an incredibly fascinating portrait of an extraordinary artist. What makes it so brilliant though is the perspective taken. It's not a direct biography of Mozart from an omniscient point of view. Instead the story is told by fellow composer Antonio Salieri who lives his entire life in the shadow of Mozart's superior work. It's dark and satirical, witty and funny, but with a wickedly sharp sense of poignancy and emotion as well to undercut all the black humor. It's far from a traditional biopic, but it's still wonderfully enjoyable and entertaining for a film of its nature.
48. Judgment At Nuremberg (Stanley Kramer, 1961)
Though a little long, this film is a superbly mature and intelligent examination of an extremely touchy and rather controversial subject matter and event. The ensemble performances of pretty much the entire cast are on point and sophisticated for such an iconic group of actors, many of whom had a tendency in other movies to either under or over act. The writing is detailed and complex as it deals with many specific historical people and places on top of all the legal and ethical jargon of a court of law. For an era in which many movies of its kind would prefer to go for pseudo-intellectual grand standing and awkward melodrama, this film surprises by being both literally (there's archival footage and photos of the Holocaust) and emotionally raw and graphic thanks in no small part to the actors and the almost noir-like cinematography and direction by Kramer. It won Oscars for its Adapted Screenplay and for Maximilian Schell's lead performance and definitely deserved more.
47. Vera Drake (Mike Leigh, 2004)
There's a scene towards the middle of this movie that features a slow closeup of the title character's reaction to finding out that the police have arrived at her home to arrest her for carrying out illegal abortions on numerous young women. Imelda Staunton's performance in that single shot is one of the most staggeringly subtle, heart-breaking, terrifyingly powerful pieces of acting by anyone I've ever seen in a movie. The entire film, in classic Mike Leigh fashion, is so carefully staged around each actor's performance and directed to such a degree that it feels like real life. The writing is so quiet and wonderfully observational of human behavior that until about halfway through the film you begin to forget that you're even watching a narrative movie with a story in it. The subject matter is, naturally, an extremely controversial one, but there's really not very much in this film that comes across as a grand socio-political statement regarding abortion. There's very little discussed in it that makes it feel like a forced-down-your-throat message and there's not much said regarding the ethical implications of Vera's actions. It's simply about her and about what she does and what happens to her. There's no judgment being made and no presumptuous conclusions being forced on us as an audience. It's simply recording what the reality would've been like for this woman who felt she was doing what she had to in order to help out young women in need. I don't care what your perspective is on this issue and neither does the movie really. It wants you to make up your own mind with the facts/story (note: it's not based on true events, there was no woman named Vera Drake) being given.
I'm including the clip from the movie that features the scene I mentioned above because, in my opinion, it has to be seen to be believed.
http://www.youtube.com/
46. Se7en (David Fincher, 1995)
What a deeply, deeply disturbing film. Not just on a graphic, visceral level, but an emotional and ethical one as well. The moral ideology and the depiction of incredibly flawed human behavior in this movie is severely fucked up and yet, in a way, it's all probably sadly true. I don't think I need to say much beyond that. The movie's pretty much perfect in all the usual areas in terms of acting and direction and production. A very impressive early film from Fincher.
45. Boys Don't Cry (Kimberly Peirce, 1999)
I just...I can't even really talk about this movie all that much. What is there to say about it? It's fucking perfect. It's pretty much flawless. And it's painful. It crosses the weird fuzzy line between biopic and docudrama and enters some blurred realm in between them both. The depiction of people and places and events in this movie is so disturbingly realistic at times I almost wanna question the ethical implications of movies that so perfectly recreate real life. But I don't really. This movie is far too important to do that to it. It never ever feels like a cheesy message movie or a vulgar true crime film. Its themes and ideologies are so far buried beneath layers of character and setting that they become little else but broadly defined implications of opinions on socio-political matters. This isn't a gay film with an urgent commentary on gay life. It's too intelligent for that. Instead it's about how people exist and how they do so with flaws in their personalities and with the sadly true ability to make bad or confused or awkward choices about themselves and about the lives they lead. No one deserves the fate of Brandon Teena and this movie shouts that notion as loud as it can but somehow without ever raising its voice above a whisper.
44. Sophie's Choice (Alan J, Pakula, 1982)
I can suffer through pretty much any gory, bloody, cynical, depressing, disturbing film you can offer and goodness knows I've seen plenty of films that can fit any of those labels. But I will never watch Sophie's Choice again. It's a fucking brilliant movie, beautifully shot and directed and featuring Meryl Streep's best performance ever. But I can never watch it again. Good lord is this movie exhausting and depressing. It wallows in its own bereavement and grief over the actions taken by the title character earlier in her life. It never lets up. Its two and a half hours feel like twelve because the movie moves pretty slowly, this isn't a criticism just an observation, I, in fact, appreciate movies that are a little long because they give you greater access to the characters. You get to know them better as people. Yes, I cried at the end of the movie, who wouldn't? But that's not the point. The point is- I was also drained, emotionally and literally. I couldn't handle another frame of this movie. It's flawless from start to finish and it tells an incredibly compelling story, but I will never, CANNOT ever, watch it again.
43. In the Valley of Elah (Paul Haggis, 2007)
Pretty much the only reason this movie works as well as it does is because of Tommy Lee Jones. He's one of my favorite actors and this is quite probably his best performance. I'm not the biggest fan of Haggis' writing or his direction, he's usually rather heavy-handed and too all over the place for my taste. But this particular film features his best and most subtle work and is graced with an excellent ensemble cast that really sells the script.
42. Au Revoir, les Enfants (Louis Malle, 1987)
Louis Malle remains one of the most underrated directors. His combination of potentially controversial subject matters with an incredibly understated and subtle style of direction and production makes for a consistently intriguing and fascinating filmography of incredibly varied movies over the years. This film in particular though is one of his very best mainly because of the way it handles its topic in a less than bombastically melodramatic and Hollywood manner. Its so distressingly quiet at times, it never plays up the uber-seriousness of the Gestapo raids and instead opts to view the occupation of France from the perspective of children. It constantly toes the line between the narrator, Malle telling a true story from his own youth, and himself as a child possibly being aware of what's actually going on and his possibly conscious or unconscious decision to not do more. There are never any easy answers in this film. Should he or could he have done more to help his friend or would that only have served to put him in more danger? There are entire sections of this film in the first two thirds that have next to nothing to do with the main 'story' of the film and instead, in classic Malle fashion, focus completely on establishing atmosphere and setting and character. I love Louis Malle and really the only reason this particular movie of his doesn't rank higher on the list is because, like Sophie's Choice, it's just far too painful and depressing a film for me to admit liking/enjoying more and pushing it further up from this slot.
41. Atlantic City (Louis Malle, 1980)
I've already talked about Louis Malle in the last film on this list so I won't say much more here except that this is simply further proof of his ability to diversify the genres and stories he works with in his movies. This particular film also features a young Susan Sarandon and an older Burt Lancaster. Both are reliably solid actors and remain underrated to this day I feel, having been overshadowed by their iconic reputations in other movies- Sarandon for Thelma and Louise and Lancaster for his work in older movies like From Here To Eternity. Both shine wonderfully in a subtly complex film of shifty and ambiguous characters, which is a common theme of Malle's movies- the inability to truly know and understand a person, the constant changes in demeanor and emotions and thought processes of every individual and how all those things serve to define who we are as people. Malle loved to pull the proverbial wool over an audience's eyes and expectations of the film they were going into in an effort to make a commentary on the nature of subject matter in general and how we make instantaneous and surface-level judgments of movies and works of art based only on the knee-jerk, superficial aspects we see in a trailer or a review or on the poster for a film. This is very evident in the poster for Atlantic City, which brims with garish colors around the main title and is surrounded by a film noir blue on all sides. The assumption by many was that Malle was making some kind of retro throwback to old-fashioned crime thrillers from the 30’s and 40’s and this assumption was further supported when it was announced that Lancaster had been cast in the lead role. Instead the film features a quiet, very un-Lancaster like performance and prominently shows the downtrodden pathetic shambles that the real Atlantic City was in back in the 80’s. Not only then is the movie about the characters but it also has a fairly blunt running joke/theme about America in general and while Malle wasn’t much of a comedian or a satirist, there’s undeniable bite to the point he was trying to make about the economy and about the good old US of A.
40. In Bruges (Martin McDonagh, 2008)
I don't even need to justify this film's place on the list.
All I will say is...
http://www.youtube.com/
39. Downfall (Oliver Hirschbiegel, 2004)
You want a movie that controversially humanizes Hitler? Then you've got one right here. This is easily the best portrayal of good ol' Adolf I've ever seen in either film or TV. People far too easily choose to dismiss Hitler as a cruel, sadistic monster, and while he was all those things and more, he was still human and to me that's what made him so terrifying. Not the cruel actions he took against countless millions of people nor the earth-shaking declaration of war upon multiple nations; no, it's the fact that underneath it all there was still some twisted sense of morality inside him and that he really was simply a very sick-in-the-head and incredibly intelligent individual. This movie, nor I, defend what he did, but it argues that a realistic look at Hitler in terms of character and a bizarre sense of compelling empathy with his downward spiral into insanity is what's necessary to both fully understand who he was, what he did, and what that means not just in terms of history but also mankind in general. Other portrayals of Hitler have gone so far off the rails and into melodramatic scenery chewing for the likes of Anthony Hopkins and Alec Guinness that it almost becomes offensive. In those films and shows everyone basically decided "it'd be too awkward for us to push our crew and our actors to their limits and truly show who this man was, let's just have our lead scream a lot and wear a silly mustache." Is the film depressing beyond belief? You bet your ass it is. But it's also smart, gritty, brutally emotional, and quite fascinating. Films should never shy away from reality and this one doesn't. For that I applaud it.
38. Cloud Atlas (Lana and Andy Wachowski & Tom Tykwer, 2012)
The movie is ambitious beyond belief, a gigantic sprawling epic that spans multiple eras, stories, genres and, of course, features the same small group of actors portraying different characters (regardless of gender or race) in each of the different stories. The film is even more impressive when you consider it was independently produced and not the usual Hollywood-backed flick that plays down to the lowest common denominator. There's so much at work here in the movie that it demands multiple viewings to fully appreciate and understand each separate section of the stories themselves. I love the audacity and the willingness to explore such grand and truly human themes in such a brilliantly effective yet unconventional manner.
37. Schindler's List (Steven Spielberg, 1993)
What list would be complete without this movie? It's flawless from start to finish. For a Spielberg film I mean. Which is to say that though I love Spielberg as a technical director, he sometimes falls just slightly short with his actors. Case in point, Ralph Fiennes' performance in this film. While it's effectively scary and intimidating and intense and appropriately evil, there's not an ounce of genuine empathy or humanity in him. I mean that as a criticism in the way I praised Bruno Ganz's performance in Downfall, there needs to be a compelling way in which an audience connects with even the villain or antagonist of a movie at least in the sense that we can potentially understand where they're coming from psychologically, even if our conclusion is that they're insane or mentally ill. Fiennes goes too far over the top in certain scenes and it breaks the realism of the rest of the movie. But ultimately that's like 1% wrong in an otherwise perfect film. It's raw and emotional and moving and heartbreaking and real and effectively and disturbingly beautiful to look at from a cinematographic perspective. Easily Spielberg's best work.
36. United 93 (Paul Greengrass, 2006)
This film is so distressingly realistic it pissed a lot of people off which I sort of get. But it's also extremely effective, harrowing, and, most importantly, an accurate, legitimate, and heartfelt tribute to the people depicted in its storyline.
35. The Killing Fields (Roland Joffé, 1984)
It kinda bums me out how underrated this film is. It tells a pretty incredible and epic story set against a turbulent, controversial, and still very much not discussed political backdrop of the rise of the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia. It's extraordinarily emotional too, both for its harrowing, suspenseful, and realistic story and for the casting of Dr. Haing S. Ngor who won an Oscar for his supporting role. Ngor himself was a survivor of the Khmer Rouge regime and its labor camps and despite not being a professional actor took the role in an attempt to more accurately depict, from a human perspective, what it was like to go through several years of hell under the cruelty of the Communist dictatorship. The movie is emotionally shattering in the way The Deer Hunter was but with a slightly stronger and more positive sense of character. It should've won more Oscars than it did and I definitely wish more people were aware of its greatness.
34. Beauty & the Beast (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise, 1991)
Yeah yeah, I know I know, pretty fucking gay and goofy of me right? Well so what? This movie is fantastic. It's beautifully animated and written and there's not a frame of it that feels like a corny, demeaning kids movie like a lot of the shit today is. This movie has heart and a story and characters and originality. All of the songs are memorable and sweet and fun. And to be honest I'd have to say that not only is this the best Disney film, it may be one of the most romantic films ever. Period. There's such an extraordinary level of nuance and personality to both the protagonists that is so strikingly different than most other animated films or even kids films or even adult romantic films. I basically just adore this movie. It's pretty much flawless and it always manages to put a smile on my face and remind me of my childhood as well as give me hope that everyone has a prince out there waiting for them. (Sappy? Yes. True? I hope so...)
33. Storytelling (Todd Solondz, 2001)
This is arguably Solondz's best work in terms of writing. It's more focused than his other films and I personally feel it has the most to say about...whatever the hell Solondz's point is. Seriously, it's virtually impossible to pigeonhole or fully identify what his themes or ideas actually are and most of the time I think he's just having fun by dicking with the audience all the time. But really there IS something profoundly moving and strangely poignant about his stories regardless of how batshit weird they can be. He's definitely saying something, but I just don't know what it is. Storytelling is unfairly forgotten I think and it provides an interesting look at the concept of writing and fiction and art in general, albeit in Solondz's trademark painfully subtle way.
32. The Documentaries of Louis Malle (Louis Malle, 1962-1986)
Here I am cheating again. I should note that I personally choose to exclude The Silent World (Malle's debut film) only because it kinda sucks and because he was just the co-director on it. Virtually all of his remaining documentaries are absolutely fascinating, less because of what their varied subject matters are and more because of the way in which Malle chooses to look at the different topics. His narration is so personal and practically poetic in its execution and he comes across as genuine rather than the occasionally dull and spacey Herzog. I also love Malle's method in creating his documentaries, rather than his tightly focused and thematically-driven work on his own features, Malle's documentaries highlight his ability to be incredibly free form and loose. His camera just looks and nothing else. There are no preconceived notions or ideas of reality that is being emphasized by manipulative and politically showy editing, but rather there is simply Malle observing life within different contexts and telling the audience what he thinks about it. And once you know more about Malle from a personal and biographical perspective by reading about him, this exploratory method takes on a much greater meaning. For example, in filming his epic Phantom India series, Malle was able to recognize how dissatisfied he was with some of his previous studio-based works that had been crafted by producers rather than created by his own artistic hand. Over the course of the series, listening to Malle is like listening to a teenager grow into an adult and mature fully. He becomes greatly appreciative of Indian culture and the experience has been an introspective one, enabling him to move on to the next stage of his career as a director. The point I'm trying to make is that none of these films are your average documentaries, they say so much about their subjects as well as their director and that is truly unique to me.
31. Ed Wood (Tim Burton, 1994)
You want a movie that explains why filmmakers are as weird and as passionate as they are about their work? Well this movie gives you your answer...sort of. This is a deliriously entertaining and strangely moving film that perfectly captures just how hard it can be to get your movie made your way and the lengths some will go to to suffer and sacrifice for their art. Bonus points for Martin Landau's Oscar-winning turn as Bela Lugosi, a funny and incredibly poignant performance.
30. Harry Potter Parts I-VII (Various Directors, 2001-2011)
If you know me in any way this is not the least bit surprising.
29. Dead Man Walking (Tim Robbins, 1995)
Here's a film that, to me, perfectly captures virtually all of the varying perspectives and components of the controversial subject of the death penalty. But not once does it devolve into political grandstanding or melodramatic twaddle, instead it completely focuses on the emotional aspects of the people involved in the story. There are no easy or identifiable sides being taken by the writing or the direction and both leads are astoundingly good.
28. Lake of Fire (Tony Kaye, 2006)
The best documentary ever about one of the most controversial subjects in today's society. Abortion. If you care one iota about this topic then you owe it to yourself to see the film. There are no answers given and no sides taken. There are talking heads galore and heaps of varying opinions and thoughts and perspectives spoken about and yet there's no concise and convenient point being made. The director rarely shows his face or his voice so it's not exactly like he's Michael Moore-ing the whole film. And that's why I love this movie so much. There's no big showy manipulation going on because Kaye himself admits he doesn't know how he feels about the matter. He and the audience is trying to sift through all the information being given and the points being argued and the end conclusion is...ambiguous at best. The movie gets pretty graphic (you basically see a full on abortion being given) and it's nicely unflinching. I grow weary of the documentaries like Blackfish and An Inconvenient Truth which have more or less convincing and compelling points to make, but spend way too much time hyping up the drama of it all and then bashing you over the head with "HAVE YOU LEARNED THE LESSON YET?" Documentaries should be like feature films and learn to be subtle and honest rather than histrionic in their method of conveying a given message and Lake of Fire is the perfect example of that idea.
27. Mother (Bong Joon-ho, 2009)
Once again I find myself in a bit of a bind having to explain the genuine appeal of modern South Korean cinema, but this particular movie I think helps cement the idea that films from this tiny country are gonna soon explode into a world-wide thing (or at least I hope they will). I can't reveal much of the plot without spoiling half the movie, but all I will say is that though I usually don't guess the surprise endings of most films, this movie's plot in particular left me in a daze and I'd be shocked if it didn't do the same to other people. It's less that there's a giant cliched twist of the plot and more that the emotional impact the near-ending has on virtually all the main characters, especially the protagonist, is staggering in its punch. Pretty much every component of this film is unpredictable in such a quiet and focused way that it makes you wonder why most other filmmakers today can't just sit down and tell a simple story from start to finish without having to throw in a bunch of incredibly unnecessary and showy roadblocks and feints to try and trip up and manipulate the audience in a shallow way. South Korean films may be a bit slow paced and drawn out, but they're almost always the better for it.
26. Malcolm X (Spike Lee, 1992)
Spike Lee isn't my favorite person. He says some dumb shit sometimes and likes to pick fights when it's pretty much unnecessary, but that's a discussion for another time because when it comes to Malcolm X I think Lee is spot-on in his writing and his direction and his production. All of his usual stylistic flourishes work brilliantly in this epic biography of a pretty extraordinary man. The last twenty minutes or so of this film have to be seen to be believed as it offers a staggeringly emotional tribute to an impressive and important figure in the Civil Rights movement. And Denzel gives what's probably the performance of his career.
25. Vanya On 42nd Street (Louis Malle, 1994)
I'm not sure I can properly describe this film or why I find it so bizarrely fascinating. All it really is is a small group of actors gathering at a rundown theater to perform a loose rehearsal of an adaptation of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya. Nothing more. And yet it captures something incredibly compelling and interesting about the nature of acting and directing and theater in general. This really is one of those movies you have to see to understand and appreciate, so it's a little tricky for me to fully identify what's so great about it, but you'll just have to take my word for it that it's an impressive final film from Malle.
24. In the Heat of the Night (Norman Jewison, 1967)
You want a movie that bashes To Kill A Mockingbird over the head with its superiority and genuine acknowledgment and realistic depiction of contemporaneous racial issues of the 60's? Well then look no further than this classic film that captures perfectly and accurately and with surprisingly poignant and meaningful subtlety the underlying and not so underlying racial tensions of the South only half a century ago. The acting is key, and both Poitier and Steiger are matched perfectly, giving powerfully angry and uninhibited performances as two men on the same side yet divided by something so gloriously superficial that it nearly costs them the case they must solve together. It's a simple and direct story yet it works on so many important and relevant levels and even more importantly it never becomes anything too overtly politically or socially minded. It's about these characters and this story and nothing more.
23. Lord of the Rings (Peter Jackson, 2001-2003)
I mean no fucking duh, of course this was gonna be super fucking high on the list.
22. Hard Eight (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1996)
This is one of PT Anderson's most underrated films. The twists and turns of the simple yet surprising plot, the nuances and subtleties of his unusual dialogue, and a stellar performance from my personal favorite actor Philip Baker Hall, this movie has it all and without all the grand showiness of Anderson's later films. It's an extremely tight and focused movie with some sharp writing and enough originality to set the neo-noir-ness of the genre on its head.
21. Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010)
I'm not gonna try and justify this one because I sense I'll be getting a modicum of hate/dislike from some of my film-related friends for listing this this high on the list. What can I say beyond the fact that I think this movie is genuinely entertaining, surprisingly original story-wise, and rather brilliant on a purely cinematic level? Fuck all the haters, because I know you exist, you assholes you.
20. The Dark Knight Trilogy (Christopher Nolan, 2005-2012)
I'm grouping all three of these films together because I think when taken as one entire cohesive story, they each work well on their own merits despite some issues and flaws in storytelling for parts one and three. I'm not denying that these films aren't perfect, but when I think of a series of movies that greatly redefined not just what superhero films can be but what still other under-appreciated genres like fantasy and science fiction films can be I smile. Here is a trilogy of extremely well-made and mostly well-written films that presents the general movie-going audience with a rather absurd concept of a man who fights crime while dressed as a giant bat but executes it so startlingly well and so weirdly realistically that it makes even the smuggest of critics and the most disdainful of comic book movie viewers enjoy every minute. They're wildly entertaining while also being carefully insightful into the protagonist's hero journey and plot-wise are grandly epic puzzles of deeply complex story that must be unraveled and reexamined by Batman as he looks for the usually difficult and morally ambiguous answer to the problem set off by the villains of each film. There really are so many intriguing and interesting layers to these movies, mostly in The Dark Knight centerpiece, and there's enough nifty gadgetry and awesome action to just watch and have fun too. These films provide a perfect balance to what's usually missing in most other movies of their ilk- there's an attempt at meaning and emotion rather than just simple pretty pictures and cool explosions.
19. Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood, 1992)
For Melissa. That is all.
18. The Straight Story (David Lynch, 1999)
I have a rather odd relationship with David Lynch. I love him as a director, but tend to loathe his actual movies. The Straight Story is an exception however. It's Lynch essentially being mainstream but also keeping enough of his wacky experimental style more or less intact in the background of this wonderfully simple true story of an old man who, unable to legally drive, takes his tractor and travels several hundred miles to visit his sick brother. The dialogue is so flawlessly perfect, the performances so perfectly nuanced and subtle, and the cinematography so astoundingly perfect you pretty much forget you're watching a Lynch movie from the first frame. Even more importantly I think however is that this movie is so wonderfully poignant without ever being melodramatic or maudlin. This old odd man goes on his journey, meets some interesting and mostly decent people, exchanges a few words with them out of genuine interest, and just moves on along his way. And when he reaches his brother there is a beautiful scene of near absolute silence between the two that defines exactly how they feel about one another and the nature of the relationship they've had in the past. The movie's extraordinary and everyone should see it, if only to realize that Lynch doesn't always have to be weird and out there in order to get a rise out of someone. The Straight Story isn't exactly philosophically complex and full of metaphoric dream-like imagery the way his other movies are, but on an emotional level it's strikingly provocative.
17. El Norte (Gregory Nava, 1983)
This movie...this movie...where do I start? I mean talk about a rather astounding production and release history. Or also the performances by a couple of pretty much completely unknown actors. Or the beautiful cinematography. But mostly let's talk about the political and social subtext. Because this movie seems to only superficially have both in spades. To read about it in a review or a plot summary online you expect some Telemundo-like high melodrama with cheesy music and instead you get a wonderfully simple and surprisingly subtle depiction of two young people searching for a home under extremely complicated and difficult circumstances. There are no big speeches about illegal immigration and there's no lame plea to the big scary white people for forgiveness. There's just the underlying fear and anger and confusion and all the other emotions inherent to such a situation. Everything the main characters feel makes sense, every scene moves along to the next with a logical and simple grace, and the ending, while incredibly depressing, feels weirdly and appropriately right. There might be a message in the movie or a lesson to be learned, but it doesn't feel like finger wagging or a round of the blame game. The movie is about how life is for these two people and about how their dreams for the future are cruelly and sadly manipulated and destroyed by an illusion that has gone on for far too long. America calls itself the land of the free and gives hope to certain outsiders, but the reality is something far different when you attempt to get here and stay. There is no practical or 'correct' method for these people to get to where they want...no NEED...to be in order to live their lives and to pretend that the real and legal ways of immigration are fair and easy is a joke. I love that this movie gets me thinking about these things, it's almost insidious in its intelligence and ability to do so. Oh and it helps that El Norte is a moving, poignant, and incredibly well-made film as well.
16. The Vengeance Trilogy (Park Chan-wook, 2002-2005)
This is a thematic trilogy and there is no continuous storyline in any of the films. But they're each separately superb movies on their own merits and each work uniquely of each other regardless of their spiritual connection in how they depict the nature of revenge on a personal and emotional level. While films one and three, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and Lady Vengeance respectively, are slightly less cohesive and as well done as the most well known of the three, Oldboy, they're still fantastic films that provide a harrowing, disturbing, and terrifyingly enough realistic look into the minds of those who seek a moral and physical vengeance against the people who wronged them in some way. My personal issues with Sympathy and Lady are rather pedantic perhaps but I feel they're relevant and do show the slight weaknesses of both movies. The main problem with Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is the lack of likability for the protagonists and their plight and in a similar fashion, the primary fault in Lady Vengeance is her aggressively cold demeanor. Whether it's intentional in the writing of both movies or a choice by the actors, the end result is that the films, while involving and interesting and thrilling on a story-level, leave me slightly wanting emotionally. But Oldboy makes up for all that in spades. The performances, the writing, the story itself, the incredibly beautiful cinematography and production, they're all top notch. There are twists and turns in the movie that shocked me upon my first viewing and even upon re-watching I find those same plot points still pack a punch and necessitate a re-examination of all that came before. The levels to which the protagonist in Oldboy is willing to sink in order to get his revenge are incredible and in a weird way, incredibly meaningful. What level will some of us go to in order to achieve something so basic and primal? It's an interesting, and on a human-level, important question to ask and all three films in the series answer it in different ways while also exploring the emotional cost of taking such actions. Extraordinary.
15. Once Upon A Time In America (Sergio Leone, 1984)
I'm gonna start off by saying that I think this film is better than The Godfather trilogy. I don't dislike The Godfather or Francis Ford Coppola I just think Leone achieves what Coppola didn't get quite right in his trilogy regarding the meaning of how he chooses to depict the relationship between gangs and gangsters and the evolution of American society. Coppola opts for a quasi-realistic and intensely detailed look at one single family and their ups and downs as they try to survive their crime business. But he also falls into a common area for most Italian directors and shows an eerie dreamlike quality to reality, there is a blurred line between what's historical and accurate to the era and the fantasy imagery as seen by the protagonists. Think of the way Godfather Part II slips so loosely between past and present, the distinctly different methods Coppola uses to show both eras as separate literally yet connected by aesthetic and metaphoric visuals. This is a common choice by Italian directors to show a mix of real and dreamed images in an effort to make a direct commentary on what's happening in the genuine story of the film. In Dario Argento's Deep Red there is a physical recreation of Hopper's Nighthawks painting in the background of the scene where the hero stumbles upon the first murder, it's a clear effort to visually signal the audience that what is going to follow is a confused and jumbled state for the hero where nothing is what it seems. Coppola and Leone both do a similar thing in their respective films, but I think Leone is better at it, more aware of it, and uses it much more to his advantage. The main issue I've always had with people praising The Godfather and with the movies themselves is that I simply don't have much of an emotional connection to what's going on in the films nor do I glean much meaning from what happens in the story. There are far too many characters to keep track of to my liking, in the sense that I don't think a lot of the characters have much impact on the overall storyline other than the fact that they exist in a Dickensian fashion, to offer a broad and repetitive symbolic meaning to the constant theme of how crime doesn't pay. Coppola is far too blunt for my liking. But Leone takes his time, he focuses mostly on de Niro's character in Once Upon A Time, and even when the story isn't solely about him, it's still about his small group of friends and his love life. Each character, even the minor ones that pop up in subplots, don't feel as superfluous as they do in The Godfather, they have a direct relation to both the plot itself or to the characters. Leone's movie is quite slow paced, even when compared to The Godfather, and as such it feels like we grow to know and like these characters despite their flaws and ways with crime. They evolve and become criminals because of their circumstances not because of the whole family business angle, which, while accurate to The Godfather, always felt like a convenient cop out for the protagonists to use whenever they need to defend how and why they do things. Coppola seems to judge a lot on a moral and philosophical level, but he also seems dubious about his own conclusions, which is why there is the murky and confused dreamlike moments from time to time. Leone has no qualms about admitting that there is no right answer to what the characters do in his story, there IS a distinct and obvious blurred middle ground on which the protagonist stands. He doesn't know where to turn or what exactly to think of his life or his friends. I think of the sad and graphic and disturbing scene that pretty much completely redefines de Niro's character- he rapes the woman he loves. And the movie, nor he, is exactly sure why. Is it out of his desire to exert power over women the way most gangsters do? Is he desperate to prove his ability to get whatever he wants to impress his friends the way they all did when they were younger? Or is he really a monster, doomed to a life of crime on every level? He doesn't know and the movie never provides us with a clear answer because I think that's the nature of crime. It's insidious and corrupting, even a man who's only ever committed a crime to defend himself and his friends, can be pulled down by it. And as the story follows we can't look at him the same way, nor can he. He devolves into constant drug use, blurring the lines between what's happening now in his life and the so-called happier times he spent with his friends. This movie is so perfectly ambiguous in certain areas, so beautifully made, and so wonderfully written that I don't even think it necessitates me stating the obvious fact that the direction, the production, and the acting are all stellar and flawless. I wish this movie were more well known and I wish Leone got more credit as a director, because he really was one of a kind.
14. In the Bedroom (Todd Field, 2001)
If the Academy actually gave a shit the year this movie was nominated, it would've swept the Oscars. But instead, as usual, they play it safe. This film is almost unbearably complex and emotional and weirdly poignant and terrifyingly realistic. There are so many unexpected layers and moments and entire scenes that shocked me, less because they were so literally surprising plot-wise and more because everything felt so right and understandable and compelling and yet so very wrong. The levels to which the two protagonists fall for the sake of their child are incredible and disturbing, and while I don't agree with their actions in the latter third of the film, I am sympathetic to their plight. Upon first viewing the movie seems simple and straightforward and it is, but it's still effective. Upon re-watching it you discover so many nuanced and subtle little bits done by the actors or written into the background of a mostly inconsequential scene and it forces you to wonder what the true nature of this family is and family in general. There are two scenes that are explosive within the context of the film, everything before them is calm and quiet- one of them is when a particular character gets slapped and in a lot of ways it helps to redefine the audience's perspective on the character doing the slapping, it questions everything you thought you knew about the reserved solemnity of that person. The second scene involves an argument that cements our growing suspicions throughout the second half of the film- mainly that the hunky dory relationship between the two people arguing is mostly a convenient illusion created for the sake of a child, but which has now been shattered for a variety of reasons. I've tried to avoid major plot spoilers in this review/summary thing because really that would spoil the movie itself, I know a lot of people still haven't seen it, but they should. They really should.
13. Passion Fish (John Sayles, 1992)
I'm fairly certain no one I know has seen this film and as usual I'm gonna demand that they should do so. Because to me, Mary McDonnell, in this movie, gives the best performance I've ever seen by an actor or actress. This is not an inherently likable character, in fact she stays pretty bitchy and not nice throughout the majority of the movie. But- Mary McDonnell forces you to sympathize with her. Out of all the sad and pathetic and poignantly moving wheelchair bound movie characters, she's the most compelling because it looks and feels damn real and fucking frustrating when she's in the chair. And the chair is everything in this movie despite it never being particularly emphasized by the cinematography except in the opening few minutes as we see her first bits of physical therapy in the hospital. And here's the other thing about her being unlikable, there's a genuine reason for it, and pretty much the whole point of the movie is to examine that reason and to break it down enough so that she can at the very least support herself emotionally and around people. And Alfre Woodard really holds her own against McDonnell with a character that'd normally be a giant cliche of a Magical Negro type that bows and exalts and has some very wise old words to impart to McDonnell. Instead she's got her own shit to deal with and she's definitely not shy about sharing her opinions about McDonnell. The two are perfectly matched in that sense, they're hard to the core and both need one another's companionship to fix the personal problems they have in life. And that's all this movie is. Just a slowly evolving and rather difficult relationship between two somewhat bitter but still mostly decent people. It's paced beautifully and doesn't rush through melodramatic histrionics by either character, in fact it's a pretty long and slow movie, but set against the lush scenery of Louisiana and supplied with a small group of other interesting characters, the movie seems to fly by at times too. I just can't emphasize enough how much I love this movie and admire it for being so wonderfully simple yet so deeply complex.
12. Kill Bill (Quentin Tarantino, 2003-2004)
I can think of no better film series that combines incredibly badass action with weirdly heartfelt and practically poignant emotional drama than Kill Bill. To me it's the perfect amalgamation of the two, giving equal weight to the acting/backstory drama and the visual aesthetics of some classic action genres of samurai films, spaghetti westerns, and even some anime thrown in for good measure. What kind of mainstream director can toss together all three of those as well as some trademark cool as shit dialogue, weird humor, and the most wonderfully random soundtrack ever and STILL wind up with such a giant hit? Nearly every aspect of these two movies could've been a recipe for disaster in the wrong hands, but Tarantino knows his stuff and is more than capable of handling the challenge of creating what's essentially an almost four hour epic, which is really no small task nowadays. I get flak often from people for liking Tarantino, people mostly say he steals shit from other movies and calls it his own, which true or not is kind of not the point and besides, sorry/not sorry to say that a huge number of directors today and years ago did the exact same thing and never get called out for it frequently enough in my opinion (I'm looking at you de Palma and your fucking incredibly obvious and not original steal from Battleship Potemkin's Odessa Steps sequence for a fucking remake of The Untouchables...), the point is maybe Tarantino is somewhat overrated and maybe some of his references and homages are a little on the nose sometimes, but so the fuck what? Imagine this- I'm at the movies in line for the new Tarantino movie and so are a crap ton of other people. I look at what other movies are playing in the theaters- Grown Ups 2, Paranormal Activity 5 Million, Turbo, RIPD, maybe a fucking Lars Von Trier film, I don't know...the point is, most everyone is in line for Tarantino. Isn't it that much more impressive that people are going to see a movie that has genuine heart in its production and a modicum of actual cinematic intelligence? Isn't it refreshing to see that people are lining up to see Tarantino rather than Sandler? I think a couple of stolen shots or lines are worth it. Sorry/not sorry, it's just how I feel.
11. Poetry (Lee Chang-dong, 2010)
I don't know how to properly convey how moving this film is. And how extraordinary the lead performance is. A sixty-six year old actress named Yoon Jeong-hee is on screen in this movie nearly one-hundred percent of the time and I can't think of a single significant scene that doesn't feature her. I know I said Mary McDonnell in Passion Fish is possibly one of the best performances I've ever seen, but Jeong-hee takes the cake and gives a startlingly real, powerful, subtle, nuanced, and poignant performance. It really is astounding. Regardless of gender or race or age, Jeong-hee in Poetry provides the history of cinema with one of the most flawlessly perfect pieces of acting I've ever witnessed. South Korean films tend to have somewhat flowery dialogue, or at least that's how the English translations sometimes read to me. But this is one of those rare foreign films where you can simply watch the actors and just know pretty much exactly what they're saying and feeling regardless of the words, which is a pretty impressive feat. I'm not even going to go on to explain the plot of this film, there's not much of one to be honest, because Chang-dong's movies tend to have fairly simple and easy to follow storylines. They're the lesser aspects of his films because he chooses to emphasize the emotions and the characteristics of his protagonists rather than get caught up the minutiae of plot development. There are certainly some surprises in this film, but they grow from the evolution of Jeong-hee's character and not from conventional cliches of storytelling. This is a very simple and direct depiction of an older woman's difficult juncture in life and nothing more and this film perfectly exemplifies what I adore most about South Korean cinema- it's finding methods of exploration and aspects of stories and life and characters that are so new and unexpected and so original and so not Hollywood that to me it gives hope that in the next couple of years we'll see another outpouring of fantastically unique films and new directors from all over the world and from every walk of life.
10. Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997)
This remains sadly Tarantino's most underrated film, it rode on the tails of the monumental success of Pulp Fiction and many felt story-wise it was merely trying to emulate that film and so didn't fare well in terms of its reputation. But this movie is actually kind of amazing. There are a lot of heist films that depict in excruciating and often violent detail every aspect of the crime being pulled off itself. Jackie Brown beats them all into submission. It's a little startling how well Tarantino seems to show the realism of a crime, the long uninterrupted takes of the different people involved taking even longer walks through the mall and the scene of the crime and the parking lot help to ratchet up some expected tension that someone's going to get caught. And that suspense, combined with an as always awesome soundtrack and foreknowledge of the characters and their personalities and the circumstances of the story make for one extraordinary and extraordinarily long scene. But it's not just the crime taking place in the middle of the movie or even the wonderfully funny scenes between all the characters, it's that Tarantino and, therefore the audience, is having fun. There's no better feeling than being genuinely entertained on an intelligent and self-aware level by a movie. And this movie has both the smarts and the cleverness in spades. And more importantly Tarantino cares enough about his characters to have them actually have real feelings and thoughts instead of manufactured ones right out of Screenwriting 101. He places especially great emphasis on the relationship between Jackie and Max in this movie and the result is one of the most beautifully complex romantic subplots I've ever seen, not complex because of the story necessarily, though that does offer some obstacles for the two, but because of the individuals themselves and where they come from and their own inability to acknowledge that they like each other. They come from two different worlds and backgrounds, there's a slight age difference and more so there's the fact that they're grown adults and maybe a romance this late in life is a bit much for them. That's genuine complexity of an unexpected and refreshingly real and original kind and so (spoilers) when Jackie and Max head their separate ways at the end of the movie it's kind of sad and touching. And the key to this romance in the movie is with the performances and both Grier and Forster are incredibly subtle in their depiction of the two characters. To be honest, Forster probably should've gotten the Oscar for his performance.
A quick note about Reservoir Dogs. It's not gonna show up on this list. I don't think highly of it, primarily because of the silly conceit of not showing the robbery itself. It bothers me, it's a dramatic cheat and I don't like it. To me that's what makes Jackie Brown far superior and more fun.
9. 12 Angry Men (Both 1957- Sidney Lumet & 1997- William Friedkin Versions)
So my reasoning for this is simple enough- 12 Angry Men is a fairly simple play that's been adapted a variety of ways and the material itself offers up the potential to actors and directors to be interpreted and executed on numerous levels and using different methods stylistically. The original 1957 adaptation is of course a classic film in terms of its direction by the monumentally talented Sidney Lumet, and while the majority of the performances are pretty damn solid, a couple come up short and feel a little dated and stilted. The 1997 version of 12 Angry Men is the opposite case- the direction is fairly straightforward and doesn't offer very many directorial flourishes, but the acting is much more consistently powerful. The script for that version too injects a great deal more political and social subtext by making several of the jurors African-American. Both are equally fantastic films but for completely different reasons and because the material stays essentially the same I think it's less of a cheat for me this time to include both on here. I remember watching both versions a few years ago and being completely blown away by the films, here's an extremely basic story that's able to plumb the depths of so many different emotions and ideas and asks so many important and relevant questions about people and society and the law and it all feels fresh and original and non-melodramatic in such a fantastic way.
8. Gettysburg (Ronald F. Maxwell, 1993)
You want a film about war? Well here it is. No melodramatic cliches, no obnoxiously unnecessary romance, no idiotic historical anachronisms, just a movie about a specific battle that depicts war realistically and looks at it from different perspectives. It's long too. Over four hours. In fact I'm fairly certain it remains the longest film I've ever seen. But there's something so interesting about it. The willingness not to fall into conventions and the insistence that it stays grounded in historical relevance or even the fact that it doesn't even really judge either side. The American Civil War has always been my personal favorite to study in history classes, partly because I grew up in Virginia and know a fair amount about it but also because from a, I guess you'd call it a conceptual perspective, it's one of the most fascinating wars. Two sides divided over several issues, chief amongst them an extremely controversial matter for the era, but both sides also from the same country. It just strikes me as very bizarre and a little unreal, and yet it happened. Maybe because the war itself is so close to us on a literal level we tend to have more of a personal investment in it, it enables us to look much more closely at the emotional aspects of war. And I can't think of another film that explores and looks at such a huge subject in the way that this film does.
7. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (Ang Lee, 2000)
http://abruisedego.blogspot.com/2012/10/flying-in-treesmy-justification-for.html
6. Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999)
What a grandly epic film. And yet it's also so human. There are maybe a billion characters in the whole story but each and every one of them is given a surprisingly even and equal amount of attention and they're all written superbly. So the movie has characters in spades, it should be easier then to pin down what precisely it's about right? Surely it's doing the whole repetitive/cyclical themes thing where the same ideas are emphasized through different stories/characters? Well not exactly. Being a PT Anderson movie, it's naturally impossible to figure out exactly what he's getting at. Everything seems so weirdly specific in the dialogue, so technically on point with the cinematography, and so carefully modulated with the performances that it all could pretty much mean anything to anyone. And that's the beauty of it. I love films that give you exactly what you need in order to draw your own conclusions but never force you down one avenue or another in terms of interpretation. And Magnolia is the perfect example of that. It's been said that some people don't like the near-ending of the film where a certain...weather phenomenon happens because it's out of nowhere and doesn't serve any real purpose in finally bringing all of these connected characters together. But isn't that kind of the point? Sad though it is, that's how shit happens. Maybe we all are weirdly connected by stuff that happens in our lives but given the nature of the universe we just never come together despite the weirdness and randomness of reality.
5. Ordinary People (Robert Redford, 1980)
This is a completely and absolutely perfect film. Every shot, every edit, every line of dialogue, every performance. It's all completely flawless. I cannot emphasize enough how much I love this movie. For me it's probably the most hard-hitting film I've ever seen, in the sense that I personally take a great deal away from it in terms of its impact and emotional power. I know many have criticized it as being kinda dated or that it's nothing but white people whining for two hours, but I don't give a shit. This is my list and I do what I want with it. These are the films that I care about and that have had some kind of influence on me. And this movie exemplifies that precisely.
4. -All of Stanley Kubrick's Films (Stanley Kubrick, 1953-1999)
I'm not gonna even try to justify this selection on the list. I know I've been criticized for picking more than one film for one entry, but so the fuck what? Kubrick will always be the exception to any rule. Instead I'm just gonna rank them by my personal order of how much I get out of them and enjoy them.
In Descending Order of Greatness:
13. Fear & Desire
12. Killer's Kiss
11. Spartacus
10. Lolita
9. Paths of Glory
8. The Killing
7. A Clockwork Orange
6. Full Metal Jacket
5. Eyes Wide Shut
4. The Shining
3. Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
2. Barry Lyndon
1. 2001: A Space Odyssey
3. John Carpenter's Halloween (John Carpenter, 1978)
There are two reasons why I rank this film so high. The first is quite simple- it is consistently the one movie that is able to scare me over and over again every time I watch it. I used to be terrified of horror movies (go figure) and I recall watching this when I was maybe six or seven years old. I couldn't sleep for days. Around every dark corner in my house during the night I swore I could see The Shape moving. So for quite some time after I vowed off watching scary movies, at least alone. Then as my taste for horror grew in my teenage years I decide to really ratchet up the tension and watch Halloween. Alone. In a completely dark apartment. On Halloween night. Needless to say I was once again right where I was all those years ago, clawing at a couch cushion, praying for poor Laurie to get through that damn door while Michael approached ever so slowly. Inch by inch. Gives me goosebumps just thinking about it. Anyway- the second reason is a bit more complicated. I personally feel that Halloween is the greatest and most accurate depiction of what evil is. Sound absurd? Well maybe it is, but I don't care. Whenever I think of evil I think of Michael Meyers. A blank slate, unknowable, uncaring, unstoppable. And I think of what dear Dr. Loomis tried to do for fifteen years. Experimenting, testing, observing, asking questions, and trying to define the reason why a small child would do something so terrible. And his conclusion, to me, is one of the most frightening notions I've ever heard- Michael has no reason, no ethics, there is nothing in him that drives him to do what he does. He is only evil. Even his name as the killer in the first film suggests that he's barely even a person- The Shape. Both of those reasons aside, there's also the obvious aspects of why this movie is so good- ridiculously creepy score, impressive production for such a low budget film, incredibly well done and eerie cinematography, and some surprisingly good performances for a film of its nature.
2. My Dinner With Andre (Louis Malle, 1981)
How to properly explain the appeal of this movie...have you ever just gone out with a friend or maybe even a date and just sat down somewhere and talked about...stuff? And during the course of the conversation everything seems natural and simple and straight-forward, you're just offering your thoughts and opinions on various matters and topics and nothing you or he/she has said seems all that super significant. And then you get home and as you're preparing for bed or whatever you think back on everything you said and everything they said and you realize- that was actually kind of amazing. Neither one of us drew major, life-changing conclusions about ourselves or existence. We didn't figure out the cure for cancer or settle a debate on some controversial subject. We just...talked. And yet everything that was said seemed to have some kind of meaning. To me. To them. To an outsider, the words would mean nothing, but to us, they were everything. But for some reason I just can't quite identify. That's precisely what this movie is and what's it about. It covers a wide range of topics that are related to the professions and lives of the two main characters of Andre and Wally, but the ease of the dialogue settles well in one's mind and gives you the sense of understanding practically everything they're saying, even if you don't fully know everything about the theater or writing. Even if you had just a modicum of knowledge regarding art in general, you'd probably be able to get something out of this movie. And that's all the film is- a conversation between two intelligent men about the nature of life and art and humanity. There's no major conflict, there are no explosions. It's just dinner. And yet there's clearly so much more going on under the surface of the discussion being had between them. And that's Malle's greatest ability as a director- his extraordinary subtlety. Even the cinematography is rather striking but in a quiet and unobtrusive way. There's a great deal going on behind Wally and Andre in the mirrors set in the walls, and yet none of that action or those reflections are given a huge amount of attention. It's just there. And really that's what I love about this movie. It feels like life.
1. Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
So yeah...here's my number one favorite/greatest film ever. It's just the best. It's entertaining and funny and weirdly insightful in some ways, at least in regards to some of its characters. Or at the very least it depicts a large number of usually cliched, conventional characters in some wonderfully original and unconventional ways. I don't know what else to say really. The movie itself is rather undefinable for a variety of reasons. What's it even really about in terms of theme? Does that even matter? I don't know and at this point I don't honestly care all that much. This list is done and I've told you my top film so I don't much feel like justifying it because this whole 101 movies thing has actually been kind of exhausting. Fun, but exhausting. It's just a pretty fucking awesome film and fuck you if you disagree. Thank you and good night.
Spike Lee isn't my favorite person. He says some dumb shit sometimes and likes to pick fights when it's pretty much unnecessary, but that's a discussion for another time because when it comes to Malcolm X I think Lee is spot-on in his writing and his direction and his production. All of his usual stylistic flourishes work brilliantly in this epic biography of a pretty extraordinary man. The last twenty minutes or so of this film have to be seen to be believed as it offers a staggeringly emotional tribute to an impressive and important figure in the Civil Rights movement. And Denzel gives what's probably the performance of his career.
25. Vanya On 42nd Street (Louis Malle, 1994)
I'm not sure I can properly describe this film or why I find it so bizarrely fascinating. All it really is is a small group of actors gathering at a rundown theater to perform a loose rehearsal of an adaptation of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya. Nothing more. And yet it captures something incredibly compelling and interesting about the nature of acting and directing and theater in general. This really is one of those movies you have to see to understand and appreciate, so it's a little tricky for me to fully identify what's so great about it, but you'll just have to take my word for it that it's an impressive final film from Malle.
24. In the Heat of the Night (Norman Jewison, 1967)
You want a movie that bashes To Kill A Mockingbird over the head with its superiority and genuine acknowledgment and realistic depiction of contemporaneous racial issues of the 60's? Well then look no further than this classic film that captures perfectly and accurately and with surprisingly poignant and meaningful subtlety the underlying and not so underlying racial tensions of the South only half a century ago. The acting is key, and both Poitier and Steiger are matched perfectly, giving powerfully angry and uninhibited performances as two men on the same side yet divided by something so gloriously superficial that it nearly costs them the case they must solve together. It's a simple and direct story yet it works on so many important and relevant levels and even more importantly it never becomes anything too overtly politically or socially minded. It's about these characters and this story and nothing more.
23. Lord of the Rings (Peter Jackson, 2001-2003)
I mean no fucking duh, of course this was gonna be super fucking high on the list.
22. Hard Eight (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1996)
This is one of PT Anderson's most underrated films. The twists and turns of the simple yet surprising plot, the nuances and subtleties of his unusual dialogue, and a stellar performance from my personal favorite actor Philip Baker Hall, this movie has it all and without all the grand showiness of Anderson's later films. It's an extremely tight and focused movie with some sharp writing and enough originality to set the neo-noir-ness of the genre on its head.
21. Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010)
I'm not gonna try and justify this one because I sense I'll be getting a modicum of hate/dislike from some of my film-related friends for listing this this high on the list. What can I say beyond the fact that I think this movie is genuinely entertaining, surprisingly original story-wise, and rather brilliant on a purely cinematic level? Fuck all the haters, because I know you exist, you assholes you.
20. The Dark Knight Trilogy (Christopher Nolan, 2005-2012)
I'm grouping all three of these films together because I think when taken as one entire cohesive story, they each work well on their own merits despite some issues and flaws in storytelling for parts one and three. I'm not denying that these films aren't perfect, but when I think of a series of movies that greatly redefined not just what superhero films can be but what still other under-appreciated genres like fantasy and science fiction films can be I smile. Here is a trilogy of extremely well-made and mostly well-written films that presents the general movie-going audience with a rather absurd concept of a man who fights crime while dressed as a giant bat but executes it so startlingly well and so weirdly realistically that it makes even the smuggest of critics and the most disdainful of comic book movie viewers enjoy every minute. They're wildly entertaining while also being carefully insightful into the protagonist's hero journey and plot-wise are grandly epic puzzles of deeply complex story that must be unraveled and reexamined by Batman as he looks for the usually difficult and morally ambiguous answer to the problem set off by the villains of each film. There really are so many intriguing and interesting layers to these movies, mostly in The Dark Knight centerpiece, and there's enough nifty gadgetry and awesome action to just watch and have fun too. These films provide a perfect balance to what's usually missing in most other movies of their ilk- there's an attempt at meaning and emotion rather than just simple pretty pictures and cool explosions.
19. Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood, 1992)
For Melissa. That is all.
18. The Straight Story (David Lynch, 1999)
I have a rather odd relationship with David Lynch. I love him as a director, but tend to loathe his actual movies. The Straight Story is an exception however. It's Lynch essentially being mainstream but also keeping enough of his wacky experimental style more or less intact in the background of this wonderfully simple true story of an old man who, unable to legally drive, takes his tractor and travels several hundred miles to visit his sick brother. The dialogue is so flawlessly perfect, the performances so perfectly nuanced and subtle, and the cinematography so astoundingly perfect you pretty much forget you're watching a Lynch movie from the first frame. Even more importantly I think however is that this movie is so wonderfully poignant without ever being melodramatic or maudlin. This old odd man goes on his journey, meets some interesting and mostly decent people, exchanges a few words with them out of genuine interest, and just moves on along his way. And when he reaches his brother there is a beautiful scene of near absolute silence between the two that defines exactly how they feel about one another and the nature of the relationship they've had in the past. The movie's extraordinary and everyone should see it, if only to realize that Lynch doesn't always have to be weird and out there in order to get a rise out of someone. The Straight Story isn't exactly philosophically complex and full of metaphoric dream-like imagery the way his other movies are, but on an emotional level it's strikingly provocative.
17. El Norte (Gregory Nava, 1983)
This movie...this movie...where do I start? I mean talk about a rather astounding production and release history. Or also the performances by a couple of pretty much completely unknown actors. Or the beautiful cinematography. But mostly let's talk about the political and social subtext. Because this movie seems to only superficially have both in spades. To read about it in a review or a plot summary online you expect some Telemundo-like high melodrama with cheesy music and instead you get a wonderfully simple and surprisingly subtle depiction of two young people searching for a home under extremely complicated and difficult circumstances. There are no big speeches about illegal immigration and there's no lame plea to the big scary white people for forgiveness. There's just the underlying fear and anger and confusion and all the other emotions inherent to such a situation. Everything the main characters feel makes sense, every scene moves along to the next with a logical and simple grace, and the ending, while incredibly depressing, feels weirdly and appropriately right. There might be a message in the movie or a lesson to be learned, but it doesn't feel like finger wagging or a round of the blame game. The movie is about how life is for these two people and about how their dreams for the future are cruelly and sadly manipulated and destroyed by an illusion that has gone on for far too long. America calls itself the land of the free and gives hope to certain outsiders, but the reality is something far different when you attempt to get here and stay. There is no practical or 'correct' method for these people to get to where they want...no NEED...to be in order to live their lives and to pretend that the real and legal ways of immigration are fair and easy is a joke. I love that this movie gets me thinking about these things, it's almost insidious in its intelligence and ability to do so. Oh and it helps that El Norte is a moving, poignant, and incredibly well-made film as well.
16. The Vengeance Trilogy (Park Chan-wook, 2002-2005)
This is a thematic trilogy and there is no continuous storyline in any of the films. But they're each separately superb movies on their own merits and each work uniquely of each other regardless of their spiritual connection in how they depict the nature of revenge on a personal and emotional level. While films one and three, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and Lady Vengeance respectively, are slightly less cohesive and as well done as the most well known of the three, Oldboy, they're still fantastic films that provide a harrowing, disturbing, and terrifyingly enough realistic look into the minds of those who seek a moral and physical vengeance against the people who wronged them in some way. My personal issues with Sympathy and Lady are rather pedantic perhaps but I feel they're relevant and do show the slight weaknesses of both movies. The main problem with Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is the lack of likability for the protagonists and their plight and in a similar fashion, the primary fault in Lady Vengeance is her aggressively cold demeanor. Whether it's intentional in the writing of both movies or a choice by the actors, the end result is that the films, while involving and interesting and thrilling on a story-level, leave me slightly wanting emotionally. But Oldboy makes up for all that in spades. The performances, the writing, the story itself, the incredibly beautiful cinematography and production, they're all top notch. There are twists and turns in the movie that shocked me upon my first viewing and even upon re-watching I find those same plot points still pack a punch and necessitate a re-examination of all that came before. The levels to which the protagonist in Oldboy is willing to sink in order to get his revenge are incredible and in a weird way, incredibly meaningful. What level will some of us go to in order to achieve something so basic and primal? It's an interesting, and on a human-level, important question to ask and all three films in the series answer it in different ways while also exploring the emotional cost of taking such actions. Extraordinary.
15. Once Upon A Time In America (Sergio Leone, 1984)
I'm gonna start off by saying that I think this film is better than The Godfather trilogy. I don't dislike The Godfather or Francis Ford Coppola I just think Leone achieves what Coppola didn't get quite right in his trilogy regarding the meaning of how he chooses to depict the relationship between gangs and gangsters and the evolution of American society. Coppola opts for a quasi-realistic and intensely detailed look at one single family and their ups and downs as they try to survive their crime business. But he also falls into a common area for most Italian directors and shows an eerie dreamlike quality to reality, there is a blurred line between what's historical and accurate to the era and the fantasy imagery as seen by the protagonists. Think of the way Godfather Part II slips so loosely between past and present, the distinctly different methods Coppola uses to show both eras as separate literally yet connected by aesthetic and metaphoric visuals. This is a common choice by Italian directors to show a mix of real and dreamed images in an effort to make a direct commentary on what's happening in the genuine story of the film. In Dario Argento's Deep Red there is a physical recreation of Hopper's Nighthawks painting in the background of the scene where the hero stumbles upon the first murder, it's a clear effort to visually signal the audience that what is going to follow is a confused and jumbled state for the hero where nothing is what it seems. Coppola and Leone both do a similar thing in their respective films, but I think Leone is better at it, more aware of it, and uses it much more to his advantage. The main issue I've always had with people praising The Godfather and with the movies themselves is that I simply don't have much of an emotional connection to what's going on in the films nor do I glean much meaning from what happens in the story. There are far too many characters to keep track of to my liking, in the sense that I don't think a lot of the characters have much impact on the overall storyline other than the fact that they exist in a Dickensian fashion, to offer a broad and repetitive symbolic meaning to the constant theme of how crime doesn't pay. Coppola is far too blunt for my liking. But Leone takes his time, he focuses mostly on de Niro's character in Once Upon A Time, and even when the story isn't solely about him, it's still about his small group of friends and his love life. Each character, even the minor ones that pop up in subplots, don't feel as superfluous as they do in The Godfather, they have a direct relation to both the plot itself or to the characters. Leone's movie is quite slow paced, even when compared to The Godfather, and as such it feels like we grow to know and like these characters despite their flaws and ways with crime. They evolve and become criminals because of their circumstances not because of the whole family business angle, which, while accurate to The Godfather, always felt like a convenient cop out for the protagonists to use whenever they need to defend how and why they do things. Coppola seems to judge a lot on a moral and philosophical level, but he also seems dubious about his own conclusions, which is why there is the murky and confused dreamlike moments from time to time. Leone has no qualms about admitting that there is no right answer to what the characters do in his story, there IS a distinct and obvious blurred middle ground on which the protagonist stands. He doesn't know where to turn or what exactly to think of his life or his friends. I think of the sad and graphic and disturbing scene that pretty much completely redefines de Niro's character- he rapes the woman he loves. And the movie, nor he, is exactly sure why. Is it out of his desire to exert power over women the way most gangsters do? Is he desperate to prove his ability to get whatever he wants to impress his friends the way they all did when they were younger? Or is he really a monster, doomed to a life of crime on every level? He doesn't know and the movie never provides us with a clear answer because I think that's the nature of crime. It's insidious and corrupting, even a man who's only ever committed a crime to defend himself and his friends, can be pulled down by it. And as the story follows we can't look at him the same way, nor can he. He devolves into constant drug use, blurring the lines between what's happening now in his life and the so-called happier times he spent with his friends. This movie is so perfectly ambiguous in certain areas, so beautifully made, and so wonderfully written that I don't even think it necessitates me stating the obvious fact that the direction, the production, and the acting are all stellar and flawless. I wish this movie were more well known and I wish Leone got more credit as a director, because he really was one of a kind.
14. In the Bedroom (Todd Field, 2001)
If the Academy actually gave a shit the year this movie was nominated, it would've swept the Oscars. But instead, as usual, they play it safe. This film is almost unbearably complex and emotional and weirdly poignant and terrifyingly realistic. There are so many unexpected layers and moments and entire scenes that shocked me, less because they were so literally surprising plot-wise and more because everything felt so right and understandable and compelling and yet so very wrong. The levels to which the two protagonists fall for the sake of their child are incredible and disturbing, and while I don't agree with their actions in the latter third of the film, I am sympathetic to their plight. Upon first viewing the movie seems simple and straightforward and it is, but it's still effective. Upon re-watching it you discover so many nuanced and subtle little bits done by the actors or written into the background of a mostly inconsequential scene and it forces you to wonder what the true nature of this family is and family in general. There are two scenes that are explosive within the context of the film, everything before them is calm and quiet- one of them is when a particular character gets slapped and in a lot of ways it helps to redefine the audience's perspective on the character doing the slapping, it questions everything you thought you knew about the reserved solemnity of that person. The second scene involves an argument that cements our growing suspicions throughout the second half of the film- mainly that the hunky dory relationship between the two people arguing is mostly a convenient illusion created for the sake of a child, but which has now been shattered for a variety of reasons. I've tried to avoid major plot spoilers in this review/summary thing because really that would spoil the movie itself, I know a lot of people still haven't seen it, but they should. They really should.
13. Passion Fish (John Sayles, 1992)
I'm fairly certain no one I know has seen this film and as usual I'm gonna demand that they should do so. Because to me, Mary McDonnell, in this movie, gives the best performance I've ever seen by an actor or actress. This is not an inherently likable character, in fact she stays pretty bitchy and not nice throughout the majority of the movie. But- Mary McDonnell forces you to sympathize with her. Out of all the sad and pathetic and poignantly moving wheelchair bound movie characters, she's the most compelling because it looks and feels damn real and fucking frustrating when she's in the chair. And the chair is everything in this movie despite it never being particularly emphasized by the cinematography except in the opening few minutes as we see her first bits of physical therapy in the hospital. And here's the other thing about her being unlikable, there's a genuine reason for it, and pretty much the whole point of the movie is to examine that reason and to break it down enough so that she can at the very least support herself emotionally and around people. And Alfre Woodard really holds her own against McDonnell with a character that'd normally be a giant cliche of a Magical Negro type that bows and exalts and has some very wise old words to impart to McDonnell. Instead she's got her own shit to deal with and she's definitely not shy about sharing her opinions about McDonnell. The two are perfectly matched in that sense, they're hard to the core and both need one another's companionship to fix the personal problems they have in life. And that's all this movie is. Just a slowly evolving and rather difficult relationship between two somewhat bitter but still mostly decent people. It's paced beautifully and doesn't rush through melodramatic histrionics by either character, in fact it's a pretty long and slow movie, but set against the lush scenery of Louisiana and supplied with a small group of other interesting characters, the movie seems to fly by at times too. I just can't emphasize enough how much I love this movie and admire it for being so wonderfully simple yet so deeply complex.
12. Kill Bill (Quentin Tarantino, 2003-2004)
I can think of no better film series that combines incredibly badass action with weirdly heartfelt and practically poignant emotional drama than Kill Bill. To me it's the perfect amalgamation of the two, giving equal weight to the acting/backstory drama and the visual aesthetics of some classic action genres of samurai films, spaghetti westerns, and even some anime thrown in for good measure. What kind of mainstream director can toss together all three of those as well as some trademark cool as shit dialogue, weird humor, and the most wonderfully random soundtrack ever and STILL wind up with such a giant hit? Nearly every aspect of these two movies could've been a recipe for disaster in the wrong hands, but Tarantino knows his stuff and is more than capable of handling the challenge of creating what's essentially an almost four hour epic, which is really no small task nowadays. I get flak often from people for liking Tarantino, people mostly say he steals shit from other movies and calls it his own, which true or not is kind of not the point and besides, sorry/not sorry to say that a huge number of directors today and years ago did the exact same thing and never get called out for it frequently enough in my opinion (I'm looking at you de Palma and your fucking incredibly obvious and not original steal from Battleship Potemkin's Odessa Steps sequence for a fucking remake of The Untouchables...), the point is maybe Tarantino is somewhat overrated and maybe some of his references and homages are a little on the nose sometimes, but so the fuck what? Imagine this- I'm at the movies in line for the new Tarantino movie and so are a crap ton of other people. I look at what other movies are playing in the theaters- Grown Ups 2, Paranormal Activity 5 Million, Turbo, RIPD, maybe a fucking Lars Von Trier film, I don't know...the point is, most everyone is in line for Tarantino. Isn't it that much more impressive that people are going to see a movie that has genuine heart in its production and a modicum of actual cinematic intelligence? Isn't it refreshing to see that people are lining up to see Tarantino rather than Sandler? I think a couple of stolen shots or lines are worth it. Sorry/not sorry, it's just how I feel.
11. Poetry (Lee Chang-dong, 2010)
I don't know how to properly convey how moving this film is. And how extraordinary the lead performance is. A sixty-six year old actress named Yoon Jeong-hee is on screen in this movie nearly one-hundred percent of the time and I can't think of a single significant scene that doesn't feature her. I know I said Mary McDonnell in Passion Fish is possibly one of the best performances I've ever seen, but Jeong-hee takes the cake and gives a startlingly real, powerful, subtle, nuanced, and poignant performance. It really is astounding. Regardless of gender or race or age, Jeong-hee in Poetry provides the history of cinema with one of the most flawlessly perfect pieces of acting I've ever witnessed. South Korean films tend to have somewhat flowery dialogue, or at least that's how the English translations sometimes read to me. But this is one of those rare foreign films where you can simply watch the actors and just know pretty much exactly what they're saying and feeling regardless of the words, which is a pretty impressive feat. I'm not even going to go on to explain the plot of this film, there's not much of one to be honest, because Chang-dong's movies tend to have fairly simple and easy to follow storylines. They're the lesser aspects of his films because he chooses to emphasize the emotions and the characteristics of his protagonists rather than get caught up the minutiae of plot development. There are certainly some surprises in this film, but they grow from the evolution of Jeong-hee's character and not from conventional cliches of storytelling. This is a very simple and direct depiction of an older woman's difficult juncture in life and nothing more and this film perfectly exemplifies what I adore most about South Korean cinema- it's finding methods of exploration and aspects of stories and life and characters that are so new and unexpected and so original and so not Hollywood that to me it gives hope that in the next couple of years we'll see another outpouring of fantastically unique films and new directors from all over the world and from every walk of life.
10. Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997)
This remains sadly Tarantino's most underrated film, it rode on the tails of the monumental success of Pulp Fiction and many felt story-wise it was merely trying to emulate that film and so didn't fare well in terms of its reputation. But this movie is actually kind of amazing. There are a lot of heist films that depict in excruciating and often violent detail every aspect of the crime being pulled off itself. Jackie Brown beats them all into submission. It's a little startling how well Tarantino seems to show the realism of a crime, the long uninterrupted takes of the different people involved taking even longer walks through the mall and the scene of the crime and the parking lot help to ratchet up some expected tension that someone's going to get caught. And that suspense, combined with an as always awesome soundtrack and foreknowledge of the characters and their personalities and the circumstances of the story make for one extraordinary and extraordinarily long scene. But it's not just the crime taking place in the middle of the movie or even the wonderfully funny scenes between all the characters, it's that Tarantino and, therefore the audience, is having fun. There's no better feeling than being genuinely entertained on an intelligent and self-aware level by a movie. And this movie has both the smarts and the cleverness in spades. And more importantly Tarantino cares enough about his characters to have them actually have real feelings and thoughts instead of manufactured ones right out of Screenwriting 101. He places especially great emphasis on the relationship between Jackie and Max in this movie and the result is one of the most beautifully complex romantic subplots I've ever seen, not complex because of the story necessarily, though that does offer some obstacles for the two, but because of the individuals themselves and where they come from and their own inability to acknowledge that they like each other. They come from two different worlds and backgrounds, there's a slight age difference and more so there's the fact that they're grown adults and maybe a romance this late in life is a bit much for them. That's genuine complexity of an unexpected and refreshingly real and original kind and so (spoilers) when Jackie and Max head their separate ways at the end of the movie it's kind of sad and touching. And the key to this romance in the movie is with the performances and both Grier and Forster are incredibly subtle in their depiction of the two characters. To be honest, Forster probably should've gotten the Oscar for his performance.
A quick note about Reservoir Dogs. It's not gonna show up on this list. I don't think highly of it, primarily because of the silly conceit of not showing the robbery itself. It bothers me, it's a dramatic cheat and I don't like it. To me that's what makes Jackie Brown far superior and more fun.
9. 12 Angry Men (Both 1957- Sidney Lumet & 1997- William Friedkin Versions)
So my reasoning for this is simple enough- 12 Angry Men is a fairly simple play that's been adapted a variety of ways and the material itself offers up the potential to actors and directors to be interpreted and executed on numerous levels and using different methods stylistically. The original 1957 adaptation is of course a classic film in terms of its direction by the monumentally talented Sidney Lumet, and while the majority of the performances are pretty damn solid, a couple come up short and feel a little dated and stilted. The 1997 version of 12 Angry Men is the opposite case- the direction is fairly straightforward and doesn't offer very many directorial flourishes, but the acting is much more consistently powerful. The script for that version too injects a great deal more political and social subtext by making several of the jurors African-American. Both are equally fantastic films but for completely different reasons and because the material stays essentially the same I think it's less of a cheat for me this time to include both on here. I remember watching both versions a few years ago and being completely blown away by the films, here's an extremely basic story that's able to plumb the depths of so many different emotions and ideas and asks so many important and relevant questions about people and society and the law and it all feels fresh and original and non-melodramatic in such a fantastic way.
8. Gettysburg (Ronald F. Maxwell, 1993)
You want a film about war? Well here it is. No melodramatic cliches, no obnoxiously unnecessary romance, no idiotic historical anachronisms, just a movie about a specific battle that depicts war realistically and looks at it from different perspectives. It's long too. Over four hours. In fact I'm fairly certain it remains the longest film I've ever seen. But there's something so interesting about it. The willingness not to fall into conventions and the insistence that it stays grounded in historical relevance or even the fact that it doesn't even really judge either side. The American Civil War has always been my personal favorite to study in history classes, partly because I grew up in Virginia and know a fair amount about it but also because from a, I guess you'd call it a conceptual perspective, it's one of the most fascinating wars. Two sides divided over several issues, chief amongst them an extremely controversial matter for the era, but both sides also from the same country. It just strikes me as very bizarre and a little unreal, and yet it happened. Maybe because the war itself is so close to us on a literal level we tend to have more of a personal investment in it, it enables us to look much more closely at the emotional aspects of war. And I can't think of another film that explores and looks at such a huge subject in the way that this film does.
7. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (Ang Lee, 2000)
http://abruisedego.blogspot.com/2012/10/flying-in-treesmy-justification-for.html
6. Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999)
What a grandly epic film. And yet it's also so human. There are maybe a billion characters in the whole story but each and every one of them is given a surprisingly even and equal amount of attention and they're all written superbly. So the movie has characters in spades, it should be easier then to pin down what precisely it's about right? Surely it's doing the whole repetitive/cyclical themes thing where the same ideas are emphasized through different stories/characters? Well not exactly. Being a PT Anderson movie, it's naturally impossible to figure out exactly what he's getting at. Everything seems so weirdly specific in the dialogue, so technically on point with the cinematography, and so carefully modulated with the performances that it all could pretty much mean anything to anyone. And that's the beauty of it. I love films that give you exactly what you need in order to draw your own conclusions but never force you down one avenue or another in terms of interpretation. And Magnolia is the perfect example of that. It's been said that some people don't like the near-ending of the film where a certain...weather phenomenon happens because it's out of nowhere and doesn't serve any real purpose in finally bringing all of these connected characters together. But isn't that kind of the point? Sad though it is, that's how shit happens. Maybe we all are weirdly connected by stuff that happens in our lives but given the nature of the universe we just never come together despite the weirdness and randomness of reality.
5. Ordinary People (Robert Redford, 1980)
This is a completely and absolutely perfect film. Every shot, every edit, every line of dialogue, every performance. It's all completely flawless. I cannot emphasize enough how much I love this movie. For me it's probably the most hard-hitting film I've ever seen, in the sense that I personally take a great deal away from it in terms of its impact and emotional power. I know many have criticized it as being kinda dated or that it's nothing but white people whining for two hours, but I don't give a shit. This is my list and I do what I want with it. These are the films that I care about and that have had some kind of influence on me. And this movie exemplifies that precisely.
4. -All of Stanley Kubrick's Films (Stanley Kubrick, 1953-1999)
I'm not gonna even try to justify this selection on the list. I know I've been criticized for picking more than one film for one entry, but so the fuck what? Kubrick will always be the exception to any rule. Instead I'm just gonna rank them by my personal order of how much I get out of them and enjoy them.
In Descending Order of Greatness:
13. Fear & Desire
12. Killer's Kiss
11. Spartacus
10. Lolita
9. Paths of Glory
8. The Killing
7. A Clockwork Orange
6. Full Metal Jacket
5. Eyes Wide Shut
4. The Shining
3. Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
2. Barry Lyndon
1. 2001: A Space Odyssey
3. John Carpenter's Halloween (John Carpenter, 1978)
There are two reasons why I rank this film so high. The first is quite simple- it is consistently the one movie that is able to scare me over and over again every time I watch it. I used to be terrified of horror movies (go figure) and I recall watching this when I was maybe six or seven years old. I couldn't sleep for days. Around every dark corner in my house during the night I swore I could see The Shape moving. So for quite some time after I vowed off watching scary movies, at least alone. Then as my taste for horror grew in my teenage years I decide to really ratchet up the tension and watch Halloween. Alone. In a completely dark apartment. On Halloween night. Needless to say I was once again right where I was all those years ago, clawing at a couch cushion, praying for poor Laurie to get through that damn door while Michael approached ever so slowly. Inch by inch. Gives me goosebumps just thinking about it. Anyway- the second reason is a bit more complicated. I personally feel that Halloween is the greatest and most accurate depiction of what evil is. Sound absurd? Well maybe it is, but I don't care. Whenever I think of evil I think of Michael Meyers. A blank slate, unknowable, uncaring, unstoppable. And I think of what dear Dr. Loomis tried to do for fifteen years. Experimenting, testing, observing, asking questions, and trying to define the reason why a small child would do something so terrible. And his conclusion, to me, is one of the most frightening notions I've ever heard- Michael has no reason, no ethics, there is nothing in him that drives him to do what he does. He is only evil. Even his name as the killer in the first film suggests that he's barely even a person- The Shape. Both of those reasons aside, there's also the obvious aspects of why this movie is so good- ridiculously creepy score, impressive production for such a low budget film, incredibly well done and eerie cinematography, and some surprisingly good performances for a film of its nature.
2. My Dinner With Andre (Louis Malle, 1981)
How to properly explain the appeal of this movie...have you ever just gone out with a friend or maybe even a date and just sat down somewhere and talked about...stuff? And during the course of the conversation everything seems natural and simple and straight-forward, you're just offering your thoughts and opinions on various matters and topics and nothing you or he/she has said seems all that super significant. And then you get home and as you're preparing for bed or whatever you think back on everything you said and everything they said and you realize- that was actually kind of amazing. Neither one of us drew major, life-changing conclusions about ourselves or existence. We didn't figure out the cure for cancer or settle a debate on some controversial subject. We just...talked. And yet everything that was said seemed to have some kind of meaning. To me. To them. To an outsider, the words would mean nothing, but to us, they were everything. But for some reason I just can't quite identify. That's precisely what this movie is and what's it about. It covers a wide range of topics that are related to the professions and lives of the two main characters of Andre and Wally, but the ease of the dialogue settles well in one's mind and gives you the sense of understanding practically everything they're saying, even if you don't fully know everything about the theater or writing. Even if you had just a modicum of knowledge regarding art in general, you'd probably be able to get something out of this movie. And that's all the film is- a conversation between two intelligent men about the nature of life and art and humanity. There's no major conflict, there are no explosions. It's just dinner. And yet there's clearly so much more going on under the surface of the discussion being had between them. And that's Malle's greatest ability as a director- his extraordinary subtlety. Even the cinematography is rather striking but in a quiet and unobtrusive way. There's a great deal going on behind Wally and Andre in the mirrors set in the walls, and yet none of that action or those reflections are given a huge amount of attention. It's just there. And really that's what I love about this movie. It feels like life.
1. Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
So yeah...here's my number one favorite/greatest film ever. It's just the best. It's entertaining and funny and weirdly insightful in some ways, at least in regards to some of its characters. Or at the very least it depicts a large number of usually cliched, conventional characters in some wonderfully original and unconventional ways. I don't know what else to say really. The movie itself is rather undefinable for a variety of reasons. What's it even really about in terms of theme? Does that even matter? I don't know and at this point I don't honestly care all that much. This list is done and I've told you my top film so I don't much feel like justifying it because this whole 101 movies thing has actually been kind of exhausting. Fun, but exhausting. It's just a pretty fucking awesome film and fuck you if you disagree. Thank you and good night.
