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Time Picks Top 100 Films
gollum123 writes "Time magazine on Monday published its list of 100 all-time favorite movies ranging from Charlie Chaplin's "City Lights" (1931) to Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List" (1993) and 2003 computer-animated hit "Finding Nemo." But critics Richard Schickel and Richard Corliss snubbed several classics such as 1939's "Gone with the Wind". Almost half of the films were made outside the United States. Here is the full list."
How did Revenge of the Sith get #1? George Lucas, are you up to no good?!?
It's like an automatic flamewar.
Oh, and Steven Spielberg Godwinned the Oscars.
Where's "Debbie Does Dallas?" This list is rigged.
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
I can vouch for Pyaasa and Nayakan. Pyaasa is a Hindi movie, while Nayakan is in Tamil (my native tongue). Kudos to Kamal Hassan for a splendid role in Nayakan. My 2c :)
Apocalypse Now.
Every time I see it, I can't help being amazed at how good it is. Simply an incredible film.
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But "Top xxx Anything" type lists do not really represent anything other than the author's personal preference and biases.
For example, where is Top Gun or A Few Good Men?
Where is Real Genius?
How about Breakfast at Tiffanys?
Three Kings?
They list the inferior Star Wars (ANH) and don't give The Empire Strikes Back?
Weak.
"You know you're getting into trouble when you try to list the 'Best' anything. The 'best' anything, movies especially, is SO objective that there can never be a definitive list, or at least a list that is even close. Regardless, Time Magazine devoted their current issue to such a topic. The difference here: The Time critics, Richard Corliss and Richard Schickel, know this. The whole point of making this list, they say, was to initiate debate and let people discuss what their favorite films are. And to sell magazines."
So, don't get angry if your favorite movie isn't on the list... that's just what they WANT you to do!
A guy walks into a bar... well, I forgot the joke, but the punchline is that he's an alcoholic.
Office Space isn't on the list. Everyone involved in making that list deserves to die in a fire.
--- We need more Ron Paul!
No "It Happened One Night." No "The Third Man." "Yojimbo" (which is a great film, don't get me wrong), but not "Rashomon." (Yeah, yeah, "Star Wars" instead of "The Empire Strikes Back".) "Aguirre" but not "Fitzcarraldo." No Tarkovsky, I think. I didn't see any Eisenstein (not starting a list like that off with Potemkin is a crime against aesthetics). And to top it all off, the Yahoo! story says "his first criteria was" ARGGH.
Then again, what do you expect from Time? At least they've got "Kind Hearts and Coronets" and "Wings of Desire" in there.
Badlands - Terrence Malick
Yojimbo??? (which is an amazing film, but not Kurasawa's best IMO) What about Throne of Blood? Or Seven Samauri?
Blade Runner instead of Alien? Are you kidding me???
Where's Das Boot?
Or Andrei Rublev?
Or The Leopard?
Or... Feh. --M
As a film buff, and someone who writes and will soon be producing films and direct-to-dvd films, I have a passion for well made films (as opposed to what I call movies or flics). There was a time when American filmmakers were focused on real film, as opposed to the latest blockbuster. That time is way past us now. I haven't read the entire list yet, but if half are made in the US, then it is skewed. When you look at masters like Fellini and Trauffaut, it is easy to see that there are a huge number of master directors that do not or did not work in the US.
On the other hand, usually when people (or fluff magazines like Time -- that USED TO BE a news magazine, but has gone for for pop news now) make lists like this, the recent films end up crowding out the top. I'm thrilled to see that silents are remembered here and that a silent film like City Lights, one of my favorites, was included.
I don't see Police Academys 1 through 7 on the list.
I remember when legal used to mean lawful, now it means some kind of loophole. - Leo Kessler
The Time's list is by far incomplete. The Criterion Collection is a good place to start for excellent films of high caliber (plus most have excellent transfers...making gems like Kurosawa's Rashomon look like it was made just yesterday).
There are a huge number of yeast infections in this county. Probably because we're downriver from the bread factory.
GWTW was the Titanic of its time. Big budget, historical, overdone, and a real tear jerker. While Titanic certainly deserved some techincal oscars, neither deserved best picture or any other awards like that.
Both were manipulative stories and high-budget chick flics.
No Princess Bride... Inconcieveable!
Feed my eyes...
In general, they're way too film-arty. That's no surprise, but still.
Hits:
Blade Runner
Dr. Strangelove
The Fly (1986)
LOTR
Unforgiven
Schindler's List
Star Wars
Misses (not present):
Men in Black
The Quiet Man (John Wayne)
The Ring
The Passion of the Christ
The Matrix (yeah, but I liked it)
How many of those "too film-arty" movies on the list have you actually seen? Whether you like subtitles or not, there's a world of incredible movies out there beyond "Men In Black" and "The Ring."
What a waste of time. No pun intended.
I think Time summed up the waste of time based on the fact that 2 guys thought that a few classics "didnt do it for them" - this isnt a "top 100" then.
For a more reliable list of top movies based on the average medium of voters, goto IMDB Top 250
Die hard. It had your action, your romance and your forgin terorists (the good kind). And to mention the greatest action hero of all time, Bruce Willis, somoene that actually gets his hair messed up as the movie goes on... unlike some people who do Akido. With such fantastic quotes such as; John McClane: A hundred million terrorists in the world and I gotta kill one with feet smaller than my sister. Supervisor: Attention, whoever you are. This channel is reserved for emergency calls only... John McClane: No fucking shit, lady. Do I sound like I'm ordering a pizza? John McClane: Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker.
"You win again Gravity!" -Futurama (Zapp)
Weird.... though seen at a cinema, 2001 isn't really a movie, more of an experience!!
Drunken Master II making the list is even weirder! It's a great film but I wouldn't put it in my top 100...
Ebert's list is pretty good - I'd provide a link but his site seems to be playing up at the moment....
check out www.rogerebert.com and look for the "Great Movies" section.
"Who says nothing is impossible? Some people do it every day!" - Alfred E. Neuman
The Sci Fi genre has been particularly badly served
I suppose it never occured to you that the reverse could be true. We like to think that SF is mind expanding and, in some ways, it is. But in terms of the quality of films, most SF films are crap (although that's changing since we're past the days of every SF film needing a monster in it). Terminator comes from a time where suspense is created by chases and fights, not from situations. Compare it to a film like "Notorious", where the last scene (I won't spoil it for anyone) is edge-of-the-seat suspense, but it is that way because the writer and actors have created excellent characters and Hitchcock has done such a great job of setting up the direction. The entire point of the scene is that we don't know what one of the characters will do until the scene is over. No car chase, no fight, just great acting, writing, and directing. If that film were re-made today, it would have had to have a car chase with lots of explosions following that scene to create what we now think passes for suspense.
While the movies you mention are definitely a cut above most SF, and while they represent the best of SF (and, btw, thank you for mentioning Terminator instead of T2), they are great examples that the best of SF is nowhere near the best of film.
In "8 1/2", a wonderful film that made the list, there is a line, something close to, "You're script is a perfect example of how film is at least 50 years behind the other arts." Unfortunately, that is true about SF -- except there's no time issue. The best SF, unfortunately, is rarely as good as real, solid, great filmmaking.
It is just plain wrong, though, that 2001 was not included on the list.
Crap, Time, very Crap.
That's what I'd say, unfortunately, about most SF. Even written SF. I remember Joe Straczynski commenting on how "The Stars, My Destination" was such a great classic of the genre. I read it at home, while I was reading a novel a friend recommended to me at the gym, while on the elipticals. The other book wasn't even considered a classic of any type, just a well written novel. It blew "The Stars..." to dust in terms of quality writing, character development, and the ability to create a setting. That, to me, dramatized more than anything else, how weak most SF is when compared to real film and literature.
As for me, if I want fantasy, I'll read something like "Midsummer Night's Dream," or "The Tempest." For a ghost story, I'll try "MacBeth" or "Hamlet." Those are examples of how fantasy or SF like material can really rise above the genre and stretch one's mind.
Smokey and the Bandit...a true classic that has been worthy of replay on WAY too many channels lately.
For my money, nothing says classic movie like a story about a truck and a car going to get beer.
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
First of all let me say the obvious -- this list was obviously assembled in order to attract attention and controversy so it should not be taken too seriously.
The list does include a lot of classics but it also includes too many modern movies that are good but not 100 best of all time. Most obvious example is Finding Nemo. Great movie, especially if you have kids, but there is nothign really special about it. In fact I guarantee that it will be mostly forgotten in five years. (If you don't believe me, try to remember the last similar movie that was heralded as being brilliant -- Toy Story, which would look very dated and kind of boring nowadays).
Then there is the Ring trilogy, which although very succesful and good movies was once again nothing exceptional. I bet if this list was made in the late nineties it would include Titanic for the same reason it includes the ring trilogy now.
And then there is Schindler's List. It basicly silly to include Schindler's list and not include some of the original holocaust movies, such as Europa Europa. I guess they want to give the impression that Spielberg was being original with Schindler's List (definately not the case). In general Spielberg has too many movies in the list. He has a knack of making his movies seem more momentous than they really are.
Then there are the choices that seem to be specifically put in to invite controversy. For example Yojimbo is included but seven samurai isn't. Berry Lyndon is included but many of Kubrick's better movies aren't. Purple Rose of Cairo is included but Annie Hall isnt. I can argue why these choices are wrong (and even kind of bizarre) but I have the feeling Time put them in exactly so I can argue about them.
It also seems that Time might be making some unusual choices in order to get cross promotion from th emovie distributors themselves. For example, it is very unlikely that a DVD of Seven Samurai will say "Chosen by Time Magazine as one of the 100 best of all time", but very likely that a DVD of NEMO will say that.
How come? :)
The list is wrong, there is no excuse for the Wizard of Oz not to be on there.
Editors are asked to choose the person or thing that had the greatest impact on the news, for good or ill--guidelines that leave them no choice but to select a newsworthy--not necessarily praiseworthy--cover subject.
In my humble opinion, Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin meet this criteria quite well for the years they were chosen for.
The whole movie would have been over in ten minutes if someone had just bitch slapped the hell out of Scarlett and sent her to her room until she learned how to behave. It's on my Top 10 Most Annoying Movies of all Time list.
.especially since that time.
From time to time I've considered giving the book a go to see if the movie had just ruined it. I think you've just saved me the time and trouble.
The film has a accorded me a twice removed "Brush With Greatness" though. My oldest friend was once being entertained in a London flat and the resident had the bad judgement to him leave alone in the sitting room for a few minutes. He was intrigued by the items displayed on a mantlepiece, particularly what appeared to be an Oscar repro, so as is his wont he went over and picked it up.
Just then the flat owner walked back into the room and my friend enquired if it was a repro:
"No. That's my grandmother's."
It was Vivien Leigh's Best Actress Oscar.
I've been known to shake my friend's hand, but I always make sure to wash and disinfect afterwards. . .
KFG
Tuition/yr costs as much as a luxury car
This one is especially awful. Luxury cars have become way too cheap. Seriously, if any family that can afford college can afford a luxury car, is it really a luxury anymore??
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Relying upon the IMDB to determine the top 250 movies of all time is like walking into a grade 2 classroom and asking them "Which Power Ranger is the best-est?"
;)
Although widespread popularity is one mark of a significant film, its not the only. Lots of solid classics were complete bombs, and took years to gain an appreciation. I'm willing to bet money without looking at the rankings that Revenge of the Sith gets rated in the top 50 after the first weekend...even though its excrement whose only redeeming feature is that its not Attack of the Clones.
Ebert's list of "Great Movies", which isn't limited by a fixed number, is a good sample of cinema's finest pieces. A top 100 list (or top 10, or top 50) is a mechanism to prompt discussion, nothing more...art cannot be subjected to an evaluative criteria, otherwise every movie would be shot in B&W, be a biography, and end with a burning sled.
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
Er... Terry and Alfred were Brits. Sorry mate.
I mean, I saw the bootleg and the camcorder work was a masterpiece!
Seven Samarai was as boring...
Believe it or not, it was criticized in Japan as being too fast paced and westernized when it came out. Personally I don't find it boring, on the contrary. But I can understand why some people do.
Recently, I rented the original Star Wars (EP 4) for my kids, and I have to say we all really enjoyed it. Having seen it many times before as a young person, I of course knew every scene by heart, and combined with being older, I was much more critically aware of the movie.
Many scenes in the movie are just chock full of wonderful stuff -- not just the obvious things like the Cantina, but, for example Luke's home, , which is a clever mixture of commonplace suburban details and North African exotica. But there are lots of crap too -- really cheesy dialog, uneven acting, and so forth. But the thing is, crap flies by so fast you don't notice it. Even now, when the industry has been transformed by that movie, it's rare that a movie paced at such a breakneck rate. You simply don't notice the flaws -- they're not on the screen long enough to make you care. It's like you're stuffing your brain full of popcorn and you barely taste it before you're gobbling the next handful.
(This by the way is why so many people hate Ep1 and Ep2. There isn't enough material, so the pace is more deliberate, and the aftertaste of synthetic corn is much more noticeable. It's fun to fantasize what Kurosawa could have done with these movies).
Now, getting back to the Seven Samurai, this film in many ways is the exact opposite. Like Star Wars, every scene has details that are simply perfect. Unlike Star Wars, the director strives to get everything perfect. And he gives you time to appreciate it. Great artists don't just paint objects, they also paint spaces. Great musicians don't just play lots of notes, they play rests too. I'll admit though Kurosawa is a bit heavy handed with the Seven Samurai; his later films like Ran have many of the merits of 7S but he isn't as anxious to hold your head down in the toilet bowl of his genius. The pauses are there, just long enough for you to notice, then he moves on. It's almost makes you do a double take -- did I really see that?
You know, by the way, who is a master of this kind of elegant pacing? Hiyao Miyazaki. I'd say Miyazaki is an even better filmmaker than Kurosawa.
Personally, I see no contradiction in being able to enjoy both films, but you have to approach them differently. If somebody has gone through the trouble of serving you foie gras in a pate brisée shell accompanied by a glass of Parcherenc du Vic-Bihl, you don't approach it the same way you do a bowl of popcorn and an ice cold can of Coke. But if you aren't a snob or an anti-snob (which is just as bad), you can enjoy both. IDIC.
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