The 1000 Greatest Films Update

Well, they've gone and done it again.  The good folks over at They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? have once again updated their 1000 Greatest Films list.  As far as background goes, the site has a comprehensive list of just about every film list out there, from the famed Sight & Sound Poll to the rather lackluster AFI lists to every critic worth his or her salt - and everything inbetween.  They take these lists and compile one great big master list of the so-called 1000 Greatest Films (of course any such list is open to inevitable debate) and that is where our story begins.  As I am sure many of my regular readers already know, I have taken it upon myself to see all 1000 movies on this same said list.  When I began this quest back in 2007, I had already seen 425 of the films.  Through slow times and fast times (speed-of-watching-wise) I have recently reached number 580 on the list.  This is when the bough broke, so to speak. 

You see, every year or so, these fine list compilers must update the aforementioned great big master list of movies.  New lists to be inputted, and all that jazz.  I have lived through three previous updates.  With each update (of course) films drop off the list and are (of course again) replaced with different films.  This of course inevitably jostles around the number of films on the list that I have seen.  Sometimes it drops me back (the first of these plummeted me from 500 to 477) and other times it shoots me ahead (updates two and three bumped me ahead 14 and 18 slots respectively).  This most recent update unfortunately has slipped me down, but only by four spots.  Just as I reached #580 on my quest, I find my self retroactively placed back at #576 again.

Anyway, here we are at #576 on my quest to watch the 1000 greatest films.  Next up is the Powell/Pressburger classic A Matter of Life and Death (the highest ranked film by The Archers on the list, one standing above my personal favourite, The Red Shoes).  You can of course follow my quest both over at The Cinematheque, and here as I post critiques of the remaining 424 films (as I have of the last dozen or so already).  I will leave you with an image from what is of course the number one movie on the list - which stays in that top spot through every update (probably) ad infinitum.

The Cinematheque Reviews: The Mechanic

To prepare myself for seeing this remake, I watched the original 1972 Charles Bronson version the night before. I suppose I would have still thought this quite banal Jason Statham thing was a mess without having first seen the inevitably superior original, but who knows.  If anything it just made this new thing seem worse.  Granted, the 1972 film is not the best of cinema, but it was a rather enjoyable genre piece (directed by the director who also gave us Bronson's Death Wish series).  I will give this new thing kudos for one thing though - Ben Foster does give the film at least a modicum of respectability.  Not enough to save it from its mediocre self, but at least a little bit.  Anyway, my review is up and running, for what it is.  

Oh yeah, and since the original is (of course) better, I've opted for an image from that one instead of the aforementioned new thing.  And to top that, it is a rather esoteric choice of screen shots at that.

Read my review of The Mechanic at The Cinematheque.

My Quest To See the 1000 Greatest: Steamboat Bill Jr. (1928)

Steamboat Bill Jr. is #579 in  

My Quest to watch the 1000 Greatest Films

Screened 11/17/10 on TCM

Ranked #392 on TSPDT

*this is one in a series of catch-up reviews in my aforementioned quest (which should explain the rather old screening date above).

The debate rages.  Chaplin vs. Keaton.  I have always been a steadfast Chaplin man myself, but in no way does that mean I dislike Keaton.  Chaplin has the pathos, the sentimentalism that makes his films work on a much deeper level than those of Keaton.  Keaton on the other hand is a better gag-writer and his films, though never as deep, are straight-up funnier than Chaplin's.  Still, the debate rages.

My favourite Keaton has always been my first Keaton, The General.  I would surely call it one of, if not the funniest movie I have ever seen.  Not a single word is spoken, but it annihilates me every time.  Keaton did not need the added words of the later screwball comedies of Hawks and Lubitsch, he did it all with his brilliant visual audacity.  If I were to compile a Top 5 Keaton List, after his Civil War-set Masterpiece (with a capital M), I would place the oft-forgotten Our Hospitality, followed by Sherlock Jr., The Navigator and then this movie, Steamboat Bill Jr. 

Mostly remembered for its famed falling house gag (where the facade of a house falls on top of Keaton as he stands precariously - and very strategically - in the perfect spot to be saved by an open window, the frame of which falling just around him) and the scary fact that this was no trick photography or body double, but Keaton himself, just inches away from being crushed to (most likely) death, the movie is full of great physical gags - just as Keaton had done in all his previous works, becoming an influence to many future comic actors, most notably Jackie Chan, who has cited Keaton as a big influence on numerous occasions.  

Unfortunately for the world, this was the last film Keaton would ever have control over, leading to eventual obscurity (though with bittersweet roles in Billy Wilder's Sunset Blvd. and Chaplin's Limelight in the early fifties) until future critics would one day rediscover the great stone-faced clown of the silent era.

My Quest To See the 1000 Greatest: The Barefoot Contessa (1954)

The Barefoot Contessa is #578 in  

My Quest to watch the 1000 Greatest Films

Screened 11/03/10 on DVD at Midtown Cinema

Ranked #556 on TSPDT

*this is one in a series of catch-up reviews in my aforementioned quest (which should explain the rather old screening date above).

I watched this film just a few days after visiting the wonderful Ava Gardner Museum in Smithfield N.C. (my lovely wife and I running across it by complete accident on the way home from Myrtle Beach) with little to no prior Ava Gardner viewing in my cinematic databanks (her breakthrough performance as the femme fatale in Robert Siodmak's 1946 The Killers being my only look at the lovely Ms. Gardner before this day).  Sure, I of course knew about her and her romances with Mickey Rooney, Artie Shaw and (of course) Frank Sinatra, but lo and behold, the naive, yet strong-willed and determined girl from Nowheresville North Carolina (sorry to all those fine folks of Smithfield and its surrounding environs - Gardner was actually born in nearby Grabtown - for I was born in Nowheresville PA myself) who would eventually spurn Hollywood (in a combination of frustration and loneliness) had somehow slipped through my cinematic radar until the aforementioned accidental museum visit.  I suppose it is about time to remedy such a slight (I will move on to fellow contemporary slights Joan Fontaine and Lana Turner soon after), but for now, let us concentrate on the movie at hand.

The Barefoot Contessa, directed by Joseph Mankiewicz, a director not really known for any certain auteuristic style, is the story of a Maria Vargas, a poor Spanish singer/dancer who is swept up into the Hollywood scene (with the aid of uncomfortable, but enthralled father figure-cum-Hollywood director Harry Dawes, played by Humphrey Bogart), only to spurn it's decadent lifestyle to marry a count - to inevitably tragic circumstances.  Just like Gardner herself, who would go around barefoot all the time, Maria would (metaphorically-speaking) keep herself grounded by having her feet still in the so-called soil of her homeland.  Though full of small moments from Gardner's own life (her relationship with controlling billionaire Kirk Edwards mirrors Gardner's own affair with Howard Hughes), Mankiewicz admits to having based the character on Rita Hayworth, who was really of Latin extraction and who incidentally would also, temporarily at least, spurn Hollywood to marry a prince.

Many consider this to be Gardner's signature role (even though Mogambo, the year before would be the only film to ever garner this underrated actress an Academy Award nomination) probably since it is, Hayworth aside, somewhat autobiographical.  The fact is, Gardner does a superb job in the demanding role (in a film that has its good and bad moments both) as she had done the year before in Mogambo (I did finally catch up on some other Gardner films since my trip to her namesake museum - and this Clark Gable, Grace Kelly, Ava Gardner triangulated African romance is one of them).  As I stated above, Gardner was indeed an overlooked actress, remembered mainly for her great beauty (considered one of the most beautiful women in motion pictures at her height of stardom) and not for her raw, fearless acting prowess that should have been very evident in each and every one of her performances - even those in the bad movies the actress did.

Gardner would eventually succumb to the emptiness her life had become filled with inside the stifling studio system of the time (according to her, the studio forced her into two abortions during her marriage with Sinatra which finally fell apart in 1957) and leave not only Hollywood and L.A., but the US altogether.  She lived in Spain for a while, befriending Ernest Hemingway and becoming lovers with one of his bullfighting comrades, before eventually settling in London, where she would die of pneumonia in 1990, at the age of 67.  There are stories of a devastated Sinatra, the man Gardner called the love of her life, and who had remained her close friend until the very end (according to an anecdote learned at the aforementioned  museum - a great place one should visit if ever in the area - a wreath was left at the funeral that simply said "Love Francis").  And like her Maria Vargas character in The Barefoot Contessa, she will be idolized by some, remembered lovingly by others, and forgotten by many.  Now onto more Ava Gardner movies... 

In case you missed the link above, check out the wonderful (and wonderfully informative) Ava Gardner Museum on line - or visit it when in or around Smithfield, North Carolina.

The Cinematheque Reviews: 127 Hours

One arm, no waiting.  The story of Aron Ralston, cocksure spelunker who thought it a smart idea to go off into the wilderness without telling anyone where he was going.  Idiot?  Douchebag?  Typical outdoorsy type (how I hate them)?  Probably all these and more, which is how James Franco portrays Aron Ralston in Danny Boyle's highly-anticipated one-man-show blow-out, 127 Hours.  A pretty good movie actually - with Franco's stellar, 176-note performance the number one reason why.   Of course, as we find out in the final post-movie, pre-credit tag, Ralston still goes cave-dwelling, but now he always leaves a note as to where he is going.  Reformed idiot?  Repentant douchebag?  Perhaps.  One arm, no waiting.

Read my review of 127 Hours at The Cinematheque.

The 1000 Greatest Films: The Thief of Bagdad (1940)

The Thief of Bagdad is #577 in  

My Quest to watch the 1000 Greatest Films

Screened 09/24/10 on Criterion DVD at Midtown Cinema

Ranked #306 on TSPDT

*this is one in a series of catch-up reviews in my aforementioned quest (which should explain the rather old screening date above).

Big and bold and beautiful, this deliciously rapturous eye-candy work of early Technicolor filmmaking, made by a committee of at least five directors (some credited, some not) working under uber-producer-cum-showman Alexander Korda, but seeming to have the strong auteurial stamp of Michael Powell (the only member of this directorial committee to become a name one day - and what a name he will become), The Thief of Bagdad, 1940 style, is a remarkably fun movie to watch (especially on the big screen) even if the misbegotten youth of today would say it was thoroughly outdated and even more thoroughly cheesy.  But then again, this very cheesy nature of the film (and I must succumb to the misbegotten youth on this one, and agree to a great deal of cheese factor) is what helps make it so damned fun to watch.

Borrowing heavily from the 1924 Raoul Walsh version, this Korda spectacular goes beyond the grandeur of that already quite grand film (the special-effected fantasy scenes in the original silent are well ahead of their time to begin with), and gives us something that can be placed among the greats of that early fantasy genre - topping nearly everything in that same said genre, save for The Wizard of Oz and King Kong (though it can certainly be spoken of, agreeably so, in such company).   Yet, no matter how epic and swashbucklery this movie gets, with its visual opulence and stimulating colouring (foreshadowing the work Powell would eventually do with partner Emeric Pressburger over the next two decades), it is the performances of the young Sabu as the titular little thief (seven years before he would work with Powell again in The Archers' stunning Black Narcissus) and especially the perfectly cast and ever-evil-playing Conrad Veidt as the murderous Jaffar.

By this time, the German actor, having made his way out of Germany as part of the anti-Hitler exodus that also included such actors and directors as Fritz Lang, F.W. Murnau, Peter Lorre, Douglas Sirk and others, had already made a name for himself playing the reluctant, tragic villains in both The Kabinet of Dr. Kaligari and The Man Who Laughs.  Here though, as the mythic personification of evil Jaffar, that reluctant part would be cast out of his villainous characterizations (just two year later, after making his way from the UK to the US, Veidt would play the Nazi officer, Major Strasser in the classic Casablanca).  Veidt here, even with the grandiose special effects and bigger-than-life djinn steals the show away.

A huge influence on those Disney imagineers when they made Aladdin (the character of Jaffar is drawn as a cartoonish dead ringer for Veidt) Korda's Thief of Bagdad is still as gorgeous now as it must have been on the screen back in 1940 - those misbegotten youths be damned.  A succulent, if not quite cheesy, masterpiece of fantasy cinema.

The Cinematheque Reviews: The King's Speech

Colin Firth should have won the Oscar last year for his devastating performance in A Single Man, but Jeff Bridges won it instead, for a performance that was well below his usual work (more of a we-never-gave-him-one-before Oscar).  Now both Firth and Bridges are up against each other again, but this time it is sure to go the other way, as Firth, though giving a fine performance indeed, will win his own we-never-gave-him-one-before Oscar.  None of this of course has nothing whatsoever to with the supposed quality (or lack thereof) of The King's Speech (as we all know - or should know - the Oscars rarely have anything to do with deserving accolades).  As far as my own personal opinion of the movie goes (the frontrunner for Best Picture as well btw), well, one would have to read my review to find that out (which, for your viewing pleasure, is conveniently linked just below).  For now let us just say it was better than expected but not as good as hoped for.

Read my review of The King's Speech at The Cinematheque.

The Cinematheque Reviews: The Green Hornet

Stupid and silly indeed, but with a certain Michel Gondry savoir faire giving it a boost out of the mediocre that it would have been mired in if many another director took the reigns.  All that and Seth Rogen was not completely annoying - well, he was annoying but the character was meant to be (it wasn't the normal Rogen-annoyance factor).  Okay, let's face it, the movie is pretty stupid, but still somewhat entertaining - or at least not un-entertaining.  Hmmmm...anyway, juts read the review.

Read my review of The Green Hornet at The Cinematheque.

Maria & Lena: R.I.P.

Maria Schneider 03/27/52 - 02/03/11 (for tributes, go here)

Lena Nyman 05/23/44 - 02/04/11 (for tributes, go here)

The LAMB Leaderboard has been updated...and I have dropped to a "career" low of 17th place

The fine folks over at LAMB (The Large Association of Movie Blogs) have updated their monthly leaderboard once again - showing which LAMB members have the most traffic driven back to the aforementioned Large Association of Movie Blogs.  In the six months since becoming a member, my ranking has fluctuated such: August I placed at #5 (with a bullet!), then in September I crept up to #4 (my highest spot thus far), but in November I plummeted waaay down to #16, only to have a resurgence of sorts in December with a #10 placing.  Now, as January ends and we see the totals for that month, I seem to have dropped to a career low at #17.  What does all this mean?  Nothing really, but I sure would like to crack that top three someday.

As for my ranking on Wikio, I have dropped there as well.  From #97 to #107 (which is out of a top 100, so I am not exactly sure how that works!?)  But then Wikio is listing big name blogs like MSN Movies and the ilk, so a ranking of any kind is good.

The Cinematheque Reviews: Season of the Witch

Perhaps it is because I generally blocked this fiasco out of my mind.  Perhaps it is because this film is so inevitably forgettable.  Perhaps I figured no one would really care about such a movie.  Perhaps I was just really busy that day.  Who knows?  The fact is that I wrote my review and posted said review over at my site, but alas, did not post my usual link here at blog central.  So here it is, three weeks after seeing it and two-and-a-half after writing my less-than tepid review of it - and probably long long after anyone who could have once cared does anymore (in fact the damned film - Ha! - is not even playing anywhere locally anymore).  Better late than never I suppose one says at this juncture.

Read my review of Season of the Witch at The Cinematheque.

The Cinematheque Reviews: Amer

A sexually charged, carnally coloured homage to Dario Argento?  Who could ask for anything more?  Seriously though, the film paints the proverbial pretty picture as a neo-giallo mindfuck of a movie.  All-but-wordless, and filmed with a probing, voyeuristic camera, Amer, is a fascinating, albeit one-note, picture, that seems to work in spite of, or perhaps because of it pretentious, egotistical art-for-art's-sake mentality.  This is meant as a relatively good thing btw, for I quite enjoyed this movie.  There!  Now go read my review dammit.

Read my review of Amer at The Cinematheque.

My Quest To See the 1000 Greatest: Black Narcissus (1947)

Black Narcissus is #576 in  

My Quest to watch the 1000 Greatest Films

Screened 09/10/10 on Blu-Ray at Midtown Cinema

Ranked #154 on TSPDT

*this is one in a series of catch-up reviews in my aforementioned quest (which should explain the rather old screening date above).

Can one truly describe a Powell/Pressburger film as batshitcrazy?  Does one dare?  Are The Archers above such a low class term?  Does their cinema transcend the insane and instead take its place in a more Heavenly, spiritual place of honour?  Probably, but I am going to stick with the term anyway.  Whether someone has this auteuristic team named as their religion on Facebook (and yes I do), and therefore puts them in the highest regard or not, the terms stays.  Batshitcrazy it is.

Seriously though, Black Narcissus, the film The Archers did just after their first masterpiece, A Matter of Life and Death, and just before their second (and greatest) masterpiece The Red Shoes, is a psychologically brilliant (though not quite masterpiece, for one does not want to overuse such a term, but awfully close I must say) look at faith and lust and love and how all three intertwine, often to dangerous, and quite inevitably tragic outcomes.  Set in a remote Himalayan mountainside makeshift convent, where an Indian general has offered his ancestral palace to a group of nuns (in actuality, a former brothel, which of course adds to the skewed juxtaposition of faith and sexual desire), Black Narcissus, starring Deborah Kerr, David Farrar, Sabu, a young Jean Simmons and Kathleen Byron as the tragic Sister Ruth, plays out as a socio-religious thriller.  And in the hands of The Archers, and their regular cinematographer-extraordinaire Jack Cardiff, it plays out as a gorgeously photographed work of art as well.

But back to the batshitcrazy comment from the beginning of this piece.  The term comes into play with the erotic nature of the film, set against the restrictive Catholicism of its main characters. It is this very clashing of cultures and ideals (East vs. West, sexual desire vs. spiritual faith) that gives Black Narcissus its intensity - its batshitcraziness.  

Marina Warner, introducing the film on BBC2, called it a masterpiece:

"The suggestions continually hover on the brink of hyperbole. The film achieves its extraordinary impact by daring so much against all bounds of decorum, far in excess of realism. The crimson lipstick Sr. Ruth applies turns her into a kind of werewolf, the kittenish wiles of Jean Simmonsalso convey, in a different mode, a fantasy of female sexual appetite. The crazed and sometimes cruel flapping of Angu Ayah adds yet another flourish to the portrait of female hysteria. In this convent, this house of women, all the women are mad."

And later:

"Again and again Powell submits Sr. Clodagh to visitants from the world of chaos and passion she has foresworn in order to touch her, shake her, break her down. First and foremost David Farrar's Mr. Dean, all bare, hairy legs, insolence and roguish eyes, erupts into her convent, the spirit of maleness embodied. The holy father in the grounds issues a mute challenge to her faith. Luxury, desire, pleasure, humiliation all thrust in upon her in the forms of the young General with his emeralds and perfumes, and of Kanchi, the young Jean Simmons in dark panstick with a jewel in her nose, and Katrhleen Byron's famous pent up, ravening portrayal of Sr. Ruth finally holds up a mirror of the abyss into which Sr. Clodagh too might fall, and indeed only just escapes in more ways than one. As in Clarissa, Samuel Richardson's classic novel about prolonged seduction and embattled virtue, Powell pits the chaste and steely Deborah Kerr against all these assailants and watches her thrash about with relish. While Lovelace had to rape Clarissa to achieve his end, Powell only has to show that Mr. Dean was right and Sr. Clodagh was mistaken. The ending of Black Narcissus vindicates the world against the cloister, libido against superego, male against female."
 

To end on a quote from the man responsible for the film itself, in Michael Powell's own view this was the most erotic film he ever made. "It is all done by suggestion, but eroticism is in every frame and image from beginning to end. It is a film full of wonderful performances and passion just below the surface, which finally, at the end of the film, erupts."