Pretend you have a ballot for the 2012 edition of Sight & Sound's top 10 movies of all time list

We had this argument seven years ago...we're gonna let that one pass.

― clemenza, Monday, August 6, 2012 12:23 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^New board description?

no itch?

One Sl4nter got called a hipster for picking Showgirls. I lol'd.

eric's list is real interesting but i can't bring myself to watch anything called 'electrocuting an elephant.'

it's definitely 'as advertised'

Eric's defence of the film makes intellectual sense, but I'll never, ever watch it.

wheres his list

So ... POX from the top 100:

Jeanne Dielman
Satantango
Gertrud
La Jetee
Rear Window
Barry Lyndon
The Night of the Hunter
L'eclisse
Nashville
Imitation of Life

― Eric H., Friday, 3 August 2012 18:12 (4 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think

http://www.slantmagazine.com/house/2012/08/if-i-had-a-sight-sound-film-ballot-eric-hendersons-top-10-films-of-all-time/

just took from the library Sokurov's Spiritual Voices; Histoire(s) du Cinema; Showgirls.

12+ hours

Thalllberg....Thallllberg....

Bogdanovich OTM

All these films and so many more should be seen by every civilized person on earth, and the whole rating idea is anti-artistic, anti-film culture, just absurdly reductive: There are so many wonderful pictures to see, that to reduce them down to a Top Ten is a disservice to all the great work that has been done with that haunting 20th century medium of humanity, born just at the end of the 19th century: a now nearly mythical visual history of more than an entire 100 years of life in the world. The first century is history. We currently have a lot to live up to; a lot more than ten.

http://blogs.indiewire.com/peterbogdanovich/the-sight-and-sound-poll

The Sight and Sound poll gets people to seek out these films and see them--you can argue that people should want to see them anyway, without the extra push of a poll, but if the poll helps to accomplish that, what is the problem?

there isn't one. also it's possibly to be perfectly civilised - cultured even - without ever seeing a single one of these films or wanting to.

"should be"

clemenza, do you have a polling numbers on that claim?

The problem is in the process. These are allegedly the choices of film scholars/lovers, and yet nearly all of them admit some artificial, arbitrary constraints they use to whittle their canons down a list of ten. So how does this produce a result that means something?

Do I have any actual evidence that the S&S poll encourages people to seek out these films? Of course not--no more than the many assertions you make on a daily basis here. (Oh, I get it--political junkie joke.) I will say this: years ago, based on a pretty good awareness of what I like and don't like, I decided that Jacques Tati wasn't really for me. But Playtime is screening here later in the month, and, because of the poll, I'm going to see it and try my best to be open-minded. It'll be my first Tati film.

As far as artificial and arbitrary constraints, I think it's a bad idea to start going down that road. I would prefer that everyone simply vote for their ten favourite films, and whatever the results are, that's what they are.

Truthfully, I doubt Bogdanovich would be saying anything if his own films did better in the poll.

you don't need numbers, it's pretty obvious that more people will see these films as a direct result of this poll. the numbers might be in the tens or the tens of thousands. does it really matter which?

Truthfully, I don't think Bogdanovich would consider any of his films to be among the 10 greatest. His ego doesn't outweigh his brains there.

I have no idea what my ten favorite films are.

Morbs, those "constraints" they claim are merely a way for critics to absolve themselves of the fact (borne out of the results) that films are demonstrably the most "dead white male" of all artistic mediums.

Also a way for belatedly rational people to talk themselves out of listing more than one screwball comedy in their top 10.

Bogdanovich's ego vs. Bogdanovich's brain--actually, Bogdanovich's ego vs. anything might be a rather lopsided contest. He probably doesn't consider any of his films to be among the 10 greatest, I agree but I bet he'd be a lot more tolerant of the poll if a few other people did. (Maybe The Last Picture Show did reel in a handful of votes, I don't know.)

that frosty look he gave you really hurt, huh?

If you take him at his word that he declined to vote -- and thus didn't know the results -- why wouldn't he have expected to react to it in one of his Indiewire pieces?

It's cute that Bogdanovich thinks everyone should have 1,300 favorite films.

Based on previous polls, I would think he'd have a pretty good idea by now that he doesn't fare well. But that's fine, maybe I'm stretching the point--maybe his qualms are 100% independent of his work. In any event, I think he's fretting and worrying over something needlessly; the poll is far and away a net plus when it comes to broadening awareness of film history.

Not to mention that it's fun to argue about the poll--see the three ILX threads, see the countless responses to the poll all over the internet, etc.

i knew a guy once who worked himself dutifully through AFI's top 100, a film at a time, reporting cheerfully on his progress the whole way. now he's educated! or is he.

I watched The Bad News Bears the other day cos of this poll

the poll is far and away a net plus when it comes to broadening awareness of film history

To be fair, I understand and empathize with the line of thinking that says S&S actually works toward a narrowing of film history awareness, not a broadening.

Meaning that instead of seeing this huge swath of films, people will limit themselves to the kinds of films that get listed (even if only on individual ballots) in the poll? I suppose that's the case with some people, but at a certain point, once you've found your way to something, I think it's up to the viewer to start to branch out. If I end up liking Playtime enough, I can almost guarantee I'll go on to see other Tati films.

it's fun to argue about the poll

FUN VS ENLIGHTENMENT

The two are not mutually exclusive, you know--I would think someone familiar with Sullivan's Travels (not to mention a million other things) would know that.

as with The General and Keaton, Playtime is in many ways Tati's most atypical film.

shit, clemenza, that's my point! Going down a list of 50 and 100 is overly circumscribed fun.

as is having 2 nearly identical presidential candidates...

You need a shock collar that zaps you when you get off the thread topic, Morbs.

Well, you've lost me. When they post individual ballots online, I'll be pouring over them and making note of things that intrigue me. If someone who lists Nashville and The 400 Blows also lists some documentary from the 1970s I've never heard of, that will catch my eye, and if I stumble over that film at the video store I go to, I'll pick it up. If this compromises some idealized world that you and Bogdanovich hold dear, so be it.

I'm sure u Canadians pour maple syrup on those lists, mmmm.

Individual ballots still more valuable than some aggregate of differing methodologies evened out.

Learn something new every day--I think I've been incorrectly using pour/pore in that context my whole life.

Eric, dead white males do very well in opera, too.

Individual ballots still more valuable than some aggregate of differing methodologies evened out.

No one ever argues against that and yet you (the royal "you") still say it over and over.

Morbs, so no year-end list for yoU?

the non-film nerds that i've spoken to about this poll ALWAYS say something like "I've never heard of any of them" - sometimes apologetically, sometimes angrily. so i wld like to think that a small number of ppl might just be intrigued enough to check out TOKYO STORY or whatever for the very first time - mission accomplished.

Eric: people here don't have to say it -- most of the Great Unwashed consulting this list are only gonna look at the group ranking.

(and think Ozau and Kurosawa are the only Japanese directors)

Mizoguchi is on there.

most of the Great Unwashed consulting this list are only gonna look at the group ranking.

Do you have polling numbers on that claim?

"The Great Unwashed"?--not that I don't have my own pockets of snobbishness, but that's a really unattractive thing to say. (Maybe it was meant ironically, I don't know.)

I thought I've made it clear that I am a misanthrope.

hardcore cineasts are more likely to be unwashed than the rest of the population but i don't have poling figures to back that up.

Cinemaniacs, specifically

clemenza: "always with a little humor"

I thought I've made it clear that I am a misanthrope.

Really, tho, how's that working out for you?