Comparing the best in film across eras doesn't work any better than it does for baseball players.
It's easy to be "forgotten" when there's only room for ten!
― Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:23 (fifteen years ago) link
I love mizoguchi, but i dont think the future lists will be kind to him, especially as stuff like The Godfather starts appearing.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:24 (fifteen years ago) link
where will the shawshank redemption place in '12?
― omar little, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:24 (fifteen years ago) link
It seems that Mizoguchi has for some reason been forgotten from the list of great directors, which is a real pity, so I gotta go for the 62 or 72 list for still including Ugetsu.
Yeah, I almost voted for 1972 for that reason.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:25 (fifteen years ago) link
Well, yeah, but in general I don't see Mizoguchi getting nearly as many mentions as Kurosawa or Ozu when talking about the greatest directors of all time, and it seems like he was held in higher regard in the 60s and 70s.
(x-post Morbius)
― Tuomas, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:25 (fifteen years ago) link
Which placing in the 2012 top twenty will Knocked Up land, Morbs?
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:26 (fifteen years ago) link
"getting nearly as many mentions today"
― Tuomas, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:26 (fifteen years ago) link
re: Shawshank ... Only Anurag Mehta knows for sure.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:26 (fifteen years ago) link
Mizoguchi >>> Kurosawa
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:27 (fifteen years ago) link
Mizoguchi has the same "problem" as Buñuel does in this format: too many masterpieces.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:27 (fifteen years ago) link
I dont even have much use for Kurosawa or Fellini apart from Seven Samurai and 8 1/2. it's kind of strange really.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:28 (fifteen years ago) link
lol shit i think a friend of mine works with anurag, or has. terrible list.
― omar little, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:28 (fifteen years ago) link
Yeah, it's amazing how Buñuel's the only Old Master who didn't once place a film.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:29 (fifteen years ago) link
I mean, really, is it possible to single one out? If it weren't for Vertigo's gothic gravitas, Hitchcock would almost assuredly be in the same position.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:31 (fifteen years ago) link
1972, Wild Strawberries
― I know, right?, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:31 (fifteen years ago) link
so what you will about boring canons, a lot of these movies are just fucking miracles to me.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:32 (fifteen years ago) link
wtf Searchers, explain yourself!
-- I know, right?, Wednesday, August 6, 2008 4:58 PM (32 minutes ago)
― I know, right?, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:32 (fifteen years ago) link
I think one problem with Mizoguchi is that he isn't nearly as "Western" as Kurosawa; his late career movies especially lack clear-cut moralities and are more ambivalent and open-ended than most Western movies of the era. This isn't to say that Kurosawa is any worse than Mizoguchi, though (I love them both), just that Mizoguchi probably isn't as easy to digest in the West.
― Tuomas, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:33 (fifteen years ago) link
David Thomson's beef with Kurosawa rests on this premise.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:35 (fifteen years ago) link
Anurag's list has a certain integrity until Jerry Maguire shows up!
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:35 (fifteen years ago) link
In retrospect, I should've also included, as a poll option, Paul Schrader, if only as a joke. But that article ended up being the furor that never happened, in the end.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:36 (fifteen years ago) link
But you look at the lists from "non-Western" critics and you're more likely to see, if anything, an even more pronounced taste for Western movie values.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:37 (fifteen years ago) link
when will films from Iran/China/HK/Taiwan show up on S&S lists? Never, that's when.
― Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:38 (fifteen years ago) link
Schrader reminds me: no Bresson on any of these lists.
(the mizoguchi/ozu vs kurosawa thing always struck me as a bit of a western "orientalist" bias)
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:39 (fifteen years ago) link
xps are directed at you btw Soto
― I know, right?, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:39 (fifteen years ago) link
C'mon – Kiarostami will show up soon.
(xxpost)
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:39 (fifteen years ago) link
In the category of "small victories," Close-Up managed something like four votes.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:40 (fifteen years ago) link
I bet something like Flowers of Shanghai will show up next time. maybe not top ten though.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 17:40 (fifteen years ago) link
Wong Kar Wai is in the process of dismantling any chance he once had of showing up on these lists isn't he.
― I know, right?, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 18:04 (fifteen years ago) link
Flowers of Shanghai's best chance was surely in '02, right? It had all the "greatest masterwork of the 1990s" hype still running fairly hot at that point. I rarely see much chatter about it these days.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:08 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah, you're probably right.
I like to check on the Senses of Cinema list once in a while, though I wish they made it longer than 10.
1. Vertigo(Alfred Hitchcock, 1958) 2. Citizen Kane(Orson Welles, 1941) 3. 2001: A Space Odyssey(Stanley Kubrick, 1968) 4. 8½(Federico Fellini, 1963) 5. La Règle du jeu(Jean Renoir, 1939) 6. Tokyo Story(Yasujiro Ozu, 1953) 7. Sunrise(F. W. Murnau, 1927) 8. Au Hasard, Balthazar(Robert Bresson, 1966) 9. Taxi Driver(Martin Scorsese, 1976) 10. La Passion de Jeanne D'Arc(Carl Dreyer, 1928
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:12 (fifteen years ago) link
i am a bigger french new wave fan than most, but i am totally stunned by the lack of any godard or 400 blows, or resnais.
I am going with 72, for the silents and the inclusion of Persona. (even though i still would rather not have any fellini on a top ten list)
― t0dd swiss, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:21 (fifteen years ago) link
I really have to hope that Bresson will escape the Buñuel/Mizoguchi trap, and that enough consensus will settle on Balthazar, but my guess is not ... too many others will go for Pickpocket or A Man Escaped instead.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:33 (fifteen years ago) link
The only thing keeping me from wholly endorsing 1962 and that then-two-years-old movie landing at #2 is the presence of two Eisensteins (even if one, Ivan, is by far my favorite of his).
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:34 (fifteen years ago) link
Apparently in 1962 nobody laughed at the movies.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:35 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm sort of surprised Resnais didn't managed to crack the top 10 in '62, then.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:44 (fifteen years ago) link
L'avventura seems to be the only movie to crack the top ten relatively soon after it's release.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:55 (fifteen years ago) link
'92, bcz it has Vigo, Ray & Dreyer on it, and no Coppola, 8-1/2 or Singin'.
otm plus no avventurzzzzzzzzz....
― tipsy mothra, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 21:59 (fifteen years ago) link
i love L'avventura but i'd rank The Passenger over it.
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:02 (fifteen years ago) link
I think I am voting '92 too for no Felini although I wish Singing in the Rain was.
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:13 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm as upset as anyone that Ugetsu has been phased out of the top 10 out of the past few decades since it is, to my tastes, far greater than anything Kurosawa has done; perhaps my favorite film as of now. Yet aside from that "Western" / non-Western thing, I read an interesting article somewhere describing Mizoguchi's works & aesthetic as being more classically feminine or concerned with the feminine, as opposed to the obsession-with-the-masculine that Kurosawa exhibited, that has resonated with (mostly male) film critics.
I wonder how different these lists would be if you *weren't* able to see your peers' rankings, and all voting would remain unpublished & anonymous....
Here is the "combined list" of the critics AND directors' rankings, the Top 50 - it is really cool to check out the entire shebang here, since I find it to be the most important/comprehensive list of world cinema on the net so far that doesn't seem all arbitrary (like that 1001 Films website thing) - and yes, I'd have to like to join this let's-watch club (but they started it in 2002, and as you can see from the last page of the board, they're still goin' at it!)
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/movies-theatrical/107091-sight-sound-2002-greatest-films-club.html
Rank Title Director Year
1 Citizen Kane Welles 1941 2 Vertigo Hitchcock 1958 3 Rules of the Game Renoir 1939 4 8 ½ Fellini 1963 5 2001: A Space Odyssey Kubrick 1968 6 Tokyo Story Ozu 1953 7 Godfather Part II, The Coppola 1974 8 Seven Samurai Kurosawa 1954 9 Rashomon Kurosawa 1950 10 Battleship Potemkin Eisenstein 1925 10 Singin' in the Rain Donen/Kelly 1952 12 Sunrise Murnau 1927 13 Searchers, The Ford 1956 14 Lawrence of Arabia Lean 1962 15 Godfather, The Coppola 1972 16 Bicycle Thieves, The De Sica 1948 16 Dolce Vita, La Fellini 1960 16 Passion of Joan of Arc, The Dreyer 1928 19 Avventura, L' Antonioni 1960 19 Breathless (A Bout de souffle) Godard 1960 19 Touch of Evil Welles 1958 22 Dr. Strangelove Kubrick 1964 22 Jules and Jim Truffaut 1962 22 Raging Bull Scorsese 1980 25 Atalante, L' Vigo 1934 25 Psycho Hitchcock 1960 25 Sunset Blvd. Wilder 1950 28 Fanny and Alexander Bergman 1982 28 General, The Keaton/Bruckman 1927 28 Godfather & Godfather Part II, The Coppola 1974 28 Mirror, The Tarkovsky 1975 28 Some Like it Hot Wilder 1959 33 Andrei Roublev Tarkovsky 1969 33 City Lights Chaplin 1931 33 Children of Paradise (Enfants du Paradis) Carne 1945 33 Grand Illusion Renoir 1937 37 Apartment, The Wilder 1960 37 Apocalypse Now Coppola 1979 37 Au hasard Balthazar Bresson 1966 37 Pather Panchali Ray, Satyajit 1955 37 Seventh Seal, The Bergman 1955 37 Taxi Driver Scorsese 1976 43 Casablanca Curtiz 1942 43 Chinatown Polanski 1974 43 Contempt (Le Mepris) Godard 1963 43 Third Man, The Reed 1949 43 Ugetsu Monogatari Mizoguchi 1953 48 Ivan the Terrible Eisenstein 1947 48 Metropolis Lang 1927 50 400 Blows, The Truffaut 1959 50 Intolerance Griffith 1916 50 M Lang 1931 50 Ordet Dreyer 1955 50 Wild Strawberries Bergman 1957
Click on the link for the rest. The rankings all get tied at 226 and go no further, which simply means that a film got at least two mentions on this combined crit/director list. If a film isn't on this, it just isn't regarded yet - since there are many eyebrow raising selections on it
― Vichitravirya_XI, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:17 (fifteen years ago) link
'52, cuz I like le million
― contenderizer, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:19 (fifteen years ago) link
then again, it's the only one without CK, so I dunno
― contenderizer, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:20 (fifteen years ago) link
wait, I change, '72's got persona, ambersons, the general
― contenderizer, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:23 (fifteen years ago) link
crub
There are some movies I don't much like on that Top 50 list (as opposed to movies I just find kind of boring which are all over the place.)
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:26 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm as upset as anyone that Ugetsu has been phased out of the top 10 out of the past few decades since it is, to my tastes, far greater than anything Kurosawa has done
i love a lot of kurosawa but i might go along with that.
thing that bothers me most about the '92 list is 2001, which i like fine (just watched it on an HD channel last month, it looked great) but no way as top 10 material. (and it crept up farther in '02. i sort of doubt that will be sustained next time around.)
― tipsy mothra, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:27 (fifteen years ago) link
eyes wide shut, barry lyndon > 2001
seven samurai > mizoguchi > rest of kurosawa
― ryan, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:37 (fifteen years ago) link
No, I see 2001 sustaining its high rankings for the long haul now. Aside from being about the only acceptable excursion into "genre" here (along with Searchers), it's also in the last few decades come to stand in for the 1960s en toto.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:43 (fifteen years ago) link
i wonder what the first post-1980 film to make one of these top 10s will be. and when.
― tipsy mothra, Wednesday, 6 August 2008 22:45 (fifteen years ago) link
kurosawa's liberal-huamanist sensibility and hotcha action also just goes down easier with western audiences i think. not that ozu or mizoguchi lack a liberal humanist sensibility, but it feels a little more specifically japanese where kurosawa felt like he was always going for broad appeal (hence all the western literary adaptations). i love kurosawa and wouldn't denigrate him at all. but i can definitely see a case for the greater rigor and depth of some of his contemporaries.
― tipsy mothra, Friday, 8 August 2008 23:13 (fifteen years ago) link
Kurosawa's films are so manly in comparison
But to be honest, I just love Ugetsu. I didn't care much for either Life of Oharu or The Geisha; still need to see Sansho the Bailiff
"-- something about it just reeks of automatic contrarianism to me. "
I wonder if that might've played a part in why some French New Wavers were so rah-rah-Mizoguchi in such a stentorian manner
― Vichitravirya_XI, Saturday, 9 August 2008 13:12 (fifteen years ago) link
Kurosawa and Mizoguchi are both among my favourite directors, I see no reason why you can't love them both. I was only noting the sad fact that Mizoguchi seems to be rather forgotten in the West these days, whereas Kurosawa is still a household name.
― Tuomas, Saturday, 9 August 2008 15:36 (fifteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― ILX System, Thursday, 28 August 2008 23:01 (fifteen years ago) link
wow so who suddenly decided KANE was great and why wasn't it considered *as* great in the 50s?
― piscesx, Thursday, 28 August 2008 23:17 (fifteen years ago) link
No one had seen it yet.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 August 2008 23:19 (fifteen years ago) link
Manny Farber convincingly traces the influence of fifties on "serious" Hollywood film of the mid to late fifties.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 August 2008 23:20 (fifteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― ILX System, Friday, 29 August 2008 23:01 (fifteen years ago) link
I think the right year won.
― Alex in SF, Friday, 29 August 2008 23:05 (fifteen years ago) link
off track but the s and sound get smart review was pretty funny
― I know, right?, Friday, 29 August 2008 23:07 (fifteen years ago) link
I saw it, In the cinema. like, paid money
booooooooooooo
― Dr Morbius, Saturday, 30 August 2008 17:48 (fifteen years ago) link
jeez, sorry to offend your sensibilities morbs
― I know, right?, Saturday, 30 August 2008 17:51 (fifteen years ago) link
i can't remember whether i voted in this thread but it's weird to look at the 1952 list and see how many of those selections basically disappeared from consideration by the next list -- no more chaplin, griffith, carne, flaherty, clair, even von stroheim. like a glimpse into a lost world.
it's also fascinating how FAST l'avventura jumped onto the 1962 list. i can't imagine any movie making it onto the list at all, let alone at no. 2, within two years of its release nowadays.
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Wednesday, 21 March 2012 00:21 (twelve years ago) link
surely the answer is 1992
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Wednesday, 21 March 2012 10:01 (twelve years ago) link
i can't imagine any movie making it onto the list at all, let alone at no. 2, within two years
make it four and prepare to be knocked for a loop by The Dark Knight
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 21 March 2012 14:42 (twelve years ago) link
When I look at the six lists together (especially the last five), it's like looking at one of those 3D pictures where things come into focus gradually, if at all--they all blur together for me.
The '72 list had a huge effect on me: saw it in the Book of Lists in the late '70s, and it was so mysterious to me, all these films like Persona and L'Avventura that I'd never heard of--pre-internet, pre-video, pre-everything if you lived in a small town--I know it played a part in my decision to enroll in film at university, rather than math. One of the dumbest decisions of my life. Thanks Sight & Sound!
― clemenza, Wednesday, 21 March 2012 14:43 (twelve years ago) link
cinephilia is like catholicism; right now I'm lapsed, but I'm never not going to be a cinephile.
Haha. Um.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 21 March 2012 15:13 (twelve years ago) link
The durability of Potemkin amazes me. Even allowing for the fact that it's not my kind of film, it just doesn't strike me as something that would be on every list across six decades (and never lower than seventh).
― clemenza, Wednesday, 21 March 2012 15:24 (twelve years ago) link
Roger Ebert has picked just one new film to replace one old one on his 2002 Top 10 list http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2012/04/the_greatest_films_of_all_time.html
― piscesx, Monday, 30 April 2012 12:24 (eleven years ago) link
A movie that was only his 3rd best movie of his year-end list for 2011.
― jungleous butterflies strange birds (Eric H.), Monday, 30 April 2012 12:26 (eleven years ago) link
I like that he almost went for Synecdoche, New York.
― And I have been called "The Appetite" (DL), Monday, 30 April 2012 12:41 (eleven years ago) link
On another blog, he floated the horrifying possibility that JUNO was on the shortlist for that slot.
― jungleous butterflies strange birds (Eric H.), Monday, 30 April 2012 12:56 (eleven years ago) link