Certain Rules and Regulations and Procedures: The ILX Political-Film Poll Results Thread

One that I forgot about and didn't nominate was Spin (1995), a doc on the media's coverage of the 1992 US election using satellite feed footage. It's easy to find on youtube if anyone's interested.

Washington Merry-Go-Round (1932) is apparently considered by some to have been plagiarized by the guy who wrote the story for Capra's Mr Smith... I don't think it holds water, bcz aside from a (much briefer) visit to the Lincoln Memorial by its hero, it checks the same boxes most of these populist ant-corruption morality plays do.

Intriguing for Lee Tracy to be playing an idealist firebrand instead of a cynic/realist. Early on he visits a Hooverville in the Anacostia Flats and berates its WWI-veteran residents for not fighting for democracy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anacostia#Great_Depression

(This is some third-act foreshadowing.) Also the villain is a steel magnate / bootlegger with fascist aspirations.

Constance Cummings, who went on to have a distinguished career esp on the stage, is very good as the more solidly grounded (and amoral) Jean Arthur figure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RucCOCy8cU

Man, this list is surprising in a lot of ways: https://newrepublic.com/article/173376/100-political-films-new-republic-list

Biggest duds on the list in a quick glance are probably The Lives of Others, Syriana, American Sniper ... and obv The Birth of a Nation. (High and Low seems a bit of a stretch to me, but hey.)

Oh, and Triumph of the Will ... understandable why it and Nation are in there, but doesn't make it any easier to see them listed alongside so many genuinely great films

You know who weighs in: https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/06/the-ten-best-political-movies-of-all-time/

(As usual, he's on his comparatively best behavior when it comes to canonization.)

Just learned of this from a friend tonight:

https://newrepublic.com/article/173376/100-political-films-new-republic-list

Hoberman writes some kind of introductory essay. Looking at their Top 10 vs. this poll's, there is overlap of five films. Their title is "most significant," which ought to give them some cover for two of their Top 10.

Geez, as hard as this is to believe, I missed the posts above mine.

Armond White has Health in his Top 10? That's truly eccentric...makes me want to finally see it.

Some things I like seeing on the New Republic list:

81. The Times of Harvey Milk
78. Eight Hours Don’t Make a Day
69. The Best Man
67. Point of Order!
56. The Fog of War
39. Hearts and Minds
10. A Face in the Crowd

At least a couple of those are surprises.

Most glaring omission (unless I missed him): Wiseman. So many to choose from--Welfare for me.

Love, love, love A Grin Without a Cat making the list, along with all the Third Cinema titles. From a glance, it almost seems like the roster of voters is, more or less, the National Society of Film Critics?

I was glad to see that too, and voted for it here. I haven't yet read Hoberman's long essay, but skimming I saw he mentioned Tanner '88, which I think should have been on there (and which I have no idea why I omitted it from my own list).

Nice to see two films by Jia on that list.
It looks like Robert Kramer's Ice only received one vote in this poll, it might be top of my own list.

Nice to see two films by Jia on that list

This. It was disheartening to see him so out of favor in that December 2022 poll I've written about too much here

Another surprising omission: no Jordan Peele. (One or both of the first two, I'd say, though I know others like the third.)

"Love, love, love A Grin Without a Cat"

Hate, hate, hate the low ranking.

That top ten is also not good. Though that's a great No1.

#81, showing the White Night Riots and the candlelight march, The Times of Harvey Milk is an amazing film with a really moving ending. I think everyone should watch it.

TNR’s link to the NYT article in 1985 shows how conservative and bigoted the NYT was at the time.

https://www.nytimes.com/1985/10/22/us/dan-white-killer-of-san-francisco-mayor-a-suicide.html

They refused to use the word ‘gay’ which was the term everyone had already long accepted at that time. Their pigheadedness went on for years after that and eventually became ridiculous and a topic of conversation among my friends. They kept referring to gay people as ‘homosexuals’, a term that had long since been seen as derogatory and that had been used in many negative contexts.