Pretend you have a ballot for the 2022 edition of Sight & Sound's top 10 movies of all time list

The Searchers is very much underrated in this era, you don't have to be Morbs to feel that way

I agree, and I'm not much of a fan.

With The Searchers out of the way, Ford is going to enjoy the Bunuel conundrum in these all-time roundups -- too many contenders, with none clearly out in front

The Godfather
Raging Bull
L’Atalante
Nosferatu
The Swimmer
Blue Velvet
City Lights
No Country for Old Men
Sunrise — A Song of Two Humans
Playtime

For The Searchers to succeed on the level of its ambitions, you need spectators that see Wayne as a mythic figure, and I don't know if enough of those people exist to rank it highly in 2022.

the Bunuel conundrum in these all-time roundups -- too many contenders, with none clearly out in front

Mexican Bus Ride the surprise #1!!

Why do people think The Searchers is going to fall out of the Top 10? It moved into the Top 10 last poll. The film's politics? They've always been there--I don't think you're supposed to admire the Wayne character. (When it was made, I suppose, but the film is adaptable to time; you can see the character's deranged racism today, and the character is more complicated as time goes on.)

xp absolutely spot-on observation, Halfway

(the first post, not the second) (I've seen Mexican Bus Ride)

I feel like The Searchers is an ur-text for a generation of filmmakers (Scorsese, Schrader, Lucas) that don't have quite the currency that they used to--or at least, aren't as central to film culture as they were a few decades ago. If the film drops in the poll, I think (or at least I'd like to think) that, and not the film's easily-misread racial politics, would be the reason why. That said, I know next to nothing about the demographics of the voters here; still, I'd be very surprised if The Searchers ever topped the poll.

(basically, what Halfway said)

Yes Halfway OTM about the diminishing of Wayne's mythic status. Even in the last ten years, the horrors of the Wayne Playboy interview have been revisited for a new generation of filmists on Twitter etc.

I'd genuinely welcome Liberty Valence suddenly vaulting into the top 10

I've been trying to watch John Ford's films again, in order. There are so many of them, including charming silents like Just Pals and The Iron Horse, as well as many others I had never seen before. I've had to skip a lot of them because of access but so far I'm up through Fort Apache (1948).

I still haven't seen Liberty Valance

I like Liberty Valence, but--unlike The Searchers--it's not much to look at, and there's probably just as much cornball stuff in one as the other.

I've always found The Searchers very, very far from Ford's best, given that My Darling Clementine, Rio Bravo, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon exist.

er, Rio Grande.

Rio Bravo is Howard Hawks, but I assume that most people here know that, and yes, I see that you corrected yourself,

More understandable than if you'd typed in Blame It on Rio.

OMG

I don't know about top ten, but I would not be surprised if "Jeanne Dielman...", "In the Mood for Love" and "Mulholland Dr." all break the top 20 in the critics' poll this time. My guess for #1 on the critics' poll would be "Tokyo Story" (which actually was #1 in the 2012 directors' poll). I noticed it was the only Asian film in the top 10 (top 14, actually) for both polls in 2012.

I'm sure someone has crunched the numbers, but I wonder if my hunch is correct that the vast majority of voters limit one film per director on their lists, which might help boost "Tokyo Story" (Ozu's "Late Spring" was his 2nd highest ranking, #15 on the critics' poll but not even in the top 100 of the directors' poll.) as the Ozu frontrunner. Whereas a director like, say, Coppola has both "The Godfather" (#7 for directors) and "Apocalypse Now" (#6 for directors) in the mix.

I'm poring over this page, btw:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sight_%26_Sound_Greatest_Films_of_All_Time_2012

I think Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, In the Mood for Love, and Mulholland Drive could all end up in the top 20 if not the top 10, and Apocalypse Now is going to continue to outpace The Godfather films in the ranking

I wonder how the silent film canon will fair. I get the feeling that Buster Keaton’s stock has risen in past ten years, so wouldn’t be surprised if ‘The General’ or ‘One Week’, did much better this time.

Jeanne Dielman's appearance in the poll last time surely an effect of it finally getting a dece home video release from Criterion; before that it was very difficult to see at all. I think many of the new arrivals this time round will also be tied to new physical media restorations.

I could see The General taking a hit for centering the Confederate army. Sherlock Jr might be easier to get behind.

I like Liberty Valence, but--unlike The Searchers--it's not much to look at, and there's probably just as much cornball stuff in one as the other.

I disagree on both points. It is very much something to look at tho not as much in the buttes department, and modern viewers' main beef with The Searchers isn't, in general, that it's "cornball."

Apocalypse Now is going to continue to outpace The Godfather films in the ranking

So long as S&S continues to force Godfather fans to pick one or the other or use two of their votes ... which, to be clear, they should continue to be forced to do

I could see The General taking a hit for centering the Confederate army. Sherlock Jr might be easier to get behind.

This is possible ... Sherlock Jr. sure fits nicely into the navel-gazing era Owen G. was railing about 10 years ago.

Maybe I am a late bloomer or something but Liberty Valance and The Searchers have only gotten better for me over the years. Tbh, it took me a long while to get the second one in the first place.

Yeah, as I mentioned above, my regard for The Searchers now vs. when I was exposed to it in college are two very different things

For The Searchers to succeed on the level of its ambitions, you need spectators that see Wayne as a mythic figure, and I don't know if enough of those people exist to rank it highly in 2022.

Isn't Liberty Valence even more invested in that kind of myth-making--not just Wayne, but also Stewart and Ford--especially coming as it does at the very end of that period in American film? Both films undermine the very thing they eulogize (Liberty Valence even more so, yes), but they seem similar to me.

The Searchers needs Wayne to have some of the heroic aura of his other roles from the start, so there's a tension between "heroism" and "racism"; if viewers start out by saying, "of course he's racist, what do you expect?", they're not going to be on board.
Liberty Valence, as you suggest, says "print the legend" but does the opposite.

I've been expecting Persona to take a tumble at some point, and it has dropped out of the Top 10 since the '72 poll, the first one I was aware of (a few years later). I don't want it to--the excitement of discovering the poll and seeing Persona for the first time soon after are synonymous for me--but I think it will.

yes, also I'm wondering if 8 1/2 will fall out of the top 10 and if Fellini's other films will also fade

I’d be fine with that

Maybe the ILX Film Poll will be a bellwether and Fellini won't make the top 100

Fellini reminds me of my early days of film enthusiasm, and his films are so bound up with my young adult yearnings. He was super straight, and male straightness was a focus of his, but he also I think understood sexuality on a deeper level and made it seem like a kind of mask.

I think Godard was similar in that sense, he is one of the straightest ever directors but was also totally queer

although I think Godard was much less sexual than Fellini

Y’all haven’t seen the recent Mexican take on 8 1/2 yet, have you.

Apocalypse Now is going to continue to outpace The Godfather films in the ranking

It baffles me that Apocalypse Now places ahead--well ahead--of The Conversation.

Just not a player, really:

https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b6a7ea9b8/sightandsoundpoll2012

(OK, I take that back ... 183rd isn't bad.)

That's what I mean: I could maybe see it in the 60s or 70s, not that far back. And whereas I always though Apocalypse Now would date poorly and The Conversation would look better and better with each passing decade, the opposite has happened in the S&S poll.

The Conversation seems made to order for the internet and issues of privacy.

Man With a Movie Camera got a big boost in 2012 from a dvd release, but I think it will fall, and think Battleship Potemkin and L’Atalante will also fall, but I could be wrong

Who knows where Kurosawa or Antonioni stand at this point?

I think many of the new arrivals this time round will also be tied to new physical media restorations.

I wonder if A Brighter Summer Day will get a significant boost on this theory. #84 in 2012, got a Criterion release in 2015, #12 on the 2019 Shmight and Shmound.

I have to think that the newer wave of critics invited will skew more toward Kiyoshi Kurosawa than Akira Kurosawa.

More Claire Denis than René Clair.

Fantasia (1940)
Ikiru (1952)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Bladerunner (1982)
Spirited Away (2001)
City of God (2002)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Parasite (2019)

if i voted today:

a brighter summer day
double tide
doomed love
stray dogs
from the clouds to the resistance
the quiet man
fuses
doctor bull
the shop around the corner
le rayon vert
kiki's delivery service