Sight and Sound 2022 Round 2: 21-40

yeah, clem, I'm not seeing the coincidence?

Both have four word titles with “the” in them

Bill Nunn recites Mitchum's love/hate speech.

finger tattoos

oh right!

electorate hasn’t watched do the right thing recently enough, poll results invalid

Night of the Hunter today, on another day it could be Mirror. With Balthazar and Do the Right Thing just behind

Seen all but Shoah and Some Like It Hot. Not sure I'll ever sit down and watch Shoah right through

One of them, Playtime, I truly hated.

― clemenza, Friday, 20 January 2023 bookmarkflaglink

This is one where it really helps for everything to be blown up in the big screen.

You get the idea of Shoals after an hour. Or less.

Shoah. Lol

I feel like you'd get the idea after reading about it but maybe that's unfair. I mean obviously it's important

Lots and lots of moments in these films I have vivid memories of and Shoah has as many as any of them.

For what it's worth I saw Playtime in a theatre. When you're really disliking a film, that's a minus, not a plus.

only one of these featured the music of Public Enemy, so it's pretty easy

xp lol ok. I was thinking the sets look great in the theatre but nevermind.

I really don't mean to disparage the film. I think it's meant for a temperament far from my own.

only one of these featured the music of Public Enemy

M was about a public enemy though

I went with Playtime, but M is a close second.

(I've seen all of these but Shoah.)

voted for Taxi Driver, one of my favorite films of all time. It is totally surreal and seems to take place in a dream. the music is ravishing and seems out of time, and the cinematography is lurid and intoxicating

Late Spring and Mirror would be my other choices. I'm drawn to 8 1/2 because it is my film mentor's favorite film, but I think La Dolce Vita and La Strada are my favorite Fellini films. I like Le Mépris more than À bout de souffle. Some Like It Hot still creeps me out

and I'm still not sure what it is about The Night of the Hunter that warrants its placement in the top 40 films of all time.

The only American film that approximates Poe and Gothic horror; it's a fable in the 19th century sense. It looks nothing like contemporaneous American film? Laughton + Agee + Gish + Mitchum is an (un) holy combination.

I’ve seen even fewer of these.

xp

ok, that makes some sense of it for me

I’ve seen even fewer of these.

― The Triumphant Return of Bernard & Stubbs (Raymond Cummings)

Which have you seen?

Taxi Driver and Do The Right Thing.

Went M over Psycho

DAISIES every time

― pilk/pall revolting odors (wins), Friday, January 20, 2023 3:31 PM (yesterday)

^^^^ easy vote

that is the only film on the list I haven't seen yet. I will watch it

It’s choice

is it me or is this list way better than the top 20?

Late Spring vs M is not a choice i would want to make irl

If there was no Hitch I'd agree.

agree because you don't think he belongs this high on a list or because Psycho and Rear Window are certified bangers and legit choices for favourite here?

l'atalante, because i have other fav ozu's

will take the opportunity to recommend reis & coredeiro's ana which i will reductively say is like what if mirror was good

NV - Hitch doesn't belong this high. Vertigo is his only film I'd put in a top 40.

Psycho, Rear Window are bangers.

Daisies just ahead of M.

Oooh. I predict varied results.

20-way tie

This one is much harder than the top 20. I don't think any of these winning would really annoy me, maybe Some Like It Hot, whose stature I've always been baffled by—it's not even close to Wilder's best film!

I haven't seen:

Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)
Shoah (Lanzmann, 1985)
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Sciamma, 2019)
8 1/2 (Fellini, 1963)
Mirror (Tarkovsky, 1975)
City Lights (Chaplin, 1931)

I could vote for:

Late Spring (Ozu, 1949)
Playtime (Tati, 1967)
The Night of the Hunter (Laughton, 1955)
Daisies (Chytilová, 1966)
L’Atalante (Vigo, 1934)
Pather Panchali (Ray, 1955)
M (Lang, 1931)

I probably shouldn't vote for Daisies as I only saw it for the first time very recently, but I loved it so much, so that.

The top 6 here is pretty unbeatable (Shoah is the only one here I haven’t seen).

Strongly considering:

The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1927)
Late Spring (Ozu, 1949)
Playtime (Tati, 1967)
Do the Right Thing (Lee, 1989)
Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)
The Night of the Hunter (Laughton, 1955)
M (Lang, 1931)
Rear Window (Hitchcock, 1954)

Not in a million years:

Some Like It Hot (Wilder, 1959)
8 1/2 (Fellini, 1963)

Which is to say, hard agree with Chris L on the top 6

and I'm still not sure what it is about The Night of the Hunter that warrants its placement in the top 40 films of all time.

― Dan S, Friday, January 20, 2023 5:53 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I can tell you that night of the hunter was talked about in such hushed tones by my mom when I was growing up, like it was this absolutely diabolical nightmare of a film which never left her memory. Maybe bc she saw it in the theater when it was released (she would have been eight or nine.) it’s a truly surreal trip of a movie, real horror movie stuff for the era, I mean it’s wild how frightening Mitchum is considering how he’s usually such an avuncular presence, and his scariest moments here really make him the personified kind of terror that one can imagine children conjure up in their darkest dreams. And that shot of shelley winters’ body tied up in the car, hair billowing underwater, is still such a horrifying beautiful gut punch.

I'm finding it hard to remember very much of Some Like It Hot, apart from the immortal punchline. Pretty sure I'd enjoy it on rewatch.

It's alright.

I'm really torn. I knew 8 1/2 would catch some flak here (though maybe that speaks well of its chances in the poll) but I do love it and find it kind of affecting. Night of the Hunter is a strong contender, as is M -- both of which are just so singular and memorable to me.

M was the first seriously "old" movie I watched in my teen cinephile phase and it knocked my socks off. If anything I was used to more contemporary movies being far more static (in a certain sense) and less expressive. It felt so free in its tones and movements. Still does.

The whole creation of Night of the Hunter--James Agee script, Laughton's only film as a director, the participation of Stanley Cortez and Lillian Gish--also figures into its iconic strangeness.

I'm pretty sure I watched it before I'd seen a single Laughton performance

It looks nothing like contemporaneous American film?

this is otm Alfred as is omar's hidden comment

Besides all that whenever I watch Bresson it's such a reset. The acting, mannerisms, Balthazar is so obliquely told.

Boccaccio was a reference point for the multiple changes of fortune.

Anyway this is mad hard. I have just reasoned out Tarkovsky and Late Spring but I cannot decide between this pair.

The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1927)
L’Atalante (Vigo, 1934)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

good winner, Balthazar deserved more votes probably

Love the spread of votes (went for L'Atalante in the end). Shoah not getting any votes is interesting.

I'd vote for any Lanzmann because some of his interviews are like the most heightened drama I've ever seen. The Rabbi who had Eichmann threatening to murder him if he didn't do ridiculous amounts of scholarly research within the hour (so he could pass himself off as a Jewish emigration expert). Dude that planted an axe into a Nazi deathcamp commander's head. It's god's work that he captured this stuff while the people were still alive.

Shoah perhaps needs some updating for contemporary audiences, you could insert pop songs and a narrator saying "but this was an illusion".

Snark aside tho a nine hour documentary about one of the most horrific events in human history is a tough sell, and even if you've gotten around to watching it (my DVD box has been staring at me unwatched for years) you're prob unlikely to think of it as a "favourite", it feels v apples and oranges to compare it to anything else on this list.

BBC2 screened it over two Sunday evenings. I definitely watched the first part, but now come to think of it I don't think I watched the 2nd.

I guess few would think as a favourite. Guessing you didn't vote in the poll, Calzino?

ILX Shoah watchalong club when

Christmas?

xxp

no didn't vote! for anyone put off by the sheer length of Shoah there is Sobibor, October 14, 1943, 4 p.m. and The Last of the Unjust which are both essential and unforgettable.

well, I'm glad my lurker vote for playtime made the difference