| | Hmmm...'Top 5(ish) Favorite Films.' --- Tough decisions there, movie-buff that I've been.
Upon considering, I can't limit it to only 5 (anymore than most here have.) However, the idea got me thinking about why such would be my faves. 1) Nostalgia (for when it was a fave of mine, as a kid); 2) 'Thought-provoking' (my fave reason for books or films) as Bidinotto commented; 3) Awesomely adventurous visceral impact in cinematography/visual-presentation ('trick' or real) - like a dynamic painting of 'what could be' but no one knows actually 'is'; 4) BEAUTIFUL, in it's totality of sound and visuals - like a dynamic painting...with music; 5) Fascinating character types and inter-relations.
Needless to say, most of my picks are not based on only 1 of the above given factors. (Indeed, there may be other 'causes/reasons' I've [and others here, methinks] not yet introspectedly discovered.)
-Oklahoma (this needs explanation?)
-Mighty Joe Young (both)
-The Matrix (saga) *
-Titanic (Cameron's version; yes, with DiCapprio)
-Forbidden Planet
-West Side Story (how did you people miss THIS one?)
-Airplane (and it's sequels; I'm not one for comedy generally; but, Marx
Bros./3-Stooges/A&C word-play/visual absurdities, well... :)
-Flight of the Phoenix (both)
-Thomas Crown Affair (both)
-Schindler's List
-The Day the Earth Stood Still
-Viva Las Vegas (hey: live with it.)
-Troy (ok, some historical 'inaccuracies' for those wanting a documentary; but the
screenplay was good, and Pitt was a good Achilles; plus, it wasn't supposed to
be The Iliad. So THERE!)
-Rainman
-Lord Of The Rings (and I DEFINITELY didn't care for the books when they were
college-popular...except for the Prologue one, The Hobbit.)*
-Anchors Aweigh
-Colossus: The Forbin Project
-Forrest Gump
-Magnificent Seven (Yul Brynner and Elmer Bernstein)
-The Big Country (Peck, Heston, Simmons et al; how could it go wrong? + the music!)
-2001: A Space Odyssey (necessary to see in 'wide-screen' ONLY)
-How The West Was Won (see above)
-El Cid (even though Heston considered the character 'cardboard'; but then, Sophia
makes up for any possibility of that.)
-2010 (at least aswers some questions re 2001)
-Lawrence of Arabia
-Rollerball (original ONLY, with James Caan)
-That's Entertainment (all 3, plus That's Dancing)
-Ben Hur
-Heavy Metal (animated)
-Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (who drew Jessica?)
-King Creole (yes, Presley again; his best [for what that's worth] methinks)
-Armageddon (Siskel&Ebert hated it. You wanna join their ilk? 'Sides: I like Bruce.)
-ANTZ (where else would one see the likes of Woody Allen in a 'buddy flick' with...
Sylvester Stallone? Plus, Woody 'gets the girl' [Sharon Stone, with no ice-pick,
er, pin, no less]; a 'classic' just because of that whole combo.)
-Halloween (the least gory and most suspenseful of the otherwise stupid genre it started.)
-King Kong (and some of it's non-Japanese descendants, including Godzilla, J-ParkII,
Valley of Gwangi; hey, who doesn't like watching dinosaur-ilk running
around a city?)
-An American in Paris (Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron...and Gershwin!)
-Demon Seed (Julie Christie, Fritz Weaver...and 'Proteus.')
-The Thing (orig;-'remake' was ok [and closer to Campbell's "Who Goes There?"] but..)
-Psycho (and pretty well most of Hitchcock's stuff...but this is best.)
-Hannibal (ONLY because Hopkins does this self-styled Nietzchean 'uberman' so
mesmerizingly; aww, add in all others with Hopkins...including M-of-Zorro)
-Shrek (1&2) --- even though my DS boy plays both over and over and...
-Yentl (I know, I know, it's Streisand, ntl, worth catching...once her politics non-savvy
is [I know: some aren't] able to be ignored.)
-State Fair (Ann-Margret...again; so call me biased.)
-The Sea Wolf (E.G. Robinson; actually, anything he's in)
-Singing In The Rain (explanations necessary on this baby? I think not.)
-Frankenstein (orig, and, see above; actually, Branaugh and DeNiro did an interesting
version also; closer to the book as well.)
-Tombraider (1st one ONLY! I'll not explain why it's included here.)
-Misery (King, Caan [again], and Bates)
-The Nightmare Before Christmas (Tim Burton)
-Sleepy Hollow (see above)
-Edward Scissorhands (see above)
-Batman (see above, though this mainly for Nicholson's character-fitting histrionics.)
-High Noon (orig with G. Cooper)
-Desperado (the re-make with Banderas)
-The Wrath of Khan
-Nemesis
-Spartacus (& yes, Gladiator, for Pete's sakes.)
-Toy Story (1&2)
-Beauty and the Beast (orig Fr version AND Disney's)
-Elvira Madigan (NO script; just one long visual-painting of a story with Mozart and
Vivaldi doing the 'background' music. Extremely UNUSUAL.)
-Cat People ('82 version, mainly for Moroder's music and Bowie's songs; right ambience)
-Metropolis ('26-'27 version AND, esp., IF you can find it, Moroder's version which is
music-filled and [wierdly] color-filtered variedly throughout. The latter is
also Extremely UNUSUAL.)
-Fantasia (AND the 2nd one; both by 'Disney' need I add?)
-Mutiny On The Bounty (Gable's AND Brando's versions)
-Gone With The Wind
-Shawshank Redemption (King again; he does his best in non-supernatural stories)
-Kindergarten Cop
-Twins
-Indiana Jones (all)
-AirForce One (who doesn't like Clancy or Ford?)
-The Prince and the Showgirl (where else can one find Monroe and Olivier in the same?)
-Star Wars (saga) *
-The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (Harryhausen stuff)
-7 Faces of Dr Lao (see above; one of Tony Randall's few 'lead' movie-characters,
+ Barbara Eden seduced by the mythic Pan?)
-Jason and the Argonauts (see above 'Sinbad'; ok: neither sticks to the original myths.
So what?)
-House of Games ('87-Crouse and Mantegna)
-The Cincinnati Kid
-Mary Poppins
-The Mummy (latest version)
-The Patriot (I know, I know: "Mel Gibson?" --- Ntl...it's well done, and he's good.)
-Rear Window (Stewart's AND Reeve's versions)
-Shakespeare In Love (Great idea about where/how Shakespeare [whoever he 'really'
was] got *his* play-ideas)
-Batman Begins (THE BEST, hands down!)
-Tora...............................................
At this point I must stop. I clearly (as many have, though not as much as moi) can go on and on. There's just too many 'faves'...for one 'reason/cause' or another.
Strictly speaking, all 'faves' (methinks by anyone) really all boil down to: "Are these worth the time in watching at least (however-many-times done before) 1-more-time?" Clearly, I probably don't have time in my life (even if I was 20) to catch them all, 1-more-time...unless I was Ebert and got paid for doing it.
'Type-wise,' rather than specific movies I'd add anything with Branaugh, M-Douglas, Loren (Sophia), James Cagney, Kathleen Turner, Bogart, Hepburn, Grant (Carey, that is), Hopkins, Theresa Russell, Astaire, Kelly, DeNiro, Bruce Lee, Davis (Bette), Stewart (James), O'Toole, Poitier, Pacino, yes, nowadays Robin Williams, Whoopi Goldberg (John ducks), and a few others. Also anything involving (sfx) O'Brian or Harryhausen, or written by Shakespeare, or produced by Hitchcock, James Cameron, Branaugh, Spielberg, Lucas, Wyler, Hawks, Ford...on and on.
So much for my...5-ish.
Re the ones with the * :
My boy asked me "Which of the SW/Matrix/LOTR) movie did you think was the best in its group?"
I answered: "Matrix Reloaded" was definitely more action-packed than the other two in that story, and Neo was quite the Super-Athlete with more cyber-space knowledge than the others who 'jacked-in' with him. And "LOTR"'s last 'chapter' sure had Frodo in Anakin's spot in being 'tempted' to do what he knew was wrong, while his friends seemed to be losing the war with the Orcs. And "Revenge of the Sith" sure showed Anakin's ability to be one tough, and confused, cookie who really could beat Obi-Wan. But talking about a single movie in a story that takes up more than one movie is like asking "Which is the 'best' chapter in a book-story?" (He's not familiar with TV-'mini-series'.) I don't think it really makes much sense. A chapter is only 'part' of the whole story. Some may like "A New Hope" better than all the other movie-chapters in SW, or "Reloaded" because it shows more Kung-Fu, but they're missing out on the whole story idea by merely focusing on a small section. (Here, I taught him the meaning of 'myopia' which too many professional reviewers seem to indulge themselves in; 'full context' and all that.) I continued (paraphrasing, here) "This isn't like the Indiana Jones or James Bond stories where each story has nothing necessarily to do with a previous one. Judge them in terms of the WHOLE story, not just a favorite scene, character, or chapter."
I asked him "Which was your favorite Indiana Jones story?" He answered, smiling "Temple of Doom." I remembered all the slave-children in that story, as well as Short-Round.
All I could think of was..."Fascinating."
LLAP
J-D
[Edit Addendum] For some reason, my 'hotmail' copy of the above post shows everything from "-How The West Was Won" to the very end *completely* in 'Bold' style, though such didn't show when I posted, nor does it appear as such (to my eyes) here, as of this addendum, as a SOLO post. Anyone got any ideas about this?
[2nd Edit Addendum] I meant to put this in the original post...and forgot (what with all my other tangential side-thought-commenting.) --- Special Mention of the re-make of "King Kong" ('76) with Beau Bridges and Jessica Lange, basically because the Twin Towers were a centerpiece of the whole movie. Never Forget.
(Edited by John Dailey on 7/30, 3:02pm)
(Edited by John Dailey on 7/30, 4:31pm)
(Edited by John Dailey on 7/30, 4:38pm)
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