Tag: Movies

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Choose your next witticism carefully….

While I was on blogcation, a number of times I found things online or off that tempted me greatly to return to active posting before my arbitrarily-chosen return point of Election Night. Many of these things were political in nature, so I’m glad I didn’t post about them, but more than a few weren’t, and one blog in particular that I happened upon shortly after I went on hiatus (and before I’d decided that I’d likely return on Election Night) was one that just killed me to not be able to link. Well, now I’m back, so here it is:

I Expect You To Die!

On this blog, a person named Snell has been methodically reviewing each and every James Bond film leading up to this week’s American release of Quantum of Solace. His takes on the films aren’t identical with mine, but they line up in a lot of key ways, and his reviews make for extremely entertaining reading. I’ve had a grand time following this blog the last couple of months, and it bums me out that I can only share it now that its purpose is nearly done. But hey, archives are like diamonds: they’re forever! So go look. If you enjoy James Bond at all, check this one out.

I Expect You To Die!

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Music that goes bump in the night

I’m a bit late for the Halloween season with this, so you can bookmark this for next year (or maybe I’ll just repost it then). Here are some good examples of film and teevee music for your listening pleasure during the Scary Season! Here I eschewing some of the more obvious choices, like Bernard Herrmann’s score to Psycho; in fact, I’m generally limiting myself to the last thirty years or so of music for film.

:: Dracula, by John Williams. He wrote this for the 1979 film starring Frank Langella as the famed count. The movie isn’t highly regarded at all, but Williams’s score is an underrated – in fact, almost unknown – gem from the remarkable 1977-1984 period of his career. It’s a dark and brooding score with a recurring motif that dominates the action. The score makes me think of the grim things brooding in the Carpathian mountains. (Williams also scored the Brian de Palma film The Fury right around this time. I’ve got that score on CD, but I haven’t listened to it.)

:: The Omen Trilogy, by Jerry Goldsmith. All three of these scores are superlative; in fact, Goldsmith would win the only Oscar of his career for The Omen, which is notable for his exceedingly creepy main title theme, called “Ave Satani”. For The Final Conflict, Goldsmith would write some of his best apocalyptic choral writing. The movies are terrible, of course, but we’re talking first-rate Goldsmith here.

:: Bram Stoker’s Dracula, by Wojcech Kilar. Kilar was actually the composer I most wanted to do the Lord of the Rings movies back when those films were in pre-production; this score is why. It’s lyrical, brooding, and darkly erotic throughout. Again, not a really good movie boasting a first-rate score.

:: Bless the Child, by Christopher Young. I never saw this movie, but I’m told it was generally awful. Really good score, though; another dark and heavily choral score for a movie that deals with Christian-themed horror. What’s notable about this particular score as it is heard on CD is that Young arranged its cues into a suite of five long tracks, converting it into a work of symphonic power. He turns it into an oratorio, almost. It’s well worth seeking out.

:: The Truth and the Light: Music from The X-Files and Millennium, by Mark Snow. Television music, which is therefore heavy on synth use, but Mark Snow was a major factor in the creation of the atmosphere of these two shows. Millennium is only available on iTunes, by the way; a few years ago a couple of readers made me copies of the music. This is very good music. Many filmscore fans deride the X-Files album because it includes dialog snippets with the music, but it works very well, for me; the dialog snippets are chosen well, and they contribute greatly to the mood of the album.

:: The Silence of the Lambs, Se7en, by Howard Shore. Before he’d come to immense fame as the Lord of the Rings composer, Howard Shore scored a lot of thrillers and dark horror films during the 1990s. These two scores are among his best in that vein. (I’ve heard lots of good things for his score to The Cell and for his work on David Cronenberg’s movies, but I’m not familiar with them.)

:: Interview with the Vampire, by Eliot Goldenthal. Lots of avant-garde orchestral effects here; Goldenthal is a bold composer who doesn’t shy away from lots of dissonance and demanding orchestrations. I actually liked this movie, and it’s a good score. (Goldenthal’s score to the third Alien movie is also good, although I hate the Alien movies.)

:: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Dead Again, by Patrick Doyle. Doyle does for Kenneth Branagh’s overwrought literary horror epic what Kilar did for Francis Ford Coppola’s overwrought literary horror epic (Bram Stoker’s Dracula). Frankenstein is a very over-the-top film, and Doyle contributes a fine over-the-top score. Dead Again is more of a thriller than a horror film, but it has a strong supernatural element, and Doyle’s score here is also dramatic and over-the-top.

:: LOST, by Michael Giacchino. I don’t like the show, but the music is pretty good, going farther down the direction earlier explored by Mark Snow for The X-Files and Millennium.

And there you go. Blast some of this music out your windows next year on the night when the dead walk the land!

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The years of my life (in music and movies)

So there’s this meme-thing percolating about in which you go through and pick your favorite album from each year you’ve been alive up to the present; I’ve been kicking that around for a while, long enough that now you’re supposed to do the same thing with movies. So, I guess I’ll combine them into one single post, although I won’t be picking exactly favorites, but things I’m very fond of from each year. (A few may be favorites, though.)

A key resource here is Wikipedia’s Years in music and Years in Film articles. In each case I’ll list an album first, followed by a movie. For albums, though, these aren’t necessarily albums I own, since the lists are heavily skewed to pop and rock. Rather they’re albums with which I am at least fairly familiar. And for the movies, just to make things a bit more interesting, I will not do the extremely obvious and pick the Star Wars movies released in 1977, 1980, 1983, 1999, 2002, or 2005. OK? OK!

1971

Tapestry, Carole King
The French Connection (I almost named Harold and Maude, which I saw for the first time just last week…I’ll be commenting on that film soon.)

1972

Hot August Night, Neil Diamond
The Poseidon Adventure

1973

The Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd
American Graffiti

1974

Rush, Rush
The Three Musketeers (Tough choice here!)

1975

Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen (chosen after a coin flip; the loser was ABBA by, well, ABBA.)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (GAHHH! This year was tough!)

1976

Boston, Boston
Rocky (I haven’t seen much from that year, apparently)

1977

Bat Out of Hell, Meat Loaf
Saturday Night Fever (If you haven’t seen this, and you think it’s just camp disco fluff, see it. It’s one of the most cynical and bleak films I know.)

1978

Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack (It’s got “How Deep Is Your Love” on it….)
Superman (still the best superhero movie ever made…but that could change very soon now, with what I’m hearing about The Dark Knight….)

1979

The Wall, Pink Floyd
Time After Time (Just a terrific movie! I almost picked Moonraker, just because that was the first Bond movie I ever saw.)

1980

Flash Gordon, Queen
The Blues Brothers (Cheating, I guess, since I’ve only seen it in bits and pieces but lots of times, so I’ve probably seen well over eighty percent of it but I can only vaguely stitch it all together in my head into a whole movie.)

1981

Face Value, Phil Collins
Raiders of the Lost Ark (Had to go with this. No contest.)

1982

Nebraska, Bruce Springsteen
TRON

1983

Sports, Huey Lewis and the News (yeah, I liked these guys.)
Brainstorm

1984

MCMLXXXIV, Van Halen (DLR’s swan song with the band)
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension

1985

No Jacket Required, Phil Collins
Back to the Future

1986

Invisible Touch, Genesis (One of my favorite albums ever. Almost went with 5150 by Van Halen; I refuse to choose between DLR and Sammy. Both were terrific for different reasons.)
Laputa: Castle in the Sky (I had no idea the movie was that old)

1987

The Joshua Tree, U2 (Not a huge U2 fan, but I really like this album)
Broadcast News (“I’ll meet you at the place by the thing where we met that time” is one of my favorite movie lines ever. That, and “A lot of alliteration from anxious anchormen placed in powerful posts.”)

1988

Irish Heartbeat, Van Morrison and the Chieftains
Die Hard (even though I didn’t see it until it came out on video)

1989

Indigo Girls, Indigo Girls (I had a hard time with this year, and picked this because I remember liking them some years ago, but I haven’t given the Indigo Girls a second thought in a long time.)
The Abyss

1990

Reflections of Passion, Yanni (Shut up.)
Dances With Wolves

1991

The Silence of the Lambs, score by Howard Shore (I couldn’t pick anything from the album list)
Grand Canyon (Wow, that was a good year for movies…lots of titles on there I like a lot, so I picked this one randomly from the ones I like.)

1992

Unplugged, Eric Clapton
Unforgiven

1993

Tuesday Night Music Club, Sheryl Crow
The Fugitive (But this was a good year for movies! I nearly picked Jurassic Park or In the Line of Fire.)

1994

Live at the Acropolis, Yanni (I’m serious, folks. To this day I love this album.)
Legends of the Fall (I really think this movie is underrated.)

1995

The Tyranny of Beauty, Tangerine Dream (I used to really love TD, but I haven’t listened to them in a long time. They’re about due for a re-exploration, I think.)
Apollo 13 (Wow, there were a ton of good movies that year. I could as easily have picked Braveheart, Rob Roy, and a bunch of others.)

1996

Falling Into You, Celine Dion (Because, hey, as if my credibility wasn’t already circling the drain….)
That Thing You Do! (Did anybody besides me really like this flick? I remember mentioning it at work when it was out, and everybody in earshot went Ewwwww! What gives?!)

1997

Princess Mononoke, film score (Nothing on the pop list stood out for me…but I can’t believe it’s been that long since Pat Boone’s heavy metal experiment. I thought that was just a few years ago!)
Titanic (Yeah, yeah….)

1998

Shakespeare in Love (movie and score)

1999

Tears of Stone, the Chieftains
The Iron Giant

2000

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (score)
Almost Famous

2001

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (movie and score)

2002

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (movie and score)

2003

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (movie and score)

(OK, I know, that probably seems to be cheating, especially when up above I swore I would eschew the Star Wars movies on this meme-thing. Oh well. My blog, my rules!)

2004

Beyond the Sunset: The Romantic Collection, Blackmore’s Night (my first Blackmore’s Night album. This group rocks my world.)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

2005

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (score by John Williams. I didn’t say I couldn’t pick the score albums for the music portions of this quiz!)
Kingdom of Heaven

2006

The Village Lanterne, Blackmore’s Night (See?)
Casino Royale

2007

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (movie and score)

For the most recent years, I should point out that I tend to be quite behind-the-times as far as the latest stuff to come out. I rarely explore stuff as it happens, preferring to follow a few things I like a lot but in most cases allow a consensus to form as to what’s really worth my time. (And even then, I’ll often ignore that consensus anyway.)

So there you are: my life in music and movies, or something like that.

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Blubbering….

I’m not sure how I missed this, but Jason has a list of movies that make men cry. I’ve bolded the ones that do, in fact, make me cry like a little girl who’s just had her lollipop stolen by the creepy old guy who owns the local nuclear power plant.

It’s a Wonderful Life

No, not really. I’ve never liked this movie all that much.

Schindler’s List

Last time I watched it, I didn’t cry at the right scene, but the film still moved me terribly. I know that the “I could have done more” scene didn’t happen in real life, but it’s still a terribly emotional scene. For me, even more emotional is the cast members accompanying their people they’re playing in laying rocks on Oskar Schindler’s grave. That always gets me.

Frequency

I haven’t seen this.

Dead Poets Society

What phony tripe this movie is. It’s the desk-standing, “O Captain my Captain” scene that’s supposed to be the tear-jerker, but as I’ve noted previously, this comes after these kids have already signed the paper getting Keating fired. It would have been more fitting if Keating had said, “Yeah, day late and a dollar short, fellas.”

Forrest Gump

I refuse to hate this movie, even though it feels like I should, or something. First time I saw it I cried when Jenny died; for Forrest to wait for her his entire life only to lose her when he finally got her struck me as terribly sad.

The Natural

I haven’t seen it, despite its being filmed in Buffalo. I stink.

The Shawshank Redemption

One of my favorite films, but it doesn’t make me cry. It fills me with a deep sense of fulfillment, as if some rightness in the cosmic order has been restored when it ends. I can think of few films that give that sense of satisfaction that this one does. (Although I do think it should have rolled the credits with Red’s bus heading down the road. We just don’t need to see him meeting Andy on the beach; it simply isn’t necessary and the whole point is that at long last Red has learned to hope again.)

Big Fish

I’ve had the DVD for two years and still haven’t watched it. Gotta get to it; I’ve heard naught but good about it.

Seabiscuit

I haven’t seen this.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

This whole trilogy is full of weepy moments for me. Just a few: when Frodo and Bilbo are reunited in Rivendell; when Frodo tries to leave Sam behind at the end but Sam just marches into the water after him; Eomer’s arrival at Helm’s Deep; Sam’s “It’s like the old stories” speech; Pippin’s terror at being taken by Gandalf away from Merry; the lighting of the beacons; Gandalf’s meditation with Pippin over the nature of death (“And then you see it: white shores….”); the charge of the Rohirrim at Pellenor; Theoden’s fall and Eowyn’s victory over the Witch King; “I can’t carry it for you, but I can carry you!; when Aragorn leads all of Gondor in bowing to the four hobbits.

The Passion of the Christ

Nope. I ended up fast-forwarding through some of it; Christ’s forced march to Golgotha with the Cross takes forever, and by the time they’re nailing him to the thing, the entire movie has for me become a bit desensitizing. I also noted something else when I watched the movie: during the more violent parts, like when the Roman soldiers flog Jesus, I actually found myself admiring the make-up effects of the movie. It’s supposed to be a horrifying moment, but I found myself wondering, “Wow, how did Gibson manage to simulate the whip actually biting into Jesus’s skin and ripping giant chunks out of it?” (I seem to recall another blogger mentioning this, but I can’t remember who that was.) I just didn’t find this film all that emotional; it was quite the opposite for me. Cold and distant.

(And there was one moment that stood out like the proverbial sore thumb. When Pilate has the Jews choose between freeing harmless Jesus and murderer Barrabas and they choose Barrabas, a shocked Pilate glances at Jesus, who gives him this stare back that seemed to me to be Jesus basically saying, “You got any other bright ideas?” It kind of pulled me out of the movie.)

ET: The Extra-Terrestrial

When I first saw this at the age of ten, I cried long and hard during the death scene. After that, I never cried during that scene again, knowing that ET wasn’t actually dead. (He was only mostly dead, har har!) But to this day, I cry immensely during the final farewell. In fact, I can actually work up tears if I just listen to that entire, magnificent “Adventure on Earth” cue that John Williams wrote for the film’s last fifteen minutes. I always lose it at the exact same moment: after Gertie and Michael have said their goodbyes to ET, and then the mother and the “Keys” guy arrive just in time to look on as Elliot approaches for his farewell. Without fail, I start sobbing right then.

And I’ve noticed a couple of other moments that make me cry, earlier, before Elliot’s “talking to dead ET” monologue. When ET is crashing, the first time they put the defibrillators on him and shock him, we cut to Gertie, who visibly jumps with surprise at the violence of the electricity being blasted through ET, and then she immediately starts to cry as only a little girl can. And so do I. And then, a minute or two later, as Elliot is looking on in total helplessness, having been shoved aside by all the doctors and officials, his mother comes up behind him, unsure of the reaction she’s going to get – and he just throws his arms around her. I lose it there, too.

8. The Green Mile

No crying here.

7. Saving Private Ryan

I’ve beaten this movie up a couple times in the last week, so I’ll have done; but it didn’t make me cry. The Normandy stuff was incredibly visceral, of course, in the way that I think Mel Gibson wanted The Passion to be but didn’t quite pull off.

6. The Pride of the Yankees

I haven’t seen this.

5. Rudy

Ugh. Especially Jerry Goldsmith’s bore of score, relentlessly pounding that one tune into our heads, over and over and over and over again….

4. Braveheart

I didn’t cry at this. I love the movie, but it didn’t make me cry.

3. Brian’s Song

I haven’t seen this.

2. Old Yeller

This movie, along with The Yearling, only made me cry tears of anger if any tears at all. “Boy becomes man by learning how to kill his beloved pet” is vomitous, nonsensical crap. I hate this movie, as you can tell. (There’s a really funny episode of Friends where Phoebe walks in as the others are watching this movie and sobbing away, and Phoebe doesn’t get it because it turns out her grandmother who raised her would invariably turn off sad movies before they got to the sad part so Phoebe’s always thought that infamously sad movies actually have happy endings. In her attempt to re-educate herself she watches Pride of the Yankees and is horrified when the baseball player gets Lou Gehrig’s Disease; someone else says, “Er, Phoebe, that actually was Lou Gehrig. Didn’t you see it coming?”)

I’ve always wondered if George RR Martin was making fun of Old Yeller in A Storm of Swords, when Daenerys hires an army of soldiers who have been methodically desensitized to just about everything through their lives. The guy in charge tells her how each soldier is given a puppy when he reaches manhood, and as his final test before being allowed to become a soldier in this army, he is required to kill his dog.

1. Field of Dreams

You’d better believe it! At three points, even: when Ray realizes that Doc Brown can’t return to being a ballplayer; when he realizes that the catcher is his father; and, of course, “Dad, you wanna have a catch?”

Jason also gives some movies that make him cry, so I should do the same. I used to be really bad about crying at movies when I was a kid; The Wizard of Oz did it, and Snoopy Come Home was positively traumatic. Dances With Wolves used to have me in a waterworks as soon as Cisco’s death, but in more recent viewings, I hold it together until the very end (but Wind In His Hair’s cries of friendship from the clifftop still get me, to this day). I admit I got seriously choked up during the slaughter of the Jedi in Revenge of the Sith, and while I haven’t cried at that sequence watching the film at home, I still find it a terribly emotional scene.

Let’s see, what else? Oh yeah, An Affair to Remember, the obvious last scene, when Cary Grant is about to leave when he suddenly says something that makes him put two and two together and realize why it was that Deborah Kerr wasn’t at the Empire State Building like she’d said she’d be. Beauty and the Beast does it now and then. I haven’t seen it in a very long time, but I remember Shadowlands being quite the tearjerker.

As long as we’re talking tearjerking stuff, a lot of episodes of teevee shows have had me all weepy. A bunch of Once and Again episodes do it (the big catalyst here being “There Be Dragons”). ER, in its hey-day, could uncork a good weeper about once a season; there was Dr. Greene’s baby-delivery-gone-awry in season one, the EMT guy who suffered third degree burns over ninety percent of his body in the season two, Carter-and-Lucy-get-stabbed, and the episode when we learn that Dr. Greene has died. That was a masterful episode that I thought a wonderful send-off for Dr. Greene, so much so that the next episode, which backtracked a bit to show Dr. Greene’s last days, felt superfluous to me. In the episode in question, at the beginning, Carter reads a letter Dr. Greene has written from Hawaii, where he’s gone to live out his last days [brain cancer]. It’s a warm and funny letter, but then at the end Carter grabs one final sheet and says, “Oh, Elizabeth [Dr. Greene’s second wife] wrote something here too…” And he’s silent for a moment, and we know what’s coming: “Mark died this morning at sunrise.” The rest of the episode shows the rest of the ER staff struggling with the news that Mark is gone; Carter posts the entire letter on the main bulletin board, and at the end of the episode, we briefly flash forward a year to see that the letter is still there. That was a great episode, back when ER was actually good.

Let’s see, what else? The West Wing had some teary moments too. “In the Shadow of Two Gunmen” opens with the aftermath of the assassination attempt, and the way Toby catches himself when he finds Josh and, after telling him to get up, realizes that Josh is bleeding profusely from his gunshot wounds, always gets me; so does Mrs. Landingham’s death later that season. And yeah, on Friends, I usually tear up a bit for Chandler’s proposal to Monica.

Star Trek? A few times, but not that often. I find that the climax of “The City on the Edge of Forever” unfolds too quickly for tears (not a fault with the episode, just a fact about the way it’s done). The DS9 episode “The Visitor”, though, is extremely moving, despite the technobabble that pads out its running time.

And then there’s that old family chestnut, Little House on the Prairie, which always had a lot of attempted tear-jerking moments. I think they tended to try too hard, though; sometimes it almost became laughable. (Poor Alice Garvey’s fate was so over-the-top that I found myself wondering if I was supposed to take it seriously, and the final episode where the people of Walnut Grove dynamited their own buildings while singing “Onward Christian Soldiers” in order to thwart some kind of evil capitalists very nearly had me on the floor in stitches.) But there was a very fine episode guest-starring Patricia Neal that was quite the weeper, and the all-time champ for this show was an early two-parter when Laura is jealous of her new-born baby brother’s attention so she prays for him to die, and when he does, she runs away to climb a mountain where she meets an angel played by Ernest Borgnine. Yes, it’s exactly as cheesy as it sounds, but wow, does that one lock my personal floodgates in the “open” position.

Well, that’s about it. I’m basically an emotional basket case. What can I say?

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Ewwwwww!

So Entertainment Weekly has made two lists: one is a list of its Top 100 movies of the last twenty-five years, and the other does the same thing with books. You know the drill: the ones I’ve seen or read are in bold, with occasional comment. (However, a couple of provisos: yes, I’d include the Star Wars prequels, so sod off, haters. And as T & C point out, the list excludes The Shawshank Redemption, which is well-nigh inexplicable.)

1.Pulp Fiction (1994) (Wouldn’t be my best, but I’m not going to quibble.)

2. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-03)
3. Titanic (1997)
4. Blue Velvet (1986)
5. Toy Story (1995) (Come now. It isn’t even the best Pixar movie; this is absurdly high to put this movie.)

6. Saving Private Ryan (1998) (Again: come on, now. It’s just not that good a movie once the Normandy stuff is past. And with all due respect to T & C, the film’s construction seems to strongly imply that we’re dipping into Ryan’s memories. The whole bit at the beginning with him walking through the graveyard isn’t even necessary; nor is the coda.)

7. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
8. The Silence of the Lambs (1991) (I consider it a great film; a lot of its atmospherics set the stage for horror filmmaking in the 90s and beyond.)

9. Die Hard (1988) (One of the iconic action movies, obviously. I haven’t seen it in a long time.)

10. Moulin Rouge (2001)
11. This Is Spinal Tap (1984) (I can’t believe this is almost twenty-five years old.)

12. The Matrix (1999) (Meh. It was really cool the first time I saw it, but I liked it less each time I watched it after that. I tried once to watch The Matrix Reloaded and I fell asleep.)

13. GoodFellas (1990) (I really do think this is overrated, and that it wasn’t robbed at the Oscars.)

14. Crumb (1995) (This looks fascinating; I’d love to see it.)

15. Edward Scissorhands (1990) (A sentimental choice for me, since this movie was what The Girl I Thought Was Cute saw on our first date. She would later become The Girlfriend, then The Fiancee, and then The Wife.)

16. Boogie Nights (1997)
17. Jerry Maguire (1996) (I heart Cameron Crowe, as I’ve long established. I may have mentioned this before, but I saw this movie in a theater in Buffalo, and since it came out just a handful of years after the Cowboys beat the Bills in two straight Super Bowls, the shot during the big game at the end of the Cowboys coach glowering actually got a cheer from the audience.)

18. Do the Right Thing (1989)
19. Casino Royale (2006) (This seems a bit quick to anoint as a classic, but it’s such a good movie that I’m not going to complain.)

20. The Lion King (1994) (I know, I just said this the other day, but I’m starting to suspect this movie of being wildly overrated.)

21. Schindler’s List (1993) (Superior to Saving Private Ryan in every way.)

22. Rushmore (1998)
23. Memento (2001)
24. A Room With a View (1986) (I think this is the only Merchant-and-Ivory movie I’ve seen. I watched it during the last week of summer vacation before my junior year of high school, after a guy I’d met at music camp two weeks before had told me that this movie “made him want to fall in love”. And yeah, it did. Haven’t seen it in years, though.)

25. Shrek (2001)
26. Hoop Dreams (1994)
27. Aliens (1986) (Meh. Again, The Abyss is a much better movie.)

28. Wings of Desire (1988)
29. The Bourne Supremacy (2004)
30. When Harry Met Sally… (1989) (A favorite of mine.)

31. Brokeback Mountain (2005)
32. Fight Club (1999) (I don’t like this movie, but I can’t find anything wrong with it. It’s simply not my cup of tea.)

33. The Breakfast Club (1985) (This was a staple in college.)

34. Fargo (1996)
35. The Incredibles (2004) (I don’t grok this as much as some others, but it’s a fine, fine film.)

36. Spider-Man 2 (2004)
37. Pretty Woman (1990) (Really? Last time I watched it, I came away a bit disappointed.)

38. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) (Ah, yes. I need to watch it again.)

39. The Sixth Sense (1999) (I figured out the “twist” halfway through, but mainly I suspect because of an unplanned intermission when the film broke and I had five minutes to think it through.)

40. Speed (1994) (Or The Bus That Couldn’t Slow Down….)

41. Dazed and Confused (1993) (I need to see this.)

42. Clueless (1995)
43. Gladiator (2000) (I want to see this, kinda-sorta. I loved Kingdom of Heaven.)

44. The Player (1992)
45. Rain Man (1988)
46. Children of Men (2006)
47. Men in Black (1997) (Really? It was a clever enough comedy, but was it that good?)

48. Scarface (1983) (I see this on a lot of “great movie” lists, and everyone I’ve met who has watched it tells me it stinks. Odd.)

49. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) (Wow, I need to watch this all the way through one of these days.)

50. The Piano (1993)
51. There Will Be Blood (2007)
52. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad (1988)
53. The Truman Show (1998)
54. Fatal Attraction (1987)
55. Risky Business (1983)
56. The Lives of Others (2006)
57. There’s Something About Mary (1998)
58. Ghostbusters (1984)
59. L.A. Confidential (1997)
60. Scream (1996) (One of the more disappointing movies I’ve seen. It can’t be taken seriously as horror, and it’s not funny enough to rise to the level of clever spoof.)

61. Beverly Hills Cop (1984)
62. sex, lies and videotape (1989) (Wow, did this movie ever flummox the small-town Lutherans I watched it with in college!)

63. Big (1988) (OK, when did this become a classic? I bet nobody remembers this movie if not for the “Chopsticks” scene.)

64. No Country For Old Men (2007)
65. Dirty Dancing (1987) (I’ve seen parts. Meh.)
66. Natural Born Killers (1994) (I saw this and admired it, but I’m not sure it’s a classic or anything. It’s not even the best Oliver Stone movie from this period, and none of those appear on this list.)

67. Donnie Brasco (1997)
68. Witness (1985) (Should be higher. I hope Harrison Ford finds this level of inspiration again one day.)

69. All About My Mother (1999)
70. Broadcast News (1987) (I haven’t seen this in far too long! I really loved it.)

71. Unforgiven (1992)
72. Thelma & Louise (1991)
73. Office Space (1999) (They said I could play my radio at a reasonable volume.)

74. Drugstore Cowboy (1989)
75. Out of Africa (1985)
76. The Departed (2006)
77. Sid and Nancy (1986)
78. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
79. Waiting for Guffman (1996)
80. Michael Clayton (2007)
81. Moonstruck (1987)
82. Lost in Translation (2003)
83. Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn (1987)
84. Sideways (2004)
85. The 40 Year-Old Virgin (2005) (The Bollywood ending had me on the floor.)

86. Y Tu Mamá También (2002)
87. Swingers (1996)
88. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997) (A friend at work and I like to express our mutual frustration by quoting this movie. “Come on, people! Throw me a frickin’ bone here!”)

89. Breaking the Waves (1996)
90. Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
91. Back to the Future (1985)
92. Menace II Society (1993)
93. Ed Wood (1994)
94. Full Metal Jacket (1987)
95. In the Mood for Love (2001)
96. Far From Heaven (2002) (I just checked this out of the library, and will report back.)

97. Glory (1989)
98. The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)
99. The Blair Witch Project (1999)
100. South Park: Bigger Longer & Uncut (1999)

So, there are the movies. Omissions? I’m not sure what I’d knock off, but I’d include Apollo 13, Braveheart, The Shawshank Redemption, The Karate Kid, The Abyss, The Iron Giant, Stand By Me, Misery, Platoon, JFK, Nixon, and the in-my-opinion-criminally-underrated Dolores Claiborne.

As for the books:

1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy (2006)
2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling (2000) (Sorry, but Prisoner of Azkaban is the better book.)

3. Beloved, Toni Morrison (1987)
4. The Liars’ Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
6. Mystic River, Dennis Lehane (2001)
7. Maus, Art Spiegelman (1986/1991) (Sheer genius.)

8. Selected Stories, Alice Munro (1996)
9. Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier (1997)
10. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami (1997)
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer (1997)
12. Blindness, José Saramago (1998)
13. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (1986-87) (What else is there to say?)

14. Black Water, Joyce Carol Oates (1992)
15. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers (2000) (Liked it but didn’t quite get the fuss.)

16. The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood (1986)
17. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez (1988)
18. Rabbit at Rest, John Updike (1990)
19. On Beauty, Zadie Smith (2005)
20. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding (1998)
21. On Writing, Stephen King (2000) (God, yes. What a book. I’ve worn mine out and need to get a new one.)

22. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz (2007)
23. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker (1996)
24. Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry (1985)
25. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan (1989)
26. Neuromancer, William Gibson (1984)
27. Possession, A.S. Byatt (1990)
28. Naked, David Sedaris (1997)
29. Bel Canto, Anne Patchett (2001)
30. Case Histories, Kate Atkinson (2004)
31. The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien (1990)
32. Parting the Waters, Taylor Branch (1988)
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (2005)
34. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold (2002)
35. The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst (2004)
36. Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt (1996)
37. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (2003) (Another wonderful work; I like that EW is open to graphic novels.)

38. Birds of America, Lorrie Moore (1998)
39. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri (2000)
40. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (1995-2000) (Only the first book; I’m not sure I’ll ever make it a sufficient priority to read the second and third. Nothing against Pullman’s message, but that first book just didn’t excite me to the point that I want to read the rest of the trilogy.)

41. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros (1984)
42. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard (1983)
43. Borrowed Time, Paul Monette (1988)
44. Praying for Sheetrock, Melissa Fay Greene (1991)
45. Eva Luna, Isabel Allende (1988)
46. Sandman, Neil Gaiman (1988-1996) (I haven’t read the entire thing yet.)

47. World’s Fair, E.L. Doctorow (1985)
48. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver (1998)
49. Clockers, Richard Price (1992)
50. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen (2001)
51. The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcom (1990)
52. Waiting to Exhale, Terry McMillan (1992)
53. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon (2000) (I thought this was wondrous from start to finish.)

54. Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware (2000) (Gotta read this – I’ve owned it for six years now.)

55. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls (2006)
56. The Night Manager, John le Carré (1993)
57. The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe (1987)
58. Drop City, TC Boyle (2003)
59. Krik? Krak! Edwidge Danticat (1995)
60. Nickel & Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich (2001) (It told me what I already knew, but too many people don’t know and worse, don’t care.)

61. Money, Martin Amis (1985)
62. Last Train To Memphis, Peter Guralnick (1994)
63. Pastoralia, George Saunders (2000)
64. Underworld, Don DeLillo (1997)
65. The Giver, Lois Lowry (1993)
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace (1997)
67. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini (2003)
68. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel (2006)
69. Secret History, Donna Tartt (1992)
70. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell (2004)
71. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Ann Fadiman (1997)
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon (2003)
73. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (1989)
74. Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger (1990)
75. Cathedral, Raymond Carver (1983)
76. A Sight for Sore Eyes, Ruth Rendell (1998)
77. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
78. Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert (2006)
79. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell (2000)
80. Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney (1984)
81. Backlash, Susan Faludi (1991)
82. Atonement, Ian McEwan (2002)
83. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields (1994)
84. Holes, Louis Sachar (1998)
85. Gilead, Marilynne Robinson (2004)
86. And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts (1987)
87. The Ruins, Scott Smith (2006)
88. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby (1995) (I just read this last week!)

89. Close Range, Annie Proulx (1999) (I’ve read one of the stories within this collection, and I’ll write about that story sometime soon.)

90. Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl (2001)
91. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc (2003)
92. Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow (1987)
93. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley (1991)
94. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser (2001) (I have a feeling this would also tell me what I already know.)

95. Kaaterskill Falls, Allegra Goodman (1998)
96. The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown (2003)
97. Jesus’ Son, Denis Johnson (1992)
98. The Predators’ Ball, Connie Bruck (1988)
99. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman (1995)
100. America (the Book), Jon Stewart/Daily Show (2004)

Not much to say there, I suppose. I need to read more, obviously. But from what I’ve heard, The Da Vinci Code isn’t actually a good book, so why is it here? Just because it was the mega-bestseller of the year back when? I obviously haven’t read enough of these to offer serious criticisms of this list, but one book I’d have in my list is Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon. Come to that, no great SF or fantasy has been written in the last twenty-five years? I think not.

And with that, I think I’m caught up on lists for now. Bring on the quiz-things!

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Movies of Lists, Lists of Movies….

SamuraiFrog, Tosy and Cosh, and Tom the Dog have both commented on this, and I must, of course, follow suit. Last week was the annual American Film Institute teevee show, when they present a list of Top X Movie Whatever’s. This year they picked several genres and named the top ten movies in each genre. As always, the point of the show isn’t to present some kind of iron-clad canon of film, but just to drum up interest in the movies. If people watching these shows say, “Hmmm, I should watch that again/for the first time”, then the show has done its job. For that reason I never really get mad at the AFI’s selections; the only one that’s ever really bugged me is when the “100 Years, 100 Romances” list omitted Say Anything.

So, here are their lists. I’ve bolded the ones I’ve seen and sprinkled my own comment throughout.

Animation

Well, right off the bat we’ve got a bit of a problem. “Animation” isn’t a genre, really; it’s a film medium. Within the confines of animation you can do SF, romance, fantasy, anything. But we can still talk about the best animated movies, right?

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)

I won’t quibble with the placement, although I personally wouldn’t call it the best animated movie ever. But it’s just as iconic as this placement suggests, and it’s interesting to watch it now and try to imagine Disney today doing something quite as dark as Snow White. (Yes, it’s a dark film. There’s some very disturbing stuff in there, amongst the funny stuff with dwarves and the Handsome Princes and whatnot.)

2. Pinocchio (1940)

Again, a movie with lots of darkness. (Hardwick’s metamorphosis into a donkey is as horrific a scene as you’ll find in a movie.) I’ve always loved Pinocchio.

3. Bambi (1942)

OK. I love this movie too.

4. The Lion King (1994)

Unlike SamuraiFrog, I like this movie a little bit less each time I see it. Oh, it’s definitely very good, but there are things about it that don’t hold up well for me. I don’t care for Matthew Broderick’s voice work, I find a lot of the climax contrived, and some of the exposition stuff at the beginning is pretty dull. There isn’t a subtle moment in this film, and there are moments that could have benefited from a less heavy hand.

5. Fantasia (1940)

Yes, it’s a mixed bag, but I really do love it. The main weak part is the Beethoven Pastoral Symphony.

6. Toy Story (1995)

Yes, it’s a really good movie. And it launched Pixar as a force to be reckoned with. But still, I don’t think it’s the best Pixar film, so putting it here, ahead of them all?

7. Beauty and the Beast (1991)

This is the best film of Disney’s Silver Age, in my opinion. It’s far better than The Lion King.

8. Shrek (2001)

Hmmmmm. See, I really like this movie. I also really like its first sequel, and I didn’t hate its second sequel (although that one was, admittedly, a pretty tired film). I guess I’m OK with it being here, with its riffs on fairy tales and legends.

9. Cinderella (1950)

I love this movie; I just love it. The animation is some of the best to ever come out of Disney (the bit where singing Cinderella is mirrored in the soap bubbles is visual invention of the highest order, and to animate those mini-Cinderellas so they’re identical is great). But you know what? I love Peter Pan more.

10. Finding Nemo (2003)

Pixar’s best film, for me. I’m not sure I can name anything wrong with it. (Well, OK, Disney couldn’t pony up to license the Bobby Darin version of “Beyond the Sea”, choosing instead a cover version that’s the same anyway? There, I found fault with Finding Nemo.)

What’s missing, then? Well, the most glaring omission is clearly The Iron Giant. I’ll second SamuraiFrog’s nomination of The Secret of NIMH, and I’ll throw in The Last Unicorn, to boot. And really, I’m not one to completely slag a lot of Disney’s non-Pixar output after The Lion King. Some of it isn’t terribly good, but I still think that The Emperor’s New Groove is an absolute classic.

Fantasy

1. The Wizard of Oz (1939)

I loved this movie as a kid. And then, as a more jaded teenaged dork, I hated it. And then as a college dork getting in touch with my inner kid again, I loved it again. And there I’ve stayed ever since. It really is a terrific film, terribly wise in its outlook and full of humor and imagination. (I quoted one of the Wizard’s lines in my written eulogy for Little Quinn.)

2. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Now, I have to ask something here. The AFI’s lists salute American films, but by what standard is LOTR an American effort? Because New Line’s an American company? That’s pretty weak tea, if you ask me. If we can consider LOTR, then the entire animation category has to thrown open to Hayao Miyazaki and the rest of the anime geniuses. But fine.

Anyway, why not do the right thing here and consider the trilogy as a whole? (Although, if I have to pick a stand-alone, I’d go with The Two Towers. But I wouldn’t pick a stand-alone.)

3. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

Meh. I’m not a fan of this movie.

4. King Kong (1933)

Yeah, it’s quite good. ‘Nuff said.

5. Miracle on 34th Street (1947)

I’m cheating a bit by including this: the one time I saw it I was in second grade and I don’t remember much about it at all.

6. Field of Dreams (1989)

Oh, hell yes. No explanations for the strange events in Ray Kinsella’s corn field, just total complete faith in it all. It’s a great movie. (By the way, it wasn’t made into a movie, but in a similar vein is W.P. Kinsella’s novel The Iowa Baseball Confederacy, which posits an exhibition game in 1908 between the Chicago Cubs and a semi-pro Iowa team that lasted something like a hundred innings and was the longest baseball game ever played – except that nobody remembers it ever happening.)

7. Harvey (1950)

8. Groundhog Day (1993)

Yes, it’s fantasy. And yes, it’s a terrific movie.

9. The Thief of Bagdad (1924)

I’ve never seen the silent one. The one from the 1940s with Sabu is wonderful, though.

10. Big (1988)

Gahhhh. Didn’t like this movie. I suspect that if you take out the bit with the piano keyboard on the floor, the movie isn’t remembered nearly as well.

So what would I consider for the Fantasy list? Well, since we’re including movies of questionable country of origin (not that the countries are questionable, just the notion of what makes an “American” film or not), I’d include Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The Princess Bride is pure fantasy. And some superhero movies may fall into this category, no? Superman or Spiderman 2 are fantasies, in my book. Excalibur (not American, but then, we’re stretching the definition of an “American” movie already).

Science fiction

Of course, with these two categories, we end up in the classic old debate about what the dividing line is between SF and fantasy. Enough ink, both real and cyber, has been dropped on this topic over the years that I’m not about to add anything earthshaking about it, except to reiterate my view that the best definition of SF is probably “SF is whatever I point at when I say, SF”.

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

I’d have it on the list. Best ever? For me, that would be…

2. Star Wars (1977)

Oh yeah! Without this movie I wouldn’t be me. (Which might not be the worst thing in the world, but still.) I admit that I’m rather horrified by the notion gradually mustering around this movie — that it stinks too, and that only TESB is any good at all.

3. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)

Lots of people these days gripe on Spielberg for “Daddy issues”. I personally don’t care. This is a great movie.

4. A Clockwork Orange (1971)

Meh. It’s not my cup of tea.

5. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Great stuff, really. I like this movie a lot. I haven’t seen it in a long time – I should rectify that soon.

6. Blade Runner (1982)

As with SamuraiFrog, I say Meh. I wrote about Blade Runner some time ago, if you really want to know my thoughts on the film.

7. Alien (1979)

Sorry, but I hate the Alien franchise. SamuraiFrog makes the interesting point that he sees it more as a horror film than an SF film, but it’s really both. SF’s kind of like “animation”: it’s such a widely defined thing that you can do anything in it at all, really. But as for this movie, I hated it. And its first two sequels. I never bothered with anything Alien related after that.

8. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

I love both Terminator movies, really. (No, there was no third. That’s a ridiculous notion.)

9. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

10. Back to the Future (1985)

I love this movie too, although I’m not sure I’d put it in the Top Ten SF movies. For one thing, I’m not sure it’s SF. Sure, it’s got a mad scientist and lots of made-up technobabble about how the time travel works, but that’s complete BS, isn’t it? The main working definition here seems to be: “It’s fantasy when you wave your hand to make something impossible to happen, and SF if you push a button to make something impossible happen.” (Which still doesn’t help in the case of Star Wars, where both happen.

So what didn’t make the cut here? Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a glaring omission. Twelve Monkeys is great SF. I’d include The Abyss, which always gets unfairly overshadowed by the overrated Aliens. Forbidden Planet and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Total Recall, and, yes, Robocop. (Hell, make it a Peter Weller two-fer and throw in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension.)

(SamuraiFrog suggests The Right Stuff, but that’s not SF at all. It’s a historical film about the early days of the American space program.)

Sports

1. Raging Bull (1980)

2. Rocky (1976)

Yes, it’s a great movie. The second one’s OK. It all goes downhill after that. (I never saw the sixth one, though.)

3. The Pride of the Yankees (1942)

4. Hoosiers (1986)

Yes, it’s good. I’m not sure it’s that good, but it’s really good. (Its score is wildly overrated, though — the Goldsmith freaks out there tend to worship this one, but to me, it’s just pleasant Americana.)

5. Bull Durham (1988)

One of my favorite movies ever. I love the dialogue, the humor, the little baseball touches. (And to me, the only acceptable response to hearing someone talk about what they’re going to get someone for a wedding gift is: “Well, candlesticks always make a nice gift. Or we could find out where they’re registered and get ’em a place setting or two. Alright, let’s get two!”)

6. The Hustler (1961)

Didn’t see it, although I did see the sequel (The Color of Money), which I liked. I was never offended that the sequel ends before the big confrontation match; I didn’t think it mattered.

7. Caddyshack (1980)

Well, duh! Great comedy (if only tangentially a sports movie). I got to make a reference to this movie once at The Store: we found a large beehive in the ground underneath one of our shrubs, and a manager suggested that we blow it up with a stick of M-80. I countered, “I am not re-enacting Caddyshack with a bunch of bees!” Luckily, he got the reference.

8. Breaking Away (1979)

I’ve seen it, but not in many years – more than twenty – and I don’t remember much about it at all.

9. National Velvet (1944)

10. Jerry Maguire (1996)

Yes, the movie holds up very well – in fact, with the money and personality cults in sports getting more and more prevalent, it’s even more relevant now.

What else is there? Well, I personally loved Tin Cup, although all the golfers I know are unanimous in their hatred of it. There’s White Men Can’t Jump, which finally clarified for me why I don’t like watching basketball: the game looks better in slow motion. I’ve always found Major League really funny, and I loved how Will Ferrel’s Blades of Glory skewered figure skating. And while it might be stretching the concept of “sport” a bit, Searching for Bobby Fischer is a magnificent film.

Western

1. The Searchers (1956)

Yes, it’s a great movie. But I don’t want to see it again.

2. High Noon (1952)

3. Shane (1953)

4. Unforgiven (1992)

This was when I realized that Clint Eastwood is a genius. It really is a great film.

5. Red River (1948)

6. The Wild Bunch (1969)

7. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

One of the great first hours in movie history. Unfortunately, it’s followed by a second hour that’s pretty much “Meh” until the very last scene.

8. McCabe and Mrs. Miller (1971)

9. Stagecoach (1939)

My parents dragged me to see this in a revival when I was in high school. I owe them for that, as I would probably never have seen it otherwise. It’s great.

10. Cat Ballou (1965)

Crikey, I need to see more Westerns. I’m still unapologetic in my love for Dances With Wolves (more here). Silverado‘s good. Legends of the Fall is a Western, isn’t it? I think it is, although that might stretch the definition a bit. And I’m not sure it’s a good movie, but The Quick and the Dead is fun to watch.

Gangster

Well, here’s a genre of films that doesn’t typically excite me. I just don’t care for Mob stories in general.

1. The Godfather (1972)

One of these years I need to watch this all the way through so I can see what the fuss is about. But I keep not making it a big priority. (I like SamuraiFrog’s assertion that the only reason the AFI did a Gangster category was so that they could talk about The Godfather again. It does get mentioned every year, doesn’t it? Maybe next year’s show should be “100 Years, 100 Whackings” and be done with it.)

2. Goodfellas (1990)

One of filmdom’s great Shibboleths of recent years is that this movie got robbed at the Oscars (it lost to Dances With Wolves). Personally, I don’t see it. Yes, it’s a very good movie, but I don’t share the enthusiasm about it that everybody else feels. I watched it once, I liked it a lot, and…we’re done.

3. The Godfather, Part II (1974)

4. White Heat (1949)

5. Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

6. Scarface: The Shame of a Nation (1932)

7. Pulp Fiction (1994)

One of my favorite movies ever. Unlike SamuraiFrog, I do think it’s a gangster movie; the gangsters are different types, that’s all, and the point-of-view is restricted to those who have to carry out the gangster’s bidding.

8. The Public Enemy (1931)

9. Little Caesar (1931)

10. Scarface (1983)

I haven’t even heard of Numbers 8 or 9 above. Is Michael Mann’s Heat a “gangster” movie? Maybe they should call this the “crime” genre? In that case we could include Dirty Harry. I dunno; I’m just not that into this whole genre.

Mystery

1. Vertigo (1958)

It annoys me that I haven’t seen this. The score is amazing, though.

2. Chinatown (1974)

Sure. Terrific movie.

3. Rear Window (1954)

Another one my parents dragged me to in a revival in the 1980s. Another one I owe them. What a movie this is! I watched it on teevee with The Wife last Thanksgiving, if I recall correctly. It’s still awesome.

4. Laura (1944)

5. The Third Man (1949)

On first glance I thought this said The Thin Man, the first in that series of wonderful mystery-comedies featuring Nick and Nora. And then I read the title correctly, and realized, no, I haven’t actually seen this.

6. The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Nothing I can say. Great stuff.

7. North by Northwest (1959)

Almost my favorite Hitchcock movie.

8. Blue Velvet (1986)

9. Dial M for Murder (1954)

This actually is my favorite Hitchcock movie. I think it’s absolutely terrific.

10. The Usual Suspects (1995)

Yuck. I hate this movie. It could have told a fascinating story about interesting criminal characters brought together for a heist and played off those characters in neat ways, but instead, we got the colossally stupid “Who is Keyser Soze?” bullshit. Since I figured out who Soze was within two minutes of first hearing the name mentioned, I spent the rest of the movie glowering at the screen.

Again, what’s a “mystery” and what isn’t? Is The Silence of the Lambs a mystery? Maybe, maybe not. The Fugitive is a mystery, at least in part.

Romantic comedies

1. City Lights (1931)

2. Annie Hall (1977)

3. It Happened One Night (1934)

4. Roman Holiday (1953)

5. The Philadelphia Story (1940)

There’s something wrong with this movie. I just have no idea at all what it is. Maybe it’s too good? Yeah, that’s it! (Loved it.)

6. When Harry Met Sally… (1989)

One of my favorite movies ever. Crackling dialogue, and it gets its job done in ninety minutes without any filler. (And if you want to see how essential good editing can be, watch the deleted scenes, which are awful.)

7. Adam’s Rib (1949)

8. Moonstruck (1987)

9. Harold and Maude (1971)

10. Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

OK, yeah, I love this movie. I don’t think it belongs on this top ten, though; a really great movie would have figured out a way to have the Bill Pullman character not get, you know, screwed on Valentine’s Day. But still, I don’t think Meg Ryan has ever been more beautiful than she is here. So there.

Odd that I consider romantic comedies to be one of my favorite genres, and yet, I’ve seen so few of the films the AFI listed here. I have my work cut out for me, obviously, but by way of other suggestions, I really love Cousins. Roxanne is wonderful, and they’re probably not eligible because they’re British, but I really adore Four Weddings and a Funeral and Love, Actually.

Courtroom Drama

1. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

Absolutely. (Note to self: re-read the book.)

2. 12 Angry Men (1957)

Also fine.

3. Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)

4. The Verdict (1982)

5. A Few Good Men (1992)

I love this movie, although I do concede the point that Roger Ebert made that the film shouldn’t have told us right before the big courtroom scene what Tom Cruise’s strategy was for questioning Jack Nicholson.

6. Witness for the Prosecution (1957)

7. Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

8. In Cold Blood (1967)

9. A Cry in the Dark (1988)

10. Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)

SamuraiFrog mentions Inherit the Wind, and I concur. I’d also add in The People vs. Larry Flint and JFK for consideration.

Epic

I’m not sure what an “epic” is; apparently they’re long and have lots of spectacle. That said:

1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

I really need to get off my arse and watch the entire thing. I’ve seen half of it. Ugh. I suck.

2. Ben-Hur (1959)

Ahhhh! What a great movie. I love this movie. Love love love it.

3. Schindler’s List (1993)

Both SamuraiFrog and Tom the Dog seem to question its epic status, but why not? It tells a pretty big story, involving lots of people, with a good deal of sweep and large set pieces. It’s an epic, in my opinion. (It’s also one of the very greatest films ever made.)

4. Gone with the Wind (1939)

I don’t like it. Sorry, but it’s dull and ponderous; all of the performances are overwrought; I watch the film in utter failure to understand why so many people are hanging on Scarlett’s every word; and I don’t fetishize the South as this movie does.

5. Spartacus (1960)

Another one I need to watch. (By the way, this is probably the single greatest unreleased film score in existence.)

6. Titanic (1997)

If Schindler’s List isn’t an epic, how is this? Its story takes place in less time and in a single location. But yes, it’s an epic. It’s also a great movie. Sod off, Titanic haters.

7. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

8. Saving Private Ryan (1998)

An amazing sequence (Normandy) that’s followed by two-plus hours of pedestrian crap. Sorry, but I really think the only reason this movie is so beloved is because it happened to come out right when “Greatest Generation” nostalgia was hitting its stride. (William Goldman’s critique is pretty much an exact statement of how I feel about this movie, except that I don’t even think the journey to Private Ryan is great stuff.)

9. Reds (1981)

10. The Ten Commandments (1956)

I’ve never much liked this movie. It’s overlong, overstuffed, overwritten, overwrought, and just plain over.

What “epics” did they miss? Braveheart is an obvious one, I think. And it probably doesn’t merit “Top Ten” status, but I really dig The Vikings.

And, as always, there we have it. Thanks, AFI!

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Recent Movie Watching

I’ve watched a couple of films of late. Be warned, I make no effort to avoid spoilers!

:: It’s taken me a while to figure out how I feel about Juno, and I’m still not entirely sure what I make of it. Juno is exactly what everybody has already said it is: a feel-good flick about teen pregnancy. I’m not sure what it means that we can now make feel-good movies on that topic, but then, I’m not anywhere near a teenager anymore; twice as many years have now elapsed since I was a teenager than I spent as a teenager, and to my knowledge, there weren’t any teen moms in my school anyway when I was a teenager, so I can’t claim to have any great perspective on this topic. It’s shaped, mostly, by those awful “After School Special” movies we often had to watch on the subject, in which teenage girls who became pregnant somehow became social pariahs who would never again fit in or live any kind of normal life. The topic of teen pregnancy, in my time, was always discussed with a major subtext of “If it happens to you, it’s GAME OVER!”.

So along comes Juno, a movie where a teenage girl gets pregnant by her boyfriend, decides to give the baby up for adoption, spends time with the adoptive parents and gets to know the husband better than she should, fights with her boyfriend a bit, watches as the adoptive family’s marriage collapses, gives the baby up to the mother anyway, makes up with her boyfriend, and then presumably returns to the relatively normal life she’s enjoyed all along. No major dramatic histrionics can be found in Juno. Her boyfriend is not some jerk jock type who is only looking to get in some girl’s pants; in fact, the sex isn’t even completely his idea in the first place. Juno doesn’t lose all of her friends during her pregnancy, nor does she become a miserable waif shunned by her peers. Her best friend sticks by her the whole way. Her parents are supportive and accepting. I watched Juno thinking the film was terribly unrealistic, but then I wondered against myself: how unrealistic is it, anyway?

Parts of the film made me a bit uncomfortable. During the scenes where Juno forms a bond with the father-to-be, I found myself wanting to warn her away from this guy, who is clearly an overgrown child. However, the screenplay (written by Diablo Cody, which is the best name for a screenwriter ever) knows its characters, and in the end, it turns out that Juno has enough insight and awareness to recognize this man for what he is, despite all the ways she is able to connect with him and not with the mother. The other scene that made me wince was when the ultrasound technician makes some kind of judgmental comment about Juno’s pregnancy, and then gets berated by Juno’s stepmother (Alison Janney). This was the only part of the film that felt in any way reminiscent of a “Very Special Episode of Blossom“, and it stood out to me as both contrary to the general tone of the film and to my general experience with people in that line of work in the first place. I found it very hard to believe that any person working in a perinatal field would make such a comment to a pregnant woman, no matter what her circumstance.

What else to say about Juno? Well, I very much doubt that lightning can be caught in the bottle twice, but when the film ended, I genuinely wanted to know what became of these characters and what life held for them. So that helps.

:: A year or so ago I bought a couple of omnibus editions of the stories of Robert E. Howard, having never actually read any Howard before. (I still don’t have them all, missing the tales of Kull the Conqueror and one of the Conan the Barbarian volumes.) Howard is one of those “founding fathers” of modern fantastic fiction, along with E.E. “Doc” Smith (space opera SF), HP Lovecraft (horror), Edgar Rice Burroughs (planetary romance SF), and other very early masters of literal pulp fiction. Howard’s creations loom over epic fantasy and sword-and-sorcery tales, and yet, I still haven’t actually read him (although that will be changing soon). I’ve read lots of stuff based on his creations, and seen the Conan movies, but the actual source material still awaits me.

I do know, however, that Howard was one of those geniuses who burned brightly for a short time and then was extinguished. He committed suicide when he was just thirty years old, never coming close to witnessing his legacy, and he never married. Those things I knew. What I didn’t know is that he had a tumultuous friendship, sometimes crossing the line into romance, with a schoolteacher and aspiring writer named Novalyne Price. The film The Whole Wide World tells this story, and I found the film astonishingly good. How I’ve managed to have never heard of it before a friend sent me a copy of it is beyond me.

Featuring Vincent D’Onofrio as Howard and Renee Zelwegger as Novalyn, the film tightly focuses on their relationship, which begins warmly enough but soon begins to lurch back and forth into pain as Novalyn becomes more and more aware of Howard’s unstable nature. The film is pretty slowly paced, which turns out to be its main virtue; eschewing the standard devices of film romances, The Whole Wide World instead allows us to get to know these characters pretty well, much moreso than in most other films of this type. We see that Novalyn’s attraction to Bob Howard isn’t merely sexual physical attraction; nor is it the hero worship of a neophyte writer for a published professional. Frequently throughout the film Bob becomes borderline – or just plain outright – abusive toward Novalyn, and she never gets weepy or bemoans her fate; she tends to stand right up to Bob and make her displeasure known.

The romance between Bob Howard and Novalyn Price is very complicated; it proceeds in fits and starts and, despite the film’s slow pace, their romance seems over before it begins. Even when they finally kiss, in a moment that almost seems ripped from every romance film under the sun with the kiss taking place at sunset on top of a vista with a gorgeous view of the Texas wilderness, with the score swelling to great passion, the darkness that we’ve come to expect surfaces almost immediately.

In the end, as a matter of record, Bob and Novalyn do not get together, and Novalyn learns of Bob’s suicide via a telegram. Her reaction to this news is one of the more heartbreaking moments I’ve seen in a movie recently: she immediately grabs paper and pen to write Bob an angry letter for having taken such an action. Only after she’s written the salutation does she internalize what’s happen, and that’s when the grief hits her.

I should also make special note of the film’s score, by Harry Gregson-Williams. Gregson-Williams has emerged as one of the more intriguing new voices in film music over the last ten years, and I suspect that he’ll become a very fine composer indeed if we ever get past the current era of rigid adherence to the temp-track. On The Whole Wide World, Gregson-Williams has to provide music that often shifts in mood several times within the same scene, as the film delves from mundane matters into the often dark psyche of Robert Howard and back again. It’s an impressive and powerful score for an impressive film.

:: Finally, a couple of weeks ago we watched Stardust, the 2007 film based on the book by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess. The film was dumped into release late in the summer and vanished from the scene almost immediately, which seems to me a cruel fate for a film that’s full of wit, charm, and good fun.

Stardust is one of those stories one finds often in contemporary fantasy that combines mythic elements that are as old as, well, the hills in ways that are fairly new and interesting, often times in a tongue-in-cheek way. In terms of mood, Stardust is much closer to The Princess Bride than The Lord of the Rings. It’s been a long time since I read Gaiman’s book, so I’d pretty much forgotten most of the story by the time we watched the film. I don’t want to say too much about the plot, since the pleasure from watching it comes in seeing the way things unfold in unexpected ways, but it begins with an English village and the wall that runs through a field nearby, a wall that separates the mundane world from the magical one, and what happens when a curious youngster ventures to journey beyond the wall. What happens then is a terrific mish-mash involving a fallen star played by Claire Danes, a wandering Gypsy sorceress and her slave woman who seems to have powers of her own, a ship that flies through the air harvesting lightning, a group of princes who constantly plot against one another for the crown to their kingdom, a trio of witches (one of whom is played by Michelle Pfeiffer, who looks awfully radiant in the movie – for a while anyway), and of course, as in all such tales, Our Hero, a young lad who is unsure of his place in the world and who his true love actually is.

When Stardust came out, I read a number of reviews that basically said that it was either too light in tone, or not light enough. It’s not a deep film at all, nor does it have a cynical bone in its body. I liked it a lot. (It has a good score, too, by Ilan Eshkeri, a composer I’d never heard of before.)

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Sensitive Man is sensitive

Lynn points out a handy list of the worst “chick flicks” of all time, and I figure, hey, a list to comment on! Yay!!!

Here’s the list, with comment:

20. Autumn in New York

I haven’t seen this.

19. The English Patient

Wow, is this movie a drawn out bore. At least, that’s what I thought of it when I watched it years ago. I read the book last year, though, and I was captivated with it. I may revisit the film sometime.

18. Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

I haven’t seen this.

17. The Notebook

I actually enjoyed this, although I didn’t find it as transformingly romantic as many others did.

16. Dr. T & The Women

Unseen by me. No idea.

15. Sweet November

Also unseen by me.

14. You’ve Got Mail

I saw this once, and found it enjoyable, but not enough to ever see again.

13. The Prince of Tides

Haven’t seen it.

12. Georgia Rule

I haven’t seen this, either.

11. Crossroads

Now, what are the odds that I’ve seen a movie starring Britney Spears?

10. The Bridges of Madison County

OK, OK, OK. Yes, the book is treacle. But the movie I found very, very well done.

9. Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Nope. Didn’t see it.

8. Fried Green Tomatoes

I’ve only seen this once, but I remember enjoying it.

7. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days

Ack! I actually found this movie enjoyable, but I’m prepared to grant the possibility that I was blinded by Kate Hudson. Especially this one scene where she takes a huge bite out of a cheeseburger….

6. Beaches

Ahhhhh, here we go. I loathed this movie when I saw it. I mean, I hated it with passion I’ve rarely hated with since. I saw it at a college screening about a year after it had come out, and everybody was telling me what a tearjerker it was — and then I was appalled to discover that the movie basically spends two hours following these two women through life as they treat each other incredibly poorly and then asks me to be sad when one of them dies! Yeah, right.

5. Sleepless in Seattle

Shoot me. I love this movie. Just watched it again a few weeks ago.

4. Dirty Dancing

OK, I think I’ve seen this, or maybe I haven’t. I dunno. Don’t care.

3. Steel Magnolias

I haven’t seen this.

2. Ghost

I haven’t watched this in a very long time — maybe ten years, wow! — but I sure liked it back in the day. I enjoyed the story, and Demi Moore was really cute back then. (Maybe she still is, I have no idea how she’s looking nowadays.)

1. Titanic

I will forever be befuddled at the sheer ferocity of the ongoing backlash against this movie. It’s as if people are angry at themselves for having liked it in the first place or something. I don’t get it.

As for films that deserve to be on this list, I agree with Lynn: Love Story is just garbage. Anyway….

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Ten Little Things in “Pulp Fiction”

I remember when Pulp Fiction came out. I was watching Siskel and Ebert one night, and one of the movies they reviewed was this drama set in and around the LA underworld, and they gushed over its quirky twists of story and its crackling dialog. Even though at first glance the movie didn’t seem like the kind of thing that would interest me, the one scene they showed really caught my attention: Sam Jackson, holding a gun to Tim Roth’s face, and shouting at his girlfriend offscreen: “We’re gonna be like three Fonzies here. And what’s Fonzie like? Come on, Yolanda, what’s Fonzie like?”

“C-c-cool?”

“Correctimundo. And that’s what we’re gonna be. We’re gonna be cool.”

For some reason I heard that exchange and thought, “Wow, I gotta see this movie.” Apparently it had won whatever the big prize is at the Cannes Film Festival (the Palme d’Or, obviously), and it was now in wide release. I think I went to see it by myself the next day, at the multiplex in Olean, NY. It was an afternoon matinee. I was the only one there. I’ve seen movies before when I was one of less than ten people in the audience, but as far as I can recall, to this day Pulp Fiction is the only time I have literally been the only person in the theater. And that movie, over the next two-and-a-half hours, rocked me something fierce. I’d never seen anything like it at all: the non-linear way the story unfolds (or, I should say, the way the stories unfold), the way the dialog just whips about with each character having his or her own voice. The camera work that almost imperceptibly heightens the tension at various places. The way the movie went for laughs in horrible ways: I’ve never seen, before or since, successful comedic sequences that arise out of drug overdoses or accidental shootings in the face.

The next time I saw Pulp Fiction in the theater, a couple of months later, it was a late night showing at a multiplex in Buffalo, near the University. The theater was packed for that one; by this point Pulp Fiction was a pop culture sensation, and it was only weeks away from losing Best Picture honors to Forrest Gump. Weird. I don’t know if I was actually one of the first people on the Pulp Fiction bandwagon, or if it just felt that way because I saw it by myself in a backwater town early in its release. But wow, what a movie.

I watched it again a few weeks ago, for the first time in several years. I have a friend at work with whom I’m always quoting the movie (we like to express frustration by either claiming to be “mushroom-cloud layin’ m*****f*****’s”, or “tryin’ real hard to be the Shepherd”), but as far as actually watching it, I hadn’t done that in a really long time. So when I finally got to see it again, a lot of stuff in it seemed new to me again.

As with any really good movie, what makes it work are, in large part, the tiny details one can find in it: the little visual or aural tics that maybe weren’t even planned, but by being there, just make it all the more real. Here are ten tiny details from Pulp Fiction that I love, in no particular order.

1. Vincent’s “church usher” pose. The early scene where Jules and Vincent are retrieving the briefcase from the hoods who are trying to steal it from Marcellus Wallace reaches its famous climax when Jules begins to recite his gonzo version of Ezekiel 25:17. The camera cuts from Jules to Brett (the hood in the chair who’s about to die), and when you see Brett, in the background you see Vincent, gearing up for the execution. The way he does it, though, is pretty nifty. He takes out his gun, cocks it, and then holds it pointing down with his hands clasped in front of him, in a way that always reminds me of the pose the ushers strike in any church service just before they’re supposed to come forth and do something (pass the collection plates, direct worshippers to Communion, whatever). It’s a terrific pose.

2. Rear-projection when driving at night. There are two sequences in the movie that depict people in cars at night that are done in stylized fashion, like they used to do such sequences when making movies in the 1940s. It’s obvious that John Travolta isn’t really driving when Vincent is stoned on his way to pick up Mia Wallace; likewise, it’s obvious that Bruce Willis and the woman playing the cab driver aren’t really driving a cab during their conversation about what it felt like for Butch to pummel the other boxer to death in the ring. The rear projection in both cases is grainy, jerky, and black-and-white. But in the film’s other driving sequences, when the tension is up (Vincent speeding an OD’ing Mia to the drug dealer’s house for the andrenaline shot, Butch driving back to his apartment to get his watch when he knows such a move could get him killed, the unfortunate moment when Vincent’s gun discharges while pointed at Marvin’s face), or when there purposely isn’t supposed to be any tension at all because we don’t know anyone yet (the “Royale with Cheese” discussion) those sequences are shot for real.

3. When Mr. Wolf sips Jimmie’s coffee, he, too, notes its high quality with a single facial expression.

4. In the film’s last scene, we get to see the robbery that Pumpkin and HoneyBunny had cooked up way back in the movie’s first scene. What’s great about this is the way that Quentin Tarantino stages that robbery; the two thieves are wildly nervous and over-do everything, making clear that this is the first time they’ve ever executed a crime of this nature. And what really drives that point home? The fact that these two, who have made robbing liquor stores their previous bread-and-butter, never think to do what anyone who’s robbed a restaurant before would know: to check the bathrooms.

5. Back in the “recovering the briefcase” scene, when Jules asks for a sip of Brett’s Sprite, he drains it instead, right down to the slurping sound that a straw makes when the pop is all gone; and all the while he’s giving Brett this stare that isn’t a cold stare, but a relaxed stare that makes utterly clear that Jules is in total command of this situation.

6. But are Jules and Vincent out of practice or something? Or is their chemistry off because Vincent is just back from three years in Amsterdam and thus hasn’t worked for a while? Because they walk into a situation where they admit beforehand they don’t know how many guys are up there, and they too don’t check the bathroom.

7. It’s not in the script, but when Lance (Eric Stoltz’s drug dealer) is describing to Vincent how to deliver the adrenaline shot to Mia’s heart, he says something like, “But she has a breast plate in front of her heart so you gotta pierce through that.” That is in the script. But in the movie, to emphasize the point, Lance mimes the stabbing motion three times, and Vincent asks: “Do I gotta stab her three times?”

8. At the end, after dispensing his wisdom to Pumpkin and HoneyBunny, when he’s sitting in the middle of a crime scene, Jules is so relaxed that he thoughtfully takes another bite of his muffin.

9. Stopping to eat in the middle of a dangerous situation doesn’t just happen there. I’ve always loved how Butch, in returning to his apartment and recovering his watch, while he has to know he needs to get out of there ASAP, stops to heat up a Pop-Tart. If he’d just left, none of the other stuff afterward would have happened, and he’d still have Marcellus’s price on his head.

10. Sounds in the film: Fabian’s excessive teeth-brushing. The way the first song during the opening credits is interrupted as the old-school manual knob car stereo is changed. Mia Wallace’s music, on a reel-to-reel tape player. When Mia’s OD’ing, we hear Vincent offscreen talking to her, and then we fade in on her drugged-out face, and we only know that Vincent’s found her when we hear his reaction.

I could go on a while, but I’ll leave it there. Generally, I tend to not like stories that glorify organized crime or criminal lifestyles the way Pulp Fiction does, but this film is different in its theme of redemption; the only character who gets to escape the life is the one who is given the epiphany that this isn’t the life he should be pursuing. (Although, to be fair, we don’t know that Jules successfully leaves the life; maybe Marcellus gets angry at his resignation and kills him? We never know.)

I suppose that one of these years I should watch Jackie Brown and Kill Bill….

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