10 years ago the AFI came out with it's list of top 100 movies. Thanks to a friend who worked in a video store and gave me free rentals, I saw most of the top 50 movies.
Wikipedia has the side by side of the two lists.
But here are a few thoughts:
Citizen Kane deserves to be #1. It really was a fantastic movie, especially when you consider the time period in which it was made.
Casablanca and The Godfather for 2 and 3 are a tossup. Both so great, yet so different.
Raging Bull moved all the way up to #4 from #24. I'm shocked and I couldn't disagree more. While I think it's a great movie, and an enjoyable movie, to make the top 10 it has to be near perfect and Raging Bull goes on too long, there is too much cursing and fighting and jumping around. At 24 I agree, at 4 it's a reach.
My favorite of all the movies I discovered while watching the oldies is #5, Singin In The Rain. Definitely the best musical ever. Funny, smart, well-done, just a fantastic movie. No, I'm not kidding.
Only four movies made since the list came out made the list: Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Sixth Sense, Saving Private Ryan and Titantic. Terrible choices.
Shawshank Redemption made the list. Thank God. If you add Gump and Pulp, 1994 was probably the best year for movies in a very long time.
How did Toy Story make this list? There are about 10 other movies in its genre that are better including Shrek and Finding Nemo.
If you haven't seen these movies which are on the list, don't: Midnight Cowboy, Easy Rider (no plot, just pretty pictures), The Deer Hunter and A Clockwork Orange.
If you haven't seen these movies which are on the list, rent them: Bonnie & Clyde, North by Northwest, 12 Angry Men and The French Connection.
3 comments:
All those free video = reason why West Coast Video ended up closing..
Toy Story is on there cuz it was the first animated movie to break new ground or some bullshit like that. It's not necessarily the 'best' animated movie...just the first one with modern computer crap.
I actually heard something similar said about Citizen Kane...having to do with some camera technique.
I 100% agree with you about Singing in the Rain....I'll admit, awesome stuff.
How is that the list is so disparately different? If an old movie was not in the top 100 10 years ago, what makes it suddenly great now?
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