Animal House? What a heap of shit.
tbf, heâs compiled this from lists that go back to the 1950s, so itâs naturally going to favour older films.
He says heâs actually modified it to make it less unfair to more recent films:
First-off, I have removed the âstood-the-test-of-timeâ formula. This formula disadvantaged films released within ten years of the poll or ballot they were listed in. After many years of adopting this approach, I finally concluded, during 2016, that this was unfair. As a result, many recent films have deservedly charged their way up this yearâs 1,000 Greatest Films listing. Some of these films include There Will Be Blood (2007), CachĂ© (2005), The Tree of Life (2011), Tropical Malady (2004), and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004).
All the criticisms made in this list are perfectly valid (apart from Ruffersâs [sorry Ruffers, I really like films]) but, you know, I found lists like this very useful when I was much younger and still nurturing an interest thatâs now become an obsession for life.
That sentence was a disaster.
Yes, the canonâs heavily, heavily, heavily skewed, and I would love to see a list that was a lot more representative. But I donât like the idea that rethinking canons requires a scorched earth approach. Reappraise, yes, but donât reject outright.
Some good stuff here. Pleased to see some genre films (Evil Dead, The Thing, Night of the Living DeadâŠ) among the arty ones that youâd expect to see. On the other hand, I agree with the comments about the lack of female directors, and itâs certainly over-weighted towards the US and to the past (even if thatâs understandable).
Still, treat it as a source of potentially interesting films that I havenât seen, rather than getting hung up on whether Rashamon is better than Seven Samauri (of course it is you idiots) and itâs quite a useful list.
I would like to work through one of these lists, but itâs not as easy as albums. Need something like a Spotify for films. Netflix/Amazon, etc all have very few âclassicâ films. Could download them illegally, but Iâm not that guy.
Wouldnât even get into my top ten âbest films of all timeâ list list
no one has actually ever watched Citizen Kane, have they?
I did. I found it really quite unspecial.
Citizen Kane was, is and will always be over rated as fuck.
There was no cane
Not a complete answer, but archive.org has got you covered for the older stuff, because itâs out of copyright:
I actually own it on DVD. I only watch it to spot all the bits that have been referenced in the Simpsons.
Thatâs actually amazing. Thanks.
i met a guy once in paris, i think he was one of the early prototype for a hipster, he was banging on a bit about citizen kane but said something about the film that made me realise that he probably hadnât watched it so I had to ask if he had, he said no but told me how he imagined it to be. Friendly guy all the same.
I liked it in a kind of history of film way.
But if you go through that list, try doing CTRL+F for 200, 199, 198 and 197 and scan the top 100 in each case. Because really if weâre ordering these then the top 100 are obviously being considered âbetterâ by some metric.
But really itâs such a Louis Tacos sort of list isnât it?
in fact, looking at this list in closer detail, most of the inclusions are old, and therefore shit.
The best bit is when it turns into a musical for 5 minutes in the middle.
As far as I can tell, itâs not really overrated so much as its rating for technical/historical reasons is confused with its rating for story/entertainment reasons.
Same shit is true for Star Wars I guess.
Just noted that In the Heat of the Night doesnât seem to be in this list. That is fucking BULLSHIT. And itâs a perfect example (in my view) of a film thatâs old but is still great and still has total power to interest an audience.
I avoided it for years because i dislike michael caine
true story.
really great bit at the end where he goes âMY NAME IS CITIZEN KANEâ.