Godfather I is my favorite movie, but the best movie ever made of all time is Citizen Kane. There will never be another movie made that is made any better than Citizen Kane (as far as combination of acting, directing, cinematography and scriptwriting).
Citizen Kane is one of the most boring movies I have ever seen. It is one of the few movies I have ever found myself nodding off in the middle of. It might be technically perfect or whatever, but the primary purpose of movies is entertainment (and making money of course), and CK is definitely not one of the most entertaining movies ever, except maybe if you are an aspiring filmmaker or something.
Citizen Kane is a movie of a different era. The movies of the "Golden Age" of Hollywood do tend to be a lot more laid-back in their storytelling and move along at what, by today's standards, a fairly slow pace. The acting is also often overly theatrical, as are often the sets and art design, etc. when compared to today's more "realisitic" approach to filmmaking. There's also often more long shots and less coverage and close-ups. And more static shots and fewer cuts. Not all Golden Age movies are like that, of course, but that was a common style of the time (though I think the late '60s and early '70s were the height of the overly slow and plodding movie. It was supposed to be contemplative, I suppose, but it often comes out as just plain boring. Few people could pull it off, and even they were not always 100% effective. Though today's "big action set piece every 10 minutes" is not necessarily better).
As much as I admire Kane, I disagree with this statement. the Maltese Falcon, for example, is about as close to perfection in filmmaking as I've ever seen...try and find one less than sincere moment, one character who isn;t convincing and interesting, one scene that doesn't deliver the exact effect that was intended. The dialogue is so interesting that 15 year old kids of today laugh at the jokes, and the actors so perfectly cast that Bogart still seems 'cool'...Awesome. But there are others...L of A is amazingly beautiful, as are all of Lean's films, but this one finds just the right note for the chosen story without veering too far into the panoramic self-indulgence of Zhivago. Kwai is also brilliant. Wings of Desire is exaclty what it wants to be, which can be a definition of film perfoection
There's a few on there I haven't seen, either, including: Casablanca, Godfather, Part II, LOTR I, II, and III, Schindler's List, Amelie, Lawrence of Arabia and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. But I think it's interesting that you threw Doc Hollywood into the Top 25 when you listed the ones you hadn't seen. If we go all the way to 100, I haven't seen (in addition to the above): Sunset Blvd., The Pianist, Once Upon a Time in the West, Paths of Glory, Spirited Away, Das Boot, Singing in the Rain, M, Requiem for a Dream, City of God, Raging Bull, The Sting, Life is Beautiful, 2001, The Great Escape, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Modern Times, Amadeus, On the Waterfront, Annie Hall, Braveheart, The Apartment, Metropolis, The General, City Lights, The Great Dictator, Kill Bill, Vol 1, and the Seveth Seal. So that's 37 of 100 I haven't seen, and at least one (Donnie Darko) I wish I hadn't seen.
Wow. It would be hard for me to disagree more. There are generally considered to be ( SJC is about to pop in here ) 2 golden ages of filmmaking: the late 30's early 40's, and the late 60's, early 70s, each for their own reasons. The first was sort of a convergence of studio techniques, the evolutiuon of experimental film into a narrative form easy to follow, a stable of seriius actors and directos working with good material, and the advent of European influences on the American genres. The latter also had many reasons behind it, but the most important was that it was the last and greatest gasp of the auteur, the writer/director who made films for reasons beyond commerical appeal. Jaws, Star Wars and the like effectively destroyed this period, as studios were amazed at the amount of meny filsm could make if packaged and sold in a certain way, and immediately assumed a much greater role in the process, and took a lot of the power out of the hands of the directors and writers. Now along with these brilliant films like Taxi Driver, Midnight Cowboy and All The President's men were many a self-absorbed, obviously highly drug-influenced excercise in mental masturbation, but the cream of the crop was more intelligent, thought provoking and genuine that are found in most of today's Hollywood studio folms. The only places you really see this kind of quality any more are in so called independant films, and those, too, are going the way of the Dodo.
Wow...I'm astounded that an accomplished filmmaker such as yourself hasn't seen a few of those movies(Namely Casablanca, the Godfathers, Schindler's List, and Lawrence of Arabia). I know I'm only a lowly high school student, but I highly suggest that you make it a Blockbuster weekend. Of course, all of those movies are good enough to make it a Best Buy DVD section weekend also.
I don't think you really disagree. There are a handful of films that came out of that era that were fantastic and were able to pull off being long (and even pull off long static shots and long periods without dialogue or anything really 'happening'), but those were few and far between. The movies you cite (and a few others) are examples of it done right, but there are a whole mess of others that simply tried to pull of the same things and couldn't. So you end up with faux contemplativeness that ends up just being long, slow and boring. But the giants of the era were not often guilty of that to any great degree (though I found The Conversation to be a little too plodding for my tastes. And I'm no fan of anything Stanley Kubrick ever did). That kind of movie was simply the style of the time, and very few people could pull it off.
I'm not as astonished. When in film, I knew quite a few director types who preffered what they saw as 'smaller, more human stories' and intentionally avoided anything with an epic feel, which they often found boring without having seen. The list Mrpaige has avoided would lead to think that he leans that way...
I think tried and failed is endemic to any period and style. I evaluate eras on the best of the bunch. Have you seen Paths of Glory, BTW? I am astonished that you didn;t like Strangelove...am I right in assuming you find Kubrick too cold?
I actually own the Godfather collection on DVD, I've just not gotten around to watching the second one yet.
But it's a style that I don't generally like when done poorly. I can enjoy lesser works from other eras, but the 60s and 70s produced a lot of stuff, beyond the very good stuff that did come out, that I just simply cannot watch. But I can watch just about anything from the '40s, for example. Actually, I do like Strangelove. That's the one exception to my Kubrick rule. I have not seen Paths of Glory. Cold is a good way to describe Kubrick.
Slo, Mr.P...I think that you're being too narrow about the time. The idea of cessarios, of thought induced films, not filling every second with action or dialogue etc. translated to many forms, aside from the social/pychological examinations for which it is most noted ( Midnight Cowboy, etc.) with excellent results: Westerns: Butch Cassidey & the Sundance Kid, the Wild Bunch,Little Big Man, Jeremiah Johnson, the Long Riders, etc. Thrillers: Klute, The French Connection, the Ipcress File, the aforementioned Conversation, the Parallax View, All The President's etc. Action: Bonnie & Clyde, Bullit, The Man Who Would Be King, etc.
Yeah. I didn't like it at the time, but it's been a while. A friend of mine considers it the best movie ever made, so it must have something going for it. That's one I might give another try.
Probably so. There are a good many movies that came out of that era that are very entertaining. But there are always going to be some that rub you the wrong way and potentially turn you off to a style of moviemaking. For example, I love "All the President's Men". It is, in my opinion, one of the best movies ever made. But you mention "Klute" in the same breath, which I did not find to be all that great. "Klute" is, in my opinion, one of the examples of the format done wrong. It had all sorts of things going for it. Jane Fonda gave an excellent performance, Donald Sutherland was great, as he so often is. The premise was a good one, and I even liked the way it was shot (and it was shot in a way that would never be done today), but for some reason, the whole was less than the sum of the parts for me. It just didn't work as an overall movie. And I came away feeling like it was too slow, too plodding and with not enough payoff for the story. It just didn't work for me, and because it had that '70s style, the overall experience for me was made worse than it would've been had the same movie been made in a '50s style, for example.
