OT: AFI's Top 100 Films

p@mast3rs wrote on 6/21/2007, 12:13 PM

AFI TOP 100 U.S. FILMS
1. "Citizen Kane," 1941.
2. "The Godfather," 1972.
3. "Casablanca," 1942.
4. "Raging Bull," 1980.
5. "Singin' in the Rain," 1952.
6. "Gone With the Wind," 1939.
7. "Lawrence of Arabia," 1962.
8. "Schindler's List," 1993.
9. "Vertigo," 1958.
10. "The Wizard of Oz," 1939.
11. "City Lights," 1931.
12. "The Searchers," 1956.
13. "Star Wars," 1977.
14. "Psycho," 1960.
15. "2001: A Space Odyssey," 1968.
16. "Sunset Blvd.", 1950.
17. "The Graduate," 1967.
18. "The General," 1927.
19. "On the Waterfront," 1954.
20. "It's a Wonderful Life," 1946.
21. "Chinatown," 1974.
22. "Some Like It Hot," 1959.
23. "The Grapes of Wrath," 1940.
24. "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," 1982.
25. "To Kill a Mockingbird," 1962.
26. "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," 1939.
27. "High Noon," 1952.
28. "All About Eve," 1950.
29. "Double Indemnity," 1944.
30. "Apocalypse Now," 1979.
31. "The Maltese Falcon," 1941.
32. "The Godfather Part II," 1974.
33. "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," 1975.
34. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," 1937.
35. "Annie Hall," 1977.
36. "The Bridge on the River Kwai," 1957.
37. "The Best Years of Our Lives," 1946.
38. "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre," 1948.
39. "Dr. Strangelove," 1964.
40. "The Sound of Music," 1965.
41. "King Kong," 1933.
42. "Bonnie and Clyde," 1967.
43. "Midnight Cowboy," 1969.
44. "The Philadelphia Story," 1940.
45. "Shane," 1953.
46. "It Happened One Night," 1934.
47. "A Streetcar Named Desire," 1951.
48. "Rear Window," 1954.
49. "Intolerance," 1916.
50. "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring," 2001.
51. "West Side Story," 1961.
52. "Taxi Driver," 1976.
53. "The Deer Hunter," 1978.
54. "M-A-S-H," 1970.
55. "North by Northwest," 1959.
56. "Jaws," 1975.
57. "Rocky," 1976.
58. "The Gold Rush," 1925.
59. "Nashville," 1975.
60. "Duck Soup," 1933.
61. "Sullivan's Travels," 1941.
62. "American Graffiti," 1973.
63. "Cabaret," 1972.
64. "Network," 1976.
65. "The African Queen," 1951.
66. "Raiders of the Lost Ark," 1981.
67. "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?", 1966.
68. "Unforgiven," 1992.
69. "Tootsie," 1982.
70. "A Clockwork Orange," 1971.
71. "Saving Private Ryan," 1998.
72. "The Shawshank Redemption," 1994.
73. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," 1969.
74. "The Silence of the Lambs," 1991.
75. "In the Heat of the Night," 1967.
76. "Forrest Gump," 1994.
77. "All the President's Men," 1976.
78. "Modern Times," 1936.
79. "The Wild Bunch," 1969.
80. "The Apartment, 1960.
81. "Spartacus," 1960.
82. "Sunrise," 1927.
83. "Titanic," 1997.
84. "Easy Rider," 1969.
85. "A Night at the Opera," 1935.
86. "Platoon," 1986.
87. "12 Angry Men," 1957.
88. "Bringing Up Baby," 1938.
89. "The Sixth Sense," 1999.
90. "Swing Time," 1936.
91. "Sophie's Choice," 1982.
92. "Goodfellas," 1990.
93. "The French Connection," 1971.
94. "Pulp Fiction," 1994.
95. "The Last Picture Show," 1971.
96. "Do the Right Thing," 1989.
97. "Blade Runner," 1982.
98. "Yankee Doodle Dandy," 1942.
99. "Toy Story," 1995.
100. "Ben-Hur," 1959.

edit: I cant believe gems like "Cant Buy Me Love", "The Devils Rejects", or "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" didnt make it.

Comments

YesMaestro wrote on 6/21/2007, 1:12 PM

Patrick, I was waiting for Caddyshack and History of the World Part 1

Paul

riredale wrote on 6/21/2007, 1:49 PM

Here's another list, this time of most popular movies of all time, after adjusting for inflation. In other words, a movie ticket bought in 1957 counts the same as a movie ticket bought in 1987 or 2007.

I like this list because it knocks the wind out of the sails when a contemporary movie ad touts "Third-highest-grossing movie of all time!!" Well, not necessarily, after adjusting for inflation...

EDIT: Oops, just tried out the link and it's looking for registration information. Just click the link at the top of that page.

$1.3 BILLION for Gone With The Wind. That's a lot of tickets.

JJKizak wrote on 6/21/2007, 2:00 PM

What is "Laurance Of Arabia" doing in that list? That was a bust when released and a total bore.
JJK

p@mast3rs wrote on 6/21/2007, 2:26 PM

Interesting list but also you have to figure in the times as well. Back then, there wasnt no where near the amount of choices as you have today. Back then, everyone wasnt competing on Friday nights for the same audience. Most cities only had one movie to show. So you either saw that flick or you did something else. Nowadays, some places offer up to 20 different movies in the same house all day long. Either way, those numbers are impressive.

p@mast3rs wrote on 6/21/2007, 2:34 PM

Whats even scarier to me is that I have seen all but about 10 films on both lists.

Jay Gladwell wrote on 6/21/2007, 2:52 PM

Back then, there wasnt no where near the amount of choices as you have today.

That isn't an accurate statement. Actually, they made far more movies "back in the day" than are being made today on an annual basis.

For example, Casablanca was conceived and produced as a "B" film. Well, that goes to show you that William Goldman was right, in Hollywood, "nobody knows anything," and that's still true today! Probably more so.

Talking about films that were a "bust" when they were released, The Wizard of Oz was one of those. It had gone head-to-head that year with other films like:

Beau Geste

Just to name a few. So "W of O" was seen as a bit out of touch, a bit of fluff. However, over the years people began to see it in a new light.

By-the-way, Lawrence of Arabia is a great piece of cinema. I think history has borne that out very well. It's just not suited for everyone's taste.

Jay Gladwell wrote on 6/21/2007, 7:22 PM

In the first eleven months of 1939, there were 533 Hollywood theatrical films released (and that was down from the previous year).

In all of 2006 there were approximately 170 Hollywood theatrical films released (this does not include documentaries, straight to DVD, or foreign-made films released by Hollywood distributors, such as Fox Searchlight).

riredale wrote on 6/21/2007, 8:08 PM

I was a little kid when I was dragged to see Lawrence of Arabia. All I remember was:

(1) a cool motorcycle crash at the beginning

(2) some guy holding his finger over a flame

(3) lots of sand.

Not my favorite movie, though it kindled in me a great desire to ride a motorcycle.

rmack350 wrote on 6/21/2007, 8:20 PM

As a kid I was totally convinced that the Poseidon Adventure was VASTLY superior to Cabaret.

Oy! What a dog that film seems to be now. I'm glad I'm not that kid any more.

And, yeah, I've seen most of those films and am really happy I did. And for those I haven't, thank goodness for Netflix.

Rob Mack

Serena wrote on 6/21/2007, 11:09 PM

I would expect a child to be bored by any film that deals with adult concepts. Lawrence was one of those and you should be wary of putting forward childish impressions. But the joke is that now most films out of Hollywood are intended for children (or those who still like that sort of thing). A film that I found boring as a young woman was "Année dernière à Marienbad, L' " (1961), but now I suspect that I was too naive to understand it; someday I'll see it again and until then my opinion of the time "the most stupid film ever" is irrelevant.

deusx wrote on 6/21/2007, 11:12 PM

ET, Star Wars, Raiders of the lost Ark, Rocky, Titanic, Saving private Ryan???

Is this list a joke?

There were 100 movies better than that crap made in the past 2-3 years.

RexA wrote on 6/22/2007, 2:18 AM

>ET, Star Wars, Raiders of the lost Ark, Rocky, Titanic, Saving private Ryan???
>Is this list a joke?
>There were 100 movies better than that crap made in the past 2-3 years.

I agree that most of them are just entertaining fluff and don't deserve to be on great lists. On Ryan, I disagree. It was maybe not the greatest story ever scripted, but as a vehicle to try to get at the nature of battle and the essence of what fighting in a war is like, I think it nailed it better than just about all the others. Platoon had some moments where it had that feeling, but got wierd. Hamburger Hill had a lot of the reality, but only the story of the battle. As a person who has shot and been shot at, I think it is worth making movies that capture all the unpleasantness and arbitrariness of the experience. The John Wayne kind of movies pump out spirits but are crap. I have never really understood why anyone likes Apocalypse Now or Deer Hunter, although I see the metaphor in the second one.

Ryan is not one that I want to watch repeatedly, but I think it deserves to be on a great list for painting a picture of war accurately, honestly, and with respect, better than most others.

RexA wrote on 6/22/2007, 2:57 AM

>Is this list a joke?

One thing about these lists is, they are always wrong to some degree based on your opinion or mine.

At the risk of starting an endless thread, here's a challenge: Relative to the AFI list --

What one movie definitely does not belong? (And, optionally why?)
What one movie would you add? (And, optionally why?)
---

Without thinking much, I'll go first.

Scrolling down, the first Not I find:
"E.T." It's just fluff, mostly for kids, and I think there are better movies for kids.

Now the hard part. I'll probably kick myself when I think of others, but right now:
Add either

Salvador
or
Being John Malkovich

both quirky, but both pass the test of watching multiple times and I still want to watch them.
Hmm, adding good films is a lot harder than removing some.

JJKizak wrote on 6/22/2007, 5:40 AM

I didn't see one of my favorites--"The Naked Prey" with Cornell Wilde. I thought had some of the best Cinemascope photography ever done. And no love story segments, all action. "Shane" is at the top of my list and also "Saving Private Ryan". They didn't show the row of dead bodies stacked up six foot high on the beach for 1.5 miles but the action and the rain sequences were a soldier's nightmare.
JJK

Jay Gladwell wrote on 6/22/2007, 6:37 AM

Yes, I had the same reaction when I fisrt saw "Lawrence," I was 12 years old (snore).

However, I have grown up since then (though some would argue that) and my taste in cinema has broadened a bit more.

If you've not seen it since you were little, you owe it yourself to sit down and watch it again.

bStro wrote on 6/22/2007, 6:57 AM

Personally, I find the title of the list to be a bit vague to agree or disagree with any items on it, let alone to add or remove items from it. What exactly does that mean, "top films"? The most entertaining? The most thought-provoking? The most accessible? The least accessible?

No matter what criteria is used, I could certainly make my own list of "top 100 films," but it would be silly to take issue with AFI's or anyone else's list because it's all subjective. It's their list, their criteria -- who am I to tell them they're wrong?

But if I had to make a list of my "favorite" films, loosely based on the AFI's, then I would:

Remove: MASH. I love the show, but am bored by the movie. I saw it ages ago and was bored. I watched it last year thinking maybe I would "get it" now, but was still bored. Maybe I'll try again in another ten years.

Add: Memento. 'Cause the film is just, like, whoa.

Rob

deusx wrote on 6/22/2007, 8:55 AM

>>>Ryan is not one that I want to watch repeatedly, but I think it deserves to be on a great list for painting a picture of war accurately, honestly, and with respect, better than most others<<<

I'd agree with the first 20 minutes, landing scenes, but the rest of the movie is as unrealistic as it gets ( and boring ).

xberk wrote on 6/23/2007, 3:02 PM

We had alot of fun the other night thinking of classic films left off this list. Our list included such inspiration gems as "Major League" .. "The Bad News Bears" .. and "Smoky and the Bandit" .. These films have classic dialogue that transformed our lives, lifted our spirits and drove us to drink.
In the words of Buford T. Justice: "There's no way, *no* way that you came from *my* loins. Soon as I get home, first thing I'm gonna do is punch yo mamma in da mouth!"