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What do you consider to be the best films ever made?

Taking into consideration some of the following:

1. Great production and direction
2. Great cinematic execution, good photography, sets, costumes, etc.
3. Good and meaningful plot
4. Meaningful thematic development
5. Great acting
6. The stories ability to draw the viewer in
7. The main characters transformation during the process (which is fundamental, I think)
8. The timeless and universally enduring quality of the film
9. Whatever else you might consider

What then do you think are some of the best movies ever made?

Using the above criteria, my top two choices would be To Kill a Mockingbird with Gregory Peck, and Apocalypse Now Redux with Martin Sheen.

Personally, on these kinds of lists that you see floating around, Citizen Kane is always at the top. Yet I fail to see how that could be. I hated Citizen Kane, and I can't help but feel that its classification as The Best Film Ever Made is one of those self-perpetuating lies or mistakes that just keeps being retold and retold because someone sees that list, thinks there must be something in it, and then repeats what they read.

What do you think?

Tags: Cinema, Film, Movies

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jaume on August 31, 2009 at 5:45pm

Ozu is a genius in my opinion. Almodóvar perhaps not so, but I felt I had to put a living director in my top list.

Solaris - I don't think you can appreciate it without reading the novel first, or at least without a fair bit of exegesis. Stalker is still his best movie.

Vittorio De Sica - Give The Bicycle Thief a try. Then, if you like it, Miracle in Milan, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, La Ciociara, Umberto D.

Kieślowski - the Blue, White, Red trilogy (Blue is the best), and The Decalogue series.

Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on August 31, 2009 at 6:08pm

I've heard of The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, and Adriana just posted something about, or a reference to, The Bicycle Thief. I've also heard of the Blue trilogy, though never seen it.

Permalink Reply by sacha on August 31, 2009 at 8:04pm

Stalker. It is one of my favourite films of all time. Try another Tarkovski, Dallas. In my humble opinion, he is the best director of all time, but Solaris was not my favourite of his.

Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on September 1, 2009 at 9:10am

Okay, I've requested Stalker from ILL.

Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on September 1, 2009 at 9:46am

Ghost World was a decent film. American Beauty was great. Thought Trainspotting was decent, too, but can't put as one of the best, imo. Same for Pulp Fiction. Never heard of Taking of Pelham, and Vanishing Point sounds familiar, but can't place it right now. Never seen The Big Lebowski, and never heard of Les Visiteurs.

Permalink Reply by Louis Davout on September 3, 2009 at 3:49am

Taking of Pelham - men hijack a subway train. I thought it (the 1974 version) was very good.

Permalink Reply by Louis Davout on September 3, 2009 at 3:45am

First I agree about Citizen Kane. I thought it was extremely boring.

I know there are movies that I can't think of right now that should be on the list but here goes (in no particular order):

The Empire Strikes
Raiders of the Lost Ark
V for Vendetta
The Usual Suspects
Inherit the Wind
Arsenic and Old Lace
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The Game
The Shawshank Redemption
Aliens
Die Hard
Slueth
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
Murder by Natural Causes (My opinion could be complete off now. I saw it once when I was 10. If I watched it now I don't what I would think of it. But I love movies with plot twists.)

Permalink Reply by James M. Martin on September 3, 2009 at 10:33pm

I dislike being baited into things like "Ten Best" lists, but I will play your silly game. The best? Hands down: Sergei M. Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible, Parts I and II. My reasons can best be summed up by the title of a term paper I did in film aesthetics at UCLA ages ago for the late Hugh Gray, who wrote the songs sung by Peter Ustinof as Nero in Mervyn LeRoy's high camp movie,Quo Vadis? and who translated into English the great Andre Bazin's What is Cinema? I wrote on "Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible: The Perfect Union of Form and Content."

Permalink Reply by DarwinsDamsel on September 5, 2009 at 4:00pm

Mysterious Skin (2004) DIR. Greg Araki
Julien Donkey-Boy (1999) DIR. Harmony Korrine
Ken Park (2002) DIR. Larry Clark
Hard Candy (2005) DIR. David Slade
Kids (1995) DIR. Larry Clark

My top 5 that smack me across the face.

Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on September 5, 2009 at 4:07pm

I just watched Mysterious Skin last month. I liked it, but I can't say it was one of my favorites. I've not heard of the others you listed. If you have the time, can you tell us a little about them?

Permalink Reply by DarwinsDamsel on September 6, 2009 at 2:00pm

Greg Araki is an acquired taste. That was one of his tamer movies. Doom Generation and Nowhere are two that are, cock-your-head strange, yet awesome at the same time.

Harmony Korrine and Larry Clark, share a lot of the same vision with film making. Raw, controversial, raunchy, border-line illegal. A lot shock value. Which I am, admittedly a sucker for. Ken Park and Kids are prime examples of such real life shock value. Harmony Korrine being a co-director/writer on each of these projects.

Julien Donkey-Boy, is a horse of a different color. Cloe Sevigny (also in Kids), Ewen Bremmer and Werner Herzog, truley make this movie for me. The acting sells the twisted story line.
It makes me squeamish to watch parts of that movie. Not for reasons of gore, which I am not normally phased by, but because people like this exist, in this world. I have met them, known them. Just like another top movie of mine GUMMO.
I can only watch Julien Donkey-Boy once every few years. It rips me apart.

I'm not much for giving away plots. Sorry, if I don't get too detailed. I'm always afraid of saying too much and giving away things that should have been surprises. lol.

Ah, and last but not least Hard Candy.
The way the movie is filmed makes you feel what the actor feels. At least that was my experience. Also Ellen Page (Juno fame), is phenomenal in this role. This is where I first discovered her. Instantly I saw potential. I'm stopping here, before i ramble on about my obsession with Ellen Page. lol

Sorry for the scattered explainations. lol.

Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on September 6, 2009 at 3:21pm

Okay, you've sold me on these films. I'm going to request them from the library today. I like shock if it is sincere, but not if it is sophmoric. Happiness seems like sincere shock to me.

Was Ellen Page in Ghost Town? I've not seen Juno, but I have seen previews of it.