The Movieforums Top 100 War Movies Countdown

This pair was on my list.

I am a big fan Polanski’s films, and The Pianist is certainly one of his top tier masterpieces. No matter what one thinks of Roman Polanski post-1977, the story of his childhood and rather miraculous escape from the Nazis in a very similar fashion to Władysław Szpilman’s is harrowing, and he powerfully used his own tragic autobiography to flesh out the details of Warsaw on screen. Adrien Brody was one of the biggest surprise Oscar winners ever when he took Best Actor over Daniel Day-Lewis, Jack Nicholson, Michael Caine, and Nic Cage, but he also richly deserved it. It was number eleven on my list (fifteen points) and on another day it could have been even higher.

The Battle of Algiers was seventeenth on my ballot. As some may recall back in 2003, in preparation for what they thought they may face in Iraq, The Pentagon even used this fictional film shot in a Neo-Realist documentary-like style as an example of how urban guerrilla warfare is waged. Forty years after the end of the actual Algerian War for Independence and thirty-seven years after the film was released, it was still considered relevant enough and accurate enough to be used in such a manner.

It has always been linked to Costa-Gavras' Z in my head, as I saw them both around the same time, they were made within a few years of each other, and while Z is more stylized and has overt elements of a mystery, that cinematic look at political upheaval in Greece meshes thematically with the Algerian conflict of Pontecorvo's masterpiece.

Algeria is still a spectre in France, and continues to pop up in movies such as Michael Haneke's Caché (2005) and Rachid Bouchareb's Days of Glory (2006) and Outside the Law (2010), yet that colonization and liberation may be unknown or a sketchy footnote to American and larger worldwide audiences. But you need not know a lot of the historical specifics to be moved and impressed by The Battle of Algiers, which like most great works of narrative art reveals universal truths through its specificity, whether you know the context or not.


That makes ten of my titles.

HOLDEN'S BALLOT

7. Fires on the Plain (#59)
9. Army of Shadows (#29)
10. Waltz with Bashir (#45)
11. The Pianist (#23)
14. MASH (#39)
15. Rome, Open City (#37)
16. Letters from Iwo Jima (#60)
17. The Battle of Algiers (#24)
19. The Ascent (#33)
21. The Killing Fields (#69)
25. The Wind That Shakes the Barley (DNP)

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I think everyone already got the hints.

No, it says number 7 for you

Really? Wow. .Maybe I was only judging it as a war movie at the time. Or maybe I probably did that because I assumed everyone else would have it high on their list!

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The Deer Hunter is my #10. Here's something I wrote about it a few years ago:

The Deer Hunter is easily one of my favorite Best Picture winners. It's been said that the best movies are about something and that they're about something else. In addition to capturing the disillusionment and dearth of patriotism found in America during and after the Vietnam War, it depicts adult bonding and friendship in a sweeping, near-operatic and indelibly affecting way. There is a lot to praise here from the sudden and jarring transition to the war and its harrowing imagery to he performance of Christopher Walken - which is iconic for how good it is, of course, and unique for how closely he makes Nick's transition parallel the country's during this era - to a scene that always seems to be a point of contention: the wedding. Naysayers point out how long and/or boring it is, but I believe that it is the movie's secret weapon. To be fair, I'm a proponent of strong first acts in general, but I think the impact of the movie's most impactful moments would be much duller if the movie only showed us the wedding's highlights and/or gave us a montage.

I've talked about how affecting and intense the movie is, but it also deserves credit for its comedy, the best of which comes from the male bonding moments. I still laugh at and, well, ponder the meaning of this line: "This is this. This ain't something else. This is this." This is not my favorite movie about the Vietnam War - that would be Apocalypse Now or Full Metal Jacket - but it is one of the best, not to mention one of the most honest portrayals of the Vietnam war or any other war at home. Oh, and how sad is it to watch John Cazale in this movie, which featured his final performance. He does his best, but he could only do so much to conceal his deteriorating state.

Trying to catch up reading everyone's thoughts, but I am still pretty far back. Meanwhile, here are a few thoughts of my own...

Knowing Braveheart's reputation on the site, in that is a pretty divisive film, I pushed it all the way up to #4 on my ballot, as I wanted to give it as many points as possible. I have been known to overrate this film in the past, like on the all-time great films MoFo list, and as far as this list in concerned, this rating feels more genuine then ranking it super high on the all-time list just to get it some extra points, even though I pulled the same stunt then! I adore Braveheart, and always have. My willingness to die on this particular hill remains strong, but 4th was as high as I was going to go, because I couldn't in good faith rank it above any of my top 3, as I feel they are all objectively better films.




I had The Pianist at #13. Is this film better than Braveheart? Yes! It is a heartbreaking, somber affair, and being a Polanski film, it excels on a technical level. But this is a favorites list, and I would rather watch Braveheart, as I just find it to be a more enjoyable/entertaining watch. I know The Pianist would rank highly, so I let it slide down a bit in order to give all my favorites a boost. Same story, different film! The Pianist is an excellent film, one that everyone should see.

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As much as I don't think Braveheart deserve to be anywhere near any best of list (not even on a best Mel Gibson movie list, with both Apocalypto and Passion being far superior), the hatred it gets has almost always been as baffling to me. No it's not capital C cinema. No, I'm sure it's not historically inaccurate. Yeah, it's mostly a collection of spectacle and easy dramatic moments and is about as deep as a toenail clipping. But none of that obscures the fact that Gibson is pretty great at popcorn level spectacle and intense emotionalism. It's a perfectly fine bit of entertainment. It's a more than competent piece of film. It's got Mel Gibson in it (who, no matter what one thinks of him personally, was always dynamite in front of the camera). And while I get why that's not enough for some (for one, me), there are so many more egregious offenders out there, even in the douche-bro sub category of cinema.



Like, at least it's not Gladiator.


Meanwhile, The Pianist is one of those movies that I honestly don't know how I feel about it. It feels like it's one of Polanski's better or even best later period films. And it's got a unique vibe in the kind of lonely despair it portrays. But, maybe as a personal failing of my own, because I can't locate what the problem actually is, I don't really connect with it. Am I supposed to be on the outside looking in on what is happening to Brodie's character? Because that's where I always end up when I watch it.

I end up there also...but I think it's because I just have this natural defense mechanism that drops various emotional shields down anytime I try to come to grips with watching something that is based on or shows true events in this manner. Even something that is a straight up documentary, as when I just recently watched a six part 9/11 docuseries, I have to sort of push through the trained and deeply ingrained process of watching something on a screen, which puts my brain in fake world mode. Probably because I have spent so much time in front of screens watching fake worlds and stories all my life.

Messed up the hint for 21. Wrong movie. Sorry.