The mafo's MoFo 100 List

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100. Fantasia (Walt Disney & Dozens, 1940)/Allegro non troppo (Bruno Bozzeto, 1976)

Two of the greatest cartoons are still alive enough to comment on the brilliance of each other.

99. Kind Hearts and Coronets (Robert Hamer, 1949)



Alec Guinness dies eight times so you can laugh all the more...

98. Stop Making Sense (Jonathan Demme, 1984)




My vote for the greatest concert film ever.

97. Hail the Conquering Hero (Preston Sturges, 1944)



One of the most genuine films ever; it's a satire, a comedy, a drama, a love story and a paean to WWII America

96. Jesus of Montreal (Denys Arcand, 1989)



Taken from Movie Tab II, July 2, 2010:

Beautiful, thought-provoking, irreverent, haunting, funny, sexy and deeply moving are all words I use to describe what I consider the greatest Jesus film ever made, Jesus of Montreal. It's set in present-day Montreal where a group of actors get together to put on an updated version of the Passion on the grounds of a Catholic church. The troupe's ostensible leader, Daniel (the incredible Lothaire Bluteau), who is to play Jesus, begins the film recruiting his apostles and before long it becomes apparent that almost everything which is happening in real life is a mirror of the Passion Play and the Gospels, often in strikingly original ways. Director/writer Arcand looks at things from many perspectives so you can never be sure what his personal agenda is, but one thing is for sure and that's if you're a believer, you should be able to put Jesus's life into a more-modern and personal context. If you hate "religious" movies, you will quickly see that this is not a religious film at all, yet it doesn't shy away from showing a powerful Jesus (both Biblical and "actor") who is totally capable of performing miracles which affect people's lives in the here and now. It's a wonderful film which seems to accomplish the impossible by presenting a potentially-polarizing subject in a very inclusive way. I think it can only disappoint the most-fundamentalist of churchgoers, but it will reward those with open hearts and minds. Besides that, it's damn entertaining. Two of my fave scenes are the low-budget special effects presentation of the beginning and ending of the world and the hilarious scene of dubbing a porno movie. However, it's the night-time Passion Play itself, which is so hypnotic and causes Daniel and his followers to get in trouble with the Catholic Church even though it's critically acclaimed and loved by the audiences.

95. One-Eyed Jacks (Marlon Brando, 1961)



Probably the greatest revenge western ever. Watch it!

94. Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa, 1954)



The Master knows when to change up on you.

93. The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, 1943)



Awesome duelling technique of the old school.

92. Night and Fog (Alain Resnais, 1955)



Probably the most powerful film about the Holocaust ever made.

91. The Iron Giant (Brad Bird, 1999)


Brad Bird begins to define his humanist sensibilities within traditional animation.
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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
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90. People Will Talk (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1951)



This film is so unique, in so many ways, that to spoil even a moment would be a sin.

89.Friendly Persuasion (William Wyler, 1956)



A simple family saga about the Civil War becomes a humorous and powerful film about the War Between the States.

88. Horse Feathers (Norman Z. McLeod, 1932)

The Marx Bros. go college and incredibly ridiculous.



Mr. Huxley U. Himself.



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86. Barbarosa (Fred Scepisi, 1982)



This is one of my fave films. Very simple. Williie Nelson and Gary Busey give tremendous performances and the film turns itself inside out to become a movie about everyone you know.



The People's Republic of Clogher
Every time an Ealing Comedy gets posted on a MoFo 100 somebody tells Sean Penn to lighten up. A bit like It's A Wonderful Life.

Only more so.

Just out of interest, if these aren't your 'top' or 'favourite' movies, what criteria do you use when choosing them?
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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
Just out of interest, if these aren't your 'top' or 'favourite' movies, what criteria do you use when choosing them?
That was a pretty silly thing I said, but I was very tired. I was trying to get at the fact that I made up a list of about 200 films, all of which probably deserve to be on a "Top 100" List. I'm picking my top films from that list, and on a different day, I could probably have 50 different titles on my list.



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
85. Wild Strawberries (Ingmar Bergman, 1957)



An awesome dream opening gives way to a meditation on how the young and old are forever intertwined.

84. The Caine Mutiny (Edward Dmytryk, 1954)



Bogart is electrifying as Captain Queeg, but the rest of the cast almost matches him and the direction is muscularly authentic.

83. Romeo and Juliet (Franco Zefirrelli, 1968)



Another authentic-looking film with very good performances; probably the most entertaining Shakespeare film ever.

82. The Three Musketeers (1973)/The Four Musketeers (1974) (Richard Lester)



THE Swashbuckler par excellence.

81. Red River (Howard Hawks, 1948)



Spectacular western epic about the first cattle drive along the Chisholm Trail is actually a thinly-veiled retelling of Mutiny on the Bounty. But years earlier, Thomas Dunson (John Wayne) breaks free from a wagon train with his longtime friend Groot (Walter Brennan), a wagon, a bull and some horses. Dunson tells his fiancee (Colleen Gray) to continue on with the train and that he'll send for her when he's ready. By the time the two men make it to the Red River in Texas, they realize that the wagons have been attacked by Indians. After the Indians attack them at night, young Matt arrives at their camp with a cow but he's half-crazy having witnessed the Indian attack on the wagon train before escaping. Years later, after the Civil War, Matt (played by Montgomery Clift as an adult) returns to help Dunson and Groot drive the herd of almost 10,000 cattle west to Missouri, although there are rumors that there's a railroad in Abilene, Kansas, which would eliminate the danger of Missouri raiders stealing the herd and killing the men. Dunson wants to take them to Missouri though and becomes despotic on the drive, causing many of the men to grumble and question his authority. Eventually, there is a mutiny and Dunson is left behind injured and embarrassed while Matt leads the herd to Abilene. Dunson vows to kill Matt once he recuperates and comes after him.

Red River is full of action, male bonding, Indian attacks, gunfights, fistfights and the recreation of a full-fledged cattle drive where all the principal actors actually are involved in transporting a huge herd. It's also a character study of a bitter man who hasn't reconciled himself to a new postwar world where he needs more help than he ever has before but is too proud to ask for it since it will make him seem weak. I'm not going to go into the details about the films ending which has been discussed here recently, except to say that it makes total sense to me and is the only ending I can think of which does in the light of the way the two main characters have been presented for over two hours of screen time. If you want to see a father kill his son in a western, go watch The Big Country where it makes sense, but don't ask an epic western about the founding of a great cattle empire to end with one of the founders dead over a stubborn old man's misplaced sense of pride.



Love The Caine Mutiny and The original Musketeers!
Great stuff!
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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
80. The Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner, 1980)



The Plot thickens as new relationships are formed and revealed.

79. Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)




Hitch's twisty masterpiece of suspense is also a great black comedy.

78. Hobson's Choice (David Lean, 1954)



Charles Laughton is a riot as the tyrannical bootshop owner Hobson, but his daughter Brenda De Banzie and employee John Mills turn the tables on him.

77. The Professionals (Richard Brooks, 1966)



Riproaring western entertainment with a terrific cast and a simple, yet action-packed story with witty dialogue.

76. The Guns of Navarone (J. Lee Thompson, 1961)




Another rousing adventure, based on Alistair Maclean's best seller, involving an impossible mission during WWII.

75. The Nun's Story (Fred Zinnemann, 1959)



Audrey Hepburn's performance is the centerpiece of this powerful and suspenseful tale of a young woman's voyage of self-discovery and sacrifice between the World Wars.

74. Young Frankenstein (Mel Brooks, 1974)



Laugh riot is not only a loving homage to the Universal Frankenstein series, but a legitimate sequel of the same.

73. Straw Dogs (Sam Peckinpah, 1971)




Controversial film packs a cinematic and sociological wallop, culminating in the final third which is the most-expertly orchestrated of any of Peckinpah's violent set pieces.

72. The Maltese Falcon (John Huston, 1941)



It's kind of hard to go wrong when you have a perfect cast and script, and you're not going to screw that up while directing your first film.

71. The Bridge on the River Kwai (David Lean, 1957)



A cross between a POW film and an impossible mission flick. The pyrotechnics at the end are impressive, but the heart of the film is Alec Guinness' flawed, yet moving character who can elicit tears from a quiet, contemplative scene where he ruminates on what his life has added up to.



Will your system be alright, when you dream of home tonight?
79. Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)



Hitch's twisty masterpiece of suspense is also a great black comedy.
79!? Blasphemy! Nah, just kidding. Still in my top 10
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I used to be addicted to crystal meth, now I'm just addicted to Breaking Bad.
Originally Posted by Yoda
If I were buying a laser gun I'd definitely take the XF-3800 before I took the "Pew Pew Pew Fun Gun."



The People's Republic of Clogher
That was a pretty silly thing I said, but I was very tired. I was trying to get at the fact that I made up a list of about 200 films, all of which probably deserve to be on a "Top 100" List. I'm picking my top films from that list, and on a different day, I could probably have 50 different titles on my list.
Excellent!

My advice to you, good sir, is to can this thread quick and get working on MoFo's first Top 200. We could get this website even more famous than it is now - the home of the most massive lists on the internet!

Oh, and I loved The Guns of Navarone so much as a kid I was bought the talking book along with my first walkman.



Put me in your pocket...
I love reading your list so far Mark. Nice job.
I haven't seen The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, People Will Talk or Hobson's Choice. You've given me more movies to look for.

My advice to you, good sir, is to can this thread quick and get working on MoFo's first Top 200. We could get this website even more famous than it is now - the home of the most massive lists on the internet!
MoFo's first Top 200?

Dave...Whatchu talkin' 'bout?
Yes...I'm a tad out of touch with things



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
70. Poltergeist (Tobe Hooper, 1982)/E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (Steven Spielberg, 1982)

Spielberg's 1-2 Punch for 1982. Poltergeist tanked and E.T. became a phenomenon.


To me, Poltergeist is Raiders of the Lost Ark in a haunted house. People seem to forget that E.T. was a low-budget flick with almost no FX. I'll admit that the second half where ET gets sick does go on far too long, but the first half of the film is cinematic magic on every level, from the acting of the kids to the homage of The Quiet Man.

69. Some Like It Hot (Billy Wilder, 1959)/Tootsie (Sydney Pollack, 1982)/Victor/Victoria (Blake Edwards, 1982)




The three best cross-dressing romantic comedies are all basically hilarious farces, yet they comment significally on sexual politics.

68. Tom Jones (Tony Richardson, 1963)



The filmmakers were afraid they had a mess, so they decided to throw in every technique they could think of. It helped, but what really pushed it over was the awesome cast and SEX!

67. The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939)



Of all the movies so far, I've probably UNDERrated, this one the most. This film lives with me and has ever since I was old enough to remember watching it. This film may have more indelible images than any I've ever seen.

66. Full Metal Jacket (Stanley Kubrick, 1987)



A couple of anecdotes: When I first saw this film, I got physically ill. I don't know if the film caused it or not, but I vote yes, and it's the most-affected I've been by a film in the 20 years since. I also believe that people misunderstand the film. True, the first 40 minutes may well be the greatest first 40 minutes I've ever seen, but the film is in THREE acts. Once in Viet Nam, there is a random series of events which are fully documented by the war, but the Third Act is the part where the Americans learn that they can kill, but they cannot defeat the "home team", even if it's made up of teenage girls. To me, that's the most powerful thing in the film, along with the fact that the American soldiers still look up to Mickey Mouse at the end.

65. GoodFellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990)



Scorsese's masterpiece covers almost everything significant he's tried to convey through cinema. You can watch many other of his films, but I'd start with this one and branch off from there.

64. Patton (Franklin J. Schaffner, 1970)



If any actor has been as possessed by a character as George C. Scott was for George S. Patton, I'd be hard-pressed to agree.

63. SE7EN (David Fincher, 1995)



Terrific script, terrific acting, and direction beyond terrific makes this film better than any "train wreck" you've ever seen.

62. Heaven Can Wait (Ernst Lubitsch, 1943)



Perhaps the most romantic American film ever made, it's certainly one of the wittiest and most colorful (yes, it's a color film, often garrishly so, thank God.)

61. The Godfather Part II (Francis Coppola, 1974)



Highly-cinematic continuation of The Godfather. However, it has almost no significance outside the context of the first film.



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60. 2001:A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)



The film which covers the greatest span of time of any film and does it very artistically. The people of 1968 bought more tickets to this film than any other, but if you're smarter than they were... cancel that; it's not a possibility.

59. The Wanderers (Philip Kaufman, 1979)



Awesome, surreal, violent, hilarious film about gang warfare, romance and the way families destroy each other.

58. The Outlaw Josey Wales (Clint Eastwood, 1976)



Eastwood's movie is one of the greatest to find peace with the Native American, at least this side of Little Big Man.

57. Planet of the Apes (Franklin J Schaffner, 1968)



Probably my fave sci-fi film which uses its brains!