Iro's Top 100 Movies v2.0

Hello, folks. Today marks the eighth anniversary of the first Top 100 list I published on this website, and there are many here among you who will agree that it's about time it got an update. Every time I look at that old list, I can't help but feel amused by my younger self - choosing objectively terrible films, ranking them above renowned classics, not to mention the sheer number of them that I haven't seen at all since I last made that list. Some favourites, huh? Anyway, a lot of long-time members have been anticipating a revised list, and though the sheer length of time (not to mention my occasional promise that I was "working on a draft" even as I stopped visiting these forums for months on end) has probably given any actual list a reputation on par with Chinese Democracy or Duke Nukem Forever, I'd like to think the end result doesn't suck. What you fine people make of it, on the other hand, remains to be seen.

Disclaimer: despite the numerical rankings, most of this list is arranged in no particular order so don't take too much umbrage at how I rank them because picking an acceptable order is nigh impossible. Also, there are some rather subjective choices, but of course that's expected.

Now, with that out of the way, it's time to get this show on the road. Okay, three, two, one, let's jam...

Lets do it

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Bring it!

A 1 and a 2 and a ....

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5-time MoFo Award winner.

... and here, we... don't.

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He's in Oz, so may not be up.

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

That's what I'd guess. At least it'll be Monday when he wakes up, so the site will probably be online.. Unlike most of this weekend.

Well, it was your list not the list of films you thought others liked on average. For that we have the IMDB.

Sorry about the delay, everyone. As soon as I'd managed to get that introductory post out of the way the site went down and stayed down well into the night. I'll actually get started now.

#100-#91



#100. Stand By Me
(Rob Reiner, 1986)

As of writing this entry, I'm twenty-three years old. I'm significantly older than the main quartet at the heart of this movie but not quite so much as to feel any good about how things were when I was their age. Not like Rob Reiner's adaptation of a Stephen King short story is quite the '50s nostalgia trip; rather, the tale of four twelve-year-old kids undertaking a journey on foot to find a dead body out of little more than curiosity makes for a well-rounded coming-of-age tale that offers instances of humour, rage and melancholy without ever getting too sentimental. Surprisingly strong child acting mixes with unforgettable sequences (junkyard dogs, leeches and speeding trains make for iconic moments) allow this film to rise above expectations and stick in my memory beyond a whole lot of other similar works.

2005 ranking: N/A



#99. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
(Tobe Hooper, 1974)

I don't really go in for slasher movies. Friday the 13th, Nightmare on Elm Street, My Bloody Valentine...they didn't really do much for me. Given how much I like John Carpenter, I even had Halloween on earlier drafts of this list. But in the end there's only one remotely "slasher" kind of movie that I feel even belongs on here, and it's this one. Sure, Halloween refined the formula a bit and had some fairly slick filmmaking to go with it, but while that's all nice and cinematic, there's something so absolutely visceral that gives Hooper's film the edge. The vague "based-on-a-true-story" vibe and the amateurish filmmaking lends the all-too-familiar story (a handful of friends encounter a fearsome killer who picks them off one by one) a better sense of immediacy than any kind of stiff professionalism. The familiar horror beats aren't quite so easily telegraphed, while the tension during the third act of the film (amplified somewhat by the ludicrous filming conditions) really pays off in making one feel like they're there in a stinking room full of maniacs. I get that there are those who have written this off and I completely understand that, but as it stands The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a strong enough proto-slasher to stand its ground almost 40 years after the fact. Also, gotta love that closing shot.

2005 ranking: N/A



#98. Near Dark
(Kathryn Bigelow, 1987)

I'm not sure why I haven't really seen more of Kathryn Bigelow's work. As of writing, I've only seen The Hurt Locker, Strange Days, Point Break and Near Dark. It speaks to her capabilities as a director that all of them are vastly different in terms of content and mood yet still manage to remain engaging. Though Strange Days and Point Break remain minor favourites, it's Near Dark that's not only my favourite Bigelow film, but also my favourite vampire film. Looking back, it almost doesn't seem that original - an unsuspecting cowboy (Adrian Pasdar) hooks up with a mysterious girl (Jenny Wright) only for her to turn him into a vampire. As dawn approaches and he starts burning up, a caravan with blacked-out windows arrives and he is more or less kidnapped by the girl and a ragtag group of vampires. Originally supposed to be set in the Wild West (there's a reason nobody actually says the V-word throughout the film), the Western overtones carry over just fine. The blood-sucking villains are played with serious panache by Aliens alumni Lance Henriksen, Jenette Goldstein and a deliciously hammy Bill Paxton, and their vicious survive-at-all-costs attitude makes for some stunning sequences - take the infamous diner sequence or the daylight shoot-out or even the film's surprising climax. Though parts of the films are admittedly clunky (Pasdar and Wright's romantic subplot just isn't that interesting, not to mention how developments in the third act may seem a little...surprising to most viewers) but it's still a largely well-made vampire-Western kind of movie. The appropriately sinister score by prolific Krautrock outfit Tangerine Dream also helps a film that already has plenty of atmosphere.

2005 ranking: N/A



#97. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin
(Liu Chia-liang, 1978)

Some films on this list are going to be representative of a single director's entire filmography. Some are going to be representative of an entire sub-section of cinema itself. I've chosen The 36th Chamber of Shaolin as a strong example of just how awesome old-school martial-arts movies could be. Specifically, Hong Kong kung-fu from the 1970s or so. As far as the genre goes it's pretty simple in terms of storyline - legendary martial artist Gordon Liu stars as a young student who flees from his wartorn village to a Shaolin monastery in order to learn how to fight off the land's oppressive overlords. Like so many other martial-arts movies, the plot serves as little more than a set-up for a number of elaborate stunts and fights, and this film delivers in spades. The middle hour of the film basically amounts to Liu undergoing an overly long training montage, but damned if it doesn't make for some eminently watchable stuntwork. I'm sure a few of you can nominate films from the same category that are even better (it doesn't quite have the colourful flair of Five Deadly Venoms or the comical edge of Drunken Master) but as a straightforward piece of work it's quite impressive.

2005 ranking: N/A



#96. Beavis and Butt-Head Do America
(Mike Judge, 1996)

"Huh-huh, heh-heh, huh-huh, heh-heh..." The titular teenaged idiots famous for little more than watching TV and acts of small-town delinquency are forced on an epic adventure when their TV is stolen, leading them on a cross-country trip where they cross paths with a pair of married criminals, a federal agent obsessed with cavity searches and their extremely unfortunate neighbour Mr. Anderson. Much like on the original show, creator Mike Judge crafts a surprisingly clever film around a pair of complete morons. The film manages to be like other good TV-to-movie adaptations by upping the production scale (the film features cinematic setpieces like a Godzilla parody and a psychedelic freakout, for starters) without sacrificing the core tenets that make it work. It takes good work to make a stupid film this brilliant.

2005 ranking: N/A



#95. South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
(Trey Parker, 1999)

I used to love South Park and cite it as one of my favourite shows, but these days I seem to have outgrown it for the most part as its later seasons start reaching mediocrity levels on par with The Simpsons. Unlike The Simpsons, South Park had its movie come out just as the show was reaching its own peak. The movie involves the main quartet of eight-year-old kids sneaking into an R-rated movie starring Canadian comedy team Terrance and Phillip, which in typical South Park fashion escalates into full-blown war between the United States and Canada while Satan and Saddam Hussein wait for the right moment to rise up and dominate the Earth. Pretty basic stuff, really. Trey Parker and Matt Stone go all out with the freedom afforded them by a cinematic release and turn the frequent use of vulgarity into something closely resembling an art form, all the while adding in grandiose musical numbers and admittedly gratuitous cartoon violence. Though the show has gone on and improved in terms of technical ability since then, the movie still sticks out as an example of just how good the show is at its best. The "Imaginationland" three-parter from a while back was supposed to be a movie in its own right but even with several years of technical improvement it didn't quite have the same charm as this. South Park may be one of those things I like less and less with each passing year, but I'll probably still hang onto this movie and consider it a minor classic - at least those musical numbers are well-done.

2005 ranking: N/A



#94. Super Troopers
(Jay Chandrasekhar, 2001)

As if to drive home the point that this is going to be a personal favourites list, I hereby include Super Troopers, which isn't that great of a film but it still beats the hell out of most other low-brow comedies from the 2000s (*cough*Old School*cough*). I even prefer it ever so slightly to other classic comedies in a similar vein like Caddyshack or Up in Smoke (both of which very nearly made the cut here). The plot revolves around a handful of Vermont state troopers (played by the members of Broken Lizard). Bored by their jobs in the quiet town, they spend most of their their time pranking motorists, each other and their rivals in the local police department. Things get serious when a drug-related murder happens in their jurisdiction around the same time that budget cuts might force the station to close. Brian Cox slums it brilliantly as the troopers' cantankerous captain, proving to be a great addition to a decent enough movie about a bunch of lawmen goofing off on the job. There's no way I can adequately defend how much I like this movie (I didn't even like it much at first myself), but a choice like this doesn't really need much defending. It's just simple, quotable fun.

2005 ranking: N/A



#93. Team America: World Police
(Trey Parker, 2004)

Amazing what I put near the top of my old list, isn't it? South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone put together another politically incorrect animated satire, this time using Thunderbirds-style marionettes. The titular team consists of a handful of combat specialists who are constantly fighting against terrorists around the world, often causing as much damage as the terrorists themselves. In order to learn about a new terrorist plot, they employ a famous Broadway actor to go undercover, causing more trouble and discovering something much bigger at stake in the process. The film is a mockery of overblown Michael Bay action movies as much as of America's overzealous approach to maintaining world peace (I never said the satire was particularly good, but it's at least the amusing kind of ridiculous). Countless blockbuster tropes are rendered especially silly by the use of marionettes - dynamic fistfights involve puppets flailing randomly at each other, melodramatic dialogue is delivered by extremely stiff faces and that's without mentioning the film's notorious sex scene - yet the production design involved actually looks rather accomplished. Though as time goes on I'm less inclined to think that Parker and Stone's output is as great as I used to, I can still dig a well-done parody and as far as I'm concerned Team America still does the trick.

2005 ranking: #15 (dropped 79 places)



#92. Before Sunrise
(Richard Linklater, 1995)

Richard Linklater's most noteworthy films from the 1990s tend to involve him reusing and refining certain concepts. Like his previous two films, Before Sunrise takes place over the course of a single day within the confines of a single city. While Slacker had a hundred characters constantly appearing and disappearing and Dazed and Confused pinballed back and forth between a few dozen high school students, Before Sunrise focuses almost entirely on just two people - American Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and French Celine (Julie Delpy) - who happen to meet on a train entering Vienna and decide on a whim to spend the whole day hanging out with each other. Sure, it's a hopelessly romantic concept that could've failed disastrously in the wrong hands, but fortunately Linklater works with some charismatic leads that actually manage to maintain consistent verbal chemistry over the course of a single film. Before Sunset was a solid sequel that made a good show of how these characters had changed over the course of a decade (I haven't seen Before Midnight yet), but I find the original to be charming even though part of me knows I probably shouldn't. It's okay, the list is going to get more cynical soon enough.

2005 ranking: N/A



#91. Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie
(Jim Mallon, 1986)

If I were in the habit of including TV shows on this list, Mystery Science Theater 3000 itself would be way higher. I'd probably cite it as my favourite show (or at least tie it with Arrested Development), and it would be in the top 50 entries. The show's premise - a lovable everyman and his robot friends are forced to watch the worst movies ever made and have to constantly crack jokes in order to stay sane in the face of such interminable badness - made the series a cult classic that ran for eleven seasons and, as you can probably tell by now, a feature film. I ended up watching MST3K: The Movie before I watched a single episode of the show, and though I'm not entirely sure it serves as the best introduction, it's still pretty funny. As I watch more and more of the show, this film loses a lot of its lustre but I guess it holds a special place in my heart for being the one that started it all. The movie's basically like a regular episode of the show only streamlined for a wider audience - jokes here are less frequent and less obscure than usual, but the ones that do make it through tend to be of good quality. Though it's a bit weak compared to the best episodes of the show, MST3K: The Movie is still a weirdly charming little piece of work - enough so to be on here anyway.

2005 ranking: N/A

Before Sunrise was amazing, and Before Midnight was even better. Stand By Me is good, too.

The only one I've seen is Stand by Me and it's really good. I'm interested in watching the others.

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I do not speak english perfectly so expect some mistakes here and there in my messages

nice you like the style of the creators of South Park, though IMO none of their other work surpasses their TV series

#90-#81



#90. Once Upon a Time in America
(Sergio Leone, 1984)

Despite its status as a modern classic, this film really is a bit of a tough sell. It comes close to four hours in length and the first quarter or so involves dealing with the main characters as incredibly bratty teenagers, but fortunately it gets past that before too long. Sergio Leone's final film tracks the exploits of a handful of New York gangsters in non-chronological order, ranging from their days as delinquent street urchins in the 1920s through their turns as bootleggers in the 1930s all the way through to their time as worn-out elders in the 1960s. Of course, it jumps around a bit in order to serve the story better - hell if I know how people tolerated the theatrical re-cut that made the whole thing run in chronological order. The central characters are bastards, certainly, but it's a testament to Leone's skills that we're at least invested in what happens to them over the course of four hours. I'll cop that the film's got its problems - being an entirely English-language film by the Italian Leone, much of the film's dialogue feels like it was badly translated from Italian to English. This film probably sounds brilliant in Italian. It's a tolerable defect that's watered down by the epic scale of the film on display - all of it melts away if you let it.

2005 ranking: N/A



#89. Dawn of the Dead
(George A. Romero, 1978)

So it's a toss-up between this and Night of the Living Dead when picking a Romero movie to include here. Night is probably the better movie when all is said and done, but Dawn definitely has the personality to make up for it. Taking place some time into the zombie apocalypse, four people escape from the city and eventually take up residence in an infested shopping mall. I'll be honest, objectively speaking this isn't that great a film. There's no denying the film has a real made-for-TV-in-the-Seventies vibe thanks to its low-budget filmmaking and the background music that wasn't done by rock band Goblin only contributes to that (although the infamous "The Gonk" muzak piece is the exception in that regard). The acting is amateur-ish, but in a way that's weirdly charming. The effects work might be goofy-looking in an age where The Walking Dead exists (just check that bright red blood and grey zombie makeup), but I'm willing to let it slide in a zombie movie that can at least stretch out a bit (how many zombie movies are over two hours long and only have four central characters throughout the whole thing?)

2005 ranking: N/A



#88. Trainspotting
(Danny Boyle, 1996)

Danny Boyle's breakthrough feature about the misadventures of a group of Scottish low-lifes, most of whom are drug addicts, managed to take Irvine Welsh's seemingly unfilmable novel (having read it, there's a lot that probably couldn't have made it on-screen) and turn it into a slick 90-minute journey through the highs (heh) and lows of life on the edge for these guys. Boyle assembles a strong ensemble - Ewan MacGregor's somewhat sympathetic protagonist plays well against Jonny Lee Miller's charismatic schemer, Ewen Bremner's hopeless loser and Robert Carlyle's drug-free yet undoubtedly dangerous psycho. The highly kinetic form of filmmaking is what makes Renton's story especially fascinating - filtering the world through the nebulous perspective of an extremely flawed junkie makes for interesting visuals, especially when blended with a very catchy and iconic soundtrack.

2005 ranking: #66 (dropped 22 places)



#87. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
(Steven Spielberg, 1984)

Nostalgia's kind of the main reason I listed the first three Indiana Jones in the top 25 of my old list (and even put Raiders and Crusade in the top five). Eight years on, I'm not inclined to be so generous towards a lot of childhood favourites and Temple is no exception. It's hard not to see past the tonal inconsistency; for starters, there's the main plot that involves Indy going up against an evil cult that deals in human sacrifice, brainwashing people through blood rituals and enslaving children in order to go after the token magic MacGuffin that every Indiana Jones film needs. Combined with that family-unfriendly premise is Indy being saddled with a pair of decidedly comedic companions in the form of street-smart Chinese preteen Short Round (Jonathon Ke Quan) and fish-out-of-water lounge singer Willie (Kate Capshaw). For the longest time this has generally been considered the weakest instalment in the franchise (until Crystal Skull staggered into being a few years ago), and while it's hard not to see why that would be the case, there are still enough good action sequences to make up for it and Amrish Puri's turn as sinister cult leader Mola Ram still makes for a worthy antagonist.

2005 ranking: #23 (dropped 64 places)



#86. Star Wars
(George Lucas, 1977)

Comparing some of these film's rankings against the ones from the last edition is proving to be one of the more interesting things about redoing the list. I had this at #3 the last time, and now I can't stop myself from pushing it down the list. Just like James Bond, Star Wars seems to be another one of those things that I find myself liking less and less these days. Is it the fans? The constant revisions? Overexposure? Combined with a gravitation to other sci-fi geek obsessions like Star Trek, I guess I'm pretty done with Star Wars on the whole, but I still like this film enough. Never mind how subsequent instalments and countless parodies have turned the plot of this one to Swiss cheese, it's still a reasonably fun little adventure and even when it isn't at least its more ridiculous flaws are enjoyable in their own way.

2005 ranking: #3 (dropped 83 places)



#85. Aliens
(James Cameron, 1986)

I took a while to really "get" Aliens. Seeing Alien on TV late at night was almost revelatory, while James Cameron's addition to the canon played down the horror slightly in favour of making an action movie was slightly (pardon the pun) alienating. Regardless, it actually works in the series' favour - the threat of one alien was brilliant enough, so what happens when you bring in a whole army of them? - and, despite having plot holes you could drive a truck through, it's still entertaining enough. Throwing in a decent amount of character development doesn't hurt, either - sure, most of the characters subscribe to fairly stock-standard archetypes, but Sigourney Weaver actually got an Oscar nomination over this movie so that's got to say something. Though I do prefer the original film more (and yeah, I'll admit it has its flaws that are just as bad as this film), Aliens is still a solid sci-fi action flick anyway you cut it and there are still films coming out trying to duplicate its brilliance.

2005 ranking: N/A



#84. Raging Bull
(Martin Scorsese, 1980)

I'm generally indifferent to sports, especially boxing. This is sort of reflected in the fact that Raging Bull is the only movie on this list that could be considered a sports movie. Based on the true story of Jake LaMotta (Robert de Niro), it tracks LaMotta's career as a middleweight boxer through highs and lows and even keeps going after his retirement. Along the way it examines LaMotta's life outside the ring, specifically his relationships with his brother (Joe Pesci) and wife (Cathy Moriarty), often resulting in explosive fits of rage as unflinching as any actual boxing matches. Monochromatic photography and a collection of classical pieces on the soundtrack seem a rather cliché choice for depicting violence both professional and domestic, but Scorsese manages to pull it off just fine.

2005 ranking: N/A



#83. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
(Irvin Kershner, 1980)

Yeah, you remember what I said before about not caring so much about Star Wars these days? That doesn't apply quite so much with Empire. Known for being the darkest film in the trilogy, it also counts as the best these days. A few years after the events of the last film, our heroes still struggling against the oppressive Empire - Luke (Mark Hamill) heads off to swamp planet Dagobah to learn the ways of the force with Jedi master Yoda (Frank Oz), while Han (Harrison Ford) and Leia (Carrie Fisher) try to escape by any means necessary. Definitely the high point of the series compared to the relative goofiness of Return of the Jedi, it's competently directed and, though it still has its problems (less to do with the film by itself and more to do with the internal logic of the universe itself), it still manages to develop its originally archetypal characters a bit further amidst action sequences that improve on the previous instalment. Lightsaber fights, disturbing journeys into the self and the second-most-spoiled twist after what Rosebud actually means are all part of one sufficiently entertaining package.

2005 ranking: #55 (dropped 28 places)



#82. The Matrix
(Lana Wachowski and Andy Wachowski, 1999)

Yeah, so when I first saw this at the age of eleven it blew my mind away and it cracked the top 50 when I made my first Top 100 at the age of fifteen. Now I'm twenty-three and have to admit that it's not quite that good anymore. Countless rip-offs and parodies (to say nothing of the sequels) have done their best to take what stood out about the original and grind it into the dirt, not to mention how obvious some of the plot holes are (even if they do get rectified a bit by the sequels, that only reminds me that the sequels exist and so it's hardly worth it). Regardless of all that has happened in the wake of the original film, its high concept combines with some fairly inventive effects work and makes for something that's still a bit more watchable than most action movies I've seen since then. The basic concept - the human race has been unwittingly imprisoned in a virtual reality world by sentient machines and a small band of rebels must fight against them to free people - has moments where the logic doesn't add up, not to mention its very basic "hero's journey" developments. This gets pushed to the side for the sake of special effects that still look pretty sharp (or at least stylishly artificial) over a decade later and though the whole leather-and-guns thing does seem a little goofy, it works alright for this. Also, something something Keanu Reeves going "whoa".

2005 ranking: #34 (dropped 48 places)



#81. Naked
(Mike Leigh, 1993)

Quite possibly the bleakest film on this list. David Thewlis gives a powerhouse performance as Johnny, a surprisingly eloquent ne'er-do-well who flees Manchester after assaulting a woman and heads to London to hide out with an ex-girlfriend before eventually resorting to roaming the streets. His episodic escapades make for a grimly compelling character study, especially when he comes into contact with characters that are just as damaged as he is, if not more so. Mike Leigh's social realist style of directing is what really stands out about this sickly grey feature, encouraging the cast to develop their own characters and making for uncomfortable yet mesmerising viewing. The stand-out sequence is Johnny's prolonged encounter with a security guard working the graveyard shift discussing everything from existentialism to the people living across the street. Though it's got some issues with developing every character - the film's sort-of-antagonist is a clean-cut sociopath that predates American Psycho's Patrick Bateman yet lacks even that much character development - the film still manages to be torturous to watch without totally repulsing or boring the viewers. If I had to pick a good metaphor to describe this film, it'd be that of a chain-smoker's lung - obviously damaged and not getting any better in a hurry but still oddly fascinating to observe.

2005 ranking: N/A

I like Super Troopers, Team America is funny but it isn't all that great from a technical level. It gets old on rematches. Raging Bull is a visual masterpiece but I'm still not a big fan of it and personally believe Scorcese has a handful of movies that are better.

Thanks for doing this. Can't wait to read it. Love most of the flicks on here already.

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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

#80-#71



#80. Full Metal Jacket
(Stanley Kubrick, 1987)

A film that's both clearly divided and clearly divisive, Stanley Kubrick's penultimate film takes place during the Vietnam War, starting off with a bunch of new recruits to the United States Marine Corps as they go through basic training before following ostensible protagonist Private "Joker" (Matthew Modine) as he is assigned to journalism duties in the midst of the war. Despite being the product of notorious perfectionist Kubrick, there's no denying that this is a film of two halves, with the first 45 minutes or so in the middle of basic training being a brilliant stretch of cinema yet the Vietnam parts of the film kind of wander a bit and aren't quite as fascinating. This is largely in part due to R. Lee Ermey's iconic turn as a belligerent drill sergeant dominating the film and after he leaves the film it doesn't quite seem the same. Even without the film's most memorable character, Kubrick still puts together some compelling wartime sequences, especially with a tense climax in a ruined city.

2005 ranking: #33 (dropped 47 places)



#79. There Will Be Blood
(Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

When it came to picking a favourite film of 2007, it was a toss-up between There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men. These days I think I prefer the former because its status as a slow-burning character study made it seem like a much more durable choice than the latter's high-stakes thriller status, which initially made for a great film but which hasn't really lasted on subsequent viewings. Anyway, back to this film - Daniel Day-Lewis delivers an Oscar-winning performance as ruthless oil tycoon Daniel Plainview, towering over a three-hour film that's almost as epic as his performance. The supporting cast is solid, especially Paul Dano as the baby-faced preacher that serves as Plainview's nemesis throughout the film. Amazing photography combined with a captivating score by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood only add to a film that's admittedly rather archetypal and a little on the long side but is still very well-crafted and worthy of attention.

2005 ranking: N/A



#78. Ed Wood
(Tim Burton, 1994)

These days Tim Burton is considered a directorial punchline almost on par with Michael Bay or M. Night Shyamalan - maybe not quite as ridiculed as those two, but his tendency to apply his "dark fairytale" aesthetic to just about every project he touches (many of them remakes or adaptations) has made it easy to call him a one-trick pony. As of writing, Ed Wood is the only biopic Burton has directed and in its own way it's not too different from your average Burton film, or indeed your typical based-on-true-events biopic. Johnny Depp stars as the titular Edward D. Wood Jr., a man responsible for making some of the worst movies ever made. The film covers what might be considered the "peak" of Wood's career; he makes Glen or Glenda, Bride of the Monster and Plan 9 From Outer Space. Along the way, he encounters a variety of bizarre characters that he considers perfect for his movies; the obvious stand-out is Martin Landau in an Oscar-winning turn as horror legend Bela Lugosi, here a washed-up heroin addict given a second chance by a starstruck Wood. Working within the confines of a realistic movie, Burton pulls off something truly worthwhile here that's a welcome reminder that, despite his constant journey into self-parody, Burton can pull off a great film given the right material.

2005 ranking: N/A



#77. Se7en
(David Fincher, 1995)

I go back and forth on liking David Fincher as a director, but Se7en is one of the two movies he's made that I genuinely love (you can probably guess what the other one is, but all I'll say is that it definitely isn't The Social Network). Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt make for a fairly typical odd-couple pair of detectives - one's world-weary and on the verge of retirement while the other's new to the job and impulsive as hell - and they are tasked with finding a serial killer who bases his murders on the Seven Deadly Sins. So effectively grim that it seems like every thriller in its wake owes it some kind of debt, the film can balance significant character development and strong performances with its horrible yet fascinating depictions of the killer's crimes. In an age where it seems like having a plot twist near the end is a mandatory practice regardless of how well it fits with the rest of the movie, it's pretty impressive how the developments in the third act work so well. That is to say nothing of how Fincher's grim sensibilities work wonders here - though already indicated in the extremely pessimistic Alien 3 a few years prior, here they're ramped up a notch and have the technical quality to back them up as well. Almost twenty years on, Se7en is still about as good as the modern murder mystery gets.

2005 ranking: #56 (dropped 21 places)



#76. The Last Temptation of Christ
(Martin Scorsese, 1988)

To call Martin Scorsese's take on the story of Jesus "unorthodox" would be putting it mildly. The basic plot is familiar enough - it covers Jesus's life from the beginning of his spiritual journey through to his death by crucifixion - but what happens between those points makes this a stand-out. There's the left-field casting that shouldn't work but somehow does - Harvey Keitel might get a Razzie nomination for playing Judas with a thick Brooklyn accent (and David Bowie is cast as Pilate for some reason), but Willem Dafoe makes for a surprisingly strong choice for this film's version of Jesus as an ordinary man whose divinity seems to be as much of an affliction as a blessing. Though the film's particular interpretation of Jesus earned the film considerable controversy in the form of outraged Christians, here it actually makes Jesus into a compelling character whose journey becomes even more fascinating to watch, especially in the way that it twists the film's supposedly foregone conclusion into something unpredictable. Aided by crisp cinematography and Peter Gabriel's hypnotic New Age score, this is definitely my favourite Scorsese film outside of the Big Three.

2005 ranking: N/A



#75. Children of Men
(Alfonso Cuarón, 2006)

I'm not sure where I heard this being touted as the closest thing the 2000s had to their very own Blade Runner, but that's about as apt a comparison as any. It is the year 2027 and no new children have been born in almost twenty years. Clive Owen's shiftless protagonist leads a hollow life in the midst of a crumbling British dystopia riddled with corruption and apathy - that is, until his freedom fighter ex-wife (Julianne Moore) enlists him for a vital mission to put an end to the mysterious lack of children. Anything more than that risks spoiling a very surprising plot, but it almost never lets up save for the occasional breather (and even those tend to feature emotionally weighty character development). As impressive as the plot and characters may be (the standout might be Michael Caine, who steals every scene he's in as an elderly hippie), it's the technical aspects of the film that really stand out. The quasi-documentary feel of the filmmaking really works, especially in the case of the film's most impressive sequences where entire action setpieces lasting several minutes take place during the course of a single take. The attention to detail in a lot of areas also recalls Ridley Scott's eye for immersion to the point where a prop in the background, whether it's a "suicide kit" or a xenophobic propaganda poster, communicates a lot about the world of the film without delving into tiresome exposition. There aren't a whole lot of films from the 21st century on this list, and while most of the others are kind of goofy, Children of Men is the kind of serious film that deserves to be remembered decades from now.

2005 ranking: N/A



#74. Commando
(Mark L. Lester, 1985)

Out of all the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicles that have been and are likely to be featured on this list, Commando is probably the quintessential example of what Schwarzenegger is all about. Sure, there are legitimately better movies that happen to star him, but they tend to be films that are strong enough on their own that they could probably survive without his presence. Commando, on the other hand, feels like a parody of not just itself but the typical 1980s action movie. The plot is extremely basic: retired soldier John Matrix (guess who) is forced to perform an assasination for the corrupt ruler of a fictitious banana republic or else his daughter gets killed. Instead he escapes and spends the whole movie fighting through an army of mercenaries to rescue her. Even though it does play like a spoof for a lot of the time, the fact that it's all so serious just makes it better. Every worn-out trope is on display - the extremely ancillary love interest, the cartoonish arch-rival, the one-liners that'd make James Bond cringe a little inside, not to mention the ludicrous body count (most of which happens in the film's climax). These days it's hard to make an action movie like this without throwing in a whole bunch of winks to the audience so it's actually kind of refreshing to see something like this. Easily one of the worst movies on this list, but you know something? I really don't care.

2005 ranking: N/A



#73. RoboCop
(Paul Verhoeven, 1987)

In a future riddled with crime and corruption, a murdered police officer (Peter Weller) is rebuilt by an amoral corporation to become the titular law-enforcement cyborg. However, his subconscious obsession with getting vengeance on the despicable street thugs that killed him leads him into a much bigger conflict. It's an admittedly silly premise and even in the hands of an accomplished foreign director like Verhoeven the satirical elements still come off as a little ham-fisted, but there's no denying the movie is darkly fun. There's black comedy in parts (take the very first scene with the stop-motion ED-209 annihilating a hapless extra, for instance) but it also takes the time to acknowledge a sort of emotional centre (Murphy's struggles with memories of his old life lend the film some emotional weight). Then there's the action that's reminiscient of the original Terminator and some ludicrous violence being perpetrated, whether for justice or anarchy. I guess it hits just about every action movie beat without fail (save perhaps a superfluous romantic subplot, but that makes sense since he's a robot and all) and sometimes I just want a movie that can do that and still stay entertaining on repeat viewings. Now that's a feat that's hard for most movies to pull off in my eyes.

2005 ranking: N/A



#72. Predator
(John McTiernan, 1987)

Hooray, another film in a long-line of high-concept movies that happen to star a certain musclebound walking one-liner. Predator sees Arnold Schwarzenegger as the leader of a crack team of American soldiers sent on a mission to the heart of the Central American jungle to do a seemingly routine hostage extraction. However, things take a turn for the worse when their escape is interrupted by the sudden appearance of the titular creature, which has come from outer space and targeted Schwarzenegger's team purely for the purpose of Hunting the Most Dangerous Game. Pulling this sort of bait-and-switch can be tricky (it certainly does a lot better than, say, From Dusk 'Til Dawn) but in the hands of action movie journeyman McTiernan it actually manages to work very well. There are solid action sequences (the raid on the terrorist compound is par for the course in a typical Schwarzenegger film), the slasher-like elements of the film's second act are handled well, plus it might possibly outdo Commando in terms of macho posturing and ridiculous one-liners. It's a perfect example of the middle ground between the good films that just happens to star Schwarzenegger (like Conan the Barbarian or The Terminator) and the bad films that are little more than vehicles for typical Schwarzenegger bravado (admittedly, this includes Commando).

2005 ranking: N/A



#71. Slacker
(Richard Linklater, 1991)

Richard Linklater's breakthrough film takes place over the course of 24 hours in the city of Austin, Texas. Instead of having a central cast, the film spends its time flitting from character to character - there are roughly a hundred different characters during the film's 90-minute runtime. Just about every character that shows up is a quirky oddball to some extent or another and the film's extremely episodic nature results in a new vignette taking place every couple of minutes. Though this method of filmmaking is a real rollercoaster and is just as likely to stick with a boring character as an interesting one, the peaks more than make up for the lulls. The quasi-philosophical burnout dialogue that makes up most of the film might even grate badly on some viewers, but for me it clicks. For a film supposedly made on a budget of around $20,000 it even looks good with dozens upon dozens of lengthy, well-framed tracking shots to accommodate the freewheeling nature of the movie. Though I'm not quite as obsessed with the film as some people supposedly are (I've heard of people who go through periods of watching it weekly or even daily), it's still surprisingly easy to watch despite its arty concept and still worth a viewing every so often.

2005 ranking: N/A

Off to a great start, including some of my favorite movies! And some movies that do not get enough mention, like the MS3TK movie which is hilarious!

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Fear and Loathing in MoFo... The Gunslinger 45's Top 50 Favorite Films

In the 10 Ring: Gunslinger45's reviews

+ rep all over the place so far, Iro. Near Dark, B&B, South Park, Before Sunrise, MST:3K, Team America, OUTIA, Dawn Of The Dead, Star Wars, Empire, Ed Wood, Se7en, Commando, Predator, Robocop and Slacker.

A good number of them are on my own 100 and a couple of others could've made it and are in the additions.