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If you are interested in joining this one, I need you to sign up and send your nominations in by 6:00 pm eastern time Sept. 29th. I'll be out of town, so I want to have this up and running before I go. It will overlap the 4th HoF by a little, but you should have watched most of your movies by then if you were a part of that one and want to join this one.
Rules
Everyone who signs up nominates one movie. Everyone will then watch every nominated movie and discuss each movie in the thread. There is no set order; you can watch each movie as the mood strikes you.
When you have watched every movie and are satisfied that you have weighed the merits of each one, you will send me a list of every nominated movie ranked from 1- most derserving to be inducted to the last movie which you believe to be the least deserving.
Movies should be full lengthed not to exceed 220 minutes.
I understand that life can get busy suddenly or a person may need to drop out after signing up do to unforeseen events. However, please don't sign up if you have no intention of watching all the movies nominated. This process will take approximately three months, so if you don't have the time for it, wait for another round.
New members are always welcomed and encouraged to join. This was always meant to have members with varying taste in film.
1. Wizard of Oz (1939, Victor Fleming) Nominated by Rauld
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It's crystal clear that everybody has seen this film, more often than not numerous times. But I would like to see everyone's deep thoughts on the film. For me, it is an artistic masterpiece and was one of my favorite films as a child. It is still one of my favorites to this day. I think nominating this will spark some great thoughts and I hope to examine it fairly in depth as well. It's a sure-fire worthy contender that deserves consideration around these parts.
The characters are also complex and interesting to watch. There is perhaps no better imaginative story than this one in the history of film. I hope everyone enjoys the rewatch.
2. "The Wages Of Fear" by Henri-Georges Clouzot nominated by Eramus Folly
A superb example of an early 50's French thriller that has great performances, suspense, and intense chills. Vastly under-seen, but can compete with its more famous brethren
3. Ordet (1955 Carl Theodor Dreyer) nominated by Tozeka
I have nominated Ordet from 1955 by Carl Theodor Dreyer as it is my favorite movie to come out of Denmark, if not Scandinavia. For me this is a perfect example of a movie where the aesthetics and the narrative goes hand in hand. The stripped down aesthetics and the long takes leaves space for the narrative and dialogue to unfold. In Film History: An Introduction by Kristin Thompson and David Bordwell they write: "Dreyer's version of modernernism acknowledges the film's source in a literary text and creates a "minimal" cinema of minutely varied pace, much more subdued than the agressive theatricality of Visconti or Bergman. Through this ascetic style, Dreyer presents the ineffatable mystery of faith and love."
The thematics of the movie revolves around personal faith and spirituality. Im personally not a religious person, but if there was one movie that could change that, it would be Ordet. The strong narrative makes me hope that both arthouse lovers and genre film buffs alike will hold this movie in high regard. As a side note, this film was not a commercial success, but it has been quite important in film history. In contemporary cinema you will find references in films such as Breaking the Waves by Lars von Trier, Stellet Licht by Carlos Reygadas and Beyond the Hills by Cristian Mungiu. A movie like The Exorcist by William Friedkien was also heavily influenced by Ordet.
4. Plein Soleil (1960 René Clément ) Nominated by Thursday Next
""In addition to Delon's fine performance, Purple Noon is characterized by expert camerawork and crisp direction. Clement understands how to sustain tension without drawing it out too far. The film is exactly the right length, as are each of the individual scenes. Cinematographer Henri Decae has composed each of his shots carefully, including a masterful series of closeups of Delon's eyes that reveal the sinister intelligence behind the apparently- guileless exterior. " ~ James Berardinelli
5. Le Trou (1960 Jacques Becker) nominated by Pussy Galore
The backstory to Jacques Becker’s prison escape movie Le Trou is something quite remarkable. Jose Giovanni, upon whose novel the film is based, was imprisoned in 1948 for his part in a racketeering venture in which three people were murdered – although Giovanni himself was responsible for no deaths. His death sentence was commuted to 20 years hard labour, during which he became involved in the prison escape which is dramatized in Le Trou. The film opens with one of the prisoners, Roland Darbant) with his head under the bonnet of a CV. Darbant turns to the character, and tells the audience that his friend Jacques Becker has made a film about the prison escape in which he was involved. Darbant is played by Jean Keraudy – who was one of Giovanni’s real-life accomplices in the breakout…
"Le Trou resembles an anatomy of a prison break; eschewing any extraneous incidents or sub-plots unrelated to the execution of the escape, Becker spends a lot of time examining the mechanics. Sometimes filming in real time, he shows us the prisoners hacking away at the concrete floor of their cell without once cutting away. It should be boring, but there’s a strange fascination to their endeavours, and an admiration for their ingenuity – or at least the ingenuity of Keraudy’s character – and perseverance." ~ Richard Cross
6. Divorce Italian Style (1961 Pietro Germi) nominated by Wintertriangles
I don't know if this is hilarious because my family's comportment is 100% Italian, but it's a film that tackles the crime of passion in 50s Europe, when everyone was becoming socially and religiously obsessed (in contrast usually) after the recovery from the war, which doesn't sound funny at all, so perhaps this was one of the torchbearers of black comedy. I don't know. Regardless, it's awfully cinematic for a comedy, which is part of why I love it, besides the whole killing-your-wife-to-marry-your-cousin-in-law part.
7. Claire's Knee (1970 Eric Rohmer) nominated by Bluedeed
This was the most difficult choice of the three picks I've made. Eventually I settled on seeing a Rohmer after none of his films from the 70s (of which there are many great ones) made our list. I chose Claire's Knee over my favorite, The Green Ray, because it's in keeping with my other picks as a film that studies the intricacies of human sexuality. The film focuses on a (surprisingly) resoundingly manly Jean-Claude Brialy, who falls in love with two teenage women throughout the course of his summer vacation in the beautifully photographed Lake Annecy. Through lackadaisical conversations between Brialy and his writer friend, and subtly tense sexual and non-sexual moments, the film develops a dialectic on the confluence of the archaic and the modern. Rohmer's ability to fill an image with both intellectual logic and Catholic sensibilities is an impeccable portrait of what it means to be living in a modern society. Along with The Bakery Girl of Monceau I also feel this is where Rohmer provides the best portrait of the male psyche as well.[/quote]
8. A Woman Under the Influence (1974 John Cassavetes) nominated by Frightened Inmate # 2
"Inspired by Rowlands's intense, unapologetic performance, Cassavetes isn't concerned with explaining Mabel's "condition" or creating an overt societal critique around it. Through extended, seemingly mundane sequences, this quietly feminist film simply presents the life of a working-class Los Angeles family with a nonchalance that amplifies Mabel's instability, but also normalizes her strains until they resemble the daily emotional fissures of any good mom. In retrospect, A Woman Under the Influence seems to anticipate the following year's Jeanne Dielman, which would express many of the same sentiments in even more shocking terms, but its shadow stretches even further. Compare Cassavetes's film to any number of more recent agony-of-suburbia dramas focusing on put-upon mothers—Julianne Moore's harrowing performance as the environmentally sensitive Carol in Safe, the suffering matriarchs of Little Children and Revolutionary Road—and you'll realize how these later films echo Influence's underlying conflict: the tension between mother as loving rock of the family and mother as human being, with inner turmoil." ~ Tim Grierson
9. Unforgiven (1992 Clint Eastwood) nominated by Camo
""Unforgiven" exults in the hard-riding romanticism of classic Westerns, but it takes revisionist stock too. It dismounts at places usually left in the dust -- the oppressed lot of women, the loneliness of untended children, adult illiteracy and the horrible last moments of the dying. Never did deaths count so much in a gun-slinging drama; never did shooting a man come so hard. " ~ Desson Howe
10. Bullets Over Broadway (Woody Allen, 1994) nominated by Cobpyth
I'm (finally) nominating one of my favorite Woody Allen films for this Hall of Fame. It's one of his more accessible and beloved films (even though it is quite underseen nowadays). Woody himself is not in it (which I know is sometimes an issue for some people who are not accustomed to Woody's style), so don't worry about that either.
It's a fun film full of interesting twists and turns that comically responds to some of the major issues and thoughts any artist or creative mind has to deal with sometimes. I'm sure some members of the committee will be as charmed by it as I am. It's full of great performances (especially Dianne Wiest is magnificent) and the story is always interesting to follow, while also offering some good laughs along the way.
Enjoy this hugely entertaining, classic "Allenesque" dramedy! It's one of my personal favorite films.
11. Boys Don't Cry (Kimberly Peirce, 1999) nominated by Cricket
I love movies that bother me in some way, movies that leave me thinking about them as I'm trying to fall asleep hours later. When I first watched Boys Don't Cry, I was still thinking about it for the next week. It's upsetting and powerful, all the more so because it's based on a true story, and I love movies that make me feel something. It also gives the viewer something to think about-hatred, love, courage, fear, ignorance, acceptance, and more.*
There's an awful lot of movies that I love. I chose to nominate Boys Don't Cry because I think it may be one that not many forum members have seen, and I think it's a movie that most members can get something out of.
12. Quills (2000 Philip Kaufman) nominated by Miss Vicky
My nomination is, of course, Quills.
Quills is the fictional tale (read: this is not a biopic) of the last days of the Marquis de Sade. Set in an insane asylum in Napoleonic France, the film examines the power of the written word, the need for freedom of expression and personal freedom in general. It also examines sexuality, religion, and mental illness.
The film is directed by Philip Kaufman (director of The Unbearable Lightness of Being and Invasion of the Body Snatchers) and stars Geoffrey Rush, Joaquin Phoenix, Kate Winslet and Michael Caine.
13. Sideways (2004 Alexander Payne) nominated by Seanc
My favorite movie by one of my favorite directors. Has everything I love, complex characters, witty dialogue, humor, and a whole lot of angst. Mostly about what I love to call white man problems. Have not heard a whole lot about this around MoFo, so I will be very interested to see how everyone feels about it.
14. A Separation (2011) - Asghar Farhadi nominated by Sane
My comments: I'm not sure there has ever been a better written movie than this wonderful drama by Farhadi. It isn't filled with quotable lines but from start to finish it builds a range of characters with real depth and motivations. At various stages of the film I was unsure of who was in the right and it builds such great engagement with the characters that I would have tears in my eyes due to the level of understanding of a character's situation ... when five minutes earlier I thought they were in the wrong.
I've seen all but one of Farhadi's six films and they are all very good but this is his masterpiece.
16. Wadjda ( 2012 Haifaa Al-Mansour) nominated by Godoggo
The fact that Haifaa Al-Mansou is Saudi Arabia's first female director is enough to make Wadjda a note-worthy film, but the fact that the film is also wonderful makes it doubly so.
Al-Mansou couldn't even interact directly with her own male crew, but she doesn't come from a place of anger or resentment. Wadjda, instead, is a film about hope and change. Regardless of how slow the change may come, it is coming one Wadjda at a time.
Rules
Everyone who signs up nominates one movie. Everyone will then watch every nominated movie and discuss each movie in the thread. There is no set order; you can watch each movie as the mood strikes you.
When you have watched every movie and are satisfied that you have weighed the merits of each one, you will send me a list of every nominated movie ranked from 1- most derserving to be inducted to the last movie which you believe to be the least deserving.
Movies should be full lengthed not to exceed 220 minutes.
I understand that life can get busy suddenly or a person may need to drop out after signing up do to unforeseen events. However, please don't sign up if you have no intention of watching all the movies nominated. This process will take approximately three months, so if you don't have the time for it, wait for another round.
New members are always welcomed and encouraged to join. This was always meant to have members with varying taste in film.
1. Wizard of Oz (1939, Victor Fleming) Nominated by Rauld
It's crystal clear that everybody has seen this film, more often than not numerous times. But I would like to see everyone's deep thoughts on the film. For me, it is an artistic masterpiece and was one of my favorite films as a child. It is still one of my favorites to this day. I think nominating this will spark some great thoughts and I hope to examine it fairly in depth as well. It's a sure-fire worthy contender that deserves consideration around these parts.
The characters are also complex and interesting to watch. There is perhaps no better imaginative story than this one in the history of film. I hope everyone enjoys the rewatch.
2. "The Wages Of Fear" by Henri-Georges Clouzot nominated by Eramus Folly
A superb example of an early 50's French thriller that has great performances, suspense, and intense chills. Vastly under-seen, but can compete with its more famous brethren
3. Ordet (1955 Carl Theodor Dreyer) nominated by Tozeka
I have nominated Ordet from 1955 by Carl Theodor Dreyer as it is my favorite movie to come out of Denmark, if not Scandinavia. For me this is a perfect example of a movie where the aesthetics and the narrative goes hand in hand. The stripped down aesthetics and the long takes leaves space for the narrative and dialogue to unfold. In Film History: An Introduction by Kristin Thompson and David Bordwell they write: "Dreyer's version of modernernism acknowledges the film's source in a literary text and creates a "minimal" cinema of minutely varied pace, much more subdued than the agressive theatricality of Visconti or Bergman. Through this ascetic style, Dreyer presents the ineffatable mystery of faith and love."
The thematics of the movie revolves around personal faith and spirituality. Im personally not a religious person, but if there was one movie that could change that, it would be Ordet. The strong narrative makes me hope that both arthouse lovers and genre film buffs alike will hold this movie in high regard. As a side note, this film was not a commercial success, but it has been quite important in film history. In contemporary cinema you will find references in films such as Breaking the Waves by Lars von Trier, Stellet Licht by Carlos Reygadas and Beyond the Hills by Cristian Mungiu. A movie like The Exorcist by William Friedkien was also heavily influenced by Ordet.
4. Plein Soleil (1960 René Clément ) Nominated by Thursday Next
""In addition to Delon's fine performance, Purple Noon is characterized by expert camerawork and crisp direction. Clement understands how to sustain tension without drawing it out too far. The film is exactly the right length, as are each of the individual scenes. Cinematographer Henri Decae has composed each of his shots carefully, including a masterful series of closeups of Delon's eyes that reveal the sinister intelligence behind the apparently- guileless exterior. " ~ James Berardinelli
5. Le Trou (1960 Jacques Becker) nominated by Pussy Galore
The backstory to Jacques Becker’s prison escape movie Le Trou is something quite remarkable. Jose Giovanni, upon whose novel the film is based, was imprisoned in 1948 for his part in a racketeering venture in which three people were murdered – although Giovanni himself was responsible for no deaths. His death sentence was commuted to 20 years hard labour, during which he became involved in the prison escape which is dramatized in Le Trou. The film opens with one of the prisoners, Roland Darbant) with his head under the bonnet of a CV. Darbant turns to the character, and tells the audience that his friend Jacques Becker has made a film about the prison escape in which he was involved. Darbant is played by Jean Keraudy – who was one of Giovanni’s real-life accomplices in the breakout…
"Le Trou resembles an anatomy of a prison break; eschewing any extraneous incidents or sub-plots unrelated to the execution of the escape, Becker spends a lot of time examining the mechanics. Sometimes filming in real time, he shows us the prisoners hacking away at the concrete floor of their cell without once cutting away. It should be boring, but there’s a strange fascination to their endeavours, and an admiration for their ingenuity – or at least the ingenuity of Keraudy’s character – and perseverance." ~ Richard Cross
6. Divorce Italian Style (1961 Pietro Germi) nominated by Wintertriangles
I don't know if this is hilarious because my family's comportment is 100% Italian, but it's a film that tackles the crime of passion in 50s Europe, when everyone was becoming socially and religiously obsessed (in contrast usually) after the recovery from the war, which doesn't sound funny at all, so perhaps this was one of the torchbearers of black comedy. I don't know. Regardless, it's awfully cinematic for a comedy, which is part of why I love it, besides the whole killing-your-wife-to-marry-your-cousin-in-law part.
7. Claire's Knee (1970 Eric Rohmer) nominated by Bluedeed
This was the most difficult choice of the three picks I've made. Eventually I settled on seeing a Rohmer after none of his films from the 70s (of which there are many great ones) made our list. I chose Claire's Knee over my favorite, The Green Ray, because it's in keeping with my other picks as a film that studies the intricacies of human sexuality. The film focuses on a (surprisingly) resoundingly manly Jean-Claude Brialy, who falls in love with two teenage women throughout the course of his summer vacation in the beautifully photographed Lake Annecy. Through lackadaisical conversations between Brialy and his writer friend, and subtly tense sexual and non-sexual moments, the film develops a dialectic on the confluence of the archaic and the modern. Rohmer's ability to fill an image with both intellectual logic and Catholic sensibilities is an impeccable portrait of what it means to be living in a modern society. Along with The Bakery Girl of Monceau I also feel this is where Rohmer provides the best portrait of the male psyche as well.[/quote]
8. A Woman Under the Influence (1974 John Cassavetes) nominated by Frightened Inmate # 2
"Inspired by Rowlands's intense, unapologetic performance, Cassavetes isn't concerned with explaining Mabel's "condition" or creating an overt societal critique around it. Through extended, seemingly mundane sequences, this quietly feminist film simply presents the life of a working-class Los Angeles family with a nonchalance that amplifies Mabel's instability, but also normalizes her strains until they resemble the daily emotional fissures of any good mom. In retrospect, A Woman Under the Influence seems to anticipate the following year's Jeanne Dielman, which would express many of the same sentiments in even more shocking terms, but its shadow stretches even further. Compare Cassavetes's film to any number of more recent agony-of-suburbia dramas focusing on put-upon mothers—Julianne Moore's harrowing performance as the environmentally sensitive Carol in Safe, the suffering matriarchs of Little Children and Revolutionary Road—and you'll realize how these later films echo Influence's underlying conflict: the tension between mother as loving rock of the family and mother as human being, with inner turmoil." ~ Tim Grierson
9. Unforgiven (1992 Clint Eastwood) nominated by Camo
""Unforgiven" exults in the hard-riding romanticism of classic Westerns, but it takes revisionist stock too. It dismounts at places usually left in the dust -- the oppressed lot of women, the loneliness of untended children, adult illiteracy and the horrible last moments of the dying. Never did deaths count so much in a gun-slinging drama; never did shooting a man come so hard. " ~ Desson Howe
10. Bullets Over Broadway (Woody Allen, 1994) nominated by Cobpyth
I'm (finally) nominating one of my favorite Woody Allen films for this Hall of Fame. It's one of his more accessible and beloved films (even though it is quite underseen nowadays). Woody himself is not in it (which I know is sometimes an issue for some people who are not accustomed to Woody's style), so don't worry about that either.
It's a fun film full of interesting twists and turns that comically responds to some of the major issues and thoughts any artist or creative mind has to deal with sometimes. I'm sure some members of the committee will be as charmed by it as I am. It's full of great performances (especially Dianne Wiest is magnificent) and the story is always interesting to follow, while also offering some good laughs along the way.
Enjoy this hugely entertaining, classic "Allenesque" dramedy! It's one of my personal favorite films.
11. Boys Don't Cry (Kimberly Peirce, 1999) nominated by Cricket
I love movies that bother me in some way, movies that leave me thinking about them as I'm trying to fall asleep hours later. When I first watched Boys Don't Cry, I was still thinking about it for the next week. It's upsetting and powerful, all the more so because it's based on a true story, and I love movies that make me feel something. It also gives the viewer something to think about-hatred, love, courage, fear, ignorance, acceptance, and more.*
There's an awful lot of movies that I love. I chose to nominate Boys Don't Cry because I think it may be one that not many forum members have seen, and I think it's a movie that most members can get something out of.
12. Quills (2000 Philip Kaufman) nominated by Miss Vicky
My nomination is, of course, Quills.
Quills is the fictional tale (read: this is not a biopic) of the last days of the Marquis de Sade. Set in an insane asylum in Napoleonic France, the film examines the power of the written word, the need for freedom of expression and personal freedom in general. It also examines sexuality, religion, and mental illness.
The film is directed by Philip Kaufman (director of The Unbearable Lightness of Being and Invasion of the Body Snatchers) and stars Geoffrey Rush, Joaquin Phoenix, Kate Winslet and Michael Caine.
13. Sideways (2004 Alexander Payne) nominated by Seanc
My favorite movie by one of my favorite directors. Has everything I love, complex characters, witty dialogue, humor, and a whole lot of angst. Mostly about what I love to call white man problems. Have not heard a whole lot about this around MoFo, so I will be very interested to see how everyone feels about it.
14. A Separation (2011) - Asghar Farhadi nominated by Sane
My comments: I'm not sure there has ever been a better written movie than this wonderful drama by Farhadi. It isn't filled with quotable lines but from start to finish it builds a range of characters with real depth and motivations. At various stages of the film I was unsure of who was in the right and it builds such great engagement with the characters that I would have tears in my eyes due to the level of understanding of a character's situation ... when five minutes earlier I thought they were in the wrong.
I've seen all but one of Farhadi's six films and they are all very good but this is his masterpiece.
16. Wadjda ( 2012 Haifaa Al-Mansour) nominated by Godoggo
The fact that Haifaa Al-Mansou is Saudi Arabia's first female director is enough to make Wadjda a note-worthy film, but the fact that the film is also wonderful makes it doubly so.
Al-Mansou couldn't even interact directly with her own male crew, but she doesn't come from a place of anger or resentment. Wadjda, instead, is a film about hope and change. Regardless of how slow the change may come, it is coming one Wadjda at a time.
Last edited by Godoggo; 12-06-14 at 06:24 PM.
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