The MoFo Top 100 Foreign Language Film Countdown

→ in
Tools    





I only had room for a couple of Tarkovskys, and I picked a couple of others, but Mirror is certainly worthy, and I hope at least four eventually turn up.


Knife is an impressive thriller and debut, introducing Polanksi's patented sense of claustrophobia. Missed my list.



Women will be your undoing, Pépé
have not seen the last four (shame on me) and of the four, The Conformist has caught my interest the strongest with my recent discovery of Italian cinema. Adding to the only Bertolucci film I've ever seen when it came out in the theaters; Stealing Beauty (1996) where I fell completely in love with Liv Tyler.




Movies Seen: 6 of 16 (37.5%)
4. Rome, Open City (1945) #93
6. Army of Shadows (1969) #90
19. Paprika (2006) #100
25. In This Corner of the World (2016) One Pointer
__________________
What I actually said to win MovieGal's heart:
- I might not be a real King of Kinkiness, but I make good pancakes
~Mr Minio



Yay, my first contribution proper

The Mirror is my favourite Tarkovsky and made my list, glad to see it show up. Not sure if I've ever seen Knife In The Water or not, which obviously means I'm counting it as a not.

Seen: 9/16 (Own: 6/16)


Faildictions ((バージョン 1.0):
84. Du rififi chez les hommes [Rififi] (1955)
83. Darbareye Elly [About Elly] (2009)



YES! The Mirror was my number 2! I adore that movie, especially the dream sequence. It used to be in my top ten movies, but now it's my number 14.


My only complaint is that this is gonna be the lowest-ranked Tarkovsky movie on the chart.



matt72582's Avatar
Please Quote/Tag Or I'll Miss Your Responses
Damn, my list is not in my SENT items.. "Knife....." might have made my list.





-Knife In The Water - 8.5/10

-Le Cercle Rouge - 8/10
-Léon Morin, Priest - 7/10
-Bob Le Flambeur - 7/10
-Le Samourai - 7/10
-The Conformist - 7/10
-The Mirror - 5/10



The Mirror was one of my picks. An absolute classic film, perhaps Tarkovsky's most impressive film, or in other words, perhaps the most impressive film ever made. Essential viewing for anybody to know what that film might be also art besides entertainment.

This list is overall great so far because it has lots of movies I haven't watched yet and the ones I have watched are all great. Might try to become a film buff again!



Sorry if I'm rude but I'm right
Mirror is one of the best films ever made but I didn't have it on my list because... more reasons. Out of hundreds of films called poetic, Mirror is one of the few that really deserves to be called that, and mind you, not just because it contains recitations of Tarkovsky's father's poems. Tarkovsky believed film to be a separate art he tried to create a film that couldn't be reproduced as any other art form. Mirror is Tarkovsky at his most personal, recollecting his life and creating a literal mirror. I think it's quite a fun, enriching experience to try and interpret the film but ultimately Mirror should be treated as poetry or classical music. You do not need to understand Beethoven's 9th or Bach's Goldberg Variations.


Maria Tarkovskaya, Andrei Tarkovsky's mother, 1932 vs. Margarita Terekhova in Andrei Tarkovsky's The Mirror (1975)

Oh, and the anecdotal cleaning lady nailed the meaning of the film: "It is about a man who had caused too much pain to the ones whom he loved and who loved him. Now he is dying and he is trying to ask them for forgiveness but he does not know how.". Still, Tarkovsky claimed that more than logically understanding his films, you ought to get an emotional understanding of them.

Tarkovsky hated symbols. He believed that a film that uses symbols is a bad film. A symbol is a dare. Once the viewer deciphers it, the symbol loses its point, it becomes a bland replacement. This is yet another tip on how to watch Mirror. Do not try to guess what a given thing means. You have to take the entire film as one entity and then proceed to process it.


Tarkovsky's mother and Margarita Terekhova on the set of The Mirror

A quote from the film:

"And I can't wait to see this dream
in which I'll be a child again
and feel happy again
because everything will be still ahead, everything will be possible"
And two excerpts from Andrei Tarkovsky's book Sculpting in Time:

Tarkovsky himself:

'What is this film about? It is about a Man. No, not the particular man whose voice we hear from behind the screen, played by Innokentiy Smoktunovsky.' It's a film about you, your father, your grandfather, about someone who will live after you and who is still "you". About a Man who lives on the earth, is a part of the earth and the earth is a part of him, about the fact that a man is answerable for his life both to the past and to the future. You have to watch this film simply, and listen to the music of Bach and the poems of Arseniy Tarkovsky. Watch it as one watches the stars, or the sea, as one admires a landscape. There is no mathematical logic here, for it cannot explain what man is or what is the meaning of his life.'
A letter of a Tarkovsky fan to their mother:

' . . . How many words does a person know?' she asks her mother. 'How many does he use in his everyday vocabulary? One hundred, two, three? We wrap our feelings up in words, try to express in words sorrow and joy and any sort of emotion, the very things that can't in fact be expressed. Romeo uttered beautiful words to Juliet, vivid, expressive words, but they surely didn't say even half of what made his heart feel as if it was ready to jump out of his chest, and stopped him breathing, and made Juliet forget everything except her love? 'There's another kind of language, another form of communication: by means of feeling, and images. That is the contact that stops people being separated from each other, that brings down barriers. Will, feeling, emotion—these remove obstacles from between people who otherwise stand on opposite sides of a mirror, on opposite sides of a door. . . . The frames of the screen move out, and the world which used to be partitioned off comes into us, becomes something real . . . And this doesn't happen through little Audrey, it's Tarkovsky himself addressing the audience directly, as they sit on the other side of the screen. There's no death, there is immortality. Time is one and undivided, as it says in one of the poems. "At the table are great-grandfathers and grandchildren . . ."Actually Mum, I've taken the film entirely from an emotional angle, but I'm sure there could be a different way of looking at it. What about you? Do write and tell me please . . .'

They don't make them like this anymore...

I'm surprised Knife in the Water made it to the TOP 100. Don't get me wrong, it's a great film, but I never knew it was so popular here (then again, 4 lists is hardly popular). Knife in the Water is a Polish Film School masterpiece soaked in the summer sun and accompanied by a jazz soundtrack by Krzysztof Komeda (he's well-regarded here in Poland). It's really cool to think of it as a Polish equivalent of the Japanese Sun Tribe films. In particular Crazed Fruit (1956), which was the film that started the Japanese New Wave. However, I'd be more willing to believe it was actually inspired by René Clément's 1960 film Purple Noon with Alain Delon. Either way, it's an excellent film and I'm happy it made it to the countdown because I somewhat forgot about it. I do owe Knife in the Water a rewatch, as I watched it only once all the way back in 2012.


A crucified Jesus wiggling his legs?!
__________________
Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.



rbrayer's Avatar
Registered User
I haven't seen or heard of Knife in the Water. I found The Mirror self-indulgent and incomprehensible. Not a fan. Much more impressed with Solaris and Stalker.



I haven't seen Knife in the Water.

The Mirror, on the other hand, was one of the three Tarkovsky films on my ballot (#19). When I first watched it, its story didn't make any sense and, with a few more viewings, I'm still not sure what it all meant, but that doesn't matter to me. I understood that the film moved me and made me feel some things which no movie has made me feel in the past, and that was more than enough. I've seen a number of poetic films, but few have moved me the way this film has. So many scenes (the burning barn, the dream sequences, the slow pans through empty houses, the ending) are just perfect. It's a truly mysterious film. The cinematography is also excellent. Cinematography usually isn't high on my reasons for liking a film, but I love how Tarkovsky makes the ordinary look ethereal while not betraying the realism of it. It's a truly beautiful film and I'm glad to see it here.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19. The Mirror (1975, Tarkovsky) #86
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
__________________
IMDb
Letterboxd



Thursday Next's Avatar
I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
I was also a bit surprised Knife in the Water made the list, I didn't realise it was that well-loved. It got a 3rd and a 4th place vote, though, so much loved by some.

I haven't seen it. For a minute I thought I had, but the film I had actually watched was Cul-de-Sac.

I only saw The Mirror very recently. It was very Tarkovsky.



Mirror is one of the best films ever made but I didn't have it on my list because... more reasons. Out of hundreds of films called poetic, Mirror is one of the few that really deserves to be called that, and mind you, not just because it contains recitations of Tarkovsky's father's poems. Tarkovsky believed film to be a separate art he tried to create a film that couldn't be reproduced as any other art form. Mirror is Tarkovsky at his most personal, recollecting his life and creating a literal mirror. I think it's quite a fun, enriching experience to try and interpret the film but ultimately Mirror should be treated as poetry or classical music. You do not need to understand Beethoven's 9th or Bach's Goldberg Variations.

That's why I put it on my list, and so highly. It's a movie that not only acts like something completely different, but WORKS.



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
Mirror is indeed poetic, mysterious and beautiful with perhaps some of Tarkovsky's most spectacular imagery. It's much easier for me to watch and get into than any of his since the early '60s.

I always found Knife in the Water more of a practical exercise and a political statement than a real movie but it's a technical marvel. Polanski had to do all kinds of tricks to get it passed untouched by the Communist censors.

Zip votes from me so far.
__________________
It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page



Thursday Next's Avatar
I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
A small clue for tomorrow's films: I'm fairly sure that these two films have the biggest gap in years between them of any of the pairs I will be posting.



Let the night air cool you off
The Passion of Joan of Arc (please god no, please let this be higher)
Parasite (this is probably higher, but I'd be okay with it showing up here since it's going to show up somewhere)



Mirror is one of the best films ever made but I didn't have it on my list because... more reasons.
Come on, man.

Well Mirror made my list because...reasons - it's one of the best films ever made.

edit: Oh and had it at #15.I was trying to limit to one film per director but Tarkovsky slipped by with two. It could have been higher on my list but had to make compromises.
__________________
"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."