Is The Godfather the greatest American film ever made?

I was just being silly. It doesn't really mean anything. Sweden is the first country with snow that came to mind that isn't America.

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It doesn't snow in Sweden. There's stuff that looks like snow, but it's not snow.

His favorite movie isn't necessarily the same as the movie he considers to be the greatest movie.

I think that Schindler's List is one of the greatest movies, but it's far from my favorite movie.

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If I answer a game thread correctly, just skip my turn and continue with the game.
OPEN FLOOR.

I actually did not say there was anything wrong with The Godfather being The Greatest, I almost said the opposite (but not quite), but what I said was that there is no The Greatest. And I stand by that.

I honestly don't understand what you mean when you say, there can be one greatest movie. Literally Captain Quint's post just said the opposite but you said you agree with his post, yet you seem to be pushing back on those who say there isn't just one greatest movie. I really don't understand how you're parsing this. Are you misreading us? Are we misreading you?

That's a logical point and yes my favorite movies are from what I would say are the greatest.

Wow Spielberg isn't as clever as I thought. My bad.

The answer is Michael Jordan.

Is this some Abbot and Costello routine? How do we just keep getting shuffled right back to the start of this conversation?

Where have I said 'there can be one greatest movie'? I have repeatedly, repeatedly, repeatedly stated that the notion of there being one movie that is objectively better than all is a completely impossible argument to prove.


Instead what I have said is it is pointless to endlessly talk about how there is no such thing as a greatest movie "because it's all just a matter of opinion". But just because something can't be proved, this doesn't mean a valuable conversation can't be had in understanding WHY people BELIEVE certain movies are better than others. WHY some people BELIEVE one movie can be the best of all.

WHY means we are learning about how others think about film, and by proxy, how they think about all sorts of other different things. That matters.

BELIEVE means its a belief. We don't need to prove a belief. Art is an article of faith, in many ways not completely removed from religion. Faith can be more important than proof. You can have a conversation about what you think God is without inviting him to the dinner table. Same thing with movies.

So I have never, not once, in my entire life, ever said that there "is one greatest movie". All there can be is one greatest movie for an individual, based on their feelings and knowledge and life experience, and that can be absolutely anything. It can be Blues Clues Licks His Balls for all I care. What matters is do they have anything of interest to say about it.

In this instance Spielberg is saying it's the Godfather for him. And maybe in other instances he has said something else. Which you are allowed do. These stupid rankings aren't a stagnant pool, because ultimately Speilberg's conclusion here isn't of much interest. It's how he explains his position, on that day, in that mood, in that situation that matters. Who cares if he's said It's a Wonderful Life is the best movie on other occassions. I'd like to hear his reason for why both might be considered, without being blinded by the inherent contradiction that there can't be two greatest movies. Because WHO CARES what the greatest movie of all time is. We have already established it can never be proven, so let's not get hung up on something we already all agree on anyways. It just ends up being distraction from the actual conversation of what makes it possible that someone would think the answer to the question is The Godfather (just as Boy Wondeur rightfully pointed out a few pages back)

As for me agreeing with Quint's quote, that is just an interesting philosophy of how to look at all art. It's the idea of getting to a zen like state where we no longer differentiate between what films are good or bad, better or best. Where we just understand it as a lineage of human expression through the ages. And this is actually the philosophy that has guided my last twenty years of watching films, and why I have also repeatedly claimed over the years that (much like Mark claimed) there isn't such thing as a bad movie. They all have something to offer. What matters is that people made them. Who gives a **** if they are technically good. Worrying about quality is a waste of breath when you would prefer to look at the whole history of cinema (or painting, or music, or books) holistically instead of individually. And I'm more interested in looking at it that way.

But just because this general philosophy lines up with mine, doesn't mean I somehow can't play along with these silly games of 'what's best'. Because, as I stated above, and all over this forum for the past few years, we can still get things of value from the discussion no matter what movie we end up talking about. I just don't put any particular weight on who is right, or who is wrong, or who made a masterpiece, or who made dog shit. I'm here for the conversation. And while, yes, I too choose sides (I think 2001 is the greatest, I think Babydriver is the worst), I only do so as a provocation to talk about the things I like in movies, and the things I don't like so much, and then see if people agree or say my taste is dog shit. Either way, I don't care if people agree or disagree. I just care that they say something worth starting a conversation or a debate over. Because that's how we learn. And learning is good.

Basically the only thing I don't see the point in, is constantly going back to the drawing board with "but there can't be a greatest movie", or "why bother having this conversation since we can't prove who is right", because these hot takes just lead to a road of mostly nothingness. Because if we take these points as gospel (and, admittedly, they probably are), why even bother talking at all? We've already decided anything anyone says is pointlessly 'subjective' or 'personal' and 'can't be proved'. Where can you possibly go from there? You're lost if you get hung up on these sorts of technicalities, instead of just looking and listening to what the person is saying about what they like, or don't like, or think is the greatest of all time.

I'm being sincere. I perceive you as grousing about certain post that stated there is no one single best film, especially the posts made by Le Boy Wondeur.
...but maybe I perceived your complaint wrong, though I posted the same thought that you support, that no one single film can be the best, and I didn't get any conformation from you that you agreed.Discussion works best when people can both give a friendly nod that they agree with at least part of what was said. That's why I find debating adversarial and a waste of time, however I find communication and discussion valuable.
I think that's your fear that if someone says 'it can't be decided what the best film is' that it ends your chance to debate. Seems to me this thread is going on pretty long and yes it is all pointless but that's OK, talking about nothing can be fun too.

I was 'grousing' about how as soon as this thread kicked off, at least three posters (Corax, Wondeur, and I believe yourself) immediately pivoted to the "there is no greatest movie" spiel. And my 'grousing' was in fact just a joke about my complete ineffectiveness in ever being able to articulate why this is a conversational dead end (at least in Wondeur's defense, they quickly suggested we get back to talking about The Godfather and its merits instead of this)

Then my comment yesterday was also a joke about how even after the thread died down for a few days, when it started up again, it was literally the exact same thing all over again. How this reinforced my original joke about how nothing I ever say can stop this circle of 'subjectivity hell' I've gotten myself stuck in here.



I didn't confirm that I agreed with you because I didn't. Comparing our thoughts about films to pizza toppings, something that doesn't amount to anything more than 'personal taste', is insinuating that discussing these things gets us nowhere. Some people like pepperoni other people like pineapple and talking about it doesn't change anything, so why bother. It completely overlooks my point where conversation is what matters, even and especially when it will never lead to agreement. So there is an inherent apathy in your pizza topping analogy that I reject out of hand.


You seem to reject debate because you ignore all the nuance in the things I or someone like Corax says, or concessions we may make, and view everything as a black and white, agree or disagree dichotomy. I'm not here to pat you on the back and tell you you're a good boy, but if you actually listen to what is being said, you'll see all sorts of areas where I am agreeing with parts of what people are saying.

Of course you are going to think debate is a waste of time if all you ever seem to do is take any kind of disagreement with what you said as simply being a case of 'you're wrong'. That's rarely the case. Most of what I or some of the more debate friendly posters here are saying is considerably more nuanced than this.

Oh, yes, my quaking fear. Or maybe the fear is more on the end of the people who are always trying to stop people from having deeper discussions. I've got enough posters here more than equipped to have decent conversations on these matters. What is annoying (not frightening) about this constant disparagement of the idea of debate is when I'm instructed not to do it with people who are willing to engage in the same way I am. If you don't like debate, you don't have to keep stepping right into the middle of them.

The greatest American movie either came out in 1939 or is a Coen brothers production. Rummage around in that bag and you’ll find it.
I have spoken.

Quick reply because I'm leaving for the day in about 15 minutes, so forgive the crappy spelling errors and my jumbled thoughts. That's exactly the cause of thread derailment. By labeling our thoughts as spiel, you can then most likely expect push back. In effect you can cause the lack of conversation by complaining about it in the first place.

Well if you're humorous it escapes me. I'll take your word for it, but people aren't going to know you're not being abrupt unless you make the humor clearer, we can't read your mind and we don't know you, maybe Corax does but I don't.


There you go again knocking the freedom for the individual to have their own thoughts. So you right, we wrong...got ya
If that works for you and Corax, good. I prefer a lighter fare.

You mean me and that's a falsehood, I'm all for discussion but very little internet debate is done by the Marquess of Queensberry Rules. Instead it's usually (and I'm not directly referencing you) about moving the goal post, ignoring good points, baiting people to keep them on the hook and aggression and yes I hate that as that is the killer of good discussion.

For sure. I know that a list of self-appointed authorities think it was "The Greatest". Being someone who, on my non-movie days, inhabits the world of art and galleries, I've seen plenty of experts, pundits, critics and art historians. At the bottom line, however, they get paid to do the same thing MOFO people do, which is pass on personal opinions. I don't disrespect them, but like one art historian once told me, "opinions are like a**holes....everybody has one and they all stink".

Personally, I have only a limited regard for movie historians and their 100 greatest lists. You do have to ask yourself, if there's anything objective about this, why are all of the lists different?

It's advice, not revealed wisdom from on high.

Gee Whiz. I thought I did that.

Well, whatever went wrong in this thread, there's certainly no lack of discussion.
As for crumbsroom - and I'm not going back to the "but you said"/"but I mean" word plays - I *think* I understand the essence of your frustration.
Discussing films is far more interesting than discussing the status of a film, but that just happens to be the topic of this thread.
(although FilmBuff himself has gone radio silence).

But rather than telling other forum members how a topic should or shouldn't be discussed, why don't you show us how it should be done? And I don't mean the general outline as you've already posted, but the matter at hand, in this case The Godfather.
The question was asked in the first post.
Now, what do you have to say about it?

If anything my comment has kept this thread right on track. I turned a couple of posts about how there can be no such thing as a greatest movie into multiple pages of it.

I'm not certain that wasn't where it was going anyways, but I certainly didn't help matters. On that we will agree.

The mistake was mislabelling it as a spiel. Spiels are usually long winded, which is more what I've been doing. What those initially offending comments were was a reflex. Something that always happens in certain situations, without fail, and clearly, is supposed to happen in a complete vaccuum where no one should ever dare comment on the constant reflexivity of them.

Just because this conversation has sucked, doesn't mean it wasn't a conversation. Before that it was just a couple of people nodding there heads in agreement that 'it's all just opinions, man'.

So you legitimately thought I wanted to stock pile a bunch of dimes to melt down into a hammer to hit myself in the head with.

Yeah, I probably should have made it clearer that I wasn't actually going to do that. Then the joke would have been super hilarious.

Oh, get lost with this soapboxing that I'm attacking your freedom. I called some posts boring and predictable. You know, using that freedom you love so much to say what I think. If you believe that makes me an ******* or a grouch or difficult, fine. At this point I probably am all of those things. But I haven't done a ****ing thing against freedom. Learn what that word means.

Please tell me this is a joke about me saying you turn everything into a black and white issue. Please tell me that's what the winky face means.

And yet you keep stepping into the middle of conversations to explain how much that lighter fare means to you. Which is a weird place for you to keep showing up, if you hate arguing so much.

Somehow you think that constantly being passively aggressive about how you expect us to converse with eachother on these forums isn't argumentative. You literally show up in every one of these kinds of exchanges to talk about how arguing about these things is beneath you, and yet there you always are. Making snide comments about the maturity of people who are debating about things that frequently don't even concern you, or how they are just foolishly wasting there time. Telling them to cut it out. Sometimes even suggesting that mods should get involved.

Basically, what you do isn't very far removed from what I do. You have a type of discourse you prefer and you are clear about what that is, and don't like it when people veer off that course. The main difference though is that you claim you aren't being 'argumentative' because you don't 'argue'. You just want other people to stop doing what bothers you because, I don't know, it bothers you? Personally, I think that's worse.

Then call out the moving of fence posts and stop trying to stop people from having these arguments like they are all by default 'conversation killers'. And if you love 'good points' so much, and hate them being ignored, maybe look at all of the things you completely overlook on these boards in favour of just finding shit for you to take offence at. You do it all the time. It doesn't just happen to pizza topping analogies.

There's a fundamental problem here. "how it should be done" implies that there's one right way, when anything involving humans contains an element of personal experience, attitude, emotional predisposition and error. If there were anything like truly objective reviews, we'd only need one review and that would be IT.

In regard to the Godfather, all this is exactly the point. It's a tall order to define great, much less greatest when there's no objective measure for great. Tallest building or deepest ocean is pretty easy, but movies are nothing like that. I think of it as a "darn good gangster movie", confined by its genre and a bunch of cultural stereotypes, but greatest ever.....no, not at all.

There we go. This is a fair response to what I said. You actually are acknowledging what my point was, and are fairly pointing out how I haven't helped matters. I should be talking about the merits of the film. Instead I've allowed myself to become distracted doing the exact thing I don't want to be doing.



But sadly, I just wasted all of my forum time on a bunch of completely pointless exchanges. FTR though, I did briefly mention my opinions on the Godfather's 'greatness' above in a response to you. It wasn't much, but it gets to the gyst of why I respect the movie, and understand why others have canonized it, but that it personally doesn't do a whole lot for me (I greatly prefer the sequel). I like sprawl, I like imperfections. And, if this makes sense, the Godfather is too perfect to really penetrate me. I think it's more interesting to study than to actually feel.

Apart from the technical aspects - good writing, good acting, good cinematography, blablabla - is there something else about The Godfather that makes it (one of the) finest examples of American cinema?
Do Americans identify with the story, is it that old "land of freedom and opportunity" thing, the idea that you and you alone are responsible for your success (or the lack thereof?)

Personally I think The Magnificent Ambersons has something more interesting to say. The decline of the "Mayflower" aristocracy and the boom of the self-made tycoons (the New Money) courtesy of oil and the industrialisation. It was such a huge turning point, in a good way, but also with devastating results.
When I watched that film for the first time I could almost believe it was made in the 19th century. And of course it's also the holy grail of incomplete films.