The MoFos Top 100 of the 90s Countdown - Redux

Bingo. Ever since I seen her in Finding Graceland I've been watching some of her films. Mostly 1990s of course.

You wouldn’t be disappointed

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Letterboxd

“Except for markf, you’re all a disgrace to cinema.”

Jackie Brown. My #13. I chose this for my Quentin Tarantino pick over another that I'm sure will place much higher (which I have some problems with for reasons I might go into when the time comes). But this is by far my favorite QT movie for one simple reason: I genuinely cared about the characters. Pam Grier was phenomenal as Jackie Brown, and I was rooting for her all the way. Her relationship with Robert Forster as Max Cherry was engaging. Both of them got a late-career boost from this; plaudits to QT for picking them. The rest of the characters were also finely and uniquely drawn, which I'm sure can be credited significantly to Elmore Leonard's source material. Terrific ensemble acting.

Trainspotting. It's been ages since I've seen this one, and my strongest memory is of the stress of watching the main characters struggle through their challenges with poverty and addiction. I see it referred to as a dark comedy, but I don't remember even chuckling. Certainly worthy, but not on my list.

Seen: 43/58
Ballot: 5/25

My predictions of how my picks will place:

Good Chance: 1/12
-- Jackie Brown #44 / My #13
Fair Chance: 4/10
-- Sense and Sensibility #49 / My #2
-- Clueless: #58 / My #5
-- Sleepless in Seattle: #91 / My #3
-- Office Space: #95 / My #23
No Chance: 0/3

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Scarecrow: I haven't got a brain ... only straw. Dorothy: How can you talk if you haven't got a brain? Scarecrow: I don't know. But some people without brains do an awful lot of talking, don't they? Dorothy: Yes, I guess you're right.

Her character has some of the funniest bits of the film

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By the way, not sure if I mentioned it yesterday... but with Starship Troopers, Paul Verhoeven becomes the fifth director with multiple entries in the countdown. His Total Recall placed early at #87.

Big fan of both movies, no votes but almost

I really love Jackie Brown and Pam Grier and Robert Forster in particular, although the supporting cast is great also. Just like the whole vibe to this movie. It almost feels like Tarantino restrained but just. However another Tarantino made my ballot instead.

I saw most of Trainspotting but haven't finished it and really need to. There were some hilarious bits but the baby scenes (if you've seen it, you know what I mean) really haunted me. Still, one I want to finish. Voted for neither.

My list:
#18 The Fifth Element list proper #56
#25 Apollo 13 list proper #68

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"Miss Jean Louise, Mr. Arthur Radley."

Jackie Brown was my first Tarantino. I appreciated the darker edge and for the most part admired where the story and the characters went. For the predictable moments, they did the absolute best they could. 85.

I saw Trainspotting twice. This was a movie that rocked it's random plot with some excellent emotional and comedic power as well as one of McGregor's best performances. 97

Seen 39/58

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Both of today's films are ones I've said "I should rewatch that" countless times over the years. I really thought I'd get around to watching Trainspotting again when the sequel came out, but I didn't. I'd like to rewatch Jackie Brown since I don't remember much about it at all, but I really need more hours in the day!

For a split second I genuinely thought you were trying to get my attention (I didn't know why though, to guess on your behalf?), since my name is Fonda hahaha.

Seen: 38/58

My List: 9

04. Barton Fink (1991) - #57
05. Raise the Red Lantern (1991) - #51
07. Strange Days (1995) - #82
10. Cure (1997) - #54
11. Gattaca (1997) - #86
13. Princess Mononoke (1997) - #65
18. Total Recall (1990) - #87
22. 12 Monkeys (1995) - #50
23. Perfect Blue (1997) - #63

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You mean your real name isn’t Cosmic? My world is being shattered

To the Trainspotting discussion - while I don't ask for restrictions on how movies address the subject, nor would I shut down discussion on such, I would point out that folks making that complaint about portrayal and tone, might be doing so from a source of pain and personal experience, and are not just uptight morality police (no one was making that accusation, but I wanted to clarify that). It doesn't mean you can't tell the story the way you want to, or that it makes a film as film, bad, but any sign of glorifying it, romanticizing it, might be a struggle for folks who lived through watching a loved one battle with addiction, and found nothing amusing about it.

Trainspotting inspired multitude of 90's Scottish youth to pick up heroin and develop an addiction.

It's not that Trainspotting glorified drug use... because it doesn't, like, at all... it's that there was a certain demographic amongst the audience that glorified the movie's depiction of drugs.

I was only 14 years old, and living in Scotland, when Trainspotting was released.
My general group of friends and acquaintances, were aged from around 12-17... most of them smoked weed and took drugs at the weekends... and yes, I agree to an extent that a LOT of them thought Trainspotting was the greatest movie ever made because of the drug use that's seen.
I wouldn't say Trainspotting inspired drug usage, but the movie and its depictions, were certainly glorified by the demographic that was "already using".

I remember feeling quite disturbed by the attitude of a lot of the kids at school over the movie, and decided to keep a close eye on who I was hanging around with from then on.

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Both great movies that missed my list. Jackie Brown is especially underrated. The story was just okay, but i loved the performances. The trunk sequence is one of Tarantino's best.


Trainspotting is a bit too far on the gross side for me, but I appreciate that it was one of the first mainstream movies to look at the seedy rock bottom level of drug addiction, all with one of the all time best movie soundtracks. Although in retrospect his parents could've easily killed him by forcing him to go through withdrawal at home like that. He should've been sent back to the hospital.


Seen: 26/56
List: 6/25

Jackie Brown is top tier Tarantino so those fans of his or even those who like some of his films should definitely check it out. Tonight! I think I said the same thing in the neo noir thread. Oh well. I'm a fan of Trainspotting too. Haven't watched the sequel yet. Any good?

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"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."

Also I noticed Holden mentioned Out of Sight - the Jackie Brown connection - and dang I should have rewatched that one and maybe voted for it. Great movie that's been far too long since I last saw it. It's not going to make it...right? Right.

Trainspotting never did much for me. It's interesting on a technical level, but I don't think it really gets at the heart of drug use and yes, I do think it glorifies a certain culture around it. Not that every film needs to have a heavy-handed message, but it's a film more in-line with something like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Both films, aside from my admiration of them on an art level and a storytelling level, do absolutely nothing for me.

Two films that I think are brilliant in their approach are Requiem for a Dream and a much much older film The Man With the Golden Arm. Also a more recent-ish film Heaven Knows What by the Safdie brothers is equally brilliant and amazing and it gives me a gut punch on an emotional level too.

Something like Trainspotting seems very surface level to me as far as the impact it has beyond technical and storytelling achievement. I'll finish a film like Trainspotting and say "Wow, that was really interesting and well done!" and then go back to whatever. If I watch Heaven Knows What, I need to crawl in a dark cave and just feel ill for a couple of hours afterwards and not want to be around anyone as it's able to penetrate my soul just a bit.

Jackie Brown is spectacular and it's Tarantino's first great film in my book and transition film of a maturing storyteller. Up until Death Proof and certainly The Hateful Eight and maybe Inglorious Basterds, it was easily my favorite Tarantino film. In fact, I'm sure if I scoured these here forums, I could find a post from 20 years ago saying as much on how I though Jackie Brown is his best movie. Even so, it didn't make my list.

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