I think what really charms people about Galaxy Quest isn't so much that it's an all-time great comedy (I love it and I don't think that), it's that it's the absolute best kind of satire: one that comes from a place of genuine affection for the thing it's teasing, which means it has a deep, intimate knowledge of it and knows exactly the ways in which it's silly.
That, and some genuine drama and emotion sneaking into the last act of the film that I think took a lot of people by surprise.
Also, most of us didn't know who Sam Rockwell was yet, and to have one of the generation's better actors in what seemed like a throwaway role just made the whole production feel overpowered to its needs, a phenomenon I talk about a lot (usually while referencing the Ocean's Eleven remake) which I think does a lot to elevate a movie.
Galaxy Quest is the best Star Trek movie ever made.
Anyhoo...
Leon: The Professional hasn't aged well.
Look into Besson's sordid history and the fact he based the entire chemistry between Leon and Matilda, on himself and Maïwenn... Leon becomes an uncomfortable watch.
Dances With Wolves is class though... often copied, never bettered.
I think the better clones are Dances With Aliens and Dances With Swords, sorry, I meant Avatar and The Last Samurai
Dances With Wolves is good, but I don't think I'll ever rewatch it.
Leon: The Professional is pretty good, but it had no chance at making my ballot. The adult-child relationship certainly gets creepy once you factor in Luc Besson's real life relationship with an underage actress. Aside from that though, it's a fairly entertaining action film and has some considerable style to it. I have no idea where its high IMDb ratings come from though.
I've never been tempted to watch Braveheart, and now that I know it's three hours long I'll file it under "permanently unseen". Just watched the trailer on youtube and it seems to me that Mel Gibson was a little bit too old for the part, and the big hairdo makes it look kinda cringe. Apparently it's beloved enough to become the #40, and if forum members like this kind of movie then I guess Dances With Wolves will follow soon.
I've never heard of the Hunkchunk Express (there's not much in the description) and I'm not cinephile enough to appreciate/understand Asian films. The list is full of surprises!
I watched 15 minutes of Braveheart and turned it off…ditto Dances with Wolves
I thought we were past the Leon point, and was pleased mofo had softened on it enough to leave it off these lists. It’s an okay movie but I have no idea why people love it this much. Even when it shows I don’t ever feel like I hear mofo gushing.
Dances With Wolves was my 8, I absolutely love it. I think it looks great, it’s funny, and it’s affecting. I think about scenes from this movie often, it has some brain burn for me. Costner is awesome in it. Still expected it, but thought originally it would be in the back half. Still not high enough, but considering how the film world thinks about these stories now, I’m glad we are still giving it love around here. I don’t get the white saviour complaints. I think the movie is clearly about the white man being saved, but I guess that’s just me.
I watched 15 minutes of Braveheart and turned it off…ditto Dances with Wolves
I will continue to ask this question of the turn off crowd till my days at mofo end. Do you not know anything about a movie before you push play? Neither of these are out in the world pretending to be something they aren’t, certainly not something you would determine in the first 15.
I did not give Léon: The Professional many points in our group exercise – I had it as my twenty-fourth pick, so only one pair of its 147 points come from me – but I also couldn’t leave it off of my list. French filmmaker Luc Besson’s first micro-budgeted feature, Le Dernier Combat (1983), was a post-apocalyptic flick that didn’t make much of an international splash, other than for die hard Sci-Fi geeks, but it did have a strong visual style as well as star a lanky, quiet actor named Jean Reno and featured a pulsing electronic score by Éric Serra. His second film, Subway (1985), got a larger budget (for French cinema of the day) and cranked the stylization up several notches, some genre nonsense about gangsters and hiding out in the Paris Metro, but it looked and sounded amazing! In his fourth film, La Femme Nikita (1990), Besson put all those stylish elements together into a tale about a wayward punk girl turned into a high-class assassin. It was an international hit, and it finally gave Luc the access to the budget, tools, and audience he had been building to.
Léon: The Professional was Besson’s first co-American production, reworking some of the basics from Nikita, but making the female protagonist even younger. The pre-teen Mathilda would be played by newcomer Natalie Portman, all of twelve, and for the title character Léon, once again it was Besson’s favorite Jean Reno, who had been in all of his films to that point, including a supporting role as a mostly wordless “cleaner” named Victor in Le Femme Nikita. His cleaner this time is just as brutally efficient and a man of few words, but he also has a softer, child-like side. Léon is a hitman in New York City, doing jobs for the Mob through his benevolent contact, Tony (Danny Aiello). The stoic killer is accidentally brought into his neighbor Mathilda’s life when she bluffs her way past the massacre of her entire family. Her low-level crook of a father has run afoul of the wrong bad guys, led by corrupt cop Norman Stansfield, played outrageously and absolutely deliciously by Gary Oldman. He and his crew murder Mathilda’s dad, mom, older sister, and her younger brother. After being taken in, she convinces Léon to teach her the skills of an assassin so that she might take her revenge.
From the very beginning Besson has been criticized as style over substance, and I doubt even Luc himself would argue too much with that. But, man…what amazing style! After the action movie genre exploded in the 1980s it had become a bit stale in the 1990s. Sure, Hollywood continued to crank out big-budget tent-pole entertainments like The Fugitive and True Lies and James Bond would be back by the second half of the decade, but the action formula had become so omnipresent there was almost nothing that felt “new”, even if it was done well or had actors you liked. And then there was Léon: The Professional, with immaculately staged, energetic gunplay and explosions, three terrific central performances, and even though it hit most every trope in the book, it somehow felt new and fun and everything you had been craving since Die Hard. Oozing with quotable lines, indelible images, and another beautiful score it was extremely memorable in the landscape of 1994, and this movie-lovin' dork hasn’t outgrown it, yet. A gift from Besson that is as satisfying a cinematic explosion as the gift of a grenade from Mathilda.
That makes nine of mine with I believe only seven more coming in the Top 34, barring any surprises.
Holden Pike: 1990s Part Deux 4. Rushmore (#42) 5. The Thin Red Line (#53) 8. A Perfect World (#61) 9. Short Cuts (#55) 12. Barton Fink (#57) 13. 12 Monkeys (#50) 19. Ed Wood (#41) 23. Dead Man (#85) 24. Léon: The Professional (#35)
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Last edited by Holden Pike; 7 hours ago at 12:00 PM.
I will continue to ask this question of the turn off crowd till my days at mofo end. Do you not know anything about a movie before you push play? Neither of these are out in the world pretending to be something they aren’t, certainly not something you would determine in the first 15.
Not sure what you’re asking but I turned off the movies because they were boring
Just had a look over my remaining ballot and it's not looking good for most of them. I think only 4 more of mine will show.
My prediction:
1. Will Make It
2. Dances with Wolves (#36)
3. Won't Make It
4. Won't Make It
5. Made the Previous 90s List, But Sadly Won't Make This One
6. Won't Make It
7. A Perfect World (#61)
8. Won't Make It
9. Point Break (#79)
10. Edward Scissorhands (#64)
11. Won't Make It
12. True Romance (#94)
13. Made the Previous 90s List, But Sadly Won't Make This One
14. Won't Make It
15. Won't Make It
16. Won't Make It
17. The Fifth Element (#56)
18. Will Make It
19. Won't Make It
20. Will Make It
21. Won't Make It
22. Will Make It
23.Won't Make It
24. Interview with the Vampire (#92)
25. Untamed Heart (One Pointer)
Most of the movies in red are ones that I never expected to make it anyway, but the two that made it last time and won't appear again make me sad, especially my #5.
I really enjoyed the extended edition of Dances with Wolves when I watched it for the 13th Hall of Fame, and urge fans of the film who have only seen the theatrical cut to check it out. And while I do think the film is better than many of the titles on the lower part of my list, I didn't actually vote it.
I've seen Léon: The Professional twice, and don't particularly care for it. Gary Oldman was great of course, but that's all I'm going to say because pretty much everything else was a negative for me.
The other two from the 90s that might show up higher on individual people's ballots are Happy Together and Days of Being Wild, but neither made it last time and at this point would require a particular fandom for specifically one of those two to have built up here over the years. Seems highly unlikely (unfortunately).
I've seen 6 of his films, but Days of Being Wild isn't one of them. Where would you rank it in his filmography? I also agree that this is way too high for Happy Together to have a shot, and I would've been (pleasantly) surprised if it had made the bottom of the list. But I'm still hoping that there are some Ashes of Time fans who submitted ballots.
Seen: 45/66
My List: 11
04. Barton Fink (1991) - #57 05. Raise the Red Lantern (1991) - #51 07. Strange Days (1995) - #82 08. Galaxy Quest (1999) - #38 09. Ed Wood (1994) - #41 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
Dances with Wolves. One day I want to write a "first time I saw them" blog post about actors whose presence on screen was compelling the first time I saw them. That would include Sandra Bullock in "Wrestling Ernest Hemmingway" (bit part, but so fresh and charming) and Kevin Costner in "American Flyers." I was in my bicycling phase and this story about a bike racer was enjoyable but not great. But this was the first time I'd noticed Costner, and he just had presence on screen. I didn't see him in Fandango and Silverado until later. Of course, then came The Untouchables, Bull Durham, and he was a confirmed commodity when 1990 arrived. But back then I didn't know of many actors who made a successful leap to directing, so I was honestly a bit skeptical. So from the first scenes to the last, I enjoyed every minute; it left a lasting impression. Here was a "Western" that wasn't about showdowns in the middle of the dusty street, or "cowboys and Indians" fighting it out. I know we can argue endlessly about whether it sentimentalizes the Native American experience in the post Civil War West. Whether the pacing is a bit too slow or it takes its time to build a credible world. All I can say is that it was a unique and moving experience, and that last image of the horses disappearing into the snow flurries will always be memorable. That's why it's my No. 9.
Leon: The Professional. Another actor in that "first time I saw them" blog would absolutely include Natalie Portman in this exciting, slightly perverse, and entertaining flick. Gosh, she was so, so good. The kind of good that compels you to watch for the next thing she's in. Her relationship with the older man made me feel a bit squirmy at the times. But all in all, I like it a lot ... but not enough to put it on my ballot.
Seen: 49/66
Ballot: 7/25
My predictions of how my picks will place:
Good Chance: 3/12
-- Dances with Wolves #36 / My #9
-- Rushmore #42 / My #16
-- 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
__________________ 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.
Dances with Wolves is very good if way too long and maybe a bit overhyped. And there’s always gonna be something about Costner’s ego that rubs me the wrong way and prevents me from fully enjoying his movies. Still it’s nice to see a western in the mix.
Leon: the Professional is kind of similar to me in that it’s very good but also a little overhyped. It’s a pretty standard story but done well with some terrific actors.
Leon is the next cab off the rank for me as I had it at #10. Despite being that high, I did wonder about if it should be a lot lower. Like other films, which didn't make my list, it's been a very long time since I last saw it and I wondered if my memory of it (it's on my 100) meant that I had it too high. How would I feel if I watched it now? Would it feel out of place or would I love it like I always had? Obviously I could've watched it and found out, but I don't do things like that and, if I've not done it for any of the other films on my list, why would I do it for this one? So it's at 10 because I loved it from the first moment I saw it. Just called Leon over here (I had a weird conversation on the net in 2000 talking about this film with an American who'd seen a film which sounded very similar called 'The Professional' that was being rinsed) I'd already seen and loved Nikita (just called Nikita here) and then Subway, although I didn't know he'd directed it because, even less than now, did I care or notice who'd directed what back then (and if you are one of those who thinks he's just style over substance try Subway and you'll never doubt that argument. ) but Leon hits different. Leon has heart and care and is cool as ****. It's style and substance, although the style is still in abundance, IMO, it's the substance and its innocence which makes it so loved. And it is innocent. We may look on it with suspcision, others may do so, hell, given the directors history he may even do so, but the film doesn't. Leon doesn't. Leon cares for Mathilda like he cares for his plant.
Just because he rarely gets mentioned I'd like to point out Danny Aiello as Tony. It's just a small, but pivitol role because it gives us so much about Leon and helps us understand the Leon is as he appears to be. You can read almost anything and everything into that performance and his relationship with Leon.
I remember really liking Dances With Wolves, but I think I've only seen it once, maybe twice? I can't remember if that second viewing reached the end? But I liked it and, were it not 3 hours, I'd have probably seen it more.
Apparently it's beloved enough to become the #40, and if forum members like this kind of movie (Braveheart) then I guess Dances With Wolves will follow soon
Ha! I'm the first one to correctly guess the next(ish) winner.
Did you notice that, @Holden Pike?
Seen Dances with Wolves, but it's been such a long time I remember absolutely nothing about it.
Seen Leon: The Professional, and it is NOT a Top 40 90s movie from what I recall. I would rather rewatch La Femme Nikita, and that also wouldn't make my Top 40.
__________________ Movie Reviews | Anime Reviews Top 100 Action Movie Countdown (2015): List | Thread "Well, at least your intentions behind the UTTERLY DEVASTATING FAULTS IN YOUR LOGIC are good." - Captain Steel
Léon The Professional is a solid action thriller, and even if it wasn't then there's still Gary Oldman as the theatrical and deliciously hateable villain.
However, I made the cardinal mistake of watching Kick Ass first. That film has a similar man/girl combo, but in such a unique way that it brought more energy to the screen. As a result it made Léon look like the lesser film, even if it isn't.
All things considered, one would expect it to show up in a top 100 but I'm surprised by the generous ranking. I had no idea it was so memorable.
As for Dances With Wolves, everything about it screams "ambitious" which I find a little off-putting.
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