The MoFos Top 100 of the 90s Countdown - Redux

I expect it will show up somewhere in the top 5 of this countdown

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

Goodfellas? Yeah I wouldn't be surprised. I probably dislike Scorsese's films the most here.

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Two of mine have showed up recently on the list.

I had Chungking Express as my #8 and Leon as my #7.



Again, I'm fairly new-ish to the films of Wong Kar-wai, with the exception of 2046 which I had seen almost 20 years ago not too long after it was released. In the Mood for Love is great and Fallen Angels is also spectacular, but neither to me has quite the singular brilliance of the two-story comedy-drama narration driven POV lovelorn joy-melancholic doting over the past and what could and might be delight that Chungking Express has.

As far as love story drama and comedies go, I put Chungking Express right up there with Billy Wilder's The Apartment and also Amelie. Of course stylistically the film has almost zero resemblance to Wilder's, but I couldn't help but be reminded of Amelie when watching Chungking Express... partly because of the narration that encapsulates people's little ticks and idiosyncrasies, be they obsessing over pineapples or cataloguing what characters like and don't like. Also the colors in both Amelie and Chungking Express just absolutely pop off the screen too, only with Amelie a majority of the scenes take place during the day and in Chungking Express they take place mostly at night, but the greens and reds seem to wash out most else giving the films a vibrant edge and particular beauty about them. Also the love interest to the main cop character in the second story, Faye, comes across as an even more neurotic and bolder and more assertive and jovial trespassing and gaslighting Amelie character who uses odd-ball methods to approach or exact her own sense of justice and means of reaching out to people. For me Chungking Express, hits many of the exact notes that makes me love Amelie so much.

Oh and that orchestral music punctuated by the high pitched droning and buzzing synth theme is just haunting and brain piercingly distinctive and memorable and one of the best musical ideas in all of film, period. Shadowing over the whole film is Wong Kar-wai's deliberate sense of uncertainty and dread of Communist China taking back control of British Hong Kong for the first time in a century as 1997 loomed ever so closely. I remember being slightly obsessed with that idea going into freshman year of high school in 1997 and reading what I could about it on what we had for interwebs back then and listening to the late night radio news on newsradio 1040 WHO for the latest updates as well as listening to my two favorite radio personalities at the time (and to be honest, to this day) the iconic and legendary Art Bell and Rush Limbaugh talk about what this might mean for Hong Kong. Moreover, it's interesting how in many ways, it's still not settled as I remember fielding questions from students in class and playing clips of the Hong Kong protests of 2019.



All of that fear and dread is certainly very much interwoven into the fabric of Hong Kong films of the 1990's and certainly in the very western-culture influenced films of Wong Kar-wai.

Chungking Express is brilliant and is an absolute new favorite of mine. Over the last 2 -2.5 years since I first "got around" to viewing it since I subscribed to the Criterion Channel, I have watched it exactly three times, and it's due for another viewing, as I last watched in back in December. Not only is it my number eight pick on the countdown, but it's among my top 100 films of all time (if I ever finish that list).

As for Leon, I love, love, love Leon, but more on that later...

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Top 100 Films, clicky below

http://www.movieforums.com/community...ad.php?t=26201

And my list so far...

1.
2.
3.
4. Raise the Red Lantern
5.
6.
7. Leon
8. Chungking Express
9.
10. Dead Man
11.
12. Ed Wood
13.
14. Glengarry Glen Ross
15.
16.
17. A Perfect World
18.
19. Close-Up
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25. Beauty and the Beast

Sadly, Goodfellas or Pulp Fiction will likely be number one on our countdown as almost invariably on almost all film lists, those two end up being in the top 5, certainly in the top 10. I consciously made a point to try to boost some of the "not quite so much usual suspect" films when making my list and certainly when making the top 10.

I do have one Scorsese film on my list, at it's probably among his most underrated of films too, but it's just amazing and is very similar content wise and stylistically to my second favorite film of all time. But yeah, at this point, it's almost certain my Scorsese pick won't show up on this list. But Goodfellas is a lock and if I remember right it was the top MoFo pick for the original 90's list. And yes, I love Goodfellas and I watched it in the theater a couple of years ago. It's an exercise in cinematic perfection and it's a marvelously crafted piece of artwork and an accomplishment on a level rarely seen in film... but all the characters leave me cold and it doesn't have moments that resonate with me or that live in my brain the way moments in my all time favorite films do. There's a distance Goodfellas keeps me at, that I've never been able to get beyond nor has it been able to really get at me the way something like Taxi Driver does, for example, such as in the scene where Travis talks to Wizard on the sidewalk outside of the cabbie hang out, nor did I find the violence as disturbing nor as traumatic as I found it to be in the climatic shootout in Taxi Driver.

I get why people love Goodfellas, and I love it too, but it will never be "next level" for me, because there's a coldness and disconnect there.

I like both films but I give them like a 3-3.5/5. Good but nothing special. But I get it, I get what the fans are seeing. Now I got a hockey game to watch.

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I've quickly fallen out of love with Pulp Fiction. Its selling point is actually why; it's way too wordy. Sometimes the dialogue works, but a lot of the times I wanted the characters to get on with it and stop yammering. I know Tarantino loves his dialogue, and I do appreciate my love for Django Unchained for its screenplay first and foremost. However, with most of his other films, they're so talky that I get bored and disinterested. When the movie moves forward it's fine. More often than not, I sat there waiting for it to happen. And the Mia Wallace story is really boring. "Let's go eat! Let's OD! Let's revive her! Ta da!" Sleepy sleep...

I saw Dances With Wolves when it was in the theaters, and I loved it. I rewatched it for the Western Countdown, and it's still just as good as I remembered it, but I couldn't find room for it on my list.


I haven't seen Léon: The Professional.

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I've always vibed with Pulp Fiction... a lot, but it's never been a great transcendent film for me or one of the greatest of all time. It's very, very good and Tarantino is wonderful at sampling and paying homage to the films and directors he loves and I really do like what Tarantino has done and I think he's really carved his own niche' post Kill Bill and I enjoy his second half of his career films far more than his first.

Pulp Fiction plays like a series of vignettes like something out of a Jim Jarmusch film, which is not a bad thing, but I am always reminded of stuff like Night on Earth or Mystery Train with a bit Godard and a bit of Robert Aldrich. And I want to reiterate, that's not a bad thing, in fact I'm glad Pulp Fiction exist as it's a wonderful film, but it's not to me among the all time greats nor is it doing anything that hasn't been done before. Pulp Fiction is what it is, a fun, quirky, clever, beautifully crafted love letter to cinema. It's a B+ if I'm cranky, an A-, or an A film, if I'm in a good mood, for me, but certainly it's not an A+ film that belongs on the list of the greatest of all time.

As far as the talking goes, I get what you mean. His films are very talky, and I don't mind that at all, but part of it comes across as a bit too self conscious and silly. The much heralded conversion of quarter pounders and what not and the banter between Jules and Vincent as they approach the apartment for a hit has never done much for me.

In fact, I'd say my favorite bit in Pulp Fiction is...

And of course, Leon is definitely a great gun movie, so here's my obligatory Internet Movie Firearms Database post:

https://www.imfdb.org/wiki/L%C3%A9on:_The_Professional

Everyone was really really into Goodfellas when I grew up, due in part that I live in NJ and a lot of Italian people live here. I've always considered it a very good movie, but as others have said, not next level good. Somewhere around a B+ to A-, mostly for the performances. I honestly preferred Heat.

That exchange is entertaining. Overall I just feel Pulp Fiction has too many words. I get what you mean, and I know it resonates with a lot of people.

I do like the diner scenes well enough. Butch's storyline is a seesaw. The film is just so draggy with the dialogue. Really I don't need to hear Jules and Vincent discuss cheeseburgers, and I don't need to hear them discuss Tarantino's coffee.

I honestly can barely remember what any of them say because it all becomes mushy in my mind after a while because they just don't shut up and it's mostly meaningless. I think it's partly because I like the "less is more" approach, and I feel telling a story with minimal dialogue is better than more dialogue, and if you can exorcise even one line, then do.

The directing is just fine. I think Tarantino knows how to turn words into action. I just wish there weren't so many words to turn into visuals, sir.

I have to include this because it'd be dishonest if I didn't; I fell in love with the trunk shot because of Pulp Fiction. I try to use it when I can, if it fits, because it just looks cool.

I know you know what it is, but I unabashedly love this shot:


I almost forgot; I actually put a trunk shot in a film noir I started, and couldn't complete (damn it) and it was my favorite of about the 25% or 30% of the film we shot. It was so cool. The police were standing over the dead victim discussing the crime scene until the detective got there, and they put the tarp back over "her" (the camera). It was so awesome.

I watched Galaxy Quest

This was decently funny, but the jokes started to wear pretty thin pretty quickly. I think if I were a fan of Star Trek this would’ve worked a lot better for me, but in the end it was not my kind of thing just like the show it satirizes.



Seen: 55/66

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