Yearly First Viewing Top Tens

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So a friend of mine actually came up with this idea, but I thought it was so good I had to have it. Those of us who love to list will probably be posting our yearly top ten lists soon. This idea is for those who love to list but maybe don't watch enough movies released within the current year to make a top ten. It is for those who are watching a lot of older movies for the first time. Basically it is for anyone who enjoys putting movie lists together. The rules are simple: If you watched a movie for the first time in 2014 it is eligible. Make a top ten list compiled from all your first time watches last year. Hopefully this will appeal to some of you and it will be something we can keep going on a yearly basis. Happy listing.
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Boy oh boy did I see a lot of great movies in 2014 which made putting this list together hard but fun. I watched 228 movies this year. I know that a lot of you watch more than that, but for me that is a huge number. I am pretty sure it is the most I have ever watched in a year by a long shot. I am leaving some good stuff off my list. Honorable mentions: Virginia Woolf, Elmer Gentry, Bottle Rocket, The American, Short Cuts, Rope, Casablanca, City Lights, and The Seventh Seal. I could probably name more, but on with the ten:

10) The Sweet Smell Of Success



9) All About Eve



8) Autumn Sonata



7) Paris, Texas



6) The King Of Comedy



5) The Third Man



4) Witness For The Prosecution



3) Becket



2) Anatomy Of A Murder



1) Lawrence Of Arabia



I can't imagine seeing more movies I love than this next year, but one can hope. It was nice to be discovering so many classics for the first time because my year at the theater was certainly not as fruitful. Keep the HOF and the recommendations coming MoFo. You are making me a more knowledgeable and well rounded movie watcher. I welcome comments on my list and can't wait to see some of yours.



2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
My ten in no order. And realistically I could be forgetting some films:

Sideways
American Hustle (I did not see it until January)
Chinatown
Halloween
The Virgin Spring
The Last Picture Show
L'Avventura
Fantastic Planet
Ed Wood
Tokyo Story

There's a few more that are very close, like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Fantastic Mr. Fox too. Those are the ten I would pick right now though.



I passed over Becket, thinking I wouldn't like it. I guess I'm going to try it.
Hope you like it Cricket. Probably my biggest surprise of the year.



My ten in no order. And realistically I could be forgetting some films:

Sideways
American Hustle (I did not see it until January)
Chinatown
Halloween
The Virgin Spring
The Last Picture Show
L'Avventura
Fantastic Planet
Ed Wood
Tokyo Story

There's a few more that are very close, like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Fantastic Mr. Fox too. Those are the ten I would pick right now though.
Good stuff Rauldc. Chinatown came close to making mine too. Should have mentioned it in my honorable mentions. Surprised Halloween was a first viewing for you.



wanabe movie critique
I had some favourites until I saw Interstellar. That movie simply blew the rest away and now I can only remember Interstella



Let the night air cool you off
I won't limit myself to ten. Not ordered:

Ordet
Barry Lyndon
Blue is the Warmest Color
Once Upon a Time in America
Autumn Sonata
Sansho the Bailiff
Whisper of the Heart
Little Otik
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Under the Skin
The Strange Color of Your Body's Tears
Mystery Team
Wolf Creek
Elmer Gantry
Punch-Drunk Love
Sweet Smell of Success
Bigger Than Life
Singin' in the Rain
Trouble in Paradise
Hellbound: Hellraiser II
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring
Fanny and Alexander
Sex, Lies, and Videotape
Who Can Kill a Child?
The Wind Will Carry Us
Le boucher
Death Race 2000
4:44 Last Day on Earth
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
Nashville
The Swimmer
The Long Goodbye
Popeye
Barbarella
Ghost in the Shell
Hugo
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
Holy Motors
The Master
Escape from Tomorrow
Le orme
Overlord
Only Yesterday
The Wolf of Wall Street
Inside Llewyn Davis
Persepolis
Stripes
Her

and I had seen parts of Synecdoche, New York before, but I watched it all the way through for the first time this year. I think it could be the best movie I've seen all year.



My top 10.

Saw plenty of great films this year, but the first is the only one which I'd give the full score. The rest are ranked in no particular order.

8 1/2:
Gave a whole new meaning to auteur theory and personal cinema for me. After months of contemplating, and, after finally rewatching it, I decided it was all-time top 5 material.



The Holy Mountain:
"Most directors make films with their eyes; I make films with my testicles" - this is actually a quote from the director of this film, and that's all you need to know about this film.



Le Samourai: You can't execute a film so flawlessly today, you just can't.


The Texas Chain Saw Massacre: First-rate horror, bravura filmmaking.


Chungking Express: Not my first Kar-wai, but definitely my favorite. The characters, the colors, the music, the dreamlike atmosphere, all wonderful.


Serpico: One of my all-time favorites period.


Straw Dogs: Great, great movie about character and machismo. This is the year I realized just how much I admired Dustin Hoffman as an actor, and this film is just one of the reasons why.


Body Double: A joy to watch from start to finish. Just fantastic. Hands down my favorite De Palma.


Stalker: So far it's my second favorite Tarkovsky. Like most great films, it grows on you. The change of color in this film basically sums up the entire film for me, and it took me months to realize just how powerful and meaningful it was.


Werckmeister Harmonies: I even wrote a review about this one a while back. The music, the camerawork, the mood, they still stay with me.




Honorable mentions: A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Touch of Evil, Barry Lyndon, Hour of the Wolf, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Amarcord, Rio Bravo, Through a Glass Darkly, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, Le Cercle Rouge, Bottle Rocket, Three Colors trilogy, For All Mankind, Contempt, Blood Simple, The Hunt.



Lord High Filmquisitor
From what I've seen...

1) Before Sunrise - 10/10
2) Before Sunset - 10/10
3) Captain America: The Winter Soldier - 10/10
4) X-Men: Days of Future Past - 9.5/10
5) Interstellar - 9.5/10
6) For a Few Dollars More - 9.5/10
7) Guardians of the Galaxy - 9/10
8) Oculus - 9/10
9) Before Midnight - 9/10
10) A Fistful of Dollars - 9/10

Numbers 1 through 9 are all in my top 100.
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Arcanis' 100 Favorite Films: 2015 Edition



My top 10 favorite films I've watched for the first time in 2014:



1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
2. High and Low (1963)
3. Solaris (1972)
4. Playtime (1967)
5. Le Cercle Rouge (1970)
6. Barry Lyndon (1975)
7. Network (1976)
8. All That Jazz (1979)
9. F For Fake (1973)
10. Body Heat (1981)

Here are some other new favorites that I discovered (watched for the first time) in 2014:

1930s



M (1931)

1940s



Scarlet Street (1945)
The Lady from Shanghai (1947)
Nightmare Alley (1947)

1950s



Limelight (1952)
Forbidden Planet (1956)
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
Some Came Running (1958)

1960s



Charade (1963)
Les Parapluies de Cherbourg (1964)
Seconds (1966)
Le Samouraï (1967)

1970s



Il Conformista (1970)
The Last Picture Show (1971)
The Heartbreak Kid (1972)
Amarcord (1973)
Farewell, My Lovely (1975)
Night Moves (1975)
Stalker (1979)

1980s



Pennies from Heaven (1981)
Angel Heart (1987)
House of Games (1987)
The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989)

2000s



Sexy Beast (2000)
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002)
Femme Fatale (2002)
Idiots and Angels (2008)

2010s



American Hustle (2013)
The Double (2013)
The Grandmaster (2013)
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)


There were plenty of other films that I really enjoyed, but these were the true highlights. It was yet another very satisfying year of exploring films!
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Cobpyth's Movie Log ~ 2019




1. Dersu Uzala (Akira Kurosawa, 1975)


2. Double indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944)


3. Manic Pixie Dream Girl (Pablo Maqueda, 2013)


4. The hole - Le trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)


5. Il posto (Ermanno Olmi, 1961)


6. Saraband (Ingmar Bergman, 2003)


7. Red Beard - Akahige (Akira Kurosawa, 1965)


8. The umbrellas of Cherbourg - Les parapluies de Cherbourg (Jacques Demy, 1964)


9. Stalker (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979)


10. Strange voyage - El extraño viaje (Fernando Fernán Gómez, 1964)

Honorable mentions
(in airing order):
  • Metropolis (Fritz Lang, 1927)
  • The girl with the hat box - Devushka s korobkoy (Boris Barnet, 1927)
  • The blue angel - Der blaue engel (Josef von Sternberg, 1930)
  • Scarface (Howard Hawks & Richard Rosson, 1932)
  • To be or not to be (Ernst Lubitsch, 1942)
  • Key Largo (John Huston, 1948)
  • Kind hearts and coronets (Robert Hamer, 1949)
  • Her mother's profession - Uwasa no onna (Kenji Mizoguchi, 1954)
  • Throne of blood - Kumonosu-jô (Akira Kurosawa, 1957)
  • Man of the West (Anthony Mann, 1958)
  • The 400 blows - Les quatre-cents coups (François Truffaut, 1959)
  • The skeleton of Mrs. Morales - El esqueleto de la señora Morales (Rogelio A. González, 1959)
  • Macario (Roberto Gavaldón, 1960)
  • Passenger - Pasazerka (Andrzej Munk & Witold Lesiewicz, 1963)
  • The naked kiss (Samuel Fuller, 1964)
  • Shame - Skammen (Ingmar Bergman, 1968)
  • The plea - Vedreba (Tengiz Abuladze, 1968)
  • The seven who were hanged - Balada o siedmich obesených (Martin Hollý, 1968)
  • Investigation of a citizen above suspicion - Indagine su un cittadino al di sopra di ogni sospetto (Elio Petri, 1970)
  • Tristana (Luis Buñuel, 1970)
  • Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975)
  • Love and death (Woody Allen, 1975)
  • The shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)
  • Pixote - Pixote: A lei do mais fraco (Héctor Babenco, 1981)
  • The secret of NIMH (Don Bluth, 1982)
  • An American tail (Don Bluth, 1986)
  • Ariel (Aki Kaurismäki, 1988)
  • The cat who walked by herself - Koshka, kotoraya gulyala sama po sebe (Ideya Garnina, 1988)
  • All dogs go to Heaven (Don Bluth & Gary Goldman, 1989)
  • The war is over - Après la guerre (Jean-Loup Hubert, 1989)
  • Baduk (Majid Majidi, 1992)
  • I stand alone - Seul contre tous (Gaspar Noé, 1998)
  • The road home - Wo de fu qin mu qin (Zhang Yimou, 1999)
  • Code unknown - Code inconnu (Michael Haneke, 2000)
  • Traffic (Steven Soderbergh, 2000)
  • The return - Vozvrashchenie (Andrei Zvyaginstev, 2003)
  • Million Dollar Baby (Clint Eastwood, 2004)
  • Grindhouse: Planet Terror (Robert Rodríguez, 2007)
  • The Tracey fragments (Bruce McDonald, 2007)
  • World's greatest dad (Bobcat Goldwaith, 2009)
  • A letter to Momo - Momo e no tegami (Hiroyuki Okiura, 2011)
  • A separation - Jodaeiye Nader az Simin (Asghar Farhadi, 2011)
  • Bunny Drop - Usagi Drop (Sabu, 2011)
  • Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I (David Yates, 2011)
  • Wrinkles - Arrugas (Ignacio Ferreras, 2011)
  • Final cut. Ladies and Gentlemen - Final cut: Hölgyeim és uraim (György Pálfi, 2012)
  • Before midnight (Richard Linklater, 2013)
  • Cheap thrills (E.L. Katz, 2013)
  • Chinese puzzle - Casse-tête chinois (Cédric Klapisch, 2013)
  • Coherence (James Ward Byrkit, 2013)
  • Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón, 2013)
  • Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part III: Rebellion - Gekijouban Mahou shojo Madoka magika Shinpen: Hangyaku no monogatari (Akiyuki Shinbo & Yukihiro Miyamoto, 2013)
  • Short Term 12 (Destin Cretton, 2013)
  • The wind rises - Kaze tachinu (Hayao Miyazaki, 2013)
  • Venus in fur - La Vénus à la fourrure (Roman Polanski, 2013)
  • Wild tales - Relatos Salvajes (Damián Szifrón, 2014)


Overall, despite I couldn't reach my major objective -365 movies- this year, I watched plenty of great stuff and could finally see many movies I had postponed for years. It was a very satisfying year in terms of film, and I hope I can do the 365 movies thing in 2015.



Lots of good stuff Jal. I saw Double Indemnity for the first time last year, it most certainly would have topped my list in 2014. Stalker was also a first watch last year and I thought it was great. I really responded to Venus In Fur as well. Good stuff.

Hey Cob, same #1. I would have expected that you had already seen Lawrence. What a fantastic example of epic film making. I never thought I would say I can't wait to see a four hour movie again, but I can't.

Great stuff guys, I am glad a bunch of people are participating in this.



1. Mary and Max. (Adam Elliot, 2009)
2. The Immigrant (James Gray, 2013)
3. Waltz With Bashir (Ari Folman, 2008)
4. The Long Goodbye (Robert Altman, 1973)
5. Persona (Ingmar Berman, 1966)
6. Harold and Maude (Hal Asby, 1971)
7. Ernest and Celestine (Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar,Benjamin Renner, 2012)
8. Bronson (Nicholas Winding Refn, 2008)
9. A Town Called Panic (Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar, 2009)
10. A Separation (Ashgar Farhadi, 2011)

Honorable Mentions: Casablanca, North By Northwest, Tale of Tales, Deliverance, Serpico, Kramer Vs. Kramer, Cries & Whispers, The Illusionist, The Triplets of Belleville, Gone Girl, Plein Soleil, Persepolis, Darkness Light Darkness.



Hey Cob, same #1. I would have expected that you had already seen Lawrence. What a fantastic example of epic film making. I never thought I would say I can't wait to see a four hour movie again, but I can't.
I tend to procrastinate long epics sometimes, but I finally watched it this year.
When a film makes you feel like you've actually traveled through the desert yourself, you know the film was special.