My Favourite Directors

Steven Spielberg is one of those directors who can really get to your heart.I find him a bit sentimental (like A.I. or War Horse) but his films are well structured and always of good quality.I tend to think that he is pure Hollywood cinema(or at least Hollywood is influenced by him) - interesting,sad,well-made yet conventional films.
I'd say that his two masterpieces are Jaws and Schindler's List followed by Raiders Of The Lost Ark and Saving Private Ryan.

I was extremely surprised when watching Lincoln because that film left me cold.I was absolutely emotionless and since I didn't even care for the story and its characters I thought that maybe I don't understand the plot,although everything seemed clear.DDL performance was good but in "Daniel Day-Lewis scale" I think it's was mediocre.

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"Anything less than immortality is a complete waste of time."

Danny Boyle
Best Film: Trainspotting
Worst Film: Millions

I've never been a huge fan of Jaws but Schindler's list is definitely a masterpiece.

On the subject of Lincoln I felt the same as you, it too left me cold. Maybe it's because I'm not American and outside of the US, Lincoln just isn't as loved a figure, integral to our history. Having said that, a movie with CGI dinosaurs held more emotional leverage for me than Lincoln did. I actually really enjoyed DDL's performance, I rate it as one of his best and the bits between him and his wife were some of the best throughout the movie. If only the remaining time had been as intriguing.

I'm a huge Danny Boyle film and completely agree with your rankings. Millions was a sadly mediocre film compared to classics like Trainspotting, Shallow Grave and Sunshine.

Thanks, it's hard to really pick an absolute favourite Danny Boyle movie for me but Trainspotting has made such an impact on movies and popular culture that I had to mention it. I highly recommend Frankenstein as well, if the National Theatre ever decide to release it on DVD. A local cinema broadcast a performance live a couple of years ago. Johnny Lee Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch were fantastic.

I've never seen Boyle's Frankenstein, might have to try and get a hold of it.

Moving this to Actors, Awards and Directors forum.

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I personally think Titanic is a better movie than The Terminator (2).

What do people see in The Terminator series anyway, besides that the first two are great action flicks and have great visual effects? I mean, I enjoyed them both, but they weren't anything really special (besides maybe the remarkable special effects in T2).

The story itself is pure crap if you ask me. It's all one big plothole.

Well, Tarkovsky liked The Terminator. He didn't like the violence though, so he liked the substance of the movie.

I think the story of the first Terminator movie is brilliant and the movie is one of the best thrillers ever made. The second one, however, doesn't make much sense in the context of the plot. It is still one awesome action movie.

Tarkovsky isn't the ultimate measure, you know. It's not because he likes a movie, that it automatically has substance.

I loved the first Terminator because of its atmosphere, but I didn't find any substance at all.
A guy came from the future to protect the leader of the human army from being killed by a robot and in the end, seems to become the father. It all fits perfectly (because it explains why the child is being raised as a hero and will become the perfect leader), but it's actually just one big stupid paradox. There's nothing brilliant about it at all. The whole ending is a huge plothole.

I agree when you say it's a great thriller, though. The suspense is awesome (but that was also the case in T2).

Well, if even one who can be possibly be regarded as the most serious film artist of the 20th century though a movie was good, that means he though it has substance.

The main theme of the movie is technology backfiring on humanity. If you want to find out more you can do some goggling.

I though the idea of the time loop was brilliant. Usually the concept of time loop is used to explain why time travel is impossible: you could go back in time and kill your grandfather before being born, so you cannot exist but you do, thus time travel is impossible. Cameron used this concept to make a movie where the time travel is a part of history: John Connor exists because of time travel, as if the whole story has always existed. That's the ancient greek theme of fate.

Titanic is the worst kind of movie, a sloppy, cheesy romance with too much reliance on circumstance and coincidence to move the story along. Add to that a bunch of cringy and unintentionally funny scenes and you have a massive misstep by Cameron. I did really enjoy the last half hour or so, with the ship sinking and the action and the choices the various characters had to make but too much of it was painted with broad strokes. It was Cameron holding our hands and telling us, "look, that's the bad guy, that's the good guy, that's the ever so nice girl stuck in a terrible relationship and that's the overbearing mother". Almost childish.

With regards to Terminator, the story is only crap if you don't full understand it. It is the tale of mans own ambitions coming back to haunt us. The story of success and arrogance which goes horribly wrong for the human race. A warning of our future, as all the best sci-fi.

Add to that some of the deepest characterisation seen in an action movie, with the original actually better than the sequel in this regards. You have the fun time party girl who's world is turned up side down by a stranger who she wants to get away from but all of a sudden that guy is her only saviour. That girl is replaced with at the end with a tougher woman, now pregnant, willing to protect her child against all odds.

We meet up with her again in the sequel and she has gone full on badass but still wants one thing, to protect her child. terminator 2 admittedly has less of a story but it's more of a coming of age tale,.

The main thing for both movies is that they succeed and are the best examples of their genre. Very few science fiction movies have even come close to the action, suspense, story, character development and themes of these 2 films.

Titanic fails at what it wants to be, an epic romance and a disaster movie, ending up being a confused bit of both.

Toe-may-toes, Toe-ma-tas.

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

I can't believe I'm defending Titanic here, as I don't like it THAT much, but I think it's one of those films that shows us that practically anything can be done with this medium. Everything looks so real. It's a wonderful piece of filmmaking.
The story has some flaws, obviously, but the fact that millions of people had to cry at the end (not including me), proves that the story has a certain emotional identity.

Your opinion is of course your opinion.


Are you implying that I don't understand the Terminator?

Every sci-fi is practically a warning. That's nothing fresh at all. The theme people vs technology is also not really 'new'. I don't say it has to be, but you and Guaporense praise it like it's a brilliant and inventive theme. It's not.
I still see no answers about the undeniable plot hole and the actual absurdity of the whole concept from you guys. The paradoxality totally pushed the movies away from seriousness for me. It made everything completely unbelievable. The story is one of an average action/sci-fi film.

I agree about the fact that Sarah Connor is pretty interesting, though. I also think the characters are the main reason why The Terminator succeeds. It were Arnold's coolness and his epic oneliners that gave these two films the legendary status they have today and that's probably also the reason why Tarkovsky likes it. Its great style and suspense scenes are admirable and irresistible.

I have to make this clear: I do not dislike Terminator! I just think that its story doesn't have any real, interesting substance.

I would say it pretty much succeeds on being an epic, a romance and a disaster movie and I think many people agree with me.

Raises hand.

I think I cam across as someone who hated Titanic in reality I think it's an ok movie, still Cameron's worse BUT compared to Terminator 1 and 2, it's not even in the same ball park.

I'm sure you've all noticed I love those movies by now, especially the sequel. It is the perfect combination of cool, smart, action, sci-fi and heroism ever committed to film...hyperbole? No sir

Numbers don't work in an argument as well as when the subject is something like Titanic. But the only thing epic about it is the fact that a giant boat sinks because people are stupid. Sounds like an everyday thing really. Everything about it was poorly thought-out though: the unbelievable, one-liner driven romance, the typical rich = corrupt, poor = hero (how much was the budget again), the disregard for the actual relevant matters of the history (of which there is soooooo much material) to further the romance, so much so that I don't know why it was called Titanic. It just feels like trivializing a catastrophe to make money.


Don't worry I truly hate it enough for both of us.

It was more like a statement. I didn't use it as an argument.

It's the proportion of the whole movie that makes it epic.

I can see why you would think that the romance is a little cheesy and that the characters are a little cliché, but I can bare it in Titanic. I'm also a fan of the theme song, so that may be a reason why I liked the romance, as it was often used during those scenes to give them an extra emotional touch.

I don't know what you mean by 'relevant matters of the history'. Did you expect a kind of documentary?
James Cameron spent a lot of money on research and he made an exact copy of the whole boat. I think the film does a pretty good job when it comes to historical accuracy.

I also don't agree with your last sentence. The disaster of Titanic was very central in this film and it showed what personal dramas it could possibly have caused in the form of two fictional main characters, who lose their chance at a happy life together because of it.

I think the original was a film of the time. It took ideas from movies like Westworld, Time After Time, and Blade Runner and moulded them into a super taut action-suspenser that audiences were clamoring for back in the early 80's (and still are really). The paradoxical nature of the plot is what gives it a kind of faux-substance if you pardon the expression. There's a shelf life there...room for re-interpretation...philosophy i.e. the kind of depth many similar genre pictures don't possess. Not surprising it became one of the most imitated films of the next two decades and we all know imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

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100 Favourites From The Future: REWIRED