The MoFo Top 100 of the 1970s: Countdown

Glad you're a fan of Days of Heaven Bluedeed! Almost forgot that it was in your top 10.

I think Stalker has a good chance of making the top 15 at least. I didn't get round to watching it myself, but it seems popular enough to make a sigificant enough lists to be that high.

I've said it before, I hate woody allen. Days of Heaven was 7 on my list. Beautiful film. I just love the cinematography in it.

It isn't just about how obscure they are. It's also about how obscure and CRAPPY I think they are. Like that Funny Games (the original) I gave a try. The fact that it made the '90s list over so many other great '90s movies is downright obscene. This forum ought to be barricaded from the world for putting that on the list.

I'm just going to talk about Leone's films here, because you particularly focused on The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, but his spaghetti western movies are what I would call "atmospheric heaven". They're epic, timeless adventures with legendary music themes and you can just feel that they're made by a master of the craft. You can inhale the passion for cinema.
Let's also not forget how revolutionizing and influential the style of those films are. Noone made films quite like that (The editing still feels fresh 50 years later).
Leone's Spaghetti Westerns feel real. They're set in real landscapes. The characters feel genuine and very much non-artificial. The stories are grand and epic in scale and the emotions, the feelings that we explore along the way, are pure.

I don't feel that kind of pure cinematic passion when I'm watching modern superhero films at all. They're much more calculated. It feels like they're merely made to earn cash. They're all part of a big, corporate machine. They don't offer anything real, anything personal.
I have a better feeling with Guardians of the Galaxy for some kind of reason, even though I haven't seen it yet. I think it's because it's made by a guy who is genuinely in love with comic books and the movies that are spawn from it. Tim Burton also kind of gave me that feeling with his first two Batman films.

But most importantly:

Leone's Spaghetti Western actually know what "cool" really means. I can't imagine that they'll ever be considered uncool. They're timeless classics.

"Cool" is not some guy who's filthy rich and who makes himself some weird suit to fight crime or an origin story about a boy that somehow has or gets superpowers that make him practically invincible.

THIS is what "cool" filmmaking is all about:



There's a reason why this scene has become immortal. It's unique, it's creative, it's full of bold passion. It's not a scene from a regular blockbuster. It's one of the most memorable scenes of all time and you can feel it in every frame!

__________________
Cobpyth's Movie Log ~ 2019

How many movies have you seen from this list so far SC, and which ones would you say are crappy?

I haven't seen a lot from this list. This list really isn't that bad. In fact, the only thing I could really complain about regarding this list is The Warriors, which I saw the other day, which I believe is more, you know, mainstream. But I absolutely hated it.

My biggest frustration with this list is that Coffy didn't make it, but it almost did. If that had made the list, this list would be really great. It's not bad, though. It has Rocky II. It has some from my list and more to come.

I'm more pissed off about the fact that Pumping Iron wasn't a 1 pointer movie, and that's all Yoda's fault, I think. I told him not to vote for it because there was no point to -- probably nobody else voted for it, it would have been a recognized 1 pointer movie from me, but now it's nothing because he probably arrogantly voted for it.

I don't know Cob. As usual you know what you love and state your position articulately. However the typical spaghetti western protagonist has a mystical feel to him. They feel very invincible to me. The "cool" you are talking about is exactly why. I never feel like they are going to lose a gunfight or not get their man. The origin story is certainly something we don't usually get but that just adds to the mysticism, they seem other worldly. The tone set in these movies is probably your strongest point but is that because it feels unique against today's films? Did they feel so fresh and epic forty years ago? The quips may not come as hot and heavy in these films either, but they were there. I am not even saying I completely disagree with your point on a case by case basis. I am just not sure they are as different as you think either.

If I listed all the comic book movies and all the spaghetti westerns I have seen and then ranked them it would probably be a pretty mixed list. Top heavy on both sides with a lot of mediocre stuff mixed in.

Also...the ending of The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly is tremendous, probably one of my favorite ever.

__________________
Letterboxd

Seconded.

__________________
Fear and Loathing in MoFo... The Gunslinger 45's Top 50 Favorite Films

In the 10 Ring: Gunslinger45's reviews

Been away for three days, but I was happy to come back and see BLAZING SADDLES show up on this countdown. I was its #2 placement.

I saw BLAZING SADDLES in the drive-in back in 1974, with my parents in the front seat of our station wagon. They'd settled my brother and me (we were 11 and 13 at the time) in the back, with the seats folded down, of course, with our sleeping bags in case we couldn't stay awake (I think they were hoping/assuming we'd conk out early), and with the big family cooler bumped right up against their seats so any of the four of us could reach a can of soda inside. We had snacks, of course too.

My only two memories of the first time I saw this movie are:

-- Me NEEDING to know who that guy was playing the gunslinger, the Waco Kid. Those blue eyes! That hair! Oh my gosh, he was perfection and I had a huge crush on him the second he showed up (upside down).

-- My mom in the front passenger seat, her feet up on the dashboard, knees bent, laughing SO HARD she was gasping for breath, tears streaming from her eyes. It was kinda surreal, really -- all that strange combination of ambiance when I was 13. It's even weirder to think now that my mom was only 35 at the time -- five years older than our Yoda.

BLAZING SADDLES is still one of her all-time favorite movies, and certainly her favorite comedy.

And what you have to "get" about BLAZING SADDLES is just how well it parodied some of the classic westerns it is sending up. Watch one of the ones by which it was influenced and THEN go back and rewatch BLAZING SADDLES. The parallels make it all the more special... at least to me, who had no clue at age 13 just what was funny about most of the jokes in that movie. (And to our parents' chagrin, we stayed awake for the whole thing.)

__________________
Linda's Author Website
Linda's Amazon Author page

The best Malick film. I saw people posting this in Rate the Last Movie You Saw, my ranking of his films is: Days of Heaven, The Tree of Life, The Thin Red Line, To the Wonder, The New World, Badlands. I really like all of them, and I vary on the order of 2,3 and 4, but Days of Heaven is consistently my number one.

__________________
Mubi

Let's try to get Holden to post the next two movies at midnight. We need to create a bar atmosphere in case Holden doesn't go to the bars tonight (although, you all know he's gonna be there).

Here:





The Pretend You're Bar Hopping MoFo Bar

will be the unofficial second name of this thread from now on.

Everybody gather around here at midnight with your beers and make Holden feel like you're in the bar with him. Try to get him to post the next two '70s movies while you pretend to be bar hopping with him. Go on now. Get your pretend beer. Or a real one if you're an alcoholic like Rodent and Sci-Fi Slob and who knows - maybe Holden, too. Maybe he's our American Rodent with him going to these bars all the time.

Attachments

   

Does this bar carry King Cobra?

It's two hours until midnight right now on the East Coast. Start drinking.

Attachments

     

Awesome.

Tell me if you wanna try drinking straight from the hose. I'll spray in your direction.

Attachments

 

let the boozing BEGIN!
I'll start with a Stoli Gimlet

Me! Me!

In a way they are invincible, but the heroes earn it in Spaghetti Western movies. They're men of flesh and blood (you can see every single imperfection in their skin during the close-ups) and they outsmart their rivals with sheer slickness, cleverness and of course the typical gun skills.
It's that mystical aspect that actually makes the western heroes so much more awesome than almost all movie superheroes, though. In modern blockbusters every comic book character needs to be fully established. It's the opposite of fun and it takes away from the interestingness of the character (especially if the same origin story is being done over and over again).

Spaghetti Westerns were quite different from the usual westerns stylistically and the editing was quite innovating if I'm not mistaken, so I guess that "unique" atmosphere and feeling to them must have definitely also felt fresh back then. I also don't believe there really was something like typical blockbuster movies already, so films automatically must have had a much more personal feeling to them in those times.

There are certainly similarities story-wise (hero beats villain), but apart from that, I think even the modern superhero blockbusters that are considered the best are nowhere near the films that the best Spaghetti Western films are (and they never will be). I can't imagine one of today's superhero movies ever reaching the same reputation as Once Upon a Time in the West or The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. Those two films truly are cinematic landmarks and I don't believe there's a superhero movie that will ever earn that kind of status in the future. I just don't see it happening, especially not in the narrow-minded format (in my opinion) superhero flicks are all coming out now.
Maybe it could happen if they'd get more out of the potential of the genre. I'm sure it's possible to write another kind of story than the typical "saving the city/world from a random villain" kind of stuff with some cliché character issues or heavy, moral statements about violence or heroism woven into it. Superhero movies should be more distinguishable from eachother. Otherwise not a single one of them will ever be truly remembered as a fantastic, timeless epic (like certain Spaghetti Westerns) in the future.
Again, I guess Guardians of the Galaxy might be a step in the right direction (from what I've heard about it so far), but I can't confirm that yet...

Yeah, that would be kind of different with me, but then again, I actually haven't seen that many spaghetti westerns yet, so it's possible that I've only seen the good ones and that I'm just not much of a fan of superhero movies in general.

Agreed!