The MoFo Top 100 Foreign Language Film Countdown

I just checked and I think I started the one-pointer tradition. My Mofo legacy!

On that note, I got a one-pointer:

Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks (2004) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0389448/

An amazing documentary that I highly recommend, assuming you have just over nine hours of free time to watch it. You can break it up into parts if nine hours is too much for one sitting. Five hours one day, four later in the day. Or something like that.

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"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."

She sure went crazy with these filters in Blue Light. All Berg films with her are very much worth seeing, too. She climbed barefoot and rarely used safety ropes. Her documentaries are incredible. She had infinite budget and really used it. Watch Tiefland if u haven't already. Reportedly she used some people from concentration camps as extras

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San Franciscan lesbian dwarves and their tomato orgies.

Films at 100 and 99:
100. Go For Zucker
99. The Wailing

Most recent film and how high:
Parasite...I'm going to guess top half for sure, probably top 40.

Country with most films on list? Japan, although Korea and Italy will be close.

Director appearing the most times: Akira Kurosawa

How many of the top 100 will be animated: Let's go with 7. Miyazaki will make up the majority along with Akira, Persepolis and The Triplets of Belleville.

Tie Xi Qu us amazing but it's so 2013. Real cinephiles watch his Crude Oil now. 14 hours.

PS: it's not as good as Tie Xi Qu

You can really feel the extra five hours. Needed an editor.

Of the ones on the list, I've only heard of La Vie en Rose, Audition and The Lunchbox. Only had a chance to see the latter...missed it due to school stuff, but I've been keeping a list of titles I missed over the years and I plan to catch up to them one day.

The Triplets of Belleville failed to make it on the animation countdown, despite receiving several votes. It's a great film, but I'd be surprised if it makes it here.

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Anna was my No.25., a 15 minute film about a woman desperately searching for a better life. It's so short but it is so well made and packs such a punch, I really hope the director of it makes a feature someday.

I saw it on an online film festival so I don't know when it will be made widely available, but take note of it so you can check it out when it's out.

All I'll say about the rest of them is that I have a few of them on my watchlist and I'm quite surprised no one else picked Audition, I thought it was a classic.

Completely forgotten what I picked for this. Heavily reworked my favourites list after submitting my ballot for this lol.

You should have a PM in your inbox that you received automatically when you submitted your ballot.

I think Kurosawa will win this for the record, but I'm rooting for Ozu, Mizoguchi, or Bergman

Ugh once again I missed the deadline. The only one pointers I have seen

Rikki-Oh
Godzilla vs Hedorah
Audition (Which would have made my list)
Way of the Dragon

#100 The Royal Tailor
#99 Opera

Parasite (#23)

France

Akira Kurasawa

2 Animated Films

Pretty sure I've seen six of the one-pointers.

Audition was the first Miike I saw. I wasn't a huge fan back then, but I think it deserves a rewatch, to be honest. The viewing of The Way of the Dragon is even further back in time, but I doubt it'll benefit from a rewatch. Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky is yet another one I've seen too long ago to say anything meaningful. I mostly remember some over-the-top violence. JCVD was pretty OK, and it showed that JCVD can even act. The Platform was an OK (and above-average Netflix film) dystopia/political allegory.

And my own one-pointer was Eight Deadly Shots (or Kahdeksan surmanluotia as the original Finnish title is). One of the few Finnish films I like. It's a TV production inspired by true events and done with huge passion (director and the star of the film, Mikko Niskanen, drank moonshine and sleep-deprived himself to get to a proper mental state). I've read that 4k restoration is being done (funded by Coppola's foundation), but there hasn't been any news in a couple of years. Hopefully, it gets released by Criterion or something.

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From the one-pointers, I've seen The Way of the Dragon, JCVD and The Lunchbox. None are favourites, but I do like them all. Dragon has a scene where a character gets hit in the balls so hard that he dies, so it's obviously quality cinema.

Also, I realized after the deadline that there was one movie I'd meant to vote for and have been kicking myself for not including it. Let's see if it makes the countdown.

Have you watched both version? The television version and the theatrical version? I know the theatrical version has a much less run time, but I wonder how much it loses in its truncated form.

Ivan Vasilyevich Changes His Profession (1973) was my one-pointer. It was recommended to me by @Tramuzgan when I asked for recommendations for this countdown. It's a fun movie that reminded me of a Mel Brooks type of comedy.

You can read what I wrote about it in my recommendations thread here.

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If I answer a game thread correctly, just skip my turn and continue with the game.
OPEN FLOOR.

very pleased to discover that at least one other person voted for my #25

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letterboxd
criticker

Wang Bing needs to learn to cut, right?