Should the 1930s get their own list?

EDIT: spun off from this post in the 1940s list thread.

I think it should be the beginning to 1939. There's not going to be enough for a top 100 of the 1930's alone i don't think, and if there is there's definitely not going to be enough for 1920's and before since most of those are silent films.

Yep, I was also thinking we were nearing it now. Being really close.

Personally I agree, because as I said the 30s is a major problem for me - I'm sure it is for many others... And if we want to keep it fresh, keep it a top 100 and keep more members in this, we need to expand.

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Top 100 for 30s is a must. And then I'm not sure we can do anything afterwards.

Yeah, i'm watching and really enjoying the 30's right now and i think when i'm done i'll be able to come up with a list. But the fact is there's only a limited amount of members who could come up with a 30's list right now and there's only a limited amount that would be willing to watch enough in a few months to come up with one. When we get to 20's and before that number becomes that much lower. It looks like the participation for this is going to be quite a bit smaller than the 50's even and most likely a higher number of partial lists.

That's my point, we should include everything before the 30's too or we won't do a Countdown where we could vote for them. There's loads of good 20's films that should get a chance in one of these.

Doing that would give a lot of great 30s films a bump off a list they deserve to be on too though.

I wouldn't have enough for a full 20s list yet but it wouldn't be impossible for me to make one in say 2 years when we would have the countdown.

At the very least we'd need about 30 lists and i can't see us getting 30 for 20's and before.

They said that about the 40s but it looks like we are making good pace.

This was my thinking, too.

It might not be perfect, but at some point the lists either a) stop/come back around or b) do a "this decade and all else before" list. So if it's not going to be "1930s and before," and there's not enough to do a "1920s and before," that means the 1920s would never be represented at all.

Anyway, you guys collectively do a great job with these and can decide for yourselves as a group. That'd just be my vote. Whatever happens, I hope everyone can make their case but otherwise go with the decision, whatever it ends up being, since there's perfectly good arguments for doing it either way.

Who said that about the 40's? Also 40's films have the benefit of not being majority silent films. Getting 30 or more members to watch enough silent films to come up with a list of 25 in a limited amount of time is not going to go over the best i don't think.

Honestly i think we'd struggle to fill up a top 100 of the 30's and i can't see any more than ten maybe films from before then making it. Think it would work out for the best personally.

I don't think we would struggle with 30s, we would with 20s though so I do see the point you are making.

I would love for a full Top 1930s list to come to fruition, but I just don't think it's a realistic scenario...

Pleasuring my ego a bit here, I would say I'm pretty well-shaped as a cinephile and know my way around many, many corners of film, despite not being close to an expert on all decades and all genres, especially when we get to the 40s-and-down mark. That's where my knowledge and watchings become very thin.

My point here being, that even I have a hard time coming up with enough films - even for this 40s list. And if we look at the people who actually sit down and watch plenty of films from the upcoming decade for the next list, it's really only a handful of people as it is now. And it will only get thinner as we go...

So if people don't have enough 30s films on hand, and if people are not actively going to sit down and prepare for the list - both scenarios of which I doubt - then a 1930 full top 100 list is VERY unlikely to be a success.

That's just my 2 cents.

Yeah, the problem is we need people to watch films in a limited time. Fact is only a fairly small amount of us keep the Countdowns on our mind and prepare for them in advance, most only do so when the Countdown has been announced and when that happens they only have a few months to come up with a list. The further down we go the less people have seen, so with say the 30's people are going to have to put aside a good amount of their movie watching time to come up with a list, and understandably people aren't always willing to do that.

I get the counterarguments but i think the choice is clearly 30's and before vs 30's and don't do the 20's at all like Yoda said.

Yep, that point is definitely one that does it for me.

If we really can do a full top 100 out of the 1930s, the 1920 and all the rest is going to be completely dead on arrival. It would be a shame to struggle so much to get a 1930s list together only to sh*t on all that came before it.

Of course, the 1920s and down could always just be a top 50. That's another option. But I'm still leaning on doing it "mash-up-style" for the next one.

Sent my list.

I think we should make a list for the 30s alone, now that we are at it. But the doubts are understandable, the problem is that the alternative of merging with the previous decades doesn't sound convincing to me. At least a top100 list of 20s and before makes some logistic sense because it's the silent era, but 30s and before? I think it's too cautious on the one hand (people do know something about 30s cinema here, even those who have never explored the decade will surely have heard of and/or watched at least a handful) and on the other it seems very difficult to defend in terms of representation because we merge silents with talkies. If the problem lies in the lack of general experience we have our strategies to improve that during the year: Halls of Fame, recommendation threads, increasing the visibility and talk of 30s film... just leave enough time for a mildly satisfying exploration of the decade and it should be enough.

I think all of that may work for a 30's Countdown, problem is i don't see it working for a 20's and before one in which case the 20's won't get any representation on one of these.

Would anyone really be mad if 20s weren't represented? There's maybe 3 films I've seen that I would consider favorites from that era.

That's true. But then, that goes both ways: if we wouldn't miss it because there wouldn't be many films, then including those films also wouldn't crowd out the 30s much.

I wouldn't be mad but i think it would be unfortunate that a decade that most see as important doesn't have a chance for us to vote for their films. I'm actually pretty confused about the pushback against this since most seem to believe the 20's wouldn't have a significant impact on a 30's Countdown anyway, why not include them then?

According to Letterboxd you've seen seventeen 1920's films, three favourites from that isn't bad.