December 12, 2006

• These kinds of lists are always banking on infuriating you, IMHO, because taste in books, movies, art, etc is subjective. You cannot say "this piece of art is overrated". What are the criteria? I can predict what people will say: 'there are some that I agree with, and some that I don't. Why didn't they include [insert film title here]?' Thence comes a discussion or argument about the merits of whatever has been listed or suggested.
• Great Scott, a discussion! We're doomed!
• American Beauty - Right out of Heidegger Chicago - I agree, not every stage play belongs on the screen Clerks - Agreed, they summed my opinion up in the review. Fantasia - whatever its Disney Field of Dreams - someone holds this movie in high regard? Chariots of Fire - Looked good when I was a kid, haven't seen it since. Good Will Hunting - someone holds this movie in high regard? Forrest Gump - I thought the directing and cinematography in this movie was good. Jules and Jim - never saw it, but I heard good things. A Beautiful Mind - someone holds this movie in high regard? Monster's Ball - eh Moonstruck - eh Mystic River - At no point in my life did I ever want to see this movie. Nashville - never heard of it. The Wizard of Oz - I didn't agree with anything they criticized this movie for. An American in Paris - eh Easy Rider - eh The Red Shoes - never saw it 2001: A Space Odyssey - I never thought anyone would have the balls to call this movie overrated. Gone With the Wind - Oh come on, Premiere is full of crap!
• Premiere? Is that rag still published?
• It's interesting to read the pro and con opinions on the movies. Even though I disagreed with many of the choices I did acknowledge a lot of the weaknesses he pointed out. But Chy pointed out would happen, and as befitting the general tenor of these sorts of threads, I can't resist mentioning that "Field of Dreams" most assuredly deserved to be on that list. OTOH, I was profoundly disappointed by the omission of Jane Campion's steaming mound of crap-osity, "The Piano". I also found the much lionized score so much prententious noodling. I'm well aware that that's an unpopular opinion, and it this painful realization that causes me to weep for humanity. I suppose I also ought to be worried that Chy can now seemingly predict (or perhaps is it control!?) my behavior
• My initial response was similar to Chy's, actually, because we so know how this thread is going to play out. But since glama's opened the floodgates: Agree with Premiere: American Beauty, Mystic River (related-but-tangentially, Sean Penn is also grossly overrated imo), and a few others. Agree with glama: Fantasia, Chariots, Good Will, Beautiful Mind, few others. But where this list bungs itself up is Nashville (shame, glama, shame! now go add your dot to this thread). This is maybe what Chy was getting at, but all lists reveal their true colors/ignorances at some point with the inclusion of that one item that clearly shows (in other people's minds) that they don't know what they're talking about. Well, this is it. And 2001. On preview: kamus makes some of the same points.
• kamus, I absolutely agree on The Piano. My #1 overrated movie of all time. At least the music suits the story in being equally nauseating.
• sly_polyglot, and The Red Shoes.
• /drawn into own argument
• I don't know that the Moira Shearer character in The Red Shoes actually had to dance off a railway bridge and then get run over by a train as she lay on the tracks. I would call that "overdetermined".
• You cried at that part, didn't you.
• Fantasia is NOT over-rated; it was and remains an astonishing and often powerfully enthralling piece of animation. Chicago - an anachronism, but watchable for all that. Field of Dreams - plot's on the saccharine side Chariots of Fire - no redeeming features. Plot: They run. They run some more. I would rather watch horses doing this. The Wizard of Oz - simply fun, with some fascinating performances by actors schooled in live performance/vaudeville. An American in Paris - if ye don't like dancing and singing, don't see it. Useless plot. (Singin' in the Rain is superior in all respects.) But watching Kelly dance is always worthwhile, and Caron's captivating. Easy Rider - very fine performance from Hoffman. If ye revel in a depressing story and seeing the seamy side of the streets, this is for you. The Red Shoes - Dark fairy-tale, surreal elements, not easily summed up and for those who enjoy enigmas, definitely worth seeing. 2001: A Space Odyssey - too slow, too ponderous, and not nearly as interesting as Clarke's writing. Significance lies in context of the way SF before and after it were treated in the movies. Gone With the Wind - escorted some of my older kin to see this back in the sixties. Very period. Very long. Fact: My life would not be the poorer if I never saw it, never read the book, but it's a relatively swift and bloodless way to do the American Civil War, if ye're interested in that one. The rest I haven't seen and doubt I will. Movies are like other categories of entertainment: most are schlock, and only in a very rare while does one come along that's worth watching once let alone again. Into that last category I'd put Fantasiaand The Wizard of Oz. And Singin' in the Rain, which isn't on the list.
• You cannot say "this piece of art is overrated". What are the criteria? Bang on. I can predict what people will say: 'there are some that I agree with, and some that I don't. Why didn't they include [insert film title here]? Hillarious. I've argued with friends about movies before, whether they were over-rated or what not, only to realize what a tard I was for it. I had nothing to do with the movie except enjoy it or want my money back. Subjective is as subjective does, Forrest.
• bees, you confuse Easy Rider with Midnight Cowboy. :) But I think the same can be said viz Nicholson's performance in Easy Rider (it was the movie with Peter Fondue & Dennis Hopper riding big motorcycles, taking drugs, & getting offed by rednecks at the end) as per Hoffman in Midnight Cowboy. I agree with what you said. (Except Field of Dreams is a guilty pleasure of mine, which I'm sure people would not predict. I like it because of James Earl Jones & the fact it has a supernatural mystery element in it. /can't stand Costner but I put up with him in this. Maybe the whole baseball thing doesn't have the same cultural meaning to me as it would an American, thus the sacharine side doesn't make me vom.) InsolentChimp, I thank you, sir. It's like going to an art gallery and arguing about which paintings are 'good'. As long as the basic technical standards are met, it is up to the artist and the viewer what merits value. Then again, there's Duchamp's Fountain, which deliberately confronts this. And I suppose a lover of cinema might bring up some underground filmmaker who does not live up to accepted popular standards of technical artistry.. ah, you see where I'm going with this.
• Chyren has, of course, nailed it with his initial comment. Taste is a nebulous thing. It interests me that Clerks, a shoe-string budget, independent film manages to make a "most overrated" list, or is this just to gain discussion from a wider audience? And the score from "The Piano" is superb, you are all crazy, and possibly on drugs of some sort.
• Chy, you're right - I did confuse 'em. I would pay not to have to see either again.
• Monkeyfilter: so much prententious noodling
• They lost my respect at Fantasia - that is a stunning masterpiece. I never even thought of it as highly rated, just my personal favorite. When I was young, I loved the pegasi, but as I got older, the abstract Tocatta and Fuge in D Minor became my favorite.
• in other words, what bees said.
• Of course debating the merits of artistic output is useless, but it's *fun* useless! I read this list last week and had a good conversation/argument with my mom over it. -- I agreed that Forrest Gump was hideously overrated, while she felt it captured the spirit of a generation (we often argue over the sanctification of the boomers). -- I also agreed that GwtW is overrated because it's a (beautiful, gorgeously acted and shot) apology for the Confederate Lost Cause (that this teaches most Americans about the Civil War has something to do with some of the wacky politics going on today, I think. Didn't the South lose, I ask as a Southerner). My mom argues that it's one of the best movies ever. And (while she's certainly not sympathetic to racists) clings to the ideas she was taught about the Civil War as a kid -- namely, that it was a war about States Rights and not slavery. -- We both disagreed with their assessment of An American in Paris and The Red Shoes as overrated. Both present some of the most beautiful dancing ever caught on camera. Gene Kelly does have some horrible roles (see: The Three Musketeers *shudder*), but this is not one of them (thought I must agree with bees about Singin' in the Rain), and The Red Shoes (which *does* make me cry every time during the last dance with just the spotlight in Shearer's position) couldn't be more beautiful. Sure, the gender politics are kind of old fashioned and overwrought, but I'm amazed that a movie was made about how hard it is for women to be pulled in too many directions back then in the first place. -- Field of Dreams is one of the few Costner movies I like (the other being Bull Durham -- he does well as a baseball player, I guess!). I'm an admitted baseball fanatic (heck, I have to be, I root for the Rangers), and this movie pretty much sums up why baseball has such a hold on the American imagination. My mom agrees, stating "Baseball is Life." Also, what Chy said about it. -- How can The Wizard of Oz be overrated? There's no place like home. -- I liked American Beauty when I first saw it because of the sheer power of the acting, but the more I thought about it, the more it fell apart. I think that's an indicator of how good Spacey and Benning are, and how shoddy the script is.
• Zapruder
• Yeah, but which version? The FBI cut version or the original? /slaps knee
• As Chy stated in the first comment: What are the criteria? He seems to have taken a few titles from the populist IMDb Top 250 and then thrown in some sacred cows like Fantasia. There are movies which strike a chord with the public (for whatever reason) and there are movies that move filmmaking forward. Fantasia and 2001 moved filmmaking forward, though they may not rank very high on the "grab your popcorn" scale. I tend to like a good writing and good acting and a certain amount of quirkiness which is why Moonstruck, The Shipping News, Wonder Boys, Rushmore and Smoke Signals are at the top of my personal list. But I would not necessarily call any of them "Great Films" and could really care less how the public at large rates them. It does bother me when good films are completely overlooked, such as Searching for Bobby Fischer. And at the top of the over-rated chart, I'd have to put Lost in Translation. If you want to see the movie that Bill Murray should have won an acting Oscar for, go see Rushmore.
• Why oh why isn't Moulin Rouge on this list?
• Because no-one in their right mind thinks it's good?
• /slaps other knee
• I'm curious to see what the magazine feels are the 20 most underrated films of all time.
• [on 2001] Yes, the design of the movie is beautiful and there are lots of great shots. But a coherent story well-told, it is not. [on Nashville] But Altman's multiple story line vision is a high-minded concept crippled by overwrought execution. The overlapping dialogue feels overindulgent, the earthy filmmaking looks sloppy... Heaven forbid that a director challenges the viewer, instead of just handing everything on a plate. Making the viewer think about what they're seeing, having signature styles that set one director's film apart from everything else out there -- these are qualities that should be encouraged. There may be a lot of failures, but they're noble ones, and far more interesting than the rest of the schlock out there.
• Underrated? Offhand, I'd say Safe.
• Here's a great run-on sentence on the subject:

  I don't know what bothers me more: critics doing a circle jerk over a supposedly brilliant piece of art, or nacho-snarfing morons piling into theaters to show their financial support for the foulest movies, which leads to two things I hate even more than overrated movies: overrated sequels to overrated movies, and the resulting frenzy of "turnstyle worship," as the lemmings who pose as "entertainment journalists" fall over themselves to put on their Hulk gloves (shame on you Joel Siegel) and rank movies according to how many fannies filled the seats.

  -via
• Underrated - Way of the Gun Most misinterpreted misunderstood movie I have ever read a review for. A western on par with any Sergio Leone film, without ripping off Kurosawa. Written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie, screenwriter of The Usual Suspects. Every time I read a review I noted huge misunderstandings of the storyline by the reviewer. Some people just want their plots spoon fed to them.
• If you ask me, they're all winners!
• taste in books, movies, art, etc is subjective. You cannot say "this piece of art is overrated". What are the criteria? Well unlike the rest of you bleating sheep-botherers, I disagree most utmostly with the baleful yawpings of Chy-in-the-Sky's amoral relativism. Sure, taste in art is subjective - if you're a squigy little bivalve mollusk stuck to the ocean floor by a single foot, whose cultural diet consists of a residue of gunge filtered from the muckiest depths of our scum-soaked society. I'm sure you people taste great prised from your shell, maybe with a little tabasco, but I wouldn't take your "pearls of wisdom" too seriously. Here's my fool-proof guide to when shit is overrated: 1. Let's say you got yourself a DVD and it has a five-star rating on the back cover, but when you put it on and watch it, one of those "stars" is Nicholas Cage. Newsflash, Hollywood: dude is FUGLY. Overrated. 2. Your girlfriend is all "waah waah let's stay in and watch a movie tonight" and then you suggest you watch a Police Academy classic like "Police Academy 11 - Time Patrol - Plato's Police Academy" but she's all like "noooo baby let's see something that Jane Austen directed like 'Love and Lovability' or 'Emma and Employability' or 'Irony and Ironmongeringability'" - I need say no more. Overrated. 3. Anything by Oliver Stone. Overrated. 4. Any movie that is a scene-for-scene remake of another movie. First movie was rated, yeah? It had ratings, rates, ratios - all that stuff. Ergo the remake of a movie whose time is OVER is - guess. Go on - guess. Jesus Christ, no - not "more rated". YOU ARE WRONG. Overrated. 5. Anything rated PG. "Parental guidance"? Listen Hollywoodistan, my parents are 87 and dead, respectively. They couldn't guide a turd down an S-bend. Overrated. OK, that about sums me up. In summary, then: what Chy said.
• Technical mastery is not a neccessity for great art. I submit the case of Thelonious Monk, who while sadly lacking in certain piano 101 skills, was a visionary who exerted a huge influence over Jazz in general and Jazz pianists in particular. I thought the film "Following" was brilliant and made up for its numerous technical shortcomings with an engaging script that immediately had viewers wanting to see the film again the second it was over. I think I remember reading that it was shot for 700 pounds. Yeah, "what are the criteria?" is a relevant, and unanswerable question. Still, it's fun to discuss subjective differences in threads like this despite the obvious pointlessness of it all. BTW, I once wrote an article on how terrible the score to "the Piano" is. So that makes me objectively infallible on the subject and I will not tolerate anyone trying to defend it. If those of you who think it's great don't change your mind right this instant, why I'll ... I'll...I'll hold my breath until you agree with me!
• 'Irony and Ironmongeringability' was a classic, dude. You really missed the boat on that one.
• I agree -it was so much better than its shitty sequel, "Copper and Copraphilia"
• American Beauty – Gag. I saw this and my response was, “This is the movie people are talking about???” Chicago – Never seen it. Commercials made me gag. Clerks – Clerks is awesome. If you were in college or a dead end job when this came out, it surely had to hit home Fantasia – gag. Overly self important. Field of Dreams – Gag. Gag. Gag. All sports movies are crap Chariots of Fire – never seen it. Good Will Hunting – remarkably unremarkable Forrest Gump – This was so popular at the time largely because of the special effects and the use of historical events. I can’t imagine anyone bringing it up in a conversation about great movies. Jules and Jim - never heard of it A Beautiful Mind – remarkably unremarkable. Jennifer Connelly sure is pretty. Monster's Ball – never seen it. The critical praise was enough to put me off of it. Moonstruck – gag. Horrible movie. Mystic River – never seen it Nashville – never seen it. The Wizard of Oz – I used to watch this film every year when it came on tv as a kid. I’m not sure there’s anything great or wrong with it. An American in Paris - never seen it Easy Rider - never seen it The Red Shoes - never heard of it. 2001: A Space Odyssey – As just about the only hard scifi movie ever made, I rank it pretty darn high. Space is silent! Gone With the Wind – Gag. Gag. Gag. Horrible horrible movie.
• Nah, I can't be arsed to allow scripts on that ad-driven drivel. I rarely pay directly for watching films, and I get my money's worth.
• Field of Dreams – Gag. Gag. Gag. All sports movies are crap Dude, really? Don't forget to punch the clock.
• overrated = "Remains of the Day" -- moral of the story, don't let your life be as boring as this movie underrated = "A Simple Plan" -- how money turns good people into pure evil
• OK, first off, I need to borrow Medusa's ovaries for the weekend so I can have Quid's love child. Now that that's out of the way... I was flipping channels the other night and I saw that some damn fool cable channel was airing Titanic. I thought to myself, "Self, it's been 6 years. Do you think thee hype and ballyhoo have died down enough that you can sit down and watch this movie without mortally choking on your own zeitgeist?" Self replied in the negative and I kept flipping. Give it six more years. On to Casablanca. I saw it as a teen and my first reaction was a big WTF? It wasn't the datedness, 'cause I already loved a bunch of other films of the era. I gave it another shot as an adult and fell in love.
• Of course you did. *cough*
• What, no Ishtar? Okay perhaps it's not overrated. Or rated. Dunno, i never seent it.
• yeah, and it was with Quiddy! Yuck!! Doubly disgusting 'cause he's just a kid!
• My favorite Bogart film: To Have and Have Not Got Bacall. Got Hoagy Carmicheal on the piano. And singing the (seriously sycopated) Hong Kong Blues. And that number alone is worth the price of admission. And [fanfare] got Walter Brennan playing the Bishop of Southwark!
• My favorite Bogart film: To Have and Have Not Yeah I loved that movie.
• Regarding Breaking Away -- How did you know that I'm writing this from a computer lab at Indiana University in Bloomington, IN? (Bloomington is the setting of Breaking Away in case anyone doesn't know) I actually haven't seen it in probably more than a decade though, so I don't remember much about it.
• Kevin Costner was really good in Silverado and, well, The Big Chill.
• I agree with most of the selections. Especially A Beautiful Mind. Has Howard ever made a good film? If so, I missed it. (And I hate Russell Crowe.) And Forrest Gump was different...but very weak. And annoying. Moulin Rouge, however, is brilliant.
• I don’t see why the Godfather couldn’t have been more like Timecop. Way, way off about Easy Rider and 2001 here. I think the Aviator was completely overrated. It was an outstanding work in terms of direction and other marks of technical excellence - the acting was great even in the incidentals. It just wasn’t that entertaining, mostly because of the story itself, not the ‘how’ of anything. One can make a flawless or even outstanding piece of film and yet not really pull anything off. Wheras Star Wars (or the Matrix) has holes you can drive a truck through, but I can watch it over and over and be entertained.
• Melvin Gibsons FTW!!!!!
• Has Howard ever made a good film? If so, I missed it. The only one I'd defend would be Apollo 13; you've got a compelling-but-simple real-world narrative, perfect for a down-the-middle director whose primary goal seems to be avoidance of any risk or edge. And even then, I'd just say it's a reasonably good film, nothing for the ages.
• Has Howard ever made a good film? If so, I missed it. Omg, WILLOW.
• Willow is pretty damn brilliant. It's so good, I wish it had been based on a novel, so I could go read more (and complain about all the stuff the film left out). You Fantasia haters just don't understand art. Tocatta! Fugue! D Minor! It's all that anyone needs to survive. Food is overrated next to baroque music.
• First film in stereo too, I believe.
• > Top 20 Overrated Movies? This list seems designed to infuriate It also seems overly geared towards recent movies, but perhaps that's unavoidable. I'm not sure what purpose lists of this type serve. I can understand a list of underrated movies; it'll give me ideas on stuff to rent or buy. But listing overrated movies? Either I've seen them and agree or disagree that they're overrated, or I haven't seen them and am possibly less likely to do so. Is this the point, to save me a few hours by identify the movies that aren't worth the time?
• Agree with you mecurious, about "Lost in Translation" being overrated. Also I submit that "Barbarian Invasions" (beloved of Canadian film critics for some unfathomable reason) is praise-misplaced. Another one: "Closer". Bleah.
• Agree with Glama, that a fair few of these films I didn't know (couldn't conceive) were rated at all in the first place. As a young boggis, the mother of a mate used to give digs to panto people. One of them was one of the dwarves from 'Willow'. He was a communist, we were stoned, and the concept of Red dwarf was almost intolerably funny. He smoked, but he said he was worried it would stunt his growth. Really nice guy, actually.
• I don't think the list is so unreasonable. A lot of it seems to be movies (like The Wizard of Oz) that really aren't that enjoyable for most adults, or made that well by contemporary standards, but have been "favorites" for so long that they're considered classics. The on-screen guide on my TV always lists "WoO" as a four-star movie and I think if it came out in the last couple of years it would have been listed at around 2.5 stars. At any rate, "overrated" is not "bad," just "not as good as their reputation suggests." (I generally liked most of the movies mentioned in the foreword, though I don't think they're "classics." In each case, I was surprised by how good the movie was, because elements of it suggested that it should have been completely painful to watch.) Another issue is that some of these films are more "influential" than "great," and sometimes influential in a bad way. Other things on the list seem to be easy-target modern Oscar-winners. People crack on American Beauty because, in terms of the style appropriate to the story it tells, it's pretentious. A Beautiful Mind isn't a great film, though it's a decent one (Fellowship of the Ring, the best and most stand-alone of the LOTR movies, was robbed that year on Oscar night). Clerks isn't a great film, but it's a lot of fun if you're in the right demographic. A lot of the rest of these movies seem to be ones that were critically successful because the demographic they were aimed at, middle-aged men baby boomers, is a powerful one. (A few of these, like Moonstruck, were more aimed at middle-aged women, but it occurred to me that what I really mean is that they felt like they were made for boomers, not me.) Fantasia - I never watched it stoned, but in my high school and among friends who'd gone to school in other parts of the country, this was a makeout movie. No plot to follow (thereby not having to potentially answer to one's parents), interesting visuals, mostly romantic music. The only movies I think were categorically mistakes to put on this list are 2001 and... that's it. I've never seen Jules et Jim or Nashville, so I don't know. I enjoyed Gone With the Wind when I was a kid, but now the racial politics bother me. Why aren't Dances With Wolves and Braveheart on this "overrated" list? (I saw the latter recently again, have seen it many times, each time it's worse and more like self-parody.) You Piano-haters are sexist philistines, though. (JOKE! I JOKE! But one can write a very effective paper based on it if one considers it in terms of feminist symbolism, which was intentional on Campion's part.) Also, on further reflection, what quiddy said. in the listy-type post.
• Yeah, but a film replete with heavy handed feminist symbolism does not a good movie make either. Nor does anachronstic, meandering, musical twaddle suggestive of the work of a post-lobotomy George Winston whose copy of Piston's Harmony got left out in the rain, a good score make-unless the point that Campion was trying to make was that not only are men brutal, unfeeling misogynists, but they can be really crappy composers too. Did I mention that I hate this film? Having got that off my chest, I'm going for a wee lie-down now.
• It's a good film because *I* think it's a good film. QED! :D (it's, like, deep and stuff. deep.) seriously though, i do wonder how many women actually hate it. all the women i know personally who hate it are sexual abuse survivors who are creeped out by it. there are also a few who appreciate it, but are too puritanical to embrace it further, because it's too explicit for them. most of the people i know who hate it based on its actual artistic merits (or mistakenly perceived lack thereof! ;) are men. similar to how i was saying that i thought a lot of the films on the list were overrated partly because they seemed to me like films heavily gauged to appeal to boomers, and usually male boomers at that: i'm not part of the demographic, and i can't see the appeal.
• pee ess - feminist symbolism, or symbolism of any other kind, doesn't a bad movie or a good movie make, period. it's just another layer. on another note, why can't we talk about what we talk about when we talk about zardoz, anyway? the heck with overrated "quality" films and our predictable little thread. we should totally talk about weird stuff.
• It's amazing how many flicks I don't see. I've only seen 2 and a half off that list. But I do regret sitting through Lost in Translation - mainly because it irritated me so much and not effectively tackling what it's really like to first come here. And that scene in which the bar is broken up is just stupid.
• I loved The Piano - beautiful cinematography, compelling story, good acting all around. It's a depressing, but good film.
• (Loved is maybe a bit strong - I definitely liked. But it was no Fantasia. Did I mention the Toccata and Fugue? The early parts of the Rites of Spring fascinate me too - and I love the Ave Maria - the animation is staid, but that's a good choice after the chaos of Night on Bald Mountain and to suit the music.)
• I quite liked Lost in Translation. I wouldn't say that it's one for the ages, but it was very well done. Not so much a story as a mood piece, I suspect, and I'll leave it to gomi to say how accurate that portrayal is, but for a complete novice like me, I found it fascinating. Someone asked Bill Murray, a year after the movie had come out, why he thought so many people reacted to it. He said something rather interesting, that usually people think of 'heroes' as someone who performs this grand act, but most often times, it's someone who doesn't do something. I think there's a lot of truth in that...
• You Fantasia haters just don't understand art If you like Fantasia, you'll also like Allegro non troppo, though perhaps not as much. Parts of it are irritating, and it peters out at the end, but a few of the sequences, particularly the one set to Ravel's Bolero, are fantastic.
• So wait, Murray sees his character as a hero for NOT sleeping with Scarlett Johannsen? Oops, ^^^spoilers!^^^ WhatEVAH. I did rather like the movie though. My personal most-overrated movie of the last few years has to be The Royal Tenenbaums , though, followed closely by The Life Aquatic. Maybe I'm just not hip enough to "get it," but it seemed like I was supposed to find endless amounts of humor in the mild- to middling- eccentricities of annoying characters. Obviously, I didn't.
• TP I was just talking to my friend about that genre of film. I have just seen Running With Scissors, and that film began like The Royal Tenenbaums or Life Aquatic, but ended completely different. I won't spoil the movie since it is new, but I enjoyed it very much.
• The only time I've ever seen a 'rating' of movies is the "100 best movies of all time" on the Blockbuster wall and Citizen Kane tops that one. Would I say it's no. 1? It's a good movie, but I like movies like I like my children: I have favorites. What a lot of people fail to realize is that some movies that are "classics" are put on that pedestal because they are benchmarks in cinema history, not necessarily because they are the best, no. 1, fuckin' 'A' movie of all time. The Wizard of Oz is a classic because of its special effects, which are a sad anachronism in the time of CGI (think of it like T2 with the liquid metal terminator). Fantasia was the predecessor of Koyanisqaatsi and Baraka. Gone With the Wind was an epic movie about the American Civil War that released a few months after Hitler invaded Poland. And it popularized (by making film) the irrepressable Mammy in a time where the KKK was ironically dropping drastically from an all time high in membership. Context, baby, context. People don't talk about these movies because they are good movies, per se, they get mentioned because they are inseperable from a time and a nostalgia of historic cinema. Compare Bridge on the River Kwai to The Seventh Samurai. Both are cinematic contemporaries from the mid fifties. Which is "better"? The former was a WWII movie released after the Korean War (madness, madness). The latter was a period piece about feudal Japan in a Japan that was in its ninth year of being torn from its cultural identity (consider the fact that the samurai die from gunfire). Are they still good movies today? No. Christmas with the Kranks is a good movie today. Butter your toast with that one and chew on it.
• I am assuming you mean "The Seven Samurai" and I think that is an oversimplification of that particular work, and fails to realize the timelessness of all his pieces. I am sorry I am a huge Kurosawa fan (own many of his DVDs and read just a "few" of books on his directing), and the reason he is one of the greatest directors of all time (if not the greatest, which I think he is), is because his works are timeless. I have to also disagree on the Wizard of Oz. I think it is a bizarre fun movie for any generation, regardless of the time it was made. I still think the flying monkeys are some of the creepiest things I have seen on the big screen. You don't see many movies successfully create such fantastic worlds like that found in OZ. I think some directors are better than others, like Terry Gilliam and Jean Jeunet. Jim Henson did an amazing job. For Jim: .
• "I like movies like I like my children: I have favorites." Arrgh! Bad parent! SLAP :D
• I like movies like I like my women: shallow and rich.
• Nah, the "Seventh Samurai" was a reworking of the Bergman film. So instead of a knight playing chess with Death, it's, you know, a samurai. Playing Go. Remake wasn't nearly as good. Max von Sydow's role was recast as Jerry Lewis.
• "...some movies that are "classics" are put on that pedestal because they are benchmarks in cinema history..." People think about the history of cinema when they rank their favorite movies? Since when? On an issue of technical wizardry, I've never seen anyone put the truly technically groundbreaking movies amongst their top ten, because no one's ever heard of them. The technical groundbreakers are usually stinkers that subsequent filmmakers rip off. Wizard of Oz used no techniques that had not been already pioneered, it simply had a big budget. Citizen Kane is put at the top, or reviled for being overrated, variantly depending on which generation you belong to, but it's plaudits are not to do with the cinematography (although it is excellent) or the editing (ditto). It's to do with the symbology, bombastic direction, quirky parodic story, + element of mystery (name for Marion Davies' clit). "they get mentioned because they are inseperable from a time and a nostalgia of historic cinema." Bollocks. Someone who judges a movie based on its era is a film historian. Someone who enjoys a movie based upon its visceral content is a movie fan. Nobody looks at the Mona Lisa & thinks about the High Renaissance unless they are History of Art majors. Most people think "what's she smiling about?" (or: where are her eyelashes?) "Compare Bridge on the River Kwai to The Seventh Samurai." Compare a duck to a bottle of scotch. Those films are completely different stylistically & in content. That's like comparing I, Claudius to The Tailor of Panama. Similarity: they're written in words on paper, the extent that they reflect their era is only reflected in the technologies used to bring them to press.
• but it's plaudits are not to do with the cinematography Well, I couldn't find an example quickly enough, but I thought it was recognized for exsqueelent cinematography at the time. I could be wrong. I'm no duck with a bottle of scotch.
• I think we may be veering into two separate aisles in the Overrating Shop here. There's overrated as in: "praised beyond it merites ad nauseam by critics, pundits, and film historians" and there's overrated as in: "everybody I talk to who's seen the movie loves it and I don't know why." And those two can feed off each other. Theatergoers can enjoy a movie simply because Roger Ebert told them they would, and there are critics who overlook important flaws in a movie because it apepas to lots of people.
• I liked the Piano, probably all the more so because it got me into college (I was *so happy* that I had something interesting to say when my entrance interviewer asked me "What was the last movie you saw?"). I love the acting and cinematography. I can't say much as to the music, other than the stuff Holly Hunter played was pretty easy (but that was about the level of piano player I was back in the day, and I got a lot of enjoyment out of it!). My mom thought the Piano was pornographic! The Royal Tennenbaums is one of my favorite movies of all time, but I have to agree that The Life Aquatic was not so good. I wonder if part of that is that I'm not a big fan of the type of Italian cinema it was trying to mimic?
• The Life Aquatic was not so good. *sputter* What? Life Aquatic was awesome! "All the interns have Glocks." C'maaaan! That shot of all the activity on the cut-away ship -- it was sheer pleasure, the kind of all-enveloping comforting warmth you only otherwise find as a kid who's peed the bed, before it turned cold.
• the kind of all-enveloping comforting warmth you only otherwise find as a kid who's peed the bed, before it turned cold. ...... What!?!? ......
• Maybe that's why I didn't like it, Captain--I don't like peeing myself either. ;)
• And AFTER it goes cold...ICK.
• When you're a kid, and you pee the bed, it's pretty fantastic. But then it turns cold, and that's when you a) wake up and b) start crying. But before that point -- wow.
• So when you first watch The Life Aquatic, it's great and brilliant and funny and the best thing ever, but after it sits a while and gets closer to room temp... I don't think this is the analogy you want, Cap'n. Pissed sheets are overrated.
• Wait: a pissed bed is a good thing??? Oh sure, NOW they tell me...
• **pees on thread**
• *notes down nongs who haven't read Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.*
• I read that book. I think it was the closest I have come to being in a coma without actually being in a coma.
• i think we've all got the measure of your wit by about now.
• Ehh, I'd be willing to give Life Aquatic another chance, maybe. I was partially disappointed because Rushmore and Tennenbaums both gave me that immediate "best movie evar!" feeling, which is a lot to live up to.
• nong?
• i think we've all got the measure of your wit by about now. Wow! I guess that goes part and parcel with Joyce.
• Who's she?
• Just about any film that's won Best Picture within the last 10 years or so is overrated. Titanic, Forrest Gump andBraveheart are rampagingly awful examples of this.
• Paging a duck with a bottle of Scotch to teach me HTML.
• I saw Seven Samurai about ten years ago for the first time and was impressed. I saw Wiz of Oz a long time ago but i remember i liked it at the time. The classics do survive, but there is a continual winnowing going on. One classic that for me fails the test of longevity is "The Rules of the Game". Then there are other classics that bomb at first and then gradually get better and better raps over the years. Like "Duck Soup" and "To be or Not to be" (the 1940's version). And yeah, the cinematography in Citizen Kane is quite remarkable, though the story sucketh a bit.
• I still want to know what nong means.
• It means "twit". "Galah".
• It's what I call my preschooler pretty much every day, when he's being a clown or does something without thinking. Also ning-nong.
• Just have him arrested, tracicle.
• From Word Web: Noun: ning-nong Usage: Austral, NZ 1. A stupid foolish person - nincompoop, poop, ninny, nong [Austral, NZ], plonker [Brit] Type of: simple, simpleton Alas, nincompoop I understand all too well.
• CNN's Top 10 Movie Deaths
• This needs to be on the front page so it can be given the ridicule it deserves.
• What? No Maj. Kong? Pfft.
• Even worse...no Sonny Corleone.
• And technically, we don't see either Butch & Sundance die, nor Thelma & Louise for that matter. The first just has a freeze-frame, the second the drive off the cliff. No Frank Poole, either.
• But if you don't need to see the actual deaths, then Shirley, the opening long-shot of Touch of Evil needs to be in there. The list is shite.
• no roy batty?? hmmpf!
• By definition, movies starring Tom Hanks, Morgan Freeman, or Robin Williams cannot be great.
• Wicked Witch of the West.
• Gandhi.
• ET in the ditch.
• Life of Brian.
• The Shining. Full Metal Jacket.
• Manchurian Candidate. Original.
• Sgt Elias, reaching in vain as the chopper passes overhead, pursued by dozens of NVA emerging from the jungle, all while Adagio for Strings reaches crescendo.
• Bill.
• Sterling Hayden in The Killing Henry Fonda in Once Upon a Time in the West
• Donald Sutherland in Don't Look Now
• Donny in The Big Lebowski
• make that Steve Buscemi, duh
• Sofia Coppola in The Godfather Part III For pure camp value only, and mostly for Pacino's silent scream.
• Obi-Wan Kenobi in A New Hope.
• Sean Connery in The Untouchables
• M. Emmet Walsh in Blood Simple
• The Champ (original)
• By definition, movies starring Tom Hanks, Morgan Freeman, or Robin Williams cannot be great. Thank you, HW! Finally someone agrees with me!
• Bambi in Bambi vs Godzilla
• Brandon Lee as Brandon Lee in the Crow
• Donny in The Big Lebowski Shut the fuck up.
• Radar's Most Overrated List
• Maxim's favorite "Nooooooooooo!" sequences.
• What? Is that more of the "so-bad'it's-good" theory? Bah. Finally, in the second hour of Sith, the franchise starts pulling itself out of the pit of suckitude that Phantom created, and then they have Vader pull that shit? I couldn't believe it. As a friend remarked at the time, "I have a five-year-old cousin who can do the 'NooooOOOOOOooOOoooOOO!' better than that." Indeed. Although not a movie, my favourite NoooooOOOOOOooOOOoooOO is Skinner with the comet and weather balloon.
• The Vader onle had my jaw on the theater floor, two. Way to ruin a moment, LUCAS!
• 30 Movie Adaptations that Must Never Be Made