1955: Movies Sorted By Tier

Submitted by stooky on Mon, 07/12/2004 - 06:33
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  • Great

  • Bob Le Flambeur
  • Diabolique
  • East Of Eden
  • Kiss Me Deadly
  • Lady And The Tramp
  • The Ladykillers
  • Marty
  • Mister Roberts
  • Pather Panchali
  • **I have put off Sarajit Ray’s elegant family tragedy for years hoping to get the Apu Trilogy together so I could watch them in order and luckily that time has finally come (with no small amount of finagling on my part). I first developed a keen interest in Pather Panchali when it made Sight And Sounds formidable poll (1992). As you can imagine 12 years of pondering can breed certain expectations no movie can deliver. Yet the film avoided all of them by being unique (unlike most movies) and defied all those earlier expectations. Ray has created a movie of simplicity in story arc and incredible complexity in it’s detail. Everyday events are handled with documentarian skill, detailing daily meetings, chores, the chatter amongst women and the play of children, these scenes creep into the film’s dramatic storytelling adding depth and crisp realism. We are introduced to a small family who’ve lost their wealth due to bad decisions and bad luck. A pregnant mother, her husband and their headstrong daughter Durga caught in a hard life of poverty. Their son Apu is born bringing luck with him and soon the husband leaves in search of an opportunity. The story is told with effortless beauty, drawing languorous portraits of unembellished life caught by Ray’s watchful camera. He photographs his characters at their most flawed, fighting fears, boredom and weakness, creating interior landscapes of pain, happiness, resolution and confusion without pretension or reproach. What Ray does visually is never unwieldy or flashy, camera floating about the characters catching their faces and expressions and capturing their daily lives with a masterful ease that lets story and acting achieve their full potential. In this environment his actors blossom, becoming powerfully convincing, their faces and bodies communicating an undercurrent of emotion that aids the script. Pather Panchali is a stunningly beautiful tragedy brimming with the rarest of all cinematic treats, the rapture of human emotion.
  • Rebel Without A Cause
  • Smiles Of A Summer Night
  • **Effortlessly witty, very fun Bergman is one of his rare forays into romantic comedy.

  • Very Good

  • Blackboard Jungle
  • The Desperate Hours
  • The Man From Laramie
  • The Mystery Of Picasso
  • Picnic
  • Rififi
  • The Trouble With Harry

  • Good

  • The Dam Busters
  • Guys And Dolls
  • Love Me Or Leave Me
  • Richard III
  • The Seven Year Itch
  • To Catch A Thief

  • Guilty Pleasures

  • I’ll Cry Tomorrow

  • Average

  • All That Heaven Allows
  • Killer’s Kiss
  • Oklahoma!
  • Strategic Air Command
  • The Tender Trap
  • We’re No Angles

  • Dreck

  • This Island Earth

  • The Big Stink

  • The Rose Tattoo

  • Unfortunately Haven’t Seen

  • The African Lion: National Geographic
  • The Big Combo
  • The Colditz Story
  • I Am A Camera
  • Lola Montes
  • A Man Alone
  • The Night My Number Came Up
  • Ordet
  • Samurai I: The Legend Of Musashi
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1956: Movies Sorted By Tier
stooky07/13/2004

I started doing these lists because I roped myself into doing so. However, as I am doing year after year I have had the rare pleasure of experiencing each film all over again. I don't think I had ever realized just how much I love everthing about movies. Technique, style, story-telling, visuals, acting. Each year I get to remember my favorite scenes, the wonderful dialogue of Mister Roberts, the silly eloquence of Marty, the hyper-activity of Picnic. I even enjoy remembering the bad movies; The scene in the Rose Tattoo when Burt shimmies up a telephone pole and screams out the woman's name...while he's shirtless. Rock Hudson's tortured face as he is quietly mocked at a party. It's impossible to communicate the nostalgic joy to anyone other than a raving movie-phile, but sufficed to say I enjoy the junk that's rattling around in my head. This series of lists have re-invigorated my love of cinema and I'm pretty sure I'm hooked, now more than ever.

I think I'll start a post called confessions of a movie junkie.

Tallyho

:?)

lukeprog10/25/2004

I'd like to read a post called 'confessions of a movie junkie.'