The Alphabet of Brilliant Films
Submitted by lbangs on Wed, 08/18/2004 - 04:29
Tags:
- A - Amateur
- B - Bringing Up Baby
- C - Citizen Kane
- D - Double Indemnity
- E - 8 1/2
- F - Field of Dreams
- G - The Garden of the Finzi Continis
- H - Hannah and Her Sisters
- I - Intolerance
- J - Jules and Jim
- K - King Kong
- L - Lawrence of Arabia
- M - The Maltese Falcon
- N - North by Northwest
- O - Once Upon a Time in the West
- P - Pulp Fiction
- Q - Quiz Show
- R - Raging Bull
- S - Simple Men
- T - 2001: A Space Odyssey
- U - Un Chien Andalou (If this is cheating, then The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
- V - Vanya on 42nd Street
- W - The Wild Bunch
- X - X2: X-Men United
- Y - The Yakuza
- Z - Zelig
Cloned From:
Wasn't this a great idea for a list by our new Listologist, 1922? I still haven't set aside enough time to do my own clone, but I'm planning on it. As much as I like the movie myself, I'm surprised to see you rate Field of Dreams so highly. I don't know why, but it just doesn't seem you somehow.
1922's idea is a terrific one. I just had to steal it... :)
Two films on this list are highly iffy. They are films I loved many years ago but have not seen since high school. Field of Dreams is one of them (although I LOVED the film at the time). Can you guess the other?
A re-watch may knock it down, but I don't know. I *really* loved it at the time. Other contenders for 'F' included The Fisher King and Fantasia.
I anticipate your list soon = hint hint =.
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
:-) I'll try to get to it tonight. Is the other iffy entry Quiz Show?
Done!
Good guess, but no. The other iffy film is The Yakuza. I remember loving this one in junior high. It was written by Paul Schrader and Robert Towne, was directed by Sydney Pollack, and starred Robert Mitchum, so hopefully I will love it still if I catch it again.
Perhaps when it hits DVD...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
About 31 minutes after I posted that I realized it was a bad guess. There just aren't that many movies that start with "Q" to choose from (not to take anything away from Quiz Show, which I remember liking quite a bit).
The funny thing about making this list was that some letters force one to make painful decisions about which movies to include (so much so that I couldn't stand the pressure, and added runners up), while other letters force one to dig deep for a movie that starts with that letter. Hence, I'm sure it killed you to have to exclude, say, "Cabaret", while including films I don't think I've ever heard you mention before, like "Field of Dreams" or "Vanya on 42nd Street."
You mentioned that "Field of Dreams" was on shaky ground, which brings up another interesting thing I noticed while making my list. I would've thought there would be some easier choices starting with F, but for the life of me, I couldn't think of too many acclaimed films starting with F, and even fewer that I've seen (especially since I was counting "The 400 Blows" as a number movie). The best I could come up with was a toss-up between the first two films of the Man With No Name trilogy, and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" (which is more a personal favorite than anything else).
Your observations about this list forcing painful decisions is dead-on and probably vocalizes some of the appeal of working on this list.
I'm still feeling very shaky on Field, especially since I've thought of Foreign Correspondent, Far from Heaven, and The Four Hundred Blows since I've posted this list. Vanya on 42nd Street, however, is a fantastic film. If Listology were around in the mid-90s, you would have heard me raving over it. :)
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
I'm sure it's better than Victor / Victoria - though like your F entry, I do remember liking that movie a lot. It's been a while, though...