Rob, my dealer (of information, which is a lot like a drug) sent me this link to the '10 Most Awesome Films that Hollywood Ever Killed'. Despite the bad title the article is interesting with films I didn't know about like Peter Jackson's 'Halo'!? I love Peter Jackson's films but there is something slightly moronic about movies based on video games. Does anyone remember 'Super Mario Bros'? Thank god I missed it.
Has there been any good film translation of a video game?
Now that I'm on the topic, are there any good cinematics/cut scenes in video games? It's an issue that has bothered me for years. I feel that it would be great if these game companies would hire actual filmmakers to create their scripts and cut scenes. Every game I've seen makes me imagine video game nerds wanting to be filmmakers. It seems that they could do something really remarkable if they would hire an 'expert' to create the little films within the games. I do remember Lucas Arts creating some great little gems with 'Sam & Max Hit the Road' and 'Day of the Tentacle' but that just feeds into my argument that they need to hire proper writers and directors (it is a George Lucas company after all). To top it off, the hugely successful Ubisoft Games out of Montreal has announced that they are going to get into the movie business. What frightens me is that they have the funds to make some great films but none of the film talent to make it. It frightens me because they are going to end up flushing their money down the toilet if they allow amateurs to make their films. It'll be another 'Wing Commander' or 'Tomb Raider' movie, full of cliches and masturbatory cinematics.
On a side note, Roger Ebert has been having a bit of a tussle with Clive Barker over some statements that Video Games are not art. This isn't my point but I'll link to it as it is an interesting topic.
In the article '10 Most Awesome Films that Hollywood Ever Killed' they state that George Lucas was originally 'hired' to direct Apocalypse Now. This is slightly incorrect. The project was in-house with Zoetrope (Coppola's company) and Lucas and Milius were originally going to make the film. Lucas went on to make American Grafitti and Star Wars and Coppola decided to make it himself. It was never a studio owned film and Coppola financed the film himself (with United Artists as distributor).
Tuesday
Wednesday
Spielberg Part 3 - Saving Private Ryan, The William Goldman Essay
I finally tracked down that essay by Goldman regarding 'Saving Private Ryan'. I thought I'd put it up here to make sure I didn't misrepresent his opinion. It's from 'The Big Picture; Who killed Hollywood? and other essays'.
SAVING PRIVATE RYAN
The bullshit started early with this baby. I remember these remarkable interviews being given on the talk shows during the standard pre-opening hype. Sort of like this:
RYAN HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
RYAN HYPIST (Pause) Well this movie, it's . . . UM . . . violent.
GENERIC KATIE (Nodding—fascinated) You mean . . . bloody?
RYAN HYPIST Oh yes, oh God yes, bloody, so much blood, people getting blown up, killed—I have to tell you all this Generic Katie because I would never want to mislead the audience: this movie is a blood bath. Just so your audience knows that before they go—this movie is filled with battle scenes and gore and explosions and young men dying.
GENERIC KATIE (moved) Thank you for being so . . . brave and honest with us. I know it must have been hard for you.
And I am staring at the tube thinking, what is everybody smoking? Let me put it another way. Let's say I am hyping a re-make of How To Marry A Millionaire. But instead of a frothy comedy with Bacall and Grable and Monroe, I have made a hard R version. Starring Cameron Diaz and Heather Graham and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST (Pause) Well, this movie, it's .. . um . . . sexual.
GENERIC KATIE (nodding, fascinated) You mean .. . with nudity?
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST Oh yes, oh God yes, passion, so much nakedness, people having orgasms—I have to tell you all this Generic Katie because I would never want to mislead the audience: this movie is carnal. Just so your audience knows be¬fore they go—this movie is filled with rapes and lesbianism and nipples and young women screaming with sexual pleasure.
GENERIC KATIE (moved) Thank you so for being so . . . brave and honest with us. I know it must have been hard for you.
Sex and violence are the twin items Hollywood wants most desperately to sell these awful days. That's why the Ryan hype was so fraudulent. Here is the kind of brave and honest hype you will never live to see.
HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of
all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
HYPIST (Pause) Well this movie, it's . . . um . . . philo-sophical.
GENERIC KATIE (Nodding, fascinated) You mean . . . with talk?
HYPIST Oh, yes, oh God, yes, tons of conversation, all of it dealing with pain and suffering and how to live on earth without doing harm. I would never want to mislead your audience: This movie is intelligent. Just so your audience knows before they go—this movie is thought-provoking and deep and filled with the kind of wisdom we so need on earth these days.
GENERIC KATIE (To herself) Didn't believe one word.
Saving Private Ryan begins, as I'm sure everyone has told you, with an incredible battle sequence. Maybe that was true for them, but the version I saw sure began differently: a fif-teen-second shot of Old Glory a-wavin' in the wind. With Copland-like music in the background. Even John Wayne would have been embarrassed to start a movie that way. Hearts and flowers, God bless America, all that awful stuff. Today, only the Farrellys could get away with something like that.
Then there follows a weird sequence which I have sub-titled "The Man With the Big-Boobed Girls." And I am not being facetious. This old guy lumbers around someplace, we don't know where, and behind him are a bunch of Norman Rockwell types, but all I can concentrate on are these big¬boobed girls who are tagging along. Then we find that we're in a cemetery, and a shot of a flag tells us France. Lots of crosses. He kneels, at a particular cross, weeps, some of the family run to him, the big-boobed ones hanging back.
Then a long shot of his moist eyes and as the camera moves slowly into a close up of those eyes, we know this much: we are going into flashback now.
The story that has moved this old man is about to be told.
And now we are into the battle sequence.
What to say about it? Fabulous, brilliant, extraordinary, whatever you want. And do you know why? The length: twenty four minutes. The stuff itself is absolute as good and no better than Francis Coppola's war stuff or Oliver Stone's war stuff. But here it just goes pulverizingly on and on. It was brave of writer Robert Rodat to write it that way and brave of director Steven Spielberg to direct it with that incredible relentless tension.
What to say about Spielberg? For me, as great a shooter as anyone in movie history. Clearly the most important American director of the last thirty years, and on occasion, the most brilliant.
When he is in his wheel house. More of that presently.
As anybody reading this must know, Robert Rodat's story is about a squad of soldiers sent on a rescue mission—to find a Private Ryan, a young soldier who has lost three broth¬ers in action. Ryan, once located, is to be sent back home be¬fore another tragedy totally destroys the remains of his family.
The last shot of the great battle sequence is a shot of a dead soldier named Ryan.
OK, so what the movie has to do is simple: get the rescue squad going after the kid. The Spielberg of Raider's of the Lost Ark would have taken maybe a minute to set that up. Tom Hanks, the squad leader would have been called into a commander's presence, told to find a Private Ryan. Hanks would ask why and the Commander would say what you know: to make sure he does not die like his brothers. Get him home now and get him home safely. Those are your orders. Go!
That is not a hard premise to set up. In this movie it takes Spielberg thirteen pretentious, operatic minutes. (An amazing length of movie time.) Climaxed when a General reads a letter Honest Abe Lincoln wrote which is s0000 moving, sports fans, it brings tears to the other high officers who are listening to the General.
Sure.
Then, after more uninteresting stuff, forty minutes into the movie, Hanks' squad finally sets off on their odyssey to find Private Ryan. And the hunt for him is just terrific. (A word here—he will not win the Oscar but Tom Sanders sure should—great production design.)
Sequence after sequence. The village with the French girl and the sudden Nazi's and the wrong Ryan. The church. The wounded area with the haunted pilot where they fmd out where Ryan might be. The bunker fight with the Nazi who Hanks releases and wonderful work between Tom Sizemore and Ed Burns and Hanks. Then the fight with the tank and off¬handedly, surprisingly, they find Private Ryan.
We are an hour and forty five minutes into the movie now. We have just had an hour plus of sensational storytelling. And I am so excited because I know what is going to happen now: they are going to take Ryan back only it is going to be so much harder than finding him was. Maybe they would revisit some of the places—would the pilot have killed himself, would the French girl be killed by sniper madness, would the madness of the entire enterprise come crashing down around them? The story was going to be like a great snowball, accumulating as it roared toward climax, gathering weight and size and emotional power as Hanks desperately tried to get the kid home to his shattered mother.
And guess what: the rest of the movie is a disgrace. Fifty plus minutes of phony manipulative shit.
Things start going south immediately. We are in a bombed French village which has a valuable bridge. Hanks tells Ryan to get ready. And Ryan—Matt Damon—says this: he doesn't want to go. Sure his mom has suffered, sure it's awful what's happened to his family, but these guys are his brothers now and he will not leave them.
Do you believe that? Do you believe that a young man who has just been informed his family has been devastated, that his mother has had grief overpowering poured on her, would say, hey, I'm sure mom'll understand but I want to stay here in the mud with my buddies.
Barely.
I can kind of make a case that Ryan is young and in such shock and feels so guilty at his good/bad fortune, he really at that moment wants to stay. OK. I go with that.
Then the first nail in the coffin: Hanks goes along with it—hey, what a neat idea, I'll stay too.
Inconceivable, as Vizzini would say.
Before I get to how it's done in the movie, let me make a parallel. Let's say you and I were given a sworn task by our father. To make sure little Matt next store gets to school that day. Our most important task on earth is to make sure that happens.
OK. We go to little Matt's house, tell him to come along. And he says this: "My best friend in the world is visiting me today. I won't go."
And you and I think about it and decide we have only two choices.
(1) To let him stay home.
(2) To stay home with him.
Take a second. That make sense? Are those the only two choices available? How about adding a third: bringing the little fucker to school.
In an awful awful scene, after Matt has stamped his foot in anger, Hanks and Tom Sizemore, the tough Sergeant have a talk.
Sizemore asks what Hanks' orders are and Hanks replies thusly: "Sergeant, we have crossed some strange boundary here. The world has taken a turn for the surreal."
And I am sitting there thinking no, nothing surreal about it. A simple request has been made that needs a simple answer.
Sizemore tells Hanks this. "Some part of me thinks the kid's right. What's he done to deserve this? If he wants to stay here fine. Let's leave him and go home."
And Hanks says "yeah."
And I say, where did the notion of leaving him and going home come from? Surely it has never been breathed on planet Earth before. What are you talking about? Then Sizemore hits him with the clincher: "But another part of me thinks what if by some miracle we stay and actually make it out of here? Some day we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole God awful shitty mess . . . . We do that, Captain, we all earn the right to go home."
So they stay. (Sizemore's speech might have made sense earlier—when they were having the fight about staying or going home, earlier in the flick, before they had found Ryan.)
You know the worst thing? It would have been easy to have them stay and not be phony about it. How? Try this:
Matt makes his pitch. Hanks says I understand your emotions, but we're out of here right now.
Next cut, they are leaving the village. Next cut they are crossing the bridge. Next cut, walking in the countryside
-and then a close up of Hanks and he stares and guess what?—
—The Germans are coming, They're here, it's too late to leave.
Next cut, exactly what we have now, and go on as be¬fore, only with more urgency. And without the awful manipulation.
The Ugly Tree
The most damaging speech of the movie comes next. Hanks and Matt Damon are waiting for the attack. Damon says he cannot summon up his dead brothers faces and Hanks says, think of something specific. Hanks, when he thinks of home, thinks of his hammock or his wife pruning the roses wearing his gloves.
And Matt Damon starts into this long—two minutes, folks—remembrance of the last time he and his brothers were together. A sexual escapade when one of his brothers was trying to fuck this girl, a girl who "took a nose dive out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down."
The speech—ad libbed by Matt Damon is the only time we get to spend any private time with Ryan. And the speech does not exactly endear him to us. It also rips a lot of the emotional fabric of the film to pieces. I would love to know what the real script said at this point. And I wonder only this: how could Spielberg allow something this atrocious to happen?
The Shooting of Tom Hanks
A bunch of Germans come running toward camera. They get into prone position, start to fire. We are drawn to¬ward one particular German bad guy. Want to know why? He's the only one without a helmet. And, gasp, we realize he is that very same Nodzi who Hanks let live in the earlier sequence. (Spielberg has just discovered irony.) And, shock of shocks, he is the very one who plugs poor Tom.
Now of course, this is manipulation to the nth power. But that's ok, lots of movies do that. But it is not ok here. And why?
Because it gives the lie to the great part of the film.
That wonderful twenty-four minute sequence? What did that tell us about war? That it is awful, yes, of course that. But it also told us this: war is non-sensical, illogical, totally beyond human comprehension.
But here it is all totally understandable. Let a bad guy go, guess what, he will return, relentless and helmetless to kill you. (And hang around conveniently so the cowardly lion of the flick, the translator, can become a man by killing the very man who shot his captain.) In order for this sequence to be in balance with the entire film, that opening battle sequence would have to be altered so that it was about John Wayne fighting his way to glory and saving all his raw recruits around him. Then this bullshit with the German soldier is in keeping with the film.
But it doesn't fucking matter who kills Tom Hanks. His death is what matters. His death is the tragedy.
The Death of Tom Hanks
Hanks is dying, Ed Burns runs for a medic, Matt Damon is alone with Hanks. And do you know what Hanks' last words were? Of course you don't, no one does, not the first time they see the movie. Because not only are they whispered so softly, they have never before been spoken on this or any planet. "Earn this . . . earn it." Those are the words.
I have zero idea what that can possibly mean. My only explanation is this: Spielberg was up half the night before reading Philosophy for Dummies and he wanted to inject that nugget into his flick.
Ed Burns at the Cemetery
Hanks is dead, the awful pretentious voice of the actor playing General Marshall is treackling away, we hear ole Honest Abe's letter again and I am now waiting for the shot of Ed Burns with the big boobed girls back at the cemetery. Why do I know that is coming? Well, only two members of the squad are left, Burns and the cowardly translator and I know it can't be him because he was not with Hanks and the squad during the twenty-four minutes of glory at the start of the film. So it has to be Burns standing there among the graves.
Now the morphing shot comes -and I am looking at the old face of Matt Damon at the cemetery.
Well, you can't do that. Don't you see, he wasn't fucking there. He knew nothing of the attack on the beach, knew nothing of the odyssey that followed, and he never had a chance to hear about it. The only spare moment he had was when he was telling us all about his brothers and the ugly girl and setting the barn on fire.
When he was great, and he was great, Spielberg was a phenomenal storyteller. All gone. That, or he doesn't care.
How's about Spielberg's version of Moby Dick: "Call me Ishmael. I'm going to tell you a story of this ship and this one legged captain and this whale. Actually, I don't know if the guy was one legged. Never saw him, never saw the ship, never saw the whale, never talked to anybody who ever saw anything."
"Who better than I to tell you what happened?"
The other disgrace of this storytelling is this: there is no pregnant moment to the story. (I'm not going all intellectual on you—remember, the Zipper scene and Matt Dillon trying to electrocute the dog back to life were my happiest moments this year in a theatre.) But all stories do and must have them. They are the reason the story is being told. The pregnant moment of Shakespeare in Love is this: Will has a block. We do not tell of Joe and Gwyneth after he's written King Lear—the whole point is the guy can't write anything. Armageddon happens when it happens because the meteor is on its way.
There is absolutely no reason for this story being told now since Matt has no specific reason for visiting the cemetery.
Didn't have to be phony. Say it was Ed Burns. Who has the flashback legitimately. Say he had a reason for coming pick any one you want. Try this: Ryan has just done something splendid. Or Ryan has just died but had a good life.
"Remember that little shit you died for?" Burns might say. "Guess what? He turned out okay. Not worth your dying, Captain, but at least it's something. Thought you'd like to know."
The Ending
Just when you think Spielberg has stooped as low as even he can, new thresholds are reached. Four agonizing minutes of pretentious syrup, climaxing when Matt asks his wife has he been a good man? What is she going to answer? Her husband is clearly having a breakdown. She says yes and Matt—wait for it—he salutes!
Then Old Glory returns, waving at us for half a minute. I guess reminding us that God and Steven Spielberg are on the same side.
Medicinal Level—A.
Can't get much higher. Patriotism and the flag and easy answers galore. Phony and manipulative, all in the sense of Country.
What to say about Spielberg at this stage of his career? He will win his second Oscar for this work, and probably a third when he finds another 'importante' subject to hide be¬hind. (Religious persecution, racial injustice, patriotism.)
I have never met him, never been in a room with him, but no person can come so far in such a killingly competitive business without having a reservoir of anger and rage and dark-ness hiding in there somewhere. I just wish once he would let it show.
There is no reason for him to do anything else than what he has been doing. The movies are wildly successful at the box-office, the critics bow.
And if he had directed Bambi, guess what? Bambi's mother would never have died .. .
SAVING PRIVATE RYAN
The bullshit started early with this baby. I remember these remarkable interviews being given on the talk shows during the standard pre-opening hype. Sort of like this:
RYAN HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
RYAN HYPIST (Pause) Well this movie, it's . . . UM . . . violent.
GENERIC KATIE (Nodding—fascinated) You mean . . . bloody?
RYAN HYPIST Oh yes, oh God yes, bloody, so much blood, people getting blown up, killed—I have to tell you all this Generic Katie because I would never want to mislead the audience: this movie is a blood bath. Just so your audience knows that before they go—this movie is filled with battle scenes and gore and explosions and young men dying.
GENERIC KATIE (moved) Thank you for being so . . . brave and honest with us. I know it must have been hard for you.
And I am staring at the tube thinking, what is everybody smoking? Let me put it another way. Let's say I am hyping a re-make of How To Marry A Millionaire. But instead of a frothy comedy with Bacall and Grable and Monroe, I have made a hard R version. Starring Cameron Diaz and Heather Graham and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST (Pause) Well, this movie, it's .. . um . . . sexual.
GENERIC KATIE (nodding, fascinated) You mean .. . with nudity?
MILLIONAIRE HYPIST Oh yes, oh God yes, passion, so much nakedness, people having orgasms—I have to tell you all this Generic Katie because I would never want to mislead the audience: this movie is carnal. Just so your audience knows be¬fore they go—this movie is filled with rapes and lesbianism and nipples and young women screaming with sexual pleasure.
GENERIC KATIE (moved) Thank you so for being so . . . brave and honest with us. I know it must have been hard for you.
Sex and violence are the twin items Hollywood wants most desperately to sell these awful days. That's why the Ryan hype was so fraudulent. Here is the kind of brave and honest hype you will never live to see.
HYPIST I have to tell you the most important thing of
all.
GENERIC KATIE Please.
HYPIST (Pause) Well this movie, it's . . . um . . . philo-sophical.
GENERIC KATIE (Nodding, fascinated) You mean . . . with talk?
HYPIST Oh, yes, oh God, yes, tons of conversation, all of it dealing with pain and suffering and how to live on earth without doing harm. I would never want to mislead your audience: This movie is intelligent. Just so your audience knows before they go—this movie is thought-provoking and deep and filled with the kind of wisdom we so need on earth these days.
GENERIC KATIE (To herself) Didn't believe one word.
Saving Private Ryan begins, as I'm sure everyone has told you, with an incredible battle sequence. Maybe that was true for them, but the version I saw sure began differently: a fif-teen-second shot of Old Glory a-wavin' in the wind. With Copland-like music in the background. Even John Wayne would have been embarrassed to start a movie that way. Hearts and flowers, God bless America, all that awful stuff. Today, only the Farrellys could get away with something like that.
Then there follows a weird sequence which I have sub-titled "The Man With the Big-Boobed Girls." And I am not being facetious. This old guy lumbers around someplace, we don't know where, and behind him are a bunch of Norman Rockwell types, but all I can concentrate on are these big¬boobed girls who are tagging along. Then we find that we're in a cemetery, and a shot of a flag tells us France. Lots of crosses. He kneels, at a particular cross, weeps, some of the family run to him, the big-boobed ones hanging back.
Then a long shot of his moist eyes and as the camera moves slowly into a close up of those eyes, we know this much: we are going into flashback now.
The story that has moved this old man is about to be told.
And now we are into the battle sequence.
What to say about it? Fabulous, brilliant, extraordinary, whatever you want. And do you know why? The length: twenty four minutes. The stuff itself is absolute as good and no better than Francis Coppola's war stuff or Oliver Stone's war stuff. But here it just goes pulverizingly on and on. It was brave of writer Robert Rodat to write it that way and brave of director Steven Spielberg to direct it with that incredible relentless tension.
What to say about Spielberg? For me, as great a shooter as anyone in movie history. Clearly the most important American director of the last thirty years, and on occasion, the most brilliant.
When he is in his wheel house. More of that presently.
As anybody reading this must know, Robert Rodat's story is about a squad of soldiers sent on a rescue mission—to find a Private Ryan, a young soldier who has lost three broth¬ers in action. Ryan, once located, is to be sent back home be¬fore another tragedy totally destroys the remains of his family.
The last shot of the great battle sequence is a shot of a dead soldier named Ryan.
OK, so what the movie has to do is simple: get the rescue squad going after the kid. The Spielberg of Raider's of the Lost Ark would have taken maybe a minute to set that up. Tom Hanks, the squad leader would have been called into a commander's presence, told to find a Private Ryan. Hanks would ask why and the Commander would say what you know: to make sure he does not die like his brothers. Get him home now and get him home safely. Those are your orders. Go!
That is not a hard premise to set up. In this movie it takes Spielberg thirteen pretentious, operatic minutes. (An amazing length of movie time.) Climaxed when a General reads a letter Honest Abe Lincoln wrote which is s0000 moving, sports fans, it brings tears to the other high officers who are listening to the General.
Sure.
Then, after more uninteresting stuff, forty minutes into the movie, Hanks' squad finally sets off on their odyssey to find Private Ryan. And the hunt for him is just terrific. (A word here—he will not win the Oscar but Tom Sanders sure should—great production design.)
Sequence after sequence. The village with the French girl and the sudden Nazi's and the wrong Ryan. The church. The wounded area with the haunted pilot where they fmd out where Ryan might be. The bunker fight with the Nazi who Hanks releases and wonderful work between Tom Sizemore and Ed Burns and Hanks. Then the fight with the tank and off¬handedly, surprisingly, they find Private Ryan.
We are an hour and forty five minutes into the movie now. We have just had an hour plus of sensational storytelling. And I am so excited because I know what is going to happen now: they are going to take Ryan back only it is going to be so much harder than finding him was. Maybe they would revisit some of the places—would the pilot have killed himself, would the French girl be killed by sniper madness, would the madness of the entire enterprise come crashing down around them? The story was going to be like a great snowball, accumulating as it roared toward climax, gathering weight and size and emotional power as Hanks desperately tried to get the kid home to his shattered mother.
And guess what: the rest of the movie is a disgrace. Fifty plus minutes of phony manipulative shit.
Things start going south immediately. We are in a bombed French village which has a valuable bridge. Hanks tells Ryan to get ready. And Ryan—Matt Damon—says this: he doesn't want to go. Sure his mom has suffered, sure it's awful what's happened to his family, but these guys are his brothers now and he will not leave them.
Do you believe that? Do you believe that a young man who has just been informed his family has been devastated, that his mother has had grief overpowering poured on her, would say, hey, I'm sure mom'll understand but I want to stay here in the mud with my buddies.
Barely.
I can kind of make a case that Ryan is young and in such shock and feels so guilty at his good/bad fortune, he really at that moment wants to stay. OK. I go with that.
Then the first nail in the coffin: Hanks goes along with it—hey, what a neat idea, I'll stay too.
Inconceivable, as Vizzini would say.
Before I get to how it's done in the movie, let me make a parallel. Let's say you and I were given a sworn task by our father. To make sure little Matt next store gets to school that day. Our most important task on earth is to make sure that happens.
OK. We go to little Matt's house, tell him to come along. And he says this: "My best friend in the world is visiting me today. I won't go."
And you and I think about it and decide we have only two choices.
(1) To let him stay home.
(2) To stay home with him.
Take a second. That make sense? Are those the only two choices available? How about adding a third: bringing the little fucker to school.
In an awful awful scene, after Matt has stamped his foot in anger, Hanks and Tom Sizemore, the tough Sergeant have a talk.
Sizemore asks what Hanks' orders are and Hanks replies thusly: "Sergeant, we have crossed some strange boundary here. The world has taken a turn for the surreal."
And I am sitting there thinking no, nothing surreal about it. A simple request has been made that needs a simple answer.
Sizemore tells Hanks this. "Some part of me thinks the kid's right. What's he done to deserve this? If he wants to stay here fine. Let's leave him and go home."
And Hanks says "yeah."
And I say, where did the notion of leaving him and going home come from? Surely it has never been breathed on planet Earth before. What are you talking about? Then Sizemore hits him with the clincher: "But another part of me thinks what if by some miracle we stay and actually make it out of here? Some day we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole God awful shitty mess . . . . We do that, Captain, we all earn the right to go home."
So they stay. (Sizemore's speech might have made sense earlier—when they were having the fight about staying or going home, earlier in the flick, before they had found Ryan.)
You know the worst thing? It would have been easy to have them stay and not be phony about it. How? Try this:
Matt makes his pitch. Hanks says I understand your emotions, but we're out of here right now.
Next cut, they are leaving the village. Next cut they are crossing the bridge. Next cut, walking in the countryside
-and then a close up of Hanks and he stares and guess what?—
—The Germans are coming, They're here, it's too late to leave.
Next cut, exactly what we have now, and go on as be¬fore, only with more urgency. And without the awful manipulation.
The Ugly Tree
The most damaging speech of the movie comes next. Hanks and Matt Damon are waiting for the attack. Damon says he cannot summon up his dead brothers faces and Hanks says, think of something specific. Hanks, when he thinks of home, thinks of his hammock or his wife pruning the roses wearing his gloves.
And Matt Damon starts into this long—two minutes, folks—remembrance of the last time he and his brothers were together. A sexual escapade when one of his brothers was trying to fuck this girl, a girl who "took a nose dive out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down."
The speech—ad libbed by Matt Damon is the only time we get to spend any private time with Ryan. And the speech does not exactly endear him to us. It also rips a lot of the emotional fabric of the film to pieces. I would love to know what the real script said at this point. And I wonder only this: how could Spielberg allow something this atrocious to happen?
The Shooting of Tom Hanks
A bunch of Germans come running toward camera. They get into prone position, start to fire. We are drawn to¬ward one particular German bad guy. Want to know why? He's the only one without a helmet. And, gasp, we realize he is that very same Nodzi who Hanks let live in the earlier sequence. (Spielberg has just discovered irony.) And, shock of shocks, he is the very one who plugs poor Tom.
Now of course, this is manipulation to the nth power. But that's ok, lots of movies do that. But it is not ok here. And why?
Because it gives the lie to the great part of the film.
That wonderful twenty-four minute sequence? What did that tell us about war? That it is awful, yes, of course that. But it also told us this: war is non-sensical, illogical, totally beyond human comprehension.
But here it is all totally understandable. Let a bad guy go, guess what, he will return, relentless and helmetless to kill you. (And hang around conveniently so the cowardly lion of the flick, the translator, can become a man by killing the very man who shot his captain.) In order for this sequence to be in balance with the entire film, that opening battle sequence would have to be altered so that it was about John Wayne fighting his way to glory and saving all his raw recruits around him. Then this bullshit with the German soldier is in keeping with the film.
But it doesn't fucking matter who kills Tom Hanks. His death is what matters. His death is the tragedy.
The Death of Tom Hanks
Hanks is dying, Ed Burns runs for a medic, Matt Damon is alone with Hanks. And do you know what Hanks' last words were? Of course you don't, no one does, not the first time they see the movie. Because not only are they whispered so softly, they have never before been spoken on this or any planet. "Earn this . . . earn it." Those are the words.
I have zero idea what that can possibly mean. My only explanation is this: Spielberg was up half the night before reading Philosophy for Dummies and he wanted to inject that nugget into his flick.
Ed Burns at the Cemetery
Hanks is dead, the awful pretentious voice of the actor playing General Marshall is treackling away, we hear ole Honest Abe's letter again and I am now waiting for the shot of Ed Burns with the big boobed girls back at the cemetery. Why do I know that is coming? Well, only two members of the squad are left, Burns and the cowardly translator and I know it can't be him because he was not with Hanks and the squad during the twenty-four minutes of glory at the start of the film. So it has to be Burns standing there among the graves.
Now the morphing shot comes -and I am looking at the old face of Matt Damon at the cemetery.
Well, you can't do that. Don't you see, he wasn't fucking there. He knew nothing of the attack on the beach, knew nothing of the odyssey that followed, and he never had a chance to hear about it. The only spare moment he had was when he was telling us all about his brothers and the ugly girl and setting the barn on fire.
When he was great, and he was great, Spielberg was a phenomenal storyteller. All gone. That, or he doesn't care.
How's about Spielberg's version of Moby Dick: "Call me Ishmael. I'm going to tell you a story of this ship and this one legged captain and this whale. Actually, I don't know if the guy was one legged. Never saw him, never saw the ship, never saw the whale, never talked to anybody who ever saw anything."
"Who better than I to tell you what happened?"
The other disgrace of this storytelling is this: there is no pregnant moment to the story. (I'm not going all intellectual on you—remember, the Zipper scene and Matt Dillon trying to electrocute the dog back to life were my happiest moments this year in a theatre.) But all stories do and must have them. They are the reason the story is being told. The pregnant moment of Shakespeare in Love is this: Will has a block. We do not tell of Joe and Gwyneth after he's written King Lear—the whole point is the guy can't write anything. Armageddon happens when it happens because the meteor is on its way.
There is absolutely no reason for this story being told now since Matt has no specific reason for visiting the cemetery.
Didn't have to be phony. Say it was Ed Burns. Who has the flashback legitimately. Say he had a reason for coming pick any one you want. Try this: Ryan has just done something splendid. Or Ryan has just died but had a good life.
"Remember that little shit you died for?" Burns might say. "Guess what? He turned out okay. Not worth your dying, Captain, but at least it's something. Thought you'd like to know."
The Ending
Just when you think Spielberg has stooped as low as even he can, new thresholds are reached. Four agonizing minutes of pretentious syrup, climaxing when Matt asks his wife has he been a good man? What is she going to answer? Her husband is clearly having a breakdown. She says yes and Matt—wait for it—he salutes!
Then Old Glory returns, waving at us for half a minute. I guess reminding us that God and Steven Spielberg are on the same side.
Medicinal Level—A.
Can't get much higher. Patriotism and the flag and easy answers galore. Phony and manipulative, all in the sense of Country.
What to say about Spielberg at this stage of his career? He will win his second Oscar for this work, and probably a third when he finds another 'importante' subject to hide be¬hind. (Religious persecution, racial injustice, patriotism.)
I have never met him, never been in a room with him, but no person can come so far in such a killingly competitive business without having a reservoir of anger and rage and dark-ness hiding in there somewhere. I just wish once he would let it show.
There is no reason for him to do anything else than what he has been doing. The movies are wildly successful at the box-office, the critics bow.
And if he had directed Bambi, guess what? Bambi's mother would never have died .. .
Friday
Sight and Sound over the years...
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1952
Critics' Poll
1. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
2. City Lights (Chaplin)
2. The Gold Rush (Chaplin)
4. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
5. Intolerance (Griffith)
5. Louisiana Story (Flaherty)
7. Greed (von Stroheim)
7. Le Jour se lève (Carné)
7. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
10. Brief Encounter (Lean)
10. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1962
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. L'avventura (Antonioni)
3. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
4. Greed (von Stroheim)
4. Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
7. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
7. Ivan the Terrible (Eisenstein)
9. La terra trema (Visconti)
10. L'Atalante (Vigo)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1972
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
3. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
4. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
5. L'avventura (Antonioni)
5. Persona (Bergman)
7. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
8. The General (Keaton)
8. The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
10. Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi)
10. Wild Strawberries (Bergman)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1982
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
3. Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
3. Singin' in the Rain (Kelly, Donen)
5. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
7. L'avventura (Antonioni)
7. The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
7. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
10. The General (Keaton)
10. The Searchers (Ford)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1992
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Regle du Jeu (Renoir)
3. Tokyo Story (Ozu)
4. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
5. The Searchers (Ford)
6. L'Atalante (Vigo)
6. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
6. Pather Panchali (Ray)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
10. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
It seems that Renoir's Rules of the Game and Welles's Citizen Kane are the most consistent amongst critics.
Critics' Poll
1. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
2. City Lights (Chaplin)
2. The Gold Rush (Chaplin)
4. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
5. Intolerance (Griffith)
5. Louisiana Story (Flaherty)
7. Greed (von Stroheim)
7. Le Jour se lève (Carné)
7. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
10. Brief Encounter (Lean)
10. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1962
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. L'avventura (Antonioni)
3. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
4. Greed (von Stroheim)
4. Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
7. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
7. Ivan the Terrible (Eisenstein)
9. La terra trema (Visconti)
10. L'Atalante (Vigo)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1972
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
3. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
4. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
5. L'avventura (Antonioni)
5. Persona (Bergman)
7. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
8. The General (Keaton)
8. The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
10. Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi)
10. Wild Strawberries (Bergman)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1982
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
3. Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
3. Singin' in the Rain (Kelly, Donen)
5. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
7. L'avventura (Antonioni)
7. The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
7. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
10. The General (Keaton)
10. The Searchers (Ford)
The Sight & Sound Top Ten Poll: 1992
Critics' Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
2. La Regle du Jeu (Renoir)
3. Tokyo Story (Ozu)
4. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
5. The Searchers (Ford)
6. L'Atalante (Vigo)
6. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
6. Pather Panchali (Ray)
6. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
10. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
It seems that Renoir's Rules of the Game and Welles's Citizen Kane are the most consistent amongst critics.
Sight and Sound top 10 as chosen by directors.
Directors' Top Ten Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
Dazzlingly inventive, technically breathtaking, Citizen Kane reinvented the way stories could be told in the cinema, and set a standard generations of film-makers have since aspired to. An absorbing account of a newspaper tycoon's rise to power, Orson Welles' debut film feels as fresh as tomorrow's headlines. And he was only 26 when he made it.
2. The Godfather and The Godfather part II (Coppola)
Few films have portrayed the US immigrant experience quite so vividly as Coppola's Godfather films, or exposed the contradictions of the American Dream quite so ruthlessly. And what a cast, formidable talent firing all cylinders: Brando, De Niro, Pacino, Keaton, Duvall, Caan. Now that's an offer you can't refuse.
3. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
Wonderfully freefloating, gleefully confusing reality and fantasy, 8 1/2 provides a ringside seat into the ever active imaginative life of its director protagonist Guido, played by Fellini's on-screen alter-ego Marcello Mastroianni. The definitive film about film-making - as much about the agonies of the creative process as the ecstasies - it's no wonder the movie is so popular with directors.
4. Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
Filmed in the desert in lavish widescreen and rich colours, Lawrence of Arabia is David Lean at his most epic and expansive. You can almost feel the waves of heat glowing from the cinema screen
5. Dr. Strangelove (Kubrick)
A black comedy about impending nuclear annihilation that was made at the height of the cold war, Dr. Strangelove is perhaps Kubrick's most audacious movie and certainly his funniest. Peter Sellers has never been better, and provides good value playing three roles.
6. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
Mixing melodrama, documentary and social commentary, De Sica follows an impoverished father and son treading the streets of post-war Rome, desperately seeking their stolen bicycle. Deeply compassionate, this poignant film is one of the outstanding examples of Italian neorealism.
6. Raging Bull (Scorsese)
An unblinkingly honest biopic of Jake La Motta - a great prizefighter but a deeply flawed human being - this catches Scorsese in fighting fit form. The boxing sequence are both brutal and beautiful, and De Niro, who famously put on weight to play the middle-aged La Motta, gives one of the performances of modern cinema.
6. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
A gripping detective story or a delirious investigation into desire, grief and jealousy? Hitchcock had a genius for transforming genre pieces into vehicles for his own dark obsessions, and this 1958 masterpiece shows the director at his mesmerising best. And for James Stewart fans, it also boasts the star's most compelling performance.
9. Rashomon (Kurosawa)
Offering four differing accounts of a rape and murder, all told in flashbacks, Kurosawa's 1951 film is a complex meditation on the distortive nature of memory and a gripping study of human behaviour at its most base. Mifune Toshiro is magnetic as the bandit Tajomaru.
9. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
Tragedy and comedy effortlessly combine in Renoir's country house ensemble drama. A group of aristocrats gather for some rural relaxation, a shooting party is arranged, downstairs the servants bicker about a new employee, while all the time husbands, wives, mistresses and lovers sweetly deceive one another and swap declarations of love like name cards at a dinner party.
9. Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
The blueprint for The Magnificent Seven was Kurosawa's magnificent swordplay epic of self-sacrifice about a band of hired samurai who come together to protect a helpless village from a rapacious gang of 40 thieves who descend every year to steal the harvest and kidnap women. The final sequence of the fight in the mud and rain has never been bettered.
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
Dazzlingly inventive, technically breathtaking, Citizen Kane reinvented the way stories could be told in the cinema, and set a standard generations of film-makers have since aspired to. An absorbing account of a newspaper tycoon's rise to power, Orson Welles' debut film feels as fresh as tomorrow's headlines. And he was only 26 when he made it.
2. The Godfather and The Godfather part II (Coppola)
Few films have portrayed the US immigrant experience quite so vividly as Coppola's Godfather films, or exposed the contradictions of the American Dream quite so ruthlessly. And what a cast, formidable talent firing all cylinders: Brando, De Niro, Pacino, Keaton, Duvall, Caan. Now that's an offer you can't refuse.
3. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
Wonderfully freefloating, gleefully confusing reality and fantasy, 8 1/2 provides a ringside seat into the ever active imaginative life of its director protagonist Guido, played by Fellini's on-screen alter-ego Marcello Mastroianni. The definitive film about film-making - as much about the agonies of the creative process as the ecstasies - it's no wonder the movie is so popular with directors.
4. Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
Filmed in the desert in lavish widescreen and rich colours, Lawrence of Arabia is David Lean at his most epic and expansive. You can almost feel the waves of heat glowing from the cinema screen
5. Dr. Strangelove (Kubrick)
A black comedy about impending nuclear annihilation that was made at the height of the cold war, Dr. Strangelove is perhaps Kubrick's most audacious movie and certainly his funniest. Peter Sellers has never been better, and provides good value playing three roles.
6. Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
Mixing melodrama, documentary and social commentary, De Sica follows an impoverished father and son treading the streets of post-war Rome, desperately seeking their stolen bicycle. Deeply compassionate, this poignant film is one of the outstanding examples of Italian neorealism.
6. Raging Bull (Scorsese)
An unblinkingly honest biopic of Jake La Motta - a great prizefighter but a deeply flawed human being - this catches Scorsese in fighting fit form. The boxing sequence are both brutal and beautiful, and De Niro, who famously put on weight to play the middle-aged La Motta, gives one of the performances of modern cinema.
6. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
A gripping detective story or a delirious investigation into desire, grief and jealousy? Hitchcock had a genius for transforming genre pieces into vehicles for his own dark obsessions, and this 1958 masterpiece shows the director at his mesmerising best. And for James Stewart fans, it also boasts the star's most compelling performance.
9. Rashomon (Kurosawa)
Offering four differing accounts of a rape and murder, all told in flashbacks, Kurosawa's 1951 film is a complex meditation on the distortive nature of memory and a gripping study of human behaviour at its most base. Mifune Toshiro is magnetic as the bandit Tajomaru.
9. La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
Tragedy and comedy effortlessly combine in Renoir's country house ensemble drama. A group of aristocrats gather for some rural relaxation, a shooting party is arranged, downstairs the servants bicker about a new employee, while all the time husbands, wives, mistresses and lovers sweetly deceive one another and swap declarations of love like name cards at a dinner party.
9. Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
The blueprint for The Magnificent Seven was Kurosawa's magnificent swordplay epic of self-sacrifice about a band of hired samurai who come together to protect a helpless village from a rapacious gang of 40 thieves who descend every year to steal the harvest and kidnap women. The final sequence of the fight in the mud and rain has never been bettered.
Sight and Sound - top 10 based on critics (2002 - done every 10 years)
Critics' Top Ten Poll
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
Dazzlingly inventive, technically breathtaking, Citizen Kane reinvented the way stories could be told in the cinema, and set a standard generations of film-makers have since aspired to. An absorbing account of a newspaper tycoon's rise to power, Orson Welles' debut film feels as fresh as tomorrow's headlines. And he was only 26 when he made it.
2. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
A gripping detective story or a delirious investigation into desire, grief and jealousy? Hitchcock had a genius for transforming genre pieces into vehicles for his own dark obsessions, and this 1958 masterpiece shows the director at his mesmerising best. And for James Stewart fans, it also boasts the star's most compelling performance.
3. La Règle du jeu (Rules of the Game) (Renoir)
Tragedy and comedy effortlessly combine in Renoir's country house ensemble drama. A group of aristocrats gather for some rural relaxation, a shooting party is arranged, downstairs the servants bicker about a new employee, while all the time husbands, wives, mistresses and lovers sweetly deceive one another and swap declarations of love like name cards at a dinner party.
4. The Godfather and The Godfather part II (Coppola)
Few films have portrayed the US immigrant experience quite so vividly as Coppola's Godfather films, or exposed the contradictions of the American Dream quite so ruthlessly. And what a cast, formidable talent firing all cylinders: Brando, De Niro, Pacino, Keaton, Duvall, Caan. Now that's an offer you can't refuse.
5. Tokyo Story (Ozu)
A poignant story of family relations and loss, Ozu's subtle mood piece portrays the trip an elderly couple make to Tokyo to visit their grown-up children. The shooting style is elegantly minimal and formally reticent, and the film's devastating emotional impact is drawn as much from what is unsaid and unshown as from what is revealed.
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
One of the most ambitious Hollywood movies ever made, 2001 crams into its two-hour plus running time a story that spans the prehistoric age to the beginning of the third millennium, and features some of the most hypnotically beautiful special effects work ever committed to film. After seeing this, you can never listen to Strauss' Blue Danube without thinking space crafts waltzing against starry backdrops.
7. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
Eisenstein's recreation of a mutiny by sailors of the battleship Potemkin in 1905 works as daring formal experiment - which pushed the expressive potential of film editing to its limit - and rousing propaganda for the masses. The Odessa Steps sequence remains one of the most memorable set-pieces in cinema.
7. Sunrise (Murnau)
Having left his native Germany for the US, F.W. Murnau had all the resources of a major Hollywood studio at his disposal for this, his American debut. What he produced was a visually stunning film romance that ranks as one of the last hurrahs of the silent period.
9. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
Wonderfully freefloating, gleefully confusing reality and fantasy, 8 1/2 provides a ringside seat into the ever active imaginative life of its director protagonist Guido, played by Fellini's on-screen alter-ego Marcello Mastroianni. The definitive film about film-making - as much about the agonies of the creative process as the ecstasies - it's no wonder the movie is so popular with directors.
10. Singin' In the Rain (Kelly, Donen)
Impossible to watch without a smile on your face, this affectionate tribute to the glory days of Hollywood in the 1920s is pleasure distilled into 102 minutes. With Gene Kelly dance sequences that take your breath away and a great score by Brown and Freed, this is the film musical at its best.
1. Citizen Kane (Welles)
Dazzlingly inventive, technically breathtaking, Citizen Kane reinvented the way stories could be told in the cinema, and set a standard generations of film-makers have since aspired to. An absorbing account of a newspaper tycoon's rise to power, Orson Welles' debut film feels as fresh as tomorrow's headlines. And he was only 26 when he made it.
2. Vertigo (Hitchcock)
A gripping detective story or a delirious investigation into desire, grief and jealousy? Hitchcock had a genius for transforming genre pieces into vehicles for his own dark obsessions, and this 1958 masterpiece shows the director at his mesmerising best. And for James Stewart fans, it also boasts the star's most compelling performance.
3. La Règle du jeu (Rules of the Game) (Renoir)
Tragedy and comedy effortlessly combine in Renoir's country house ensemble drama. A group of aristocrats gather for some rural relaxation, a shooting party is arranged, downstairs the servants bicker about a new employee, while all the time husbands, wives, mistresses and lovers sweetly deceive one another and swap declarations of love like name cards at a dinner party.
4. The Godfather and The Godfather part II (Coppola)
Few films have portrayed the US immigrant experience quite so vividly as Coppola's Godfather films, or exposed the contradictions of the American Dream quite so ruthlessly. And what a cast, formidable talent firing all cylinders: Brando, De Niro, Pacino, Keaton, Duvall, Caan. Now that's an offer you can't refuse.
5. Tokyo Story (Ozu)
A poignant story of family relations and loss, Ozu's subtle mood piece portrays the trip an elderly couple make to Tokyo to visit their grown-up children. The shooting style is elegantly minimal and formally reticent, and the film's devastating emotional impact is drawn as much from what is unsaid and unshown as from what is revealed.
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
One of the most ambitious Hollywood movies ever made, 2001 crams into its two-hour plus running time a story that spans the prehistoric age to the beginning of the third millennium, and features some of the most hypnotically beautiful special effects work ever committed to film. After seeing this, you can never listen to Strauss' Blue Danube without thinking space crafts waltzing against starry backdrops.
7. Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
Eisenstein's recreation of a mutiny by sailors of the battleship Potemkin in 1905 works as daring formal experiment - which pushed the expressive potential of film editing to its limit - and rousing propaganda for the masses. The Odessa Steps sequence remains one of the most memorable set-pieces in cinema.
7. Sunrise (Murnau)
Having left his native Germany for the US, F.W. Murnau had all the resources of a major Hollywood studio at his disposal for this, his American debut. What he produced was a visually stunning film romance that ranks as one of the last hurrahs of the silent period.
9. 8 1/2 (Fellini)
Wonderfully freefloating, gleefully confusing reality and fantasy, 8 1/2 provides a ringside seat into the ever active imaginative life of its director protagonist Guido, played by Fellini's on-screen alter-ego Marcello Mastroianni. The definitive film about film-making - as much about the agonies of the creative process as the ecstasies - it's no wonder the movie is so popular with directors.
10. Singin' In the Rain (Kelly, Donen)
Impossible to watch without a smile on your face, this affectionate tribute to the glory days of Hollywood in the 1920s is pleasure distilled into 102 minutes. With Gene Kelly dance sequences that take your breath away and a great score by Brown and Freed, this is the film musical at its best.
Another Poll! The Imdb Poll... (numbers represent votes)
1. 9.1 The Godfather (1972) 227,086
2. 9.1 The Shawshank Redemption (1994) 269,346
3. 8.9 The Godfather: Part II (1974) 129,387
4. 8.8 Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (1966) 69,609
5. 8.8 Pulp Fiction (1994) 231,389
6. 8.8 Schindler's List (1993) 158,087
7. 8.8 Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) 168,540
8. 8.8 Casablanca (1942) 105,123
9. 8.8 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) 116,215
10. 8.8 Shichinin no samurai (1954) 58,021
11. 8.8 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) 207,903
12. 8.7 Star Wars (1977) 206,927
13. 8.7 Rear Window (1954) 68,016
14. 8.7 12 Angry Men (1957) 52,902
15. 8.7 Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) 144,270
16. 8.7 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) 244,856
17. 8.7 Cidade de Deus (2002) 72,915
18. 8.7 Goodfellas (1990) 123,179
19. 8.6 The Usual Suspects (1995) 163,826
20. 8.6 C'era una volta il West (1968) 35,898
21. 8.6 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) 99,449
22. 8.6 Psycho (1960) 84,291
23. 8.6 Citizen Kane (1941) 91,171
24. 8.6 North by Northwest (1959) 56,349
25. 8.6 The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) 198,477
26. 8.6 The Silence of the Lambs (1991) 144,297
27. 8.6 Memento (2000) 153,439
28. 8.5 Fight Club (1999) 203,232
29. 8.5 Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 49,417
30. 8.5 Sunset Blvd. (1950) 29,263
31. 8.5 It's a Wonderful Life (1946) 63,063
32. 8.5 The Matrix (1999) 226,715
33. 8.5 Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, Le (2001) 105,148
34. 8.5 American Beauty (1999) 174,958
35. 8.5 Taxi Driver (1976) 83,826
36. 8.5 Vertigo (1958) 53,944
37. 8.5 The Departed (2006) 112,501
38. 8.5 Apocalypse Now (1979) 104,903
39. 8.5 Se7en (1995) 152,220
40. 8.5 Léon (1994) 100,604
41. 8.4 American History X (1998) 114,238
42. 8.4 Paths of Glory (1957) 24,706
43. 8.4 Laberinto del fauno, El (2006) 60,083
44. 8.4 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) 114,059
45. 8.4 To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) 49,803
46. 8.4 Chinatown (1974) 43,684
47. 8.4 M (1931) 21,885
48. 8.4 The Third Man (1949) 30,334
49. 8.4 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) 17,882
50. 8.4 A Clockwork Orange (1971) 109,624
51. 8.4 The Pianist (2002) 64,591
52. 8.4 Alien (1979) 102,342
53. 8.4 Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) 98,565
54. 8.4 Ratatouille (2007) 19,684
55. 8.4 Untergang, Der (2004) 37,978
56. 8.4 Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (2001) 52,239
57. 8.4 The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) 35,484
58. 8.4 L.A. Confidential (1997) 105,259
59. 8.4 The Shining (1980) 92,037
60. 8.4 Double Indemnity (1944) 19,994
61. 8.4 Boot, Das (1981) 44,904
62. 8.4 The Maltese Falcon (1941) 31,320
63. 8.3 Requiem for a Dream (2000) 95,901
64. 8.3 Reservoir Dogs (1992) 119,701
65. 8.3 Saving Private Ryan (1998) 160,678
66. 8.3 Metropolis (1927) 21,467
67. 8.3 Hotel Rwanda (2004) 43,113
68. 8.3 Raging Bull (1980) 49,306
69. 8.3 Aliens (1986) 100,224
70. 8.3 Rashômon (1950) 21,376
71. 8.3 Sin City (2005) 129,916
72. 8.3 Forrest Gump (1994) 157,922
73. 8.3 Singin' in the Rain (1952) 32,884
74. 8.3 Leben der Anderen, Das (2006) 16,919
75. 8.3 Modern Times (1936) 18,402
76. 8.3 Rebecca (1940) 19,613
77. 8.3 The Great Escape (1963) 34,514
78. 8.3 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) 98,087
79. 8.3 All About Eve (1950) 20,863
80. 8.3 Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) 126,532
81. 8.3 Some Like It Hot (1959) 40,198
82. 8.3 Amadeus (1984) 58,223
83. 8.3 Touch of Evil (1958) 18,847
84. 8.3 Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957) 18,209
85. 8.3 Vita è bella, La (1997) 61,266
86. 8.3 The Manchurian Candidate (1962) 22,268
87. 8.2 The Prestige (2006) 72,575
88. 8.2 Jaws (1975) 79,614
89. 8.2 On the Waterfront (1954) 22,930
90. 8.2 The Sting (1973) 38,503
91. 8.2 Strangers on a Train (1951) 18,528
92. 8.2 The Elephant Man (1980) 29,841
93. 8.2 The Simpsons Movie (2007) 3,778
94. 8.2 Full Metal Jacket (1987) 81,745
95. 8.2 City Lights (1931) 13,576
96. 8.2 Grindhouse (2007) 35,419
97. 8.2 Batman Begins (2005) 127,353
98. 8.2 Nuovo cinema Paradiso (1988) 24,659
99. 8.2 Braveheart (1995) 146,328
100. 8.2 The Apartment (1960) 19,013
2. 9.1 The Shawshank Redemption (1994) 269,346
3. 8.9 The Godfather: Part II (1974) 129,387
4. 8.8 Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (1966) 69,609
5. 8.8 Pulp Fiction (1994) 231,389
6. 8.8 Schindler's List (1993) 158,087
7. 8.8 Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) 168,540
8. 8.8 Casablanca (1942) 105,123
9. 8.8 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) 116,215
10. 8.8 Shichinin no samurai (1954) 58,021
11. 8.8 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) 207,903
12. 8.7 Star Wars (1977) 206,927
13. 8.7 Rear Window (1954) 68,016
14. 8.7 12 Angry Men (1957) 52,902
15. 8.7 Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) 144,270
16. 8.7 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) 244,856
17. 8.7 Cidade de Deus (2002) 72,915
18. 8.7 Goodfellas (1990) 123,179
19. 8.6 The Usual Suspects (1995) 163,826
20. 8.6 C'era una volta il West (1968) 35,898
21. 8.6 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) 99,449
22. 8.6 Psycho (1960) 84,291
23. 8.6 Citizen Kane (1941) 91,171
24. 8.6 North by Northwest (1959) 56,349
25. 8.6 The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) 198,477
26. 8.6 The Silence of the Lambs (1991) 144,297
27. 8.6 Memento (2000) 153,439
28. 8.5 Fight Club (1999) 203,232
29. 8.5 Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 49,417
30. 8.5 Sunset Blvd. (1950) 29,263
31. 8.5 It's a Wonderful Life (1946) 63,063
32. 8.5 The Matrix (1999) 226,715
33. 8.5 Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, Le (2001) 105,148
34. 8.5 American Beauty (1999) 174,958
35. 8.5 Taxi Driver (1976) 83,826
36. 8.5 Vertigo (1958) 53,944
37. 8.5 The Departed (2006) 112,501
38. 8.5 Apocalypse Now (1979) 104,903
39. 8.5 Se7en (1995) 152,220
40. 8.5 Léon (1994) 100,604
41. 8.4 American History X (1998) 114,238
42. 8.4 Paths of Glory (1957) 24,706
43. 8.4 Laberinto del fauno, El (2006) 60,083
44. 8.4 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) 114,059
45. 8.4 To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) 49,803
46. 8.4 Chinatown (1974) 43,684
47. 8.4 M (1931) 21,885
48. 8.4 The Third Man (1949) 30,334
49. 8.4 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) 17,882
50. 8.4 A Clockwork Orange (1971) 109,624
51. 8.4 The Pianist (2002) 64,591
52. 8.4 Alien (1979) 102,342
53. 8.4 Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) 98,565
54. 8.4 Ratatouille (2007) 19,684
55. 8.4 Untergang, Der (2004) 37,978
56. 8.4 Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (2001) 52,239
57. 8.4 The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) 35,484
58. 8.4 L.A. Confidential (1997) 105,259
59. 8.4 The Shining (1980) 92,037
60. 8.4 Double Indemnity (1944) 19,994
61. 8.4 Boot, Das (1981) 44,904
62. 8.4 The Maltese Falcon (1941) 31,320
63. 8.3 Requiem for a Dream (2000) 95,901
64. 8.3 Reservoir Dogs (1992) 119,701
65. 8.3 Saving Private Ryan (1998) 160,678
66. 8.3 Metropolis (1927) 21,467
67. 8.3 Hotel Rwanda (2004) 43,113
68. 8.3 Raging Bull (1980) 49,306
69. 8.3 Aliens (1986) 100,224
70. 8.3 Rashômon (1950) 21,376
71. 8.3 Sin City (2005) 129,916
72. 8.3 Forrest Gump (1994) 157,922
73. 8.3 Singin' in the Rain (1952) 32,884
74. 8.3 Leben der Anderen, Das (2006) 16,919
75. 8.3 Modern Times (1936) 18,402
76. 8.3 Rebecca (1940) 19,613
77. 8.3 The Great Escape (1963) 34,514
78. 8.3 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) 98,087
79. 8.3 All About Eve (1950) 20,863
80. 8.3 Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) 126,532
81. 8.3 Some Like It Hot (1959) 40,198
82. 8.3 Amadeus (1984) 58,223
83. 8.3 Touch of Evil (1958) 18,847
84. 8.3 Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957) 18,209
85. 8.3 Vita è bella, La (1997) 61,266
86. 8.3 The Manchurian Candidate (1962) 22,268
87. 8.2 The Prestige (2006) 72,575
88. 8.2 Jaws (1975) 79,614
89. 8.2 On the Waterfront (1954) 22,930
90. 8.2 The Sting (1973) 38,503
91. 8.2 Strangers on a Train (1951) 18,528
92. 8.2 The Elephant Man (1980) 29,841
93. 8.2 The Simpsons Movie (2007) 3,778
94. 8.2 Full Metal Jacket (1987) 81,745
95. 8.2 City Lights (1931) 13,576
96. 8.2 Grindhouse (2007) 35,419
97. 8.2 Batman Begins (2005) 127,353
98. 8.2 Nuovo cinema Paradiso (1988) 24,659
99. 8.2 Braveheart (1995) 146,328
100. 8.2 The Apartment (1960) 19,013
Now see what happens when you take a poll... 1999 Empire Magazine Poll
1. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977)
2. Jaws (1975)
3. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
4. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
5. Goodfellas (1990)
6. Pulp Fiction (1994)
7. The Godfather (1972)
8. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
9. Schindler's List (1993)
10. Titanic (1997)
11. The Usual Suspects (1995)
12. Citizen Kane (1941)
13. The Godfather, Part II (1974)
14. Aliens (1986)
15. Blade Runner (1982)
16. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
17. Casablanca (1942)
18. Gone With the Wind (1939)
19. The Sound of Music (1965)
20. It's A Wonderful Life (1946)
21. Reservoir Dogs (1992)
22. Apocalypse Now (1979)
23. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
24. L.A. Confidential (1997)
25. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
26. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
27. Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983)
28. Leon (1994)
29. Braveheart (1995)
30. Se7en (1995)
31. Die Hard (1988)
32. North by Northwest (1959)
33. The Truman Show (1998)
34. Taxi Driver (1976)
35. Jurassic Park (1993)
36. Alien (1979)
37. Psycho (1960)
38. Raging Bull (1980)
39. Some Like It Hot (1959)
40. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
41. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966)
42. Rear Window (1954)
43. E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (1982)
44. The Deer Hunter (1978)
45. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
46. The Terminator (1984)
47. Fargo (1996)
48. The Great Escape (1963)
49. Face/Off (1997)
50. Speed (1994)
51. The Matrix (1999)
52. Singin' in the Rain (1952)
53. The Exorcist (1973)
54. Ben-Hur (1959)
55. Trainspotting (1996)
56. Forrest Gump (1994)
57. Dr. Strangelove, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
58. Zulu (1964)
59. Vertigo (1958)
60. The Wild Bunch (1969)
61. Once Upon a Time in the West (1969)
62. The Italian Job (1969)
63. The Shining (1980)
64. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
65. The English Patient (1996)
66. Heat (1995)
67. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
68. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
69. Grease (1978)
70. Platoon (1986)
71. Stand By Me (1986)
72. Back to the Future (1985)
73. Withnail and I (1987)
74. JFK (1991)
75. The Seven Samurai (1954)
76. Get Carter (1971)
77. The Third Man (1949)
78. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
79. Armaggedon (1998)
80. Chinatown (1974)
81. Goldfinger (1964)
82. The Untouchables (1987)
83. Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
84. True Romance (1993)
85. Unforgiven (1992)
86. Scarface (1983)
87. The Blues Brothers (1980)
88. The Graduate (1967)
89. When Harry Met Sally... (1989)
90. Dances With Wolves (1990)
91. Spartacus (1960)
92. Toy Story (1995)
93. Cinema Paradiso (1989)
93. Life is Beautiful (1997)
95. Grosse Point Blank (1997)
96. Annie Hall (1977)
97. Dead Poets Society (1989)
98. Good Will Hunting (1997)
99. 12 Angry Men (1957)
100. Easy Rider (1969)
2. Jaws (1975)
3. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
4. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
5. Goodfellas (1990)
6. Pulp Fiction (1994)
7. The Godfather (1972)
8. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
9. Schindler's List (1993)
10. Titanic (1997)
11. The Usual Suspects (1995)
12. Citizen Kane (1941)
13. The Godfather, Part II (1974)
14. Aliens (1986)
15. Blade Runner (1982)
16. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
17. Casablanca (1942)
18. Gone With the Wind (1939)
19. The Sound of Music (1965)
20. It's A Wonderful Life (1946)
21. Reservoir Dogs (1992)
22. Apocalypse Now (1979)
23. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
24. L.A. Confidential (1997)
25. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
26. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
27. Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983)
28. Leon (1994)
29. Braveheart (1995)
30. Se7en (1995)
31. Die Hard (1988)
32. North by Northwest (1959)
33. The Truman Show (1998)
34. Taxi Driver (1976)
35. Jurassic Park (1993)
36. Alien (1979)
37. Psycho (1960)
38. Raging Bull (1980)
39. Some Like It Hot (1959)
40. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
41. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966)
42. Rear Window (1954)
43. E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (1982)
44. The Deer Hunter (1978)
45. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
46. The Terminator (1984)
47. Fargo (1996)
48. The Great Escape (1963)
49. Face/Off (1997)
50. Speed (1994)
51. The Matrix (1999)
52. Singin' in the Rain (1952)
53. The Exorcist (1973)
54. Ben-Hur (1959)
55. Trainspotting (1996)
56. Forrest Gump (1994)
57. Dr. Strangelove, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
58. Zulu (1964)
59. Vertigo (1958)
60. The Wild Bunch (1969)
61. Once Upon a Time in the West (1969)
62. The Italian Job (1969)
63. The Shining (1980)
64. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
65. The English Patient (1996)
66. Heat (1995)
67. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
68. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
69. Grease (1978)
70. Platoon (1986)
71. Stand By Me (1986)
72. Back to the Future (1985)
73. Withnail and I (1987)
74. JFK (1991)
75. The Seven Samurai (1954)
76. Get Carter (1971)
77. The Third Man (1949)
78. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
79. Armaggedon (1998)
80. Chinatown (1974)
81. Goldfinger (1964)
82. The Untouchables (1987)
83. Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
84. True Romance (1993)
85. Unforgiven (1992)
86. Scarface (1983)
87. The Blues Brothers (1980)
88. The Graduate (1967)
89. When Harry Met Sally... (1989)
90. Dances With Wolves (1990)
91. Spartacus (1960)
92. Toy Story (1995)
93. Cinema Paradiso (1989)
93. Life is Beautiful (1997)
95. Grosse Point Blank (1997)
96. Annie Hall (1977)
97. Dead Poets Society (1989)
98. Good Will Hunting (1997)
99. 12 Angry Men (1957)
100. Easy Rider (1969)
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