Killing Sacred Cows

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What classic films do you think are overrated? Citizen Kane? Battleship Potemkin? Here's the latest sight and sound poll for reference

― Jeff-PTTL (Jeff), Friday, 23 January 2004 20:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Bbbbbut those all look good?

Balde Runner, maybe?

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Friday, 23 January 2004 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

haha I meant Blade Runner, of course.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Friday, 23 January 2004 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

"Gone With the Wind"

Over-inflated windbag of a soap opera. Crap film, crap performances, cheeseball story.

Pretty to look at, perhaps impressive at the time, but an embarassment today.

Bring on the slaughter. . .

― BabyBuddha (BabyBuddha), Friday, 23 January 2004 20:54 (twenty-two years ago)

There are discernible differences between the critics' list and the directors' list, aren't there?

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Friday, 23 January 2004 21:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Some Like It Hot? More like some like it...not! i'm not the hugest billy wilder fan. wait, he directed Lost Weekend, right? nevermind, he's a genius.

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 23 January 2004 23:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Out of the 20 that I've seen on the first list, I liked 3. I don't like most films.

― Leee Majors (Leee), Friday, 23 January 2004 23:51 (twenty-two years ago)

I love posts that ignore the title of the message board. ;)

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 24 January 2004 03:00 (twenty-two years ago)

i didn't like la dolce vita when I saw it, but that was 12 years ago.

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Saturday, 24 January 2004 03:08 (twenty-two years ago)

i like almost all the usual film 101 suspects - kane, vertigo et al - but it's genuinely distressing to see how homogeneous most of the individual lists on that site are.

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:09 (twenty-two years ago)

i think The Godfather is pretty mediocre.

― ryan (ryan), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Citizen Kane (Welles)
The Godfather and The Godfather Part II (Coppola)
2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
Sunrise (Murnau)
The Searchers (Ford)
Touch of Evil (Welles)
Metropolis (Lang)
Wild Strawberries (Bergman)
The 400 Blows (Truffaut)
Taxi Driver (Scorsese)
The Third Man (Reed)
Blade Runner (Scott)
Lawrence of Arabia

These then are the ones I don't like.

― Leee Majors (Leee), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Does it have to be on the Sight and Sound list? Because I realy can't stand Scarface, and I feel all alone.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I haven't made it too far into Seven Samurai, and I don't have much urge to finish it either.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Strange, since I genuinely liked Yojimbo and Rashoman.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 24 January 2004 07:44 (twenty-two years ago)

I just put the sight and sound link for some reference to some classic films, feel free to use any other list. I generally enjoy most of the sight and sound list.

― Jeff-PTTL (Jeff), Saturday, 24 January 2004 17:35 (twenty-two years ago)

The Graduate. It's an okay film - I enjoyed it - but good lord, it's not even close to being the #7 best American film of all time (as the AFI would have you believe - http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/movies.aspx). There are a lot of movies on that list that have me shrugging "good, but not great."

― Ernest P. (ernestp), Saturday, 24 January 2004 18:40 (twenty-two years ago)

A lot of action movies filmed as if they were the fifth book of Gospels don't do much for me (The Bridge on the River Kwai, in particular).

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 24 January 2004 18:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Re: Sight and Sound Critics' list

I love love love Buster Keaton, but The General always gets cited as his best, when I much prefer a few others over it (Sherlock, Jr. and Steamboat Bill, Jr., any day).

It's been years since I've seen Jules and Jim, but I remember it leaving me kind of...blah. Absolutely loved The 400 Blows, though, and would've expected that one to be rated higher.

Interesting to see Barry Lyndon as the second-highest ranking Kubrick film on the critics' list.

― Ernest P. (ernestp), Saturday, 24 January 2004 18:53 (twenty-two years ago)

I've never really felt Taxi Driver. The show-offy grandeur of a lot of his stuff makes it less enjoyable on repeat viewings and with age. Kinda like John Woo. I tend to think Paul Schrader is a far more interesting, if not always successful, filmmaker than Scorcese.

― theodore fogelsanger, Saturday, 24 January 2004 20:54 (twenty-two years ago)

You must see 7 Samurai at a theater, it's not the same otherwise (obvious but true).

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Saturday, 24 January 2004 21:03 (twenty-two years ago)

which ones did you like, Leee?

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Sunday, 25 January 2004 01:57 (twenty-two years ago)

By the way, did anyone snoop into the AFI site to see their next list? "100 Years... 100 Songs"? Yipes. Here I was thinking they'd do "100 Years... 100 Sermons" next time. (shouldn't the list be 106 years at this point?)

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Sunday, 25 January 2004 02:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I only liked Passion of Joan of Arc, Breathless, Seventh Seal. I'm incredibly picky.

― Leee Majors (Leee), Sunday, 25 January 2004 19:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Another one: The Shining. There's a Kubrick thread around here that mentions his coldness, his lack of humanity, and I agree with that, though his films often work in spite of it. What bugs me about The Shining especially is the apparent lack of care that went into directing the actors. There are no good performances in this film. Shelly Duvall is miscast and then misused, the kid is terrible (which I do not blame the kid for) and Jack is just Jack. Applaud his being Jack if you like, but it's hard to argue that he's stretching himself. Whenever I see this movie now, it's apparent to me that the focus was on the composition of the shots, not the action therein, and it's beyond distracting. It's annoying. Annoying and very pretty.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Sunday, 25 January 2004 19:30 (twenty-two years ago)

The only Bergman I've seen that I think is anything special is Fanny & Alexander. I thought Wild Strawberries was merely OK, thought The Seventh Seal was dullish, and flat out hated Smiles on a Summer Night.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Sunday, 25 January 2004 20:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I guess the problem I have with the films mentioned in the Sight & Sound poll is that it's less about being "great films" and more about being "important films" in the history of narrative cinema. There is a certain greatness you achieve in being the first (or at least the first popular) film in a genre, but that doesn't necessarily make it a great film, per se. ok, i'm rambling--you get my point.

i didn't originally agree with t.j.'s post on "taxi driver," but i'm starting to get swayed, now that i think about it. it's definitely not a "repeat watch" film, because it's like a horror flick in terms of the shock value. i thought scorsese did a good job of creating a creepy, coked-up, sleazy atmosphere (and atmosphere is the key thing that i respond to in a film, creating a world you feel that you're inhabiting), and it captured the essence of the seventies very well. but the contrivances of the film come through strongly on repeat viewings, and the scorsese "grandeur" certainly shows through. however, i never get tired of the final scene, simply because of the desaturation (which i know was not deliberate, but it adds such a sleazy, nightmarish feel & such a sharp aesthetic juxtaposition from the rest of the film that i find it amazing).

― jay blanchard (jay blanchard), Monday, 26 January 2004 02:11 (twenty-two years ago)

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