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eddycKarlok

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All-time favourite movies?

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There are indeed lots of great movies, but I always come back to Diva (1981) as my favourite. Intriguing story, cool characters, amazing visuals and there’s some really great music too.
I could make a list of other favourites as well, but it would change from time to time, Diva is always number one though.

     

Lazy Bee
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Should anyone care: I’ve updated my original post to include all the movies I gave 4.5/5 as well. Now it’s a bona fide top 100. Cool


Advie - 24 September 2013 09:20 AM

Thanks for the tip ,Tim you know how clumsy i am Smile

Actually, I originally had Das Boot on my list twice as well (hence why I initially said “35 movies with 5/5” instead of 34). But one was the movie, and the other was the mini series. Both are equally brilliant, btw. Well, maybe the mini series is better because it runs longer… Tongue


diego - 23 September 2013 06:48 PM

We do have the similar taste in games, but it’s even more similar with movies - however, you should really squeeze Open Your Eyes in there. Crazy

Actually, Abre los ojos is one of those movies that *just* missed the top 100. I’ve given it 4 stars, but 4.25 would probably be more accurate (I round down). Which reminds me, I really should watch it again (even if only to scrub out the memory of Vanilla Sky).


zobraks - 24 September 2013 07:22 AM
Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 06:59 AM

Lord of the Rings movies are better than the books.

Only if you don’t like to read.

Great adaptations and a visible labo(u)r of GREAT love LotR movies are (I love them!), but I still prefer the books. Yes, I’ve read those (unlike Diego ).

^ I agree with Zobraks.
Even though the LotR movies got 5, 4.5 and 5 stars in my book (3x5 if you count the extended versions), I STILL prefer the books.

But then again, the LotR trilogy is my entire top 3 of favourite books, so that probably doesn’t help the movies. Smile


Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 09:56 AM

The Shining is a great film, but the book is better. King famously HATES the Kubrick movie.

And that’s why he wanted to “set the record straight” and directed his own The Shining mini series in 1997. It was mediocre at best while Kubrick’s movie is awesome…

Edit: Sefir already mentioned this. I agree with him.


Sefir - 24 September 2013 09:46 AM

And now the bad news considering my favorite actor...

Not only YOUR favourite actor, but mine as well. Sad news…


Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 11:40 AM

Never watched Dancer in the Dark, but at the time I had “Bjork-phobia” and her annoyingly squeeky singing put me off seeing her acting.

I’m not a Bjork fan either, but Dancer in the Dark is a great movie.

     

The truth can’t hurt you, it’s just like the dark: it scares you witless but in time you see things clear and stark. - Elvis Costello
Maybe this time I can be strong, but since I know who I am, I’m probably wrong. Maybe this time I can go far, but thinking about where I’ve been ain’t helping me start. - Michael Kiwanuka

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I’m sure I’ll forget many, but here are the ones I can think of right now:
- Back to the Future 1,2
- Starwars 4,5,6
- Indiana Jones 1,2,3
- Terminator 1,2
- Pan’s Labyrinth
- Memento
- Matrix
- Innerspace
- Shawshank Redemption
- The Usual Suspects
- Godfather
- Seven
- The Sixth Sense
- Rain Man
- The Dark Crystal
- Dumb and Dumber
- Lord of the Rings trilogy
- American Beauty
- Fight Club
- Aladdin
- The Lion King
- Toy Story
- Ratatouille
- Blade Runner
- The Fifth Element
- Life is Beautiful
- My Neighbor Totoro
- Kikis Delivery Service
- Spirited Away
- American Gangster
- American History X
- Kill Bill
- Ghost
- New Batman Trilogy
- City of God
- Finding Forrester
- Boys Don’t Cry
- You’ve Got Mail
- Kikujiro
- Kung Fu Hustle
- Shaolin Soccer

     
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My, my!  How could I forget Dead Poet’s Society, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Fried Green Tomatoes?  They were great films.  Cuckoo’s Nest is also a play that has a similar feel to the movie, but I did like the book the best, mostly because the of Chief’s inner dialogue, which would be difficult to do well in any other medium.

Regarding books vs. movies, I have a t-shirt I wear frequently that says, “Never judge a book by it’s movie.”  It takes a very insightful director to be able to find the essence of a story and also get the details right without bogging down in minutiae.  I loved Tolkien’s books, but they are complex, and his pace is slow with language made to be savoured.  In a movie, that can be deadly.  I was unhappy to see Tom Bombadill left out of the movie, but I understand why they did it.  To tell his story well could have taken too much time.  I thought the movies were excellent and kept the feeling of the the original epic but at a faster pace.

Regarding The Shining, I do like the book much better than the movie.  The pace was there in the movie, but Kubrick took away some essential elements of the story that I think needed to be there.  The mini-series put in those elements, but didn’t keep up the suspense.  It is a delicate balance.

     

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Wow, this thread went on a spree Grin I’ve rarely seen a thread get so many posts so fast…

Anyways, I knew I forgot something very important - Life of Brian! Will go add that to my list now Smile One of the most important movies ever, in my opinion.

Also, no one else has In the Mood for Love? I wonder, have people seen it? (Not in the sense that “if you see it you need to have it on your list” but just because I’m interested, and a bit surprised).

Also, I need to add to my “almost makes it to the list but not quite” - Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid.

Intense Degree - 24 September 2013 05:29 AM

Mulholland Drive (seriously, the club silencio scene… wow.)
...
Blue Velvet
...
Not necessarily in order but Mulholland Drive belongs at the top!

Indeed! And why am I not surprised? Tongue Our mutual Lynchianism strikes again. Though, Blue Velvet is a bit much for me to be in my favorites… Though I’d need to see it again, it’s been a long time and I was quite a bit younger at the time (which might not be surprising to the most keenest of minds who read this, considering it was - as I said - a long time ago).

Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 10:21 AM
Sefir - 24 September 2013 10:04 AM
Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 09:56 AM

The Shining is a great film, but the book is better. King famously HATES the Kubrick movie.

...and that’s how a Shining film was remade, supervised by Stephen King himself, making sure that the script stays entirely on King’s book and the result was the definition of awfulness…
I guess we just disagree on that…
Wink

Never said that the remake was better, just that the book was better.

Kubrick made the film more about the father, marginalised the mother and the hotel itself as a character. It’s a domestic disaster about a father having a psychotic break.

Neither the book or movie is perfect, but it does highlight the differences between how effective horror can be done on the page and on the screen.

Both from the same source and both great in their own way.

I just prefer the novel.

Regarding The Shining (the movie) I most whole-heartedly suggest the documentary Room 237, in which there are several theories about some pretty wild hidden meanings in it and reasons on why he changed the original book so much. Funny enough, the most out-there theory is also - in my opinion - the one with the best arguments Grin

Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 10:02 AM
Intense Degree - 24 September 2013 09:14 AM
Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 06:59 AM

Lord of the Rings movies are better than the books.

Mr 21! Really! Gasp

How came you to form such an opinion?! The films, brilliant as they are, greatly (and necessarily) lack the depth of the book(s) on any view surely?

Mostly because the movie improves on the pacing of the book. I’ve always hated how slow and pondering the book is. The whole gettin out of the shire and the annoying Tom Bombadil sections, take waaay too long.

The movie cuts alot of the back story chaff that isn’t needed.

Of Course this is just my opinion.

It’s indeed a very subjective thing because I found that the movies ruined the pacing of the book (though the Frodo & Sam & Gollum parts are rather tedious in both). The extended versions were much better already (and surely, they are the “definitive” versions of the movies, right?), but I still find them much too action-packed and not pondering enough. And I loved the Bombadil section Wink

     
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TimovieMan - 24 September 2013 12:26 PM
Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 09:56 AM

The Shining is a great film, but the book is better. King famously HATES the Kubrick movie.

And that’s why he wanted to “set the record straight” and directed his own The Shining mini series in 1997. It was mediocre at best while Kubrick’s movie is awesome…

Edit: Sefir already mentioned this. I agree with him.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that I prefer the 1997 miniseries version of The Shining over Kubrick’s movie version because the miniseries version is faithful to the book.  I realize some editing of non-essential events or compositing of minor characters is necessary due to time constraints when bringing a book to the screen,  but the problem I have with Kubrick’s version is that, like the later Harry Potter films, the director chose to downplay or remove important plot points present in the book and substitute events of his own creation that never occurred in the original source material.  While this might be permissible in movies made from obscure books or stories that never enjoyed mainstream success, in bringing best-sellers to the screen I find it unforgivable. 

Movie directors, if you want to get “creative” with a storyline then go write your own original book or screenplay, but please don’t (metaphorically) turn a sumptuous multi-course meal into a turd and call it art.

That rant being vented, here are a few of my favorites that haven’t been mentioned yet:

Kingpin

Dogma

There’s Something About Mary

The Abominable Dr Phibes

An American Werewolf in London

Nightbreed

Death Becomes Her

The Thing (the John Carpenter version)

Galaxy Quest

     

Warning- People won’t have as much of a sense of humor about you putting an Alka Seltzer in your mouth then staggering into a restaurant while shouting “THE VIRUS HAS MUTATED!” as you’d hope they would.

Consider this: People say “Ewwww!!!” when they hear about a guy having a hairy bum or hairy back, yet every Teddy Bear ever made has had both a hairy bum AND a hairy back and nobody complains about them; In fact, people think Teddy Bears are adorable.

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Sage - 24 September 2013 01:41 PM

That rant being vented, here are a few of my favorites that haven’t been mentioned yet:

Kingpin

Dogma

There’s Something About Mary

The Abominable Dr Phibes

An American Werewolf in London

Nightbreed

Death Becomes Her

The Thing (the John Carpenter version)

Galaxy Quest

Oh man Dogma and The Thing both great movies.

No Sweet Home Alabama, Forrest Gump or My Cousin Vinny on your list.  Tongue

Which gets me to thing what great movies have been set where people live.

For me

Trainspotting
Shallow Grave
Braveheart
Highlander

     

An adventure game is nothing more than a good story set with engaging puzzles that fit seamlessly in with the story and the characters, and looks and sounds beautiful.
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Lady Kestrel - 24 September 2013 01:06 PM

My, my!  How could I forget Dead Poet’s Society, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Fried Green Tomatoes?

Beats me!

UPtimist - 24 September 2013 01:21 PM

Wow, this thread went on a spree Grin I’ve rarely seen a thread get so many posts so fast…

It’s only natural: almost everybody likes movies.

     

Everybody wants to be Cary Grant.
Even Me.

-Cary Grant

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and especially AG players ..

     
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Sage - 24 September 2013 01:41 PM

The Abominable Dr Phibes

Oh wow!  This one brings back memories.  I saw it on a flight to Italy in 1971 (back when you had only one choice of a movie), and it really creeped me out.  I will never get that plague of locusts scene out of my mind.

     

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I didn’t see anybody mention The Fugitive (though I could easily have missed it in all the large lists of wonderful movies). I’ve been wanting to rewatch that recently.

     
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Lucien21 - 24 September 2013 02:33 PM

No Sweet Home Alabama, Forrest Gump or My Cousin Vinny on your list.  Tongue

I’m afraid not.  I got the impression that Sweet Home Alabama was written by someone who had never actually visited the South and was taking Gone With The Wind and various Tennessee Williams plays as documentaries.

Forrest Gump is in general a good film, but my enjoyment of it is marred by the not just bad but downright bizarre interpretations of Alabama accents.  For this, I partially blame myself: I was living in Savannah while Forest Gump was being filmed there and I avoided the open casting calls for extras; If I had known at the time that the majority of the book upon which the film was based was set in Alabama, I could have offered my own accent as a more realistic example on which Tom Hanks could have modeled his character’s speech patterns and inflection.

Of the three films you mention, My Cousin Vinny is my favorite: The accents aren’t egregious, the supporting characters aren’t wildly over-dramatized, and it’s simply a good story well told.

     

Warning- People won’t have as much of a sense of humor about you putting an Alka Seltzer in your mouth then staggering into a restaurant while shouting “THE VIRUS HAS MUTATED!” as you’d hope they would.

Consider this: People say “Ewwww!!!” when they hear about a guy having a hairy bum or hairy back, yet every Teddy Bear ever made has had both a hairy bum AND a hairy back and nobody complains about them; In fact, people think Teddy Bears are adorable.

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I love “Shot them up” “Who Frame Roger and Rabbit” and “The Boondock Saints”

     

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It’s not surprising to see that the lists here mostly consist of American films. Nevertheless it’s nice to see films like Blade Runner getting some love around here. Kubrick’s popularity is amazing, but it’s not surprising since I’m a fan of his work as well. 2001: A Space Odyssey is my personal favorite. Also, UPtimist, In the Mood for Love is my favorite Wong film, but over time I have found so many other films to like that I don’t think I would include it in a list of my favorite films unless I had to write down at least 50 of them.

Since there aren’t that many Asian films in this thread, I might as well write about some of my favorite Japanese (and one Taiwanese) films:

My two absolute favorite films of all time are Hideaki Anno’s End of Evangelion and Edward Yang’s Yi yi - the former changed my life entirely (have been interested in cinema, literature, philosophy, psychology and music ever since) and the latter is just about as perfect as a portrayal of life in a contemporary society can get.

Beyond ranking these two films at the top, I don’t like ranking films. There’s so much variety in film that it wouldn’t be fair to compare films made in different places in different periods of time for different sort of purposes. Japan alone has produced so many films that I love that it wouldn’t be fair to go ranking them all in one list. There are the old masters of the Golden Era, like Akira Kurosawa (famous for Seven Samurai) and Yasujiro Ozu (famous for Tokyo Story) and then there are the rebellious New Wave directors, out of whom I like Hiroshi Teshigahara and his Woman in the Dunes the most.

From more recent directors, Hirokazu Koreeda and Sion Sono are the most intriguing ones. Koreeda has an amazing backlog of films brimming with human drama and sophistication. Nobody Knows is probably his most famous film and a good example of his style although it’s not my favorite of his filmography (that would be either Still Walking, After Life or Maborosi). Sion Sono’s Love Exposure is a 4-hour epic that never lets you down and it’s a film that I recommend to just about anyone. I have already had dozens of people watch it and not one has said anything negative about it. As long as you have 4 hours to spend you should watch it because you won’t regret it.

     
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Hello, Oz, and welcome!

I saw Woman in the Dunes when I was in college in the 1960s.  In trying to convey the tedium of the task set before the captive man, I found that the movie itself was tedious, despite the creative use of the camera.  The ultimate message of someone finally accepting his captivity and actually finding good in it and wanting to stay did make me think i.e. Was it true acceptance or brainwashing?  However, I thought the movie took too long in getting that message across.

Along the same lines, Samuel Beckett’s short play Act Without Words is much more dynamic in conveying the same kind of message.  I’ve only seen it onstage, but there is a filmed version of the play directed by Karel Reisz for the Beckett on Film project.

     

Carpe chocolate.

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