Sight and sound is a magazine published by the British Film Institute. Starting in 1952, and continuing once every 10 years, they poll and publish their list of the Greatest Films of All Time based on critics and film professionals. Roger Ebert described the polls as “by far the most respected of the countless polls of great movies – the only one most serious movie people take seriously.”
This list, based on more than 1,600 participating voters, is the most recent (2022).
I am curious as to which of the top 20 you have seen, or even heard of.
When we were just starting to date, my now-wife was getting her masters degree in English, and for one class she wrote an essay on Roger Ebert’s review of Tokyo Story (from my copy of Ebert’s anthology book Great Movies Ii), so it’s one of the first DVDs we rented from Netflix. Good, mellow, expertly shot film, about parents, children, and grandparents.
Hehehe, I had this poster of Man With a Movie Camera for years before seeing the movie. Right now it’s hung at the top of the stairs. I finally saw the movie a couple of years ago, and it really kind of lives up to the poster.
I guess I’ve become more like that as I’ve gotten older, but that’s usually because of the Internet.
Still, I’d heard of the top 7. But I’ve only watched one. Citizen Kane played on TV once when I was pretty young, and I happened to flip to it not very long after it started. I only learned it was Citizen Kane later, as I knew nothing besides the name of it at the time.
I did check to see if I’d seen “Singing in the Rain,” but I don’t remember that plot. I think I’d just seen the clips of the song.
I have a hard time with any list that includes Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. I watched it, based on its reputation, and it’s a terrible film. It’s basic point is to tell its story in the most tedious way possible. I think the point is to show how boring life can be. But that’s not really enough of an idea to base a film on.
I’m going to take the risk here of sounding like one of those anti-woke assholes. But this movie was made in 1975, when the feminist movement was gathering momentum. The movie was written and directed by a woman, with a female lead. Akerman consciously chose to work with an all women crew (at a time when there were not a lot of women with experience in film making). So I feel that critics bent over backwards to praise the movie. Nobody wanted to be the man who said that a group of women had made a movie and the result was a failure.
That said, if somebody can tell me what I’m missing and unlock this movie for me, I’d welcome it.
Spoiler: During sex she either has an orgasm or is disgusted by what she is doing, then dresses herself and stabs the man to death with a pair of scissors. She then sits quietly at her dining room table.
Oh…Kay. I did NOT see that coming (so to speak). Is that supposed to be empowering?
I don’t think that should be a role model for women. Women every day lead lives of quiet desperation, and yet don’t become whores or stab clients.
And …three hours twenty one minutes?? I don’t need a slow film to tell me life is slow. I get that on my own.
I can’t remember offhand if I’ve seen Tokyo Story or In The Mood For Love, though I did pick up a used copy of the Criterion disc of the latter recently. I can’t really argue with the ones I’ve seen, in terms of impact upon their release. Though there are Hitchcock films I like a lot more than Vertigo (how can it possibly beat out Rear Window year after year?).
