Lists are always a curious journalistic creature, but The Guardian's attempt to name the 1,000 Best Movies Ever seems to me to slightly founder on the simple largeness of the number. Here under the As, for example, I find American Pie and think to myself "okay, I liked this when it came out, and even re-watched it once, but it's not that good." But then you think -- okay, quick, can you name 999 better movies? And, no, I can't, at least not off the top of my head. Indeed, if I were to find myself listing my 1,000 favorite movies, the ratio of movies on the list to movies that aren't on the list but that I've actually seen would, I suspect, get too high for the exercise to make sense.
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1,000 Is a Very Big Number
25 Jun 2007 09:10 am
Comments (20)
The tagline for "Movies Beginning with A" is "From Ace in the Hole to L'Avventura", which I skimmed as saying "Ace Ventura". Then I reread it and relaxed. Then I opened it, and saw that the second movie on the list was in fact Ace Ventura.
Starting from the other end of the alphabet, "Z" is one of the best.
Once upon a time I read the writings of a list-making freak, who insisted that for top x lists you need to apply a 10% ratio for what you've seen or heard or read. This would qualify me to rate about 50 to 60 movies (depending on whether actually remembering the film is a criterion).
I guess the Guardian experts have seen a lot more movies, or that they used many experts. But seriously, Clueless? What are these experts? [fill in blank space]
The only memorable performance Alicia Silverstone ever delivered was not on screen, but in Aerosmith videoclips.
To get on with the nerdy list-mania: Films I might include in my top 26-60 but which didn't make the A-C1 list:
Adaptation
Addams Family Values
Almost Famous
Barfly
Basic Instinct
Big Trouble In Little China
Cast Away
Code Inconnu
Contact
Z is excellent. And easily leads my list of the top 1,000 films with one-letter titles.
It is pretty great, but it would have to take second place behind M.
The best movie with a title which is a single character, non-letter: $ (1971), starring Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn.
Clueless is a fine movie.
After The 39 Steps, Singin' in the Rain, Bringing up Baby, It's a Gift, and The World of Henry Orient, I quit counting.
Matt, I think Haggai may have you there.
On another note, Big Trouble in Little China is terrific, but is it really better than Escape from New York?
How did one pronounce "$"? Did people walk up to the box office and say "two tickets for that one with Warren Beatty", or was there a divide between Normals, who talked about "going to see Warren Beatty in 'Dollar Sign'" and Nerds, who talked about "Warren Beatty in 'String'"?
Also, was it really better than the other single-non-letter film, "Pi"?
"O" wasn't bad.
In the book Essential Cinema, Jonathan Rosenbaum comes up with what looks like a perfectly reasonable list of the 1000 greatest films, although it takes quite a few avant garde selections that maybe two dozen people have seen in order to get to a thousand. And yeah, you pretty much have to have seen a breathtaking number of movies, perhaps dedicated your life to nothing but watching movies (i.e., be a rather long lived film critic like Rosenbaum) in order to come up with a semi-reasonable list. It seems like the people who put together the Guardian list have actually only seen 1007 movies. How else do you explain American Pie and Ace Ventura getting on the list?
"$" was usually pronounced "dollars".
"Pi" is a Greek letter.
There are 3 films titled "?" and one titled "@".
Go figure.
Hey, I just watched M on youtube a couple of days ago!. Hell of a movie! And it's on youtube!
The Guardian is not calling its list the "best" 1,000 movies, but the "essential" 1,000 and "1,000 films to see before you die." So it's something different than, say, the TSPDT "Greatest 1,000 Films" list.
Newpapers tend to go for movies with a more popular appeal, so I'll cut the Guardian a little slack, but it's not just a list of the biggest box office hits. Some qualitative judgment is being made. And that's where the fun -- and the arguments -- begin.
It's hard to understand what they were thinking with the inclusion of Ace Ventura. Even harder for me to understand is how they could not include City Lights. I have to think the latter is just an oversight.
So nobody's perfect, but I do think lists like this are worth having. If you're young and haven't seen most of them, how do you know which movies to see? You can find a list and pick some that look interesting. It's one way to start.
I'm in my 40s and have seen (judging by the A list) about 3/4 of them. When I was single I went to the movies a lot (100+ times a year), and with VCRs, DVDs, etc., it's easy to catch up on the old classics at home. You don't even need to go to the video store anymore. Since I've seen most everything on the lists of top 100 movies, I like the lists of 1,000, which give me some ideas on what else to see.
You'd have to name 1000 better movies, not 999, for American Pie to fall off the 1000 best movies list.
With all-cable, I certainly watch at least 500 movies a year. Sometimes only as background while I am on the computer.
I have never watched American Pie, but if you want, I can list 1000 better movies. Say the word.
How can you have a list of 1,000 movies and miss Adaptation, Basic Instinct and Almost Famous? Even on just an anthropological level, those are at least interesting movies. I would argue that even if Ace Ventura and Clueless haven't aged particularly well (but Clueless does give me a bit of mid-1990's nostalgia, which means that the Onion is getting a little too accurate), they still at least were important when they came out and have their moments, which seems like a reasonable criteria to be included on a list of the 1,000 essential movies.
Clueless is an entirely nonessential film. Even as tacky 90s nostalgia it's not essential. It's not bad enough for that. I don't know any tacky 90s nostalgia cinema that is essential, but you could compare Dirty Dancing, which is essential as tacky 80s nostalgia (see if that makes the list).
Basic Instinct is an essential film. Not necessarily among the best films, but definitely among the most essential. Whatever your judgement, you need to have seen it. Almost Famous or Adaptation are not as essential, but definitely more so than Clueless, or American Pie.
So you don't need to name 1000 better movies to kick one movie that's bad or not essential off the list, you just need one better or more essential movie that didn't make it.
My top one-letter film: "Q." A giant, flying, man-eating reptile roosting in the spire of the Chrysler Building. Doesn't get much better than that.
Too bad "V" was a miniseries and not a film...
The Title is "Q: The Winged Serpent"
But, it really is one of best of the dumbo monster movies.
V? Q? Z?
M gets the nod from this corner as the best one-letter-title film.
And I'll second the idea that 1000 is too many. But 100 isn't enough. Maybe about 300 is the right number.
Comments closed July 09, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
Yeah, even at 2 movies/week it would take a person nearly 10 years to see their first 1000 movies.
Presumaby you would want to see at least 1001 before you identified your top 1000!
Given that kids tend to watch kids movies, and most kids' movies aren't that great, the judging is basically closed to anyone under 30.
Posted by Dan f. | June 25, 2007 9:31 AM