|
Well, not exactly. 77% of the movies on the list stayed exactly the same, although someone clearly liked "Raging Bull" a whole lot more and "The Graduate" a whole lot less this time around. And of course, #1 is still "Citizen Kane"--and probably always will be. I first saw that movie when I was only 9 years old, and my high opinion of it has never wavered. However, 23 new films made the list this time around--effectively bumping 23 films from 10 years ago into film oblivion, if you take these lists seriously. Here's the ones that are now on:
Intolerance, 1916. The General, 1918. Sunrise, 1927. A Night at the Opera, 1935. Swing Time, 1936. Sullivan's Travels, 1941. A Streetcar Named Desire, 1951. 12 Angry Men, 1957. Spartacus, 1960. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, 1966. In the Heat of the Night, 1967. The Last Picture Show, 1971. Cabaret, 1972. Nashville, 1975. All the President's Men, 1976. Sophie's Choice, 1982. Blade Runner, 1982. Do the Right Thing, 1989. The Shawshank Redemption, 1994. Toy Story, 1995. Titanic, 1997. Saving Private Ryan, 1998. The Sixth Sense, 1999. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, 2001. And here are the ones that are now gone:
The Birth of a Nation, 1915. Jazz Singer, 1927. All Quiet on the Western Front, 1930. Frankenstein, 1931. Mutiny on the Bounty, 1935. Stagecoach, 1939. Wuthering Hights, 1939. Fantasia, 1940. The Third Man, 1949. American in Paris, 1951. A Place in the Sun, 1951. From here to Eternity, 1953. Rebel Without a Cause, 1955. Giant, 1956. The Manchurian Candidate, 1962. My Fair Lady, 1964. Dr. Zhivago, 1965. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, 1967. Patton, 1970. Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1977. Amadeus, 1984. Dances With Wolves, 1990. Fargo, 1996.There are plusses, to be sure: Nice to see the racist "Birth of a Nation" replaced with "Do the Right Thing." I'm glad that Fred Astaire, Preston Sturges, and Pixar are now represented. And 12 Angry Men is the movie that EVERY liberal should see. BUT--does anyone think the "Sixth Sense" will be remembered a decade from now? Did "All Quiet on the Western Front" and "Manchurian Candidate" deserve the old heave-ho--or James Dean's entire oeuvre, for that matter? And--did the AFI really have to swap out the Coen Brothers' loopy avant-garde genius for one of the most bloated, cliched, poorly written epics of all time, leaving a true classic like "LA Confidential" to once AGAIN twist in the wind? Your thoughts, cinephiles.
|