An Attempt at a Top 10 List, a.k.a. A Futile Exercise in Tokenism

Lists are all the rage in the entertainment evaluation community. At the end of each year, various entertainment publications will come out with their annual top tens: Top Ten Albums, Top Ten TV Shows, Top 10 Movies, Top 10 Celebrity Mishaps, etc. Every once in a while, a particularly ambitious publication might attempt to calculate a definitive list of the best works of a particular medium of all time. Of all time!

There’s nothing wrong with these lists, per se, but I do have a few problems with them, personally, which I feel are a part of a minor bothersome trend within the field of art criticism. However, I will go more in depth on these later. For now, I will start my demonstration by attempting to compile a list of my top ten favorite films of all time.

What should a proper top ten list entail? Quite simply, it should be a list of my favorite films of all time. The problem comes with the fact that I’ve seen many more than ten films. Many more than ten times ten films. Probably even more than ten times ten times ten films. Since there’s no way in hell I’ll ever remember every single film I’ve ever seen, I can safely assume that the ones I don’t remember probably wouldn’t make the cut, anyway.

But even when all those are eliminated, there’s still a few hundred films that I remember liking very much. Films that often times, I find comparisons between to be futile. Surely I can’t judge The Killer by the same canons I would judge Sansho the Bailiff, can I? The truth is, I like very much a wide variety of films that are often incomparable with one another. Perhaps the best way to start a top ten list would be to come up with ten wildly different films that I love which I feel best represent my taste in cinema. Now, to come up with ten different categories:

• Ozu and Mizoguchi should respectively be reserved a slot each for one of their films, simply because they are the masters and two of my favorite directors of all time. Choosing pretty much any Ozu would work fine, due to his stylistic consistency. The critical consensus seems to be that Tokyo Story is his best film, though I might have preferred Early Summer myself. Or did I? Or was my favorite Floating Weeds? I’m not sure, but I’m leaning toward something from the “Noriko” trilogy. As far as Mizoguchi goes, he was a bit less consistent than Ozu, but the best of his works reach a level of artistic accomplishment that most filmmakers could only dream of. I think I’ve come to a consensus with myself that Ugetsu is my favorite, but how can I ignore Sansho the Bailiff, or The Life of Oharu, or Street of Shame? Women of the Night was absolutely gorgeous, too. Pretty much any of his films I’ve seen except Yang Kwei Fei could contend for this spot.
• A French New Wave Film. Quite simply, the French New Wave is not only one of the most important “movements” in film history, but one of my favorite. The free spirited nature of these directors changed forever the way that films are conceived and shot. This leads to a question of moral integrity: Godard or Truffaut? The answer was obviously Godard for a long time, but I’ve taken an extreme liking to Truffaut lately. On one hand, we have a wild experimenter, who challenged his viewers to think critically about the film they were watching. On the other hand, we have one of cinema’s greatest storytellers. One is completely in your face, reminding you that you are watching a film. The other is a master of narrative structure, subtly changing the ways a story is told. Perhaps the best answer to come to would be a happy medium. One of Godard’s more narrative-centered films, or one of Truffaut’s more experimental films. Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player serves as a great happy medium, don’t you think? Or what about Pierrot le Fou?
• A New Hollywood film. For the uninitiated, New Hollywood was the movement in the 1970’s that happened when a bunch of young, educated, bratty film buffs gave the middle finger to the Hollywood establishment and started incorporating influences from the French New Wave into their films, to reinvigorate the stale state of commercial cinema’s world headquarters. The consensus is The Godfather, which is a spectacular film and a sheer joy to watch, but at the same time just a tad bit overrated. I hate to use that word to describe a film as good as The Godfather but its greatness does get blown a bit out of proportion. I think I’ll go with Apocalypse Now, a film which unfortunately we will never see anything of its kind again. At least not in the current filmmaking climate.
• A Newfangled Chinese Art Film! Let’s expand this to Taiwan and Hong Kong, too. Wong Kar-Wai has always been one of my favorite filmmakers, but his films are much more expressionistic than most of this movement, which is marked by minimalism and subtlety. I probably should put at least one Wong Kar Wai film on this list based on that alone. I should also probably choose something from Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Tsai Ming-Liang, or Jia Zhang-Ke. Maybe an early Zhang Yimou like Raise the Red Lantern would fit the bill. Of these filmmakers, Hou is the most experienced and respected, but unfortunately I’m mostly familiar with his more recent work thanks to the unavailability of acceptable versions of his earlier, and supposedly better, work. Jia is great, and I loved The Platform, but there are other films along the same time that I liked as much. Tsai is probably my favorite of these choices, but his films are so similar to Wong’s thematically that I’d feel redundant having both a Wong Kar Wai and a Tsai Ming-Liang film in my top ten. Perhaps if I chose Wong’s Days of Being Wild, his most subtle and rewarding film, that would solve this problem. It can also make up for my choosing a Truffaut over a Godard. It also unfortunately ignores the impact that Chungking Express had on me. What if I choose both Chungking Express and a minimalist film?
• An action film! Oh boy, what fun this will be. Action films are very intricate and difficult to pull off, yet don’t get the respect to deserve due to the fact that they have less “deep meaning” (arbitrarily) assigned to them. A Kurosawa film would sidestep that whole “deep meaning” (whatever the hell that phrase means) barrier. The thing is, while Kurosawa was an early pioneer of action, that would be doing a disservice to the complex and dynamic action sequences found at the height of Hong Kong action cinema. If I wanted to appeal to the bigwigs, A Touch of Zen would be a good choice. The problem is, the film is a bit on the bloated side and suffers in the dramatic sequences. There’s always good room for a John Woo shoot ‘em up. I think I’ll make my choice from madman Tsui Hark’s oeuvre. Tsui made three truly great action films in Peking Opera Blues and the first two Once Upon a Time in China movies. Any of the three will do.
• An American independent film, post-Stranger Than Paradise. If I include a Tarantino film, I’ll look like a complete noob, won’t I? However, I can’t deny how much I enjoy Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill. Then there’s Richard Linklater, and his excellent films Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, which are two of the greatest romantic films ever made. Wes Anderson makes his nice little pageants. My favorite director of this movement is Paul Thomas Anderson, whose works are so consistently awe-inspiring that choosing a favorite is more difficult than fitting a camel being ridden by a fat rich man through the eye of a pin. Screw it, noobishness aside, I’m going to go with Pulp Fiction. Much like a lot of my generation, Tarantino was the first director whom I followed anyway.
• Two spots left, and I could use another national cinema. Something from Italy, perhaps? No, I’m hip and current, and to prove how hip and current I am, I should choose something from an exciting, emerging national cinema. Eastern Europe in general seems to be on the rise, but anyone who knows me knows how excited I get over Korean cinema. Look at the variety of voices, too: there’s Bong Joon-Ho the Satirical, Park Chan-Wook the Twisted, Hong Sangsoo the Guy with Women Problems, Kim Ji-Woon the Versatile, Lee Chang-Dong the Heavy-Handed, Kim Ki-Duk the Minimalist. I think I can safely narrow my choices down to Memories of Murder, Lady Vengeance, and Oh! Soo-Jung. Historically I’ve always liked Lady Vengeance but right now I like Memories of Murder a lot… Memories of Murder it is!
• One spot left. Should I choose a western? A silent film? A Hitchcock? A film noir? Citizen Kane? Something more typically mainstream? Classic Hollywood cinema? Soviet Montage? Italian Neo-realism? Erotica? I don’t have any comedies! Alright… think, Adam, think. Did Hitchcock ever direct any funny, silent westerns? God damnit. What if I expand the list to fifteen? No, then I’ll keep expanding it to include every film I’ve ever liked. Alright, let’s go with The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Can’t go wrong with Leone, right? Not until someone mentions John Ford, but you all know how much I can’t stand that damn John Wayne. Yes, I know its heresy any I’m burning in hell. Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.

Okay, so let’s review what I’ve narrowed myself down to for a safe-ish top ten:

• An Ozu. Something from the Noriko Trilogy.
• A Mizoguchi. Probably Ugetsu.
• A French New Wave Film. Probably Shoot the Piano Player or Pierrot le Fou.
• Apocalypse Now
• Chungking Express
• A Chinese art film. Let’s say Vive L’Amour until I’ve seen Hou’s early masterpieces.
• One of Tsui Hark’s three best films. I’m thinking Peking Opera Blues
• Pulp Fiction
• Memories of Murder
• The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

That four of these films are less than twenty years old is a bit alarming, no? I could go back and reevaluate to catch more of film history and make myself look better, but I have another point to make.

Here comes the second hurdle, the one that induces brain aneurysms: putting them in order.

This is the part I hate. This is the part where I have to compare films from disparate genres that I would prefer differently depending what mood I’m in. The part that I’ll redo every day for the next three years, not to mention that I’ll probably see more films that I’ll think deserve a slot in here.

Because these films are all so different, I can’t simply choose a set of general canons and evaluate them all based on such. The things that make an Ozu film great are nearly the opposite of what makes a Tsui film great, as are Vive L’Amour and Pulp Fiction.

Common criticism technique would tell me that I should forget form and stylistics in lieu of content and substance. What films enlighten me as a human?

But why is this so important? Looking at art objectively, is content not simply arbitrarily assigned by the artist? Why should I applaud the artist who makes something socially conscious and not the artist who makes the thriller? Does choosing a more “meaningful” subject matter really take that much more talent and inspiration?

No, it doesn’t, and until and unless I am convinced otherwise, I will continue to posit that form always takes precedence over content. Certain subject matters might have more personal appeal, but truly great art is able to transcend that.

To put it quite simply, ordering this list would be either an exercise in maintaining the status quo or a futile quest to upset it, or maybe a bit of both. The fact that certain genres of film will never produce a film that could ever be considered to be among “the greatest” simply because of their generic status as “low art” is a disgrace to all the hard work and creativity that went into them.

And that, my friends, is why I choose to no longer attempt to make definitive numbered lists.

The Official 2009 in Film Post, Part 2

Greetings to the two of you that will ever read this pathetic little blogspot. Here's what I've already seen from 2009:

First of all, the spillover from 2008 that weren't available to be seen around here until 2009:

Ashes of Time Redux (Wong Kar Wai)
I missed the score from the original Ashes, as outdated as it sounds, and I wasn't a big fan of the added CG. However, seeing a restored 35mm print of Ashes was well worth the price I payed for it plus more, having seen nothing but terrible quality DVD's for years. The cinematography ranks among the best ever filmed.

The Wrestler (Darren Aranofsky)
Lots of pretty tracking shots and a surprising amount of color, not to mention an excellent performance from Mickey Rourke. I'm not going to say his was better than Sean Penn's in Milk, though it's a pretty close competition. This is a major change for director Aranofsky, who I've mostly associated with less conventional narratives. While it may have the feel of a typical indie flick, it's one of the best of its kind, and definitely top 5 of its year.

Che (Steven Soderbergh)
Part one is spectacular. The colors of the cinematography are full of vibrant greens, which make the film come to life. Soderbergh made an excellent choice not to film Antonio Banderas alone in shots, which captures the spirit and ideals of Guevara. (However, one of my socialist friends might disagree, as he is opposed to guerrilla warfare due to the fact that it isn't as inclusive as Marxist ideas are supposed to be). Overall, an excellent war film.

Part two is well made, but boring. The most amusing part is spotting Matt Damon hidden somewhere in the film. At best, it gives me hope for digital cinematography, as I was completely convinced that it had been filmed on blue-tinted film stock. Things do start to pick up toward the end. Overall, a bad war film.

Tokyo Sonata (Kiyoshi Kurosawa)
Despite stiff competition, Tokyo Sonata emerged as my favorite movie of 2008. Although I'm not too familiar with Kurosawa's earlier work, I can safely say that this is a big departure from the conventional horror genre, at least. Sonata can, in fact, be seen as a horror film in its own right, due to the fact that the overall scenario could happen to pretty much anyone in today's economy. It takes some unrealistic turns, but I'm willing to suspend disbelief due to the fact that the film gets away with it so convincingly. The cinematography is steeped in Japanese tradition, and ranks as my unofficial favorite film of the year.

Departures (Yojiro Takita)
Speaking of Japanese cinematography, advertisements and screen shots of Departures mislead me into thinking it would be more Japanese-style than it actually is. While the visuals are a bit more westernized than I had hoped, it's still a thoughtful and winning experience. Perhaps it didn't deserve to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language film, but considering only one film from Japan could even be eligible, I'm not too disappointed.

Cyborg She (Kwak Jae-Yong)
aka, My Sassy Girl Part 3. I'm considering writing more in depth about Kwak, who I have mixed feelings about as a writer/director. This is a better example of his work. Not as ridiculously uneven as say, Windstruck or Daisy, but it doesn't quite reach the highs of My Sassy Girl, either. Kwak has a very clear formula in his screenwriting, but for the most part, it works here.

The Films from 2009 that I've scrounged up enough money to see in theaters:

Watchmen (Zack Snyder)
I notoriously disliked 300 around my friends. Despite that, I decided to actually go with the hype for once and see Watchmen. Much like Snyder's previous film, the visuals are nowhere near as intriguing as they are purported to be. Despite the well-done CGI, most of the framings are rather boring, though a few excellent shots do stay in my mind to this day. Overall, a worthwhile experience, though there was no way it could've lived up to the monumental hype surrounding it.

Away We Go (Sam Mendes)
A very stylish and enjoyable indie comedy. Also contains a grossly inaccurate portrayal of my home town of Madison. At least we were post-Hippie crazies and instead of clueless farmers. Not actually shot in Madison, by the way.

(500) Days of Summer (Marc Webb)
Practically a love letter to having good taste in music, this might be the best rom com dram I've seen come out of America since High Fidelity. Speaking of which, the influence from Cameron Crowe (and a bit of Woody Allen) is very strong.

The Hurt Locker (Katheryn Bigelow)
Remind me not to have Sundance 608's lemonade while watching a movie with this much frantic camerawork. If I were not familiar with filmmaking techniques, I probably could've been tricked into thinking this was a documentary. Once I got used to the zooms (which were definitely not tracks), I enjoyed the film very much. The intensity of the bomb diffusing scenes is amazing. Perhaps not quite as good as Che Part One, but miles ahead of Part Two.

The Official 2009 in Film Post, Part 1

This is more for myself than it is for the twelve people that will unfortunately stumble across this blog.

First, the films that I plan on seeing:

Theater (if Possible) Tier:
Thirst (Park Chan-Wook)
I Come with the Rain (Tran Ahn Hung)
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
A Serious Man (Joel and Ethan Coen)
Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese)
The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
Red Cliff (John Woo)

Possibly Theater, Probably DVD Tier:
The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch)
Funny People (Judd Apatow)
Antichrist (Lars von Trier)
Capitalism: A Love Story (Michael Moore)
Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson)
Ponyo (Hayao Miyazaki)
Taking Woodstock (Ang Lee)
The Informant! (Steven Soderbergh)
Where the Wild Things Are (Spike Jonze)
Sherlock Holmes (Guy Ritchie)
Broken Embraces (Pedro Almodovar)
Avatar (James Cameron)

Not gonna hold my breath for a local Theatrical Release Tier:
Written By (Wai Ka Fai) Mother (Bong Joon-Ho)
Vengeance (Johnny To)
Storm Warriors (Pang Brothers)
True Legend (Yuen Woo-Ping)
Air Doll (Hirokazu Koreeda)

Waiting for DVD/Already Missed in Theaters Tier:
Blood: The Last Vampire (Chris Nahon)
New York, I Love You (Shunji Iwai, other people)
Whatever Works (Woody Allen)
Tetro (Francis Ford Coppola)
Paper Heart (??)
Ninja Assassin (James McTeigue)
Public Enemies (Michael Mann)
Drag Me to hell (Sam Raimi)
Up! (Pete Docter... eh... Pixar)
The Girlfriend Experience (Steven Soderbergh)
The Brothers Bloom (Rian Johnson)
The International (Tom Tykwer)
Coraline (Henry Selick)

Stuff I might watch if someone else wants to:
Adventureland (Greg Mottola)
I Love You, Man (John Hamburg)
The Hangover (Todd Phillips)
Knowing (Alex Proyas)
Sunshine Cleaning (Christine Jeffs)

Hard Eight

Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Starring Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Samuel L. Jackson

In the opening sequence of Hard Eight, a mysterious old man approaches John (John C. Reilly), offers him a cup of coffee and a cigarette. This man is Sydney (Philip Baker Hall), who claims he has a surefire way to help John earn some cash in Vegas toward his mother's funeral. John has never met Sydney before, and much like the audience, is curious as to why Sydney wants to help him.

The reason? Insignificant now. The fact is, Sydney's technique helps John become very successful, and the bond between the two of them becomes very strong, so much that when we are introduced to Clementine (Paltrow), she is endeared by the way John looks up to Sydney.

Is the reason why Sydney helps John just a MacGuffin? Not necessarily, but it is one of many ways in which the film creates suspense in this masterful debut film of his. To reveal any more of the plot would not necessarily ruin the film, but might take away the impact of the first viewing of the film. While the atmosphere is familiar to the film noir variety, the twists and turns the plot takes are completely unexpected, so that even the most seasoned viewers of the film will be find a delightful surprise in store for them.

Hard Eight is the impressive debut of Paul Thomas Anderson, who has gone on to make even better pictures than this later in his career. His trademark steadicam tracking shots, courtesy of cinematographer Robert Elswit, are already in place. There's one notable shot that sticks in my mind which follows Sydney as he walks through a casino. The way the colors light up the screen gives a sense of beauty to a place riddled with alcohol, addiction, loose women and sleazy men.

Samuel L. Jackson deserves a mention, as this is possibly his second best performance to his performance in Pulp Fiction a couple years previous to this. Philip Seymour Hoffman also has a memorable cameo as a young gambler who taunts Seymour.

Smart People

Directed by Noam Murro
Stars Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Ellen Page (aka that Juno girl), and Thomas Haden Church (aka the guy from Sideways who isn't Paul Giamatti)

I've heard people describe average movies as being "good simply for not being bad." Smart People just might be the opposite. There's nothing glaringly horrible about it at first look, but the movie is emotionally empty, and not in the cool, detached Jean-Luc Godard way.

That's not to say the movie doesn't try quite hard to convey some sort of emotion. 90% of the movie is spent wallowing through the sorrow of Prof. Lawrence Wetherhold, who would probably have been a much more sympathetic character through the hands of a better director. Ellen Page plays his smart and quote-unquote "funny" daughter. Insert Juno comparisons here. Their world is flip-turned upside-down when Lawrence suffers a seizure and his lazy brother (Church) moves in to help as a driver.

Prof. Wetherhold begins dating a former student of his, the same doctor who helped him recover from the seizure (Parker). One would assume she's supposed to be seen as a likable and intriguing character, but she just comes off as cold. They have about as much chemistry one would imagine 50 Cent would have with Laura Bush, and despite this, the movie tries its hardest to make us believe that there is something magical happening between them. It fails.

A lot of potentially good scenes are ruined by replacing dialogue with canned adult contemporary guitar jams. Most of the other potentially good scenes are cut off too soon before anything spectacular can actually happen. In some movies, it works when characters develop off screen. In Smart People, it doesn't.

In fact, Smart People's biggest flaw is that it only scratches the surface of things that have the potential to be interesting. Most obvious is Wetherhold's son's relationship with one of the women who is on the committee for the selection of head of the English department, a position in which Wetherhold is vying for. We aren't given any insight into what implications this relationship could have, and ultimately, it ends up becoming utterly pointless to even show the two of them together. Page's friendship with Church, one of the more interesting parts of the first half of the film, is cut off all too suddenly.

At best, the film shows that director Noam Murro has potential to be a decent filmmaker, and for a first film, Smart People is a respectable attempt at being a comedy-drama a la Sideways 2: Electric Boogaloo. Speaking of which, the film is advertised as being "from the producers of Sideways" - making its influence and even more clear.

Smart People doesn't really ever take off. As a comedy, it's not funny, and as a drama, it's not engaging. But it does make a good attempt, which is likely to win it a few fans.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

Directed by Wes Anderson
Stars Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, and a crapload of other people.

Wes Anderson only hinted at his fascination with Jacques Yves-Costeau in his 1998 sophomore picture, Rushmore. The Life Aquatic is a complete send up of Costeau, filled with colorful stop-motion marine life and a soundtrack filled with actual David Bowie recordings and cover versions by Brazillian musician Seu Jorge, who also plays a member of Zissou's team.

It's also the worst film Anderson has made.

That's not to say that The Life Aquatic even approaches being a bad film - the technical aspects are even more refined than in his previous film, The Royal Tenenbaums. The cinematography is perfectly composed, and the cast all turns out great performances. Most notable is Owen Wilson as Ned, Zissou's long lost son from a previous relationship. Rather than playing the shady, insecure characters he is known for, the change of pace as an emotionally honest and forgiving character works wonders. There are also a few great scenes which used a cross-section of Zissou's boat as an anthill-like stage built for the theatre.

It's the script, co-written by Anderson and The Squid and the Whale director Noel Baumbach, that is the film's only real flaw. Unfortunately, it's a large flaw. The Life Aquatic has all the things that made his best film, the aforementioned Rushmore, excellent: lead characters in serious need of counseling, jokes that go for the cerebrum rather than the gut, and a sense of loss that makes aforementioned characters easy-to-relate for the audience.

The catch is that the characters are too messed up, and the sense of loss is so dark and so grand that the audience is likely to feel more depressed and disappointed than the characters. The cerebral jokes won't do much to heal this feeling.

Two disasters happen to the crew in the film. While one of the disasters that occurs in the film leads to an exciting and unpredictable subplot, the latter disaster feels tacked on and brings the weight of the film to an unlikable low.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is likely to disappoint both fans of Bill Murray and Wes Anderson, but it isn't without its merits. Casual film fans will probably detest it. Perhaps this is a film that gets better with repeat viewings.