| |
|
201
|
|
202
|
|
203
|
|
Meet Me in St. Louis |
|
VINCENTE MINNELLI (170) |
 |
|
1944 | 113m | Col | USA |
Musical, Family Drama |
|
"As with many of the
finest Hollywood films, the richness of Meet Me in St. Louis
derives from the interaction of a number of sources and determinants,
some of them complex in themselves, producing a filmic text to which no
single, "coherent" reading can do justice." - Robin Wood, Film
Reference |
|
Selected by David Bordwell, Andy Medhurst,
Terence Davies,
Stephen Frears,
Lindsay Anderson. |
|
Amazon
The Observer
Pop Matters |
|
|
|
It
Happened One Night |
|
FRANK CAPRA
(197) |
 |
|
1934 | 105m | BW | USA |
Romantic Comedy, Screwball Comedy |
|
"It Happened One
Night was made in 1934, in the years before there was such a thing
as screwball romantic-comedy formula. It's among the first of its kind,
and it's one of the greatest. Audiences responded at the time (the
picture was a huge hit), and today It Happened One Night still
feels unbeatably fresh and shiveringly touching." -
Stephanie Zacharek , Salon, 2001 |
|
Selected by
Kevin Thomas, Andrew
Bergman, Simon Relph, Tim Pulleine. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Film Reference |
|
|
|
Tabu |
|
F.W. MURNAU (227) |
 |
|
1931 | 82m | BW | USA |
Romance, Docudrama |
|
"Filmed entirely in the
South Seas in 1929 with a nonprofessional cast and gorgeous
cinematography by Floyd Crosby, this began as a collaboration with
documentarist Robert
Flaherty, who still shares credit for the story, though
clearly the German romanticism of
Murnau predominates... The exquisite
tragic ending is one of the pinnacles of silent cinema."
- Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Fred Camper, Jean Douchet, Barthelemy Amengual,
Ingmar Bergman,
Eva Zaoralova. |
|
Amazon
Pop Matters
Time Out |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
204
|
|
205
|
|
206
|
|
|
|
|
|
Blow-Up |
|
MICHELANGELO ANTONIONI (229) |
 |
|
1966 | 111m | Col |
Italy-UK | Mystery, Psychological Thriller |
|
"This
is so ravishing to look at (the colors all seem newly minted) and
pleasurable to follow (the enigmas are usually more teasing than
worrying) that you're likely to excuse the metaphysical pretensions." - Jonathan
Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
William Friedkin,
Trevor Steele Taylor, Tom
Tykwer, Luciano Trigo, Raoul Coutard. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Slant Magazine |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
207
|
|
208
|
|
209
|
|
Death in Venice |
|
LUCHINO VISCONTI (226) |
 |
|
1971 | 130m | Col | Italy | Drama, Period Film |
|
"Dirk Bogarde gave
the greatest performance of his career, in fact one of the greatest of
any screen performances, in
Visconti's magnificent 1971 version of
the Thomas Mann novella, played out in a series of long, often wordless
takes which are miraculously suffused with spiritual meaning." -
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian, 2003 |
|
Selected by
Nikita Mikhalkov,
Henrik Uth Jensen, Alfredo Guevara, George Sluizer, Suzi Feay. |
|
Amazon
Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert)
BBC |
|
|
|
Diary of a Country Priest |
|
ROBERT BRESSON (200) |
 |
|
1950 | 120m | BW | France | Psychological Drama, Religious Drama |
|
"This
spare, intense 1950 film, adapted from Georges Bernanos' novel, is
Robert Bresson
at his greatest and most difficult, building a profound sense of a
higher order through its relentless detailing of the cold, small facts
of everyday life. A masterpiece, beyond question." -
Dave Kehr, Chicago
Reader |
|
Selected by John Anderson,
Hal Hartley,
Kim Ji-Seok, Miguel Picazo, Basil Wright. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Criterion Collection Essay |
|
|
|
Pandora's Box |
|
G.W. PABST
(198) |
 |
|
1928 | 110m | BW | Germany
| Drama, Melodrama |
|
"With his brilliant
staging and visual mastery of the rich, shadowy blacks and whites that
would later mark American film noir,
Pabst re-creates the rigid, mercenary
society around Lulu (Louise Brooks). Then he shows how her impish beauty
throws open its doors." - Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune, 2007 |
|
Selected by
Yvonne Rainer,
Gavin Lambert, Derek
Jarman, Suzanne Liandrat-Guigues, Brad Stevens. |
|
Amazon
Derek Malcolm's Century of Films
Criterion Collection Essay |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
210
|
|
211
|
|
212
|
|
Schindler's List |
|
STEVEN SPIELBERG (202) |
 |
|
1993 | 195m | Col-BW | USA | War Drama, Biography |
|
"Steven
Spielberg created a film that is an austere act of historical
witness, a powerful and suspenseful drama, a high moral act and,
finally, a movie that escapes the bounds of conventional criticism."
-
Richard Schickel, Time |
|
Selected by Michael Koresky,
John Dahl,
Matthias Greuling, Sonke Wortmann, Tino Pertierra. |
|
Amazon
The A.V. Club
metacritic |
|
|
|
The
Spirit of the Beehive |
|
VICTOR ERICE (273) |
 |
|
1973 | 95m | Col | Spain |
Drama, Childhood Drama |
|
"It is one of the
most beautiful and arresting films ever made in Spain, or anywhere in
the past 25 years or so... The film can be construed in many ways but
is, above all, an almost perfect summation of child hood imaginings." -
Derek Malcolm, The
Guardian, 1999 |
|
Selected by Derek Malcolm,
Alejandro Amenαbar,
Monte Hellman,
Jessica Winter, Mauricio Silva. |
|
Amazon
Strictly Film School
Criterion Collection Essay |
|
|
|
The
Story of the Late Chrysanthemums |
|
KENJI MIZOGUCHI
(184) |
 |
|
1939 | 143m | BW | Japan |
Period Film, Romantic Drama |
|
"Not the best known of
Kenji Mizoguchi's
period masterpieces, but conceivably the greatest... Never before nor
after (with the possible exception of The 47 Ronin) would
Mizoguchi's
refusal to use close-ups have more telling effect, and the theme of
female sacrifice that informs most of his major works is given a
singular resonance and complexity here."
- Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Jonathan Rosenbaum, Gilbert Adair, Ian Christie, Yomota Inuhiko, Tadao
Sato. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Derek Malcolm's Century of Films |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
213
|
|
214
|
|
215
|
|
Sans soleil |
|
CHRIS MARKER
(300) |
 |
|
1983 | 100m | Col | France
| Avant-garde/Experimental, Documentary |
|
"Chris
Marker's masterpiece is one of the key nonfiction films of
our time--a personal philosophical essay that concentrates mainly on
contemporary Tokyo but also includes footage shot in Iceland,
Guinea-Bissau, and San Francisco (where the filmmaker tracks down all
the locations from
Hitchcock's Vertigo)."
- Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Veronique Godard, David Rooney, Lodge Kerrigan, Stefan Grissemann, Ben
Gibson. |
|
Amazon
Henry Sheehan
Criterion Collection Essay |
|
|
|
|
|
Unforgiven |
|
CLINT EASTWOOD
(230) |
 |
|
1992 | 127m | Col | USA |
Western, Revisionist Western |
|
"Unforgiven
is a classic Western for the ages...
Clint Eastwood has crafted a tense,
hard-edged, superbly dramatic yarn that is also an exceedingly
intelligent meditation on the West, its myths and its heroes." -
Todd McCarthy, Variety, 1992 |
|
Selected by
John Dahl,
Shinozaki Makoto, Noel King, Shinji Aoyama, Richard Combs. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Rolling Stone |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
216
|
|
217
|
|
218
|
|
Written on the Wind |
|
DOUGLAS SIRK
(217) |
 |
|
1956 | 99m | Col | USA |
Melodrama, Family Drama |
|
"To
appreciate a film like Written on the Wind probably takes more
sophistication than to understand one of
Ingmar Bergman's
masterpieces, because
Bergman's themes are visible and underlined, while with
Sirk the
style conceals the message."
- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, 1998 |
|
Selected by
Ty Burr, Scott McGehee, George Kuchar, David Rooney, Jack Stevenson. |
|
Amazon
Film Reference
Criterion Collection Essay |
|
|
|
Last Tango in Paris |
|
BERNARDO BERTOLUCCI (207) |
 |
|
1973 | 129m | Col |
France-Italy | Psychological Drama, Erotic Drama |
|
"What a bizarre film it
is, capable of delivering some shocks, certainly, but possessing not
power exactly, but a fascinating, unevolved clumsiness. Brando confronts
the audience like a bull behind the china shop counter, and his
extraordinary, old-fashioned charisma is what keeps you watching."
- Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian, 2007 |
|
Selected by
Charles Taylor, John
McNaughton,
Hector Babenco,
William Friedkin,
Edgar Reitz. |
|
Amazon
Derek Malcolm's Century of Films
Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert) |
|
|
|
Close Encounters of the Third Kind |
|
STEVEN SPIELBERG
(225) |
 |
|
1977 | 135m | Col | USA |
Science Fiction, Adventure Drama |
|
"Mr.
Spielberg is at his best as a movie craftsman, someone who
seems to know by instinct (and after millions of hours of
movie-watching) how best to put together any two pieces of film for
maximum effect... Close Encounters is most stunning when it is
dealing in visual and aural sensations that might be described as being
in the seventies Disco Style."
- Vincent
Canby, The New York Times |
|
Selected by
Andrew Stanton, Danny
Cannon, Patrice
Leconte, Mark Shivas, Elaine Paterson. |
|
Amazon
Reel Views
Film Reference |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
219
|
|
220
|
|
221
|
|
Mr.
Hulot's Holiday |
|
JACQUES TATI (209) |
 |
|
1953 | 86m | BW | France |
Comedy, Slapstick |
|
"It is not a comedy of hilarity but a
comedy of memory, nostalgia, fondness and good cheer. There are some
real laughs in it, but Mr. Hulot's Holiday gives us something
rarer, an amused affection for human nature--so odd, so valuable, so
particular."
- Roger Ebert, Chicago
Sun-Times, 1996 |
|
Selected by
Richard Lester,
David Parkinson, Sally
Potter, Paul Cox,
Ingmar Bergman. |
|
Amazon
The A.V. Club
Images Journal |
|
|
|
Alexander Nevsky |
|
SERGEI EISENSTEIN (190) |
 |
|
1938 | 107m | BW | USSR |
Historical Film, Biography |
|
"Sergei
Eisenstein turns the story of the great Russian prince into
an abstract exercise in visual and aural counterpoint--it's more theory
than movie. But Edouard Tisse's superb photography and Prokofiev's
stirring score contribute to a rhythm that is well-nigh irresistible,
culminating in the famous battle on the ice." - Dave Kehr,
Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Charles Burnett,
Guy Hamilton,
Peter Cowie, George Sluizer, Mary Harron. |
|
Amazon
Film Reference
Movie Reviews UK |
|
|
|
Freaks |
|
TOD BROWNING (284) |
 |
|
1932 | 64m | BW | USA |
Drama, Psychological Thriller |
|
"Browning's
film succeeds in being, as one critic has put it, 'moving, harsh, poetic
and genuinely tender'. It was undoubtedly before its time and no one has
equalled it...
Today, it looks like a damning antidote to the cult of physical
perfection and an extraordinary tribute to the community of so-called
freaks who made up its cast."
- Derek Malcolm,
The Guardian, 1999 |
|
Selected by
Carlos Garcia Brusco, Dan Georgakas, Ed Gonzalez, Oscar Colulich, Jose
Luis Cienfuegos. |
|
Amazon
Bright Lights Film Journal
Slant Magazine |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
222
|
|
223
|
|
224
|
|
L'Argent |
|
ROBERT BRESSON
(212) |
 |
|
1983 | 90m | Col |
France-Switzerland | Drama, Crime Drama |
|
"Robert
Bresson's final film is a harrowing scour of ideological
cinema, based on a sermonic Tolstoy story about greed but turned by
Bresson
into a pantomime stations of the cross, so completely focused on
sensuous minutiae, moral interrogation, and the fastidious lasering away
of movie bullshit (like acting and action) that it comes as close as any
movie has to 15th-century Christian icons."
- Michael Atkinson, Village Voice, 2005 |
|
Selected by
Olivier Assayas,
Shinji Aoyama, Neil Hunter, Shinozaki Makoto, Clara Law. |
|
Amazon
Strictly Film School
Senses of Cinema |
|
|
|
Germany, Year Zero |
|
ROBERTO ROSSELLINI (224) |
 |
|
1947 | 74m | BW |
Italy-West Germany | War Drama, Childhood Drama |
|
"To the critics of the
time, it seemed that
Rossellini had betrayed the tenets of
neo-realism by introducing melodrama, an elliptical narrative, and
intimations of a Christian consciousness. It now appears as
Rossellini's first mature work,
pointing to his masterpieces of the 50s."
- Dave
Kehr, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Michael Haneke,
Bernardo
Bertolucci,
Claire Denis, Wally Hammond, Miguel Marias. |
|
Amazon
Senses of Cinema
Strictly Film School |
|
|
|
Rosemary's Baby |
|
ROMAN POLANSKI (276) |
 |
|
1968 | 136m | Col | USA |
Occult Horror, Psychological Thriller |
|
"Scary just isn't
the right word for
Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby. It's an unnerving,
artful, vaguely unpleasant picture that settles deep into your bones,
leaving you feeling just a little unclean, as if you've been made
uncomfortably privy to one woman's very intimate suffering."
- Stephanie Zacharek, Salon, 2001 |
|
Selected by
Stuart Gordon,
David Fincher,
Mark Borchardt, Wesley Strick,
Atom Egoyan. |
|
Amazon
Film Reference
The Village Voice |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
225
|
|
226
|
|
227
|
|
The
Deer Hunter |
|
MICHAEL CIMINO (257) |
 |
|
1978 | 183m | Col | USA |
Ensemble Film, War Drama |
|
"What distinguishes
The Deer Hunter most is its many rich characters and the size of
its vision. This is a big film, dealing with big issues, made on a grand
scale. Much of it, including some casting decisions, suggest inspiration
by The Godfather."
- Gene Siskel, Chicago Tribune, 1979 |
|
Selected by Milos Forman,
F.X. Feeney, Serge Toubiana,
Tom Tykwer, David Dalton. |
|
Amazon
Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert)
Time Out |
|
|
|
Crimes and Misdemeanors |
|
WOODY ALLEN (203) |
 |
|
1989 | 104m | Col | USA |
Comedy Drama, Psychological Drama |
|
"The principal characters
in Crimes and Misdemeanors,
Mr. Allen's most securely serious and
funny film to date, have a way of jumping headlong from the specific to
the general, trying to place themselves in some larger system of things.
So, too, does Mr. Allen,
and never before has he made the leap with more self-assurance than in
this adventurous dramatic comedy." -
Vincent Canby, The New
York Times, 1989 |
|
Selected by
Michael Moore,
Peter Bradshaw, David Siegel,
John Dahl, Yiwen Chen. |
|
Amazon
Roger Ebert's Great Movies
Reverse Shot |
|
|
|
The
Birds |
|
ALFRED HITCHCOCK (287) |
 |
|
1963 | 120m | Col | USA |
Horror, Natural Horror |
|
"Alfred
Hitchcock's most abstract film, and perhaps his subtlest,
still yielding new meanings and inflections after a dozen or more
viewings. As emblems of sexual tension, divine retribution, meaningless
chaos, metaphysical inversion, and aching human guilt, his attacking
birds acquire a metaphorical complexity and slipperiness worthy of
Melville."
- Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Tom Hunsinger, Cedric Kahn, Tomislav Gavric, Christa Blumlinger, Liliana
Cavani. |
|
Amazon
Film Reference
Ozu's World Movie Reviews |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
228
|
|
229
|
|
230
|
|
A
Star is Born |
|
GEORGE CUKOR (195) |
 |
|
1954 | 154m | Col | USA |
Musical Drama, Marriage Drama |
|
"Brutally cut after
its first release and further disfigured by the insertion of the long,
tasteless production number Born in a Trunk,
George Cukor's
1954 film somehow survives--and even touches greatness at times... This
was Cukor's
first complete film in color and his first in 'Scope: both elements are
used with a bold assurance and perfect expressiveness."
- Dave
Kehr, Chicago Reader |
|
Selected by
Kevin Thomas, Gavin Lambert, Phillip Lopate, Linda Williams, Paul Julian
Smith. |
|
Amazon
Images Journal
Film Reference |
|
|
|
The
Graduate |
|
MIKE NICHOLS (215) |
 |
|
1967 | 105m | Col | USA |
Coming-of-Age, Sex Comedy |
|
"Dustin Hoffman gives the
inspired performance that launched his movie career, and director
Mike Nichols
shows a gift for social satire that has never glistened quite so
brightly since. Anne Bancroft and Katherine Ross head the marvelous
supporting cast. Simon & Garfunkel spice up the soundtrack with The
Sound of Silence and other hits."
- David Sterritt, Christian Science Monitor, 1997 |
|
Selected by
Scott Rosenberg, Vadim Jean, Gary Sinyor, Iain Johnstone, Milan Pavlovic. |
|
Amazon
Film Reference
Chicago Reader |
|
|
|
Bride of Frankenstein |
|
JAMES WHALE (196) |
 |
|
1935 | 75m | BW | US |
Monster Film, Sci-Fi Horror |
|
"Some movies age;
others ripen. Seen today,
Whale's masterpiece is more surprising
than when it was made because today's audiences are more alert to its
buried hints of homosexuality, necrophilia and sacrilege. But you don't
have to deconstruct it to enjoy it; it's satirical, exciting, funny, and
an influential masterpiece of art direction." - Roger Ebert,
Chicago Sun-Times, 1999 |
|
Selected by
Stuart Gordon,
David Rooney, David Edelstein, Ed Lewis, John Russell Taylor. |
|
Amazon
Bright Lights Film Journal
Film Reference |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
231
|
|
232
|
|
233
|
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