The Longest Post On Filmwurld

[oscar jubis]

Today, I updated my list of "Favorites of All Time" (or "Great Films I Love") that can be found at the beginning of this thread. The basic criteria is that these movies give me tremendous pleasure and edification over repeated viewings. This thread includes a discussion of the importance or lack of importance of lists or canons. My own experience makes these lists essential. As a teen and young adult, I used Andrew Sarris' yearly lists from 1929 to 1968 and the Sight and Sound's Critics and Directors polls as a guide as to what a film lover cannot miss (not what one must like or love, mind you, don't let anyone tell you that!). The lists were extremely helpful to me. I share my list in that same spirit of discovery that has guided my film viewing since the 1960s.

Repertory additions include:

Alfred Hitchcock's Murder! (1930), in my opinion his first masterpiece, in which he goes beyond Griffith in demonstrating via his camera how cinema transcends theater.

Abel Gance's La Roue (The Wheel) (1923) which was finally restored and released on dvd recently. I was so stunned by this 4 and 1/2 hour film that I rewatched it almost immediately and wrote a 13-page essay about it. Gance is justly famous for Napoleon, as seen by Abel Gance but it's La Roue that made my list.

La Maternelle

After rewatching some early Godard films as part of my French Cinema course at UM, I've come to the conclusion that I love his My Life to Live more than his debut (Breathless), which is the more accessible and more influential film. Breathless is too "drunk" on and indebted to the Hollywood films that nourished the young New Wave directors after WWII. My Life to Live seems to me after the latest screening as the more mature, more revealing work. It has more to say to me right now than the more famous Breathless (which I have removed from my list after much consideration). It also has Anna Karina in the role of her life.

I've also added three films shown in the USA in 2007 (listed as 2006 since my list is based on year of world premiere):

Fiction (Cesc Gay)

Away From Her (Sarah Polley)

Offside (Jafar Panahi)

I've watched these three times and they continue to impress as much or more than upon first viewing. There are a number of films I've posted about in my repertory threads pending additional viewings to decide if they are great enough to make it into the list.