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Note that I don’t say “Best.” That way I don’t have to justify my choices, some of which are not mainstream indeed. I could justify them, but I don’t have to.
TWO THAT STAND OUT
The greatest moviegoing experiences of my life, movies that shook me immediately and grew even more on repeated viewings. In order of release.
2001, A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
The Tree of Life (Malick).
They soar above any listing I might make. Now that that’s off my chest let me try for a Top 10 Favorites:
TWO THAT STAND OUT
The greatest moviegoing experiences of my life, movies that shook me immediately and grew even more on repeated viewings. In order of release.
2001, A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
The Tree of Life (Malick).
They soar above any listing I might make. Now that that’s off my chest let me try for a Top 10 Favorites:
MY TOP 10
AI: Artificial Intelligence (Spielberg)
Barry Lyndon (Kubrick)
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Fincher)
The Dead (Huston)
Empire of the Sun (Spielberg
The General, The (Keaton)
Interstellar (Nolan)
The Long Day Closes (Davies)
Lord of the Rings Trilogy (Jackson)
The Thin Red Line (Malick)
RUNNERS-UP
The Abyss, The (Cameron)
The Age of Innocence (Scorsese)
Alien (Scott)
All about Eve (Mankiewicz)
Angels in America (Nichols)
Anna Karenina (Wright)
Apocalypse Now! (Coppola)
Avatar (Cameron)
Babylon (Chazelle)
Blade Runner (Scott)
Bringing Up Baby (Hawks)
Call Me By Your Name (Guadagnino)
Casablanca (Curtiz)
Chinatown (Polanski)
Citizen Kane (Welles)
A Clockwork Orange (Kubrick)
Cloud Atlas (Wachowski Siblings)
Crimson Peak (Del Toro)
Death in Venice (Visconti)
Deer Hunter (Cimino)
Django Unchained (Tarantino)
Father and Son (Sokurov)
The Fountain (Aronofsky)
Full Metal Jacket (Kubrick)
The Godfather Trilogy (Coppola)
The Grand Budapest Hotel (W. Anderson)
The Haunting (Wise)
Heaven’s Gate (Cimino)
A Hidden Life (Malick)
Hugo (Scorsese)
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (Spielberg)
Inglourious Basterds (Tarantino)
The Innocents (Clayton)
Inside Llewyn Davis (Coen Brothers)
Jaws (Spielberg)
La La Land (Chazelle)
Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
The Leopard (Visconti)
Let the Right One In (Alfreson)
Let There Be Blood (P.T. Anderson)
Life of Pi (Lee)
The Lone Ranger (Verbinski))
The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
The Manchurian Candidate (Frankenheimer)
Maurice (Ivory)
Midnight in Paris (Allen)
Mimic (Del Toro)
Mother and Son (Sokurov)
Moonlight (Jenkins)
Moulin Rouge (Luhrmann)
Nashville (Altman)
The New World (Malick)
The Night of the Huner (Laughton)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Coen Brothers)
Of Time and the City (Davies)
Once Upon a Time in America (Leone)
Paths of Glory (Kubrick)
Pennies from Heaven (Ross)
Predestination (Spierig Brothers)
Radio Days (Allen)
Seven (Fincher)
Seven Chances (Keaton)
The Shining (Kubrick)
The Social Contract (Fincher)
The Thing (Carpenter)
Titanic (Cameron)
West Side Story (Robbins & Wise)
West Side Story (Spielberg)
Wolfen (Wadleigh)
Some of those runners-up, if I were in a different mood, just might have switched places with some in the Top 10.
DIRECTORS
Certain directors have been essential in my life. Some are represented in the above lists. Others: well, how could you decide which movies to include? For some, I will watch anything they produce but reserve the right not to like (Allen, P.T. Anderson, Aronovky, among ohers).
Woody Allen
Paul Taylor Anderson
Wes Anderson
Darren Aronofsky
Ingman Bergman
Kathryn Bigelow
Bong Joon Ho
James Cameron
John Carpenter
Coen Brothers
Francis Coppola
Terence Davies
Brian De Palma
Guillermo Del Toro
Federico Fellini
David Fincher
Alfred Hitchcock
Peter Jackson
Buster Keaton
Krzysztof Kieślowsk
Stanley Kubrick
Akira Kurosawa
Davd Lean
Ang Lee
Sergio Leone
Terrence Malick
Christopher Nolan
Yasujirō Ozu
Martin Scorsese
Stephen Spielberg
Quentin Tarantino
Tom Tykwer
Luchino Visconti
Wachowski Siblings
Zhang Yimou
Chloé Zhao
I have gotten great pleasure out of certain franchises:
The Avengers
Harry Potter
The Hobbit
Indiana Jones
The Matrix
Pirates of the Caribbean
Star Wars.
And then there are movies that in spite of critical and/or popular success have left me cold. Examples include the Back from the Future Trilogy, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Vertigo. Some actors I tend to avoid: Roberto Benigni, Joan Crawford, Kim Novak, and John Wayne lead the pack. (Reminder to self: Do try to watch The Searchers again and try to figure out what all the fuss was about. And maybe Vertigo.)
And I must to confess loving a number of movies that all others seem to hate: 2012, Alien3, Cowboys & Aliens, John Carrter, The Lone Ranger. And I am proud that I admired some movies right off the bat, ignoring what seemed to be revealed consensus at the time of release, and have watched critical reevaluation catch up with me: Blade Rummer, Heaven’s Gate, and The Thing (Carpenter’s) serve as examples.
All such lists are works in progress. I hope in about 5 years to be able to revisit these lists and see whether and how they have changed.
AI: Artificial Intelligence (Spielberg)
Barry Lyndon (Kubrick)
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Fincher)
The Dead (Huston)
Empire of the Sun (Spielberg
The General, The (Keaton)
Interstellar (Nolan)
The Long Day Closes (Davies)
Lord of the Rings Trilogy (Jackson)
The Thin Red Line (Malick)
RUNNERS-UP
The Abyss, The (Cameron)
The Age of Innocence (Scorsese)
Alien (Scott)
All about Eve (Mankiewicz)
Angels in America (Nichols)
Anna Karenina (Wright)
Apocalypse Now! (Coppola)
Avatar (Cameron)
Babylon (Chazelle)
Blade Runner (Scott)
Bringing Up Baby (Hawks)
Call Me By Your Name (Guadagnino)
Casablanca (Curtiz)
Chinatown (Polanski)
Citizen Kane (Welles)
A Clockwork Orange (Kubrick)
Cloud Atlas (Wachowski Siblings)
Crimson Peak (Del Toro)
Death in Venice (Visconti)
Deer Hunter (Cimino)
Django Unchained (Tarantino)
Father and Son (Sokurov)
The Fountain (Aronofsky)
Full Metal Jacket (Kubrick)
The Godfather Trilogy (Coppola)
The Grand Budapest Hotel (W. Anderson)
The Haunting (Wise)
Heaven’s Gate (Cimino)
A Hidden Life (Malick)
Hugo (Scorsese)
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (Spielberg)
Inglourious Basterds (Tarantino)
The Innocents (Clayton)
Inside Llewyn Davis (Coen Brothers)
Jaws (Spielberg)
La La Land (Chazelle)
Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
The Leopard (Visconti)
Let the Right One In (Alfreson)
Let There Be Blood (P.T. Anderson)
Life of Pi (Lee)
The Lone Ranger (Verbinski))
The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
The Manchurian Candidate (Frankenheimer)
Maurice (Ivory)
Midnight in Paris (Allen)
Mimic (Del Toro)
Mother and Son (Sokurov)
Moonlight (Jenkins)
Moulin Rouge (Luhrmann)
Nashville (Altman)
The New World (Malick)
The Night of the Huner (Laughton)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Coen Brothers)
Of Time and the City (Davies)
Once Upon a Time in America (Leone)
Paths of Glory (Kubrick)
Pennies from Heaven (Ross)
Predestination (Spierig Brothers)
Radio Days (Allen)
Seven (Fincher)
Seven Chances (Keaton)
The Shining (Kubrick)
The Social Contract (Fincher)
The Thing (Carpenter)
Titanic (Cameron)
West Side Story (Robbins & Wise)
West Side Story (Spielberg)
Wolfen (Wadleigh)
Some of those runners-up, if I were in a different mood, just might have switched places with some in the Top 10.
DIRECTORS
Certain directors have been essential in my life. Some are represented in the above lists. Others: well, how could you decide which movies to include? For some, I will watch anything they produce but reserve the right not to like (Allen, P.T. Anderson, Aronovky, among ohers).
Woody Allen
Paul Taylor Anderson
Wes Anderson
Darren Aronofsky
Ingman Bergman
Kathryn Bigelow
Bong Joon Ho
James Cameron
John Carpenter
Coen Brothers
Francis Coppola
Terence Davies
Brian De Palma
Guillermo Del Toro
Federico Fellini
David Fincher
Alfred Hitchcock
Peter Jackson
Buster Keaton
Krzysztof Kieślowsk
Stanley Kubrick
Akira Kurosawa
Davd Lean
Ang Lee
Sergio Leone
Terrence Malick
Christopher Nolan
Yasujirō Ozu
Martin Scorsese
Stephen Spielberg
Quentin Tarantino
Tom Tykwer
Luchino Visconti
Wachowski Siblings
Zhang Yimou
Chloé Zhao
I have gotten great pleasure out of certain franchises:
The Avengers
Harry Potter
The Hobbit
Indiana Jones
The Matrix
Pirates of the Caribbean
Star Wars.
And then there are movies that in spite of critical and/or popular success have left me cold. Examples include the Back from the Future Trilogy, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Vertigo. Some actors I tend to avoid: Roberto Benigni, Joan Crawford, Kim Novak, and John Wayne lead the pack. (Reminder to self: Do try to watch The Searchers again and try to figure out what all the fuss was about. And maybe Vertigo.)
And I must to confess loving a number of movies that all others seem to hate: 2012, Alien3, Cowboys & Aliens, John Carrter, The Lone Ranger. And I am proud that I admired some movies right off the bat, ignoring what seemed to be revealed consensus at the time of release, and have watched critical reevaluation catch up with me: Blade Rummer, Heaven’s Gate, and The Thing (Carpenter’s) serve as examples.
All such lists are works in progress. I hope in about 5 years to be able to revisit these lists and see whether and how they have changed.
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