Thanks for that insightful write-up. I just saw the film for the first time in December and thought it was ****-worthy as well. And I agree that it tops Ugetsu

Killshot (2008)
Contract killer “Blackbird” (Madame Tussaud’s Mickey Rourke) doesn’t leave loose ends and, after implausibly having teamed up with a hotheaded wannabe gangster (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, annoying) for an ill-advised blackmail attempt, tries to kill an estranged couple (Carmen Colson, Thomas Jane) who have foiled/ witnessed the attempted blackmail.
This adaptation of an Elmore Leonard novel, directed by “Shakespeare in Love” director John Madden, is a sub-Tarantinian home invasion movie with very little to offer despite of the talent involved. The characters are unlikeable throughout and behave according to the necessities of the plot and irrespective of what would be logical for their characters to do. It is also a rather boring movie for a violent thriller. Bad - 3/10

Eyes without a Face (1960)
Brilliant surgeon Dr. Génessier (Pierre Brasseur) and his assistant (Alida Valli) kidnap young women in order to transplant their faces onto Dr. Génessiers daughter Christiane (Edith Scob), whose face has been disfigured in a car accident and who lives in a trance-like state in Dr. Génessier’s mansion outside Paris, wearing a featureless mask at all times.
This is the most famous fiction movie by French director Georges Franju, a co-founder of the cinémathèque francaise and noted maker of industrial documentaries. ‘Eyes without a Face’ often crops up in list of scariest movies or most important horror movies ever made. Indeed, it is a bizarre, taboo-breaking and strangely beautiful film, which provides the blueprint for Pedro Almodóvar’s recent ‘The Skin I Live in’ (and Mike Myers’s ‘Halloween’ mask). Its distinguishing features are the poetic imagery and the “mad doctor” villain, who isn’t presented as a monster but as a kind-hearted person caught in tragic circumstances. Perhaps, a lack of intensity could be held against this movie, but original horror movies are hard to find and the beauty of some scenes alone makes it worth watching. Very good - 8/10

Superbad (2007)
Three high school buddies and social outcasts (Michael Cera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse) try to buy alcohol for a party in order to impress the girls (Emma Stone and others) and get laid before they go to college while having strange adventures with a couple of unconventional cops (Bill Hader, Seth Rogen).
‘Superbad’ is a formulaic high school comedy bromance from the stable of Judd Apatow and nothing special, really. The direction by Greg Mottola isn’t exactly bad but unremarkable and the script mistakes foul language for something funny in and by itself, which becomes tiresome. However, some of the dialogue is absolutely hilarious and there are some absurdly comical surprises along the way. Overall, ‘Superbad’ is sufficiently funny to warrant a recommendation, but only as a better-than-average timewaster – 6/10

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)
In this sequel to Guy Ritchie’s 2009 re-interpretation of Sherlock Holmes, the great detective (Robert Downey Jr.) and newly-wed Dr. Watson (Jude Law) must foil arch-enemy Prof. Moriarty’s (Jared Harris) attempt to provoke a war between imperial Germany and France.
The first Sherlock Holmes was a better than average movie, although I don’t think that re-imagining this most cerebral character – who solves many cases from the safety of his home at 221 Baker Street in the original Conan Doyle stories – as an action hero is a good idea. After all, why would you take away Sherlock Holmes’s most distinguishing characteristics if you decide to make a Sherlock Holmes movie at all. While the first Guy Ritchie-directed Sherlock Holmes movie managed to get away with it on the strength of the witty banter between Holmes and Watson (and Robert Downey Jr.’s performance), this sequel puts a lot more emphasis on explosions, a silly plot (which is handled badly, bordering on incomprehensibility) and slow-motion action sequences, which would be over the top in a Zack Snyder movie. Some of the humour still works – Holmes’s “urban camouflage, for instance – which saves ‘A Game of Shadows’ from being outright bad, but this is a disappointment. Watch the recent modern-day interpretation in the BBC series ‘Sherlock’ (starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman) instead. Below Average - 4/10

Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)
Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and his IMF spy organisation are framed for a bombing of the Kremlin, so Hunt and his team (Paula Patton, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg et al) must go rogue in order to find the culprit – Swedish nuclear scientist Dr. Hendricks (Michael Nyqvist) - and prevent him from launching Russian nuclear weapons against America.
I love a good action movie, of which there are way too few, and “’MI4’ is the best one in a long time. Of course, there are issues with implausible plot points, but ‘MI4’ moves along at such a pace that you are wowed by the next elaborate action sequence or amused by funny gags before plot holes become too bothersome. Director Brad Bird (of ‘The Incredibles’ and ‘The Iron Giant’ fame) proves that he can handle live action with the best of them – it’s fast-paced and kinetic, but still comprehensible unlike in the Bourne sequels, for instance. The gadgets are very cool and there is a breathtaking stand-out action sequence in which Tom Cruise climbs the Burj Khalifa in Dubai (which, arguably, comes a bit too early because everything after it can only be a bit of a letdown). Speaking of Tom Cruise – he may be a nutter and not a great actor, but he is a very good lead in action movies. This is the best installment in the series after the rather disappointing ‘MI2’ and ‘3’. Very good 8/10

Melancholia (2011)
In a prologue, we witness the end of life on Earth as it collides with a gigantic planet called “Melancholia”. In the following first part, Justine (Kirsten Dunst) tries to see through her wedding party, which must be the most dysfunctional wedding ever committed to the screen, despite of her suffering from depression. Of course, it doesn’t end well. In part 2, her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), who holds the family together (just) is increasingly worried about the crossing of Earth’s and Melancholia’s orbits, while Justine slowly seems to assert herself in the face of the impending end of the world.
In his most recent movie – with a stellar cast including Alexander Skarsgard, Kiefer Sutherland, Charlotte Rampling, John Hurt, Stellan Skarsgard and Udo Kier – Danish enfant terrible auteur Lars von Trier grapples with the issue of depression in a metaphorical way. The first part of the movie is particularly successful in doing this as Justine slowly loses it in the course of her wedding party. Kirsten Dunst – winning the best actress award at Cannes 2011 – is hugely impressive, particularly as I hadn’t really considered her to be much of an actress before. The second half of the movie isn’t quite as good, but there are still incredibly beautiful images and chilling scenes, which make ‘Melancholia’ compelling. Of the three Lars von Trier movies, which I have seen (hated ‘Breaking the Waves’, liked ‘Antichrist’ as a horror movie), this is easily the best and a must-see for any cineaste.
Mention should be made of the weird critical reception of ‘Melancholia’. James Berardinelli didn’t like the movie, because the science of planet ‘Melancholia’ hitting Earth isn’t sound. That much is true, but at the same time, JB inexplicably fails to get that the whole end of the world scenario is metaphorical. (There is even the possibility that Justine brings on the end of days as a result of her depression.) The hint is in the planet’s name. Scientific accuracy isn’t an issue here at all.
Equally, Roger Ebert misses the boat when he wonders why the guests at the wedding party are unconcerned about their impending doom and are inexplicably concerned with trivial issues such as advertismenet taglines. At this point, planet Melancholia is merely a distant star in the sky and its impeding collision with Earth isn’t common knowledge yet, at least to the wedding guests.
Overall, ‘Melancholia’ isn’t quite a masterpiece but is a very powerful film and one of the best 2011 movies, which I’ve seen so far. Very good 8/10

I feel the same way about Sherlock Holmes. I like the point you make about them taking away what Sherlock Holmes was best at (and best known for) in order to make an action movie. Which is a shame, since the parts involving thinking and calculation remain the best parts of the film.

Meanwhile I would have liked Mission Impossible 4 better if it had a villain who wasn't a complete non-entity and if there was any sense of urgency to the action/violence. After seeing Tom Cruise get hit on the head 100 times, it starts to lose all meaning.

Last movie I watched in a movie theatre: Men in Black 3
It wasn't as good as the first installment, but it was certainly better than the first sequel. There are a couple of plot holes, a couple of jokes fall flat - especially at the beginning - and Emma Thompson is criminally underused, but in general it was a funny, fun blockbuster with decent CGI, an entertaining story and cool alien designs. Will Smith is as charismatic as ever and the character of Griff is a great addition, but the real scene-stealer is Josh Brolin as a young K: it seems as if Tommy Lee Jones was cloned and then de-aged.

Last movie I watched on Blu-ray: Shame
Difficult, intense, dark and any other cliche you may want to come up with. It effectively shows the life of a sex addict by showing sex as a very shallow, unsexy thing. Michael Fassbender's performance is amazing - and what many critics could call "brave", which means he appears naked a lot. It's not a film I'll be watching all the time - it's not fun in the traditional sense of the word - but it definitely is worth watching at least once.

I saw this one recently too and enjoyed it to a similar tune. I think it's something more people should see, and that most would enjoy. It has a really good sountrack that adds a lot to the mood of the film, and it's as much a contemplative movie as it is an entry into the horror genre. It's just a really good, creepy, and poetic film.



I think I liked this a little more than you, but I completely agree with the point here. I think Bird's direction is excellent, and Cruise is still a formidable action star, but the script is just window dressing for the next action set piece. There's nothing at stake and the movie suffers for it. It's still a fine example of action done well, however.

I rewatched Alien last night in preparation for Ridley Scott's latest (you might have heard about it). It's one of the very few movies that can still creep me out even though I know exactly what's going to happen at every turn. It's such a well shot movie. The only way to describe it is suffocating and claustrophobic. It's a perfectly crafted film that I can watch at any time. It's one I look forward to showing my kids (whenever I have them) and scaring the shit out of them.

Green For Danger

This starts off pretty promising; a patient dies on the operating table, and soon after a nurse is found dead, supposedly as part of a cover-up. Green For Danger succeeds in establishing a nice, mysterious tone, and then completely shifts tone into something lighter about midway through with the introduction of a horse's-ass of a police investigator.

I hate it when movies do this. This could have been a lot more than what it was.

Aaaaagreeeeed. I found out about this film when it somehow snuck into the NY Times "Top 1000 of all time" list and it's really mediocre

To be honest, I think it would be really hard to come up with a list of a 1000 films and not have a few titles on there that many people would consider mediocre.
-Jeremy

Yep, 1000 is really too much. Let's do the math: cinema is, what, roughly 110 years old. Never mind how much it had changed over a century. Anyway: you need an average of roughly 8 movies per year. Count out the first decade or so of the 20th century and you need to come up with more movies from later years. No way there are 8 really great movies or more each year - counting-in non Hollywood productions. 500 still would be too high a number. 250 - I could accept that.

There are books like "1000 movies you need to se before you die" - that might have inspired the decision.

Oh well, here I go on rambling again....

It's true that the villain is a non-entity, but that didn't bother me in the case of 'MI4', because the overall threat is sufficiently established. There are none of the James Bond-movie like scenes, in which the villain kills incompetent henchmen or discusses his plans (actually, I don't remember any scene which wouldn't focus on the spy team), so I didn't feel that it was necessary to make the villain more interesting.

I'd go even further and say that none of the characters in the movie are given much (if any) depth. 'MI4' is extremely economical with characterisations, which, in my opinion, is preferable to the perfunctory "character defining moments" in action films, which are usually handled very poorly.

That being said, I completely understand if somebody thinks the relentless non-stop action in 'MI4' makes it a bit boring.

I've only seen, say, 2500 movies, so making a Top 1000 would involve 40% of all movies I've seen. So in that regard, 1000 seems like too much. However, 8 great movies a year (as an average) doesn't seem that difficult if you take every world cinema into account

I agree you could probably get to 8 great movies on a "yearly average", but you'd probably more yearly entries towards the latter 1/2 of the 20th Century and beyond and more spartan numbers of entries in the earlier years of cinema.

I think the real issue though is that nobody has enough time in the world to view enough films to be able to come with "1000" great ones on their own. Plus be able to devote some critical thought as to why said films are "great", since more than just one viewing of a film would be necessary before one could place it on the list.

Sure, if god granted me another century or so on this little bit of space dust, I bet I could come up with a 1000 titles that I personally think are deserving of the moniker that are "great" (and just to be clear, I would be willing to limit myself to films that have only been released as of this writing) but honestly I'm not going to have that kind of time.

Granted there are probably a handful of critics out there who have managed to find the time to do so but I don't see a top 1000 list that was done by committee (and I'm assuming the NY Times list was done by committee) being capable of not including large numbers of "mediocre" titles.
-Jeremy

Eyes Wide Shut

To be fair, this is an extremely well directed and acted film. The problem for me had more to do with content and to a certain extent, believability. My main objection was that it seemed custom designed to deliver the message "SEX WITH STRANGERS OR OUTSIDE THE CONFINES OF MARRIAGE IS DANGEROUS AND SCARY AND WILL GET OTHERS OR YOURSELF KILLED OGGA BOGGA WOGGA!"

Other troublesome messages:
1) Never be completely honest about your feelings with your spouse. Doing so will cause them to go *crazy* even if they are exactly the sort of feelings that billions of people have felt before. This is where I had credibility issues with the film, certainly a modern, well educated doctor would be perfectly aware that many woman enjoy having sex and are capable of lusting after multiple men, other than their husband. Why this revelation would cause so much grief in this instance is beyond me.
2) Sex with strangers cannot possibly involve real intimacy.
3) Strange sex cults are dangerous and will kill people to protect their secrets. Unless you interpret all of that crap as being the result of a fevered imagination, this kind of thing seems really difficult to pull off in real life. Once you start killing people and leaving a trail of bodies around, you tend to start attracting all sorts of unwanted attention from the police and such, increasing your chances of exposure. Rich people tend to just pay a lot of money for discrete prostitutes.

And sorry, but if you're that worried about AIDS just be sure to use a condom or engage in less risky activities.

So, if anyone could explain to me how Eyes Wide Shut is anything more than a well directed and acted version of this:

http://youtu.be/tWsHdGjLZ6o

(with a heavy dollop of pretentious symbolism thrown in on the side) I'd be more than happy to re-evaluate my opinion. By which I mean, how is the scary and deadly sex cult any more believable or convincing than a porno demon?

One last note, but this reminded me a heck of a lot of the only L. Ron Hubbard novel where a guy was driven insane after catching his wife cheating on him. Given that Tom Cruise is a Scientologist, this is probably not a huge coincidence.
-Jeremy

Eyes Wide Shut isn't really about sex, and I'm willing to bet that Tom Cruise's input into the movie was somewhere between negligible and nonexistent.

I tried arguing this in the reviews section but hit a brick wall. I agree that it is a powerful film and one that seems to take a well-timed swipe at the decedent, self-loathing middle-classes.

The Tattooist: This would be a reasonably entertaining movie except for one thing: Jason Behr is HORRIBLE! I have never seen a performance this bad ever!

I'd go on, but I'm too tired.

On a literal level it is about sex. Subtextually, Kuberick could have been trying to say any number of things, and knowing him, he probably was but there is no denying that literally, the film is focused on the potential sexual indiscretions of the main couple and how they end up being punished for those indescretions.

Again, I am willing to bet that Kuberick *meant* to say something else, but I'm not willing to give into that kind of analysis until I understand what the film is saying on a literal level. And on a literal level, this film offends me.

2001: A Space Odyssey, is literally about mans explorations of the cosmos.
Full Metal Jacket is literally about the depravity and dehuminazation of warfare.
A Clockwork Orange is literally about the problematic ways a fictional society tries to control it's criminal population.

And so on, whether or not Kuberick intended other messages to be in there (and I've put forth my own interpretations of some of these films before) is a matter of debate.

I enjoyed each of these films because of whatever subtextual meanings Kuberick meant for them, they could be understood on a literal level.

As for Eyes Wide Shut I have made an attempt to read other interpretations of what Kuberick *might* have been trying to say. The best that I came across was this, which I highly recommend checking out regardless of one's opinion of the film:
http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/0096.html

But again, I won't argue that Kuberick might have been trying to say something other than "human sexuality is a dirty and disgusting thing", such as "western civilization is decadent and collapsing and the evil rich exploit the poor in millions of horrid ways".

The problem is that, on a literal level, "sex is a dirty and disgusting thing" is exactly what he says.

2001 is literally about a mission to Jupiter. Full Metal Jacket is literally about being trained and then fighting in Vietnam. A Clockwork Orange is literally about committing crimes and getting rehabilitated.

(I don't mean to be terse. I'll address this issue at greater length when I'm more at liberty.)

The Last American Virgin

I always liked this movie. Generally, it's about three high school kids who are trying to pick up girls and find some pleasure in a bored world. Our lead character's a bit of a sad sack who seeks a little bit more. The film meanders here and there, but totally nails the ending. Despite its shoehorning into the comedy genre, this takes its subject seriously (though there are funny moments). And the soundtrack is killer. Good but not great; would be done better in 2009 as Adventureland.