damn Dom I feel robbed.

oh man can't believe I forgot to mention one of my absolute fav animated films the fantastic mr fox.
thats a masterpiece.

My pick for Sci-Fi movie on Earth would have been Seconds with Rock Hudson. I would have finished last. Or Arrival.

wait, Seconds is a sci-fi film?

I think there were two in my category that I haven’t seen yet

I’m gonna try to watch them this week before my rankings because I appreciate being given new ones to try.

Of the ones I can remember taking, I’m pretty sure Blood Simple and Chinatown will be 1/2 but need to look at whole list and watch the new ones

I've always thought so.

1. Ikiru, Dom. This was a surprise. I have weird taste in films and am always trying to get people to watch the weirdest ones. Ikiru is so weird that I’ve never bothered mentioning it. Who would watch Ikiru? I guess Dom would.

Nothing happens. No sword fights. Hero dies in the middle of the movie (not a spoiler, just a beautiful script). It’s a cautionary tale of what not to do with your life. People credit the themes of this movie to Tolstoy, but actually it’s even better -- Jane Austen -- in that there’s a note of redemption at the end.

Also, Ikiru may be your only chance to see actress Miki Odagiri. She plays Toyo, the spark-plug office girl who tracks down the hero with her resignation letter and teaches him life. She was a former child actress training to be a backup dancer when Kurosawa grabbed her and cast her in this role. She’s great. A stunning performance.

2. Ran, Nicholasp27. I don’t know if Ran was Kurosawa’s last film, but it may have been his last great film. It may have been his all-time greatest film. I don’t see it being made as available as some of his early stuff is, and I don’t know why. Maybe because it’s in color? That doesn’t make any sense, but it’s a great watch.

It’s popular to guess where Kurosawa gets his ideas from, and you'll hear that Ran came from King Lear. I’m not sure that is true. I think it may have had storylines similar to King Lear’s, and it may have grown into King Lear and come together with King Lear, but it’s a masterpiece in its own right.


3. Yojimbo, mrbaseball, is the classic western that Zeno wanted for his draft. The basis for A Fistful of Dollars, it has Mifune playing the no-name character later to be played by Eastwood. It also has Tatsuya Nakadai playing the bad guy with the gun. Nakadai is a great actor. He plays the hero(?) in Sword of Doom, which may be the best portrayal of a psycho killer in the movies.


4. Rashomon, xander biscuits. How is this film not number one? Xander demonstrated why when he picked it -- it’s been copied so many times that it has become a cliche. Even Homer Simpson has covered it. Rashomon may be the greatest film of all time, but getting people to see its greatness is like trying to convince them that Mozart didn’t spend his life writing advertising jingles. So, there are multiple points of view? Duuuuh! What about it?

Another great thing about this flick is that Kurosawa was trying to make a silent movie -- with talking. Look at the gorgeous scene composition - the natural scenery could have been framed by Ansel Adams. Look at him cut to people’s faces to show them reacting. There's a ton of good technique from the silent era here. As a filmmaker, as a film Field Marshall, Kurosawa has no equal. Rashomon shows why.

5. Seven Samurai, Zeno. How is Seven Samurai not number one, you may ask. It’s not number one because I don’t want you to see it.

If you haven’t seen it yet, and see that it’s #1, you may be tempted to watch it. And if you watch it, you’ll watch it on television, and this flick makes no sense on television. The screen is too small. It’ll just be a bunch of tiny guys running in circles. It'll suck.

But if you have a chance to see the full 3-hour version in revival on a big screen, you’ll be enthralled. Maybe it’s the greatest Western of all time, the greatest samurai film of all time and the greatest movie of all time rolled into one.

6. No Regrets for Our Youth, Shuffle.

Shuffle, Shuffle, Shuffle -- what are we going to do with you? If you had told me a year ago that I’d have a Kurosawa film draft, and that No Regrets for our Youth would be picked, I would have fallen out of my chair. But that’s not what happened this time. Here I selected the category, noticed that Shuffle was playing, and said to myself, “Here comes No Regrets for our Youth.”

For me, this is a fascinating movie. In fact, it’s two movies. The first part is an anti-war melodrama, which is interesting because it was filmed during the Occupation after WWII and was subject to American censorship. This meant an anti-war film had to be anti-Japanese-war and not anti-American-war, which required some soul-wrenching mental gymnastics. Plus, this first part has scenes shot on location in beautiful Kyoto. Some of the Kyoto University buildings are still there.

The second half of the movie turns into an almost-Maoist-return-to-Mother-Earth epic, except here the peasants really suck. But we learn why *everyone* (and I do mean everyone) falls in love with Setsuko Hara, as she rolls in the mud and turns into a woman that can only be described as indomitable. This may be the first movie where all the men in the audience looked at her and realized that all was lost.

I don’t know where or how you can see this movie, but it shows up sometimes during Kurosawa festivals. It’s worth a watch for its history alone.

Special Award: High and Low, John Cole. My favorite Kurosawa flick. John is the only person I know who has seen it. Maybe he would have picked it.

I almost picked High and Low for Neo-Noir, but honestly, I think it is just plain Noir.

Phat,

Lovely write up, and I would have picked High and Low for an oddball choice. I have a fondness for films set in restricted spaces, and the first half of High and Low is simply brilliant. But Ran, Seven Samurai, Yojimbo, Kagemusha, Roshomon, and quite a few others are superb as well.

My Rankings

1st - Shuffle - 2001: A Space Odyssey

I love this movie. I love how such a slow and meandering movie doesn't have an ounce of fat. Not a single unneeded frame. Mesmerising from start to finish, especially in the last 45 minutes where it becomes a silent movie.

2nd - Zeno - Psycho

A classic. You all know what's great about this movie and now you know that I agree with you all.

3rd - Dominic - Rear Window

This is a great blend of light hearted people watching and edge of your seat tension. Love the cinematography choice, works really well.

4th - Riverboatking - Dr Strangelove

Great to see a comedy from Kubrick. Top notch screwball comedy with great performances but also it's cinematic, dark, poignant and has a great score.

5th - Nicholasp27 - North By Northwest

Great movie. It's got all the great parts of a Bond movie without having any of the bad parts of a Bond Movie. Love a movie with a snappy ending too.

6th - mrbaseball - Strangers on a Train

Great concept executed well. Not much more to it than that, but you don't need much more than that to make a great movie.

7th - Phat Mack - The Killing

It's a good movie and I like it but it just pales in comparison to all the other stuff picked. It feels to me like it started life as a B-Movie and then got singlehandedly turned around, like some guy who buys an old clunker and then turns it into a hot rod.

8th - Schlitz mmmm - The Shining

I'm not really a fan of this. I think I was oversold it. "Here's Johnny!" and all the classic scenes seem to be surrounded by some pretty dull and boring scenes. I get that these are intentional to show the slow decent into madness through isolation but it's just not my cup of tea.

Some other info from me:

Best movie that could have been picked: Paths of Glory

Worst movies that could have been picked: Champagne, Waltzes from Vienna, Mr and Mrs Smith

Also I buck the conventional trend with not really liking Eyes Wide Shut or Vertigo.

No! It starts as a B movie and ends as a B movie. It never loses sight of itself. All noirs, at least good noirs, are B movies. The Killing is the epitome of B-movie-ness!

I'm the same way -- I like animation. Whatever I didn't pick was going to constitute a crime. Ratatouille, Fritz the Cat, Fantasia. I think the greatest animated movie I have ever seen was Disney's Alice in Wonderland, but I couldn't see the point in picking it.

Spirited Away was a special problem. Picking it would have meant not picking Grave of the Fireflies, Castle in the Sky, Totoro, Kiki, Mononoke -- Jesus Veiled Christ, how could I not pick them? What kind of a monster leaves them out? I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

So I had to go with Paprika. It's unbridled lunacy gives everybody something to love and something to hate. It was my only out.

I think every beautiful actress starts out as eye candy. If they're lucky, someone gives them a role where they can show their chops. From my limited perspective, this is where Hara first got to show what she could do.

I always admire the few directors who seem to have knack for giving actresses breaks. I don't think it is so much a case of their being enlightened so much as being able to see what's in front of them in the way of talent, and especially, in the way of scripts.

In fact, I've been thinking about Wong Kar-wai/Maggie Cheung for the last day because of this thread.

very cool videos, Shuffle

my simple mind thought this one was interesting as well.

There's just too many Maggie Cheung movies. Plus, I remember them in the order that I saw them instead of the order she made them. But I think As Tears Go By was her breakout.

She made plenty of action films after that, some of them really great, and she made another Police Story, but she stopped being the annoying girl next door and started getting decent roles.

I will enlighten the movie masses with rankings on the western picks, but it will be delayed for a few days because I’m fully engaged in other actions/activities. Which includes clearing land and industrial strength house repair.

I also plan on ribaldry and criticisms of select movies. Nothing personal, just business.

my life as a zucchini is a really sweet touching french stop motion animated film and its available on Netflix.

highly recommend.

I've seen Blood on the Moon and it was decent. Definitely worth watching

Picked "Westerns" Ranked:

1. The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (Mr. Baseball) We all want to be Tuco, you won't admit that fact to anyone, especially the wife or girlfriend, but you can't hide it from me. I know. And now you do too. And the best Western advice ever is given by Tuco: If you are going to shoot – shoot.......don't talk. There is only one Western better than G B&Ugly, and it wasn't picked.




2a The Outlaw Josey Wales (Shuffle) Explores more themes than The Wild Bunch. Plus Indians.

2b The Wild Bunch (Phat Mack) A good way to die. Plus Mexicans.

3 No Country for Old Men (Nicholasp27) Best modern Western in film History. And in Texas. Plus Mexicans.

4. Unforgiven (Schlitz) No Mexicans, but a psycho sheriff almost makes up for the lack.

5. Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid (Dom). Bob Dylan ruined this film.

6. In the Valley of Elah (Riverboating) ; not really a western but I don't care – anything that rips off a location from the Bible makes it cheap and tawdry. Burn it.

Cellar: Yellow Sky (Xander Biscuits) First, no western need be loosely based on some slop from Shakespeare.

And second, “return to the bank they robbed and give back the stolen money. “, according to an outline of this sad film. Just NO. This is a violation of everything a Western should and needs to be. Yellow Sky is an Abomination of celluloid gibberish and I'm happy I've never seen this film and I never will.

*****
As I stated up thread: nothing personal; just business. And I have the guns and ammo to prove it.

I haven't had a chance to watch the 2 unknown-to-me movies yet, so here is a ranking of the others. I'll update with where the last 2 would go once I get a chance to watch them. They both sound good and I'm excited to have 2 new films on my watch list. All the movies selected that I've seen are good movies and it was tough ranking them. Pretty close from top to bottom.


1. Blood Simple

In my top 4 Coen films (#5 is a toss-up between a few) and really top 2. I love this movie. A guy wants someone to kill his wife but it's never that simple, especially with the Coen Bros.


2. Chinatown

A great classic Nicholson film. In my top 50 and one I need to watch again soon as it's been a few years.


3. Drive

Great opening sequence and then the rest of the film is a great noir with Gosling and Mulligan. I like a good heist movie, and a good failed heist movie is just as good.


4. Cape Fear

Another classic film, with young De Niro doing a great job as a stalker. Also inspired a good Simpsons Episode.


5. LA Confidential

Great atmosphere and a good plot. Another that I loved in the 90s but haven't watched in quite awhile and need to rewatch sometime. If I had guessed pre-draft on what 8 would be drafted, this likely woulda made the list.


6. Body Heat

I haven't seen this in so many decades it almost qualifies with the last 2 as an unseen movie.


7. Point Blank

Looks really good and I'm excited to see this soon and hopefully it will shoot up these rankings.


8. Pale Flower

Sounds good from the description but I can't even find where to stream this on any service so not sure how I'll get to watch it anytime soon.

This can be streamed on demand on TCM now through August 13th.

Who Doesn´t

Thanks to everyone who participated, this was really interesting ready. Special thanks to Xander, what a great idea!

Just for S&G, I'll fill in categories, even though most of mine were selected.

Ozu N/A. I'm not as sophisticated as you all.

Comedies < 10 yrs This is the End. Went in thinking "oh this will be dumb, hopefully a few laughs". Riotously funny.

Billy Wilder Some Like it Hot. Don't translate well all the time to the today's culture, but still good. Maybe Stalag 17, it's close.

Western Unforgiven. Just for the scene when they're collecting the money and find out Ned's dead, even though the rest is great.

Neo-Noir Naked Gun. Frank Drebin's voice-overs. If that' s not o.k., L.A. Confidential.

Sci Fi on Earth The Terminator. Another one went to the theater with low expectations, and "wow, that was good".

Animation The Incredibles. Don't really watch much of this category, but was very pleasantly surprised. Neck-and-neck with Up.

Kurosawa See Ozu

Hitchcock/Kubrick North by Northwest. Probably tied with Dr. Strangelove. Also, Rear Window was on the other night--always a "well, I guess I'll watch some" when I see it. Hard to go wrong in this category.

For my category, I would've put out there "Movies which could not be remade today".

I don't mean something with the same title and similar characters, but a different film. I mean, if the exact screenplay/plot/cast etc were pitched today, no company would be willing to touch it. Presumably due to changes in the culture, but maybe there are other reasons.