vote for the best Oscar-winning Best Pictures of all time

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How can you caricature blandness-as-subterfuge?

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Friday, 5 May 2006 22:15 (seventeen years ago) link

I guess I just always rankle at these silly supervillain-esque treatments of serial killers.

Hmmm. There's an argument to be made that, whichever of the killers in SOTL you're talking about, you're misreading them, but I suppose it's neither here nor there if you simply don't like the movie. In any case it was certainly Demme's last good one.

Gene Hackman is one of my all-time favorite actors.

phil d. (Phil D.), Friday, 5 May 2006 23:11 (seventeen years ago) link

1. 1929/30 - All Quiet on the Western Front
2. 1977 - Annie Hall
3. 1962 - Lawrence of Arabia
4. 1978 - The Deer Hunter
5. 2004 - Million Dollar Baby
6. 1970 - Patton
7. 1943 - Casablanca
8. 1972 - The Godfather
9. 1957 - The Bridge on the River Kwai
10. 1997 - Titanic

don't read too much into this, i made it in 3 minutes

a.b. (alanbanana), Friday, 5 May 2006 23:16 (seventeen years ago) link

The dialgoue in All Quiet on the Western Front is creaky; had the film been silent it would be a classic (that way we could ignore Lew Ayres' wet solemnity).

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Friday, 5 May 2006 23:27 (seventeen years ago) link

there's a silent version of "all quiet" but i haven't seen it

a.b. (alanbanana), Friday, 5 May 2006 23:31 (seventeen years ago) link

alfred OTM on All quiet

erklie (erklie), Saturday, 6 May 2006 00:05 (seventeen years ago) link

mark sinkers essay on SOTL is where i come from here--and what moves me about it, is that it is trash, hard, unleavened trash, not redeemed at all by middle class pretensions of art. i have no idea why it won the academy award, but it was one of the best movies of the last 15 years, because of the charisma and intellegience of hopkins, because of how those qualities, and his charisma seduced foster (one of the things i think we miss about serial killers is to get that many people unders ones belt one has to be a bit charsamtic, because its the first time ive ever believed her as naive, because of the strangeness and the genuine fright i got from jamie gumb, and because of many of the virtousou(sp) elements of film making...

the apartment i like because of its britlleness, and how much it hates.

anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 6 May 2006 00:35 (seventeen years ago) link

you're otm (except for Foster - wrong on all counts), and that's exactly why i don't like it. the serial killer seeks celebrity, and the movie delivered a generic form of that celebrity indelibly into pop culture. it won the academy award because, for all its fetishistic blue-collar milieu, it's a big spectacle epitomized by the flayed-dudes-on-cages money shot. as morally indefensible as the terrorist attacks in Independence Day.

gabbneb (gabbneb), Saturday, 6 May 2006 00:53 (seventeen years ago) link

the aliens were freedom fighters

erklie (erklie), Saturday, 6 May 2006 00:55 (seventeen years ago) link

Around the time she retired Pauline Kael praised The Grifters and dismissed SOTL: "I like my pulp as pulp." I'm not sure what she meant, since SOTL may be slower and attempt ambiguity (the hostility of fellow G-men and local sheriffs directed at Clarice Starling) but it's got the reductive psychology of pure pulp (a helpful explanation by Dr. Lecter: Clarice wants to catch Buffalo Bill because, see, she couldn't save a lamb and she wants to avenge her father's death).

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Saturday, 6 May 2006 01:03 (seventeen years ago) link

thats where kael is wrong--i also like my pulp as pulp, and fucking hell it was pulp, in the most meatspace sense of the word (cf news footage of Dahmer or Gacy,etc--which concentrated on issues of flesh and the body)

anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 6 May 2006 01:46 (seventeen years ago) link

Every scene with Buffalo Bill is classic. Everything else, not so much... excepting "I can smell yr cunt."

My ten (first half for real, second half a little devil's advocate):

01. Sunrise
02. All About Eve
03. How Green Was My Valley
04. Annie Hall
05. The Best Years of Our Lives
06. Titanic
07. The French Connection
08. Ordinary People
09. Million Dollar Baby
10. Driving Miss Daisy

Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 6 May 2006 02:53 (seventeen years ago) link

defend DMD

anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 6 May 2006 03:03 (seventeen years ago) link

well uh pauline kael liked it! *ducks*

J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Saturday, 6 May 2006 03:04 (seventeen years ago) link

It's hilarious! Esther Rolle "I wouldn't be in your shoes if the good Lord came down here and ask me hisself." Dan Ackroyd just getting really fat. "Bee-uh... and an Are-uh!" I should start a JFK thread on it.

Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 6 May 2006 04:00 (seventeen years ago) link

yes, DMD is good if conventional; it doesn't stink just cuz Spike Lee (who certainly was robbed) wanted Hoke to burn the mansion down.

Foster is what give SOTL its reason for being; Hopkins isn't scary or believable, he's just a pro at not blinking.

Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 6 May 2006 17:21 (seventeen years ago) link

Oh, if only Hopkins had played Capote in Capote and Katherine Hepburn in The Aviator.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Saturday, 6 May 2006 17:34 (seventeen years ago) link

results are up
fuckers got rotk in there

a.b. (alanbanana), Sunday, 7 May 2006 04:12 (seventeen years ago) link

ROTK at #20 is a pretty weak showing for an ubergeek touchstone in a Net poll.

Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Monday, 8 May 2006 12:35 (seventeen years ago) link

one year passes...

's here.

but was there a newer one?

pisces, Thursday, 28 February 2008 01:52 (sixteen years ago) link

six years pass...

http://www.ofcs.org/the-best-of-the-best-picture-oscar-winners-part-6/

22. Gone With the Wind (1939)
23. 12 Years a Slave (2013)

Ouch.

Eric H., Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:36 (ten years ago) link

http://www.ofcs.org/the-best-of-the-best-picture-oscar-winners-part-6/

Eric pointed out this marvelous juxtaposition:

22. Gone With the Wind (1939)
23. 12 Years a Slave (2013)

Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:41 (ten years ago) link

Oops. Goddamn cell phones.

DMD at #80 is ridic though

Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:41 (ten years ago) link

Yeah, of all the vilified '80s winners, that ones by far the best movie, even if it got awarded during the very wrong year.

Eric H., Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:46 (ten years ago) link

there are a lot of "good" best-picture winners i have little-to-no personal affection for, but here are some i really like:

how green was my valley
the best years of our lives
it happened one night
casablanca
the godfather
going my way
no country for old men
gigi
the silence of the lambs
rocky

(I admit that I don't love "rebecca")

espring (amateurist), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:50 (ten years ago) link

we should do a thread where we all pick the best american movies of all the years since 1927/28. i.e. "what should have won the oscar?"

espring (amateurist), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:51 (ten years ago) link

or maybe we can even pick the FIVE NOMINEES and one winner, none of which have to actually have been nominated/won.

espring (amateurist), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:52 (ten years ago) link

sure as shit Holiday should've been at least nominated in '38.

Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 22:53 (ten years ago) link

we should do a thread where we all pick the best american movies of all the years since 1927/28. i.e. "what should have won the oscar?"

There's an Oscar for best American movie?

Alba, Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:00 (ten years ago) link

I got '95 on lockdown.

Eric H., Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:00 (ten years ago) link

most mediocre of my lifetime

Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:01 (ten years ago) link

Not too hard to improve the nominations tho.

Eric H., Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:04 (ten years ago) link

rebecca easily my fav hitch these days

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:11 (ten years ago) link

Probably time to revise my list from upthread. Now it'd be more like ...

01. Sunrise
02. All About Eve
03. Annie Hall
04. The Best Years of Our Lives
05. No Country for Old Men
06. How Green Was My Valley
07. The Godfather (I give)
08. maybe West Side Story
09. I dunno, maybe The Hurt Locker?
10. Ordinary People

Eric H., Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:12 (ten years ago) link

revised:

Sunrise
All About Eve
The Apartment
The Godfather, Part II
It Happened One Night
From Here to Eternity
How Green Was My Valley
No Country for Old Men
Rebecca
The Best Years of Our Lives
On the Waterfront
12 Years a Slave

Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:15 (ten years ago) link

Chronologically:

On the Waterfront
The Apartment
Midnight Cowboy
The Godfather
The Godfather II
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Annie Hall
The Deer Hunter
American Beauty
No Country for Old Men

"American blah blah blah?"--it's okay, I'm aware, I'm aware.

clemenza, Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:21 (ten years ago) link

Missed From Here to Eternity--probably that over Annie Hall, but it's close.

clemenza, Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:23 (ten years ago) link

1. Forrest Gump
2. Amadeus
3. Rain Man
4. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
5. Silence of the Lambs
6. Titanic
7. Platoon
8. The Godfather
9. Driving Miss Daisy
10. The Deer Hunter

Mr. Snrub, Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:24 (ten years ago) link

rebecca
sunrise
the apartment
one flew over the cuckoo's nest
the best years of our lives
casablanca
midnight cowboy
how green was my valley
all quiet on the western front
the lost weekend

(The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Tuesday, 4 March 2014 23:53 (ten years ago) link

the lost weekend is a really good movie, I forgot about that one

espring (amateurist), Wednesday, 5 March 2014 00:00 (ten years ago) link

four years pass...

don't know the guys who wrote abt Gigi and My Fair Lady, but they're kind of embarrassing

a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 16 February 2019 14:54 (five years ago) link

at first I thought, "but a lot of these 'What Should Have Won' choices are dubious too" before realizing they're only choosing from the other nominees

Josefa, Saturday, 16 February 2019 15:50 (five years ago) link


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