Is “Vertigo” the Greatest Movie of All Time?

Posted on August 4, 2012 at 3:48 pm

Every ten years, the prestigious film journal Sight & Sound polls critics and film-makers on the greatest films of all time. Citizen Kane has led the list for decades, but this year it was toppled by Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo. While I would vote for “Citizen Kane” if they offered me a ballot, I think it is a good idea to take a fresh look. The point of polls and lists is to start a discussion, not to end one. And the changing perceptions of the films on the list say more about our times than they do about the inherent, absolute merits of the film.

“Vertigo” stars James Stewart as a former cop impaired by a paralyzing fear of heights who is unable to save a woman he was hired to protect when she commits suicide by jumping from a bell tower. When he later meets another woman who strongly resembles the first (both played by Kim Novak), he becomes obsessed with making her over to re-create the woman who died.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0bV2gh4E7Y

These results were released the same week that Tippi Hedren, who starred in Hitchcock’s “Marnie” and “The Birds,” said that he ruined her career but not her life, with obsessive, creepy, sexual harassment. A forthcoming HBO film, “The Girl” stars Toby Jones and Sienna Miller as Hitchcock and Hedren. These claims/revelations about what may have inspired or influenced the themes of obsession and fixation and repression in “Vertigo” and other Hitchcock films recontextualize the films as well.

Roger Ebert has some important insights about the list and the inherent limits of any reductionist attempt at ranking works of art.

What surprised me this year is–how little I was surprised. I believed a generational shift was taking place, and that as the critics I grew up with faded away, young blood would add new names to the list. Kieslowski, perhaps. Herzog. Fassbinder. Scorsese. Lynch. Wong Kar-Wai.

What has happened is the opposite. This year’s 846 voters looked further into the past. The most recent film in the critics’ top ten, as it has been for years, is Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968). The two new films are silent: Vertov’s “Man With a Movie Camera” (1929), and Dreyer’s “The Passion of Joan of Arc” (1928). Murnau’s great silent “Sunrise” (1927) is also on the list–three silents out of ten, and no Chaplin, Keaton or Eisenstein.

Why not more recent directors? To make the list, a director is punished if too many of his films are voted for. He needs an “official masterpiece.” With Buster Keaton that film used to be “The General,” but after the restoration of all of his films his votes have become scattered, I suspect, among “Sherlock Jr.,” “Steamboat Bill Jr.” and other treasures.

But his most important point is this: “let’s remember that all movie lists, even this most-respected one, are ultimately meaningless. Their tangible value is to provide movie lovers with viewing ideas.” So, for your Netflix queue, here are the new Sight & Sound lists:

The Critics’ Top Ten Greatest Films of All Time:

Vertigo (Hitchcock, 1958)
Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941)
Tokyo Story (Ozu, 1953)
La Règle du jeu (Renoir, 1939)
Sunrise: a Song for Two Humans (Murnau, 1927)
2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)
The Searchers (Ford, 1956)
Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1927)
10. 8 ½ (Fellini, 1963)

The Directors’ Top Ten Greatest Films of All Time:

1. Tokyo Story (Ozu, 1953)
2. (tie) 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)
2. (tie) Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941)
4. 8 ½ (Fellini, 1963)
5. Taxi Driver (Scorsese, 1976)
6. Apocalypse Now (Coppola, 1979)
7. (tie) The Godfather (Coppola, 1972)
7. (tie) Vertigo (Hitchcock, 1958)
9. Mirror (Tarkovsky, 1974)
10 Bicycle Thieves (De Sica, 1948)

Movie Critics’ Advice on Films for a Bright 14-Year-Old

Posted on June 15, 2012 at 8:01 am

Indiewire asked its panel of critics to respond to a great question from a critic who is mentoring a film-loving 14-year-old.

“I mentor a 14-year-old from Harlem and nothing would make me happier then to have her enjoy ‘art house’ movies. She goes to Hollywood movies in chain theaters, and doesn’t particularly like what she sees. Of course, the fact that she’s African-American makes it even harder for me to find movies that I think would speak to her. She is sophisticated and would probably not mind some subtitles and nontraditional narratives. Help!”

Answers ranged from the just-released “Moonrise Kingdom” to classics like “Battle of Algiers,” “Cinema Paradiso,” “Zero for Conduct,” “Run Lola Run,” and “Black Orpheus.”

All of the critic surveys are fun to read, especially the perfect summer movie, and under-appreciated writers.

Can You Write a 140-Character Movie Review?

Posted on June 13, 2012 at 3:58 pm

The website Movie Tweeviews is conducting a competition for tweet-able movie reviews of classic films for inclusion in a possible book. Ira Deutchman will post the title of one classic film each day and invite all who want to enter to submit via twitter a review in 140 characters or less. Here is what Deutschman says about the rules:

Contributors are invited based on their standing in the industry, or based on the quality of their tweets. They can be critics, curators, distributors, filmmakers or articulate fans.

The ground rules are simple…

Reviews should be honest.

They should not be self-promotion.

Distributors should not include anything about films they are distributing.

Producers, writers and directors should only review films that they have nothing to do with.

Do not use the #MTRV tag on anything that isn’t a review.

If you re-tweet other #MTRV tweets, remove the hashtag so that those reviews do not end up in the feed twice.

Do not include links to longer reviews.

Don’t use the word “awesome” more than once per year.

Try to be clever.

I reserve the right to remove people from the feed if they break the ground rules, but professional critics can do as they please.

If you would like become a contributor, just start tweeting with the hastag #MTRV for anything you would consider a review. Just be mindful of the rules above. If your tweets seem like they would fit in, I’ll add you to the official feed, and your tweets will magically appear (even the one’s you’ve already tweeted).

I’m anxious to see whether this turns into something useful.

He will pick one winner each day. Here are some of the entries so far:

DAY 7 (June 10) #WestSideStory

@carynjames: #WestSideStory Prettiest gang fight ever. Romeo/Juliet update. Nat. Wood lipsynchs;glorious Bernstein music makes up 4 Hollywd glitz #mtrvc
@nyindieguy: #WestSideStory: Gloriously cinematic choreography, brilliant score & can’t miss R&J adaptation…1 of the great musicals of all time. #mtrvc
@SatriVision: #WestSideStory Bernstein/Sondheim/Robbins/Wise do beautiful NY Shakespeare. Marni Nixon makes Natalie Wood feel pretty, witty & gay. #mtrvc

DAY 6 (June 9): #Alien

@nyindieguy: #Alien: Successful cross between sci-fi & horror marked the first credible female action hero along w/ pulse quickening scares. #mtrvc
@SatriVision: #Alien – Claustrophobic, feminist sci-fi nightmare. If a phallic monster pops out of a guy’s chest, get your cat off that spaceship! #mtrvc
@TheCinemaGirl: #Alien redefines space as intimate sphere where wisdom is as vital as bravery in creating a hero. No wonder a woman like Ripley rules. #mtrvc

DAY 5 (June 8): #ItHappenedOneNight

@tobinaddington: Between trumpets, curtains, and a bit of leg on the highway, the sexes battle it old school. Snappy Capra. #ItHappenedOneNight #mtrvc
@TheCinemaGirl: Template for sophisticated romantic comedies, #ItHappenedOneNight makes journalist & heiress smart, funny & sweet – no small feat. #mtrvc
@nyindieguy: #ItHappenedOneNight: Capra hits all the right notes in classic screwball comedy…slyly suggestive for its time, and still hilarious. #mtrvc

DAY 4 (June 7): #MyOwnPrivateIdaho

@carynjames: #MyOwnPrivateIdaho Gritty dreamlike VanSant breakthru, druggy River Phoenix char., feels creepier over the yrs.Not so private anymore #mtrvc
@TheCinemaGirl: Shakespeare’s brash Hal is a gay hustler, but My Own Private Idaho belongs to tender narcoleptic River Phoenix & vast Western skies. #mtrvc

DAY 3 (June 6): #HoopDreams

@TariqRButt: The stakes are high, the drama intense in this pioneering indie doc. #HoopDreams plays with all the intensity of a championship game. #mtrvc
WINNER OF THE DAY
@DavidJaeilKim (Facebook): Portrait of moms, dads, sons; our hood, frnds & dreams defrrd. Not just bout ball: #HoopDreams is n American prophecy that gets finer w/age #mtrvc

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Why Do Critics Hate Movies Audiences Love?

Posted on June 4, 2012 at 3:57 pm

David Carr and A.O. Scott had a lively discussion about the role of critics and whether they should lighten up a little bit when it comes to popular films. It is well worth watching for anyone who is interested in movies, pop culture, or seeing smart people debate about something that matters to them.

Thanks to Adam for suggesting this!

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How to Write a Movie Review

Posted on May 26, 2012 at 3:55 pm

People often ask me how to become a movie critic, and I usually reply: “You watch a lot of movies and you write movie reviews about them. This is the world’s best time to be a movie critic because anyone can find a place to publish reviews. The trick is to make them good enough that people will want to read them.” (The other trick is getting paid for them, but if you accomplish the first, the second will follow.) For some guidance on how to write good movie reviews, Chris Klimek of the blog “Swagger, Not Style” has an excellent set of guidelines. I especially like these:

Your review should let your reader know these three things: What is this production trying to achieve? Was it successful? Is the thing that it succeeded or failed at something that’s worth doing at all?

and “Be funny….but never be mean.”

Adding some more specifics is Katherine Dacey of The Manga Critic, with some guidance for movie reviews of superhero films. In other words, this is one category of fan explaining the world she lives in to those who just visit it. And hmmm, she and Klimek agree on one crucial and too often overlooked piece of advice: “Do Your Homework.”

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