AFI Top 100 Movies Update
I’ve seen a few more of them. I should just let this go. Oh well.
3. Casablanca — Some great one-liners, but the plot’s unclear. Is Rick the main character? What’s he trying to achieve? Should I be happy at how it ends? Or, like, care? I probably would have liked it better if I hadn’t been told it was the third greatest movie ever — but it still wouldn’t have been a favorite.
11. The Searchers — Eleventh best movie of all time? Ouch for humanity. Lumpy plot with a poor sense of direction and, as far as I can tell, John Wayne made money for being an icon, not for his acting. Am I wrong?
27. High Noon — It’s now one of my favorites, a really tight, effective movie. Even though its message was intended to be allegorical for the McCarthy-era witch hunts, I found it considerably more universal than that.
38. Treasure of the Sierra Madre — A painful experience. That crazy old guy alone would have been too much to take. Boring dialog and no reason for me to care about the characters.
45. Shane — Other than Jack Palance’s bemused looks and a neat ending, I didn’t see much I liked. Corny, wooden, over-acted, strangely edited, woodenly staged. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a movie with so many awkward silences. Why did the Southerner have an Irish accent? Plus Alan Ladd is way, way too pretty to be believed in this role. And the fake beards were *terrible*.
(IMHO.)
bkd
That’s pretty bad using “wooden” twice in one sentence. Oh well. Easier to comment on than fix (not really, actually).
I totally think Casablanca is overrated!
Haven’t seen any of these others; will add High Noon to Netflix.
I prefer watching foreign movies to old Hollywood movies.
I usually end up liking foreign films better than “highly regarded” old movies as well. Apparently. Just recorded my third consecutive 1-star Netflix rating tonight (Punch Drunk Love). Quite a streak I’m on…!
4. Raging Bull — Saw it tonight. I can live with it being considered a top-100 movie. Some scenes felt over-long to me and I admittedly just don’t care about its subject matter, but still: *way* better than The Departed.
6. Gone with the Wind — I kind of liked it. A lot of very funny stuff in there and in terms of over-long melodramatic historical movies, this is certainly best-of-breed. Weirdly fun for me. And, yes, better than The Departed.