Just to prove that I can waste time like the best of them, I’m reviewing the latest list of the top 100 films on IMDB (as of today) and working out what I have left to see of the list as it currently stands.

There are quite a few new entries this time around: The Departed is on there, as is Pan’s Labyrinth and The Prestige (which surprises me because as much as I thought it was good I didn’t think it was top 100 good - but considering it’s number 86, I doubt it will be in a years time.) The Bourne Ultimatum is on there as well, a film I intend to see as soon as it’s available for rental. By that time it will have dropped out as it’s too new to have any lasting power.

Anyway, the list is as follows and what I’ve yet to see is highlighted in bold. Feel free to join in or not.
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Last year I published a list of films. It was the first 100 films from the list of the Top 250 films as voted for by the subscribers of IMDB.com. All films that had been emboldened were ones I’d watched and the rest I had yet to watch.

Here’s the new list as of today. As you can see, most of the top 50 are the same but there are some new entries in the shape of Sin City, Hotel Rwanda and Downfall while some films I watched because of this list (namely Oldboy) have slipped out of the top 100. Also worth noting is that Hitchcock’s 1940 film Rebecca now features in the top 100 and that, for the first time I’ve seen, The Empire Strikes Back is ranked above Star Wars.
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Dir. Roman Polanski
Scr. Ronald Harwood (adpt. from Wladyslaw Szpilman)
Str. Adrien Brody

I was capitvated by this film, which I’ve been meaning to see for years but was never in the mood to watch it whenever I was at Blockbusters. Not surprising as it is quite harrowing - but then what else do you expect from a film about the life of a Polish Jew during the Nazi Holocaust. The Pianist tells the true story of musician Wladyslaw Szpilman (played by Brody in a minimalist but emotionally provocative performance which definitley deserved his Oscar) surviving the Nazi invasion of Warsaw in 1939 and charts his life through the war until the Russians liberated Poland in 1944.

I can’t really say too much more about it. I had heard that a lot of people found it boring and was expecting to watch yet another film that had been lauded only to not see what everyone else sees. No disappointment to be found here though. Comparisons will surely be made to Schindler’s List but this is a very different type of film and one that is much more delicate in it’s storytelling and much more personal about the subject matter. It doesn’t dwell on the acts of cruelty and barbarism that Spilzman witnessed but they are shocking and stomach churning nonetheless and this cleverly juxtaposes the compassion shown later on by the German officer without having to stress the point or clumsily hammer it home.

This film deserves all its credit. It deals with a very sensitive subject and does so with much subtlty and without any of the histrionics or sermonizing that you often find with such material. While it’s by no means a feel good film, it’s certainly a film which highlights the courage of ordinary people in exceptional circumstances.

(I am attempting to make sure that by the end of the year I have watched every single one of the top 100 rated films according to IMDB as of 18th March 2005. I have 22 to go. The full list is here.)

I’m a big fan of Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns, especially the Clint Eastwood “man with no name” trilogy. In fact, I would never have claimed to have really liked westerns on the whole but that’s only when I think about all the macho, strutting “heroes of the wild west” type films which are full of the smug jingoism that resurfaced in many of the eighties hollywood actioners.

Leone treated the films differently. There are no heroes as such, just bad buys who do bad things and bad guys who do good things. The film might always turn out okay at the end but there’s always a bit of a sour taste left in your mouth and no-one ever gets to ride away cleanly into the sunset.

Once Upon A Time In The West is pretty much the same. Featuring the combined acting talents of Charles Bronson, Henry Fonda and Jason Robards (in the usual Leone roles of the good, the bad and the ugly respectively) it’s slightly more epic than the Eastwood trilogy which is unsurprising given that once set (the railway station set in the opening scene) cost more than the entire budget of his first film. Charles Bronson’s Harmonica isn’t quite as charismatic as Eastwood’s man with no name and is only really memorable for his theme tune (the one he plays himself with his harmonica… hence his name). But the film works and while I think it’s less iconic than the original trilogy, it’s still an interesting and watchable film and definitely worth watching. Wouldn’t personally have placed it so high in the top 100 list though.

(I am attempting to make sure that by the end of the year I have watched every single one of the top 100 rated films according to IMDB as of 18th March 2005. I have 23 to go. The full list is here.)

(Time to clean out my drafts and sort out this whole 100 movies thing - seen a few but haven’t written about them!)

Rear Window is allegely Hitchcock’s favourite of his own films. Telling the story of a photojournalist who is stuck in his flat after breaking a leg and watches the world go by from the rear window of his apartment. The story is seen entirely from his perspective and the action never leaves the room our protagonist is in. This is part of why Hitchcock is so great. This is, essentially, a film that is a play, with a minimal cast and one set. We see nothing outside of what Jimmy Stewart’s character sees and yet we get caught up in the ensuing thriller, wondering whether he’s victim of his own overactive (and caged) imagination or if he’s perception of his neighbour’s seemingly nefarious actions is reality.

A classic in every sense of the word. Great perfromances by Jimmy Stewart and the stunningly beautiful Grace Kelly and top notch direction by the master of thrillers himself.

(I am attempting to make sure that by the end of the year I have watched every single one of the top 100 rated films according to IMDB as of 18th March 2005. This film is the first. I have 24 to go. The full list is here.)

dir. Park Chan-Wook
wri. Hwang Jo-yun, Lim Chun-hyeong (adapted from Tsuchiya Garon)
st. Choi Min-sik, Yu Ji-tae, Kang Hye-jeong

Stunning! Absolutely fantastic. That’s all I’ve got to say about Oldboy, the second in a trilogy of revenge films by Park Chan-Wook. I’m always sceptical about films that appear in a top 100 list so shortly after their release. But this film blew me away.

First up, a caution. This film is not for the faint of heart. If you don’t like violent films then you won’t like Oldboy. It is a tale of vengeance and it’s a Korean film based on Japanese manga. There is blood and violence and a particularly disgusting scene involving a live squid in a sushi bar. (I’ll leave you to figure out what might happen - but bear in mind cultural sensibilities and the fact that this is a Korean film…)

The story centres on Oh Dae-su, a normal, everyday man with wife and child. For reasons unknown, he is abducted and imprisoned, detained one room with nothing but a T.V., pen and paper for company. He sees news reports of his wife’s murder and watches as he is named number one suspect. Then, after 15 years of confinement, he is released, again with out any explanation. His abductor provides him with clothes, money and a simple task: to find out why he was abducted in the first place.

There’s so much to recommend about this film. In the wrong hands this could have been another trashy, badly scripted, poorly shot film featuring bloody vengeance for bloody vengeance’s sake. But it’s not. It’s beautiful to look at. The lighting and cinematography is fantastic. The acting is tremendous. In Oh Dae-su, we see an ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances. We see him change from being a chubby, loud mouthed drunkard to being a lean, mean, laconic, vengeance machine. We get caught up in his quest to find out who imprisoned him and why. The story twists and turns and the revelations and surprises keep coming.

There is a lot of action and it is very well done without being over the top (watch out for the fight scene in the corridor and try to remember that it’s all done in one take) but it never detracts from the human element of the film and that’s a credit to the director. Chan-wook Park mixes the right elements of a Hitchcockian thriller with the sublime action of a Takeshi Kitano film and the payoff is a marvellous film that, in my humble opinion, fully deserves the Grand Jury Prize it won at last years Cannes Film Festival.

A little over a year ago there was a meme going around that particularly appealed to me. It took the list of the top 100 rated films from IMDB and asked you to highlight the ones you’d seen. I’d seen 60-70% of them last year and made it my mission to watch the ones I hadn’t seen by the end of the year.
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