Metroplis, # 86 of 101 Great Films

I love movies. I have since I went to the Drive – In with my parents to see

Support your local Sheriff.

Since then I have watched,  god only knows how many, but a safe guess is 1,000 films,

that may be more about the fact that I’m old than I watch a lot of films! 

For this segment of my Self- Indulgent Blog,

I’m going to list my 101 favorite films, why 101 - why not!

I think I understand films but I’m not a critic, or an academic. So sometimes I'm full of ....

Here is my list, there really isn't any criteria, except, a film has to be at least 10 years old, I need to think about  and revisit a film  away from its  original time frame.

other than that there are no other criteria, 

I would love to hear from everyone, so please email or post comments

No.  86

1926 Metropolis, Directed by Fritz Lang

German  Expressionist.

I don’t really know what that is, but I know it when I see it

And you see it in Fritz Lang’s 1927 science-fiction film “Metropolis”.

According to Wikipedia, German Expressionism was partly created by the German film industry to combat the more expensive Hollywood films.

Althought at the time Metroplis was the most espensive movie ever made.

You can tell a expressionist film by its strange visual style, extraordinary camera work, and some wonderfully demented set designs that may have been  created while on some serious mind altering drugs.

        Started near the end of WWI, expressionism wasn’t just confined to Germany, but didn’t spread to Hollywood until some of the great expressionist craftsmen moved  to America.

Karl Freund

Especially Karl Freund, the cinematographer for the 1931 Dracula, Karl was a pioneer at Universal using the expression style for their horror films of the 30s

The horror genre wasn’t the only one influenced by German expressionism, Film noir maybe the child of this style with its  dark sets and themes, and the  use of light in a more artistic way than most American films up until that time.

If you haven’t seen this wildly imaginative film make sure to get the 2010 reconstructed version

Right after its initial release, the German studio Universum Films, cut it substantially, and tragically some of that footage has been lost forever.

             The 2010 release from a 16mm print maybe as close as we get can get to the original, but even with the lost footage this is still a great movie, and very proletariat film.

The films narrative is simplistic, with its workers underground, and bosses in the sky, it definitely  wears its politics on its sleeve.

BUT  regardless of its narrative, it is an amazing film and still one of the great science fiction films of all the time.

Video exhibit for # 86- Metroplis

101 Great Films so far:

101 One False Move

100 Friends of Eddie Coyle

99 Tampopo

98 The Thing

97 Nanook of the North

96 The Battle of Algiers

95  The Third Man

94 Au Revoir Les Enfants

93 Meshes of the Afternoon

92 Alien

91 Young Frankenstein

90  Bull Durham

89 Los Olvidados

88 Two-Lane Blacktop

87 Ace in the hole

Ace in the hole, No. 87 101 Great Films

1951
Ace in the hole
Directed by Billy Wilder
USA


“I met a lot of hard-boiled eggs in my life, but you – you’re twenty minutes.”
Chuck Tatum from Ace in the Hole



Sometimes I have a hard time recognizing a good film, if the characters in the film are bad, not just villain bad, but just plain bad I have a hard time judging the film,

A good example of this is Sideways, critics loved this film, and there was tons of positives, strong female characters, a really well told story, but I cannot get over the fact that the protagonist stole money from his mother, I cannot forgive this, and thus I think of this as a bad movie, I know it’s me more than the film but still  I can't  stand it,


Billy Wilder's grave marker

  but the difference between Sideways, and a film like Billy Wilder’s 1951 Ace in a hole, besides being a much better film, the ethics of the film are right out there for everyone watching to see, and everyone is indicted; everyone in the movie, and everyone in the audience. In fact, Wilder has fun with the audience as he cuts between the action and the spectators watching outside, which he of course includes us the viewer on the real outside.





     Wilder is making us(the viewer) as responsible for Leo being in the cave as the newspaper reporter Chuck Tatum( Kirk Douglas)

Ace in the Hole, which Paramount changed to the Big Carnival, hoping it would convene a crime drama to the public, not a disturbing account of an unscrupulous journalist.



Kirk Douglas & Robert Arthur

  Was not a success with the American public or critics, but after a decade went by the critics standed to understand the genius of Wilder, including Vincent Canby.
Vincent Canby does a much better job than I explaining Ace in the hole and Billy wilder:


Kirk Douglas & Jan Serling


“Wilder is often called cynical, mostly, I think, because his movies seldom offer us helpful hints to better lives. There are few people in his movies one could model one’s behavior on. He doesn’t deal in redeeming social values. Instead, he sees the demeaning ones.”



I’ve included in the video exhibit for Ace in the hole a wonderful clip from the bonus feature of the dvd.
It’s Spike Lee, another great director with a critical eye,
talkin about Ace in the hole.

Please watch his comments and go out and rent Ace in a hole, there may not be a more relevant movie about the state of our media that this 60 year old gem.

Ace in the hole vidoe exhibit




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDv2BLk_OEo

Two-Lane Blacktop # 88 of 101 Great Films

#88

1971

Two-Lane Black Top

Directed by Monte Hellman

Two- Lane blacktop

“The whole idea of the road, of going from one place to another, is essentially American.”

*–Two-Lane Blacktop Screenwriter, Rudy Wurlitzer

Either I’m an idiot – no comments!

GTO, The Mechanic, the Driver, The Girl

Or Two-lane Black Top is a masterpiece, a 100% American masterpiece,
a western epic with 400 horses and minimum dialog.

Monte Hellman a east coast kid and a west coast college graduate got his real world degree from
The Roger Corman College of Exploitation,
with a minor in fast & cheap.

Two of his best Corman projects were in partnership with Jack Nicholson;
Ride in the Whirlwind and The Shooting,
both westerns, both shot in 18 days and with pennies for a budgets.









Then in 1971 with Hollywood backing Hellman made Two Lane Black Top.
His cast 2 musicians, who had never acted before or since, an 18 year old newcomer, and a 20 year veteran of the small and big screen Warren Oates,
Oates, like the 18 year old newbie, Laurie Bird, left us way to early.


Both were shining stars. 

 
      Monte got help with the script from Rudy Wurlitzer and a first rate camera crew, Jack Deerson, Gregory Sandor & Ken Swor.  

The 30 member crew and actors traveled across the southeast and southwest, finishing principal filming in just 6 weeks, and for under a million.






         Some folks have mistaken the lack of conversation among the driver (James Taylor) and the mechanic (Dennis Wilson) as an obsession about a race that never ends, Critics have commented that the film transcends a road movie, its about 60’s America, a America in bad shape, maybe even dying, but I think the film is much simpler, Two Lane is an existential truth; it’s what men do. Not all men, GTO talks enough for both as does the girl.


But the Driver and the Mechanic don’t need monologues,

- Which by the way is the genius of the casting- 2 guys who make a decent living with their words, having them barely speaking- freakin genius! –




They are happy with the road, they will race, but it ain’t the race that fuels them it’s the road, it’s the music of the engine, it’s the open space,
the American landscape that fuels it all.


       Filmed in 1971, it gets lumped with Easy Rider as another “Counter Culture” movie a “Hippie” diatribe about the problems of American

but I think this movie doesn’t give a shit about hippies or counter culture.
If Easy Rider was a statement about the 60s, it was thru the eyes of Hollywood,
I don’t care, people can call Rider counter culture all they want, but it was made by veterans of the Hollywood system, and produced and starred the son of a Hollywood legend,

It was more about spoiled kids rebelling then America and its problems. 

Two Lane, is a working class statement, it’s about making things work, not grand ideas,
just machines, with tools they know how to use.
There are no mean as hell rednecks waiting to kill them on the road.
Around the turn in Two- Lane Black Top are people some like the Driver and the Mechanic, and some that aren’t, just regular working folks, and if they ask real nice, they just might get a hardboiled egg from the Mechanic.


Btw: the hardboiled egg, has a long tradition of being  traveling food, a treat that can be picked out of a jar, on the counter, all across the country in gas stations and small neighborhood grocery/butcher stores, at least when we had two lane black tops.

Please visit your local Revival Theatre, not sure about one in your area

For a Revial theatre in your area click here

101 Great Films video exhibit of Two-lane Blacktop

101 Great Films:

101 One False Move

100 Friends of Eddie Coyle

99 Tampopo

98 The Thing

97 Nanook of the North

96 The Battle of Algiers

95  The Third Man

94 Au Revoir Les Enfants

93 Meshes of the Afternoon

92 Alien

91 Young Frankenstein

90  Bull Durham

89 Los Olvidados

101 Great Films- # 89 Los Olvidados

#89

1950

Los Olvidados  “The young and the Damned”

Directed by Luis Bunuel

Los Olvidados, is a tough film to watch. 

Critics have called it callous, cold, & sadistic. 

The producers of the movie, were so unhappy with the end of the film they re-shot a alternate happier ending, 

Thankfully Luis Bunuel’s original version is still intact, and the alternate version has been discarded.  

Luis Bunuel

Bunuel’s 1950 masterpiece is not a Hollywood movie, 

IT does not have a sentimental ending; the film  does not have any answers. I’m not sure the film has any compassion at all,

A scene from Los Olvidados

so maybe it is cold, certainly Bunuel gives no help to his audience, he gives very little breathing room.

 Luis Bunuel is an artist, and this is a tough masterpiece

Los Olvidados, loosely translated meaning- The young and the damned,   is a film that I have only watched 

once,some films are just too painful, but don't mistake that comment as bad, this film has some amazing 

images, including one character’s dying vision of Death- as a mangy mutt, leading the dying boy down a long 

dark road, that image will stay with you a long time, maybe those critics are right.

This is what "Precious" could have been if it had been made by a master filmmaker.

Cast and crew of Los Olvidados

 101 Great Films: Los Olvidados

101 Great Films:

101 One False Move

100 Friends of Eddie Coyle

99 Tampopo

98 The Thing

97 Nanook of the North

96 The Battle of Algiers

95  The Third Man

94 Au Revoir Les Enfants

93 Meshes of the Afternoon

92 Alien

91 Young Frankenstein

90  Bull Durham

Bull Durham- # 90 of 101 Great Films

1988          Bull Durham     Directed by Ron Shelton

There are only a few genres that are uniquely American; one of them is the Sport’s movie.

A good sports film has an undercurrent, which has little to do with the sport;

A man’s fight for redemption,  

protect the family,

proving one is worthy, 

overcoming tragedy,

looking for acceptance,

Tim Robbins & Kevin Costner

In the case of Bull Durham, it has some of these themes but the main theme that drives this film:

 It doesn’t matter how hard you work, practice,

no matter what you do,

unless you have that gift- call it god given or whatever,

you are not going to be an elite artist,

thousands try their dream, and some are even good enough to make some noise, but like Crash Davis,  no matter how long they or Crash  works at their/his art, they/he ain’t got “it” 

                 Crash knows the game better that most, but he just will never make it, he knows this, but he keeps playing. LaLoosh is a young cocky flamethrower who doesn’t respect the game, partly cause he is young, but mainly cause he has the gift- he has the “it”

The question with  Ebby Calvin “Nuke” LaLoosh is will "it" be enough.

Ron Shelton

          

 Former minor league player turned writer/director Ron Shelton understand this as much as anyone, it was in his blood too.

What Shelton does in Bull Durham that is truly amazing, is he brings in a character which in standard romantic films, would just be the standard by the numbers female lead,



But with Annie Savoy, we have another version of Crash,

a female that loves the game as much as anyone playing,

but cause of who she is; she can’t get to the top.  

She loves the game, understands the game as well as anyone.

Susan Sarandon

                                   She is not baseball “groupie”

if that were the case, then this wouldn’t be a great film, hell it might  not be a good film, but cause she is the Chorus of this Diamond Play Bull Durham is damn good

Trey Wilson & Robert Whul

Another reason for this making 101 Great Films, is the spot on performances by the supporting cast through the film. Trey Wilson, who we lost way to early, is a force that steals every scene he is in, as he did in another film on this list.

The whole cast and crew were a winning combo that hit Bull Durham out of the park! And place it on the top 101

 Don’t you just love sports metaphors.

Video exhibit of Bull Durham

MGM's Bull Durham is on Blueray and standard dvd now.

101 Great Films:

101 One False Move

100 Friends of Eddie Coyle

99 Tampopo

98 The Thing

97 Nanook of the North

96 The Battle of Algiers

95  The Third Man

94 Au Revoir Les Enfants

93 Meshes of the Afternoon

92Alien

91 Young Frankenstein

101 Great Films- # 91 Young Frankenstein

# 91

1974

Young Frankenstein

Directed by Mel Brooks

Made right after Brook’s  over the top in every way including the box office- and future entry on the top 101, “Blazing Saddles”,

Mel Brooks was almost understated in his direction, and vision for “Young Frankenstein”,

Mel Brooks and Marty Feldman

                                                

I said Almost!!

Brooks, maybe the best slapstick, campy, réalisateur in film history, started off as a writer for TV, including the “Dick Van Dyke show”, & “Your Show of Shows”

Teaming with Carl Reiner, the duo worked  together for  years in the  TV industry, then they released several comedy lps, that were hits, and included the routine the 2000 year old man.  

1974 Young Frankenstein

 

Young Frankenstein parodies the old school horror films

and the gothic novels of Shelley and company

Co-written with Gene Wilder, the film was shoot in wonderful black & white 

and uses some of the same sets used in the 1931 James Whale classic film  “Frankenstein”.

                                          With a great cast, including the already on this list, Peter Doyle,

Young Frankenstein is still laugh out loud funny, 

even during the silly dance numbers, which may include the best monster- doctor dance routine in the history of Cinema.

101 Great Films- # 91 Young Frankenstein video exhibit

101 Great Films:

101 One False Move

100 Friends of Eddie Coyle

99 Tampopo

98 The Thing

97 Nanook of the North

96 The Battle of Algiers

95  The Third Man

94 Au Revoir Les Enfants

93 Meshes of the Afternoon

92Alien

 

Alien # 92 of 101 Great Films

# 92
1979
Alien
Directed by Ridley Scott
USA

I like horror movies.
I like Science Fiction films and I dig monster movies.
I enjoy the great ones, the good ones, the bad ones, and the silly ones.
I don’t like the mean spirited ones, which seems to be all they make nowadays, but Alien isn’t that; It’s a damn good monster film.
A damn good SiFi, and one of a few first-class horror films.

“In space no one can hear you scream.”

Dan  O'Bannon

Written by Dan O’Bannon,

Ridley Scott

produced by action director Walter Hill, and directed by Ridley Scott, add to those 3 creative giants one really disturbed artist, H.R. Giger and you have a totally unique film in a very structure genre;

1st: the cast is older than most for films like this, this is not a teen movie.

Two- Alien is atmospheric, nerve wracking, with a great pace, not the 100 mile an hour quick edit flicks,
but a slow boiling creepy and very scaring film.


Three-, it has a feeling of class, which horror films never do, the protagonist are normal everyday workers just trying to survive, not super heroes that defy logic to defeat the beast, which also makes the horror more intense and real. The sense of class has been seen in European films, but not in but a few America films and certainly not in horror films, at its core Alien is a story about the ruling class-via the company- exploiting the workers.

Sigourney Weaver, Yaphet Kotto, Harry Dean Stanton

But maybe the biggest ploy in the film
is the fact that the hero is a woman,
the last “man” standing,
and not the helpless victim that usually saturate this genre.






Having just given you 4 reason why this is a unique adventure, at its heart it is an Agatha Christie spooky manor who done it.
However you want to diagnose this film, it is one damn fine piece of work.

and everyone heard me scream. 

this video exhibit, is a combo of several works,
The making of Alien, a bonus feature on the Dvd release of Alien.
And excerpts were used from the American Film Institute’s interviews with key players from the film.

Video exhibit for # 92 of 100 Great films: Alien
Remember Alien is available on DvD & Blue ray
Also if you have an independent movie house near you suggest to them to bring Alien back to the big screen.