Cinema 101
2022: The year cinephilia bottomed out. And then rose again.
by Michael J. Casey
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guess you could say the low point arrived on March 27, 2022, with the broadcast of the 94th Academy Awards. No, the “slap heard ’round the world” wasn’t it—though that cast a pall over the proceedings, didn’t it?—but the constant, almost jubilant, belittlement cinema received by the very ceremony created to champion it. “Here at the Oscars, where movie lovers unite and watch TV,” host Wanda Sykes said in a scripted intro. “They weren’t all great,” host Amy Schumer said of the nominated movies. “I didn’t see many—any of them. I didn’t see them.” Animation was maligned as mere kiddie fair, a handful of production awards were handed out while the stars were still walking the red carpet, and there was that whole #OscarsFanFavorite thing. All this after two years of a pandemic that disrupted productions, neutered releases and shuttered the very spaces moviegoers called home for over a century. Not that things were that rosy in the first place. A rise in fanboy culture poisoned the well, turning casual discourse into coordinated toxic affairs, while the streaming wars eroded the viability of communal conversation. Back before the launch of Netflix Instant in 2007, the DVD mailing service offered a massive catalog of films from far and wide, old and new, for a relatively low price and the convenience of having the movies come to you. Before that was Blockbuster, Hollywood Video and a battery of mom-and-pop rental shops across the U.S. Before them were film societies, second-run theaters and art house cinemas connected to museums and universities. It might take some doing, but the best movies—new and old, mainstream and underground, domestic and foreign—were never out of reach. That was then. These days, streamers’ catalogs
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are so limited that the typical viewer subscribes to multiple services to keep pace. Once were the days when even the most casual moviegoer could watch the best picture nominees. Now you’re SOL if you have a Hulu account but not Apple TV+. Has cinephilia ever felt this fractured?
Darkest before the dawn
Yet there is hope, and it comes in the shape of a British film magazine. This November, Sight & Sound will announce its once-a-decade poll of the greatest films of all time. Invited critics, programmers, academics, distributors and writers from around the globe submit ballots of what they consider to be the 10 greatest movies— with the definition of the word “greatest” left up to each individual. From these ballots, Sight & Sound tabulate the frequency of each title to determine a list approaching definitive. Officially, the tradition dates back to 1952 when 63 critics dubbed Vittorio De Sica’s neo-realist masterpiece, Bicycles Thieves, the best. Ten years later, 70 respondents to Sight & Sound’s call placed Citizen Kane on the pedestal, a spot it would occupy until 2012, when 846 respondents from 73 countries knocked Kane out in favor of Vertigo. Interestingly, the roots of the poll can be found in a 1941 Sight & Sound column, “Quiz on Film Classics.” There, writer Charles Oakley opined that the larger moviegoing audience lacked critical appreciation. “They have little understanding of why they liked or did not like the film—partly, no doubt, because their reactions to it were mainly emotional; but partly also because they have never been given any guidance on how to like films,” Oakley wrote. His solution: Teach film appreciation. “This can be done by selecting, say, 10 outstanding fiction films for screening as ‘classics’ in schools, and by preparing a textbook for teachers.” Oakley was on to something; his suggestion of a top 10 is part of a long lineage of list-making and discussion. The titles Oakley chose elicited passionate letters from readers, enough that Sight & Sound decided to make more of it. Eight decades later, here we are.
Turning content into conversation
One of the upsides of Sight & Sound’s poll is that the results are a starting point. I became aware of Sight & Sound’s top 10 after the 2002 results were published. Nine I’d seen, so I sought out the blind spot: Yasujirô Ozu’s remarkable Tokyo Story.
AUGUST 18, 2022
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It opened a door in TOP: Bicycle Thieves my soul. When the (1948) follows a poor 2012 results were father searching in postpublished, Sight & World War II Rome for Sound ran the top 10 his stolen bicycle. alongside the top 100 vote-getters. A few BOTTOM: Federico weeks later, Sight Fellini’s surrealist 8 /1/2 & Sound posted all won multiple Oscars after 2,045 nominees. its release in ’63. Titles leaped off the page and into my queue: The Mirror, Shoah, Touki Bouki, The Color of Pomegranates, Barry Lyndon—the list went on. One of the thrills in anticipating Sight & Sound’s 2022 poll is the thought of how many movies I will encounter because of their inclusion. There’s a chance that this year’s poll will further codify the cinematic canon by retaining the same titles and filmmakers it always has. There’s also a chance that this year’s poll will tear all that down in favor of a new list that moves cinematic appreciation out of the 20th century. Either way, the poll—in its traditional 10 titles and expanded version, whatever count that may be—is destined to launch a thousand reactions, corrections and appreciations. Whether it was Oakley’s aim to encapsulate the history of the seventh art or to entice viewers into cinematic exploration with his “Quiz on Film Classics,” it appears he accomplished both.
Cinema 101
I’ve been writing about movies for over a decade now. Along the way, I’ve been asked countless times what the best movie is (Citizen Kane is the easy answer, and maybe the correct one) and what my favorite movie is (changes frequently, it might be Kane these days). Then there are the questions of what to watch, be it what’s in theaters now or where to start with a particular filmmaker, genre or industry. I adore these questions because the options are so varied. Sure, I want you to watch the best movies, but I’d rather you watch the movies that make you excited to watch more movies. So, in anticipation of Sight & Sound’s poll and the spirit of students returning to school, I give you my list, Cinema 101: A trip through 141 years of movies. Some of the titles are familiar. Some you might find peculiar. All, I think, are worth your time. BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE