“Movie fans listing their favorite pictures is fairly common."
I
feel safe in making that assumption because I was once a part of an online service called Your Movie DataBase (YMDb). It was run out of Brussels, Belgium, by a guy named Fred Nanson. I think there is a reincarnation of it somewhere online these days, but it’s not like the original. Back then, about 15 to 20 years ago, movie fans from all over the world gathered online to discuss their favorites. And the typed conversation was always lively. Like many good things, online trolls began to take over the conversation, Mr. Nanson sold the site (I always imagined because of lack fo time to keep it running properly) and the movie fans gave way to the trolls who eventually ruined the great fun. OK, to answer the question, “If it was run out of Brussels, were the online comments all in English?” Yes, that was an early decision of Fred Nanson, and people from France, Israel, England, Belgium, Canada , USA and other places converged to discuss film. To join YMDb, a member began by listing his/her 20 favorite pictures. That became the members’ home site. Mr. Nanson compiled those, and the sub-site that included the composite favorites also served as a discussion board for everyone. But that wasn’t my first venture into listing my favorite films. Initially I was prompted by a 1977 television special produced by the American Film Institute (AFI) that announced a membership voting for the 10 “greatest motion pictures ever made.” From there I began compiling my own favorites, and in 1998, AFI produced a new TV special, “100 Years … 100 Movies.” The success of the ’98 show set the Institute on a path for a dozen more specials spotlighting different film genres, actors and actresses, and even music. All these can be found by searching online for afi. com and following prompts. Meanwhile, my own list evolved into 783 favorites, a gesture that greatly amused an old film-watching buddy of mine. These days the list changes only slightly, although there are occasional new pictures that deserve spots there. Unlike the AFI lists, I include international movies among my favorites. 28
While publications such as Entertainment Weekly, People, Time, Readers’ Digest, TV Guide, Movietime, Village Voice, Halliwell’s, Aspect Ratio, Cahiers du Cinema and others have offered lists, arguably the most respected is the Sight & Sound poll taken every 10 years since 1952. It was the only poll in which prominent film critic Roger Ebert took part in and is compiled from lists made by movie critics and directors around the world. Originally only the top 10 movies were listed in the Sight & Sound poll, but since 1982 the magazine has listed separate pollings for the critics and directors. And in 2012, the leading 250 critics’ choices and 100 directors’ choices were included in the released material. The next S&S poll is due in 2022. So let’s look at some of these favorites. S&S voters chose Vittoria De Sica’s “The Bicycle Thief ” (Italian, 1949) as the best picture in the 1952 poll. But for the next five decades, through 2002, Orson Welles’ “Citizen Kane” (USA, 1941) led the list. Then in 2012, in somewhat of a surprise, ‘Kane’ was dropped to No. 2 behind Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” (USA, 1958) in the critics’ list while Ozu Yasujiro’s “Tokyo Story” ( Japan, 1953) was named No. 1 by the directors. On a personal note, my own all-time favorite, “Lawrence of Arabia” (USA/England, 1962) was pushed to No. 81 in the 2012 critic’s poll and landed in a tie for No. 48, according to the directors. I insert this to show how subjective these all-time favorite and/or greatest movie lists can be. For example, the 1952 favorite “The Bicycle Thief ” dropped to No. 33 in the 2012 critics’ poll even though it did remain at No. 10 among the directors’ choices. Two Charlie Chaplin films, “City Lights” (USA, 1930) and “The Gold Rush” (USA, 1925), were in the 1952 top ten, but his pictures haven’t landed a spot among the elite a single time since. Divergent lists are a common thing for movies. While Time Magazine didn’t number its top 100, such pictures as “Star Wars” (1977), Anna Living Magazine
“Pulp Fiction” (1994) and “E.T.” (1982) are included. Movietime magazine has “True Lies” (1994) among its favorites and “Blade Runner” (1982) is a Village Voice choice. Keeping in mind that your friendly writer is in the senior age category, I always found it interesting that a close friend chose “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” (1963) as his favorite. The films of Adam Sandler, Vince Vaughan, Jennifer Lawrence and Jennifer Lopez are favorites of many moviegoers these days. So naming a favorite like ‘Borat’ or “The Hangover” or any of the ’Toy Story’ incarnations is not out of the realm. Here is a good rule of thumb for emerging movie fans. Don’t omit anything or any genre. Give all pictures a chance, whether it be “Night of the Living Dead” or “Heredity;” “It Happened One Night” or “Crazy Rich Asians;” “The Best Years of Our Lives” or “Nomadland;” “Broadway Melody of 1938” or “Sound of Metal.” There is a lot of truth to the adage, “One man’s junk is another man’s treasure.” It surely holds true for the movies. DON ELDREDGE is the retired editor of the Herald Democrat newspaper (Sherman-Denison, TX) and resides in Sherman. E-mail him at eldredgedon@gmail.com.
