Essential Cinema: On the Necessity of Film Canons

Appendix: 1,000 Favorites (A Personal Canon)

407 Appendix ∞,≠≠≠ Favorites (A Personal Canon) The criteria I’ve used for the inclusion of films on this list are pleasure and edification; I haven’t factored in any sense of historical importance that might exist independently of these factors. I have incorporated shorts as well as features, animation as well as live action, and both videos and some works made for television (although nothing made for a particular TV program). I’ve also included two fragments of unfinished films, The Confession (1990) and Improvisation (1996). Broadly speaking, these are the films I’d want to have with me on a desert island, except that I’d want to bring along many other things that I haven’t yet seen—including some of my more conspicuous omissions. No one who claims to have seen all the possible contenders for the greatest films ever made can possibly be telling the truth—even in relation to a single year—and so, if I’ve omitted a film, this may be because I haven’t yet caught up with it. Others, however, are absent because I don’t value them as much as those that I’ve included. Such a list thus carries an unfortunate ambiguity, one also present in some of Andrew Sarris’s critical valuations in The American Cinema, namely, that in many cases it isn’t clear whether an exclusion entails a critical judgment. Although I’ve made a conscious effort to be exhaustive, unwitting omissions— films I’ll eventually hate myself for having overlooked—are inevitable, largely because I haven’t come up with any sure-fire method of recalling or tabulating everything I’ve seen, or even everything I can remember seeing. I undoubtedly saw more candidates during the late 40s and most of the 50s, when I had relatively easy access to the films shown at the theaters operated by my grandfather, and during my subsequent periods as a professional reviewer, in London (1974–76), New York (1979–81), and Chicago (1987–2003)—although I also saw a good many films during my five years in Paris (1969–74), before accepting my first reviewing job. I’ve kept this list in (rough) chronological order—and in alphabetical order within each year—simply as a matter of convenience. I have also connected a director or filmmaker to each title, but merely for the sake of easy identification, not because the name is necessarily that of the most important individual involved in the film. With the exception of *Corpus Callosum, titles preceded by an 408 APPENDIX asterisk belong to my hundred favorite films—a lineup that for me currently represents la crème de la crème. J.R. december 2003 Abbreviations As a partial guide to my extended commentaries on some of the films listed below, the following abbreviations are employed in this list: AK Abbas Kiarostami (with Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa; Champaign: University of Illinois Press, ≤≠≠≥) CR Chicago Reader DM Dead Man (≤d ed.; London: British Film Institute, ≤≠≠∞) EC Essential Cinema: On the Necessity of Film Canons FTCC Film: The Critic’s Choice (New York: Billboard Books, ≤≠≠∞) FTFL Film: The Front Line ∞Ω∫≥ (Denver: Arden Press, ∞Ω∫≥) G Greed (London: British Film Institute , ∞ΩΩ≥) MM Midnight Movies (with J. Hoberman; NewYork: Da Capo, ∞ΩΩ∞) MFB Monthly Film Bulletin MMu Movie Mutations: The Changing Face of World Cinephilia (coedited with Adrian Martin; London: British Film Institute, ≤≠≠≥) MaP Movies as Politics (Berkeley: University of California Press, ∞ΩΩπ) MW Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Films We Can See (Chicago: a cappella, ≤≠≠≠) PM Placing Movies: The Practice of Film Criticism (Berkeley: University of California Press, ∞ΩΩ∑) 1895 L’arrivée d’un train en Gare de la Ciotat (Louis Lumière) La sortie des Usines Lumière (Lumière) 1907 *Le Tunnel sous la Manche (Georges Méliès) 1909 A Corner in Wheat (D. W. Griffith) 1912 Musketeers of Pig Alley (Griffith) 1913–14 Fantomas (Louis Feuillade) 1914 The Avenging Conscience (Griffith) Child of the Big City (Yevgeni Bauer) L’enfant de Paris (Léonce Perret) The Wishing Ring (Maurice Tourneur) 1,000 FAVORITES (A PERSONAL CANON) 409 1915–16 *Les vampires (Feuillade) (CR, EC) 1916 Carmen (Charlie Chaplin) Intolerance (Griffith) 1916–18 Judex (Feuillade) 1917 One A.M. (Chaplin) 1918 *Tih Minh (Feuillade) (MaP) 1919 Barrabas (Feuillade) Broken Blossoms (Griffith) The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Robert Wiene) The Oyster Princess (Ernst Lubitsch) True Heart Susie (Griffith) 1920...