I have decided to go through my entire Top 100 films list (a list official as of 29 October 2012) ten films at a time in a series of posts that will hopefully allow me to showcase these films as my one hundred favourites in short bursts rather than one whole long page. Here are films 100-91:
100: Dogville (Lars von Trier, 2003)
“There’s a family with kids. Do the kids and make the mother watch. Tell her you’ll stop if she can hold back her tears. I owe her that.” Probably the most chilling, horrific film quote I have ever heard.
99: Solaris (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972)
Anyone who is confused by the popularity and acclaim amongst arthouse fans of Andrei Tarkovsky needs only to sit and watch Solaris; afterwards, everything will become clear. I promise you that.
98: Rear Window (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
The whole movie is in one room. One room. Every single character is brilliant. James Stewart is brilliant. Grace Kelly is brilliant. Thelma Ritter is brilliant. The suspense is incredible.
97: La Belle Noiseuse (Jacques Rivette, 1992)
Few spur-of-the-moment film-related decisions I’ve ever made have been as perfect as watching the four-hour La Belle Noiseuse on YouTube with no prior knowledge of it at all. It stunned me. Four hours of artistic perfection, with a startling twist that makes it all worthwhile.
96: L’Age D’Or (Luis Buñuel, 1930)
Buñuel, you fucking genius, you. The best cinematic provocateur there ever was. All I need to say about L’Age D’Or is that it concludes by presenting to the audience Jesus Christ as a rapist and pervert. That final sequence alone is enough to earn this a place high up on the list of most ballsy films of all time.
95: Week End (Jean-Luc Godard, 1967)
Because fuck you.
94: Barry Lyndon (Stanley Kubrick, 1975)
I feel like, even in an age where Kubrick is almost constantly loved and discussed and puzzled over and admired, Barry Lyndon still does not get anywhere near the vicinity of enough respect and love. It is one of the great epics of all time, yet still a relatively quiet chamber drama and one of Kubrick’s most powerful movies.
93: L’Eclisse (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1963)
Anyone who has seen the film may think this sounds really pretentious and stupid but the last seven minutes of this movie are fucking phenomenal. It makes me really sad that Antonioni gets such hate. Any filmmaker who can craft a masterpiece like this deserves to have his name screamed from the rooftops in admiration and pride.
92: Festen (Thomas Vinterberg, 1998)
I will never stop giving friends my DVD of this film and telling them to just watch it without reading anything at all beforehand. It is great fun.
91: The Poseidon Adventure (Ronald Neame, 1972)
I don’t care what anyone says, this is the disaster movie. I have loved it ever since I was a child. Gene Hackman and Ernest Borgnine are fucking incredible. And Shelley Winters: “In the water… I’m a very skinny lady.” You’re heartless if you didn’t cry in that scene. This is everything a disaster movie should be. Absolutely perfect. I adore it. Oh man, I want to go and rewatch it now…
Films 90-81 coming soon. In the meantime, let me know what you think in the comments of my ten choices so far!