Greetings, reader!
My ranking of my all-time favorite movies continues today, as we go from the 80th-best film all the way to the 71st-best one. One week closer to the eventual Top 10!
80. Being John Malkovich (1999)
"Meet you in Malkovich in one hour"
Definitely one of the most bizarre films I've laid my eyes on, this experimental flick is something that only Charlie Kaufman could write. The premise is relatively straightforward: boy meets girl, boy gets job, job includes a hidden portal that takes one into a form of reality where you see the world through world-famous actor John Malkovich's eyes for fifteen minutes, portal becomes a hit, boy shows portal to girl, girl becomes obsessed as being Malkovich awakens her transgender identity, et cetera. You all know the story.
Jokes aside, Being John Malkovich isn't just memorable because it has the possibly most unique and creative premise in cinema history, but also because it manages to insert multiple fascinating themes into this story and produces an all-around great film out of it. John Cusack provides the best performance of his career as the protagonist, an anxious and philosophical puppeteer whose life is changed after he discovers the portal into Malkovich's head. Kaufman's script succeeds in balancing his brand of humor (I find it absolutely hilarious how a majority of the characters react to the portal's existence in such a casual, mundane fashion) and more serious stuff (the tail end of the film delves into Kaufman's typical tirade through ponderings on free will, nihilism, the limits of mortality and what have you). There's no other movie like this one.
79. Clerks (1994)
"...In a row?"
If you've seen Clerks, you'll likely remember the context for the line quoted above, and laugh out loud thinking about it. I didn't include the full dialogue leading up to it here, but trust me, it's one of the funniest lines of all time. While Kevin Smith's debut film earns a spot in my top 100 for that indescribably hilarious conversation alone, the rest of the film is also comedy gold. The budget is low, the premise begins and ends with "A workday in the life of two convenience store clerks", and that's all the simple but solid film needs. The atmosphere is wonderfully chill (despite the occasional dives into extremely dark humor), and the chemistry between main dudes Dante (Brian O'Halloran) and and Randal (Jeff Anderson) is tight.
No other film in my top 100 is quite this compact and uncomplicated, but there's definitely something to be said for minimalistic comedy films that keep you entertained with amusing dialogue and a laid-back energy. The conversations between the main characters, as they argue about movies, screw with the customers and occasionally take breaks to play hockey on the roof, are absolute gold. All in all, one of my all-time favorite comedies and perfect Friday night viewing.
78. Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
"The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity"
As a cinematic blockbuster sequel to the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994), Star Trek: First Contact is already very decent, with brilliant directing by Jonathan Frakes and an exciting plot about the U.S.S. Enterprise following the Borg Collective back in time in order to thwart a history-altering plan of theirs. What makes this Trek flick amazing and unforgettable, however, are the ideals behind it. Star Trek is one of my very favorite fictional franchises, and a lot of this is due to its values and ideas, as the franchise takes place in a well-though-out utopian future where humanity has managed to overcome war, hatred and corruption. Star Trek shows us where humanity could be headed if we all managed to be the best versions of ourselves, and didn't let violence and greed dictate our society. And while the Star Trek movies have generally been more shallow and less focused on these ideals than the television shows, First Contact is a huge exception.
This film is all about humanity's potential, and watching it gives one hope even in today's often hopeless-seeming state of the world. In First Contact, we go back in time from the franchise's setting to a point still in our real-life future, as we're given a backstory on how Star Trek's futuristic society of peace and harmony came to be. Through this powerful story, we get a glimpse of a possible path forward, and I just hope that our real future as a planet and a species has as much resemblance to Gene Roddenberry's vision as possible. A larger-than-life viewing experience.
77. The Fugitive (1993)
"I didn't kill my wife!"
"I don't care!"
Andrew Davis's The Fugitive is one of those impressive films of which you can say that there are tons of movies just like this one, but none that are quite as good. This 90's classic is simply the best of its kind, with the category being intense and exciting cat-and-mouse chase thrillers. My own relationship with the film is quite special, as I remember seeing short bits and pieces of it at a very young age on an airplane, and I kept thinking that it looks like the coolest action thriller ever made (every time I glanced at the screen, there was something totally awesome happening), but afterwards I wasn't able to find out what film it was. This bugged me for years, until eventually I saw The Fugitive, and about half an hour into the flick, realized that this was the movie I had been looking for all those years.
And boy, it was worth the wait. With Harrison Ford playing an innocent man falsely accused of killing his wife, and Tommy Lee Jones playing the U.S. Marshal who is after him, this film has no dull moments in its entertaining and suspenseful plot. While Ford's character Richard Kimble evades the authorities, he simultaneously tries to figure out the mystery of who really was behind his wife's murder, and this setting leads to a whole lot of close calls, chase sequences, clever escape moments and all sorts of thrilling set pieces. If I was asked to name the perfect crime/action thriller, 9 times out of 10 this would be the first film to come to mind.
76. Boyhood (2014)
"So what's the point?"
"Of what?"
"I don't know, any of this. Everything"
"Everything? What's the point? I mean, I sure as shit don't know. Neither does anybody else, okay? We're all just winging it, you know. The good news is you're feeling stuff. And you've got to hold on to that"
The genre of coming-of-age movies has often fallen into repeating certain tropes and clichés, so a filmmaker has to get creative when wanting to produce an entry into this genre that stands out from the crowd. This is exactly what Richard Linklater did, through a stroke of absolute genius - Boyhood was filmed across twelve years, so that the audience gets to see the main character grow in a slow and realistic manner. In the beginning of the film, Mason (Ellar Coltrane) is six years old, and by the end, he's arriving at college.
While there's a lot to appreciate in this tender and moving film, the concept and the way it is executed is definitely Boyhood's biggest asset. It's so wonderful to follow the characters aging little by little, and one has to respect the commitment of the film's cast and crew as they gave such a long period of their lives into this project. Mason's growth is as intriguing and well-written as it is visually impressive, and Coltrane does a great job carrying the role. Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke provide absolutely sublime performances as his parents, who also undergo quite the character archs throughout the long-spanning story. I always appreciate a good "gimmick movie", but my respect goes to a whole new level when the film doesn't just stick to its gimmick but also manages to be quality cinema in general, gimmick or no gimmick.
75. Forrest Gump (1994)
"Run, Forrest, run!"
Tom Hanks stars in this modern classic as Forrest Gump, a mentally challenged man with a heart of gold and a hand in multiple historical moments. From Vietnam and the civil rights movement all the way to Watergate, this lovable protagonist makes his way through life while having a front row seat to key moments in modern American history, very much making this into the We Didn't Start The Fire of movies.
Forrest Gump is quite the no-brainer for a "Top 100 movies of all time" list, as it is such a classic and rightfully so. Eric Roth's heartwarming script based on Winston Groom's novel, Robert Zemeckis's quality directing, Hanks's amazing lead performance and the visual effects department's brilliant job editing the fictional protagonist into real-life footage of historical events all won very well-deserved Academy Awards, which is extremely impressive when considering what a competitive year 1994 was at the Oscars (Pulp Fiction and The Shawshank Redemption came out during the same year, which many consider to be the greatest individual year in cinema history).
74. Lost Highway (1997)
"You were in the house, calling my name, but I couldn't find you. Then there you were, lying in bed...but it wasn't you. It looked like you, but it wasn't"
If a typical filmmaker wanted to make a film about dreaming or capture the essence of a dream into a film of theirs, they would likely employ means such as impressive visuals, fantasy elements like flying and superpowers, and other elements found in dream-related films such as Inception (2010) and Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). But my man David Lynch is no ordinary filmmaker. For Lost Highway, he decided to capture the very feeling of dreaming by making such a film that watching it literally feels like dreaming - namely, everything is confusing as hell. The locations, character names and identities, and plot threads keep shifting and changing with no explanations, very much like they do during one's sleep. When I first saw the film, I didn't know that Lynch's grand idea was to make the end product feel like a dream, but after I read about this in my post-viewing confusion (fellow Lynch fans will know this exact feeling), everything suddenly made sense.
Beyond the film's fantastically confusing atmosphere and delightfully illogical plot, Lost Highway has a whole lot going on for it as a film in general. Angelo Badalamenti's psychedelic instrumental score and the heavy use of Rammstein in the soundtrack make for a unique soundscape, and Lynch's directing skills are as evident as ever. Bill Pullman provides a dynamite lead performance, lifted to further greatness by Patricia Arquette's supporting roles as two different characters who are possibly different versions of the same character, not to mention Robert Blake's incredibly creepy performance as the Mystery Man (that's literally the name of the character in the film's credits, and what a fitting name it is). Watching this film will mess with your head, and I thoroughly recommend it to everyone who enjoys the occasional mind-boggle.
73. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
"Did you do it?"
"Yes"
"What did it cost?"
"Everything"
Once again, my love for comic book movies is on full display, this time with this Marvel blockbuster of gargantuan scale. The eighteenth feature film to come out of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Infinity War is the very epitome of how well-built groundwork and build-up can lead to fantastic payoffs and climaxes. Seeing the main characters of so many different films coming together in a natural-feeling and entertaining fashion is pretty amazing, especially as directors Anthony and Joe Russo manage to balance out everyone's screen time and character arch to a point of perfection. The previous Avengers movie had been criticized for feeling like a thousand different characters just appear with no particular focus on anyone, and here it has been fixed: every Avenger has their own character development and own moments in the spotlight, which is quite a feat for a film with so many major characters.
The greatest achievement of Infinity War, however, is how it managed to be two very different things at once, thus giving every Marvel fan what they wanted. The task ahead of this climactic film seemed impossible: what many comic book fans wanted was for the film to serve as an ultimate team-up, with all Avengers uniting gloriously to fight together against a big villain - meanwhile, many cinema enthusiasts were bored with the 'Marvel formula' and specifically wanted the film to do things differently, instead of being yet another occasion of the heroes teaming up and defeating the bad guy in a CGI-filled fight sequence.
Somehow, Marvel pulled off an end product that satisfied both groups: the film does give the nerd crowd what they wanted, as the film features all Avengers coming together to fight Thanos (Josh Brolin) in an ultimate manner, yet the movie buffs who wanted something bold and unconventional were equally thrilled, as the film's final act takes an insane turn that people didn't see coming. Infinity War was enough of a conventional superhero hit to feel like a proper Avengers blockbuster, but it was also way more than that with its bold storytelling that will definitely go down in cinema history as quite the game-changer.
72. Casablanca (1942)
"Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship"
I think it says a lot about the dialogue in Casablanca that I spent way too many minutes deciding which iconic line I would choose to represent the film. The dialogue in this classic of the highest order is filled to the brim with quotes so iconic that watching the film for the first time is full of "Hey, I've heard this one!" sensations. Apart from its golden dialogue, Casablanca has a whole lot going on for it - a well-written love story, timeless performances by Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, and some great tunes (both in Max Steiner's instrumental soundtrack and the songs performed by Dooley Wilson's pianist character Sam).
The overarching World War II setting, as well as the more specific milieu of the vibrant temporary safe haven of Casablanca, Morocco, not to mention the exact location of Rick's Café Américain, all make for a unique and colorful (despite the black-and-white cinematography, heh) atmosphere. Casablanca dabbles successfully in an impressive amount of genres: it makes for a gripping look at the war without being a war film, it features delightful moments of light humor despite not being a comedy, and the mounting tension of the final act will have you at the edge of your seat even though it's not a thriller. There's a little bit of everything in this legendary film, which might be why people still watch and enjoy it after 79 years.
71. Finding Nemo (2003)
"Just keep swimming"
I will always have a huge spot in my heart for this beloved childhood favorite. The film's colorful animation, exciting setting and adventurous Thomas Newman soundtrack make for an atmosphere of pure curiosity and fascination. As we follow Marlin (Albert Brooks) and Dory (Ellen DeGeneres) in their search for Marlin's son Nemo (Alexander Gould), they meet multiple intriguing characters and make their way through exciting obstacles and visually magnificent milieus.
The overall magical feel of this movie and the way it captures the sheer epicness of the world under the sea, not to mention my childhood nostalgia and subsequent emotional attachment to the film, make Finding Nemo into a big favorite of mine in the category of animation, family movies and cinema in general. If you have small children, make sure they see this film - hopefully they will be as much in awe as I once was.
Thank you for reading! Tune in next Thursday, as I continue my ranking from #70 to #61. The next batch of ten features directing from Peter Jackson to Christopher Nolan, stars from Al Pacino to Tom Hanks, as well as genres from World War II epic to slasher horror.
P.S. after I publicly shamed my parents in last week's blog for never finishing Citizen Kane (1941), I must now give them credit as they sat down together with me last Friday to finally watch the film. One of them even enjoyed it. I can now be proud of my parents and admit that they are cultured people, despite their occasional shortcomings. Maybe my next challenge will be making them watch Schindler's List (1993).
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