by Allan Fish
Here we go…
Best Picture Psycho, US (9 votes)
Best Director Alfred Hitchcock, Psycho (8 votes)
Best Actor Anthony Perkins, Psycho (7 votes)
Best Actress Shirley MacLaine, The Apartment (5 votes)
Best Supp Actor Fred MacMurray, The Apartment (6 votes)
Best Supp Actress Janet Leigh, Psycho (10 votes)
Best Cinematography Raoul Coutard, A Bout de Souffle (5 votes)
Best Score Bernard Herrmann, Psycho (14 votes)
Best Short High Note, Chuck Jones, US (2 votes)
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and my own choices…
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Best Picture PSYCHO, US
Best Director Jean-Luc Godard, A Bout de Souffle
Best Actor Anthony Perkins, Psycho
Best Actress Hideko Takamine, When a Woman Ascends the Stairs
Best Supporting Actor Chabi Biswas, Devi
Best Supporting Actress Shirley Jones, Elmer Gantry
Best Cinematography Sven Nykvist, The Virgin Spring
Best Musical Score Bernard Herrmann, Psycho
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and on to 1961…
1961
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Best Picture/Director
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Accattone (Italy…Pier Paolo Pasolini)
Allures (US…Jordan Belson)
Alyonka (USSR…Boris Barnet)
L’Amant de Cinq Jours (France…Philippe de Broca)
And Love Has Vanished (Yugoslavia…Alexander Petrovic)
L’Année Dernière à Marienbad (France…Alain Resnais)
Antigone (Greece…George Tzavellas)
The Assassin (Italy…Elio Petri)
Une Aussi Longue Absence (Italy…Henri Colpi)
Bandits of Orgosolo (Italy…Vittorio de Seta)
Baron Munchhausen (Czechoslovakia…Karel Zeman)
Barravento (Brazil…Glauber Rocha)
Bitter End of a Sweet Night (Japan…Yoshishige Yoshida)
Blast of Silence (US…Allen Baron)
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (US…Blake Edwards)
Brutality in Stone (West Germany…Alexander Kluge)
Cartouche (France…Philippe de Broca)
Chronique d’un Éte (France…Jean Rouch)
Clear Sky (USSR…Grigori Chukhrai)
Le Comte de Monte Cristo (France…Claude Autant-Lara)
The Connection (US…Shirley Clarke)
Cuba, si… (France…Chris Marker)
Dance in the Rain (Yugoslavia…Bostjan Hladnik)
The Day the Earth Caught Fire (UK…Val Guest)
Design for Dying (Japan…Kozaburo Yoshimura)
The Diplomat’s Mansion (Japan…Shiro Toyoda)
Divorce Italian Style (Italy…Pietro Germi)
El Cid (US…Anthony Mann)
The End of Summer (Japan…Yasujiro Ozu)
Une Femme est une Femme (France…Jean-Luc Godard)
The Girl With the Golden Eyes (France…Jean-Gabriel Albicocco)
The Girl With a Suitcase (Italy…Valerio Zurlini)
The Guns of Navarone (US…J.Lee Thompson)
Hand in Hand (UK…Philip Leacock)
The Human Condition Part III: A Soldier’s Prayer (Japan…Masaki Kobayashi)
The Hustler (US…Robert Rossen)
Immortal Love (Japan…Keisuke Kinoshita)
The Innocents (UK…Jack Clayton)
The Inundated (Argentina…Fernando Birri)
Jack the Giant Killer (US…Nathan Juran)
Judgment at Nuremberg (US…Stanley Kramer)
Labyrinth (Czechoslovakia…Jan Lenica)
Léon Morin, Priest (France…Jean-Pierre Melville)
Line (Norway…Nils Reinhardt Christensen)
Lola (France…Jacques Demy)
Love Mates (Sweden…Lars-Magnus Lindgren)
Lover Come Back (US…Delbert Mann)
A Lustful Man (Japan…Yasuso Masumura)
The Misfits (US…John Huston)
Mother Joan of the Angels (Poland…Jerzy Kawalerowicz)
La Notte (Italy…Michelangelo Antonioni)
Of Stars and Men (US…John Hubley)
One Eyed Jacks (US…Marlon Brando)
One Hundred and One Dalmatians (US…Hamilton Luske, Wolfgang Reitherman, Clyde Geronimi)
One, Two, Three (US…Billy Wilder)
Paris Nous Appartient (France…Jacques Rivette)
Payroll (UK…Sidney Hayers)
Pigs and Battleships (Japan…Shohei Imamura)
Plácido (Spain…Luis Garcia Berlanga)
Il Posto (Italy…Ermanno Olmi)
A Raisin in the Sun (US…Daniel Petrie)
Salvatore Giuliano (Italy…Francesco Rosi)
Samson (Poland…Andrzej Wajda)
The Sea Knows (South Korea…Kim Ki-young)
Siberian Lady Macbeth (Yugoslavia…Andrzej Wajda)
Splendor in the Grass (US…Elia Kazan)
The Steamroller and the Violin (USSR…Andrei Tarkovsky)
Stray Bullet (South Korea…Yoo Hyun-mok)
A Taste of Honey (UK…Tony Richardson)
Ten Dark Women (Japan…Kon Ichikawa)
Through a Glass, Darkly (Sweden…Ingmar Bergman)
Too Late Blues (US…John Cassavetes)
Les Trois Mousquetaires: Parts I & II (France…Bernard Borderie)
Two Rode Together (US…John Ford)
Underworld U.S.A. (US…Samuel Fuller)
Victim (UK…Basil Dearden)
Viridiana (Spain…Luis Buñuel)
Waiting for Godot (US…Alan Schneider)
West Side Story (US…Robert Wise, Jerome Robbins)
Whistle Down the Wind (UK…Bryan Forbes)
A Wife Confesses (Japan…Yasuzo Masumura)
Yojimbo (Japan…Akira Kurosawa)
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Best Actor
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Warren Beatty Splendor in the Grass
Dirk Bogarde Victim
Charles Boyer Fanny
James Cagney One, Two, Three
Cassen Placido
Soumitra Chatterjee Two Daughters
Franco Citti Accattone
Peter Finch No Love for Johnnie
Clark Gable The Misfits
Charlton Heston El Cid
Raizo Ichikawa A Lustful Man
Marcello Mastroianni Divorce Italian Style
Toshiro Mifune Yojimbo
Choi Mu-ryong Stray Bullet
Tatsuya Nakadai The Human Condition Part III
Ganjiro Nakamura The End of Summer
Paul Newman The Hustler
Sidney Poitier A Raisin in the Sun
Maximilian Schell Judgment at Nuremberg
Spencer Tracy Judgment at Nuremberg
Stuart Whitman The Mark
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Best Actress
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Anouk Aimée Lola
Harriet Andersson Through a Glass Darkly
Claudia Cardinale The Girl with the Suitcase
Aparna Das Gupta Two Daughters
Suzanne Flon Thou Shalt Not Kill
Audrey Hepburn Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Anna Karina Une Femme est une Femme
Piper Laurie The Hustler
Deborah Kerr The Innocents
Geraldine Page Summer and Smoke
Irene Papas Antigone
Silvia Pinal Viridiana
Dusa Pockaj Dance in the Rain
Rosalind Russell A Majority of One
Hideko Takamine Immortal Love
Rita Tushingham A Taste of Honey
Alida Valli Une Aussi Longue Absence
Ayako Wakao A Wife Confesses
Lucyna Winnicka Mother Joan of the Angels
Natalie Wood Splendor in the Grass
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Best Supp Actor
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Leon Askin One, Two, Three
Alan Barnes Whistle Down the Wind
Gunnar Björnstrand Through a Glass Darkly
George Chakiris West Side Story
Montgomery Clift Judgment at Nuremberg
Jackie Gleason The Hustler
Pat Hingle Splendor in the Grass
Stanley Holloway No Love for Johnnie
Manos Katrakis Antigone
John McGiver Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Leo McKern The Day the Earth Caught Fire
Murray Melvin A Taste of Honey
Tatsuya Nakadai Yojimbo
Dennis Price Victim
Jesus Puche Placido
Tony Randall Lover Come Back
George C.Scott The Hustler
Rod Steiger The Mark
Martin Stephens The Innocents
Torin Thatcher Jack the Giant Killer
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Best Supp Actress
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Fay Bainter The Children’s Hour
Dora Bryan A Taste of Honey
Mylène Demongeot Les Trois Mousquetaires – Parts I & II
Joan Fontaine Tender is the Night
Pamela Franklin The Innocents
Judy Garland Judgment at Nuremberg
Megs Jenkins The Innocents
Margaret Johnston Night of the Eagle
Lotte Lenya The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone
Barbara Loden Splendor in the Grass
Una Merkel Summer and Smoke
Rita Moreno West Side Story
Genevieve Page El Cid
Jean Simmons The Grass is Greener
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Best Cinematography
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José F.Agayo Viridiana
Raoul Coutard Une Femme est une Femme
Raoul Coutard Lola
Gianni di Venanzo La Notte
Gianni di Venanzo Salvatore Giuliano
Daniel L.Fapp West Side Story
Freddie Francis The Innocents
Boris Kaufman Splendor in the Grass
Robert Krasker El Cid
Walter Lassally A Taste of Honey
Christian Matras Cartouche
Russell Metty The Misfits
Kazuo Miyagawa Yojimbo
Zoshio Miyajima The Human Condotion Part II: A Soldier’s Prayer
Sven Nykvist Through a Glass Darkly
Eugene Schufftan The Hustler
Ragmar Sorensen Line
Sacha Vierny L’Année Dernière à Marienbad
Jerzy Wojcik Mother Joan of the Angels
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Best Score
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Georges Auric The Innocents
Georges Delerue Cartouche
Michel Legrand Lola
Zdenek Liska Baron Munchausen
Henry Mancini Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Paul Misraki Les Trois Mousquetaires: Parts I & II
Miklós Rózsa El Cid
Mikló Rózsa King of Kings
Masuru Sato Yojimbo
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Best Short
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The House (US…Louis van Gasteren)
I made one late change on my 1960 ballot for musical score, naming Elmer Bernstein’s magnificent work for Robert Mulligan’s THE RAT RACE, edging ahead of the iconic Herrmann score I had previously named.
For 1961, in addition to my best film, there are several others that achieve masterpiece or near-masterpiece status: VIRIDIANA, LA NOTTE, LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY, EL CID, THE HUMAN CONDITION 3, SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS, IL POSTO, THE INNOCENTS. PIGS AND BATTLESHIPS, 101 DALMATIANS, ACCATTONE, ANTIGONE.
Best Picture: West Side Story
Best Director: Robert Wise and Jerome Robins (West Side Story)
Best Actor: Maximillian Schell (Judgement at Nuremberg)
Best Actress: Harriett Andersson (Through A Glass Darkly)
Best Supporting Actor: George Chakiris (West Side Story)
Best Supporting Actress: Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Best Cinematography: Sacha Vierney (Last Year at Marienbad)
Best Score: Miklos Rozsa (El Cid)
Best Short: Antonio Gaudi
Yay for “Psycho” winning best picture and score in 1960. Yay for Anthony Perkins winning best supporting actor for “Psycho” in 1960.
I vote “Viridiana” for best film in 1961.
I vote Luis Buñuel for best director (“Viridiana”) in 1961.
I vote “Yet Akash (A fire)” for best short in 1961.
I vote Toshiro Mifune for best actor in “Yojimbo” in 1961.
I vote Silvia Pinal for best actress in “Viridiana” in 1961.
I vote Vincent Price for best supporting actor in “The Pit and the Pendulum” in 1961.
I vote “Viridiana” for best cinematography in 1961.
I vote “Yojimbo” for best score in 1961.
Feature: Through a Glass Darkly
Short: as with last week I’ll return after watching all the nominees.
Director: Alain Resnais (Last Year at Marienbad)
Actor: Toshiro Mifune (Yojimbo)
Actress: (tie) Harriet Andersson (Through a Glass Darkly) for performance & Audrey Hepburn (Breakfast at Tiffany’s) for star power (I try to avoid ties, but these are both so memorable in such different ways that I wanted to honor both. Rita Tushingham and Anna Karina are also close contenders)
Supp. Actor: Murray Melvin (A Taste of Honey)
Supp. Actress: Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Cinematography: Sacha Vierny (Last Year at Marienbad)
Score: A Woman
Hepburn! shudder.
Argh, published before I was done. Right as my break ends. Typical. Will complete in 2 1/2 hours…
Pic- Through a Glass Darkly
Dir- Resnais – Last Year at Marienbad
Actor- Cagney – One, Two, Three
Actress- Harriet Andersson – Through a Glass Darkly
Supp. Actor- George C Scott – The Hustler
Supp. Actress- Rita Moreno – West Side Story
Score- Michel Legrand – Lola
Cinematography- Sacha Vierny – Last Year at Marienbad
Part 2
Score: Henry Mancini (Breakfast at Tiffany’s) – how come no Woman is a Woman or Last Year at Marienbad?
Screenplay: Il Posto
Editing: Accattone
Honorable Mention:
Divorce, Italian Style
The Hustler
*Paris Belongs to Us
Viridiana
A Woman is a Woman
honorable mention to the honorable mentions: Judgement at Nuremberg. Kramer gets knocked a lot, and probably rightfully so, but this one’s pretty damn good and see it’s getting the recognition in votes as such.
Not getting any easier….
Best Picture: El Cid (Runner-up: Yojimbo)
Best Director: Mann (Runner-up: Resnais)
Best Actor: Mifune (Runners-up: Nakadai, Heston, Mastroianni)
Best Actress: Karina (Runner-up: Kerr)
Supporting Actor: Gleason
Supporting Actress: Oh, what the hell!… Moreno (runner-up: Sophia Loren, El Cid)
Cinematography: Vierny (color: Coutard, Un Femme…)
Score: Sato (runner-up: Rosza, King of Kings)
Pic: Yojimbo (Japan…Akira Kurosawa)
Director: Yojimbo (Japan…Akira Kurosawa)
Actor: Maximilian Schell Judgment at Nuremberg
Actress: Audrey Hepburn Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Sup Actor: George C.Scott The Hustler
Sup Actress: Rita Moreno West Side Story
Cinematography: Kazuo Miyagawa Yojimbo
More Hepburn, double shudder.
Best Picture: Viridiana
Top Five: 1. Viridiana 2. The Innocents 3. Yojimbo 4. Last Year At Marienbad 5. The Hustler
Picture: Viridiana
Director: Luis Bunuel,Viridiana
Actor: Toshiro Mifune, Yojimbo
Actress, Harriet Andersson, Through a Glass,Darkly
Sup. Actor: Fernando Rey, Viridiana
Sup. Actress: Dora Bryan, A Taste of Honey
Cinematography: Sacha Vierny, Last Year at Marienbad
I really have a bit more affection for the Clayton film than I do the big musical, but I realize that WEST SIDE STORY is a bit more ambitious and more difficult to pull off, plus it broke all sorts of new ground for the genre, and remains a much-loved and fantastically well-crafted film. Even so, THE INNOCENTS doesn’t go home empty-handed.
There are some exclusions in Allan’s list that absolutely must be mere oversights. The acting races can’t be complete this year without considering the cast of A RAISIN IN THE SUN–Sidney Poitier for Actor, Claudia MacNeil for Actress, and Ruby Dee for Supporting Actress. Also, I placed Spencer Tracy (also not listed) in the Best Actor race for JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG, but I moved Maxmillian Schell to the Supporting race, because I always thought it belonged there. And how does Megs Jenkins get considered for her pleasant but not absolutely memorable turn in THE INNOCENTS, while the extra-creepy Martin Stephens gets forgotten. Finally, and most glaringly, there’s no mention of Natalie Wood from SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS (even though three other cast members get noted), or Marilyn Monroe for THE MISFITS. Again, surely many of these are oversights, and could be added back in.
Thanks to MovieMan for putting up lists and links to the short film finalists! I voted for VERY NICE VERY NICE, but I also voted a second for a non-listed film–John Whitney’s CATALOG, also an influence on 2001 and the very first film to use computer-generated images!
Anyway, here we go!
1961
PICTURE: WEST SIDE STORY, followed by The Innocents, Through a Glass Darkly, Yojimbo, The Hustler, Judgment at Nuremberg, Divorce Italian Style, One Two Three, Splendor in the Grass, Blast of Silence, The End of Summer, A Raisin in the Sun, 101 Dalmatians, La Notte, Baron Munchausen, The Misfits, Last Year at Marienbad, Viridiana, Night Tide, The Exiles, Whistle Down the Wind, The Hoodlum Priest, One-Eyed Jacks, Underworld USA, Barabbas, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Children’s Hour, The Guns of Navarone, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Curse of the Werewolf, The Parent Trap, Five Minutes to Live, The Errand Boy)
DIRECTOR: Jack Clayton, THE INNOCENTS (2nd: Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise, West Side Story)
ACTOR: Sidney Poitier, A RAISIN IN THE SUN (2nd: Paul Newman, The Hustler followed by Marcello Mastroianni, Divorce Italian Style; James Cagney, One Two Three; Toshiro Mifune, Yojimbo; Spencer Tracy, Judgment at Nuremberg)
ACTRESS: Harriett Andersson, THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY (2nd: Natalie Wood, Splendor in the Grass followed by Deborah Kerr, The Innocents; Marilyn Monroe, The Misfits; Claudia MacNeil, A Raisin in the Sun; Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany’s)
SUPPORTING ACTOR: Jackie Gleason, THE HUSTLER (2nd: Martin Stephens, The Innocents followed by Maxmillian Schell, Judgment at Nuremberg; George C. Scott, The Hustler; Keir Dullea, The Hoodlum Priest; Montgomery Clift, Judgment at Nuremberg)
SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Rita Moreno, WEST SIDE STORY (2nd: Judy Garland, Judgment at Nuremberg followed by Ruby Dee, A Raisin in the Sun; Barbara Loden, Splendor in the Grass; Thelma Ritter, The Misfits; Fay Bainter, The Children’s Hour)
SHORT: VERY NICE VERY NICE (Arthur Lipsett) (2nd: Catalog (John Whitney))
CINEMATOGRAPHY: Freddie Francis, THE INNOCENTS (2nd (B&W): Sven Nykvist, Through a Glass Darkly)
ORIGINAL SCORE: Henry Mancini, BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S (2nd: Miklos Rosza, El Cid)
FURTHER:
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Ingmar Bergman, THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY (2nd: William Inge, Splendor in the Grass)
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Truman Capote and William Archibald, THE INNOCENTS (2nd: Abby Mann, Judgment at Nuremberg)
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: THE EXILES (Kent MacKenzie)
COLOR CINEMATOGRAPHY: Daniel L. Fapp, WEST SIDE STORY (2nd: Asakasu Nakai, The End of Summer)
B&W ART DIRECTION: ONE TWO THREE
COLOR ART DIRECTION: WEST SIDE STORY
B&W COSTUME DESIGN: THE INNOCENTS
COLOR COSTUME DESIGN: WEST SIDE STORY
FILM EDITING: WEST SIDE STORY
SOUND: WEST SIDE STORY
SCORING OF A MUSICAL: Saul Chaplin, Johnny Greene, Sid Ramin, Irwin Kostal, WEST SIDE STORY
ORIGINAL SONG: “Moon River” from BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S, Music by Henry Mancini and lyrics by Johnny Mercer (2nd: “Town Without Pity” from Town Without Pity, music by Dimitri Tiomkin and lyrics by Ned Washington)
SPECIAL EFFECTS: THE GUNS OF NAVARONE
MAKEUP: THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF
ANIMATED FEATURE: 101 DALMATIANS
Thanks Dean – I have raced to assemble these additions the past few weeks but am hoping to take more time in assembling the next ones. I you have any suggestions, or a master list which includes shorts in any capacity, lemme know. I’m going to try and stretch as widely as possible, especially once I reach the mid 70s and Amos Vogel’s master list is no longer of any use. I remember you had some great selections in your screen cap compilation, which I’ll definitely be examining for future selections. I’m really looking forward to this exercise because I’m going to get to discover so many films I haven’t seen before. Already peeking ahead at some of the weird early CGI of the 80s has me intrigued.
Btw, interesting that no I chose the Lester film
To finish my thought: interesting no one chose the Lester film last week. Although I didn’t find it as amusing as I thought I would. Munro was hilarious and almost got my vote.
The Lester film is a great historical document but doesn’t work entirely, so it’s no surprise that it wasn’t chosen. As a former film festival programmer, I understand the importance of short film work, because some stories are perfect for shorter lengths. I truly encourage all film lovers here to experience the short films listed here, and in the future, because I think they enhance our understanding of the scope of individual movies. Simply said, there are some things that short films can do that feature length films cannot.
Interestingly enough though I seldom feel that narrative is one of those things. I can count a lot of short films among my favorites, but hardly any narratives – and even those are only narratives loosely (like the surrealist shorts of the Fleischers or Tex Avery, where the narrative is just a clothesline for hilarious gags and wild images).
LOL For what it’s worth (and that’s proibably not much), I was thrilled to find out I had 6 out of 8 winners on my ballot for 1959-Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor and Score…
In any case…
Here we go:
PICTURE: WEST SIDE STORY
Top 5: 1. West Side Story 2. Through a Glass Darkly 3. Yojimbo 4. Last Year at Marienbad 5. The Hustler
This was a supremely difficult choice for me, what with the one-two-three puch from three of the very greatest foreign films ever made. However, WEST SIDE STORY beat the competition from other lands not my own with its epic scope and its vibrant, one-of-a-kind movement that was rare both before it and after it in the realm of screen musicals. It comes damned close to matching SINGIN IN THE RAIN for the title of greatest musical ever afforded the movies. If the score was only a screen original it would stand the tallest.
DIRECTOR: Jerome ROBBINS, Robert WISE (WEST SIDE STORY)
Essentially, it’s a win for Robbins and Wise because of the brilliant fanning out they do to the stage material that makes WEST SIDE STORY more organic and realistic. It introduced a kind of choreography never seen in films and Wise was perfect to capture every little detail and nuance Robbins brought to the show in movement and intensifying the music color of the greatest American opera of all.
LEAD ACTOR: Toshiro MIFUNE (YOJIMBO)-This was a tough choice for one reason and one reason only: PAUL NEWMAN. Newman ALMOST had me with THE HUSTLER. However, Mifune creates a kind of brutal, comic legend with his mythical hero in one of Kurosawas most entertaining and repeatable films. It’s like watching the creation of a comic book superhero with all of the humanistic traits so few have. Mifune became one of my favorite actors after I first saw him in this film and I’ve followed him ever since. Newman, on the other hand, has always been my first leading man screen crush and I could watch him in anything. The pain of rehabilitation and the gaining of maturity in a world he thinks he had by the balls is noirish perfection. But, as Newman will have his day with me shortly, Mifune takes it for his gargantuan turn. I love it.
LEAD ACTRESS: Harriett ANDERSSON (THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY)
A powerhouse of a performance by one of the true greats in all of cinema, her turn hovered over all the truly great ones and even a few that were nailing her hem down to keep her from running for the prize. Intense one moment and quietly retrospective the next, Andersson’s performance is so good you cannot take your eyes off her a second even when other great actors are in the room. Natalie Wood (SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS) came very close, her nervous breakdown at the halfway mark can reduce you to a stomach ache (her very best performance in a mediocre career).
SUPP. ACTOR: George CHAKIRIS (WEST SIDE STORY)
He’s got just enough time on the dance floor and in the big dramatic knife fight to get the competitiion running behind him to the finish line. However, its a long gap between him and the runner-up. There’s a kinetic energy on the screen whenever he walks into frame and his moments with Rita Moreno are sexually heated.
SUPP. ACTRESS: Rita MORENO (WEST SIDE STORY)
Probably the best performance by an actress in either category after Harriett Andersson. Moreno was out to prove something with her turn as the go-between Anita and, in one foul swoop delivered a performance that breathlessly balances song, dance, dramatics and humor with effortless versatility. She made her mark with WEST SIDE STORY. OSCAR got this one right and it was really a no-brainer for me. The greatest single moment in the film is her handling of the show-stopping AMERICA. She matches in dance and vocals every flourish and sweep of Bernsteins frenetic orchestrations in that number. She’s got real heat, to spare, here.
PHOTO: Daniel L. FAPP (WEST SIDE STORY)
The use of bright primary colors make the visuals look like graffitti paintings from New York City come to life. Fapp’s cinematography allows New York City to become the most ominous character in the film, one of great majesty and, at the same time, one of such huge power that it can crush you like a bug.
MUSIC: George AURIC (THE INNOCENTS)
One of the most delicate and intimate scores for a horror film ever written, it’s got the delicacy of a china cup on the verge of tottering off a table and crashing on the floor. Unsettling would be the best word to describe this, the best score of the year, and one that could bring you to madness in its repetitious nuance. It was this score that took THE INNOCENTS from very good film to great film for me. It was the tipping point.
Christ, Dennis, not another on the West Side Story bandwagon. I only hope Sam paid you a decent bribe or gave you somne of the R2 DVDs for free.
As of late I find myself agreeing more and more with Dennis. Who’d a thunk it?
Best Picture: West Side Story
Best Directors: Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins (West Side Story)
Best Actor: Paul Newman (The Hustler)
Best Actress: Harriet Andersson (Through A Glass Darkly)
Best Supporting Actor: George Chakiris (West Side Story)
Best Supporting Actress: Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Best Cinematography: Gianni Di Venanzo (La Notte)
Best Short: The Fat and the Lean (Polanski)
Best Score: Miklos Rozsa (El Cid)
Best Picture: Viridiana
Best Director: Alain Resnais (Last Year at Marienbad)
Best Actor: James Cagney (One, Two, Three)
Best Actress: Silvia Pinal (Viridiana)
Best Supporting Actor: Fernando Rey (Viridiana)
Best Supporting Actress: Jean Simmons (The Grass is Greener)
Best Cinematography: Sacha Vierney (Last Year at Marienbad)
Best Score: Miklos Rozsa (El Cid)
I don’t need a bribe to vote for one of the best of movie musicals………..
Best Picture: West Side Story
Best Director(s): Wise, Robins
Best Actor: Max Schell
Best Actress: Audrey Hepburn
Best Sup. Actor: F. Rey
Best Sup. Actress: R. Moreno
Best Short: Beep Prepared
Best Score: M. Rozsa, El Cid
Best Cinematography: S. Nykvist
Don’t listen Frank… I’ve only loved WEST SIDE STORY since I first saw it as a teenager…
No, but as Sam will be in the school prodding you to comment, there’s a message for him…BALLS!
Don’t really think I need Sam to prod me to vote. It has become a weekly ritual to cast a vote on this thread. Sometimes I agree with Sam, sometimes I don’t. I didn’t vote for Ben-Hur during the recent bruhaha. Balls is questioning the legitimacy of my vote, which I pretty much do now automatically.
The message was for Sam…
It may have been for Sam, but it implies that I was coaxed into voting for a weekly thread I have been there for over many weeks.
So ‘L’Avventura’ and ‘Breathless’ go down in flames to a prolonged sick joke (“mother isn’t herself today”), Hitch’s stuffed-bird and pickled-corpse carnival ride. Onward and upward in 1961.
Film: ‘La Notte’
Director: Alain Resnais (‘Last Year At Marienbad’)
Actor: Marlon Brando (‘One-Eyed Jacks’)
Actress: Jeanne Moreau (‘La Notte’)
S. Actor: Jackie Gleason (‘The Hustler’)
S. Actress: Lotte Lenya (‘The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone’)
Photography: Gianni di Venanzo (‘La Notte’) & Robert Krasker (‘El Cid’)
And here we get to start up on another of my obsessive favorites… Things are likely to stay heavy on the Imamura in coming years…
PICTURE: Pigs and Battleships
DIRECTOR: Shohei Imamura
LEAD ACTOR: Mifune, Yojimbo
LEAD ACTRESS: Harriet Anderson, Through a Glass Darkly
SUPPORTING ACTOR: George C. SCott, The Hustler
SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Rita Moreno, West SIde Story
SHORT: Very Nice, Very Nice (forgot I had seen that one…)
SCORE: Toshiro Mayazumi, Pigs and Battleships
CINEMATOGRAPHY: Shinsaku Himeda, Pigs and Battleships
Here is John Whitney’s CATALOG, the very first computer-generated film.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbV7loKp69s&w=420&h=315%5D
My top five for 1961: Last Year at Marienbad, La Notte, Through a Glass Darkly, Viridiana, A Woman is a Woman.
Best Picture: Last Year at Marienbad
Best Director: Alain Resnais
Best Actor: Paul Newman (The Hustler)
Best Actress: Jeanne Moreau (La Notte)
Best Sup. Actor: Montgomery Clift (The Misfits)
Best Sup. Actress: Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Best Cinematography: Sacha Vierny (Last Year at Marienbad)
Best Score: Michel Legrand (Lola)
Best Film: Judgement at Nuremburg
Best Director: Jack Clayton (The Innocents)
Best Actor: Maximillian Schell (Judgement at Nuremburg)
Best Actress: Audrey Hepburn (Breakfast…)
Best Supporting Actor: Montgomery Clift (Judgement…)
Best Supporting Actress: Rita Moreno (West Side Story)
Best Score: Miklos Rozsa (Kings of Kings)
Best Cinematography: Robert Krasker (El Cid)
Best Short: no vote
I am torn between ‘West Side Story’ and ‘Last Year at Marienbad, so I will leave it as a tie. Films as different as one could possibly imagine, but both great in their ways.
Best Film: West Side Story and Last Year at Marienbad
Best Director: Alain Resnais
Best Actor: Toshiro Mifune
Best Actress: Harriet Andersson
Best Sup. Actor: Burt Lancaster (Judgement at Nuremburg)
Best Sup. Actress: Rita Moreno
Best Cinematography: Sacha Vierney
Best Score: Georges Auric
I wouldn’t expect Ritwik Ghatak’s Komal Gandhar to get many votes (or any votes for that matter), as I’m not sure how many here would have watched it. But, that said, I’m a bit surprised, Allan, that you didn’t include its name in the lists above, given that it ranks among his most highly regarded works.
I’m also tad surprised that there have hardly been any takers for Montgomery Clift in Judgement at Nuremberg – though it was a short role, I felt he was quite devastating in it, and nearly imploded onto the screen. He was, in fact, the easiest choice for me in the categories this year.
Allan, just a suggestion – I feel it would be great to have ‘Best Screenplay’ included as well (of course, subject to its feasibility). Given the quality of movies in this decade, as well as next, it would be a challenging exercise voting for it – given the importance of this caategory.
Anyway, my choices for 1961:-
Best Picture: Through A Glass Darkly
Best Director: Ingmar Bergman (Through A Glass Darkly)
Best Actor: Paul Newman (The Hustler)
Best Actress: Jeanne Moreau (La Notte) & Harriet Andersson (Through a Glass Darkly)
Best Supporting Actor: Montgomery Clift (Judgement at Nuremberg)
Best Supporting Actress: Chandana Banerjee (Three Daughters)
Best Cinematography: Eugene Schufftan (The Hustler)
Best Score: Kenyon Hopkins (The Hustler)
Top 10:-
1. Through A Glass Darkly
2. La Notte
3. Komal Gandhar (A Soft Note on a Sharp Scale)
4. The Hustler
5. Pigs & Battleships
6. Judgement at Nuremberg
7. Yojimbo
8. Teen Kanya (Three Daughters)
9. The Girl with a Suitcase
10. Blast of Silence
Ugh, I hate that VIRIDIANA is going to win this thing…
Don’t think so. I have it at 6-4, West Side Story over Viridiania. Huzzahs for the fellow Bergman voters (damn, I realize I’ve voted two Bergmans in a row! So much for spreading the wealth around…) that would be Jon and Shub.
And sirres, for giving Allan his second shudder…
Joel, Bergman will be deeply in the mix down the line for PERSONA, FANNY AND ALEXANDER, CRIES AND WHISPERS, THE SILENCE and perhaps even for SCENES…………
Probably not for Best Picture by my vote though, except maybe Scenes for a Marriage which has some strong competition for me that year.
Persona is the most obvious candidate from here, but I’ll be voting for Masculin Feminin in ’66 which I named as my favorite film of all time last year.
Bergman has a few more Director nods though perhaps (again, just talking about my ballots). Farrokhzad will get my vote in ’63 but ’66 he probably has a clear shot, with Bresson his strongest rival. I’ll have to see how I feel in 4 weeks!
Sorry, but… WHAT THE FUCK?
Jaimie, this is WitD. You must surely know that ANYTHING goes here, right?
LOL!!!!!
That was me commenting on the Bunuel film…WEST SIDE STORY is SO much better.
Stop Dean, your embarrassing yourself.
Tee hee…I added the SO for a little rub-it-in-your-face mojo…
STAHP
Nah, Dean is not embarrassing himself at all, and this is coming from a huge fan of Bunuel and VIRIDIANA. The greatest film musical ever made (yes those who prefer SINGIN IN THE RAIN can’t be argued either) shouldn’t be referred to in such emphatic terms? No, I stand by Dean here, and VIRIDIANA is probably my favorite film from one of my favorite directors.
Saying WSS>VIRID is fine, but the use of SO comes off as adolescent silly.
Ok Fair enough, I see what you are saying.
Still, an opinion is an opinion.
Hey incidentally Allan, where’s your vote for short? You said you were voting till 1970, and specifically this year. I’m kind of curious what you picked.
I’m afraid Joel’s right, the feckin’ numpties win out again. This site is like fly paper for the numpty.
Translation:
My opinion is worth way more than the opinion of others.
The only “numty” in this equation is the peson who is name calling. WEST SIDE STORY for decades has been widely considered one of the greatest screen musicals of all time by critics and audiences. If it wins this year in this polling it should come as no surprise at all.And yes, American-made films do win once in a while in this polling.
It’s just his opinion Sam, but one that has some legs to stand on. While many voters are diverse in their selections, there is a clear segment that’s highly predictable in what they choose (with little deviation) every sunday/monday.
West Side Story and Ben-Hur winning polls doesn’t really mean anything obviously, but it seemingly contradicts the idea/assumption of Wonders being a more serious film blog.
Maurizio, with all due respect I don’t think the opinion as voiced here does have legs to stand on. I don’t criticize other voters for voicing their opinions, much less throw around insults. WHO exactly is making the determination that “WitD is not a serious film blog” because of the support for BEN-HUR or WEST SIDE STORY? You? Allan? So you feel it’s right for someone to call someone else a “numpty” for voicing their opinion? Never is an explanation ever offered in the face of disparity, only insults are hurled. This is a voting thread, not one that should include assaults for difference in taste. This weekly thread has given their best picture prize to Bergman, Bresson, Welles, DeSica, Renoir, Lang, Ford, Capra, Murnau, Chaplin and Keaton in past years. Should we then assume that those votes are now tainted? Or shall we instead just call the results in 1959 and 1961 pure aberation. Because you chose not to take WEST SIDE STORY (a film the great film scholar Stanley Kauffmann calls the greatest film musical ever made in a celebrated review his his scholarly treatise “A World on Film”) as a serious choice should not attempt to disparage the votes of others here who feel otherwise. If you need a more comprehensive look at the film go back to last year’s musical countdown, where the film finished in the Top 4, and was glowingly and perceptively covered in a terrific comment thread under Marilyn Ferdinand’s brilliant essay. Ms. Ferdinand is hardly one who is easy to please. But it all comes down to taste, and I do know yours quite well. If it isn’t film school, it doesn’t quality. Luckily most of the serious critics and audiences have embraced the film over decades.
You of course are free and encouraged to state your opinion.
However what you, Allan or anyone else are not welcome to do is to demean or insult because an opinion might contradict what is esentially nothing more than TASTE. If the insults still are posed, then expect a firm response.
BEN-HUR and/or WEST SIDE STORY as Best Films of their years? Coming from a lifelong fanatic of Bergman, Bresson, Renoir, Tarkovsky, Kieslowski, Vlacil and Ozu, I say it’s most worthy.
BTW I’m not sure what you mean by “some voters are predictable each and every week” but with due respect to you (and you know and love film exceedingly) I don’t doubt it are quite predictable as well. I have you all figured out. But NOT in a bad sense at all, in a very good sense, but still………..predictable.
I would like to think that my vote for WEST SIDE STORY was cast out of reasonable film authority and passion. To suggest that what I did is somehow an embarrassment does more than raise my gander, thank you.
Didn’t realize numpty was some horrific insult to recoil in horror from. I also wasn’t talking about you when mentioning the lack of diversity by some voters.
And when have you ever praised Vlacil before lol.
I don’t get this argument at all, either, Sam.
Predictability lies in how well you know the person casting the vote. In the case of someone like Maurizio, whose laid to bear his tastes here as we all have, he is just as “predictable” as the next person.
WEST SIDE STORY, regardless of what other “haters” here feel, is one of the most acclaimed and critically lauded films of the decade that covered 1960 to 1969. From the point of view of musicals, there are few peers that top it. However, what many people here on WITD don’t do is look deeper at the artisty that went into WSS, the message that is presented in the confines of the musical form and the intense reality of the story. This is NOT SINGIN IN THE RAIN and the film looks more like an independent film attempt at the musical form.
To call a lover for, and a voter for, WEST SIDE STORY a “Numpty” flies in the face of the opionions of those that cast a vote for it. However, you never hear these same people get up in your face when you agree with them and I find it funny that when a film like PSYCHO landslide prevails, and that was as predictable a win as any that has reared it’s head here on these threads, that the numpty’s are given a reprieve from chastisement.
I suppose I’ll get my head handed to me for choosing Julie Andrews for BEST ACTRESS in 1964 and when I annoint E. T. BEST PICTURE in 1982.
I think that what has happened is that many here have crossed over into adulthood and refuse to be touched anymore by what touched them back when they were youths. Actually, I think it’s kind of sad that many here feel it’s imperative to bash films that were, at the time, the beacons that lit the way for their appreciation of film in the very beginning of their life with film. The difference is, though, that while many of the films that were embraced when we were younger don’t stand up under adult/mature scrutiny, WEST SIDE STORY is one of the few that still maintains it’s ingenuity, artistic roots in forms like opera and classical music, and artistic presentation.
Just because it’s a beloved classic doesn’t mean its not good.
When have I ever praised Vlacil before? Did I hear that right? Well, you did say “lol” so I guess this was meant as a joke.
Are you aware the two years ago I attended a comprehensive Vlacil Festival at the Walter Reade Theatre at Lincoln Center, much to Allan’s proclaimed envy and saw nine films by the director, including his celebrated MARKETA LAZAROVA, THE DEVIL’S TRAP and VALLEY OF THE BEES, not to mention several rarities that will apparently never become available. A few years before that I assisted Allan in leading a ‘BFI petition’ charge to get MARKETA LAZAROVA released on DVD, a venture that succeeded. In addition I will be voting said film #1 in it’s coming year, and in the 60′s poll I had it near the top of my list. It is because of that Vlacil Festival that I became close friends with Allan Hardy, and we continue to refer to it and to this (for me) greatest of all Czechoslovakian directors. I have promoted him endlessly on past diaries, including a comprehensive round-up, and even penned a full review on VALLEY OF THE BEES at the site here:
https://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com/2010/03/26/searing-valley-of-the-bees-from-czech-new-wave-master-frantisek-vlacil/
I don’t know if I could have been more open and more enthusiastic fo any director than I have been for Vlacil.
being that you asked……….LOL!
Oh, here is the Diary round-up on Vlacil:
https://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com/2011/02/07/opera-nixon-in-china-9-frantisek-vlacil-films-8-fritz-lang-films-and-broadway-revival-driving-miss-daisy-on-monday-morning-diary-february-7/
And here is my enthusiastic announcement that the Festival was imminent:
https://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com/2011/02/04/franticek-vlacil-festival-at-walter-reade-theatre-status-with-this-coming-mondays-diary-links/
I also own six Vlacil films on boxed DVDs and have made copies for many people. I am impatiently awaiting for the rarities I saw that may never come.
Yes it was a joke. The Bresson, Ozu, Bergman adoration seems more certain/plentiful when you give a run down of favorites usually. Funny enough, you usually take that name-checking various arty directors approach when you feel your taste has been called into question lol.
I feel I have to when there is a question about my comparative judgement. I want to reaffirm that I am not a WEST SIDE STORY and BEN-HUR loving numpty, but rather someone who can embrace the serious art house stuff, and quality work in a more popular vein in much the same way. Plus I feel I must defend and/or validate the integrity and worthiness of the voting when it comes under fire.
Still, what I alway like about you most of all is that you and I can spar within the sphere of respect and civility. That’s why I will have the utmost respect for you, even when you are exasperated. Ha!
Okay to both Dennis/Sam… I have a game we could play if you like. Let’s see how predictable my taste actually is and make a conclusion afterwards. I will make a list of the next 25 years of Best Picture winners (62-86) and give the results to Joel (where I trust he will keep it secret) to observe. You guys can both post what you think my selections will be on this thread and after 86 we’ll see how predictable I actually am. I will then post my own results on this thread (that Joel could verify) and then a final verdict can be assumed. If you want to try this, I will make a list shortly. After I confirm that the list has been sent to Joel, you guys can post what you think I voted for. I promise to be honest in my selections….
Maurizio, this game sounds like fun. I’ll gladly participate. You may also want to do the same for any of the voters that you have questioned as “predictable.” I can contact any of them, you just needs to be specific. But yes, I’m your guy. Ha!
What’s the point of all this? Tomatoes, TOE-MAH-TOES.
The facts remain that those that choose something like WEST SIDE STORY shouldn’t have their balls handed to them like they were some dribbling idiot. Call me predictable if you want, but I always go with what grabs me, moves me and speaks to me.
And, if I’m to be called an artless, Spielberg loving, idiot, numpty then I take the name calling and promptly drop it in the nearest toilet. I do the best I can, see what I can and make my opinions after long pondering. I can do no better than that. I learn everyday and sometimes my taste changes with my opinions as I discover more. What I detest is that sometimes a motherfucker just can’t catch a break here…
Besides, if the “real” brains here know so much better than us “numpty’s” then why have they not been able to thwart our collective praise for, as Allan calls it, “Shite”????
Facts remain that none of you vaulted intellectuals have been able to come to an agreement and stop the juggernauts that are WEST SIDE STORY and BEN HUR.
Okay Sam I sent the list to Joel… 62-91 for 30 years. You can post your picks here whenever your ready. I will tell you how many you got right after an hour but won’t disclose the selections (so an element of surprise during successive poll threads can exist). If you have any doubts, Joel will verify. If you get 20 or more right then It can’t be argued that I’m predictable. Anyone can try… except Joel lol.
Quite right Dennis. As deserving abd BH asnd WSS are, they came out on top because the anti vote if you will split in a number of directions. Any fool can see that in tabulating the votes. It’s a shame that so many people on this thread who are so tasteful and knowledgeable are being dismissed as clueless. This is destructive elitism of the highest order.
“You don’t agree with me?”
You are a dummy.
Shall I do this weekly or all at once? Will you be actually voting for every choice that you have sent to Joel as the weeks unfold? Can I take my time in figuring out this entire equation?
Just for fun on a slow day Dennis. It means nothing.
You can make the list whenever your ready Sam. I will hold off voting until you do post though. And yes I have sent Joel the films I will be selecting in the upcoming weeks.
Come to an agreement and let West Side Story and Ben Hur juggernaut win. A perfect illustratuon of the political mentality. The reason they can’t come to a decision is because there’s at least a dozen films each year that are better than the two winners.
Yes, that is what you say. However Allan, the MAJORITY agreed that both BEN HUR and WEST SIDE STORY is the cream of the crop. There were at least more than just two people that felt these films were meritorious enough to take the top position. So, are all of these people dunder-headed morons????
Majority, thanks for proving the point further. Hook or by crook, doesn’t care how by. Numbers will out.
That’s not what I am saying at all and you know it. The question was are all 5 or 6 (or however many people there were voting WEST SIDE STORY and BEN HUR in) all uneducated film idiots?
I go in and make my ballot out without knowing what you or Sam or anyone else is voting for as I am sure everyone else does.
So, are those that voted WSS or BEN HUR on there ballots film morons whose opinions are worthless?
That is the question. Please reply with an answer to that question only…
Again I agree with Allan here in some respects. It seems like the diversity of great films these last few years has split many individual selections… but the more conservative mainstream voters never leave their predefined box of cinematic conformity. This does not necessarily include everyone who voted for Ben-Hur as an example. It’s just that you can count on a certain number of voters to go with the most obvious, generically elevated commercial Hollywood film(s) every time out. With this scenario, I don’t see predictable individual tastes that Sam has charged me with occurring very often… but a more general cliche mainstream flavor. That is where diversity is failing…
It’s a microcosm of why something like the Oscars or film critic group awards are deeply flawed. The conventional can always be agreed upon by the conventional. Insults are not required though. Everyone should vote for whatever they want in the end.
To be fair, E.T., much as though I hate it, is a better film than either West Side Story or Ben Hur. People are entitled to vote for it, but if it triumps over Fanny and Alexander, it’s a backward step in any language. E.T. is a well made kids film, a very well made kids film – certainly better than Star Wars. But that’s where the praise ends. There is nothing more to it than that.
It’s cinema for those who want their eyes opened to childlike wonder and their brains shrinkwrapped like a stale sandwich.
So now for the sake of this argument you make claim to “hating” E.T. When I met you in 2005, and you introduced me to your book, you claimed the film was one of three Spielberg “masterpieces.” From masterpiece to hate, quite a dubious journey here.
And thanks so much for the lecture on the wonder of misanthropy.
I hate the idea of E.T. being thought of on the same level as Fanny and Alexander and real cinema, yes. I said E.T. is an exeplary children’s films, what more did you want.
And if you’re goign to bring up “when we first met”, you said I was insane for suggesting Mizoguchi and Ozu were better than Kurosawa and said, and I quote “Ozu only did Tokyo Story”.
“Majority, thanks for proving the point further. Hook or by crook, doesn’t care how by. Numbers will out.”
Really? Isn’t this the reason why you conducted your project here in the first place? Did you not set up the ground rules? Are ‘total votes’ not the way you make determinations? Is each winner now subject to your damning scrutiny? And what “juggernaut” are you talking about?? LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!! Each film received a scant SIX (6) votes.
You call that a juggernaut!!!!!!!!!! Right.
KABOOM!!!!!!
“It’s cinema for those who want their eyes opened to childlike wonder and their brains shrinkwrapped like a stale sandwich.”
I think one could make the case that E.T. in particular does this to a certain extent, inasmuch as the middle section is very rushed and breezy, not letting the material stretch out and take hold of you as it does in the first half-hour or so (where the sense of the alien and ethereal is very real). This makes sense thematically, in terms of E.T. entering the busy world of the children, but it also dovetails too conveniently with Spielberg’s desire to please and satisfy everyone I think. I’ve come to see the movie as a bit less interesting in many regards, at least as a whole, than say Close Encounters. (Star Wars I think works perfectly on its own terms, it isn’t meant to have any intellectual/gravitas pretensions – unlike the sequels and especially prequels – and it doesn’t, nor does it need them anymore than, say, The Adventures of Robin Hood.)
However, do you mean broader implications to the statement coupling childlike wonder with shrinkwrapped brains? I mean in particular how you praise E.T. as a kids’ film but no more as if being a kids’ film disqualifies it from having true weight. But I would argue that “opening eyes in childlike wonder” (which, let’s remember lest we get too sentimental about the wonderful world of kids, entails visceral fear and anxiety as much as joy or enthusiasm – ALL the emotions are heightened in childhood, not just the good ones) is just as important in life and art as expanding the intellect and neither need be had at the expense of the other. In a sense, I guess, all fantasies and films which “seem” predominently directed at kids are not only not immoral, they serve a deeply moral function – at least in the sense I take morality to have, which is to make us all the most extended and experienced human beings we can be (which is rather different from the ethical connotations usually attached to the term morality, but that’s another matter). They are presently our closest links to mythology.
Perhaps, Sam, look into who first coined the word juggernaut when referring to Ben Hur and West Side Story – clue, it wasn’t me – and then think again.
This clearly implies that I, Sam Juliano coined the term. Did I? I don’t think so. And if I did ever use the word in a discussion of either film it would NOT have applied to the voting on both on these threads. “Juggernaut” implies a film that is smashing the opposition with landslide voting. That is hardly the case here, and no I never used it in that context, if at all.
Actually, it was your comnrade Dennis. Who said, and I quote…
“Facts remain that none of you vaulted intellectuals have been able to come to an agreement and stop the juggernauts that are WEST SIDE STORY and BEN HUR.”
Now I thoroughly expect stony embarrassed silence as you realise you need to change the subject.
Did I Sam Juliano say it? No. And the only ‘stony silence’ should be practiced on your end. Dennis’ statement, unbeknowst to me is clearly referring to his perceptions of both films, NOT aything to do with the amassing of that relatively tiny number of votes each film received. To use the word juggernaut in these terms either or both films would have to gain nearly 20 votes.
And yes, Maurizio is right, the idea of Wonders being populated by serious film buffs is a phallacy. But I’m not out to change that, Wonders is popular at what it does, and we have what we have. Moaning about it puts me in the role of Ed Murrow in the bookends of Good Night and Good Luck, which gets me chopped down by the mass ensemble of higher fawning numpties, the brownshirts of cyberspace.
Right. The old “generalization” game again. Are these not the same voters who annointed Wild Strawberries, Citizen Kane, Rules of the Game, Diary of a Country Priest, Sunrise, M, Modern Times, Bicycle Thieves, The Grapes of Wrath, Tokyo Story, The Third Man the best films of their respective years? But I don’t have time to list them all, there are several others. Is this what you liken to pedestrian popularity and predictability? Because you disagree with the concensus choices for TWO YEARS the voters on this thread are derided as the stooges of the masses, even though they pass the test with you about 35 other times. Would the masses really embrace that Bresson and Bergman the way they did to mention just two of the picks?
Does anyone casting a vote feel like they are sub-par or ill-equipped in a cinematic sense to cast ballots? I know I don’t.
So you again play the leverage game, enlisting by decree the support of Maurizio, who you have battled with in the past. And contrary to what you might think, even in tandem you are hardly qualified to decide the fate of the cineastes who cast ballots on this thread. Your taste in film does not equate with permission to judge the taste of others.
Yes, but twice is still twice to often. If a doctor prescribes pills to a patient 100 times but gives the wrong dose/drug twice, that could be fatal, but by your rules, 98 out of 100 is pretty good. You can get things respectable all bar twice, but if you mess up twice, the mess up is what is remembered.
I meran it doesn’t matter to me, my vote doesn’t count and I have my own choices year upon year, but it is embarrassing to see these two films win in any serious sense of film scholarship as it would have been with Oz in 1939 but for a one off vote.
I feel both are part and parcel to any serious film scholarship, but no the entire weekly voting has not been tainted, even with that extreme example you give.
We’ll just have to agree to disagree.
So we only get one chance, and on two its excommunication time. Hmm, I will be using my get-out-of-jail-free pass in 1977, alone as luck will have it since my surest comrade has decided not to participate.
Looks like you come close to using your own pass in 2003, or perhaps will if Dogville has slipped a few notches since the 00s countdown.
Allan, are Ben-Hur and West Side Story really comparable to Wizard of Oz in terms of the acceptance in the critical/historical canon? I think not: Oz, like Casablanca, is a distinctly populist classic which nonetheless has a pretty firm reputation as canon. Ben-Hur and West Side Story, at least in my perception, do not. Here’s a good example of what Im talking about: http://www.theyshootpictures.com/gf1000.htm
Wizard of Oz places at #66. West Side Story and Ben-Hir place at #274, respectively. If we’re going to talk about canon in any sense other than the personal or abstract, we have to take that kind of calculus into consideration.
To a degree, in that Oz is a classic of its type, the kids movie. But there is was a question of Oz not triumphing over La Regle du Jeu and The Story of the Late Chrysanthemums. Ben Hur and West Side Story are not up to Oz’s standard, they’re both deeply flawed. Great guilty pleasures at their best, but not beyond that.
Your long-time prejudice against musicals rears it’s ugly head again, though in response you will rifle off many you DO like. Many genre fans consider it at or near the top of film musicals. Who is it a “guilty pleasure” to” You? Maurizio? No, you speak for everyone, when in fact it is only YOU who is making such a damning judgement.
Ah yes, the prejudice again musicals. The same prejudice that saw me vote for Singin in the Rain ahead of Ikiru and would hacve had Love me Tonight close to winning in 1932. The usual generalisation from the man who accuses me of the same.
Funny thing is, I wrote Maurizio an email up just yesterday telling him, point by point, why I loved David Fincher’s ZODIAC (a film Maurizio is crazy about) and the guy tells me that I should elongate the letter and turn it in as a review because I hit on a lot of valid reasons to praise it.
I guess I’m not such a “numpty” after all?
Or was it because I agreed with you, Maurizio?
I didn’t call you a numpty.
I was not referring to either you or Sam in that comment.
I was also not really talking about WSS in my initial salvo either and trying to making a larger point. More of a generalization about the type of films certain people vote for week in week out…. they tend to be fluffy mainstream commercial Hollywood films. If you or Sam decide to take a break from picking Ozu and go with WSS for a week or two, fine… but a block of people select nothing but these examples 85% of the time. Just making an observation.
I don’t care if people agree with me. If you tell me you like The Diving Bell And Butterfly more than Zodiac in 2007 (something I don’t agree with at all) that wouldn’t prompt me to say anything. If you instead extoll the virtues of something like Ocean’s Thirteen then maybe I might be compelled to speak lol. Either way it’s mostly an observation and not an insult towards anyone. I was just agreeing with some of Allan’s sentiments but not the name calling necessarily.
Maurizio, who are these people? And if their choices are suspect, why do these films almost never end up in the winner’s circle? WSS of course is hardly mainstream Hollywood fluff, but rather worldwide one of the most beloved film musicals ever made. But I understand you were not targeting this film.
Because in lesser years there are only one or two clearly better films to give them the heave ho they deserve. In 1959 and 1961 there were too many great films, they split the vote.
If the voting for example took into account 1-5 choices, Ben Hur wouldn’t have won. It would have won for those who liked it, but those it didn’t win for wouldn’t have had it in their top 5. It’s the price we pay for strictly one choice voting. And like I said, I knew that before we started, 1959 and 1961 were done deals.
How could you have POSSIBLY known that 1959 and 1961 were “done deals?” Who could have been clairvoyant to know that five art house films in the later year split almost evenly and that in the earlier year four of the same type split? Nobody would have known where those votes were going. I didn’t and I feel i know the tastes of all those who cast ballots. And yes, BH and WSS, great as they are, did win because of the system and the split. But you set the rules yourself.
That’s not what I am saying at all and you know it. The question was are all 5 or 6 (or however many people there were voting WEST SIDE STORY and BEN HUR in) all uneducated film idiots?
I go in and make my ballot out without knowing what you or Sam or anyone else is voting for as I am sure everyone else does.
So, are those that voted WSS or BEN HUR on there ballots film morons whose opinions are worthless?
That is the question. Please reply with an answer to that question only…
No, but several of them fit the type. For example, since I dared to aim a broadside at Spielberg I have been persona non grata to you, and it’s that sort of mentality I’m against, the “defend against all comers” compromise that is at the heart of modern western problems. We accept our lot instead of fighting for better and then talk of fool’s gold being gold when we’ve forgotten what real gold is. We all want Obama re-elected, but not because he’s been that great, but because the alternative is mind-numbing.
Put it this way, the voters at Wonders are from round the country even round the world, but if you took out Italian Americans from New Jersey, WSS would have 3 votes. In other words, Sam’s personal friendships won the vote. In a network email poll as Sam once ran West Side Story would run away with 1961, the Wonders expansion has diluted the prejudice but sadly not entirely eradicated it. Occasionally, the insipid will win out over the inspired because more people want insopid than inspired.
Likewise talk of majorities is childish, 6 people voted for WSS, 15 people didn’t. A true majority would have been 11 or 12 votes.
I still don’t see it.
I defend Spielberg as a director who made some very good films. I don’t hold the man up with the same regard as Bergman or Kubrick or Ozu or Keislowski etc. However, to totally trash the man because he’s not able to keep up the same excellent standard that these others do (for whatever reason) is to trounce all the good work he has given us. Yes, some of it is mere “entertainment” and even I have been critical of his recent work. But when the man is good he’s as good as anyone out there.
Sure, JAWS isn’t as great a film as BARRY LYNDON and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK is pale in comparison next to many of the offerings coming from the year 1981. But, should I be lambasted for enjoying and praising a well constructed and expertly rendered piece of entertaining cinema?
I don’t think I should.
You say he’s the destructive force behind all the crap that has mimicked him. I say that it’s not his fault because he made films that caught the imagination of just about everyone that saw them and THEY wanted to emmulate what worked so well. Should he have not made JAWS because the mimickry that followed would send a guy like you reeling that it was the death of good Hollywood? Bash him on the knuckles for funding crap, I could agree with that, but to do a full labotomy on his good movies is just being mean spirited and plain unfair.
I have taken issue with many of the mans films: I am 60/40 in favor of A.I., hated dreck like TIN TIN and HOOK and ALWAYS and THE COLOR PURPLE. I have moaned and winced with every sequel that followed RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and am no fan by any stretch of the imagination of films like WARHORSE or THE TERMINAL and AMISTAD.
But, I will defend a film like E.T. as something more than just the mere rollercoaster you claim it to be, and I still thrill to the likes of CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, JAWS and MINORITY REPORT.
He’s more than just SCHINDLERS LIST.
My love of WEST SIDE STORY did NOT influence the ballots of David Noack, Peter M. or Frank, not to mention Dennis nor Dean. This is an outrageous, slanderous allegation. Even my own first cousin Bobby McCartney (who never liked the film) and who practically LIVES in my house DID NOT support the film in this vote!!! If myu game was rustling up votes, wouldn’t you think “Bobby” would have done me a personal favor?The film received a scant six votes, but under our byzantine voting system the result was an honest one.
I find it telling that only TWO (2) people of the entire WitD membership are publicly complaining about it’s seeming triumph. The answer my friends will lie in last year’s voting thread under Marilyn ferdinad’s spectacular review of the film. The film’s widespread supporters are there to be read in that comment section.
Allan and Maurizio do not command the sensibilities of the voters.
I wasn’t saying you DID influence the ballots. If you had, the result would have been a landslide. What I am saying is that there are two people who would not have come to Wonders were they not your friends. It wasn’t a slander, it was merely a distilling of who voted for what.
But the two people I think you are referring to have been regulars at this site for over four years now, and if you look back at the voting during this project you will see individually that these two disagreed with me as much as they agreed.
Yes, agreed, but I was only talking about this instance.
Yes, but “sight unseen.” I was a doubter and was proven wrong.
Your case here is far different. You are going from masterpiece to hate. There is something wrong in this picture, the same one that had you giving THE WIZARD OF OZ your highest rating of five stars and then saying recently you “loathe” the film with “every fiber of your being” Yeah you tried unsuccessfully to explain it, but as one regular here said “only in a bizarro world” could this happen.
Masterpiece is a statement referring to how one sees the film on an intellectual level. I loathe Oz and E,T. both, but they’re both superbly done, that cannot be denied.
As I said back then in a way anyone can understand, I loathe and detest Triumph of the Will as well, but does that mean it’s not a masterpiece of cinema. Or Salo, is that a masterpiece? Yet do you love it? A film can be called a masterpiece or classic and loathed at the same time. If you can’t get that, it means you can’t differentiate between ‘best’ and ‘favourite’, which may be the problem behind some of the voters here, who perhaps can’t differentiate between the two. I mean, Animal House is my favourite film of 1978, but it wouldn’t make a top half dozen in terms of best.
It would make a top dozen though? Comedies are always hardest to judge in terms of some kind of cerebral concept of “greatness,” one reason I didn’t participate in the comedy polling.
As for distinction between “favorite” and “best” I generally agree. One of the things I’ve always liked about your approach is that you are willing to go beyond personal taste, fun and instructive as that can be (although I wish sometimes you would be as lucid in damning works as you are in praising others, if you’re going to bother to damn them anyway).
That said, I don’t quite buy into the complete distinction or definition of “intellectual” admiration and visceral loathing, and how the two are applied and mixed, etc. For example I greatly respect Triumph of the Will’s craft. I also deeply object to its philosophy. But I ALSO am deeply stirred by its skill – the admiration for craft is not entirely an Olympian, removed thing that I can neatly slice off from my visceral enjoyment or lack thereof.
Likewise, I sometimes get the sense that you actually enjoy (or enjoyed at one point) watching Wizard of Oz or E.T. but that their inflated reputations and the views of film they represent have both made consideration of them irritating and perhaps even the viewing of them unenjoyable. Which may or may not be legitimate, but is certainly more of an intellectual response than a visceral one, which oddly enough makes your judgement of favoritism in these cases as conditioned by an intellectual approach as your judgement of greatness, maybe more so.
But it goes beyond that. Favouritism also is different in that it allows for persopnal choices of films you just know are trash and not remotely worthy of being considered great, but which you just couldn’t do without. For me that category would include a couple of de Milles, a couple of Russ Meyers, a couple of Radley Metzgers, Animal House, Warhol’s The Chelsea Girls, Siodmak’s Cobra Woman. None of them art, but wouldn’t want to be without them omn that island. For others they may have John Waters or Mario Bava’s later works.
Right, but that’s an aspect of the distinction that doesn’t interest me as much at the moment. I’m more interested, in these particular cases: do you enjoy watching the movies as movies? Did you at one point? Was the transition to disregarding them triggered directly by something in the movies themselves, or by gradually growing weary of the fuss around them? It just seems to me that, in this case, your personal judgement of these movies has more to do with intellectual concerns than visceral. Which again, is fine – and when we’re talking “favorites” anything goes in terms of criteria anyway – but adds an interesting wrinkle to your theory of how one judges greatness vs. favoritism.
If I wanted to talk about enjoyment I wouldn’t be conducting these polls. Enjoyment is irrelevant when discussing serious film. It’s a nice tangent, but nothing more. Leave the favouritism and populist shite to film magazines read by retarded wannabes.
Huzzah, Sam. The idea that everything that wins in this effort has to be slow, boring, and foreign is anethma to the democratic ideals of film and film love. I mean, come on…LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD for Best Picture? Gimme a freakin’ break…
Ya know Dean, our good friend Joel Bocko (Movie Man) has stated on the record that LAWRENCE OF ARABIA is his favorite film of all-time, and you can be rest assured he’ll have it as his top film in the coming 1962 polling on Sunday. I hope he doesn’t have to face the heat for supporting another big Oscar winner, that just because of it’s exceeding popularity may be alien to the art house theme that is preached at this site, a theme I support about 80% of the time. I am not even sure that I will vote for LAWRENCE, but I’ll be interested to see if the so-called “predictable” voters will fall in line.
Well, I know what I’m voting for this Sunday, and it sure as hell ain’t L”ECLISSE or IVAN’S CHILDHOOD. It will be LAWRENCE all the way, and I won’t give a good goddamn who has a problem with it. Sometimes the best is the best, and the people who say otherwise are just being contrary for contrary’s sake.
Dean, if I could place a wager I’d say Lean’s movie wins in a landslide.
Lawrence gets my vote for sure (although L’Eclisse would be second – both films do wonder with characters in landscapes). I mentioned a comment or two ago that Masculin Feminin might be my all-time favorite. It’s #1 rival is definitely Lawrence of Arabia.
I don’t suspect Lawrence voters will get much flak at any rate. Its critical/historical reputation has been pretty secure since the 80s and as for the folks here I know most are fans. Allan will vote for something else, but Lawrence made the top 20 of his 60s countdown if I remember correctly.
It’s a great time-capsule film, stylistically, because it contains both the earlier, more static approach (in the Faisal’s camp scenes) which Ben-Hur kinda falls pray to and an almost avant-garde use of abstract landscapes and figures which hearkens toward 2001. And it couples this stylistic progression with a transformation in the character himself. Ultimately, I’ve never bought the claims that Lawrence is spectacle over story. To me the two are intimately linked, and the movie’s central feature seems to be its hero’s fiery psyche – it uses geography as psychology in a brilliant way, which is true of many of my favorite movies or even books come to think of it (Wind in the Willows for example).
No, just remoitely art with depth, which neither Ben Hur or West Side Story are.
Oh so we are back with that line again. You Allan Fish will determine what has depth and what is art. You’ll have your say when you post your own choices. The picks here are those of the group in coming to a consensus, a weekly ritual.
I say both films have astounding emotional depth and gloriously qualify as art. Apparently the critics of that time felt along my lines too as WSS was named Best Picture by the NYFFC, much as BEN-HUR did. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
wow you guys play for keeps. I don’t like west side story as much as Sam, but I do like it and defend it’s selection as art-worthy. Here’s my vote:
Film: Through A Glass Darkly
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Actor: Toshiro Mifine
Actress: Harriet Andersson
Supporting Actor: Fernando Rey
Supporting Actress: Rita Moreno
Photography: Last Year at Marienbad
Score: King of Kings
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I’m not the one wearing dollar spectacles here
hahahahaha!!! You score on that one!
One more vote and Through a Glass Darkly ties West Side Story! One more vote and Through a Glass Darkly ties West Side Story!
Calling all Bergmaniacs! Calling all Bergmaniacs!
Report to Wonders at once!
Er, two more votes. Get to it lurkers!
Won’t do any good, like I said, Sam would call out the Fairview militia – he’d get each of his kids to vote if necessary.
Well I did chuckle at that comment! Ha!
Joel, though I am admittedly a card-carrying Bergmanaic since my college days, (he may be my favorite director in fact) I can’t help you out this year, though I adore THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY. PERRSONA comes within a hair for me in 1966, and FANNY AND ALEXANDER and CRIES AND WHISPERS will be my #1 choices in 1982 and 1972. I previously voted WILD STRAWBERRIES the Best Film of 1957 as well.
Anyone see the videos with Henri The Existential French Cat on Youtube??? Reminds me of Bergman and French New Wavers alike lol. The second and third videos are pretty funny.
I follow him on Twitter, my kind of cat. Last week…
What follows from ennui but more ennui? It is a cycle that needs only disillusion to perpetuate itself. Also, I’m hungry.
Why does everything that appreciated on WITD have to have this Asia- and Euro-centric patina of “art” to it? Is this all you think movies can achieve at their very best–this notion of grey-matter-challenging “art?” For me, emotion is a much more valuable by-product of watching movies. Look, I recognize and love art, too, but if I were locked in the greatest museum in the world for the rest of my life, I’d go mad just as surely as I would eternally locked in a room with a TV blaring reality shows. I require diversity in my filmmaking, and that means I appreciate what many different filmmaking types can achieve. My gosh, if we left things up to “art” alone, we’d only have 15 filmmakers repped for the majority of the history of cinema–no comedies, no musicals, no westerns or horror films, no tearjerkers or adventures—just lots of morose people having morose thoughts between unsatisfying stints of coitus.. Bottom line: the votes for BEN HUR (which I disagreed with, ironically, by picking 400 BLOWS) and WEST SIDE STORY are votes for the diverse palette of cinematic colors.
Dean you nail my own objections to a tee.
transcending emotions are a compelling part of the artistic equation. For those who don’t feel it, they dismiss. I am a tireless promoter of European and Asian cinema, and a huge part of my voting output will go that way. But never at the expense of films outside that box, and I feel are equally as deserving.
But see, Dean, this is missing out on so much of what these supposedly intellectual and dry art films actually do. To my eyes they’re often MORE emotional than Hollywood melodramas because rawer, more exciting, more visceral. Last Year at Marienbad is playful in the extreme, and Through a Glass Darkly is deeply moving. I reject the claim that they are primarily cerebral experiences. (And yes, I know you like a lot of these movies too but are generalizing to make a point.)
To me the sixties is the greatest decade in cinema because it best fused the entertainment values of Hollywood with the experimental vision of the avant-garde. One of the things I hate today (and one of the reasons I celebrate your screen-cap exercises, which effervescently mix the “high” with the “low”, the obscure with the familiar, across all periods and genres and forms) is this increasing division between notions of film as art and entertainment. While there are plenty of pretentious poseurs around to be sure, ultimately I feel the most enthusiastic “splitters” are those in the populist camp who want to pass off their narrow definition of what movies can be as somehow “broader” and more “fun”. The creation of a Red America/Blue America in cinephilia – you can see it a lot of the rejoinders to the recent “death of cinema” essays and the aggressiveness with which comic-book-movie fans go after critics. To me there’s a degree of cognitive dissonance at work here. Blockbusters seem far LESS fun than they did a few decades ago, even as we’re all supposedly having “more” of it and feeling less guilty about it. Meanwhile, as if to fulfill the untrue stereotypes many had of them, art films and indies are getting smaller and smaller in their concerns, more inert in their style, more focused on intellectual instead of emotional concerns.
I see a great divide building and I hate it. Another thing I love about the sixties is the cross-pollination. It wasn’t just a matter of Ben-Hur and West Side Story on one hand and Hiroshima Mon Amour and Viridiana on the other. The French New Wavers and others too, were enchanted by the dreams of Hollywood and filtered it through their own realities. In return, Hollywood picked up big time on their influence and incorporated stylistic and thematic tics of the New Wave in the New Hollywood of the late 60s and 70s. There’s such a gap between art and entertainment now, such a huge divide between what mass audiences consider “films” and what cultural elites (often self-appointed) do – and I’m very disappointed with both but in some ways, even more with the former who seem to accept movies as mindless spectacle rather than emotional experience (David Denby gets at this brilliantly, I think, in his essay, the best of the recently themed pieces). I can’t imagine that kind of cross-pollination taking place today. And it depresses me because I want the movies to be a mass art form, something that can reach in both directions while anchoring itself. It risks being torn apart like Solomon’s baby.
/rant.
And I know most of this doesn’t have to do with your own point of view, which was honestly more of a spark than something I’m strictly responding to, but actually one of the ironic things about your clashes with Allan is you both have similarly eclectic and catholic tastes, no matter how differently you articulate them. His countdowns always featured Looney Tunes alongside Renoir films and Oscarbait next to the obscure. The reason I love Wonders in the Dark is that it brings so many different viewpoints, experiences, and perceptions under one big tent. That tent is cinema – may it live forever.
ok, now /rant for real.
I mean heck, we’ve got Tom and Jerry on the banner right now.
Incidentally, Dean, will you be voting for Masculin Feminin in ’66? I know you’re quite fond of Chantal Goya in that. Sometimes I think it’s my all-time favorite.
Perhaps Dean because I see film in a light way difefrent from the sort of blogs on the internet that are just magazine clones. And when I see victories for Ben Hur and the like, however predictable, it’s a step backwards for the site being taken remotely seriously.
Beating a dead horse will not make your argument any more convincing. You disparage the ‘popular’ with a heavy dose of snobbery. You have an opinion, nothing more.
Best Picture: Yojimbo (Japan…Akira Kurosawa)
Best Director: Luis Buñuel for Viridiana
Best Actor: Toshiro Mifune for Yojimbo
Best Actress: Silvia Pinal for Viridiana
Best Supp Actor: Gunnar Björnstrand for Through a Glass Darkly
Best Supp Actress: Pass – I don’t particularly like any of the performances I saw.
Best Cinematography: Sacha Vierny for L’Année Dernière à Marienbad
Best Score: Henry Mancini for Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Best Short: Surogat or Ersatz as it is strangely listed here by German title, I find it simply delightful!
Putting this all into context, this is pretty playful stuff. I knew that Ben Hur and West Side Story would win because I know the Wonders clientele. And it could have been worse, I suppose, that interminable piece of utter bird shit Breakfast at Tiffany’s could have won.
But think about it. Even though you know the clientele, neither film would have triumphed without a highly unlikely (severe) split between the top art house films of each year.
Six (6) votes rarely carries the day, when you consider the relatively large number who cast ballots.
Yes, one of the smallest we have had. 6 vote for WSS and 15 don’t, but such was the choice of great films the ‘juggernaut’ wins out by default.
And the problem is I can’t call favours to get three people to vote for Viridiana – not that it was my winner, but it’s a sane winner – because you’d then round up 700 Fairviewians to pick WSS.
Only Dennis lives in Fairview of those who supported WSS. Had I actively went out and supported it (which I would NEVER do at any time) it would have received way more than six. There are no “new” people suddenly appearing either. But either way I find it sad that this landmark musical film (one of the most beloved of all-time) is being questioned.
Only because we’re voting for best. I have told you for 7 years that no sane film scholar would vote for Ben Hur and West Side Story. Then you only had Fairview to judge on. Now you can see a little bit more. If we had more voters, more still, but we don’t. But West Side Story and Ben Hur, while entertaining, are not credible as artistic choices for their given years. That’s all.
i know several of the very best film critics who would support either or both of these films for poll position in 59 and 61, but that’s neither here nor there. This is a concensus of the membership of this site, and though the “film school”mantra is dominant, I think there’s a welcome variety of perceptions.
Yers, but they’re the critics of 1959 and 1961 and thus irrelevant. I could nake several who loathed both even at the time, but I won’t name them.
There are loathers for sure (heck Kael hated SAWDUST AND TINSEL to name just one) but where you get the idea that people who loved the film in 1961 have all of the sudden now are reappraising their reactions to conform with your wishful thinking.
no, but thankfully most of them are now dead and sanity can be restored.
There were 40 comments here when I totted up votes this morning, now there’s over double that.
It’s been a fun discussion but I think at this point if it we’re to get REALLY interesting, we have to start examining the films themselves instead of the politics of voting: i.e. WHY are West Side Story & Ben-Hur not worthy of comparison to the others? What is it about them?
Is it content, form, both independently, or the two together? Here, I think, is a quick rundown of the arguments one might make against both these films (not that I necessarily endorse all of these, although I see where all of them are coming from and many of these are the reasons that I never really considered either of these as having a shot at Best Picture for me):
1) Content. The films are often considered middlebrow, proclaiming their High Purpose (moreso in West Side Story’s case, though Ben-Hur is pretty serious-minded compared to DeMille’s epics) with an earnestness that eschews the pure pleasures of strictly-entertainment films. On the other hand, the rather simple (or less generously, simplistic) Purposes – personal redemption from revenge (with a Christian overtone) and a desire and Youth & the Racial Problem – could be seen as watered-down for the masses, especially compared to the themes European films of the time were broaching.
2) Style/Form. If the films are heavyhanded in theme, they are DEFINITELY heavyhanded in style – even taking into account West Side Story’s attempts to be sprightly in its choreography, and Ben-Hur’s famous chariot race. By and large, the films are what Manny Farber would deride as “elephant art” vs. “termite art” (although, oddly enough, he would characterize New Wave works like Jules + Jim and Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner as elephantine too): they are often too busy painting the big picture to throw all their intensity into a small gesture. The set design for both is rather spare, and the camerawork and editing are generally limited. This was a time when both widescreen and color entailed limitations on production, usually holding directors to long takes and master shots less of art than necessity. There was a kind of slowness and weight to these films which wasn’t shaken off until the late 60s with The Graduate, Bonnie and Clyde, and Easy Rider. As with content, the form of Ben-Hur and West Side Story may seem to be “trying” too hard.
3) Being Behind the Times (more in terms of its effects on the content rather than being a bad quality in and of itself). We can look back and say historical context does not matter, that it makes no more sense to judge, say, West Side Story against Last Year at Marienbad than it would to judge Bringing Up Baby against Last Year at Marienbad. In other words, that Hollywood increasingly seemed behind the times compared to Europe should be disregarded in determining work. That’s true as far as it goes.
But I would argue that, in the process of making the films, being behind the times has practical, objective consequences which manifest themselves in the content long after the initial conditions are gone. This is partly because some elements of the film will be out of step with others (hence the difficulty in adapting to technology) and also because the makers will probably be aware to a certain extent of not moving forward and this self-consciousness may creep into the act of creation itself in various subtle ways (a timidity in performance, a recourse to a certain technique that doesn’t quite come off, or just simply the lack of inspiration that always accompanies innovation). This is kind of a complicated argument to make, but hopefully I’m making myself clear.
You did a good job examining many factors I concur with Joel. I would say that the reasons are rather obvious as to why those two films might be deemed unworthy. That discussion seems less fascinating then the one about actual voting tendencies.
Initially perhaps, but at a certain stage I feel the points have been made. Repeatedly lol
True enough. But the thread has been winding down in that respect.
Hopefully it expands in others…
Although on the other hand I DO need to watch the short film links above and vote on my pick for ’61. Which was actually why I came to this page in the first place, so many hours ago lol…
Well I’m blogged out for the day. I’ll be expanding into other areas of life after 4.
I wanna joing you Maurizio, but i suspect I’ll be held prisoner a bit longer. ha! Looks like SEVEN PSYCHOPATHS is on the docket for tonight.
Not too much longer. It’s earlier out here on the West Coast but at 4 our time I’m off to work. Why I should choose to spend my pre-work hours on a sunny day on a computer discussing metaphysics and movies is anyone’s guess, but we do tend to take our sun for granted out here… And anyway, with an iPhone now I can enjoy fresh air and sunshine, while still laboriously typing musings on the aesthetics of West Side Story. If there is a God, surely he’s to thank for such wonders…
Yet (this is to both Joel and Maurizio) you seem to be examining these films by strict guidelines as to what “art” is and how it qualifies for such an appraisal. Case in point: In the four years plus that I have been here at WitD, our friend Samuel Wilson at MONDO 70 is without question one of the most articulate, brightest and tasteful bloggers out there. He is of the the very top rank. No wonder too as he holds a PhD. Samuel did NOT vote for the hard core art house films that Allan and perhaps maurizio are lamenting did not win the vote (i.e. Viridiana, Through a Glass Darkly, Last Year at Marienbad etc.) He voted for Anthony Mann’s EL CID as the best film, a film that at least in some quarters could be compared to the two questioned films that won here in 59 and 61.
Samuel Wilson is someone I respected deeply, as much as any other blogger at this site. The pointers you pose here Joel are not all-encompassing I’m afraid, but I will have more to say soon enough here.
I’d love to hear more from Samuel in particular with that, though in this case I’ll have less to go on as I haven’t seen El Cid yet.
I should note that there are really two aspects to this argument, which are broached above in a discussion with Allan in a slightly different context (boy, is this thread exploding! I think it’s turning into one of the good old Wonders classics…). The “greatness” factor – or the cerebral – and the “favorite” – or the visceral. They overlap more than people generally admit but still we can kind of regard them individually as well.
I’d also note that, whether or not we’re looking at greatness or favorites, it isn’t so much a matter of setting up standards that have to be lived up to but rather working off one’s own reactions (and those of others) and figuring out backwards WHY one responded the way one did, and how much of that had to do with qualities inherent in the work itself. I think this is inductive vs. deductive reasoning, but hell I was never very good at science so I might have it backwards haha. Let me check…
Double-checked and I was correct. It seems to me that induction works far better for aesthetics than deduction. The “phenomenon” we are judging is less the movie itself than the emotional experience of watching it. Attempts to trace what might be “great” about a movie one didn’t enjoy, or “not great” about one you did, have a kind of mystical quality to them as you are attempting techniques whose end goal is to subvert the very physicality they entail. Which sounds like it doesn’t make any sense haha. What I’m trying to say is: a mystic starves himself or repeats words or walks on nails or whatever not for their own sake, but in order to spark a rapturous spiritual experience – means to an end. Likewise with films, although the point often gets lost especially since just looking externally at them CAN be kind of fun. Yet ultimately we don’t study mise en scene or montage techniques, or read about a director’s approach, or analyze the critical reaction to a movie for its own sake but to evoke whatever quality we may be missing in our initial engagement – to discover if there’s a “there” there.
To finish the thought: To find out if there’s a “there” there or if, to use the mystical analogy again, presumed contact with the Godhead is in fact just a case of bad digestion.
(At which point the analogy breaks down for me personally, since I’m not sure it matters to distinguish between the Godhead and bad digestion, but I do think there’s an important distinction between films enjoyed for qualities they contain and films enjoyed primarily because of what the individual viewer brings to them. I guess because the spiritual phenomenon is repeatable no matter what the cause, but the aesthetic one probably isn’t: also because as an aspiring filmmaker, I want to know what effects a filmmaker can achieve to reach the audience. Without any aspirations to be a god, as of yet, I can’t say I have the same concern with what’s causing the mystical experience and whether or not I can duplicate it.)
Joel, I think our still kicking and writing friend Stanley Kauffmann, who is now 97 years old, admirably dealt with your entire premise here of the mitigating affect of the popular when he opined in a stinging postscript to his October 23, 1961 review in THE NEW REPUBLIC:
From many of the intelligensia this film brought a strong adverse reaction. To find substantial merit in WEST SIDE STORY the rubric ran, was to swallow Broadway liberalism and ‘kitsch’ and to assume that a pure, exhilarating popular-art form was all the better for Doing Good. Occasionally specific arguments were adduced, but most of them seemed to spring from a prior conviction that such a film must be an abortion. No one is more jealous of the purity than the intellectual. These commentators prefer musicals in which credibility of plot and quality of acting are irrelevent and beyond criticism (as they are not in WEST SIDE STORY) which exist for their music and dance. But it is in those very terms that these pictures seem to me inferior to the Robbins-Bernstein-Sondheim work. ………..and…………Earlier I called ‘Spartacus’ a trap for snobs. I venture the same opinion–for different reasons about ‘West Side Story. To repeat: NOT as sociology nor as a new ‘Romeo and Juliet, but in dance, lyrics and music–expressing the spirit of a subject–this is the best musical film that I know………..
Sam, Kauffmann addresses the content argument nicely but not the stylistic one.
He does also address the stylistics as well in the body of his long review.
Here’s part:
The film bursts into life, not merely into action, from its opening split-second. Done in color on an extra-wide screen, it begins with stunning helicopter shots of Manhattan which catch the dramatic aspect of the city better than any establishing shot has done before. We zoom down from the sky right to the snapping fingers of the Jets, the white street gang. From then on, the film moves into its story with two concomitant rhythms: the one within the framework of the screen (the movement of the actors) and that of the editing and montage–the juxtoposition of shots. These two powerful rhythms, powerfully employed, along with the irresistible music, takes us to the center of a moment of our time.
Stanley Kauffmann is the dean of American film critics, though over the years I’ve often disagreed with him (he’s awfully hard to please, too hard, his standards are Olympian, he’s even more reluctant to lavish praise than John Simon), but agreement or disagreement isn’t the point anyway when reading film criticism. Kauffmann has always made me think about films (and life) in a way I’d never have done if SK hadn’t existed.
and here is where he brings his discussion of the film’s elements into a qualification of art, one I concur with to a fault:
It is essentially Jerome Robbins’ alchemy that uses Bernstein’s score, uses the drama and color, and thansmutes the fine components into an even finer art.
It is telling that Kauffmann, the most gifted of the stage critics working in the days of Kael, Sarris, MacDonald and Simon, found that WEST SIDE STORY transcended it’s stage origins in a spectacular way.
Mark—
Though Kauffmann is my personal favorite -even ahead of the dreaded Pauline— I agree in his heyday he was even more difficult to please than Simon, which is saying something. VARIETY once did a study on both critics and they came to the same conclusion that you did. Kauffmann famously tore down THE GODFATHER as you may recall. (“Hurricane Marlon is sweeping in and I wish it were more than just a lot of hot air”) But yep, what you say there in conclusion is the entire point. He really does make you think more profoundly. He is the consumate cultural maven too. And he was always hip. A greater Beatles fan didn’t exist, but with Shakespeare he was peerless.
Wrote a long response but it seems everyone’s getting a bit of comment fatigue (including me to I guess) so I’ll keep it simple.
I do quite like both West Side Story and Ben-Hur, so I’m not the best person to launch a critique. But I think I understand why others don’t, and why I myself – despite enjoying these films since childhood and seeing them many times – would vote for, say, World of Apu and Through a Glass Darkly instead. It helps that I’ve seen the latter films only once or twice and later in life, so their appeal is still fresh. But more important, I think, is a certain sense of luminousness they have, a kind of cinematic glow. I love the story and character in Ben-Hur. I love the music (and Rita Moreno!) in West Side Story. In both cases, the films often deliver on this material well. But they don’t to my eyes have that extra “oomph” that expert use of moving camera, editing, photography, composition, movement within the frame (well, West Side Story has that), etc. That sensual alchemy that defines cinema for me.
They are good movies, I like them, I’m glad they’re around, I don’t really begrudge their votes, but when it comes to assigning “greatness” I need a fleetness and inner spark that these films, while assembling some great material and satisfying me in many ways, don’t quite achieve. Or maybe my barometer’s off and will be re-set on another occasion. I certainly returned more to my childhood affection for Ben-Hur on the big-screen viewing. Who knows?
In the end, we just call it like we see it although sometimes I wish we’d all explain what exactly we’re seeing a little more. It’s dancing about architecture to a degree but heck, I guess that’s why I want to start going the route of video essays…
I think, is a certain sense of luminousness they have, a kind of cinematic glow.
That’s an excellent point Joel. Hard to refute, just to say that it all comes down to what means the most to the individual viewer. In the instances of the two films being contested here, I do believe deep and lasting emotion triumphs over everything else. The emotions were honestly arrived at through some stirring character dynamics.
FFS, what the flying feck does Kauffmann have to do with it, he’s about as relevant as the Gregorian calendar. We read Kauffmann to be entertained by the prose, not for his opinions which, more often than not, are tripe.
Samuel is a nice man, but the PhD is irrelevant as is his vote as any more important than anyone else’s. The vote for El Cid is less embarrassing because that’s a film that has grown over time till it dwarfs Ben Hur in context and impact. I wouldn’t put it in the top 10 of its year, but I would pick El Cid and Fall of the Roman Empire ahead of Ben Hur as they aimed higher and have deeper resonance than Wyler’s film could ever have.
I think that many, many, many more people in this world think that your opinions are tripe than do Kauffmann, a man who has been reviewing films for over 60 years. As far as Samuel’s PhD it was just a general statement to frame his experience in acadmic circles and how it informs his good taste. Nothing more.
As far as the use of EL CID to demean BEN-HUR that was about as predictable as your one-sided assessment of the 1959 film, which is laughable and frankly tiresome. How can you purport to know the emotional experience this film has always given me? You speak for what I feel now?
Speak of the devil, and here I am, though I worry whether I’ll ever extract myself from this thread. Allan, by the way, is exactly right about the irrelevance of my credentials, especially since my degrees aren’t in film studies. I’ve been a lone wolf in both controversial years but my sympathies have been with the dissidents like Allan and Maurizio. I’ll concede considerable virtues to both Ben-Hur and West Side Story, but they’re relatively unchallenging stuff and go for the easy epiphanies too often. By comparison, El Cid feels like a real epic in its concern with honor and its relation to integrity, and Heston is far better in the Mann film than in the Wyler. The real-life hate he and Sophia Loren had for each other may explain the power their scenes of conflict (and their scenes of reconciliation) have. It’s neither as challenging (both intellectually and pictorially) as Marienbad nor as brazen as Yojimbo, to round up my top three of this year, but it has a majesty just as worthy of recognition. Overall, I don’t privilege the emotional connection and that’ll keep Sam and me disagreeing through the years, but I don’t feel entitled to disparage the emotional connection, either. And I’m embarrassed to admit that I’d never seen or heard the word “numpty” before I saw it on this blog. It is dreadfully evocative, though.
Bravo, someone on this site willing to acknolwedge that Heston’s performance in Ben Hur is his weakest in an epic. He’s better in The Ten Commandments and way better in El Cid. Indeed, I’d say only his turn in The War Lord tops his work in Cid.
Many many more people think my views are tripe? Didn’t think that many people read my views for them to be hated more than Kauffmann’s. Such infamy. Check your hyperbole at the door. Kauffmann is an entertaining read as Kael is, but both are impossible to agree with on their opinions the vast majority of the time.
You, Allan Fish will never appreciate or see the worth in critical opinion. This is the result of a narcissist approach to perception and summary judgement.
And you will never accept that defending West Side Story and Ben Hur is indefeinsible. It’s called an impasse.
Really? I thought I just moments ago on the comment closest to the bottom of this thread, that I did offer a reasonable and passionate defense. You method is snide dismissal without substance, and an extension of your limited taste.
Limited taste? Hmm, I’ll just laugh at that. In terms of accurate statements that’s like calling Barack Obama caucasean. Not just stupid, plainly STUPID.
Oh, so your “taste” is more “all-encompassing” than mine, eh? If that were the case we wouldn’t even be having this on-going row!
If ‘Mary Poppins’ wins in ’64 I’m shooting myself.
’62: ‘L’Eclisse’ RU: ‘Knife in the Water’ and ‘The Manchurian Candidate’
’63: ’8-1/2′ RU: ‘The Leopard’ and ‘The Fire Within’
’64: ‘Dr. Strangelove’ RU: ‘Gertrud’ and ‘A Married Woman’
’65: ‘Pierrot le fou’ RU: ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ and ‘Simon of the Desert’
’66: ‘Persona’ RU: ‘Au Hasard Balthazar’ and ‘Masculin, feminin’
’67: ‘Bonnie & Clyde’ RU: ‘The Red and the White’, ‘The Missing Switchboard Operator’ and ‘Mouchette’
’68: ‘Faces’ RU: ‘Shame’ and ‘Petulia’
’69: ‘The Wild Bunch’ RU: ‘My Night at Maud’s’ and ‘The Passion of Anna’
Mark–fantastic choices of course!!!!
Just taking th later years of the decade, I’ll say:
in 67 it would be MARKETA LAZAROVA (Vlacil), MOUCHETTE (Bresson) and BELLE DE JOUR (Bunuel
In 68 it would be a dogfight with 2001, Once Upon A Time in the West, The Color of Pomegranates, Memories of Underdevelopment, Valley of the Bees, The Producers, The Creamator.
In 69 it would be Kes, days and Nights in the Forest, Army of Shadows
It could bve worse than Mary Poppins, Mark, My Frightful Lady could win. Compared to that elephantine pile of poo Mary Poppins is Bernini’s St Theresa.
I don’t think anyone has to worry about either one of these movies making the grade. My gosh, what kind of monsters do you think we are?
The sort who voted for Ben Hur, which while better than Poppins and Lady, is only better in terms of beign a guilty pleasure enjoyment, there’s no pleasure at all in Lady.
Dean Treadway did NOT vote for BEN-HUR, so this assertion is groundless. And I won’t fall for the intimidation of anyone who derives joy from MY FAIR LADY. I won’t be voting for it in the movie-rich year of 1964, but I do like it.
I’m casting my short film vote for Catalog.
A film which oddly enough was not on my list of nominees but which Dean offered in the comments. Thanks, Dean.
Very Nice Very Nice was interesting too. Kind of an intriguing prologue to “the 60s” setting the stage for what would be progressively dynamited in films like Fists in the Pocket, Weekend…and finally the cinematic climax of the 60s, Michelangelo Antonioni’s brilliant Pink Floyd-scored conclusion to Zabriskie Point. Also reminds me a bit of the montage in Parallax View.
Now that I’ve accomplished what I came here for, I think I can finally leave the thread. I’m going to take a nice long break from Wonders and decade polls…at least until tomorrow afternoon.
Yeah, I thought that VERY NICE VERY NICE was definitely an influence on that PARALLAX VIEW scene. Good eye, Joel. CATALOG is definitely a worthy competitor!
“phallacy”? The mind boggles. Has Allan ever written a review of a film he doesn’t like? A lot harder than trotting out positive reviews and hurling insults.
Yes, several, though rarely for this site, which I prefer to see as celebrating film.
Joel, I enjoyed your rant, and concur with it; this cross-pollination you write so eloquently about is, indeed, lacking in today’s cinema like a desert lacks liquid. I do love all kinds of movies, and I hold nothing against art films from wherever they spring. What I rail against here, as you know, is the tyranny of the highest brows over the lower ones. I’ll just keep it that simple.
By the way,. I’ll be putting some plugs in for MASCULINE FEMININE when 1966 rolls around. You know that it’s from that year, correct?
What is the “art” of cinema anyway? If we consider it’s unique aspects, it essentially rests on the visual and movement; form in a word. In this sense, WST is as great if not greater than Viridiana.
PS: From the Le Cahiers du Cinema ‘bio-filmographie’ of Robert Wise on WST – my translation: “On a historical and artistic level, West Side Story is the most compelling example of the emergence of modernity in the American musical; an osmosis of the choreography of Jerome Robbins and the staging of Wise that reached a perfection and plastic rhythmic never equaled.”
- http://www.cinema-histoire.fr/media/DossierWestSideStory.pdf
I think your argument here is excellent Tony. Kauffmann has said as much in his famous review, and I have broached these spects several times as well. But your concise framing is food for thought. I am not at all surprised either that Cashiers have praised WSS for a number of reasons, in fact the French critics have ben huge supporters of the film since it’s release. The contention that the film “goes for the easy epiphanies” is nothing more than a measured explanation of why someone can’t connect with the film’s core, borrowed from Shakespeare and embellished with enegy, movement and the dance form.
Why do I feel this is the greatest of all musical films? First off, it contains what is arguably the greatest score ever written for a musical property. (Only Kern and Hammerstein’s SHOWBOAT can be brought up for comparison) The score is intensely operatic, it contains soaring songs and songs infused in the racial makeup of the story. But, just having a great score is not enough in adapting a stage play. WEST SIDE STORY captures the spirit of the stage work, by employing fluid, often electrifying editing and choreography (Yes Jerome Robbins was a spectacular force here) a brilliant pacing and excellent performers. (Yeah, Richard Beymer is the weak link in the cast, but he is superbly dubbed, and his wimpy almost wooden demeanor is actually what Shakespeare envisioned in his Romeo) Several of the film’s incomparable songs stand among the greatest ever written: “Somewhere,” “One Hand One Heart,” “Tonight,” “America,” and even “Maria,” which originally was derided for being too sugary, but now is seen as one of the most beautiful melodies Bernstein has ever written.
And then there is the film’s visceral centerpiece, which is a stunning rebuke to those few who are unconvinced that this film is great because of it’s cinematic style, and NOT because it simply boasts that great score. The sequence I am referring to occurs not far from the half-way point when Wise and Robbins string together an electrifying looks at the rival gangs preparing to do war, and all the film’s major protagonists being seen in preparation stages, with a spillover of some of the film’s major melodies, highlighted by the soaring operatic intensity of “Tonight” which Tony sings while leaving the store. It is probably the most exhilarating sequence in the history of the musical film, and it leaves the viewer stunned and breathless.
The score is irrelevant, that was written for the stage musical – to praise it is like praising the words in any version of Hamlet. The film should be purely about the interpretation of the text, and while it is magical in places (the Robbins bits), the Wise sequences kill it as art.
You will never win this argument. West Side Story is a largely excellent film of a great stage musical. Film is about how you use the material not how good the material is. The songs in Singin in the Rain aren’t the greatest, they literally made a musical out of Freed and Brown’s songs, but it had more cinematic invention in any five minutes than WSS had in its entire 2½ hours.
I am not looking to win anything. Why does there have to be a winner? Are you that insecure? Your argument that the score is irrelevent is perhaps the worst you have made on this entire thread. Whether the score was adapted or not (it was) it is still a vital part of the essence of this cinematic presentation. Shall we now deride or set aside Olivier’s RICHARD III or HENRY V because the original material (to say the least) was “adapted” from Shakespeare?
No, but we can set aside say Zeffirelli’s or Richardson’s versions from the same text. Great original text does not automatically mean great film. WSS is an excellent but not better than that version of a great show. Likewise To Kill a Mockingbrid is only a serviceable to decent version of a far better novel.
As for insecure, let’s not even go there.
As for insecure, let’s not even go there.
Right. Let’s not.
You present here what you feel are cinematic failures based on celebrated material. The original argument was your posing that great music in a stage play does not translate to a great film. This was never argued. I attempted to present above why the film was a venture that embellished, enriched and trascended even it’s stage origins aided by the wholly spectacular score.
Is this the same Juliano ear for music that thinks Depp nailed it in Sweeney Todd
Sam has Van Gogh’s ear for music.
Ha! Well we are talking about WSS, not the critically-acclaimed SWEENEY TODD, where so many critics and musical fans had many nice things to say about Depp’s surprising effort. Not Enrico Caruso or Luciano Pavarotti, but a good enough vocal transcription of Sondheim.
BTW, did you know that Sondheim himself thought Depp did a very fine job? Is his ear faulty too?
Allan has the Marquis de Sade’s love for film. Ha!
So many criticc and musical fans. Yawn, yawn. It’s Tim Burton, that tells you it’s worthless before you even start.
“BTW did you know that Sondheim himself thought Depp would make him a bundle of money”
Allan: Burton’s new film FRANKENWEENIE was a delightful work that has Burton on the right track. Even Maurizio, who uses Burton’s past work to aid and abed the matter of musical taste, has awarded the film 4/5, and has conceded in past comments that at least a few of Burton’s past films have pleased him.
Maurizio: Yes indeed, but there is too much at stake as far as musical respectibility to make an embarrassing statement. The vast majority expressed amazement that Depp could actually hold a tune, and his work was one reason why the film succeeded.
It’s that “taste” thing again. Easy to figure.
Yes I have always said Ed Wood is a near masterpiece. A few others like Pee Wee, Scissorhands, and the three animated films are good. Burton himself is overrated though…
Sweeney Todd is very close to being perfect also… you just need to be tone deaf to appreciate it’s splendor.
Well, I will contest this of course *tone deaf* but it is taste disparity again that comes into play more strongly than musical compatability.
No Sam, Depp objectively can’t sing. Think about the fact that when he was in a rock band back in the 90′s, he played bass and let someone else handle vocals.
Be that as it may, (and I don’t doubt what you say there about those days with the rock band) they got a better singing performance from him than could have ever expected. Am I saying that many others would not have been better? No. I am saying (and this will always come down to how rigidly or liberally we assess the vocal requirements) he did a reasonably decent job. Had he flopped, be rest assured the film would not have been so well-reviewed. He may never do it again (This was a Richard Gere/chicago) parallel, but he passed the test.
His mark in my grade book: B.
Lets settle on C+ and seal it with a hug.
That’s fair enough. I can go with that C+.
A D- would be the more appropriate grade, but who am I if not a pragmatic compromiser.
That HBO Hitchcock movie is playing tonight at 9:00pm ET Sam. Will be busy tonight but I plan on catching it on demand tomorrow or next week. Julian Jarrold (of the great Red Riding 1974) is directing.
I really want to see that Hitchcock badly, but I am also tied up tonight with a screening of a film that has received astonishing reviews, about a disabled man wanting to lose his virginity.
It’s titled THE SESSIONS
I vote for
Best Picture : West Side Story (La Notte close)
Best Actress : Marilyn Monroe (Misfits)
Best Actor : Toshiro Mifune (Yojimbo)
Fantastic Stephen!!!!
Wank!
Allen is a frustrating goofball. He must be a very unhappy person.
Funny enough it was your goofball comment that started all this drama Dean. You can at least take solace in the fact that your historically erroneous “opinion” lead to this wonderful thread lol.
Still we need to ask what is worse… being an unhappy person or epically delusional enough to assume something like WSS is better than the immortal Viridiana (or a slew of other films in 61).
Worse to be unhappy.
Selecting one film over another based on personal taste is never any kind of a misnomer.
But I think the tone here was one of playful exasperation. No big deal. We’ve had the cannons out for 24 hours and finally there have been some modest concessions. I will be leaving for Manhattan in a matter of minutes. Let’s all smile and move on.
May I recommended relaxing and putting in the CD soundtrack to WEST SIDE STORY in the car. Sublimity, incarnate. Heck I’ve listened to today as well, in view of all the hoopla.
“We’ve had the cannons out for 24 hours and finally there have been some modest concessions.”
Oh so you admit WSS is shit… cool. Thread can be abandoned finally.
“May I recommended relaxing and putting in the CD soundtrack to WEST SIDE STORY in the car.”
As for the car, I rather listen to Throbbing Gristle’s Slug Bait on an infinite loop. Or maybe I’ll just walk instead.
“Worse to be unhappy.”
What if said film causes the unhappiness?
“But I think the tone here was one of playful exasperation.”
Always Sam always.
If I had to count the times that ‘said films’ may have caused Allan severe unhappiness I’d be here for days, as long a time as I’d be if I had to make a list of all the people who have loved or been touched by WEST SIDE STORY worldwide.
Ha! The concessions were on Depp’s singing voice, not on one of the greatest film musicals of all-time. There can never be a concession there, but you are free to lobby as long as your heart desires.
God, you go away for a few hours and peace is declared. As for frustrating goofball, Jesus, it’s like being in a 1980s school movie. Get me out of here.
Fetch the bug people, the site needs placing in quarantine, there’s roaches about.
Be careful, there’s one in your bedroom.
Tee hee. I knew you’d like that “goofball” line. It just seemed so…you.
No, seriously, Allan, I wonder if, since you’ve been spending so much time watching all the masterful cinema out there, if you’ve ever really protractedly and continuously been a patron, either by accident or profession, of almost exclusively bad, horrible, or simply mediocre movies. I think not. I think you lack perspective on what’s truly bad. Look, I get it–it’s happened to me more than once. But, though I hope for as much good cinema as can be delivered, i have had to get a handle on two useful facts:
(1) We never see the REALLY bad movies (I mean the ones that were never in any sort of film fest or anything–the kind of film they wouldn’t play in Antarctica), I learned this being a film fest programmer for three years; there are many more movies out there that you can see are unwatchable, literally, from their first seconds. When you see a lot of those, you really get a new appreciation for even the movies you previously thought you hated, but now you realize they were actually accomplished on some level.
Movies are, individually, machines that make us think and feel and even exist in ways we would not have if we chose not to use them. Just in the actual world of mechanics, some machines do one thing, and some machines do another. I had to accept that about movies, and not get so indignant about another’s opinion on how they were watching one movie, expecting a music box and instead they got a chainsaw. It makes for good conversation, which I think we largely trade in here on WITD. But, other than your rants, Allan, I rarely see such an articulately unhinged opinions held like a cudgel upon others,, And this goes for your “Death of Hollywood” rant: Look, Hollywood ain’t disappearing and neither are movies. I agree—there’s been a step down, and no, also, we don’t need to pay special attention to box-office- or Oscar-annointed films. But, honestly, I really am happy with getting, each year, 35 or so great movies from around the world, and 30 more very good to okay titles of all different stripes. I’m really fine with that number–and by the way, I don’t think anything that we can do or write can do anything to staunch said slide backwards in industry quality, anyway.
Also, I should say that, at that film festival I ran, I saw about 300 movies a year I thought were superb, in their own ways, and to date, very few of those movies have been seen by a non-festival audience. So there are still a LOT of great movies that we don’t get to see each year because the distribution (theatrically) just isn’t there. Yes, we were lucky to get those years in the past where the form was relatively new and filmmakers were infinitely more playful with it. But the past is past. It wonderful, it is gone, there it is.
The painful fact is all we have is the now, and in the now, the more we film lovers see, the less we think is great. Our perspective of what is good and bad is and should be constantly changing, or else we back into a sort-of echo chamber of black-and-white judgments like you hand down to the vast majority of movies. I, personally, had to learn that THE INCREDIBLE MELTING MAN or STRIKING DISTANCE could sometimes be exactly sort of machines that work…and, of course, sometimes the machine might be THE LEOPARD or THE BEAR, GIANT or BABE, MY BODYGUARD, or MY BEST FIEND, THE PASSENGER or THE DRIVER, RED RIVER or RED DESERT, Jarman’s BLUE or Kieslowski’s BLUE.
Get my drift? Movies aren’t all just one thing; they are many things. And they’re not always the things we think they are. The best any film writer can do is be most articulate and honest in assessing the workings of each machine. Sometimes, Allan, I doubt you succeed in either, Plus, you can be a bit insulting, if I may tiptoe around it. And I say this with all due respect, as I hope you well know (and I love that you focus on the stuff you love here; I do the same on my site, and I suspect we do it for the same reasons), That said, I advise you to relax, take a stress pill, and think things over, and I shall probably do the same.
Wow, I can’t believe this thread is still going lol. 224 responses…this has to be an Alternate Oscars record, right?
Joel–
Here’s our all-time record – 366 comments:
https://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com/2009/08/11/akira-no-50/
Late to the party — but I feel the urge to opine. I do not consider WSS to be the best of its year. The best aspects, songs and lyrics, preexisted the film version, which was respectable but not overpowering cinematically. The film was hampered by some subpar acting and overly melodramatic moments. But yet I love the film. The emotional impact cannot be discounted, and Sam, for example, is perfectly justified to argue his point. Ben Hur, on the other hand, is downright hammy though its quite a technical achievement. Again, I don’t begrudge anyone for selecting it as a #1 choice. People have different criteria and weigh things differently, that’s all.
I think ET is a marvelous film – not a children’s film, nor is The Wizard of Oz a children’s film IMO.
I can get off on a more cerebral film like L’avventura or Last Year at Marienbad, but even those films have strong emotional components that are merely accessed through a different route.
Intelligently and fairly put, Pierre. And I agree about BEN-HUR. I voted for THE 400 BLOWS.
A worthy choice, Dean. I’d be tempted to vote for that one – or even Some Like It Hot just to mixed things up. And I want to take a moment here to express admiration for someone (i.e., Sam) whose cinematic tastes are not just passionate but encompass such a broad spectrum of styles and genres. Very slim indeed is the list of people who can fully appreciate excellence throughout such a wide variety of artistic efforts.
Pierre—
I thank you for that my friend! The issues/contentions you broach here are quite telling in the sense that there are some style or genres of films that just won’t wash with certain voters. That’s not to say that anyone’s cup of tea is contrary to what others might view as quality cinema, but just that ‘square can be beautiful too.’ The ‘emotional quotient’ is what divides the site’s participants, and it’s what is at the root of the issues with WEST SIDE STORY, a film universally admired by the intellectuals and the laymen. It always comes down to (as you note) what viewers are looking for and value most.
Our reactions to any particular film may vary on any particular day depending on what’s happening in our life, depending on whether we’re fighting something or have been recently affected by a person or event. We may be in a place where we put higher value on intellectual content as opposed to emotional response. Additionally, the cultural context of the times also plays a role. For example, some people have been underwhelmed by The Artist as “not about much, really — pretty lightweight,” when in actuality, for me, it’s more about emotional impact. One’s appreciation of Ben Hur, another example, may resonate more to people of deep religious faith. A film that takes a cynical, anti-establishment view may enjoy more popularity in a sociopolitical environment such as the Watergate era. So many factors affect how we rate the quality of a work of art. So, as far as you’re concerned, Sam, I think it takes a special person to have the ability to embrace all these things from such a broad perspective.