MOVIES!!

My Top 40 Movies: Andrei Rublev to Amorres Perros

My top 40 movies reviewed since April 2008 (9 months in which I've watched over 250 movies and averaged a movie a day) this is a personal and subjective ranking based on my own 6 star system. The movies here all rank at the very top with the first 12 winning my full 6 star rating. Many great 5 star movies were excluded to keep this list short and current. A few years ago my #40 Amorres Perros would have been listed as #1- things change. Of these 40 movies it can be added that all have had at least some critical acclaim. I tend to watch multiple films of a director if I like their work- some directors are represented more than once. My sole criteria- a great movie transcends the screen! Enjoy.


#1) Adrei Rublev, dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, Russia- 1966
2) The Grapes of Wrath, dir. John Ford, USA - 1940
3) There Will Be Blood, dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, USA - 2007
4) The Empire Strikes Back, dir. George Lucas (not Irvin), USA- 1980
5) 2001, dir. Stanley Kubrick, USA- 1968
6) Rashomon, dir. Akira Kurosawa, Japan - 1950
7) Red Beard, dir. Akira Kurosawa, Japan- 1965
8) To Have and Have Not, dir. Howard Hawks, USA- 1944
9) Stalker. dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, Russia- 1979
10) Todo Sobre Mi Madre, dir. Pedro Almodovar, Spain -1999
11) Habla Con Ella, dir. Pedro Almodovar, Spain- 2002
12) Rear Window, dir. Alfred Hitchcock, USA- 1954
13) Once Upon A Time in America, dir. Sergio Leone, Italy/USA - 1984
14) Apocolypse Now Redux, dir. Francis Ford Coppola, USA- 1979
15) The Dark Knight, dir. Christopher Nolan, USA- 2008
16) The Asphalt Jungle, dir. John Huston, USA- 1950
17) Seven Samurai, dir. Akira Kurosawa, Japan- 1954
18) Blade Runner, dir. Ridley Scott, USA- 1982 (see new director's cut)
19) On The Waterfront, Elia Kazan USA- 1954
20) A Woman Under the Influence, John Cassavetes, USA- 1974
21) Faces, John Cassavetes, USA- 1968
22) Night of the Iguana, dir. John Huston, USA- 1964
23) Hiroshima Mon Amour, dir. Alain Resnais, France- 1959
24) Days of Being Wild, dir. Wong Kar Wai, Hong Kong- 1991
25) Fitzcarraldo, dir. Werner Herzog, Gemany- 1982
26) Three Times, Hou Hsiao Hsien, Taiwan- 2005
27) Treasure of the Sierra Madre, dir. John Huston, USA- 1948
28) The River, dir. Tsai Ming-Liang, Taiwan- 1997
29) Opening Night, dir. John Cassavetes, USA- 1977
30) Killer of Sheep, dir. Charles Burnett, USA- 1977
31) Killing of a Chinese Bookie, dir. John Cassavetes, USA- 1976
32) Tampopo, dir. Juzo Itami, Japan - 1986
33) 2046, dir. Wong Kar Wai, Hong Kong - 2006
34) Vive L'Amour, dir. Tsai Ming-Liang, Taiwan, 1994
35) Millennium Mambo, dir. Hou Hsiao Hsien, Taiwan - 2001
36) Ashes of Time Redux, dir. Wong Kar Wai, Hong Kong - 2008
37) The Return, dir. Andrei Zvyaginstev, Russia- 2003
38) Chinatown, dir. Roman Polanski, USA - 1974
39) The Maltese Falcon, dir. John Huston, USA - 1941
40) Amorres Perros, dir. Alejandro González Iñárritu, MEXICO- 2000

My 10 "Ultimately Bad" Worst movies

10) W, dir Oliver Stone, 2008
9) Enigma of Kasper Hauser, dir. Werner Herzog, Germany - 1975
8) Waiting for Happiness, dir. A. Sissako, Africa - 2002
7) 10,000 BC, dir. R. Emmerich, 2008
__Special disgust for the entire French New Wave including but not limited to the next three directors (hipsters cringe now):
6) Jean Luc Goddard's films of 1960's, FRA (Pierrot Le Fou and Breathless excluded as those are 4 star films worth watching)
5) Robert Bresson's film Pickpocket and L'Argent, FRA- 1959 (A Man Escaped is maybe worth seeing once)
4) All Jean-Pierre Melville's films, FRA, 1960s (except of course Army of Shadows, a classic)
3) Nashville, dir. Robert Altman, USA- 1975
2) Max Payne, dir. who cares, 2008
1) TIme of the Wolf, dir. French wannabe, FRA, unwatchable, 2003


FIN!