Gonna have your list up today muppet? Or do I have to fly to Britbong land and cave your head in with a plate of curry?
no country for old wainds
Active Member
- Nov 23, 2002
- 26,696
- 9,669
- 113
yes, gonna post it as a nice self-indulgent countdown (i'll format it the normal way underneath to make it easy to count though lol)
no country for old wainds
Active Member
- Nov 23, 2002
- 26,696
- 9,669
- 113
first my 25-11:
top ten later.
=24) The Boost (Dir. Harold Becker) & Cop (Dir. James B. Harris)
two great james woods vehicles. one is deliciously cynical pulp, a bullshit-averse, ellroy-penned dirty harry offshoot with its sights on the proto-SJWs. the other is a surprisingly sad, earnest drama about addiction, male insecurity and the dark side of the american dream, the rot bubbling from beneath its quintessential reagan-era TV movie aesthetic, postcard-perfect and utterly hollow.
23) Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Dir. Pedro Almodovar)
almodovar's breakout movie, all kitschy set designs and popping colours, a mixture of hysterical farce and soapy melodrama. carmen maura rules every scene, dragging it along with her whenever it threatens to get too silly or slight; her ugly crying in the back of the most garish cab in the universe is peak cinema.
22) A Short Film About Love (Dir. Krzysztof Kieślowski)
perhaps only kieslowski could make a “short film about love” about an invasive peeping tom and avoid the slightest pinch of irony, celebrating instead the connective power of the gaze. one for all the pillow-fuckers out there.
21) Midnight Run (Dir. Martin Brest)
"I suffer from aviaphobia. It means I can't fly. I also suffer from acrophobia and claustrophobia."
"If you don't cooperate, you're gonna suffer from "fistophobia"".
send prime de niro on a road trip with the heroically obtuse charles grodin and you're obviously gonna get one of the all-time big-hearted comic romps.
20) My Neighbor Totoro (Dir. Hayao Miyazaki)
barely any story, conflict or moralising, just a wondrous world to explore. so intuitive it bypasses cognition entirely, appealing to your inner child almost exclusively.
19) Pin (Dir. Sandor Stern)
come for a sentient anatomical model voiced by jonathan banks(!), stay for david hewlett's bizarre, obsessive gurning and gloriously incestuous poetry reading. between this and wings hauser-vehicle the carpenter, a good year for dreamy psychosexual slashers, but this one really transcends that genre tag with its sheer uncomfortable wrongness.
18) The Moderns (Dir. Alan Rudolph)
"Paris has been taken over by people who are just imitators of people who were imitators themselves. It's become a parody. It's finished, over. Believe me -- Hollywood is gonna be like a breath of fresh air." f for fake meets the great gatsby by way of robert altman (for whom rudolph worked as assistant during his peak years). one of many films on this list steeped in artifice and dreaminess, littered with tonal contradictions which don't always work but help to create something singular.
17) Tales From the Gimli Hospital (Dir. Guy Maddin)
the beginnings of the true heir to the early works of bunuel and lynch; a funny, deeply discomfiting dream of a myth of love and death. every guy maddin film is a cult classic.
16) Deadbeat At Dawn (Dir. Jim Van Bebber)
no-budget scuzz masterpiece for scumfucks and wastrels. there's something real and raw here that hollywood simply has no concept of.
15) The Carrier (Dir. Nathan J. White)
the deadbeat at dawn of backwater body-horror. batshit DIY nonsense dreamed up by inbred retards, containing the most cats you'll ever see in a movie made by (call this an educated guess) dog lovers. i love that this is what DP peter deming was up to in between evil dead II and his many collaborations with david lynch.
14) Die Hard (Dir. John McTiernan)
i'll let the gif speak for itself.
13) Hairspray (Dir. John Waters)
for some, this was john waters selling out. to me, it's proof that although the vulgarity and depravity of his earlier work is part of its charm, it's not fundamentally what makes waters waters. every frame of this is unmistakably his creation; absolutely righteous, unruly camp.
12) Paperhouse (Dir. Bernard Rose)
a fraught, eruptive fantasy born of illness and abandonment which doesn't skimp on the nasty stuff, and feels alive with wonder and danger in a way the world only can when you're young. if it was more coherent and the performances were better (headly dubbing an english accent onto herself post-production did not make her any less wank, who would've guessed?), this prime slab of wainds-core would be even higher. the fate of the two young leads (one died of an illness a few years later, the other vanished from the screen entirely) lends an extra layer of pathos.
11) The Last Temptation of Christ (Dir. Martin Scorsese)
of course jesus struts toward the camera gathering a posse of dudes with brooklyn accents in scorsese's version of the gospels; this is far from being his first movie about the son of god, even if it's the first to call him by name. i'm undecided on whether i prefer this to silence, which is a greater intellectual and aesthetic triumph, but never attains the raw emotion of this climax (served by perhaps keitel's greatest performance).
two great james woods vehicles. one is deliciously cynical pulp, a bullshit-averse, ellroy-penned dirty harry offshoot with its sights on the proto-SJWs. the other is a surprisingly sad, earnest drama about addiction, male insecurity and the dark side of the american dream, the rot bubbling from beneath its quintessential reagan-era TV movie aesthetic, postcard-perfect and utterly hollow.
23) Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Dir. Pedro Almodovar)
almodovar's breakout movie, all kitschy set designs and popping colours, a mixture of hysterical farce and soapy melodrama. carmen maura rules every scene, dragging it along with her whenever it threatens to get too silly or slight; her ugly crying in the back of the most garish cab in the universe is peak cinema.
22) A Short Film About Love (Dir. Krzysztof Kieślowski)
perhaps only kieslowski could make a “short film about love” about an invasive peeping tom and avoid the slightest pinch of irony, celebrating instead the connective power of the gaze. one for all the pillow-fuckers out there.
21) Midnight Run (Dir. Martin Brest)
"I suffer from aviaphobia. It means I can't fly. I also suffer from acrophobia and claustrophobia."
"If you don't cooperate, you're gonna suffer from "fistophobia"".
send prime de niro on a road trip with the heroically obtuse charles grodin and you're obviously gonna get one of the all-time big-hearted comic romps.
20) My Neighbor Totoro (Dir. Hayao Miyazaki)
barely any story, conflict or moralising, just a wondrous world to explore. so intuitive it bypasses cognition entirely, appealing to your inner child almost exclusively.
19) Pin (Dir. Sandor Stern)
come for a sentient anatomical model voiced by jonathan banks(!), stay for david hewlett's bizarre, obsessive gurning and gloriously incestuous poetry reading. between this and wings hauser-vehicle the carpenter, a good year for dreamy psychosexual slashers, but this one really transcends that genre tag with its sheer uncomfortable wrongness.
18) The Moderns (Dir. Alan Rudolph)
"Paris has been taken over by people who are just imitators of people who were imitators themselves. It's become a parody. It's finished, over. Believe me -- Hollywood is gonna be like a breath of fresh air." f for fake meets the great gatsby by way of robert altman (for whom rudolph worked as assistant during his peak years). one of many films on this list steeped in artifice and dreaminess, littered with tonal contradictions which don't always work but help to create something singular.
17) Tales From the Gimli Hospital (Dir. Guy Maddin)
the beginnings of the true heir to the early works of bunuel and lynch; a funny, deeply discomfiting dream of a myth of love and death. every guy maddin film is a cult classic.
16) Deadbeat At Dawn (Dir. Jim Van Bebber)
no-budget scuzz masterpiece for scumfucks and wastrels. there's something real and raw here that hollywood simply has no concept of.
15) The Carrier (Dir. Nathan J. White)
the deadbeat at dawn of backwater body-horror. batshit DIY nonsense dreamed up by inbred retards, containing the most cats you'll ever see in a movie made by (call this an educated guess) dog lovers. i love that this is what DP peter deming was up to in between evil dead II and his many collaborations with david lynch.
14) Die Hard (Dir. John McTiernan)
i'll let the gif speak for itself.
13) Hairspray (Dir. John Waters)
for some, this was john waters selling out. to me, it's proof that although the vulgarity and depravity of his earlier work is part of its charm, it's not fundamentally what makes waters waters. every frame of this is unmistakably his creation; absolutely righteous, unruly camp.
12) Paperhouse (Dir. Bernard Rose)
a fraught, eruptive fantasy born of illness and abandonment which doesn't skimp on the nasty stuff, and feels alive with wonder and danger in a way the world only can when you're young. if it was more coherent and the performances were better (headly dubbing an english accent onto herself post-production did not make her any less wank, who would've guessed?), this prime slab of wainds-core would be even higher. the fate of the two young leads (one died of an illness a few years later, the other vanished from the screen entirely) lends an extra layer of pathos.
11) The Last Temptation of Christ (Dir. Martin Scorsese)
of course jesus struts toward the camera gathering a posse of dudes with brooklyn accents in scorsese's version of the gospels; this is far from being his first movie about the son of god, even if it's the first to call him by name. i'm undecided on whether i prefer this to silence, which is a greater intellectual and aesthetic triumph, but never attains the raw emotion of this climax (served by perhaps keitel's greatest performance).
top ten later.
Ladies and gentlemen, the reason I basically started this game. penisexploding.gif
TechnicalBarbarity
Poser Disposer
The Carrier sounds fucking amazing. I love retarded redneck hixploitation shit.
Haha!
No I didn't specifically mean no country's autism, I just meant using people's posts as rec lists.
Slammed
Active Member
- Jun 15, 2017
- 31,451
- 45,124
- 113
no country for old wainds
Active Member
- Nov 23, 2002
- 26,696
- 9,669
- 113
i know i've probably technically missed the deadline in aussie time, but i should post it before the end of the deadline british time
Slammed
Active Member
- Jun 15, 2017
- 31,451
- 45,124
- 113
It's ok CiG is on Perth time, he's 20 years behind the rest of us!
i know i've probably technically missed the deadline in aussie time, but i should post it before the end of the deadline british time
Bitch you're like 4 hours ahead of me aren't you?
Edit: lol and a day, oops. Hurry your ass up.
challenge_everything
Active Member
no country for old wainds
Active Member
- Nov 23, 2002
- 26,696
- 9,669
- 113
10-1:
10) They Live (Dir. John Carpenter)
the entire first act of they live is piper sleepwalking around LA observing his surroundings over a deceptively chill bluesy beat. eventually he wakes up, but soon the film grinds to a halt again so he can spend six minutes waking up his buddy too. somehow, john carpenter makes this into the film's defining strength. hundreds of other movies are bigger, louder and more action-packed, but hardly any of them possess the personality, atmosphere and menace of this casual, languid thing. a true original.
9) Miracle Mile (Dir. Steve De Jarnatt)
the epitome of reagan-era paranoia and helplessness, idealism on the verge of crumbling until it does, tangerine dream synths charting a sudden, irreversible descent into dread, destruction and doom. it almost feels like the death of the '80s; the great side-characters, each a relic of the era, slip out of the film without a goodbye and vanish into oblivion.
8) Iguana (Dir. Monte Hellman)
no ordinary B-movie but a bleak origin story of civilisation told in blunt caveman strokes, with everett mcgill (big ed from twin peaks) playing a slave and outcast who suffers, revolts, and builds a kingdom in the image of his oppressors, delivering brutal “justice” until his subjects either fight him to the death or accept their subjugation.
7) Akira (Dir. Katsuhiro Ôtomo)
perhaps the only way to provide a complete picture of contemporary japan is through violent sensory bombardment, vomiting up its horrors and obsessions in a deluge of guts, neon and twisted metal.
6) Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (Dir. Todd Haynes)
sued into the abyss by the subject's brother and collaborator richard, todd haynes' cult debut about the tragic death of karen carpenter is to this day available almost exclusively on bootleg or youtube, but this is a story told in the language of damage and death, and the extra layer of visual degradation only makes it more disturbing. many films from this year depict an america of melting plastic, but none so literally as this.
5) High Hopes (Dir. Mike Leigh)
the social satire could be less on-the-nose, and his penchant for caricature is misguided here as it often is, but mike leigh has been one of the world's greatest dramatists for almost fifty years, and any time davis' and sheen's complex, sweet, wryly hilarious central couple are onscreen, this is my fucking jam.
4) Vampire's Kiss (Dir. Robert Bierman)
"and you call yourself a psychiatrist." a difficult film to approach without irony in the wake of cage's millennial memeification, but rewatches wed the hilarity with great pathos. i might theorise that peter is in love with alva and what she represents: an unattainable escape from this ambivalent city and his lonely, privileged bubble within it. in any case, it's a singular film which exists out of time or genre; an amalgam of american psycho, after hours and silent-era horror theatrics centred around perhaps the all-time nuttiest performance in cinema and a heartbreaking, sadly overshadowed gem from maria conchita alonso alongside him.
3) Days of Eclipse (Dir. Alexander Sokurov)
every bit the hypnotic, otherworldly, post-apocalyptic strugatsky adaptation stalker was, and also reminiscent of my beloved pathologic. in other words, my kind of arthouse movie (unlike damnation and landscape in the mist and sound and fury and etc...).
2) Drowning by Numbers (Dir. Peter Greenaway)
wes anderson if you strangled the twee out of him, made him watch resnais' filmography on repeat for a year and gave him the eye of a master painter. a macabre, misanthropic deadpan comedy about women murdering their husbands, mathematically precise and artificial to a fault, philosophically dense, transporting and beguiling. when the cinematography, screenplay and performances fire on all cylinders in service of a vision as unique as this, it's hard to look away.
1) Dead Ringers (Dir. David Cronenberg)
"I've often thought that there should be beauty contests for the *insides* of bodies." not quite my favourite cronenberg, but probably his best looking, best written and best acted, his most surgical and invasive work, and among the most broken and frightened of all films. if the fly suggests we're insects dreaming that we're more, dead ringers has twins dream that they're insects, horrified when their perfect hivemind starts splitting into separate entities and the "dreams of the flesh" spill forth. no filmmaker better understands the ineffable horror of being human.
1) dead ringers
2) drowning by numbers
3) days of eclipse
4) vampire's kiss
5) high hopes
6) superstar: a karen carpenter story
7) akira
8) iguana
9) miracle mile
10) they live
the entire first act of they live is piper sleepwalking around LA observing his surroundings over a deceptively chill bluesy beat. eventually he wakes up, but soon the film grinds to a halt again so he can spend six minutes waking up his buddy too. somehow, john carpenter makes this into the film's defining strength. hundreds of other movies are bigger, louder and more action-packed, but hardly any of them possess the personality, atmosphere and menace of this casual, languid thing. a true original.
9) Miracle Mile (Dir. Steve De Jarnatt)
the epitome of reagan-era paranoia and helplessness, idealism on the verge of crumbling until it does, tangerine dream synths charting a sudden, irreversible descent into dread, destruction and doom. it almost feels like the death of the '80s; the great side-characters, each a relic of the era, slip out of the film without a goodbye and vanish into oblivion.
8) Iguana (Dir. Monte Hellman)
no ordinary B-movie but a bleak origin story of civilisation told in blunt caveman strokes, with everett mcgill (big ed from twin peaks) playing a slave and outcast who suffers, revolts, and builds a kingdom in the image of his oppressors, delivering brutal “justice” until his subjects either fight him to the death or accept their subjugation.
7) Akira (Dir. Katsuhiro Ôtomo)
perhaps the only way to provide a complete picture of contemporary japan is through violent sensory bombardment, vomiting up its horrors and obsessions in a deluge of guts, neon and twisted metal.
6) Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (Dir. Todd Haynes)
sued into the abyss by the subject's brother and collaborator richard, todd haynes' cult debut about the tragic death of karen carpenter is to this day available almost exclusively on bootleg or youtube, but this is a story told in the language of damage and death, and the extra layer of visual degradation only makes it more disturbing. many films from this year depict an america of melting plastic, but none so literally as this.
5) High Hopes (Dir. Mike Leigh)
the social satire could be less on-the-nose, and his penchant for caricature is misguided here as it often is, but mike leigh has been one of the world's greatest dramatists for almost fifty years, and any time davis' and sheen's complex, sweet, wryly hilarious central couple are onscreen, this is my fucking jam.
4) Vampire's Kiss (Dir. Robert Bierman)
"and you call yourself a psychiatrist." a difficult film to approach without irony in the wake of cage's millennial memeification, but rewatches wed the hilarity with great pathos. i might theorise that peter is in love with alva and what she represents: an unattainable escape from this ambivalent city and his lonely, privileged bubble within it. in any case, it's a singular film which exists out of time or genre; an amalgam of american psycho, after hours and silent-era horror theatrics centred around perhaps the all-time nuttiest performance in cinema and a heartbreaking, sadly overshadowed gem from maria conchita alonso alongside him.
3) Days of Eclipse (Dir. Alexander Sokurov)
every bit the hypnotic, otherworldly, post-apocalyptic strugatsky adaptation stalker was, and also reminiscent of my beloved pathologic. in other words, my kind of arthouse movie (unlike damnation and landscape in the mist and sound and fury and etc...).
2) Drowning by Numbers (Dir. Peter Greenaway)
wes anderson if you strangled the twee out of him, made him watch resnais' filmography on repeat for a year and gave him the eye of a master painter. a macabre, misanthropic deadpan comedy about women murdering their husbands, mathematically precise and artificial to a fault, philosophically dense, transporting and beguiling. when the cinematography, screenplay and performances fire on all cylinders in service of a vision as unique as this, it's hard to look away.
1) Dead Ringers (Dir. David Cronenberg)
"I've often thought that there should be beauty contests for the *insides* of bodies." not quite my favourite cronenberg, but probably his best looking, best written and best acted, his most surgical and invasive work, and among the most broken and frightened of all films. if the fly suggests we're insects dreaming that we're more, dead ringers has twins dream that they're insects, horrified when their perfect hivemind starts splitting into separate entities and the "dreams of the flesh" spill forth. no filmmaker better understands the ineffable horror of being human.
1) dead ringers
2) drowning by numbers
3) days of eclipse
4) vampire's kiss
5) high hopes
6) superstar: a karen carpenter story
7) akira
8) iguana
9) miracle mile
10) they live
Ironically somehow Phy and me have similarly shit maths tallying these games up. I'm a braindead high school dropout so I have an excuse...
Slammed
Active Member
- Jun 15, 2017
- 31,451
- 45,124
- 113
Similar threads
