Rank Good Director's Films in Order of Goodness

What about dreadful directors' films in order of dread?

Brian De Palma

--Scarface
--Raising Cain
--Wise Guys (Danny DeVito & Joe Piscopo star)
--Body Double
--Casualties of War
--Carlito's Way
--Untouchables

You may take issue with my use of the word "pure", but at least I tried to explain what I meant. Your use of the word "substance", which you conveniently fail to explain, leaves me confused. Again.

Why dont you try another drive-by blast, leroy?

explaining things in depth right off the bat doesn't appear to be my forte, sorry

nothing wrong with your use of "pure" but the way i see it is Kubrick using long winded music videos to make up for the lack of good story, which i think is what i meant by "substance"

That's fine. No harm no foul.

My use of the word "pure" was referring obliquely to the Pure Cinema philosophy of the 20s,

The term was first coined by Henri Chomette to define a cinema that focused on the pure elements of film like form, motion, visual composition, and rhythm . . . . The goal was "pure" cinema, free from any influence from literature, the stage, or even the other visual arts. . . . .an opportunity to transcend "story", to ridicule "character," "setting," and "plot" as bourgeois conventions, to slaughter causality by using the innate dynamism of the film medium to overturn conventional Aristotelian notions of time and space . . . . .

Dulac's term which might better be translated "Self -Sufficient" or "Complete" cinema -- to stress that these works, all of them, functioned only as cinema art: that they could not exist in any other medium because their essential effect arose from the unique potentials of the cinematic mechanism, such as flexible montage of time and space, measured pacing and control of gaze, exact repetition, single-frame diversity and continuity, superimposition and its related split-screen imagery.

I see the movies, particularly 2001, that I mentioned as belonging to this lineage, and I felt the criticism that it didnt possess "substance" was way off the mark, although that term is so vague it could mean almost anything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinema_pur

I see the movies, particularly 2001, that I mentioned as belonging to this lineage, and I felt the criticism that it didnt possess "substance" was way off the mark, although that term is so vague it could mean almost anything.

i still think 2001 sticks out like a sore thumb here, it really feels to me like dull music videos sandwiched between bad sci-fi. Kubrick's "form, motion, visual composition, and rhythm" may be impressive, but the film hardly transcends story (it might have been better served if it had). I brought up Harmony Korine because he seems to fit into this lineage better.

What about dreadful directors' films in order of dread?

Brian De Palma

--Scarface
--Raising Cain
--Wise Guys (Danny DeVito & Joe Piscopo star)
--Body Double
--Casualties of War
--Carlito's Way
--Untouchables

glad to say i've only seen about half of thoes

there is probably already a thread like this in the archives somewhere, i'd go looking for it but i think people perceive me to be negative enough as it is (it would give me a chance to do a full Scorsese list, starting out with After Hours and Goodfellas at the top)

so many of Kubrick's films feel like the technical accomplishments of a genius with very superficial treatment of the subject matter, maybe the Eddie Van Halen of filmmaking?

i still think 2001 sticks out like a sore thumb here, it really feels to me like dull music videos sandwiched between bad sci-fi. Kubrick's "form, motion, visual composition, and rhythm" may be impressive, but the film hardly transcends story (it might have been better served if it had). I brought up Harmony Korine because he seems to fit into this lineage better.

so I don't disagree with this, although it's not Kubrick's fault if MTV copied the fuck out of him later, so that's an unfair criticism, at least the way it's phrased. but I'll take Lem over Clarke and Tarkovsky over Kubrick, even though I think I agree with Frau Schau that Solaris is the least of his that I've seen.

as for contrarian, I'm not sure there's a Hitchcock film I could sit through all of now, and I've pretty much seen all of them. the last I tried was Shadow of a Doubt (one of my previous top few) and somehow the Hollywood-ality of it killed it for me. I felt like this about Kurosawa for a while too (both my single favorite directors at one point back in the day), as did Yuko, but we've been getting a little more into his stuff again recently.

David Lynch:

Inland Empire
Mulholland Drive
Lost Highway
Twin Peaks (season 1)
Eraserhead
Blue Velvet


Tarkovsky:

Andrei Rublev
Mirror
Sacrifice (moved up my list a bit after seeing the luminous SFI version on DVD)
Stalker (moved down my list as it doesn't hold up as well as I hoped. It's visually impeccable it's talkiness is irritating at times)
Solaris
Nostalghia
Ivan's Childhood


Tarr:

Werckmeister Harmonies/Satantango (tied first place. Werckmeister is more appealing at first glance but Satantango was uncompromising in it's misanthropy - for me at least Satantango was close to perfect cinema)
Damnation
The Man from London


Kubrick:

2001
The Shining
Eyes Wide Shut
Full Metal Jacket
Barry Lyndon
Paths of Glory
The Killing
Clockwork Orange
Dr Strangelove (Saw it recently and it seemed very dated and only had a couple of good moments)

Didn't like, Lolita, Killers Kiss or Spartacus so won't include them


Bergman:

Winter Light (as close to a perfect film as I've ever seen)
Through a Glass Darkly
The Silence
Fanny and Alexander
Wild Strawberries
The Seventh Seal
Persona
I need to see more...


Coppola:

The Conversation
Apocalypse Now
Godfather
Godfather Part II


Ken Loach:

My Name is Joe
Kes
The Navigators
Land and Freedom
Tickets (with Olmi and Kauristami)
Carla's Song
Finally the poorly written and crafted, The Wind that Shakes the Barley

Tranh Anh Hung

Cyclo
The Vertical Ray of the Sun
The Scent of Green Papaya

it would give me a chance to do a full Scorsese list, starting out with After Hours and Goodfellas at the top

After Hours came out a year after I started going to college in Manhattan, and it was pretty trippy to see as a relative neophyte there. it's got fantastic lower Manhattan atmosphere* and it holds up pretty well too, I last saw it a few years ago.

also, one of Linda Fiorentino's first roles, 9 years before The Last Seduction, yowza.

*which is the opposite end of the spectrum from Kubrick's hilarious faux-Village in Eyes Wide Shut ('let's just build it from how I remember it when I was last there decades ago, I'm sure it's exactly the same, and if it isn't, no one will notice').

Tranh Anh Hung

Cyclo
The Vertical Ray of the Sun
The Scent of Green Papaya


Right on, glad to see someone recognize these extraordinary films.
Papya was first, close to over-saturation of lush and sensual elements. The shock of his second feature, Cyclo, was dislocating for me. That one director could create the seductive textures and folds of Papya with the brutality and unsentimental poverty of Cyclo is stunning.

Tranh Anh Hung

Cyclo
The Vertical Ray of the Sun
The Scent of Green Papaya


Right on, glad to see someone recognize these extraordinary films.

Cheers Jesse. Actually, any one of the three films could take first place. I remember The Vertical Ray of the Sun (At the Height of Summer) being criticised for lack of plot but it was just very subtle I think. I wonder what his new film I Come With Rain will be like?

so I don't disagree with this, although it's not Kubrick's fault if MTV copied the fuck out of him later, so that's an unfair criticism, at least the way it's phrased.

it is phrased in a very anachronistic way, but i couldn't think of a better way to describe it

I'll take Lem over Clarke and Tarkovsky over Kubrick, even though I think I agree with Frau Schau that Solaris is the least of his that I've seen.

I like Solaris more then Stalker acually, especially as a reaction against 2001.

I love the Solaris set and how Tarkovsky made the premise his own so much that it isn't really worth thinking about in relation to the novel (talking out of my ass a little here, i haven't actually read it)

also Natalya Bondarchuk is amazing, and she was in so few films that Solaris is almost worthwhile just to see her in it

as for contrarian, I'm not sure there's a Hitchcock film I could sit through all of now, and I've pretty much seen all of them. the last I tried was Shadow of a Doubt (one of my previous top few) and somehow the Hollywood-ality of it killed it for me. I felt like this about Kurosawa for a while too (both my single favorite directors at one point back in the day), as did Yuko, but we've been getting a little more into his stuff again recently.

i felt the same way about Shadow of a Doubt the first time i saw it

Shadow of a Doubt, Notorious, Vertigo and Rashomon all took a few tries before they clicked with me so i understand where you are coming from very well

After Hours came out a year after I started going to college in Manhattan, and it was pretty trippy to see as a relative neophyte there. it's got fantastic lower Manhattan atmosphere* and it holds up pretty well too, I last saw it a few years ago.

i intensely disliked the script, which was like a middle schoolers attempt to be clever while also trying way to hard (the kafka reference ). i have big issues with the things Scorsese seems to find funny.

also, one of Linda Fiorentino's first roles, 9 years before The Last Seduction, yowza.

yes! whatever happened to her? she makes The Last Seduction great

*which is the opposite end of the spectrum from Kubrick's hilarious faux-Village in Eyes Wide Shut ('let's just build it from how I remember it when I was last there decades ago, I'm sure it's exactly the same, and if it isn't, no one will notice').

haha, yeah but there is a crowd who claim that the fake-ness of the sets are on purpose (not that it makes the movie any better)

Tarkovsky:

0. Ivan's Childhood (this deserves a special mention, if it were any other director it might be at the top of the list but because it's Tarkovsky it is very hard not to put it at the bottom)
1. Sacrifice (i was worried that it would be imitation bergman, but it is %100 Tarkovsky, and i really feel that he reached a culmination with his last two films)
2. Nostalghia
3. Andrei Rublev (if i were an artist, this would probably be no.1)
4. Mirror
5. Solaris
6. Stalker (agreed with smithy here "It's visually impeccable it's but it's talkiness is irritating at times")

Welles

1. Touch of Evil
2. Chimes at Midnight
3. The Lady from Shanghai
4. F for Fake
5. Mr. Arkadin (someone should take a stab at a semi-definitive cut, instead of the "all the footage thrown together" cut that they have now)
--------------------
the ones i didn't like, from best to worst
--Citizen Kane
--The Trial
--Macbeth
--Othello
--The Stranger
--The Magnificent Ambersons
has anyone seen The Immortal Story? curious to what that one is like.

Verhoeven

1. Flesh & Blood
2. Showgirls
3. RoboCop
4. The Fourth Man
5. Starship Troopers
6. Soldier of Orange
7. Total Recall
8. Hollow Man
i've seen everything he has done from Soldier of Orange onward, and the rest i didn't much care for.
i've never been able to get a hold of his other 70's work, but i hear that Turkish Delight (1973) is supposed to be good.

Carol Reed/Graham Greene

1. The Third Man
2. The Fallen Idol
3. Our Man in Havana
a bit of a no brainer perhaps, but a tad overlooked for such a winning combination

the ones i didn't like, from best to worst
--Citizen Kane

come on now.

the ones i didn't like, from best to worst
--Citizen Kane

come on now.

there are some really good bits (the newsreel at the beginning and the camera angles really impressed my as a child), but after awhile it starts to get tedious. plus the whole rosebud thing is lame

I'm sorry, I can't respect that opinion.

that's okay

what did you think of Touch of Evil and Chimes at Midnight?

Touch of Evil is pretty good, obviously the opening shot and Dietrich and Welles are great. Charlton Heston is maybe the weak link for me, he's not exactly Mexican in real life. but that's just nitpicking, I'm a fan. Chimes at Midnight I haven't seen.

Chimes at Midnight is on youtube if you are interested

i like Chimes at Midnight a lot, it is almost as if Welles got fat just so he could play Falstaff

Quite a lively thread, but once more it's descended to the level of personal pet peeve. However much you might not care for Mr Welles or Mr Kubrick (Eddie van Halen, Jon? I'd have thought Eric Clapton would be more appropriate), you ought to recognise that Citizen Kane and 2001 are both extraordinary examples of filmmaking. Substance? Purity? Smells of the old high art / low art debate a bit.
Touch Of Evil is, for me, even more exciting than Kane (and I'm not a Charlton Heston fan at all). Welles' use of sound alone in that movie looks forward to Godard (superimposed / "unintelligible" dialogue, an incredible play between on and off screen) and Walter Murch's work on Coppola's Conversation (the radio mic tracking scene near the end). Not a great fan of Chimes - I don't mind his Macbeth but I have yet to see a film adaptation of Shakespeare that really works.

(Eddie van Halen, Jon? I'd have thought Eric Clapton would be more appropriate)

EVH might not be ideal, but Kubrick is more soulless than Clapton IMO, who at least tapped into some genuine blues on that Derek and the Dominos record.

as for 2001, maybe if I'd seen it closer to when it was released. I've seen it in the theater, I've seen it at home, not a fan and the end section is just painful hippie treacle.

I don't mind his Macbeth but I have yet to see a film adaptation of Shakespeare that really works.

are you counting Kurosawa? Throne of Blood and/or Ran are pretty damn good attempts IMO.

Chimes at Midnight is on youtube if you are interested

if you're watching films on youtube, some of your opinions/rankings make more sense.