10 films you love that are rarely mentioned

- Bigger than Life (1956) – Nicholas Ray
- Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980) – R. W. Fassbinder
- Les amitiés particulières (1964) – Jean Delannoy
- Numéro deux (1975) – Jean-Luc Godard
- As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000) – Jonas Mekas
- Peeping Tom (1960) – Michael Powell
- Paperhouse (1988) – Bernard Rose
- The Devils (1971) – Ken Russel
- Gycklarnas afton (1953) – Ingmar Bergman
- Leave Her to Heaven (1945) – John M. Stahl

The Dock Brief (1962) – James Hill
Deadbeat at Dawn (1988) – Jim Van Bebber
Dead Heat (1988) – Mark Goldblatt
Sometimes a Great Notion (1970) – Paul Newman
Tenebre (1982) – Dario Argento
Highway Patrolman (1991) – Alex Cox
Electra Glide in Blue (1973) – James William Guercio
Brubaker (1980) – Stuart Rosenberg
Edge of the City (1957) – Martin Ritt
Black Peter (1964) – Milos Forman

1. I Served the King of England (Jirí Menzel, 2006)
2. Il Divo (Paolo Sorrentino, 2008)
3. The Band’s Visit (Eran Kolirin, 2007)
4. Music (Juraj Nvota, 2008)
5. The Solitude of Prime Numbers (Saverio Costanzo, 2010)
6. My Perestroika (Robin Hessman, 2010)
7. The Trap (Srdan Golubovic, 2007)
8. Pandora’s Box (Yesim Ustaoglu, 2008)
9. The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner (Stephan Komandarev, 2008)
10. Bad Day to Go Fishing (Alvaro Brechner, 2009)

Laugh, Clown, Laugh (1928) – Herbert Brenon
The Search (1948) – Fred Zinneman
The Hill (1965) – Sidney Lumet
Stromboli (1950) – Roberto Rossellini
The Hanging Tree (1959) – Delmer Daves
The Young One (1960) – Luis Bunuel
The Beguiled (1971) – Don Siegel
One, Two, Three (1961) – Billy Wilder
A Patch of Blue (1965) – Guy Green
Pale Flower (1964) – Masahiro Shinoda

The King of Marvin Gardens – it’s mentioned, but should be as well known as Five Easy Pieces
Fat City – same, among the great 70s films
Night Moves – same goes for this
Night/ Day Watch – maybe not the greatest films of all time, but exciting mainstream cinema with lots of interesting visual ideas
Fuck Off! Images from Finland – very enjoyable portrait of Finland 1971
Is It Easy To Be Young? – one of the great documentaries, heard of it in The Story of Film
Wednesday – same with this, heard about it from same place, Russian documentary
In the Cut – Jane Campion, one of the best American films last decade, yet far from her most well known
In the White City – beautiful film from Lisbon, Bruno Ganz in his life’s role
Deep End – I guess it’s starting to become famous with it’s re-release a few years ago, but still not as well known as it should be

Off the top of my head…

For Me and My Gal (1942) – Busby Berkeley
Hangover Square (1945) – John Brahm
The Yearling (1946) – Clarence Brown
Unfaithfully Yours (1948) – Preston Sturges
House by the River (1950) – Fritz Lang
The Red Badge of Courage (1951) – John Huston
Good-bye, My Lady (1956) – William Wellman
The Sterile Cuckoo (1969) – Alan Pakula
The Fury (1978) – Brian De Palma
CrissCross (1992) – Chris Menges

Amos and Andrew (1993) E. Max Frye
My Left Eye Sees Ghost (2002) Johnnie To, Ka-Fai Wai
Sex is Zero (2002) Je-gyun Yun
Captain Ron (1992) Eberhardt
Shower (1999) Yang Zhang

The Cuckoo (2002) Rogozhkin
The Ascent (1977) Larisa Shepitko
Like Water for Chocolate (1992) Alfonso Arau
Adams Apples (2005) Jensen
Ballad of A Soldier (1959) Chukhray

Bride of Frankenstein (1935) – James Whale
Run Lola Run (1999) – Tom Tykwer
After Life (1998) – Hirokazu Koreeda
Dog Day Afternoon (1975) – Sidney Lumet
Grave of the Fireflies (1988) – Isao Takahata
Sweet & Lowdown (1999) – Woody Allen
Simon of the Desert (1965) – Luis Bunuel
The Collector (1965) – William Wyler
The Sorrow and the Pity (1969) – Marcel Ophuls
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They (1969) – Sydney Pollack

Primary
The Americanization of Emily
Harlan County USA
My Life as a Dog
Safe
Exotica
The Sweet Hereafter
The Ice Storm
American Movie
Together

“- Paperhouse (1988) – Bernard Rose”

OHH hell yeah. I saw this one when I was a kid and it kinda blew me away. I’d love to watch it again.

Pusher (Nicholas Winding Refn,1996)
Love is Colder Than Death (Rainer Werner Fassbinder,1969)
Eating Raoul (Paul Bartel,1982)
Bullet in The Head (John Woo,1990)
Tenchu! (Hideo Gosha,1969)
Rose Tinted Dreams (Dusah Hanak,1977)
Three Businessman (Alex Cox,1998)
Diary for My Children (Márta Mészáros,1984)
Times and Winds (Reha Erdem,2006)
Mr. Thank You (Hiroshi Shimizu,1936)

Hombre
Southern Comfort
The Happiness of the Katakuris
You, the Living
Survival of the Dead
Red Road
Coeur Fidele
Il Grido
Night Moves
Adam and Paul

@House of Leaves – nice cult canon
@Neil McCaule​y’s Cooler Brother – Katakuris & Night Moves are good choices.

How Tasty Was My Little Frenchman (1971)
Izo (2004)
Underworld (1927)
Stolen Kisses (1968)
Dry Wood (1973)
City of Ghosts (2002) – really not a great film, but I like it for some reason
The Limits of Control (2009)
White Material (2009)
Port of Shadows (1938)
25th Hour (2002)

Off the top of my head (and of varying quality):

The Body Snatcher (Robert Wise)
Leaves from Satan’s Book (Carl Theodor Dreyer)
Las Horas del Día (Jaime Rosales)
JSA (Chan-Wook Park)
The Company of Wolves (Neil Jordan)
Bad Guy (Ki-duk Kim)
Idiocracy (Mike Judge)

Good thread, many films I need to see now. Film history is so unfair, many films deserve more attention

Off the top of my head…some of these might be sometimes mentioned as great films, but not enough IMO:

Five Graves to Cairo (Billy Wilder)
Black Robe (Bruce Beresford)
Tombstone (George Cosmatos)
I Confess (Alfred Hitchcock)
Mafioso (Alberto Lattuada)
The Ballad of Cable Hogue (Sam Peckinpah)
Man on Fire (Tony Scott)
Infernal Affairs II (Andy Lau)
The Good Shepherd (Robert De Niro)
The Black Dahlia (Brian De Palma)

I almost put Some Came Running down, but feel like it truly is revered by almost all that have seen it.

O Lucky Man! (Anderson)
The Human Beast (Renoir)
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (Hunt)
Mesa of Lost Women (Ormond) — hey, you didn’t say they had to be good films…
Orpheus (Cocteau)
White Zombie and I Walked with a Zombie
Koyaanisqatsi (Reggio)
Venus in Furs (Jess Franco)
Diabolique (Cluzot)
20 Million Miles to Earth (fun little Ray Harryhausen picture with phenomenal stop-motion work)

@ Dave:

the Black Dahlia is an interesting pick. I read the book when it came out in 1988-ish and instantly became an Ellroy fan. I had such high hopes for DePalma’s film, coming less than a decade after LA Confidential, which I also enjoyed (better Best Picture contender than Titanic that year, IMO).

DePalma’s film changed so many significant points from the Dahlia novel, for no good reason i could discern. Bucky’s mano-a-mano confrontation with the killer was suspenseful as hell in the book; it is completely omitted from the film.

I would certainly give respect to your thoughts on why you like the film. I wanted to like it. I had such high hopes. And yet: meh.

Maybe it was the casting. Johansson looked like a doe in the headlights. and I’ve never understood the career success of Josh Hartnett. Eckhart was solid. Swank just doesn’t do it for me when I think of a femme fatale. Maybe Angelina Jolie would have been a better choice?Mia Kirshner, as the ill-fated Elizabeth Short, was poignant in her few scenes.

I’ll also give a nod to the cinematography, too. But overall…well, I’m just damning the film with faint praise.

I’d like to hear another critical assessment.

Thanks,

Steve

@ Steve

I agree with some of the criticisms you have of the film – mainly in regard to Johansson, as I think she was just flat-out miscast. Not having read the novel, the film’s faithfulness to Ellroy isn’t something I had to consider. But you point out some of the stronger points that really resonated for me. Mia Kirshner as the Dahlia, in those scenes where she is interacting with De Palma, I thought were excellent and allowed me to connect to the strands of the story concerning Hollywood, destruction etc.

Mainly, though, my love of the film comes from being a De Palma fan and watching him do some great things in terms of moviemaking, IMO. I constantly seem complaints about the narrative being incomprehensible, but I didn’t find it to be. This is one of De Palma’s appealing qualities for me: his ability to make the viewer think he is being tricky, when in reality things are not as complicated as you think. Everything about the movie is laid out and can be picked up on if you go back and look. And some of the individual sequences – like: the shooting that leads to the discovery of the Dahlia’s body, and, the end, I thinking are very well done. These sequences are executed wonderfully and look spectacular thanks to Zsigmond.

And there is certainly a camp aspect to it all that I think can (and does) turn many people off. The entire Linscott family is bizarre and campy, but I think it works in a very Twin Peaks kind of way.

So those are some thoughts/reasons that immediately come to mind. I have since come off my previous position that The Black Dahlia is my favorite De Palma, but I do still consider it among my favorites of the 2000s. And I know what a minority that puts me in!

Dave,

I understandwhat you are saying. To me, Dahlia is a guilty pleasure. For God’s Sake, man, read Ellroy’s novel. He is the best crime fiction novelist alive and one of the five greatest who ever lived. Hard-boiled noir. Hanson’s film of LA confidential was toned down considerably from Ellroy’s book. I don;t think any of the majors would dare make a completely faithful adaptation of an Ellory novel and sink any serious money into such a project. LA Confidential comes close.

As for DePalma, I’ll say Blow Out is my favorite of his. Then Dressed to Kill and Body Double, although the latter features that boring-as-hell Craig Wasson.

Cheers,

Steve

@Cinemat​ic Cteve – Have you read My Dark Places? It’s heartbreaking. Ellroy interweaves his mother’s murder with Elizabeth Short’s and traces his childhood. It’s a wonder he is not in jail if he hadn’t found writing.

Beautiful Girls (1996)
I’m just madly in love with this picture.

Angel Face (1952)
Preminger’s finest hour (and a half).

Bowfinger (1999)
Arguably the funniest movie ever to star Eddie Murphy in multiple roles.

Pickup On South Street (1953)
Bonjour Tristesse (1958)
After Hours (1985)
Why Do Fools Fall in Love (1998)
Nothing But The Truth (2008)
Dare (2009)
Please Give (2010)

Pierre,

Yes, I read that about 16 years ago and you are right: heartbreaking. It’s a marvel the man did not kill himself from drugs, booze and other forms of reckless living. Glad he lived through it all because he is a phenomenal writer.

@ It’s funny that you put 20 Million Miles to Earth, because I was thinking of putting ten films with Ray’s stop motion mastery, but I guess that would be cheating. Or would it? Eh, what the heck.

Clash of the Titans (1981)
Jason and the Argonauts
the Seventh Voyage of Sinbad
Mysterious Island
the Valley of Gwangi
First Men in the Moon
the Golden Voyage of Sinbad
It Came from Beneath the Sea
the Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
Mighty Joe Young

I tried to get a list of ten I really loved but are rarely mentioned:

• The Escape Artist (1982, Caleb Deschanel) – It’s a great film about a kid who wants to be a escape artist like his father. From that period in the early 1980s when American Zoetrope almost succeeded as a studio it’s really worth a watch and only has two fans here on Mubi.

• Les Uns et les Autres (1981, Claude Lelouch) – The stories of four families (American, French, German, and Russian) all with a great intrest in music that span from the 1930’s to the 1930s with Robert Hossein, Nicole Garcia, Geraldine Chaplin, James Caan, Daniel Olbrychski, Jorge Donn, and Jean-Claude Bouttier. It has foolishly criticized for three or four dancing sequences but mainly one at the start and end of the film but it’s Claude Lelouch’s masterpiece.

• The Heartbreak Kid (1972, Elaine May) – Young Jewish couple Charles Grodin and Jeannie Berlin marry, honeymoon in Miami, the husband’s shallow and the wifes needy. So he meets and becoumes obsed with a blonde, witty, midwstern, tall girl who he decieds he decieds to marry her. It’s known but not watched.

• The Apartment Cat (1998. Sarah Roper) – Wonderfull short it’s 7 minutes long & right here – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0vD8BQAPAU watch it!

• The Immortal Story (1968, Orson Welles) – From a Karen Blixen about an old merchant in 19th century Macao who becomes a obsessed with a story about a rich old man who offers a sailor five guineas to impregnate his wife so he tries to make it happen. It’s only an hour on hulu plus – http://www.hulu.com/watch/247350 watch it!

• Ruggles of Red Gap (1935, Leo McCarey) – Charles Laughton’s a English butler has been gambled away to newly rich American couple that take him back to Red Gap, Washington and then he becomes slowly, independent.

• The Two of Us (1967, Claude Berri) – During world war two Jewish couple send there son to live with the elderly parents of a friend in the French countryside, the boy has to hide his identity from the loving couple. But he bonds with the man played by Michel Simon but who believes the war to be caused by Jews, communists, freemasons, and the English

• They All Laughed (1981, Peter Bogdanovich) – Light New York comedy of intersecting people that meet and quickly become friends.

• The Magic Box (1952, John Boulting) – Amazing film about a man William Friese-Greene who becomes obsessed with his new technology of film and how expand it and popularize it.

• Wild River (1960, Elia Kazan) – Young government man goes to rural Tennessee to oversee the building of a dam, the people don’t like that, it might be Kazan’s best.

the westerner d. wyler (1940)
murder by contract d. lerner (1958)
maldone d. gremillon (1928)
the third shadow d. inoue (1963)
bandits of orgosolo d. de seta (1960)
asphalt d. may (1929)
the mortal storm d. borzage (1940)
hold back the dawn d. leisen (1941)
the president’s analyst d. flicker (1967)
one way passage d. garnett (1932)

@ steve

i agree with you about the black dahlia. the book is fantastic (i just finished it). it has been years since i saw the film and i remember being very disappointed with it. to me h. swank just wasn’t right in her role. i am tempted to watch it again, but i am sure i would regret the decision..

as for my favorite depalma films. i would say dressed to kill and the extremely overlooked femme fatale.

Abraham Valley (Oliveira)
Alice in the Cities (Wenders)
The Attached Balloon (Zheliazkova)
Changes in the Village (Peries)
Cloud-Capped Star (Ghatak)
Invasion (Santiago)
The Pearl (d’Ursel)
Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu)
Street of Crocodiles (Quay bros)
Tales of the Taira Clan (Mizoguchi)

more hidden treasures

Dog’s Dialogue (Ruiz, 1977)
Face (Tsai, 2009)
Garden of Delights (Agosti, 1967)
Invasion (Santiago, 1969)
La donna del lago (Bazzoni & Rossellini, 1965)
La vie nouvelle (Grandrieux, 2002)
Late August at the Hotel Ozone (Schmidt, 1967)
Memories of Underdevelopment (Alea, 1968)
The Third Part of the Night (Zulawski, 1971)
Visitor of a Museum (Lopushansky, 1989)

@ Roger O Thornhill:

Great name for a great character in my favorite movie. Yes, Femme Fatale is overlooked. I’m not convinced Rebecca Romjin is an accomplished actress, but I will say this: she can prop up her feet on my coffee table any damn time she pleases. Rowwr.