One of the oddest choices: 51. Nostalghia (1983, Andrei Tarkovsky)
I think some of Schrader’s writing on the criteria is a bit vague. (e.g., on beauty: “…its ability to qualitatively transform reality”)
I also have mixed feelings about the criteria of “viewer engagements.” That criterion seems highly subjective (and I thought Schrader tried to separate what he liked from what he thought was great). I mean, the film may be made in a style or deal with a subject that the viewer finds uninteresting. That doesn’t necessarily mean the film isn’t great, imo.
On the other hand, I think a great film should resonate and move the viewer on some level (which is close to engaging the viewer).
Thanks for posting this, Robert.
This from the guy who wrote Rolling Thnder (a movioe that makes Death Wish look like a Bergman Film) and directed an Exorcist sequel…. Gimmee a break.
I like judging lists such as these through the oddities and surprises. Ranking “Masculine Feminine” so high interests me. I’d also call it a stunning masterpiece but maybe not Godard’s best. Everything else on the list seems sort of by-the-book for the most part.
I have this canon as a list on here.
Judging by his criteria, I feel like Last Year at Marienbad should be a lot higher on this list…
His list lacks quirkiness, the only even somewhat obscure film is the Budd Boetticher.
I’m a big fan of Schrader with American Gigolo and Light Sleeper qualifying as masterpieces in my book. After reading Schrader’s article in Film Comment, I shared it with our film society. Two points we all agreed upon: first, that repeatability is a key hallmark of a great film, and second, that it did not matter which film one selected by a master. Some of us preferred Ozu’s Late Spring, others preferred Dersu Uzala or Red Beard from Kurusawa, but the key was that the director had found a place on each of our lists. As for Nostalghia, I prefer The Sacrifice or Andre Rublev, but by his criteria, it makes no difference which work of an artist puts that artist on the list. Imagine choosing among Rules of the Game, Grande Illusion and Picnic on the Grass. Any one belongs in the Pantheon. I prefer The Woman Next Door or Two English Girls to Jules and Jim. It is enough that the artist appears on the list.
My only quibble is with the lack of women on the list. Surely, Claire Denis belongs, preferably with 35 Shots of Rum. And maybe Carl Franklin is more deserving of a place than Dovzhenko who fails my repeatability test. And where, oh where are Howard Hawks and Douglas Sirk? But what good are lists if one can’t amend them (and one Gene Kelly with Vincente Minelli is all we need; I’ll pass on Singin’ in the Rain, which I find unwatchable after one viewing by Schrader’s criteria). And I would definitely choose Nicholas Ray over Nicholas Roeg. Tannhowser is right – it does lack quirkiness, but I don’t see that as a flaw in his criteria, only in the critic. By the way, Rolling Thunder is one film that lingers in consciousness long after viewing and fits perfectly with Schrader’s obsession with pilgrims and puritans. John Fl ynn was a solid action director and this movie is as disturbing as anything in Sam Peckinpah. The political resonance of the garbage disposal scene on an honored war veteran says as much about inner national corruption as the hot coffee scene in The Big Heat.
I like that he recognizes La Notte over the other Antonioni films of that period. A lot of people overlook that film in favor of L’Avventura and L’ Ecclise.
The repeatability criteria seems crucial to me. People kick against the goads of canon, but they fail to remember that repeatability, holding up over time, and ability to speak across generations are necessary factors. This is why newer movies, even if we love them to death, can’t enter the canon. New movies must endure the passage of time. This is why Schrader’s list looks tepid to some – he’s picking movies that have stood up over the long haul, stalwarts of the cinema.
I will admit that I’m a little surprised at a few selections.
The Life of Oharu, though a very good film, is not the obvious choice for Mizoguchi.
Ditto Shanghai Express and Sternberg.
Though I’m a big fan of Gun Crazy, I’m a bit surprised at its inclusion.
Talk to Her would seem to violate the repeatability criteria. Has it stood the test of time? Has it spoken across generations? It’s my favorite Almadovar, but I wouldn’t think of it as a potential canon candidate.
Very predictible. I would have expected someone that has been in the bussiness this long to have explored more. Maybe The Auteurs/Mubi is the first place where this tipe of ubber exploration is going on.
The problem with the list is when you combine repeatability with tradition as this serves to simply reinforce previously held values and choices, choices then filtered through some opaque favoriting system know only to Schrader since any number of other films fit his criteria equally well. I would suggest a modified understanding of tradition is necessary to any idea of a film canon that can speak to something beyond a very narrow view of film history, one that has been determined as much by availability over the years as anything else. That isn’t to say that one should ignore the films that we have celebrated over the years, but that they cannot be seen as having extra virtue simply because they were able to be seen. it is one thing to reference an old canon of ideas or films as a starting point for our modern understanding, that can be good as much of what we know came from that base, but it is another thing entirely to try and build a new canon from those old ideas, that just repeats the blind spots of those that came before.
The other criteria are iffy in some respects as well even if they also aren’t “wrong” per se. They are all dependent on a personal interpretation of what they mean to be identified in a film, which is obvious, but that obviousness doesn’t eliminate the issue.
I don’t see the Tarkovsky as bieng an odd choice for Paul. Overall solid list reflecting the taste of a wide variety of film lovers.
I love Schrader as a screenwriter and a director, but this is just a favorites list like anyone else’s favorites list. Sure, he defined his criteria, but don’t we all do that in our heads when making such lists. Also, while Taxi Driver is even higher on my list than his, the fact that he would include one of his own films is questionable.
Though I’m a big fan of Gun Crazy, I’m a bit surprised at its inclusion.
You know he is a huge fan of Noir?
The list comes from and article he did in Film Comment around 2006 (I remember that Marie-Antoinette was on the cover). More important than the list itself is the article that accompanied it. The criteria that Robert lists are a part of the article, but he does into more detail elsewhere. I suggest seeking that out for a better explanation of Schraders’ purposes
Marie Antoinette was on the front cover and an ad for Coppola’s wine was on the back. Not that I’m suggesting anything by that…well, maybe a little something…
The problem with the list is when you combine repeatability with tradition as this serves to simply reinforce previously held values and choices, choices then filtered through some opaque favoriting system know only to Schrader since any number of other films fit his criteria equally well. I would suggest a modified understanding of tradition is necessary to any idea of a film canon that can speak to something beyond a very narrow view of film history, one that has been determined as much by availability over the years as anything else.
Greg sums up my sentiments perfectly.
But let me put it in my—and less diplomatic—way as well. Schrader shouldn’t have bothered. He could’ve just substituted the Criterion Janus Collection instead of this list, and no one would really know the fucking difference. YAWN. Branch out and watch some of the absolutely brilliant movies from at least the old Soviet Bloc before you make a list.
Overall solid list reflecting the taste of a wide variety of film lovers.
I hope you’re joking with the wide variety part, Mr. Ehrenstein.
@ Nathan The article is at the link at the bottom of the OP.
For strangeness why not The Shanghai Gesture?
I do like the term strangeness for what it is getting at. It’s a much better concept than originality.
@BK
As others have mentioned – timelessness is creating the blandness.
brilliant movies from at least the old Soviet Bloc before you make a list.
Given the criteria which films?
I love Soviet films, but there is tininess to them – the strangeness gets old fast.
Check out Medvedkin’s Happiness some time Robert, that should give a different viewpoint on Soviet films of the thirties, I also dig Vassilisa the Beautiful, but that likely wouldn’t make the cut for this kind of list where Happiness really could.
Yeah, there are some good ones based on novels: Nikita Mikhalkov’s Unfinished Piece for the Player Piano
My weakness: slapstick silent comedy
([{ shudder )]}
“The problem with the list is when you combine repeatability with tradition as this serves to simply reinforce previously held values and choices”
That, by definition, is what a canon is.
“The other criteria are iffy in some respects as well even if they also aren’t “wrong” per se. They are all dependent on a personal interpretation”
Not sure I follow you. Earlier you said that the repeatability and tradition “reinforce previously held values and choices,” i.e. as criteria, they simply recapitulates decisions that have already been made. Here you’re saying that the other criteria used to determine the list are matters of personal interpretation, the implication being they’re idiosyncratic, and therefore to some degree invalid because they’re not objectively verifiable. Isn’t this what a “canon” list should do, offer a bridge between the personal and the shared?
“I would have expected someone that has been in the bussiness this long to have explored more.”
“Branch out and watch some of the absolutely brilliant movies from at least the old Soviet Bloc before you make a list.”
Seriously, guys? You think Schrader’s taste is more limited by by the films he has and hasn’t seen than is your own?
I wasn’t joking at all. Paul’s taste is quite mainstream for an intelligent cineaste of his generation.
The one interesting item is #36.
Among the films he’s written and directed I like “Light Sleeper” and the grievously underrated “The Walker” best.
Matt, I understand what you’re saying about a canon as a concept, but the values it holds can be set as a condition before one begins the exercise. I would suggest that not including some conception of breadth in his initial decision making he erred on the side of some of the more regrettable traditions, which is why setting out to construct a canon now, as Schrader is doing, could and should seek to rectify some of the limits of the past. It isn’t that I’m suggesting anything goes, but that one can adapt to changes over time with a canonical list to show the further reaches of scholarship and understanding of film histories that weren’t always appreciated. Schrader adds films like Talk to Her, so he is adding films to his canon that are recent in years, but not adding much to the scope of the endeavor, and that is where I think this is lacking. I would also suggest that a personal canon, like this one appears to be, is also something of a mistake in that I believe a canon needs to have some defining purpose which is where my second objection, the one you felt contradicted the first, came in. My objection there is that there is no clear reason why certain films are in and others are out by any sort of outside or otherwise discernible standard other than Schrader’s whims, even if one accepts the initial limiting factors he chose, the selections within those criteria are whimsical at a certain point, by which I mean there isn’t a clear defense for adding film X instead of film Y other than he wanted to. So my first point was aimed at the limiting factors or criteria used and the second at the selections within that criteria. As a whole it just comes across as a list of favorites that he deems others should see, nothing wrong with that, but that isn’t what I’d think of as a canon. Perhaps he objects to certain aspects of other films from around the world, or hasn’t involved him,self as much in those areas or simply likes these films better, but that sort of personal limitation is why a canon, if it is to be taken seriously needs a broader base of construction, more viewpoints and a clearer ideology behind it to make sense, since that is what a canon is for after all, to instruct in a way or method of understanding. This one might do that, but I’d say it is outdated if that is the goal.
Robert W Peabody III
Schrader’s criteria:
Beauty. Beauty is not defined by rules and attributes (symmetry, harmony, variety within unity—Clive Bell’s “significant form”) but by its ability to qualitatively transform reality.
Strangeness. Harold Bloom uses the term “strangeness” in lieu of the more common “originality.” Strangeness is the type of originality that we can “never altogether assimilate.”
Unity of form and subject matter. Hegel states in Aesthetics, “will depend upon the degree of intimacy with which . . . form and subject matter are fused and united.”
Tradition. Bloom picks up the argument in The Western Canon.“Tradition is not only a handing down or process of benign transmission,” he writes, “it is also a conflict between past
genius and present aspiration in which the prize is literary survival or canonical inclusion.”
Repeatability. Timelessness is the sine qua non of the canonical. Winckelmann, the father of art history, was motivated by the need to explain the timeless beauty of Greek art. This is basic—from Hume to Bloom all agree: great art “holds up,” it can be experienced repeatedly, it can be appreciated by
successive generations, it grows in importance and context with time.
Viewer engagement: A great film is one that to some degree frees the viewer from this passive stupor and engages him or her in acreative process of viewing. The dynamic must be two-way.The great film not only comes at the viewer, it draws theviewer toward it. The film, either by withholding expected
elements or by positing contradictions, causes the viewer to reach into the screen, as it were, and move the creative furniture around.
Morality. Movies will always have a moral component. One can’t depict real-life situations, develop characters, and tell stories over time without moral ramifications.
One film per director.
1. The Rules of the Game (1939, Jean Renoir)
2. Tokyo Story (1953, Yasujiro Ozu)
3. City Lights (1931, Charles Chaplin)
4. Pickpocket (1959, Robert Bresson)
5. Metropolis (1927, Fritz Lang)
6. Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles)
7. Orphée (1950, Jean Cocteau)
8. Masculin-Feminin (1966, Jean-Luc Godard)
9. Persona (1966, Ingmar Bergman)
10. Vertigo (1958, Alfred Hitchcock)
11. Sunrise (1927, F.W. Murnau)
12. The Searchers (1956, John Ford)
13. The Lady Eve (1941, Preston Sturges)
14. The Conformist (1970, Bernardo Bertolucci)
15. 8 ½ (1963, Federico Fellini)
16. The Godfather (1972, Francis Ford Coppola)
17. In the Mood for Love (2000, Wong Kar-wai)
18. The Third Man (1949, Carol Reed)
19. Performance (1970, Donald Cammell/Nicholas Roeg)
20. La Notte (1961, Michelangelo Antonioni) Silver
21. Mother and Son (1997, Alexander Sokurov)
22. The Leopard (1963, Luchino Visconti)
23. The Dead (1987, John Huston)
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, Stanley Kubrick)
25. Last Year at Marienbad (1961, Alain Resnais)
26. The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928, Carl Theodor Dreyer)
27. Jules and Jim (1961, Francois Truffaut)
28. The Wild Bunch (1969, Sam Peckinpah)
29. All That Jazz (1979, Bob Fosse)
30. The Life of Oharu (1952, Kenji Mizoguchi)
31. High and Low (1963, Akira Kurosawa)
32. Sweet Smell of Success (1957, Alexander Mackendrick)
33. That Obscure Object of Desire (1977, Luis Bunuel)
34. An American in Paris (1951, Vincente Minnelli)
35. The Battle of Algiers (1966, Gillo Pontecorvo)
36. Taxi Driver (1976, Martin Scorsese)
37. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974, Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
38. Blue Velvet (1986, David Lynch)
39. Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989, Woody Allen)
40. The Big Lebowski (1998, Joel Coen)
Bronze
41. The Red Shoes (1948, Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger)
42. Singin’ in the Rain (1952, Stanley Donen)
43. Chinatown (1974, Roman Polanski)
44. The Crowd (1928, King Vidor)
45. Sunset Boulevard (1950, Billy Wilder)
46. Talk to Her (2002, Pedro Almodovar)
47. Shanghai Express (1932, Josef von Sternberg)
48. Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948, Max Ophuls)
49. Once Upon a Time in the West (1969, Sergio Leone)
50. Salvatore Giuliano (1962, Francesco Rosi)
51. Nostalghia (1983, Andrei Tarkovsky)
52. Seven Men from Now (1956, Budd Boetticher)
53. Claire’s Knee (1970, Eric Rohmer)
54. Earth (1930, Alexander Dovzhenko)
55. Gun Crazy (1949, Joseph H. Lewis)
56. Out of the Past (1947, Jacques Tourneur)
57. Children of Paradise (1945, Marcel Carne)
58. The Naked Spur (1953, Anthony Mann)
59. A Place in the Sun (1951, George Stevens)
60. The General (1927, Buster Keaton)
From an 2006 article done for Film Comment C A N O N F O D D E R