Saw too late, of course, that by the living directors I meant to add Godard. We still need to do a separate poll for this, like Adam has done for films. Sorry.
Very good job, Adam. The results came out very close to the “objective” values on the pitch.
The lists are also very similar to the effective “Sight & Sound” poll: someone could consider us critics, instead of film-goers.
However, a rapid analisys of the poll, makes me disagree (that’s just my opinion) with two things:
1) Francis Ford Coppola takes full advantage of the numerous “Godfather” fans. In this way he results higher than Martin Scorsese in the Top Directors’ chart. Sometimes I wish Coppola had never directed that “thing”. I really don’t know how many hundreds of masterpieces the poor Marty will have to produce to overtake Coppola, according to your opinions… LOL
2) France is higher than Italy in the “Top Ten Nations of Cinema” chart. So, I would like to remind that the “Best foreign language film” category was institued by the Academy to award those masterpieces that were coming out in the 1950s from the Cinecittà Studios in Rome, directed by Rossellini, De Sica and Fellini… The reason because the Cannes Film Festival exists is that Frenchmen couldn’t “defeat” the too-powerful Italian directors. It is clear that this result of today came out just because there are too many people from France on www.theauteurs.com, or too many enthusiastic fans of the Nouvelle Vague. It was just a consideration, I hope you don’t really mind. ;)
Thank you for your generous attention.
Hey Adam, you say you’re going to post all movies with 3 or more votes. If it isn’t too much trouble I think that it should be lowered to 2 or more votes. That way it shows that the movie wasn’t just a statistical anomaly; more than 1 person thinks it’s a worthwhile movie and it’d be nice to give it credit I suppose. That’s just my thought though; I’m not doing any of the work so it’s very easy for me to have all sorts of awesome thoughts like that.
Let me know what you think.
Excellent work, Adam! Thank you.
It will be just as easy for me to post movies with 2 votes or more. The only reason I wanted to avoid that is because so many films have 1 or 2 votes, that it might remove emphasis from the others. But, yes I believe I’ll post those with 2 votes or more. That way Synecdoche, New York can get some lovin’.
Ha, are you planning on compiling a comprehensive list of directors based upon total votes as well or just gonna stick it out with the top 10?
Bob, and here I practically assured you on your Kane thread that Kane wouldn’t even show up in our poll. I was hoping for a more esoteric list, to be honest.
I’ll be posting a list of directors as well, yes.
Good work Adam, very much appreciated.
In terms of the list, zzzzzz. Jeez, I was at least expecting one that isn’t so canonized. I find it hard to believe that so many people would have Kane as a favorite, but at least Joan and Stalker made the list. Although Scorsese ranking so high is disappointing, and Kubrick at number 1?!?! I need some anesthesia quick to get rid of this headache.
Kubrick is popular for a reason. I’m metaphorically looking a JP.
Although Im not upset in anyway that Kubrick was number 1, I would have never guessed it. Unsurprising but disappointing, is the fact that no directors from the East made it on that list except for Kurosawa…..
Nice work Adam. Nice work to all you cinephiles.
I was hoping the final top ten would be more unique, but I can’t argue with the quality of the films included.
Someone else, Chambord, voted for La Jetee. I feel all warm and fuzzy insde!
I’m more disappointed with the absence of some directors from the directors list.
This is all entirely my problem. See you in 2019 for a redo Adam.
“Unsurprising but disappointing, is the fact that no directors from the East made it on that list except for Kurosawa…..”
Did anyone else include a South American director on their list? Just me?
JP thats sort of what I meant when I said the results were kind of conservative. I agree all the films that made the cut are indeed what I consider great so no complaints really from me. It just would have been nice to see more picks outside of Western Europe and the US of A.
Very good job, Adam, thank you and all cinephiles. It’s a great list but I must say that I am surprise there is no Bergman or Ozu on it. And I wonder if we vote for top 10 directors alone instead of count on the top 10 films list the result probably would be a little different.
Sammax, I just realized there was no Bergman on the top ten as well. I think this was probbaly due to many people including his films….just not the same one. He was the 4th most listed.
Justin & JPB: Re Kane as number one: Well, who can account for taste, even here? I started that Kane thread to see why critics always put that one number one and got many good reasons from posters why. The fact that it always is top on lists, including ours, I am going to leave for greater minds to figure out. Check out the Kane thread for the relevant arguments. I am going to revisit my own thoughts and others in a thread I did on the ‘definitive canon’ (full title if anyone is interested: IS THERE SUCH A THING AS A ‘DEFINITIVE’ CANON OF FILMS/DIRECTORS?), because we are in the process of basically recreating the canon of films on so many other top ten lists. As we have had a ton of top ten, top 20, top 100 lists, and so forth here; at least we now have the most popular films for auteurs and grounds for endless arguments re their merits or what was left off.
I think it might be interesting, not for a poll, but for another short (say around 10 or so) list of personal favourites that we love but would not put on the ‘canon’ type lists. This way, we could highlight quirky films even more. This has been mentioned already. Now that we can see all the submitted lists for the current poll, we’ll have lots to talk about, discuss, argue over – but this exercise has been done so well, we need not repeat it anytime soon.
Bob I like that idea, maybe we could do like a Poll part 2 where people pick films they simply like on a personal level rather then any objective context. If anything, it would provide some interesting results.
That’s what I did the first go-around, so my list would be the exact same.
Bob, on such a list, my picks or rather my criteria for choosing would be much the same. I can’t be objective. I was not contributing to a “canon” here. Having said that – my next list would certainly be different, but it would still not include personal favourites like High Fidelity or Year of the Dragon when space is limited. Well, jeez I would perhaps include Year of the Dragon. Cimino has had little or no love here.
I’m the same way with High Fidelity; it’s a film I can watch endlessly but wouldn’t put it as an absolute favorite.
I doubt anyone would say they don’t personally like the films they chose. They’re just safe picks for the most part. We voted with the Green Party, or Nader.
Adam, something puzzles me: Kurosawa got 2 films in the top ten, but is way down at 5 on the directors list, while Bergman is number 3 but got no films in the top ten.
That’s why a list of films we watch and re-watch endlessly, irregardless of where we fit them critically, would be interesting, as well. Yes, in some cases it would be the same. I have mentioned that my own top 10 list are all films I have seen at least a few times, but it does not include some of my other personal favourites like Some Like it Hot, Billy Liar, Unbearable Lightness of Being, Portrait of Jennie, The Party – sure films, I enjoy, but not necessarily up there with my own ‘critical’ list. I’ll start a thread for this, where anyone can throw out a different take on ‘personal’ if they like.
Justin, its probably a case where so many people chose Bergman films but no one film got alot of votes. While for Kurosawa, those voting for him would tend to pick the same couple of films.
Adam my lad… I applaud you! great effort and a couple of surprises.
and to echo Bob S… I guess when contributing to a poll like this we naturally temper it to ‘important’ or influential films, as well as factoring in personal taste. If it was just 10 films that you personally enjoy without all the historical baggage the list might be different? but when thinkinhg in terms of history who could deny Kane it’s due? or Hitch his place? I’d be throwing in The Life Of Brian or Butch Cassidy on the personal list and they won’t make a critics top ten.
Great job Adam, I enjoyed this a lot.
Bravo Adam.
Everyone else:
so you know what I’m referring to in my comments, my list is:
The Best Years of Our Lives William Wyler
The Conformist Bernardo Bertolucci
Dr. Strangelove Stanley Kubrick
The Grapes of Wrath John Ford
Great Expectations David Lean
The Magnificent Ambersons Orson Welles
North by Northwest Alfred Hitchcock
The Passion of Joan of Arc Carl Dreyer
Sunset Blvd. Billy Wilder
The Third Man Carol Reed
My list had nothing to do with historical significance or social import. No ranks, just alpha.
These are 10 pictures (there could have been 75 or 100) that I will watch any time, anywhere, in any format, even with commercials.
I will also recommend them to anyone, any age (beyond childhood), any nationality, and pretty much any educational background.
Important project going on? Oh look, TCM is showing The Third Man; can’t help you until Valli walks that walk.
Anyway, I chose Ambersons over Kane because, while CK is a “great” movie and a stunning stylistic/technical advance of cinema,
Ambersons is a better picture.
It’s hard to believe The Third Man didn’t make the Auteurs cut. Same goes for The Conformist.
Only one of my top 10 (The Passion of JofA) made the Auteurs list, but somehow 1 out of 10 seems about right, mathematically.
And if Vertigo deserves a higher ranking than N by NW, then I guess I forgot to include “overwrought” and “earnest” as positive criteria.
The matter of Stalker showing up on this list is baffling, if not entirely shameful. So now I have to go back and give it a second look.
Thanks Adam! Hooray for JOAN OF ARC! Hooray for two Kurosawa films!!
Desjarlais
None of my films made it, Bummer!