When I say "A Perfect Film", What One Film Pops Into Your Head First?

Winter Light. It’s the best film I’ve ever seen (although Breaking the Waves is really at its heels), and it’s perfect show of dispair and loss, of things unsaid, just grabs me. It is amazing.

Really, though, the first thine that pops into my head is No Country for Old Men, not because I think it’s perfect (although it’s damn close), but because Ebert cited it as a “perfect” film, and that stuck with me…

Savvy

i thought Breaking the Waves was one of the saddest films I’ve seen too – the loss of innocence and total despair was so beautifully evoked by Emily Watson.

I’ll watch Winter Light and see what I think. Enjoyed No Country for Old Men – although was unhappy with the handling of the ending -

Night of the Hunter or The Curse of the Jade Scorpion.

A Woman Under The Influence

Match Point.

2001

Godfather. period.

The Mirror
Syndromes and a Century
Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks

Au Hasard Balthazar

The only film that I can think of that I can’t find even the tiniest thing that I dislike or disagree with would be Tarkovsky’s “Mirror”.

This One:

The performers don’t even look like they are performing: they simply “become” to the point where it is only the characters on screen: Peter Finch is NOT Howard Beale…Howard Beale TAKES OVER totally. Faye Dunaway is NOT Diana Christensen…it is DIANA CHRISTENSEN and nobody else. These characters just “happen” to look like Peter Finch and Faye Dunaway. So how fitting is it a film about the illusory nature of television presents itself as the perfect illusion? However, from this fantasy world of fictional people, we draw truth: Paddy Chayefsky really is speaking the truth about television, its unwholesome level of influence upon people, the corporate world, the homogenisation of human society. Also, I love the scene where Laureen Hobbs and her fellow communists start arguing over money from the Mao Tse Tung Hour. This film is dripping with irony. Your will never experience a film with better writing, better acting…maybe some films with EQUIVALENT levels of writing or acting, but I dare say, I shall never see anything from film that surpasses its magnificence.

The Darjeeling Limited
Amelie
12 Angry Men

Once upon a time in the West, such a beautiful film and perfect in my opinion. Morricone’s score is amazing as is the performances, story, opening, finale, amazing cinamatography, tension etc.. I love the slow burn style and am just fascinated by this film.

Others
:
Aliens(definitely dated dialogue, but I love it and think its a perfect movie nonetheless)
Taxi Driver
The Evil Dead 2
Oldboy
The Fall

Very first title that popped into my head: SHERLOCK, JR.

American Beauty – not my favorite film, but it was as close to perfection that I knew the first time i saw it.

Blow-Up
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie
Heat
Au Hasard Balthazar
Pierrot le Fou

Days of Heaven

Ordet, A Woman Under the Influence, Mikey and Nicky, and Abigail’s Party

Very few, but they would have to be:

The Conversation
Rosemary’s Baby
Chinatown
The Passion of Joan of Arc
Annie Hall

Sans Soleil

In the Mood for Love

I’m sure this has been mentioned, but I think “a perfect film” is impossible and for that nothing pops in my head. However, a bunch of excellent films popped into my head.

Is it sad that the very first thing to pop into my head is The Princess Bride? Something about a film with R.O.U.S’s and characters with the name Buttercup and Humperdinck. I just love it!

You Can’t Take It With You

au hasard balthazar

come and see

Eternal Sunshine and Rushmore immediately spring to mind.

KALYN sounds defensive. " Is it sad that the very first thing to pop into my head is The Princess Bride? "

I felt the same way. Not after KALYN broke the ice for me. Maybe someone else did as well.

Princess Bride has action, drama and is great visually. It has romance, good guys, bad guys and, for Hollywood fans, an appropriately happy ending. However I do not consider this a Hollywood film. It is FUNNY! Funny in a deliciously absurd way. Every moment. Visually, through dialogue, and intellectually it was priceless. It’s rife with great lines and scenarios. No problems for me with the performances, pace and editing. And everything else that I could see. Inconceivable !

For me when someone says perfect film i just think in City Lights. Chaplin movies in general.
Another films I can list would be 12 Angry Men, Ordet (The Word), Rebecca, Rear Window, The General, Ladri di Biciclete Mononoke Hime… and a lot more :) … And of course Children of Men!

Gummo