Sight & Sound's Top 10 List and More Tiff Titles

A tiff must see - Seven Psychopaths:

Midnight Madness
An alcoholic screenwriter (Colin Farrell) struggling to write a serial-killer script gets more real-life inspiration than he can handle when a dognapping scheme gone awry brings a galaxy of crazies to his doorstep. A top-notch cult-movie cast — including Christopher Walken, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton-anchors this wacky, blood-spattered commentary on the psycho-killer thriller from the writer-director of In Bruges.

It was my intention to update the blog yesterday, but grad studies got in the way. Don't you hate having to prioritize? Well, yesterday, tiff announced a boat load of great films that will be screened at the festival in September, and to many people's surprise, The Master has been added to the schedule as a Special Presentation programme and will be show at the Princess of Wales Theater, right across from the Roy Thomson Hall. I'm very excited to see The Master as it is Paul Thomas Anderson's follow up film to Oscar winner 2009 film, 'There Will Be Blood'. The Master centers around a young man being lead into a secretive and controversial cult group by it's charismatic leader. The film is close to a depiction of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, and Anderson even sought out Tom Cruise's advise by showing him the film in advance, and it's reported that Cruise "has issues" with the film. No doubt dude!

In my opinion, the more "issues" Cruise or any Scientologist have over the film, the more juicier it's going to be. Although The Master will be released in theaters on September 14th, The Weinstein Company head, Harvey Weinstein, wanted to get the Oscar talk starting on this film NOW so that's why it's playing at both Venice Film Festival and Toronto. Some people may ask, 'Well, since it's coming out so soon, why see it at tiff"? Basically, it's very simple. I'd rather watch The Master in the brilliant city of Toronto with celebrities, producers, and fellow cinephiles, than here, at home in Ann Arbor, at the Rave theater. See? One venue in particular is all about the prestige and excitement of having the world of Hollywood, literally, under the same roof, breathing the same air. Ahhhhh.

For fuller details on films to be shown at tiff announced yesterday, go to the film programming page at the tiff site, or The Wrap (it's easier to read the film list rundown here).

Once in a decade, the prestigious British film magazine, Sight & Sound list its critics Top 10 Greatest Films of All Time list, and a director's Top 10 list. The last time they did this, back in 2002, Twitter was not invented yet, so you can imagine how chaotic it was on twitter this afternoon when S&S tweeted a countdown of their top 10. They had a link to their homepage, but it appears that every other cinephile on the planet was trying to go to their website, so I couldn't open it. But alas, many other entertainment websites have posted the Top 10 list and I have it here. Allow me to preface to say that I'm embarrassed to admit that I have only seen maybe 3 of these films, and I say maybe because I'm not sure if I saw the third one.

As you see, Vertigo has been crowed as the bestest film on the entire planet world, beating out Citizen Kane which sat at the top for 34 years! Now I don't want to lie or anything, but I'm sure I saw Vertigo before, a long time ago. However today, I have reserved a copy of the DVD from the Ann Arbor Public Library, and I'll pick it up and review it over the weekend. I'll see if they have any of  the other films listed as well... and yes, I have seen Space Odyssey. And speaking of that, 2001 Space Odyssey is the baby of the bunch and that came out in 1968! So as far as Sight & Sound is concerned, there are NO OTHER films made in the 70's, the 80's, the 90's, the 2000's, that warrant recognition to be included in the Top 10? That's a shame!

Vertigo - Hitchcock - 1958

In any event, here is the Top 10 Greatest Film List according to Sight & Sound. Which ones have you seen?

Critic's List Top 10
Vertigo (Hitchcock, 1958)
Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941)
Tokyo Story (Ozu, 1953)
La Règle du jeu (Renoir, 1939)
Sunrise: a Song for Two Humans (Murnau, 1927)
2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)
The Searchers (Ford, 1956)
Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1927)
 8 ½ (Fellini, 1963)

Director's List Top 10
Tokyo Story (Ozu, 1953)
=2  2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)
=2  Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941)
8 ½ (Fellini, 1963)
Taxi Driver (Scorsese, 1980)
Apocalypse Now (Coppola, 1979)
=7  The Godfather (Coppola, 1972)
=7  Vertigo (Hitchcock, 1958)
Mirror (Tarkovsky, 1974)
Bicycle Thieves (De Sica, 1948)