Rank: 15
Release Year: 1954
Genre: Samurai
Plot
Summary: A poor village is under constant attack by bandits, so they
hire seven unemployed samurai to defend the community.
What
Makes It Special: It is easy to call Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai the
greatest samurai film of all-time or the director’s most impressive
masterpiece. The film is on one hand an epic action film that slowly builds to
its brilliant and entertaining climax and on the other hand it is a beautiful
piece about humanity. Kurosawa always played with richly textured characters,
even when making what could be called a grand action film rather than a
character drama; but Kurosawa balances it so well that it plays as both (when
appropriate).
Rank: 14
Release Year: 1966
Genre: Thriller
Plot
Summary: Alma is a nurse put in charge of famous movie star Elisabet
Vogler who is on the verge of a complete mental breakdown. At present, Vogler
cannot even speak (this condition befalling her in the middle of her latest
movie role). As Alma cares for her, she finds that her persona and Volger’s
begin to blend, making it difficult to tell them apart.
What
Makes It Special: Persona is a visually striking film – one that is also
very unnerving and creepy. It is maybe the scariest film that was not made to
be scary in the classical sense. Ingmar Bergman uses surreal and dreamlike
imagery to both seduce and unhinge the viewer. Reality and illusion become indistinguishable.
The film is raw, intimate, and unforgettable.
Rank: 13
Release Year: 1953
Genre: Drama
Plot
Summary: An elderly couple decides to take a trip to the city to visit
their children and grandchildren but find that the children are all too wrapped
up in their own lives to take the time to be with them.
What
Makes It Special: With Tokyo Story Yasujiro Ozu makes a film examines
the post-WWII middle-class Japanese family dynamic. It is wholly compelling, as
generational and personal barriers are put up and excuses made to limit true
interaction between people, even those most beloved, all in the name of
self-importance above all else (our own lives always feel more important than
anything else to us). Ozu’s rigid directional style only exaggerates the space between
characters. 1950s Japan was culturally very reserved, but Ozu is able to create
a film that is still very powerful dramatically by really getting at the heart
of what his characters feel and experience. Tokyo Story should feel foreign and
yet its emotions, characters, and family dynamic resonate just as strongly
today. Ozu addresses universal human truths that cross generations and cultures.
Rank: 12
Release Year: 1974
Genre: Gangster
Plot
Summary: Michael Corleone takes tighter control of his family (crime
syndicate); while back in the 1920s New York Michael’s father Vito gets his
start as a gangster.
What
Makes It Special: The Godfather: Part II is generally the film that
comes to mind when critics discuss the best sequel of all-time – many even
putting it ahead of The
Godfather (although, I might retort that The Godfather: Part II’s narrative
is dependent on The Godfather’s and thus is subservient to it). It is an
astonishing character drama, as the audience seeing Michael transformation juxtaposed
to his father’s. The film is also a stellar gangster genre piece, Francis Ford
Coppola creating many iconic sequences and moments. It is magnificent
aesthetically as well.
Rank: 11
Release Year: 1976
Genre: Crime Drama
Plot
Summary: Travis Bickle is a mentally unstable Vietnam War veteran who
finds himself in New York working the night-shift as a taxi driver. The
decaying city that Bickle perceives weighs heavily upon his subconscious
driving him to violence. He also becomes infatuated with a young prostitute named
Iris; thinking of himself as the hero, he wants to save her from her life on
the streets.
What
Makes It Special: Taxi Driver is a hypnotic film that plays in the
darkness. The cinematography, score, writing, Martin Scorsese’s directing, and
Robert De Niro’s performance are all stunning. Scorsese presents New York City
as a cesspool (a common perception of the time period), creating feelings of
extreme loneliness, anger, and paranoia in Travis Bickle’s mind. His isolation
has a duality – it both makes him a sympathetic character for the audience to
follow and maybe even root for and it drives Bickle mad and to violence as a
means of push back against the oppressiveness of the city that seems to bleakly
strangle him with its perceived corrupting filth. Bickle is sympathetic but
also volatile and dangerous. Scorsese has created a hero who is also the
villain with Bickle. Taxi Driver is a grim, unsettling look at humanity stripped
of basic compassion, and it is electric.
