(1985)
Not at all for public eyes, and simply how I've filed away films the past year, I thought I'd share this list for friends of the Birdhouse. Again, none of this is for the public, so imagine you are not.
When I scan over various lists year after year, of films or books or music, most seem built to either impress the reader or to make some statement. No statement here. It's the way the chips fall. It's how films came to me, and often via the satellite dish reception, which is out there in the woods and snow. Or what I still glean from town libraries, but I'm doing much less of that these days. I can now pull almost all Criterion films right off my Roku contraption. An old friend, long gone, who used to assist us on retrieving such things over the Internet, the 'sky', or far towns, will get a kick out of knowing we're still keeping-on and finding good stuff.
Curiously, not many foreign films are listed here, which I watch regularly, although the first film noted is top shelf Europa. Many of these films came off the Turner Classic Movies station c/o Robert Osborne which is like a nice little neighborhood bakery you can't do without. Everyone mentions greater and grander bakeries and dishes and sweets, but here you are sticking to your faithful and tiny shop — Osborne's — day after day. A little bell on the door as you walk in.
The films are noted in no order of importance. It's how each film was registered, others erased, others kept and re-watched many times.
I do consider Claude Lanzmann's Shoah the greatest film ever made. Five minutes, heck, five seconds of Shoah equals all of Citizen Kane. The camera work alone is incredible. The commentary overwhelming. The portraits unforgettable . . . no matter what else comes your way. I watched the film when it was first released and recently watched it again, all six discs, because Sweetheart had never seen it. A masterpiece nine and a half hours long (shaved down from 350 hours of footage). You'll want someone sitting with you.
_______________________________
SHOAH
BLACK NARCISSUS
HAROLD AND MAUDE
PARIS, TEXAS
THE GAME
NIGHT OF THE HUNTER
THE KILLING (Kubrick)
FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT
THE WILD BUNCH
REAR WINDOW
NORTH BY NORTHWEST
A WOMAN UNDER THE INFLUENCE
DR. STRANGELOVE
STRANGERS ON A TRAIN
THE GRADUATE
RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY
THE ASPHALT JUNGLE
CAPE FEAR (original)
TWO-LANE BLACKTOP
EYES WITHOUT A FACE
WITHNAIL AND I
CITY LIGHTS
WHERE DANGER LIVES
DIABOLIQUE (original)
NIAGARA
GUN CRAZY
LADY IN THE LAKE
BADLANDS
BONNIE AND CLYDE
SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS
POINT BLANK
YOJIMBO
ANGEL FACE
A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH
KISS ME DEADLY
NOTORIOUS
THE VIRGIN SPRING
WE OWN THE NIGHT
A PLACE IN THE SUN
TENSION
PAYBACK
INDIA: MATRI BHUMI
LOUIS C.K. OH MY GOD
HIGH SIERRA
LAWRENCE OF ARABIA
OUT OF THE PAST
DARK PASSAGE
SEVEN SAMURAI
LE SAUVAGE
BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD
VERTIGO
IN A LONELY PLACE
NIGHTMARE ALLEY
ANDREI RUBLEV
FUNNY GAMES (original)
THE STORY OF FILM: AN ODYSSEY
AU HASARD BALTHAZAR
That's enough.
Oh! ALL the films of BUSTER KEATON. Place them, respectfully, right next to SHOAH.
Again, this is not a favorite films list — though many of my favorites are here — it's films that came to me the past year and I kept awhile in an archive to watch, and watch again.
Sweetheart and I now laugh when we think how when in our woods cabin on Saturday night, circa 1974, deep in snow piles and no tv in our midst for the next ten years, how we often dreamt on those nights how nice it would be to sit with a film. So far from town, no one it seemed for miles around, just the river and the stars and the silence. Just.
