100 Great American Movies - Revised

The AFI has produced another in the never ending chain of BEST 100 lists, this one no more definitive of BEST than any other. In 1998, the AFI produced its first such list, labeled “Best American Films of the 20th Century”. It did what was intended: generated conversation about movies and provided an excuse for a T.V. special. The new one will do no less and no more.

Ten years ago, I spent some time forming my opinions about inclusions and exclusions, rankings and implications. Now I recall those thoughts and add some new ones about the updated list.

My first thought is that then, as now, I have to admit that I agree with most inclusions, though some are not as “great” as others and I still quarrel with many rankings based on my own taste.

The latest list redressed some of my grievances, but not others. For example, I noted then that the list was too impressed with “importance,” as defined by Oscar success and grosses, political correctness, and apparent “newness” of style or technical breakthroughs, which I thought to be of historical rather than long-lasting significance.

On those grounds, the current list eliminated all of the following films (with their 1998 rankings):

39 Dr. Zhivago;
44 Birth Of A Nation [replaced in the new list by Griffith’s less inflammatory 49 Intolerance];
52 From Here To Eternity;
53 Amadeus;
54 All Quiet On The Western Front;
57 The Third Man [the one egregious exclusion];
58 Fantasia [replaced by Toy Story];
59 Rebel Without A Cause;
63 Stagecoach;
64 Close Encounters Of The Third Kind;
67 The Manchurian Candidate;
68 An American In Paris;
73 Wuthering Heights;
75 Dances With Wolves;
82 Giant [along with Rebel, eliminates James Dean from the list];
84 Fargo [eliminates any from the Coens];
86 Mutiny On The Bounty;
87 Frankenstein;
89 Patton;
90 The Jazz Singer;
91 My Fair Lady;
92 A Place In The Sun [the second George Stevens film removed];
99 Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner.

Some such movies were severely downgraded (1998/current):
(72/100) Ben-Hur;
(70/93) The French Connection;
(50/73): Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid;
(17/65) The African Queen;
(40/55) North By Northwest;
(13/36) Bridge Over The River Kwai;
(46/70) A Clockwork Orange.

Yet, overrated movies remain:
Gone With The Wind dropped only slightly, from 4 to 6.
Inexplicably, The Sound Of Music rose from 55 to 40 [while Bonnie And Clyde dropped from 27 to 42].

Films that are new to the list:
17 The Graduate;
18 The General [redressing the previous omission of Buster Keaton];
50 Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring [the most recently released movie on the list, 2001];
59 Nashville;
61 Sullivan’s Travels [reflecting the overdue recognition of Preston Sturges];
63 Cabaret [adding Bob Fosse’s most popular, if not best film work (All That Jazz)];
67 Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? [a second by Mike Nichols, who previously was shut out];
71 Saving Private Ryan [Spielberg trades Close Encounters];
72 The Shawshank Redemption;
75 In The Heat Of The Night;
77 All The President’s Men;
81 Spartacus [Kirk Douglas’s only entry];
82 Sunrise [Murnau’s 1927 silent masterpiece];
83 Titanic;
85 A Night At The Opera [adding a second Marx Brothers classic to the list, with Duck Soup (85/60);
87 12 Angry Men;
89 The Sixth Sense;
90 Swing Time [adding an Astaire Rogers musical for the first time and a Stevens movie replacing two that are dropped];
91 Sophie’s Choice;
95 The Last Picture Show;
96 Do The Right Thing;
97 Blade Runner;
99 Toy Story.

Other films soared in esteem in the past 10 years.
Raging Bull rose from 24 to 4;
Vertigo from 61 to 9;
City Lights from 76 to 11;
The Searchers from 96 to 12.

In 1998, I felt that some films were too recent to be fairly evaluated because my standard for “great” requires aging, multiple viewing during your life. Some on the list seemed dated or tedious on later viewing, not as “important” or as much a breakthrough as they appeared when released, or just not as pleasurable when seen again. Because one of my personal standards for “greatness” is whether I want to see it again, and if so, how often, many would not be popped into my VCR / DVD.

Those I questioned then but accept now include
Pulp Fiction (1994), then ranked 95, now 94, which I now consider to be too low;
Fargo was then 84, now out of the top 100;
Goodfellas was 94, now 92, also underrated.
The Unforgiven was 98, now 68 - reflecting Clint Eastwood’s revisionist view of the Western preferred over John Ford’s [(63) Stagecoach drops out of the 100].

I still think these are overrated:
Platoon (83/86);
Doctor Zhivago (39/off);
Giant (82/off);
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (20/33);
Tootsie (62/69),
Dances With Wolves (75/off).

Maybe The Lord Of The Rings and Titanic will stand the test of time but certainly, if they deserve to make the list, how can Shakespeare In Love (1998) be neglected?

Ten years ago, some critics complained that the list was weighted toward recent films. I noted then that 21 of the top 40 were released before 1960. The new list increases it to 23.

But the “Golden Year” of 1939 has been tarnished.
GWTW and Wizard Of Oz (6/10) downrated; Stagecoach and Wuthering Heights omitted along with classics Goodbye, Mr. Chips and Gunga Din, which didn’t make the list in ‘98. Only Mr. Smith Goes To Washington improved position (29/26).

Another thing I noticed 10 years ago was the omission of films by some great stars — Laurel & Hardy, Shirley Temple, W.C. Fields, Garbo, Carole Lombard, Von Stroheim, King Vidor, Wellman, Lubitch. But I must admit that great moments, scenes or styles are what we remember and prize from those artists, rather than “great films”. It is difficult to name a “great film” associated with Laurel and Hardy, for instance, though they were certainly “great” comics. Adding Keaton’s The General, and Astaire/Rogers Swing Time are minor corrections.

A comparison of the genres represented on the old and new lists, are instructive [films which overlap genres are counted again]:

Musicals (10/8): removed: Amadeus, Fantasia, American In Paris, The Jazz Singer, My Fair Lady. Added: Nashville, Cabaret, Swing Time. Still didn’t make it: Gigi, The Band Wagon, Carousel, Top Hat/Shall We Dance, All That Jazz.

Westerns (8/6): Out - Stagecoach, Dances With Wolves. Left out again: Red River; My Darling Clementine; The Ox-Bow Incident, The Magnificent Seven.

War films (20/18). [Defined by me as including those in which a war is a major element in the drama, even if not labeled a war movie — thus I include a film like Casablanca.]

These films are appropriately numerous considering that wars or the threat of them were the most dramatic events of the 20th century. The list includes those which will provide a fitting chronicle — albeit somewhat skewed, sharply dramatized and often propagandized history — for the viewers of the next century of our nation’s wars.

Out = Birth Of A Nation, From Here To Eternity, All Quiet On The Western Front, Patton. Added = Saving Private Ryan, Spartacus. Ignored by both lists: Paths of Glory; A Walk in the Sun; 12 O’Clock High; Battleground; The Story of GI Joe; Porkchop Hill; The Big Parade; Red Badge of Courage and Fail-Safe.

Comedies (17/19) [including its subcategory — romantic comedies.] Many of my favorites left out are: The Bank Dick (Fields); Born Yesterday ; Animal House; The Pink Panther/Shot in the Dark; His Girl Friday; The Awful Truth; 1,2,3; Mr. Roberts, Young Frankenstein / The 12 Chairs / The Producers / Blazing Saddles (as a Mel Brooks entry); The Court Jester.

Sci-fi/ Occult (5/5). Frankenstein (87), Close Encounters (64) were offed, The Sixth Sense (89) and Blade Runner (96)were added A genre that doesn’t lend itself to great films. Other classics left out: The Thing (Hawks version); The Day The Earth Stood Still; Invasion of the Body Snatchers [Siegel version].

Epics (12/10) Somewhat facetiously, this is a genre including any film with “a cast of thousands.” Saving Private Ryan, Titanic, Intolerance, The Lord Of The Rings replaced Dr. Z, Birth Of A Nation, From Here To Eternity, All Quiet, Mutiny, Patton.

Crime: mysteries / thriller / spy / gangster (20/22). Perhaps it is the genre most reflective of American society with our never waning attraction to violence.

This is the most broadly represented genre in terms of spanning eras and rankings, appropriately so as it is the most durable and popular of genres among ‘serious’ directors; the specialties of the best of film makers such as Wilder, Huston, Hitchcock, Coppola, Scorsese.

The Third Man, The Manchurian Candidate, Fargo, A Place In The Sun join previous neglected classics out of the top 100: Scarface [Hawks version], Public Enemy, From Russia With Love and Bullitt. All The President’s Men, Do The Right Thing, Sixth Sense, Heat Of The Night, Shawshank, 12 Angry Men are added.

Horror / Monster (non-sci-fi): (3/2). Frankenstein gone.

So few are “great,” perhaps because the formula is so easily hackneyed and the earlier classics so satisfied the standard. Bela Lugosi’s Dracula is unaccountably omitted, considering its influence, inspiration and captive themes for popular culture.

Also omitted are any of Lon Chaney’s silent classics, including the very influential Phantom Of The Opera. Also neglected are The Exorcist, The Omen, Rosemary’s Baby, The Shining.

Romances (love stories, not incidental to other genre plots) (5/5). Added - The Graduate, Titanic.

This genre is scarce in "greatness", though as an element, love stories are universal: (boy meets girl, etc being the oldest and most durable of all film formulas, but clearly one least susceptible to originality and whatever other criteria define “greatness”).

Great screen lovers like Gable, Garbo, Monroe, John Gilbert, Valentino, Bette Davis, Audrey Hepburn made few “great” films, many pleasant romances.

Notably left off both lists are Roman Holiday, When Harry Met Sally, You’ve Got Mail / Sleepless In Seattle.

Sports (2/2). One genre almost shut out, which reflects the truth that this genre rarely produces greatness. I am willing to wait for time to prove Field of Dreams, or Bull Durham worthy. Pride of the Yankees, though a sentimental, warm memory is not a “great” film in a sense. Only Rocky and Raging Bull on boxing make the list.

Adventure/ Fantasy (1/2) Another left out is Adventures of Robin Hood in the genre which includes Raiders of the Lost Ark but omits Gunga Din.

Some directors have fared better than others. Wilder and Hitchcock still have 4 each, but Ford now has 2. George Stevens had 3, lost 2, gained 1. Chaplin, Huston, FF Coppola, Kubrick, Scorsese, Spielberg, and Capra also 3. Wyler now has just one as does Cukor. Mike Nichols joins Kazan and Victor Fleming with 2. Spike Lee, Brian De Palma, Welles, Polanski, Milos Forman, Zinnemann, Griffith, Eastwood, and Howard Hawks are represented by only 1 film each.

It is also interesting which of the great stars, so important in Hollywood history, are represented in multiple films and which in fewer, or none at all:

It is probably not surprising that the most popular and durable Hollywood film star, James Stewart, leads with 5. The only surprise of stars with four on the list would be Holden, who is lightly regarded by critics, but whose persona and talent for comedy, irony, and action made him a favorite of Wilder and other good film makers. Also with 4: Bogart; De Niro; Brando, and now, Hoffman and Ford.

There are fewer actresses with multiple entries: (4) Katherine Hepburn; (3) Diane Keaton; Fay Dunaway.

The character actors /featured player with the most appearances is Robert Duvall with 6 movies in the top 100.

The other surprise is how many great stars are represented with only one film on the list, neglecting other “classics” they made:
H. Fonda: (no Mr. Roberts; Ox-Bow; Clementine; Lady Eve);
Cagney: (no Public Enemy; White Heat);
Gary Cooper: (left out: Capra’s Mr. Deeds Goes to Town; Meet John Doe; Sergeant York; The Westerner);
Audrey Hepburn: (left out: Roman Holiday, Donen’s Two For the Road, Sabrina, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Charade);
Fredric March: (out: Nothing Sacred, Inherit the Wind; Death of a Salesman);
Charles Laughton: (Advise and Consent).
Paul Newman
Olivier: (no Hamlet; Rebecca; Marathon Man);
Spencer Tracy (what about: Captains Courageous; Woman of the Year; Adam’s Rib; Test Pilot or Boom Town;
Sidney Poitier: Lillies of the Field; Blackboard Jungle, The Defiant Ones.
Barbara Stanwyck
Edward G. Robinson
Bette Davis
Kirk Douglas

Many were shut out:
Joan Crawford
Irene Dunne (Show Boat, The Awful Truth;)
Greer Garson (Mrs. Miniver; Goodbye, Mr. Chips);
Barbra Streisand (Funny Girl; The Way We Were)
Robert Mitchum (Night of the Hunter; Out of the Past; Story of GI Joe.)
Richard Widmark
Glen Ford (Gilda)
Glen Close
Walter Brennan (five Oscars and a million films)
William Hurt
William Powell
Jane Fonda
Carole Lombard.

Finally, it is obvious that the list is still top heavy in sentimentality although the intervening decade has increased our appreciation of darker visions.

It should not be surprising that many of the favorite well-executed American classics (that have remained popular to succeeding generations) are “beloved” because they touch our emotions about the way we wish love or families or friendship to be.

It is noteworthy that films and film makers expressing more “realistic,” even cynical views about people, America and life are as well represented.

The Good German (2006)

Directed by Steven Soderbergh; written by Paul Attanasio, based on the novel by Joseph Kanon; director of photography, Mr. Soderbergh (under the name Peter Andrews); editor, Mr. Soderbergh (under the name Mary Ann Bernard); music by Thomas Newman; production designer, Philip Messina; produced by Ben Cosgrove and Gregory Jacobs; released by Warner Brothers Pictures. Running time: 105 minutes.
WITH: George Clooney (Jake Geismer), Cate Blanchett (Lena Brandt), Tobey Maguire (Tully), Beau Bridges (Colonel Muller), Tony Curran (Danny), Leland Orser (Bernie), Jack Thompson (Congressman Breimer), Robin Weigert (Hannelore) and Ravil Isyanov (General Sikorsky).

Like other contemporary film people, Soderburgh has alternating careers. His makes entertainments that provide the freedom for his independent experiments. Clooney has become the Mastroianni to his Fellini, abetting many of these projects. So, for every opening of an “Ocean’s #,” there is a “Syriana,” “Full Frontal” or “Bubble”. Soderburgh has tacked this zig-zag course for a long time. “Sex, Lies & Videotape” (1989), “Out Of Sight” (1998), “Erin Brockovich” (2000), “Solaris” (2002), etc.

Also like others, Soderburgh’s “experiments” can devolve into self-indulgent vanity projects, wish fulfillment that, as one critic observed, cares little about the audience. The dictum that an artist’s only duty is to please himself is usually a refuge of artists embittered by audience derision. Soderburgh is among the fortunate elite who can truly brag, “Oh I could be popular if I wanted to” and also can claim to produce “Art for its own sake”.

“The Good German” is a cute experiment that tries to bridge the gap to popular acceptance. The concept is to make a film the way the Studio made it back in the day — like “Casablanca”, but with a contemporary freedom to tell it like it REALLY was. Tell the unsentimental truth about love and war and the American Way, using the Studio crafts that created the myths back then — an anti-“Casablanca”. He also tries to recapture the mood of Carol Reed’s “The Third Man”, the “Neo-Realism” of Rossellini’s “Open City” and “Germany Year Zero” and some of the cynicism of Wilder’s “A Foreign Affair.” (Apparently, Soderburgh screened the film for critics paired with John Huston’s “The Maltese Falcon.”)

Many loved the idea and were licking our chops at the thought of seeing Clooney’s spin on Bogie; Blanchett’s on Bergman, Soderburgh’s on Curtiz and all those others. He fails miserably. And it is too bad.

It fails for a lot of reasons. First in my view, Attanasio’s script lacks polish, coherence, wit and surprise. Second, the acting is a disappointment: Clooney seems unsure of himself in every scene. Soderburgh’s instruction was to act like a contract player of the ‘40's, dropping the internalized modern acting. Clooney, who seems the most traditional of today’s screen personalities, apparently interpreted the direction as elimination of all Cloonyisms. Thus, we get no self-deprecating winks or stammered anger, no personality at all. The actor was more charming as Fred Friendly.

Blanchett is trapped in a “Deitrich” accent and faux fatale look that provokes comparison with her caricature of Hepburn in “The Aviator” crossed with Natasha of “Rocky And Bullwinkle”. The high contrast black and white close-ups are the antithesis of 40's glamour photography and the unflattering hard look, accentuated by the deep voiced German accent and her burnt out flat delivery fails to hint at the woman she was before the war that is now lost in her fight to survive.

And there is absolutely no chemistry between the stars. Clooney earned his star stripes in a car trunk and hotel room with J-Lo in "Out Of Sight." Here, we get a blackened screen kiss and quick cut back to plot.

Neither character, the "world weary reporter" returning to recapture his love, or the bitter survivor, is written, directed or acted with enough passion to make us care very much.

Sentimentality is overwrought emotion. Anti-sentimentality is not the absence of any feeling.

In “Casablanca,” the chemistry was carefully cultivated during the flashback sequence showing pre-war innocent intimacy between the lovers that has been lost. Soderburgh could not bring himself to insert such a now-hackneyed device and he finds no substitute. When he does use a brief flashback, it is to show Lena being raped and shooting a Russian officer to explain her frigidity and fear of the Russian Zone, while he conceals her deeper secret until the very end.

Jake’s obsession with Lena should be like Rick’s with Ilsa, repressing his cynicism for one last stab at redemptive love or at least self-sacrificing nobility. The script wants Lena to seem like a hardened femme fatale with a soft heart or is it vice versa? But neither the plot nor the style nor the pace nor the acting successfully conveys any of this feeling to the audience.

Soderburgh hopes that his stylish photography and cutting will carry the day. He wants to be a heroic auteur like Huston, Reed, Curtiz, Welles, overcoming trite material and studio strictures to create distinctive and personal art. He is correct that those classic directors had style, but he ignores the fact that for the most part, their work was intended to and did enhance the mood, to tell the story and make the audience feel.

Every movie of this kind tells both a micro and macro story — in the breathless Studio trailer parlance: “a love story set against a backdrop of intrigue and danger.” The macro story is the postwar beginnings of the Cold War, the rush to capture German scientists amid the wreckage of Berlin ... “where everything and everyone has a price...”

Lena’s husband is a mathematician who aided the leader of Camp Dora, the concentration camp / project to build the V-2 rockets. “Emile Brandt” is a composite of real figures including Arthur Rudolph, and his boss, “Franz Bettmann,” is based on Wernher Von Braun. Both Rudolph and Von Braun were captured by the US Army and hustled to America in Operation Overcast / Paperclip, evading war crimes trials for abuse of slave laborers, at least 20,000 of whom were killed (more than were victimized when the rockets exploded in England).

The script rather transparently mimics wartime and immediate postwar liberal sentiment. Jake is a reporter for “The New Republic” and he wants to uncover the nasty truth that America is willing to use Nazis and Nazi methods to survive the rocket age. His adversaries are American soldiers named “Muller” and “Shaeffer,” and a Congressman named “Breimer” while an officer who helps him is a Jew trying to gain evidence to punish war crimes. But there will be no happy ending in this re-write of history. The truth will be suppressed on the grounds of national survival.

The last scene is obviously intended to mimic and undercut “Casablanca’s” famous airport finale. Everyone who has tried to act nobly has failed. Emile's secret dies with him. Lena's guilt remains. Jake has traded suppression of the truth for Lena’s safe passage out of Berlin. Now he wants to know why she is so desperate to leave Berlin. She confesses that she is a war criminal; she turned in twelve of her fellow Jews to the Gestapo. This is meant to be a shock, a crescendo that reveals her corruption and the end of possibilities for redemption.

Like Rick, Jake will give up the love of his life. But not in order to continue any noble fight alone; not because she is worthy. Maybe because she is no good and Jake feels — well, we don’t know exactly what — disappointment, disgust, resignation, disillusionment, guilt?

The scene falls flat. You can almost hear the audience murmuring: “so what?” With what we now know about what everyone did to survive the Holocaust and The War and The Post War, Lena’s revelation seems almost trivial.

A better, more dramatic re-write would have echoed “The Maltese Falcon’s” climactic scene, allowing Jake to disclose his knowledge of the truth about her, cruelly forcing her to confess.

Alternate endings could then follow. (1) He could have done the sentimental thing: said something like, “Go ahead, get out of my sight. I can’t stand to look at you.”

Or (2) he could have said something really shocking and unsentimental: (With A Shrug) “Okay babe, it doesn’t matter. I want you anyway. Maybe you'll look better in Technicolor. Besides, who am I to judge? I spent the war getting drunk in London.”