Critics' 10 Best Lists

Sabin
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Post by Sabin »

...I will say re: my comments about The Year of Consensus, Breaking Bad and My Dark Twisted Fantasy really are the best television show and album of the year respectively.

(anonymous · Posted on Dec. 16 2010,11:43
(Sabin @ Dec. 16 2010,10:39)
Both critics are EW give it to The Social Network...Call it the year of total consensus.

Another message board did this experiment. Awards season last year, a few members were complaining why The Hurt Locker is winning everything so they decided to vote on their own "top" list. Around 20+ people participated in the exercise and the votes were tabulated: The Hurt Locker still won. The one who did the tabulating even calculated it in several ways (point system, weighted ballots, straight majority, etc.) and The Hurt Locker still came out the winner.

But a top ten list isn't aggregate! A top ten reflects individual choices. Critics groups, I understand. Top ten lists? I don't. There are only a handful of films this year that could weather the aggregate process of critics groups. There are years where there are, and this and last year there were not. But these top ten lists are just pathetic. I have seen only 36 films this year and The Social Network only currently ranks ninth because I have not seen two more films I'd place at ***1/2.
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Post by anonymous1980 »

Sabin wrote:Both critics are EW give it to The Social Network.

EW is also calling Breaking Bad the best TV show on the air and My Dark Twisted Fantasy the best album of the year. Call it the year of total consensus.
Another message board did this experiment. Awards season last year, a few members were complaining why The Hurt Locker is winning everything so they decided to vote on their own "top" list. Around 20+ people participated in the exercise and the votes were tabulated: The Hurt Locker still won. The one who did the tabulating even calculated it in several ways (point system, weighted ballots, straight majority, etc.) and The Hurt Locker still came out the winner.
Sabin
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Post by Sabin »

Both critics are EW give it to The Social Network.

EW is also calling Breaking Bad the best TV show on the air and My Dark Twisted Fantasy the best album of the year. Call it the year of total consensus.
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Post by Damien »

Precious Doll wrote:Sight and Sound

1. The Social Network
Et tu, Sight and Sound?
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Post by Precious Doll »

Sight and Sound

1. The Social Network
2. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
3. Another Year
4. Carlos
5. The Arbor
6. I Am Love
= Winter's Bone
8. The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu
= Film socialisme
= Nostalgia for the Light
= Poetry
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Post by anonymous1980 »

Damien wrote:
Sabin wrote:Slant, collectively...

1. Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos)
2. The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski)
3. Lourdes (Jessica Hausner)
4. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
5. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
6. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (Edgar Wright)
7. Vincere (Marco Bellocchio)
8. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)
9. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
10. Let Me In (Matt Reeves)

Just to be clear, Slant is saying that the two best American films of the year are Scott Pilgrim and Let Me In. I still need to see Lourdes, Vincere, and Carlos on their list.
Now,THIS is what a 10 Best List should look like. Idiosyncratic and reflecting one's personal taste, not a general herd mentality take on things.
You forgot to add: And no goddamn cartoons! :p
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Post by Eric »

Hah, swap out "not living in NYC" with "living in flyover country" (where it's not like we don't get some of these movies, but definitely not all of them and in many cases not until this time next year). But thoughts like that work against my move towards a transcendence of cinephiliac self, in terms of my soon to be former desire to be a tastemaker.
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Post by rain Bard »

Fernando lives here in the Bay Area, and is just as brilliant in person as in print. Finally met him (and Jon as well, who I believe recently moved away from the Bay?) this year at a couple of film festivals. Love that he picked the Resnais as his #1- think we might've been at the same screening.
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Post by Eric »

I love my Slant sisters and brothers but ... Damn, sometimes they make me feel like a reject for not living in NYC.
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Post by Greg »

Damien wrote:Now,THIS is what a 10 Best List should look like. Idiosyncratic and reflecting one's personal taste, not a general herd mentality take on things.

How do you know that someone's list is an example of following the herd vs. a coincidence of just happening to like most the year's most critically popular films? I have not gone to many films this year, as very few have interested me; and, a lot of the year-end films that I have read about and am interested in seeing (Black Swan, Winter's Bone, The King's Speech, etc.) have not opened yet in may area. So, I personally would only have a top 3 list, being:

1: The Social Network
2: Inception
3: Toy Story 3

This would put my list squarely within the critical consensus; but, I am not parroting what critics have said. This year my taste simply matches what the preponderance of critics have said.




Edited By Greg on 1292456052
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Post by Sabin »

It's an aggregate list. Here are the individuals.


Ed Gonzalez:
1. Everyone Else
2. Secret Sunshine
3. The Ghost Writer
4. October Country
5. Prodigal Sons
6. Winter's Bone
7. Mother
8. 45365
9. The Social Network
10. Ondine

Honorable Mention: Around a Small Mountain, Bluebeard, The Crazies, Easier with Practice, The Human Centipede (The First Sequence), Let Me In, The Milk of Sorrow, Piranha 3D, Samson and Delilah, and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Nick Schager:
1. Lourdes
2. Everyone Else
3. Dogtooth
4. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
5. Secret Sunshine
6. Mother
7. October Country
8. The Social Network
9. Prodigal Sons
10. Winter's Bone

Honorable Mention: 45365, Bluebeard, Carlos, Enter the Void, Inside Job, NY Export: Opus Jazz, Ondine, Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, The Strange Case of Angelica, White Material

Joseph Jon Lanthier:
1. Samson and Delilah
2. Greenberg
3. And Everything Is Going Fine
4. The Killer Inside Me
5. Dogtooth
6. Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl
7. A Prophet
8. Marwencol
9. White Material
10. Applause

Honorable Mention: Amer, The Ghost Writer, How to Train Your Dragon, The Human Centipede (The First Sequence), Mid-August Lunch, October Country, Rabbit Hole, Shutter Island, Wah Do Dem, and Waste Land

Andrew Schenker:
1. Our Beloved Month of August
2. Lourdes
3. Vincere
4. Ghost Town
5. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
6. Inside Job
7. The Ghost Writer
8. Hadewijch
9. Blue Valentine
10. Around a Small Mountain

Honorable Mention: 45365, Alamar, Boxing Gym, The Kids Are All Right, Last Train Home, The Milk of Sorrow, Mother, Ne Change Rien, The Strange Case of Angelica, and The Temptation of St. Tony

Bill Weber:
1. Wild Grass
2. Dogtooth
3. Mother
4. Carlos
5. DDR/DDR
6. Have You Heard from Johannesburg
7. The Illusionist
8. Everyone Else
9. Ne Change Rien
10. Vincere

Honorable Mention: Boxing Gym, Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer, Ghost Town, The Ghost Writer, I Love You Phillip Morris, Let Me In, Lourdes, Marwencol, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and Winter's Bone

Fernando F. Croce:
1. Wild Grass
2. Ne Change Rien
3. Carlos
4. The Ghost Writer
5. Vincere
6. Alamar
7. Exit Through the Gift Shop
8. Vengeance
9. Let Me In
10. Last Train Home

Honorable Mention: Amer, Bluebeard, The Crazies, Everyone Else, A Film Unfinished, I Am Love, Lourdes, Mother, Restrepo, and White Material

Simon Abrams:
1. Dogtooth
2. Amer
3. Let Me In
4. Oceans
5. The Ghost Writer
6. Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl
7. Hadewijch
8. Life During Wartime
9. Lourdes
10. Black Swan

Honorable Mention: Anton Chekhov's The Duel, The Crazies, The Eclipse, How to Train Your Dragon, The Human Centipede (The First Sequence), Mid-August Lunch, Never Let Me Go, The Paranoids, Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
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Post by Damien »

Sabin wrote:Slant, collectively...

1. Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos)
2. The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski)
3. Lourdes (Jessica Hausner)
4. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
5. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
6. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (Edgar Wright)
7. Vincere (Marco Bellocchio)
8. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)
9. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
10. Let Me In (Matt Reeves)

Just to be clear, Slant is saying that the two best American films of the year are Scott Pilgrim and Let Me In. I still need to see Lourdes, Vincere, and Carlos on their list.
Now,THIS is what a 10 Best List should look like. Idiosyncratic and reflecting one's personal taste, not a general herd mentality take on things.
"Y'know, that's one of the things I like about Mitt Romney. He's been consistent since he changed his mind." -- Christine O'Donnell
Sabin
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Post by Sabin »

Slant, collectively...

1. Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos)
2. The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski)
3. Lourdes (Jessica Hausner)
4. Everyone Else (Maren Ade)
5. Mother (Bong Joon-ho)
6. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (Edgar Wright)
7. Vincere (Marco Bellocchio)
8. Wild Grass (Alain Resnais)
9. Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
10. Let Me In (Matt Reeves)

Just to be clear, Slant is saying that the two best American films of the year are Scott Pilgrim and Let Me In. I still need to see Lourdes, Vincere, and Carlos on their list.
"How's the despair?"
anonymous1980
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Post by anonymous1980 »

Slant Magazine's list.

Unlike most lists, they're usually pretty interesting.
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Post by Damien »

Greg wrote:
The Original BJ wrote:
Greg wrote: Does anyone think, with Best Picture now in a field of 10, that Inside Job will be the first documentary nominated for Best Picture?
I watched Inside Job yesterday, and I can't even see it as a genuine threat for the Documentary Oscar. It's solid and rich with detail...but I can't imagine anyone being emotionally affected by it or attached to it the way I think voters' hearts will swoon for Waiting for 'Superman.'
I think Inside Job, dealing with the current financial collapse, might end up trumping Waiting For Superman, about the U.S. educational system, on the basis of the immediacy of its subject matter hitting much closer to home for many people. After all, it does no one any good to be well educated and trained for a job that does not exist.
I saw Inside Job the other day and found it quite tedious. Too many interviews with self-justifying villains who can't acknowledge that they are villains and mostly all saying the same thing. My eyes kept glazing over, as they do whenever I read anything related to financial markets (which is one reason I'm not rich :D )
"Y'know, that's one of the things I like about Mitt Romney. He's been consistent since he changed his mind." -- Christine O'Donnell
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