Hi! I'm new round these parts, so if you've done this before, ignore me. Have you done a poll thingy of everyone's top five films?

1. Kind Hearts and Coronets
2. The Big Lebowski
3. Fight Club
4. The Maltese Falcon
5. Twelve Angry Men

If anyone gives a toss, i'll compile them in a bit a make a top twenty/fifty/whatever.
Trying too hard....
Nil thread.

We've been around for anywhere between 4 months and 14 years, depending on how you're counting, so naturally we've done this before.

Still, I shan't wish a nil thread on someone with such good taste in films.

Thing is, mine is emphatically a Favourite rather than best. I know TonTon denies the distinction, but he's wrong.

1 - School for Scoundrels
2 - The Lady Vanishes
3 - The Big Lebowski
4 - Taxi Driver
5 - The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

I remember when this were all five best films of all time lists.

Yes, we have done this before and I doubt mine has changed since last time.

1. A Matter of Life and Death
2. The Apartment
3. Crimes and Misdemeanors
4. The Band Wagon
5. Withnail & I

Favorites:
1. Black Orpheus
2. Ballad of a Soldier (beat you to it, evilC)
3. The Family Way
4. I Walked with a Zombie
5. Marie Antoinette

Favourites, not best, for me too. Not only is it impossible to quantify what makes a film great, but I also like flaws in most things ...plus I'm a soft bastard, too!

1. Eraserhead
2. The Elephant Man
3. Paris, Texas
4. Exotica
5. Ballad of a Soldier


This list is also liable to shuffle and sometimes entirely change at a moment's notice, though.

(Bastard, Heliotrope! ;-> )

1. Magnolia
2. The Apartment
3. The Royal Tenenbaums
4. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
5. Fight Club

Perhaps to mix it up a bit, we could instead (or as well) riff off the BFI's question: what one film would you bequeath to posterity?

I'm tempted to say one of my favourites (which I also think are very, very good films (eg Lebowski or The Good, The Bad And The Ugly), but taking the premise of the quesiton seriously, I think I'm forced to say Koyaanisqatsi. A glorious demonstration of both the possibilities of the medium of film itself and of nature of the world and humanity.

Cheers for not making this a nil thread, all. To be honest, I meant more favourite than best. My top 3 or 4 are fairly set in stone, but my last couple of places are always subject to my latest whim. That tends to mean a back-up list of about 15 which tend to swap places depending on what I've seen/rewatched most recently.

Favourites for me, too, because I don't accept that my critical faculties are up to much.

1. Back To The Future
2. The Taking Of Pelham 123
3. Midnight Cowboy
4. Threads (Can I have Threads? It was made for TV, but it's feature length - if not, then "The War Game". That was shown in cinemas after the BBC banned it, and it won an Oscar, so it qualifies as a film in my book)
5. Amelie

Ginger Yellow wrote:

QUOTE:
Perhaps to mix it up a bit, we could instead (or as well) riff off the BFI's question: what one film would you bequeath to posterity?

I'm tempted to say one of my favourites (which I also think are very, very good films (eg Lebowski or The Good, The Bad And The Ugly), but taking the premise of the quesiton seriously, I think I'm forced to say Koyaanisqatsi. A glorious demonstration of both the possibilities of the medium of film itself and of nature of the world and humanity.

Personally, I find that quite a different question, as you're then forced to judge the film by more than your own personal whims/preoccupations. However, it would quite possibly be one that isn't even on my list there, having just missed the cut: 'La Jetee'. I think that serves the same purpose as your choice, GY, only with a bleakly pessimistic viewpoint. If I wanted to dedicate a film that is positive about the human spirit, then it would probably be either 'Paris, Texas' or 'Ballad of a Soldier'.

(Damn! Forgot 'Amelie'! I love that film. That possibly pushes 'Ballad...' out of my top 5.)

Now, if it's one film to show the potential of the medium then for me it'd have to be Taxi Driver which is, for me, the closest cinema has come to Hamlet in terms of giving you a window on the soul of a tortured individual in the middle of a nervous breakdown. Except that Travis isn't as much of a cissy as Hamlet, obviously.

Star Wars