The 20 Best Films of all Time chosen by me - Part 4

For this final selection I'm moving into new territory: the best adaptions (of novels or plays).

In order to play fair I've only included films where I have also read or seen the original source material.

1. The Company of Wolves - Neil Jordan
Neil Jordan worked with Angela Cater to produce a wonderful adaptation of two of her short stories from The Bloody Chamber that is brilliantly evocative of the Hammer Horror films that used to be on late night TV at the weekend.

2. The Remains of the Day - James Ivory
I'd read and enjoyed the novel by Kazuo Ishiguro and was slightly apprehensive about how anyone could adapt such a complex novel.   But James Ivory had cornered the market in up-market literary adaptations, the screenplay by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala is brilliant and both Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson give the performances of their lives.

3. The French Lieutenant's Woman - Karel Reisz
Another superb film from a novel which many people considered unfilmable.  Harold Pinter's adaptation solves the problem brilliantly, although the final section is far more Pinter than Fowles. Meryl Streep captures the character of Sarah brilliantly and there is an early cameo from Penelope Wilton in the final section

4. The Lord of the Rings - Peter Jackson
I'd loved the books from the moment I read them and had sat though both the Ralph Backshi part adaptation that was partly animated plus (honest) a one man version on the Edinburgh Fringe.  But from the first moments of The Fellowship of the Ring I knew that this was the real thing. 

I've even been to a screening where a live orchestra performed Howard Shore's magnificent soundtrack live.

5. Atonement - Joe Wright
Another potentially unfilmable novel which David Hare adapted brilliantly and which was one of the high spots in the first season of our Film Society:

Honourable mentions:

I've read the book and cannot wait to see Cloud Atlas: from what I've read about the film it is magnificent.

I'd read about Adaptation and finally managed to track down and enjoy a copy.  this is a film about the writing of a film, with a superb late period performance by Meryl Streep in what must have been a gift of a role.

The 20 Best Films of all Time chosen by me - Part 3

And now we move on to thrillers.  Once again this is my own selection, and the only criterion is that I have to have seen any film I nominate.

1. The Lady Vanishes
I read some time last year that you could not consider yourself a serious film fan unless you had seen The Lady Vanishes.  I'd read about it many times but had never seen it - at least no consciously.  Fortunately a quick internet order remedied the deficiency: I really enjoyed it and it has an amazing vitality that belies its 1938 release date.

2. The Long Good Friday
I'd been a fan of Helen Mirren ever since O Lucky Man - I'd even watched her on Jackanory reading a story in an amazingly low cut Jacobethen dress - but this was the first time I'd seen her in a role that did justice to her talent.  Bob Hoskins is pretty good too (understatement) and the whole film really caught the zeitgeist.

3. Casablanca
I'm not sure if this is a thriller or a lovely story, but who cares.  It's a film I could see forever, and it was the film that my wife and I went to on our first date: a double bill with Play It Again Sam. We'll always have Casablanca.

4. Fargo
In our film society we try t show the best of releases, but several years ago we made an exception for Fargo - still one of the best films in a very strong field from the Coen brothers.  since I'd first seen it I'd actually visited Minnesota several times for work and recognised the accent, but fortunately all my trips were in the Spring or the Autumn.  And now I even have my own wood chipper.

5. Chinatown
I first saw this in my first year at university when I suddenly became aware of the big world of films that opened up around me. It's a brilliant homage to Hollywood of the 1940s as well as a key film of the 1970s - and several of the characters play key roles in David Thomson's brilliantly unsettling novel Suspects.

The 20 Best Films of all Time chosen by me - Part 2

It's been difficult to limit myself to just five films, but this is a list which I could happily watch on a regular basis:

1. Duck Soup - The Marx Brothers
While growing up I'd seen A Night at the Opera, A Day at the Races, A Night in Casablanca and The Big Store on TV as a regular bass as my father was a great fan.  But when I read up about the Marx Brothers saw that there were several early films that never seemed to make it to TV.  And then one wet Sunday afternoon BBC2 screened Duck Soup and I was hooked.

2. Notting Hill

I'd always regarded Four Weddings and a Funeral as a piece of cinema verite as  saw it at the time that most of my college contemporaries were getting married, and so far only one has died.  However Notting Hill has a more complex plot, a wonderful role for a beautiful Julia Roberts, and Elvis Costello singing She over the credits.  Need I say more?

 

 

3. Manhattan
It's a bit of a cliche to choose Manhattan as it regularly appears on Best Of Lists, but it is pretty good and I do like Rhapsody in Blue...  I've seen all the films that Woody Allen directed in the 10 years after Annie Hall and many of those from the later period, although only his recent Midnight in Paris comes close to his legendary brilliance.

4. Kind Hearts and Coronets
I had to choose an Ealing comedy and to me this is by far the best.  Apart from the virtuoso series of character parts from Alec Guinness the plot is razor sharp with a brilliant twist at the end.

 

 

 

5. Best in Show

This comes from the same team that produced This is Spinal Tap and is set in the world of competitive dog shows.  Against my better judgement I once went to Crufts to accompany my wife, who is a confirmed dog-aholic and it confirmed all my worst nightmares.  However Best in Show is a very funny satire - in the form of a dog-umentary.



The 20 Best Films of all Time chosen by me - Part 1

The various film critics on The Daily Telegraph have all been busy listing their favourite films of all time: 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/classic-movies/9995693/20-greatest-films-of-all-time-selected-by-Robbie-Collin.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/classic-movies/10000742/20-best-films-of-all-time-chosen-by-Tim-Robey.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/classic-movies/10025946/20-best-films-of-all-time-chosen-by-Jenny-McCartney.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/classic-movies/10004264/20-best-films-of-all-time-chosen-by-David-Gritten.html

I thought it was time I joined the party and produce my own list: it may not be definitive, but these are all films that I have seen and enjoyed:

Part 1 - Foreign Language

Day for Night (1973) - Francois Truffaut
When I was in school the local amateur theatre doubled as a film theatre.  I used to help on the bar and one quiet night I wandered into the auditorium to see what was being screened and got hooked.  This was the beginning of my life long fascination with film:

Cries and Whispers - Ingmar Bergman
This is another memory of my schooldays.  I was absolutely stunned when I saw this as a callow 17 year old and it reinforced my desire to see more by Bergman:

The Leopard - Visconti
Believe it or not, we were taken to see this as part of our A Level History course - which included the reunification of Italy.  It was also the first time I'd ever seen a major Hollywood star in a non English language film.

 

Downfall - Hirschbiegel
We screened this at our film club several years ago.  The film was brilliant but utterly relentless and totally exhausting.  More recently it has become the source of thousands of parodies - of varying levels of sophistication and amusement.

 

Throne of Blood - Kurosawa
I finally saw this about thirty years ago in my mid film society phase.  I've seen some excellent productions of Macbeth and thought this captured the essence of the play totally.  I was initially tempted to include Ran, but finally opted for Throne of Blood.

The Ten Best Horror Films

Here's another list from The Daily Telegraph to argue with:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/classic-movies/10001332/10-best-horror-films-chosen-by-Tim-Robey.html

I can accept most of the choices (especially Night of the Demon), and have seen eight of them, but where is the Bride of Frankenstein?

And, more recently, where is Let the Right One In (original version)?

 

Here's the trailer for Night of the Demon:

 

 



Are superheroes the new gods?

In a typically brilliant article Anne Billson argues that superheroes are the new god and laments the lack of what, in The Guardian, would be called female gods:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/10125441/Man-of-Steel-Are-superheroes-the-new-gods.html

I came later to graphic novels after giving up Batman  comics at the age of 11, but ultimately I gave in and read Watchmen before seeing the film.  The graphic novel was superb in its range and execution, and its episodic structure made it difficult to adapt into a coherent story (would it have worked better as TV series?), but ultimately I missed the words.

The film was close to its source in many scenes which were famed exactly as drawn, but i think i would have enjoyed the film as much without having read the novel.

I've never been a Superman fan, but loved the X-Men (especially the first two films) and the Christopher Nolan Batman reboot, ie the Dark Knight Trilogy.  However my all time favourite superhero films have to be Hellboy and Hellboy and the Golden Army.

Downton Abbey Exclusive

Today I can exclusively reveal that the next series of Downton Abbey will include a scene set at a fete - and I will not be in it.

When we went to the local fete - my wife bought up the-plant stall and I made a beeline for the books, I noticed a stall advertising for extras for the next series of Downton Abbey.

I was interested - inevitably - but the date did not work: filming was during the week, and unfortunately I do not have the leave left to take time off.

The high point of the afternoon was seeing Penelope Wilton opening the fete.  apparently she has some kind of role in Downton Abbey, but to me she will always be Harriet Jones - one of a whole range of ancillary characters in Doctor Who.

I resisted the temptation to say "I know who you are"...