If I could only Keep 10 movies in the house...

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Brothers and Sisters,

This brings up a question: why would we set movies before our eyes (as entertainment-thus avoidable) that violate the law of God? Many of the movies you listed (I have not seen them all) are clear violations of the Scriptures. I'm not saying that all films are bad...
Job 31:1 "I made a covenant with mine eyes..."
 
These are my 15:

Rear Window (1957)
Braveheart (1995)
Being There (1981)
Anchorman (2004)
Groundhog Day (1993)
Excalibur (1981)
Chariots of Fire (1980)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Faster, Pussycat, Kill! Kill! (1966)
12 Angry Men (1957?)
Klute (1971)
High Plains Drifter (1968)
The Iron Giant (2003)
The Incredibles (2005)
North By Northwest (1959)

:2cents:
 
Runners Up:

Un Chien Andalou (The Andalesian Dog) (1929) Salvador Dali's film...
Things To Come (1936) Sci-Fi and Art Deco that is UNbelievable
Metropolis (1927) by Fritz Lang-- awesome German sci-fi
Olympia (1936) by Leni Riefenstahl
All Film Noir Movies, especially "DOA" (1946), and "The Big Clock" (195_) (redone as No Way Out, with Kevin Costner)
Blow Up (1966), features the Yardbirds in a cameo
 
Wow, I guess I have a lot of catching up to do when it comes to watching good movies.

Based on everyone's selections, I am missing out by never seeing any of the following films:

12 Angry Men
A Better Tomorrow
A Place in the Sun
About Schmidt
Alien
Band Of Brothers
Being There
Best Years of our Life
Better Off Dead
The Big Clock
Blow Up
Brazil
The Bridge over the River Kwai
Capote
Captain and Commander
Casablanca
Chariots of Fire
Citizen Kane
Cool Hand Luke
Corpse Bride
Crash
Das Boot
The Dirty Dozen
Dirty Harry
DOA
Doctor Zhivago
Dr. Strangelove
Drunken Master
East of Eden
Equilibrium
Excalibur
Fail Safe
Faster, Pussycat, Kill! Kill!
Fistful of Dollars
For a Few Dollars More
Galaxy Quest
Gaslight
Gods and Generals
Gone With The Wind
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
The Great Escape
Green Fried Tomatoes
High Noon
High Plains Drifter
Horatio Hornblower
The Iron Giant
It’s A Wonderful Life
Joe Kidd
Kelly's Heroes
Kentucky Fried Movie
Key Largo
Klute
Kung Fu Hustle
The Legend of Drunken Master
The Longest Yard (The original)
Magnolia
The Maltese Falcon
Martin Luther (Black & White)
Metropolis
Mildred Pierce
Million Dollar Baby
Moon River
Mr Smith Goes to Washington
Narnia Movies (BBC Version)
Nicholas Nickleby
North and South
Olympia
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
The Outlaw Josey Wales
Paint Your Wagon (GAG)
Papillon
Pride and Predjudice (BBC Version)
Punch Drunk Love
Quo Vadis
Rear Window
Rebel Without a Cause
Remember the Titans
Rumble in the Bronx
Secondhand Lions
The Seven Samurai
The Shop Around the Corner
Sling Blade
So I married an Axe Murderer
Stage Coach
Steel Magnolias
Sudden Impact
Swing Kids
Swing Kids
Things To Come
Two Mules for Sister Sara
Un Chien Andalou (The Andalesian Dog)
Unforgiven
The Usual Suspects
Vertigo
What's Up doc?
Where Eagles Dare
The Wild Bunch
The Winslow Boy
Wives and Daughters
 
Wow, I guess I have a lot of catching up to do when it comes to watching good movies.
...


Warning - only some of my picks a really good quality films. "The Seven Samurai" is very good. "Better Off Dead" is not what I call a Oscar winner. It's not even as good as "Napoleon Dynamite", but it's similar in quality.
 
By that criterion, how many sermons would you have to ban? Those preachers do go on about sin! Not what is true, noble, just , pure, lovely, of good report, of virtue, and praiseworthy.

Rick Warren, Joel Olsteen, the Copelands and the rest of the "tickle their ears" and entertain 'em hord of cheap-grace, easy believe-ism, proponents seem to support this kind of reasoning. However...

Tewilder et. al: Do any of us dare equate sermons and preachers faithfully delivering the word of God with worldly entertainment? I pray not.

Additionally, for many of us who utterly trust in the ultimate lovingkindness and truth of God's word, even God's word in it's most fierce dealings and warnings to wayward, self-indulgent, and willful human-kind, we do nonetheless find it true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, of virtue, and praiseworthy.
 
Well...if we want to go there and disparage "drama" we have to also discard The Divine Drama -- The Greatest Story Ever Told, revealed in God's Holy Word.

Like it or not, we are all in the story right now (which didn't end with the end of the book, btw.)

We yet await the final scene when the Divine Author/Playwrite walks onstage.

Drama isn't evil. Men are.

:um:

That is one strange "doctrinal" interpretation. Spoken with reference, God ACTING as God?

Drama, by definition is one person taking on the personality of another.
 
Rick Warren, Joel Olsteen, the Copelands and the rest of the "tickle their ears" and entertain 'em hord of cheap-grace, easy believe-ism, proponents seem to support this kind of reasoning. However...

Tewilder et. al: Do any of us dare equate sermons and preachers faithfully delivering the word of God with worldly entertainment? I pray not.

Additionally, for many of us who utterly trust in the ultimate lovingkindness and truth of God's word, even God's word in it's most fierce dealings and warnings to wayward, self-indulgent, and willful human-kind, we do nonetheless find it true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, of virtue, and praiseworthy.

Amen!

And thank you sister, for your support here.
 
Drama, by definition is one person taking on the personality of another.

The thing is, I do not see how such a proposition can be proven from the bible since the idea of drama in the sense we are discussing here is never addressed.

I have, in the past, read quite a lot of the Protestant Reformed Church's literature on this topic when I was investigating it for myself, but I remain unconvinced that drama is inherently wrong. They will say 'drama is assuming the personality of someone else'. A proponent of film will say 'no, he's not assuming another personality, he's just portraying a character to present something to the audience!'. And we could go around and around forever in this manner because the bible never addresses the idea of theatratical drama. I believe (forgive me if I am mistaken, it has been sometime) their fundamental proposition is that acting is rebellion against what God has made the actor by attempting to become someone else. I do not believe this is proven since the actor does what he does in a specific context of creating a dramatic presentation. And if we want to ignore context shall we conclude the Jesus was lying by telling his parables since they obviously involved situations and persons that were not real?

I do agree there is much to object to in the content of drama today.

Edit: I know the PRC have other reasons for objecting to the form of drama, but it was not my intention to address all the issues regarding drama, just to comment on this one point.
 
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These are my 15:

Rear Window (1957)
Braveheart (1995)
Being There (1981)
Anchorman (2004)
Groundhog Day (1993)
Excalibur (1981)
Chariots of Fire (1980)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Faster, Pussycat, Kill! Kill! (1966)
12 Angry Men (1957?)
Klute (1971)
High Plains Drifter (1968)
The Iron Giant (2003)
The Incredibles (2005)
North By Northwest (1959)

:2cents:

Why Excalibur?
 
Runners Up:

Un Chien Andalou (The Andalesian Dog) (1929) Salvador Dali's film...
Things To Come (1936) Sci-Fi and Art Deco that is UNbelievable
Metropolis (1927) by Fritz Lang-- awesome German sci-fi
Olympia (1936) by Leni Riefenstahl
All Film Noir Movies, especially "DOA" (1946), and "The Big Clock" (195_) (redone as No Way Out, with Kevin Costner)
Blow Up (1966), features the Yardbirds in a cameo

All Film Noir? IMDB lists 426 of them, and I have seen higher numbers elsewhere.
 
Tewilder et. al: Do any of us dare equate sermons and preachers faithfully delivering the word of God with worldly entertainment? I pray not.

Did the argument that I was questioning make that distinction? No it did not. Was it capable of making the distinction? No is it not.

So isn't there something deeply misconceived about the argument?
 
Why Excalibur?

Let me answer your question with a question:

Why NOT Excalibur?

In its defense:

1) Timeless Story, Classicly (but Stylistically) Told
2) Beautiful-- scratch that, make it Phenomenal Cinematography (notice how they used the color green in such a thematic way)
3) Acting of: Helen Mirren, Liam Neeson, Nicol Williamson, Gabrielle Byrne, Patrick Stewart
4) Directed by John Boorman-- this is among his best work.

Just found a well-put excerpted review, which echoes some of what I just articulated:

EXCALIBUR is a great, great film that holds up very well after more than 20 years. It is an expert distillation of the essential Arthurian legend (this from someone who has read and re-read Malory's original work, Le Morte D'Arthur, on which the movie was based, as well as Tennyson, White, Steinbeck, and many of the other modern fictional treatments, as well as a lot of the secondary literature on the history and meaning of the Arthur myth). The film is wonderful on many, many levels, from Boorman's masterful direction and writing (along with Pallenberg, his screenwriter), to the cinematography, the armor and costumes, the sets and production design, and the acting (with a great cast too numerous to mention). The film has violence, sex, myth, drama, intrigue, heroics, pathos, and aspirations to art, all in the best senses of those terms. The film probably works best if you already have some sort of sense of the Arthur legends, but I would recommend it to anyone. Also, listen to Boorman's director's commentary on the DVD. Perhaps the best and most lucid DVD commentary that I have heard on video; interesting and sharp comments throughout the entire film, and well worth replaying if you aspire to filmmaking in any way, or just want to hear a smart filmmaker talk about his work.
 
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All Film Noir? IMDB lists 426 of them, and I have seen higher numbers elsewhere.

Well, as a uniquely American genre, you would be hard-pressed to not be THOROUGHLY entertained by virtually anything in this genre. To be sure, there are some dogs, but it is the very style of the intense contrast between dark and light, just the look of these films, that elicit a sense of "otherworldliness" (yet with relatability of the fragile human condition), that is bound to leave an impression. Even an AVERAGE "Film Noir" picture is better than 98% of what we get these days.

See how STORY and use of light to help tell that story, is the driver here-- not CGI special effects, with limp, formulaic storylines-- which is pretty much all you get out of Hollywood today...
 
Wow, I guess I have a lot of catching up to do when it comes to watching good movies.

Based on everyone's selections, I am missing out by never seeing any of the following films:

They are not all that good.

Being There
A great showcase for Seller's talents, and a bitting satirical piece. Very funny in places. But not a great film, because the potential for greatness was not in the script or in the book it was based on.

Blow Up
This is one of the few where it is really worth watching it a second time using the commentary tract on the DVD, which is done by a capable critic. Like Petulia this film shows how quick the better filmmakers were to see that the youth counter-culture was just a phase of shallow self-deceiving modernity.

Brazil
One of the best, if not the best of the anti-utopias. The great strength of the film is that it does not use the cliche of projecting into the future some trend that it wishes to critique (usually to make an ecological point) but is not located in the future. Just get the director's version, and not the mutilated American theatrical version onto which the distributors forced a happy ending.

Captain and Commander
Possbily you mean Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World If so, very well made. And of educational use too. This one really benefits from the home theatre six or eight channel audio, so you can hear the ship creaking around you, etc.

Casablanca
Overrated, but important to know because it is constantly quoted and referred to.

Cool Hand Luke
What we have here is a failure to communicate.

Das Boot
It is supposed to be great in its realism of submarine combat, especially after all the phony semi-propagandistic movies made by Hollywood, and which the public has seen endless times on TV. It was one of the first DVDs I bought, and yet over the years I have never desired to watch it a second time.

The Dirty Dozen
Always hated this one, don't own it, and can't see what the greatness is.

Dirty Harry
Posturing, and quotable lines, but more a piece of pop-culture iconography than good cinema.

DOA
Maybe. Got remade. Still I think there are any number of better Noirs.

Excalibur
Whatever was special about this one got by me.

Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More
Cultural iconography. Never has felt worth buying to me, though.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
There is now a DVD with the uncut version. Supposedly is worthwhile. I haven't seen that version.

The Great Escape
An excuse to get a lot of stars on screen for marketting purposes.

High Plains Drifter
Less than meets the eye. A revenge from which no-one learns anything, but even that is not the point of it.

It’s A Wonderful Life
Sentimental, liberal pseudo-Christianity. Disgusting.

Joe Kidd
Oddly controversial. Some people find it a "lesser western" and rather stupidly plotted. But some people think the character elevates it above Eastwood's other westerns.

Kelly's Heroes
Moronic. For one thing it has Don Rickles. For another Donald Sutherland is a hippy tank commander who shoots shells full of paint, not explosive from his tank cannon.

Key Largo
A John Huston film, with Edward G. Robinson, but the Bogart-Bacall paring has given it an undeserved status above better Noirs. Still it's good.

Klute
Considered a sort of breakthrough in thrillers in terms of grittiness, atmospherics, and exploration of pychological depravity. But having been imitated by every police show since, it no longer stands out as it did when it appeared.

The Maltese Falcon
Set the standard, and of course now necessary to know to understand all the quotes and references. But only great relative to its genre.

Million Dollar Baby
Really?

Moon River
Does not appear to exist.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
See it once. I.e. a rental title.

The Outlaw Josey Wales
I would guess the best Eastwood western.

Rear Window
A good example of film technique. Important if you want to learn to understand cinema.

Vertigo
Underappreciated when it came out. For the same reasons with getting in a DVD edition with "extras" that what was going on in the production design, techniques etc.

What's Up doc?
An imatation of the screwball comedies of the thirties, and for that reason, watch the originals instead.

The Wild Bunch
Nothing exceeds like excess. Still a very serious movie with a lot of content at many levels. One of those "passing of the West" movies. I intend to get around to writing about this one.
 
Let me answer your question with a question:

Why NOT Excalibur?

In its defense:

1) Timeless Story, Classicly (but Stylistically) Told
2) Beautiful-- scratch that, make it Phenomenal Cinematography (notice how they used the color green in such a thematic way)
This is one of Boorman's movies in his back yard. He lives in Ireland and Ireland is green. (Zardoz was made at the same location, with Conery saying in Boorman's house and writing poetry every evening.)

3) Acting of: Helen Mirren, Liam Neeson, Nicol Williamson, Gabrielle Byrne, Patrick Stewart
4) Directed by John Boorman-- this is among his best work.

As an Arthurian film, I prefer Edel's The Mists of Avalon. Haven't had a chance to see Lancelot du Lac.

I don't think it works to do Malory on film. You get too many anachonisms. An early medieval legand in late medieval trappings, where people sit down to dinner in absurd impractical armor. When Malory gets translated fully into imagery by showing it on screen, it breaks down.
 
Been thinking of my top ten for a while that I would want if I could only keep that many, so here goes:

The Great Escape (1963)
The Quiet man (1952)
Shadowlands (1993)
Somewhere in Time (1980)
Marx Brothers - Animal Crackers (1930)
Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein (1948)
Abbott and Costello in Africa Screams (1949)
Daddy Day Care (2003)
LOTR Trilogy
Back to the Future
(1985)
 
Moon River
Does not appear to exist.
No it doesn't. Habit- I always called it that when I was little. But it's Breakfast at Tiffany's. I wouldn't say it's a 'great film' though: it's not like Henry V or Pride and Prejudice (or Ernest Goes to Jail). It is just one that I would like to have around to rewatch.
 
No it doesn't. Habit- I always called it that when I was little. But it's Breakfast at Tiffany's. I wouldn't say it's a 'great film' though: it's not like Henry V or Pride and Prejudice (or Ernest Goes to Jail). It is just one that I would like to have around to rewatch.

Breakfast, though based on a novella from the 50s, because of its major movie status showed that the new era of the sixties had arrived. Copote's book came out in 1958, the year that Film Noir ended. In Breakfast, the moral order of Noir with its avenging Furies is gone, and is replaced with hedonism and individual fulfillment. In Breakfast the short-hair phase of the sixties was clearly in full swing. (The youth-culture or counter-culture phase of the sixties was still to come.) The movie is significant for tracking cultural history. The theme music has been recorded more than 500 times, and was a super hit in itself.

Of course, the film itself is very well done. The major weakness is the corny party scene, which is the part of the movie that Blake Edwards, the director, invented himself. The wrong guy for the job.
 
1) The Shawshank Redemption
2)the Outlaw Josey Wales
3) A simple plan
4) the Godfather I & II
5) A Christmas story
6) The Patriot
7) Good Fellas
8) Slap Shot
9) Forrest Gump
10) Brokeback mountain :deadhorse:
Just kidding
 
A representative list, off the top of my head...

1. Chariots of Fire
2. Braveheart
3. LOTR Trilogy
4. Pride & Prejudice (I'm with Matt - the BBC version is the ONLY version.... "OH, Mr. Bennett, you do VEX me!")
5. The Mission
6. The Great Escape
7. A Beautiful Mind
8. The Paper Chase
9. A Christmas Carol (Alistair Sim is the ONLY one)
10. It's A Wonderful Life

and... I'll take the chance of naming an 11th:

The Breakfast Club (yeah, ok... well, it's only because it captures SO WELL the awful 80s high school years i recall)
 
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