The Oscar nominees are being announced today (I think?), so I thought I’d start my new project to watch all the Best Picture Oscar Winners.
I’ll post about the project & the 31 that I have left to watch soon. First I thought it would be fun to rank the 62 that I’ve already seen.
I do have to say that I haven’t enjoyed the Oscars as much for the last decade or so. When you look at winners from the past, there are some truly fantastic & epic films. But maybe the problem is just that movies aren’t actually as good nowadays… Either way, I don’t expect much from this year’s nominees since I didn’t see anything great in 2020. We’ll see – there are still plenty of 2020 films not yet available in the U.K. so maybe I’ve missed out on a masterpiece (but I doubt it). And although there are loads of great movies that I really liked in the list below, only the top 2 are personal all-time favorites of mine.
For now, here’s my full ranked list of all the Best Picture Oscar Winners I’ve seen so far, counting down to my top ten:
60-51: (some of these really shouldn’t be winners)
60. Crash (ugh)
59. Shakespeare In Love
58. The Hurt Locker
57. All Quiet On The Western Front (don’t really remember this – watched it in school)
56. Ordinary People
55. Birdman
54. Chicago
53. Oliver!
52. The King’s Speech
51. Out Of Africa (don’t remember this well either)
40. Moonlight
39. Argo
38. Braveheart
37. The Silence Of The Lambs
36. My Fair Lady
35. All About Eve
34. The Best Years Of Our Lives
33. Rebecca
32. The French Connection
31. Gladiator
Top Thirty:
30. Forrest Gump
29. Ben-Hur
28. West Side Story
27. Amadeus
26. In The Heat Of The Night
25. The Shape Of Water
24. Casablanca (in all honesty, need to rewatch this as well)
23. Gone With The Wind
22. The Sting (also need to rewatch – just remember liking it a lot as a kid)
21. Platoon
Top Twenty:
20. Terms Of Endearment
19. Rain Man
18. The Deer Hunter
17. It Happened One Night
16. Parasite
15. The Departed
14. Million Dollar Baby
13. Schindler’s List
12. American Beauty
11. Midnight Cowboy
2014 12 Years a Slave
1988 The Last Emperor
1983 Gandhi
1978 Annie Hall
1971 Patton
1967 A Man for All Seasons
1964 Tom Jones
1963 Lawrence of Arabia
1959 Gigi
1957 Around the World in 80 Days
1956 Marty
1954 From Here to Eternity
1953 The Greatest Show on Earth
1952 An American in Paris
1950 All the Kings Men
1949 Hamlet
1948 Gentleman’s Agreement
1946 The Lost Weekend
1945 Going My Way
1943 Mrs. Miniver
1942 How Green Was My Valley
1939 You Can’t Take It with You
1938 The Life of Emile Zola
1937 The Great Ziegfeld
1936 Mutiny on the Bounty
1934 Cavalcade
1933 Grand Hotel
1932 Cimarron
1930 The Broadway Melody
1929 Wings (and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans) (plan to watch both as they both actually won the top prizes that year – Wings was later declared the official winner but Sunrise sounds better…)
I’ll still be working on my IMDb Top 250 Challenge as well. Last week I ranked the those I’ve watched so far HERE and listed those I still need to watch HERE.
Happy Birthday to Robert De Niro, who turns 74 today.
I was thinking I may not be able to do this list as I may struggle to find ten De Niro movies that I’ve seen. Ha! I’ve seen 29! How did that happen?! Sheesh – he’s been in loads of films. Took me ages just to type out the biggest ones I’ve seen & not seen.
I like De Niro but I’m not gonna pretend he’d make a top ten list of my favorite actors. Of the two, though, I’ve always preferred him to Al Pacino (I’ve only seen 14 of his movies).
As always, I’ll include a list at the end of some of the biggest De Niro movies I’ve not seen. And there are truly some biggies! As for Taxi Driver, it’s a bit like Rocky was for me until I finally watched it all the way through this year for my Blind Spot thingy: I’ve probably seen most of Taxi Driver from seeing bits & pieces over the years but can’t really include it on this list until I fully watch it properly.
I do want to see Once Upon A Time In America & The Untouchables (Maybe I’ll make them Blind Spot 2018 choices!). I have no desire to see Casino as it sounds too violent for my wussy self. And I have a feeling I may get yelled at for Raging Bull not making my Top Ten… 😉
So, of what I’ve managed to see so far, here are My Top Ten Robert De Niro Movies (ranked by movie, not performance):
**List Updated 22/08/17 to add The Untouchables
The Rest That I’ve Seen:
27. The Fan
26. Cape Fear
25. Great Expectations
24. Red Lights
23. Shark Tale
22. Arthur And The Invisibles
21. Angel Heart
20. Hide And Seek
19. Limitless
18. Cop Land
17. Sleepers
16. American Hustle
15. Backdraft
14. Silver Linings Playbook
13. Meet The Parents & Meet The Fockers
12. Analyze This & Analyze That
11. Raging Bull
Need To Re-Watch/Fully Watch:
Taxi Driver, Midnight Run
Not Seen:
Mean Streets, New York, New York, Once Upon A Time In America, Falling In Love, The Mission, We’re No Angels, Stanley & Iris, Mad Dog & Glory, This Boy’s Life, A Bronx Tale, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Casino, Marvin’s Room, Wag The Dog, Flawless, The Adventures Of Rocky & Bullwinkle, Men Of Honor, 15 Minutes, The Score, The Good Shepherd, Machete, Little Fockers, The Family, Last Vegas, The Intern, Joy, Dirty Grandpa
Happy Birthday to Robert Duvall, who turns 86 today!
Robert Duvall has been in a lot of big films but he seems to be an actor who is often overlooked. To be fair, when I decided to do this Top Ten after watching THX 1138, I couldn’t have instantly named all the movies he’s been in & was like “Oh yeah – he was in that one too!” when looking him up at IMDB & seeing his full list of films. I think some of the films in this list are overlooked as well (I actually really like Falling Down, Colors & Deep Impact, which is why I have them fairly high & will probably be moaned at for having them above a couple of classics). 😉
As always, I’ve ranked these according to how much I personally like these movies (Not according to Duvall’s individual performances in each. But he’s good in them all!). Here are My Top Ten Robert Duvall Movies:
Happy Birthday to Harry Dean Stanton, who turns 90 today! Wow – I can’t believe he’s 90. Such a great actor who has been in so many awesome films. Stanton has quite of an impressive résumé & doesn’t seem to get the credit he deserves.
As always, I’m ranking these according to how much I like the movie as opposed to the character (if going by character, Seven Psychopaths would be much higher – loved his character in that). So, counting down to my favorite movie (a movie that NOTHING tops), here are My Top Ten Harry Dean Stanton Movies:
Happy Birthday to Francis Ford Coppola, who turns 77 today.
This is a part of my Coppola Week. I’ve been reviewing movies directed by Francis Ford Coppola & his daughter Sofia (ones that I’ve seen for the first time this past year). So far, I’ve reviewed The Bling Ring, The Outsiders & Marie Antoinette.
I was going to make this a Top Ten including all of the members of the Coppola family who are in the movie industry but, after looking into how many that would involve, I decided it would be a pain in the ass! Besides, I’ve already done My Top Ten Nicolas Cage Movies HERE. I’ve also never seen the Rocky movies, so there’s no point including Talia Shire. And Jason Schwartzman is mainly in those Wes Anderson movies I can’t stand so screw that. And then there are loads of other family members who do lots of behind-the-scenes stuff such as cinematography so, after researching the Coppola family more than my own ancestry, I decided to make this a list including only Francis Ford & Sofia.
So here are My Top Ten Movies Directed By Francis Ford or Sofia Coppola, counting down to my favorite:
**Updated April 2018 to add The Beguiled remake**
(I’ve seen a total of fourteen so here are 14-11):
14. Jack
13. Somewhere
12. Peggy Sue Got Married
11. The Beguiled (2017)
FYI: If they’re not listed, I’ve not seen them. No, I never even bothered to watch The Godfather: Part III. The one I really need to see is Rumble Fish now that I’ve finally watched The Outsiders…!
I’ll finish Coppola Week tomorrow with a review of The Conversation.
**I recently participated in Ruth from FlixChatter’sFive For The Fifth, in which she asks fellow bloggers five movie or TV-related questions. The fifth question is from a guest blogger & I was this month’s guest with the question “Which character would you most like to see killed off in a current TV show?“. I chose this question knowing I’d be seeing The Walking Dead season finale the next day & now I’d really love to bitch about that ending with fellow bloggers!! Grrr. Have a look at Ruth’s Five For The Fifth post HERE. Thanks again, Ruth! 🙂
I’m continuing my Oscar-themed week with this list of my favorite (and least-favorite!) Best Picture Oscar winners.
The Academy does quite often get things very wrong (especially in recent years) but when looking at a list of all the winners, there are indeed a lot of true classics here that I’d highly recommend to everyone.
I have my little IMDB project where I’m trying to watch all the IMDB Top 250 Films so I’m not about to start attempting to watch all the Best Picture Winners. However, when making this list, I discovered that I’ve already seen 47 so I guess that isn’t too bad! So I ranked them ALL (because I’m sad like that). But I’ll of course focus on the top ten.
So now, counting down to My Top Ten Best Picture Oscar Winners, these are all of them that I’ve seen ranked from least favorite to favorite. My Bottom Five list will follow this one…
Chicago Birdman
The King’s Speech
Oliver!
Out Of Africa
On The Waterfront
Driving Miss Daisy
Chariots Of Fire
Dances With Wolves Unforgiven
A Beautiful Mind Spotlight Moonlight
Argo
Braveheart
My Fair Lady
All About Eve
The Best Years Of Our Lives
The Silence Of The Lambs
Rebecca
The French Connection
West Side Story
Gladiator
Amadeus
Forrest Gump
Ben-Hur The Shape Of Water
Rain Man
In The Heat Of The Night
Casablanca
Gone With The Wind
The Sting
Terms Of Endearment
We’re getting there… 😉
15. Platoon
14. The Deer Hunter
13. The Departed
12. Million Dollar Baby
11. Titanic
I absolutely love Cuckoo’s Nest – it’s very easily my number one favorite. 🙂
And now is when I’m going to be a bitch! Here are My Bottom Five Best Picture Oscar Winners (Counting down to the very worst):
5. Crash 4. Ordinary People (it beat Raging Bull & The Elephant Man!) 3. Shakespeare In Love (it famously beat Saving Private Ryan) 2. Slumdog Millionaire 1. The English Patient
*yawn!*
It was fun making this list! I really should try to watch more Oscar winners – I seem to especially have not seen many of the winners from the past decade or so. I’d love to hear all of your favorite & least favorite Best Pictures in the comments now! 🙂
**List updated 2/7/17 to add Spotlight, Million Dollar Baby & Rocky
**List updated 25/11/17 to add Moonlight
**List updated 28/1/18 to add The French Connection
**List updated December 2018 to add The King’s Speech & The Shape Of Water
**List updated February 2019 to add In The Heat Of The Night
Today’s IMDB Top 250 Guest Review comes from Zoe of The Sporadic Chronicles Of A Beginner Blogger. She reviewed The Godfather: Part I for us last week (see her review HERE). Now she’s tackling The Godfather: Part II. She’s also reviewed The Departed (HERE) and The Green Mile (HERE) and Big Fish (HERE). Thanks once again, Zoe – you’re truly awesome! 🙂 Now let’s see what she has to say about The Godfather: Part II, IMDB rank 3 out of 250.
There are still some movies up for grabs if anyone wants to do a guest IMDB Top 250 review. You can find the list of remaining films HERE. See the full list & links to all the reviews that have already been done HERE.
***WARNING: SPOILERS***
“There are many things my father taught me here in this room. He taught me: keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.” – Michael Corleone
So as the trilogy progresses, Michael Corleone has become a force to be reckoned with. Al Pacino reprises the mantle of Michael, and it is rapidly evident that he has completely taken up and embodied the role of being the head of the Corleone crime family. This movie was presented interestingly, different from the first in that it plays out the current state of affairs that Michael is dealing with as well as taking you back to Vito Andolini’s youth, and seeing how he ultimately lost his Andolini name, took on the Corleone name and rose to his prominent position.
“If anything in this life is certain, if history has taught us anything, it is that you can kill anyone.” – Michael Corleone
This movie worked incredibly well. It is a long movie, clocking in at 200 minutes, but not once do you get too familiar with that, you are instead caught up in another time and whisked away. This speaks volumes about Coppola’s ability to rivet the audience, still. The time shift that worked its way in throughout the movie was truly brilliantly executed. In the present you see Michael (Al Pacino), and his antics, as well as the issues he is dealing with, ranging from his wife Kay (Diane Keaton) to his drama in court. Michael is progressively becoming more and more ruthless, which still resonates with the watcher seeing as we know how reluctant he was to become involved with the family business in the first place, and to watch him embrace it now in its entirety never fails to surprise and amaze. Al Pacino’s performance was again subtle, carrying with it a power that is palpable, a demand for allegiance and focus, respect and fear. I love the way Pacino captured Michael’s brooding, his shift, his stress, the way he worked to keep everything functioning, the way he dealt with betrayal from everyone, truly highlighting how ruthless he had become. His portrayal as Michael Corleone is definitely one of my favourite portrayals in movie history.
“Don’t you know that I would use all of my power to prevent something like that from happening?” – Michael Corleone
Diane Keaton was really good in conveying her role as the wife of a mobster – not just any mobster, but the head of an extremely strong mob family. The splinters of the relationship are introduced at the end of The Godfather, where we see how unhappy Kay is about the fact that Michael is running things, as well as how he has changed towards her, too. Now, however, two kids along and all that, we see how she is starting to pull away from him, his violence, his dominance. She is seemingly alone, Michael has all the love and respect from everyone, and she is considered his wife, and is respected as such. Later we learn what extremely hard and rough decisions she made due to her growing hatred and resentment for Michael, which leaves you stunned that she would take such steps against him as well as admit it. Her desperation is palpable. Michael is cold and cruel, and he does not hide that from her. Kay is eventually on her own, from permanently fighting with Michael, egging him on and pushing him for legitimacy to being cast out, even being taken away from her children, completely cut off.
Robert Duvall steps up as Tom Hagen once again, delivering another fine performance as the family consigliere. Something that is extremely evident from the off is that Tom has become more involved with the family business as well as how things get done. A lot of responsibility and trust has been placed on him, and he has become colder. Still extremely calculated, and still doing some of the more horrendous jobs (remember the horse head?). He visits Frank Pentangeli (Michael V. Gazzo) in prison and informs Frank that he should recant, also promising that the Corleones will care for his family. Frank commits suicide later that night in the fashion discussed with the consigliere, and Tom seems to have no emotion for it as it was merely business. His performance was great, but it is becoming obvious that he is no longer just an incredibly educated outsider, but Michael’s right hand man, and that he loves the position.
“When a plot against the Emperor failed… the plotters were always given a chance… to let their families keep their fortunes. Right?” – Tom Hagen
Vito Andolini’s (Robert De Niro) youth is addressed, and it is quite the enthralling tale. His father was murdered, his brother attempted to avenge him and was killed, and his mother was gunned down by Don Francesco Ciccio (Giuseppe Sillato) and Vito, who did not talk much and was considered to be a bit slow, ran for it, and was helped out by family friends to make passage to the United States of America. A struggling young man with a wife and a child, Vito sees how things are going in life, how the crime families are treated, and in a scheming way eradicates any competition he could have had, instantly making him the new man on the block, a man who definitely does things differently than the previous guy. He listens to the people, and is respected by the people. We get to explore the rise of Vito’s empire, as well as how he exacted his revenge that eradicated his family and swept him from his homelands. We see who he was and how he became what he did. He was smart and methodical, and in stages got everything just as he wanted it. The Corleone children serve as markers to see Vito’s progress, as well as indicating how the family did not always have everything, but that Vito built them up from scratch.
“Do me this favour. I won’t forget it. Ask your friends in the neighbourhood about me. They’ll tell you I know how to return a favour.” – Vito Corleone
Fredo’s (John Cazale) bitterness at Michael is thinly veiled, something he struggles with constantly. Michael may have humoured it for the first while, but eventually that, too, becomes a serious problem, causing strife between the two brothers. I liked how the discord in the family was shown, that even though Michael is the one that stepped up, there was resentment and bitterness about it. Fredo took it as a personal failure that Michael ran the Corleone family, and that Michael was the one supporting Fredo and looking after him, even though Fredo is the older brother. His ultimately betraying Michael could be seen coming, but the reaction of Michael was intense, and it caused some tension within the family, too. Michael has many friends, but at the same time he is losing family and loyalty he thought he didn’t have to question faster than he suspected. As if Fredo is not enough for Michael to deal with, Connie (Talia Shire) is still bouncing off the walls, crazy and doing really stupid things, expecting Michael to pick up after her, to see how much she can push him. Initially she is not looked into much, and while she does not command a lot of screen time, it is eventually explained why she did what she did. This does not make it better, but the questions are no longer floating around and not making sense anymore. As fast as she broke herself away from the family, it seems that she is doing what she can to work her way back into Michael’s good graces at the very least.
“Taken care of me? You’re my kid brother and you take care of me? Did you ever think about that?” – Fredo Corleone
So many aspects of this story come together at intervals, and it is a stunning work of art to get to the end result. The journey, the characters, the events are all just exactly what they need to be, and it is exceptionally impressive overall. The score used suited everything just right, and Coppola truly took this film in a direction to match its predecessor equally. The camera work was fantastic, and all the actors worked wonderfully in their roles. Movies are just not the same as they used to be, and The Godfather Part II is just further evidence of this. I don’t really have words to justify this movie, there is just so much to talk about (the scheming, the partnerships, the travels, the alliances struck up, etc), and I know many more people have discussed it in more detail than I have, but I am going to stop here now, The Godfather Part II is just one of those films that has to be experienced to be understood. My Spock Chop, I know you are not a fan and all, but really, this is something glorious!
Cinema Parrot Disco 