Friday, December 14, 2007

50 years ago: The Bridge on the River Kwai, winner of 7 Oscars, released

The Bridge on the River Kwai

Released: December 14, 1957

Studio: Columbia

Genre: war epic

Box Office (numbers in millions):

Domestic: 27.20 Worldwide: ?

Adjusted for Inflation:

Domestic: 533.72 Worldwide: ?

Directing: David Lean

Screenwriting: Pierre Boulle, Carl Foreman, Michael Wilson

Starring: Alec Guinness, William Holden, Sessue Hayakawa, Jack Hawkins

Review:

Screenwriters Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson were blacklisted in Hollywood for “alleged communist associations” ^MSN so they wrote “this epic World War II action film,” ^MSN an “outstanding, psychologically complex adaptation of Pierre Boulle’s 1952 novel,” ^FS in secret. Boulle – who spoke no English – was originally credited as the sole screenwriter. In 1984, Foreman and Wilson were awarded screenwriting Oscars posthumously. ^MSN

The story is about American and English soldiers in a Japanese prison camp who are ordered by camp commander Colonel Saito (Hayakawa) to build a bridge in the Asian jungle of Burma which will transport Japanese troops. “A tremendously antagonistic battle of wills ensues” ^FS between Saito and Nicholson (Guinness), “the rigid British officer who refuses to bow to torture.” ^A07 The latter colonel develops “a twisted sense of pride” ^FS in overseeing the construction of the bridge. His obsession with using “this exercise to show the Japanese as inferior humans and soldiers” ^VD blinds him to the reality that he is aiding the enemy.

Holden is an American who escapes from the camp, only to be tasked with leading a mission back to destroy “the bridge.” ^A07 The film does “just as well showing the psychological battle of wills as the more epic scenes of military conflict.” ^BFI

Sources:

^A07 American Film Institute (2007). “AFI’s 100 Years…100 Movies – 10th Anniversary Edition”
^BFI British Film Institute. (1999) “The BFI 100: A Selection of the Favourite British Films of the 20th Century”
^FS Filmsite.org “100 Greatest Films”
^MSN MSN Entertainment (7/19/2018). “100 Best Movies” by Shahnaz Mahmud
^T95 Time Out (1995). “Centenary Top One Hundred Films”
^VD Video Detective (1997). “Top 100 Films of

Awards/Honors/Lists:

Dave’s Movie Database Lists:

Dave’s Movie Database Genre Lists:

Box Office:

Oscars:

Wins: 7 – including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Guinness), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Score, Best Film Editing

Nominations: 8 – including Best Supporting Actor (Hayakawa)

Notable Awards:

Other Lists/Honors:

First posted 5/30/2023.

Friday, November 9, 2007

No Country for Old Men the Best PIcture Oscar-winning deconstruction of the classic Western, released

No Country for Old Men

Released: November 9, 2007

Studio: Miramax

Genre: crime/film noir/western

Box Office (numbers in millions):

Domestic: 74.28 Worldwide: --

Adjusted for Inflation:

Domestic: -- Worldwide: 111.05

Directing: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

Screenwriting: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin

Review:

Brothers Joel and Ethan Coen deliver “there best film since FargoPD They “didn’t let the dense prose of Cormac McCarthy inhibit them from faithfully adapting No Country for Old Men,” ^ST a “thriller about a drug deal gone to hell and an ensuing manhunt into a staggering deconstruction of the classic Western.” ^PD

The movie “is a tension-ratcheting, 1980 Texas-set chase movie” ^E18 in which “a man (Josh Brolin) comes upon $2 million in missing drug money and soon finds himself being hunted by a ruthless killer (Javier Bardem).” ^ST “Terrific performances bring every character even further to life.” ^ST Bardem “makes an awesome villiain;” ^E18 his “chilling killer Anton Chigurh, [is] often cited as the most realistic depiction of a psychopath in film history.” ^PD

“Pitch-black modern themes and characteristically gorgeous Roger Deakins cinematography linger in the mind.” ^PD

Sources:

^E18 Empire (3/20/2018). “The 100 Greatest Movies”
^PD Parade.com (5/22/2023). “…We Ranked the 100 Best Movies of All Time!” by Samuel R. Murrian
^ST Stacker.com (4/14/2023). “100 Best Movies of All Time” by Jacob Osborn

Awards/Honors/Lists:

Dave’s Movie Database Lists:

Awards:

Oscars:

Wins: 4 – Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor (Bardem), Best Adapted Screenplay

Nominations: 8 – including Best Cinematography, Best Film Editing, Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing

Lists:

Experts’ Picks:

Genre Lists:

First posted 6/9/2023.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

American Film Institute: 100 Greatest American Films of All Time

American Film Institute:

100 Greatest American Films of All Time

In 1998, the American Film Institute reached out to, as it says on their website, “more than 1,500 leaders from across the American film community – screenwriters, directors, actors, producers, cinematographers, editors, executives, film historians and critics among them – to choose from a list of 400 nominated films compiled by AFI and select the 100 greatest American movies.” The results were revealed on a CBS television special on June 16, 1998.

In 2007, AFI updated its list, repeating the original process and airing another CBS special on June 20, 2007.

The list presented here is an aggregate of the two lists. Here are the results:

1. Citizen Kane (1941)
2. The Godfather (1972)
3. Casablanca (1942)
4. Gone with the Wind (1939)
5. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
6. Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
7. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
8. Schindler’s List (1993)
9. The Graduate (1967)
10. On the Waterfront (1954)

11. Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope (1977)
12. Raging Bull (1980)
13. Sunset Boulevard (1950)
14. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
15. Psycho (1960)
16. Some Like It Hot (1959)
17. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
18. Chinatown (1974)
19. All About Eve (1950)
20. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

21. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
22. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
23. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)
24. The Maltese Falcon (1941)
25. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
26. Apocalypse Now (1979)
27. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
28. High Noon (1952)
29. The Godfather Part II (1974)
30. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

31. Annie Hall (1977)
32. Double Indemnity (1944)
33. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
34. Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
35. Vertigo (1958)
36. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
37. Midnight Cowboy (1969)
38. It Happened One Night (1934)
39. The African Queen (1951)
40. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)

41. King Kong (1933)
42. City Lights (1931)
43. Rear Window (1954)
44. West Side Story (1961)
45. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
46. The Sound of Music (1965)
47. North by Northwest (1959)
48. The Philadelphia Story (1940)
49. Taxi Driver (1976)
50. Jaws (1975)

51. The Searchers (1956)
52. M*A*S*H (1970)
53. Shane (1953)
54. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
55. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
56. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
57. Network (1976)
58. Tootsie (1982)
59. The Deer Hunter (1978)
60. The Gold Rush (1925)

61. Rocky (1976)
62. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
63. American Graffiti (1973)
64. Duck Soup (1933)
65. Forrest Gump (1994)
66. Modern Times (1936)
67. The Wild Bunch (1969)
68. The French Connection (1971)
69. Unforgiven (1992)
70. Platoon (1986)

71. Ben-Hur (1959)
72. Easy Rider (1969)
73. The Apartment (1960)
74. Bringing Up Baby (1938)
75. Goodfellas (1990)
76. Pulp Fiction (1994)
77. Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
78. The General (1927)
79. Doctor Zhivago (1965)
80. The Birth of a Nation (1915)

81. Intolerance: Love’s Struggle Throughout the Ages (1916)
82. From Here to Eternity (1953)
83. Amadeus (1984)
84. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)
85. The Third Man (1949)
86. Fantasia (1940)
87. Nashville (1975)
88. Rebel Without a Cause (1955)
89. Sullivan’s Travels (1941)
90. Stagecoach (1939)

91. Cabaret (1972)
92. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
93. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
94. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
95. An American in Paris (1951)
96. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
97. Wuthering Heights (1939)
98. Dances with Wolves (1990)
99. In the Heat of the Night (1967)
100. All the President’s Men (1976)

Resources:

Originally posted 6/20/2007.

Friday, April 13, 2007

50 years ago: 12 Angry Men released

12 Angry Men

Released: April 13, 1957

Studio: United Artists

Genre: courtroom drama

Box Office (numbers in millions):

Domestic: 4.36 Worldwide: ?

Adjusted for Inflation:

Domestic: ? Worldwide: 16.33

Directing: Sidney Lumet

Screenwriting: Reginald Rose

Starring: Henry Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, Martin Balsam, Ed Begley, E.G. Marshall, Jack Klugman, Jack Warden

Review:

In his directorial debut, Sidney Lumet adapts Reginald Rose’s television play to a masterful courtroom drama. “In a hot summer courtroom in NYC, a teenaged Latino (Savoca) is on trial for murdering his father with a switchblade knife and faces the electric chair if convicted.” ^FS The “film finds all its drama outside the courtroom itself and inside a jury deliberation room packed with fantastic character actors.” ^E18

Of the twelve jurors, only one (Henry Fonda) thinks there is reasonable doubt regarding a guilty conviction. “In the sweaty, claustrophobic room, the tempers, prejudices and personalities of the cranky, smoking men are displayed as they examine the evidence and deliberate their verdict.” ^FS In a model of how to change opinions in the face of adversity, Fonda methodically convinces everyone to change their verdicts to not guilty.

“The growing sense of claustrophobia in 12 Angry Men was masterfully designed and contributed to the film's critical success…Lumet’s use of camera angles is a benchmark for how those lens choices actually affect mood. As the movie starts, the camera begins above eye level, it later slides down to eye level as the story develops, and toward the end of the movie it is below eye level, heightening the tension.” ^MSN

Sources:

^E18 Empire (3/20/2018). “The 100 Greatest Movies”
^FS Filmsite.org “100 Greatest Films”
^MSN MSN Entertainment (7/19/2018). “100 Best Movies” by Shahnaz Mahmud

Awards/Honors/Lists:

Dave’s Movie Database Lists:

Oscars:

Wins: 0

Nominations: 3 – including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay

Awards:

Other Lists/Honors:

Critics’ Picks:

Christopher Nolan

First posted 11/22/2021; last updated 5/29/2023.

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