My Top 13 of 1955 (Of What I've Seen)

13. Le amiche [The Girlfriends] (Michelangelo Antonioni)

12. L'angelo bianco [The White Angel] (Raffaello Matarazzo)

11. Wichita (Jacques Tourneur)

10. Killer's Kiss (Stanley Kubrick)

9. Il bidone [The Swindle] (Federico Fellini)

8. The Trouble with Harry (Alfred Hitchcock)

THREE-WAY TIE FOR 7:

7. Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "Revenge" (Alfred Hitchcock)

7. Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "Breakdown" (Alfred Hitchcock)

7. Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "The Case of Mr. Pelham" (Alfred Hitchcock)

6. Land of the Pharaohs (Howard Hawks)

5. To Catch a Thief (Alfred Hitchcock)

4. Yô-kihi [Imperial Concubine Yang] (Kenji Mizoguchi)

3. Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray)

THREE-WAY TIE FOR 2:

2. Nuit et brouillard [Night and Fog] (Alain Resnais)

2. Artists and Models (Frank Tashlin)

2. Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich)

FIVE-WAY TIE FOR 1:

1. The Night of the Hunter (Charles Laughton)

1. Mr. Arkadin (Orson Welles)

1. Lola Montès (Max Ophuls)

1. The Long Gray Line (John Ford)

1. Ordet [The Word] (Carl Theodor Dreyer)

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My Top 10 of 1928 (Of What I've Seen)

10. Dom na Trubnoiy [The House on Trubnoya] (Boris Barnet)

9. Street Angel (Frank Borzage)

8. Mother Machree [incomplete] (John Ford)

7. The River [incomplete] (Frank Borzage)

6. La petite marchande d'allumettes [The Little Matchstick Girl] (Jean Renoir)

5. Four Sons (John Ford)

4. The Docks of New York (Josef von Sternberg)

3. The Last Command (Josef von Sternberg)

THREE-WAY TIE FOR 2:

2. The Cameraman (Buster Keaton with Edward Sedgwick)

2. La chute de la maison Usher [The Fall of the House of Usher] (Jean Epstein)

2. Spione [Spies] (Fritz Lang)

1. La passion de Jeanne d'Arc [The Passion of Jeanne d'Arc] (Carl Theodor Dreyer)

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My Top 14 of 2004 (Of What I've Seen)

14. Abenaa: "Rain" (Abel Ferrara)

13. Hana & Alice (Shunji Iwai)

12. Bergman Island: Ingmar Bergman on Fårö Island Cinema and Life (Marie Nyreröd)

11. Clean (Olivier Assayas)

10. La mala educación [Bad Education] (Pedro Almodóvar)

9. Tanner on Tanner (Robert Altman)

8. The Hand (Wong Kar-wai)

TIE FOR 7:

7. La niña santa [The Holy Girl] (Lucrecia Martel)

7. All the Ships at Sea (Dan Sallitt)

6. Une visite au Louvre [A Visit to the Louvre] [both versions] (Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet)

5. Chats perchés [Perching Cats] / The Case of the Grinning Cat (Chris Marker)

4. Sud pralad [Strange Creature] / Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)

3. Triple Agent (Éric Rohmer)

TIE FOR 2:

2. The Dangerous Thread of Things (Michelangelo Antonioni)

2. Notre musique [Our Music] (Jean-Luc Godard)

TIE FOR 1:

1. 10 on 'Ten' (Abbas Kiarostami)

1. 2046 (Wong Kar-wai)

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My Top 14 of 1953 (Of What I've Seen)

14. The Blue Gardenia (Fritz Lang)

13. La signora senza camelie [The Lady Without Camelias] (Michelangelo Antonioni)

12. All I Desire (Douglas Sirk)

11. Jigokumon [Gate of Hell] (Teinosuke Kinugasa)

THREE-WAY TIE FOR 10:

10. Gion bayashi [Gion Festival Music] (Kenji Mizoguchi)

10. Gycklarnas afton [Carnies' Twilight] [aka "Sawdust and Tinsel"] (Ingmar Bergman)

10. I vitelloni [The Sucklecalves / The Fellas] (Federico Fellini)

9. The Big Heat (Fritz Lang)

8. Les vacances de Monsieur Hulot [Monsieur Hulot's Holiday] (Jacques Tati)

7. Eaux d'artifice (Kenneth Anger)

6. Pickup on South Street (Samuel Fuller)

5. I Confess (Alfred Hitchcock)

4. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Howard Hawks)

3. Sommaren med Monika [Summer with Monika] (Ingmar Bergman)

SUPREME THREE-WAY TIE FOR 2:

2. Ugetsu monogatari [A Tale of the Rain and the Moon] (Kenji Mizoguchi)

2. Mogambo (John Ford)

2. Madame de... (Max Ophuls)

SUPREME THREE-WAY TIE FOR 1:

1. Tôkyô monogatari [A Tale of Tokyo] [aka "Tokyo Story"] (Yasujirô Ozu)

1. The Golden Coach (Jean Renoir)

1. The Sun Shines Bright (John Ford)

===

My Top 15 of 1938 (Of What I've Seen)

15. Four Men and a Prayer (John Ford)

14. Holiday (George Cukor)

13. Fantasia sottomarina [Undersea Fantasy] (Roberto Rossellini)

12. The Singing Blacksmith / Yankl der Shmid [Yankl the Blacksmith] (Edgar G. Ulmer)

11. Angels with Dirty Faces (Michael Curtiz)

10. Three Comrades (Frank Borzage)

9. You and Me (Fritz Lang)

8. Anma to onna [The Masseurs and the Woman] (Hiroshi Shimizu)

7. Werther (Max Ophuls)

6. Child Bride (Harry J. Revier)

TIE FOR 5:

5. Quadrille (Sacha Guitry)

5. Jezebel (William Wyler)

4. The Lady Vanishes (Alfred Hitchcock)

TIE FOR 3:

3. Bringing Up Baby (Howard Hawks)

3. La bête humaine [The Human Beast] (Jean Renoir)

2. La Marseillaise, chronique de quelques faits ayant contribué à la chute de la Monarchie [The Marseillaise: A Chronicle of a Few Events Having Contributed to the Fall of the Monarchy] (Jean Renoir)

1. Aleksandr Nevsky (Sergei Eisenstein)

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My Top 10 of 1946 (Of What I've Seen)

10. Bedlam (Mark Robson and Val Lewton)

9. Cloak and Dagger (Fritz Lang)

8. Gilda (Charles Vidor)

7. Fragment of Seeking (Curtis Harrington)

6. A Scandal in Paris: The Story of Vidocq (Douglas Sirk)

5. La Belle et la Bête [Beauty and the Beast] (Jean Cocteau)

4. The Stranger (Orson Welles)

TIE FOR 3:

3. My Darling Clementine (John Ford)

3. Canyon Passage (Jacques Tourneur)

TIE FOR 2:

2. Paisà (Roberto Rossellini)

2. Utamarô (w)o meguru go-nin no onna [The Five Women Around Utamarô] (Kenji Mizoguchi)

TIE FOR 1:

1. Notorious (Alfred Hitchcock)

1. The Big Sleep (Howard Hawks)

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My Top 12 of 1985 (Of What I've Seen)

12. Miami Vice: "The Home Invaders" (Abel Ferrara)

11. Rocky IV (Sylvester Stallone)

TIE FOR 10:

10. AK (Chris Marker)

10. Ran [Chaos] (Akira Kurosawa)

9. A Nightmare on Elm Street: Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (Jack Sholder)

8. Mala Noche / "Bad Night" (Gus Van Sant)

7. Sans toit ni loi [Without Roof or Rule] [aka "Vagabond"] (Agnès Varda)

6. L'île aux merveilles de Manoël [Manoël's Marveled Island / Manoël's Treasure Island] (Raul Ruíz]

5. Détective [Detective] (Jean-Luc Godard)

4. Hurlevent (Jacques Rivette)

3. Police (Maurice Pialat)

2. Tong nien wang shi [Childhood's Past Events] / The Time to Live and the Time to Die (Hou Hsiao-hsien)

TIE FOR 1:

1. Shoah (Claude Lanzmann)

1. Je vous salue, Marie [I Salute Thee, Marie / Hail Mary] (Jean-Luc Godard)

===

My Top 10 of 1993 (Of What I've Seen)

10. Short Cuts (Robert Altman)

9. Trois couleurs: Bleu [Three Colors: Blue] (Krzysztof Kieslowski)

8. Body Snatchers (Abel Ferrara)

7. Ozu to hanashiru [Talking with Ozu] (Kôgi Tanaka)

6. Je vous salue Sarajevo [I Salute Thee, Sarajevo / Hail Sarajevo] (Jean-Luc Godard)

5. Le tombeau d'Alexandre [Alexandre's Memorial] (Chris Marker)

4. La naissance de l'amour [The Birth of Love] (Philippe Garrel)

3. Snake Eyes (aka "Dangerous Game") (Abel Ferrara)

2. Hélas pour moi [Alas for Me / Woe Is Me] (Jean-Luc Godard)

1. Hsimeng jensheng [Dream Drama Life] [aka "The Puppetmaster"] (Hou Hsiao-hsien)

===

My Top 14 of 1977 (Of What I've Seen)

14. Smokey and the Bandit (Hal Needham)

13. Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope (George Lucas)

12. The Serpent's Egg (Ingmar Bergman)

11. The Domain of the Moment (Stan Brakhage)

10. Powers of Ten (Charles Eames and Ray Eames)

9. Hishû monogatari [A Tale of Grief] (Seijun Suzuki)

8. Veredas [Pathways] (João César Monteiro)

7. The Driller Killer (Abel Ferrara)

6. Mikey and Nicky (Elaine May)

5. Goszâresh [The Report] (Abbas Kiarostami)

4. Killer of Sheep (Charles Burnett)

3. House (Nobuhiko Obayashi)

2. Eraserhead (David Lynch)

1. Opening Night (John Cassavetes)



===

Fait Accompli: Episode 1: Caused

1 hour 37 minutes

The first (pilot) episode of an ongoing film-serial. (Subsequent episodes 10-20 minutes.) Click the full-screen icon to watch. Best watched with headphones on laptops, iPads, or iPhones, or also via AppleTV, Roku, or any smart-TVs that stream Vimeo content. Or hook your (newer) Mac up to your TV via the HDMI out.

directed and edited by Craig Keller

scenario by Craig Keller

starring:
Craig Keller
Sunita Mani
Jeffrey Gardener
Jennifer Prediger
Homayoon Khorram

special appearances:
Todd Reichart
Caroline White
Tallie Medel
Jessye Casale

music: Jake Rabinbach / Craig Keller

produced by Craig Keller and Jeffrey Gardener

===

Cannes 2013 Best-Of

1. Les trois désastres
[The Three Disasters]
by Jean-Luc Godard
***hors-comparaison / outside of and beyond comparison

===

2. Upstream Color
by Shane Carruth
***supreme masterpiece


===

3. Maynila sa mga kuko ng liwanag
[Manila in the Claws of Light]
by Lino Brocka
(1975)
***masterpiece

4. Borom sarret
[The Wagoner]
by Ousmane Sembène
(1963)
***masterpiece

5. L'Inconnu du lac
[The Stranger at the Lake]
by Alain Guiraudie

6. Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus and 2012
by Sebastián Silva

7. Harmony Lessons
by Emir Baigazin

8. I Used to Be Darker
by Matt Porterfield

===

Les trois désastres

On Seeing the Premiere of the New Godard [Part of the Otherwise Unfortunate 3X3D] at Cannes, 18.05.13

(reposted/revised from my Twitter) The Godard short is re-entry hot.

Topics: dimensions (how a building might be in 3 dimensions but when it collapses it's in 2, like... 

...how in Hiroshima people were 3D then became 2D when their ash-shadows were left against walls. Topics covered (cont'd) —

...mathematics and "N"; catastrophes (désastres); dice (dés); cosmos (astres); reality and time; money; cinema; Eisenstein; Orson Welles;...

..and on and on. Narrated by Godard (mostly) and Miéville and more. Broken into 3 sections (1st, 2nd, 3rd disasters). ...

 ... The third section recounts "the story of the dog" through history and what he must wonder if he sits near a fireplace...

 ...and listens to the conversation between a man and a woman. This is one of the most powerful, moving. and poetic passages in all of JLG...

 ..Godard himself appears from moustache down in extreme close-up during this 3rd section, which is punctuated with footage...

...of a dog (in 3D naturally) in the wet autumn-leaf -strewn woods gazing up into the camera. It's an overwhelming image and moment...

...There are also several punctuational moments where b&w stills of director's faces [Welles; Ford; N. Ray] snap from "squished" aspect-ratio to their proper...

...dimensions. Among the HD 3D sequences shot 'in-house', there's the documentation of the assembly of the apparatus, how JLG created his 3D technique, ...

...with two DSLR cameras placed on a mount, beside one another, one rightside-up, the other upside-down; we see the camera[s] "film itself"...

...later revealed (filmed by the same camera itself [from an outer angle]) in an incredible tracking shot to be pointed into a giant mirror (i.e., "the ultimate movie")..

(that is, a JLG-3D camera filming in tracking shot a JLG-3D camera, stationary and unmanned, filming itself in a mirror..

(..which resulting image we see previously a few times) (but it is revealed as a shot into a mirror; not a shot of the camera[s] from across an imaginary 180-degree-line)..

..It closes with JLG in VO denouncing James Cameron ("the master of the Titanic") for perverting depth/profundity with his use of 3D...

...and words to the [very rough] effect that he [Cameron] has no idea what to do with his technology, why he forced this technique upon the world, nor has any clue as to what dimensions are...

... / are used for. The final supertitle reads: "3D / malheur numérique." —

There are things in this movie we have never seen nor imagined.
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