AFI Top 100

Its the start of a new year which makes me want to make lists...Here's another list of fantastic movies... The AFI top 100 (2007). We have the Rank, the movie, the director and if I have seen it or not.

1. Citizen Kane Orson Welles
2. The Godfather Francis Ford Coppola
3. Casablanca Michael Curtiz 
4. Raging Bull Martin Scorsese
5. Singin' in the Rain Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen 
6. Gone with the Wind Victor Fleming 
7. Lawrence of Arabia David Lean
8. Schindler's List Steven Spielberg 
9. Vertigo Alfred Hitchcock
10. The Wizard of Oz Victor Fleming 
11. City Lights Charlie Chaplin 
12. The Searchers John Ford
13. Star Wars George Lucas
14. Psycho Alfred Hitchcock
15. 2001: A Space Odyssey
16. Sunset Boulevard Billy Wilder
17. The Graduate Mike Nichols 
18. The General Buster Keaton, Clyde Bruckman
19. On the Waterfront Elia Kazan
20. It's a Wonderful Life Frank Capra
21. Chinatown Roman Polanski
22. Some Like It Hot Billy Wilder
23. The Grapes of Wrath 
24. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial Steven Spielberg 
25. To Kill a Mockingbird Robert Mulligan 
26. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington Frank Capra
27. High Noon Fred Zinnemann
28. All About Eve Joseph L. Mankiewicz
29. Double Indemnity Billy Wilder
30. Apocalypse Now Francis Ford Coppola
31. The Maltese Falcon John Huston
32. The Godfather Part II Francis Ford Coppola
33. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Miloš Forman
34. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs David Hand 
35. Annie Hall Woody Allen 
36. The Bridge on the River Kwai David Lean
37. The Best Years of Our Lives William Wyler
38. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre John Huston
39. Dr. Strangelove Stanley Kubrick
40. The Sound of Music Robert Wise
41. King Kong Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack 
42. Bonnie and Clyde Arthur Penn
43. Midnight Cowboy John Schlesinger
44. The Philadelphia Story
45. Shane George Stevens
46. It Happened One Night Frank Capra 
47. A Streetcar Named Desire Elia Kazan
48. Rear Window Alfred Hitchcock
49. Intolerance D. W. Griffith
50. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Peter Jackson 
51. West Side Story Jerome Robbins, Robert Wise
52. Taxi Driver Martin Scorsese
53. The Deer Hunter Michael Cimino
54. MASH Robert Altman
55. North by Northwest Alfred Hitchcock
56. Jaws Steven Spielberg
57. Rocky John G. Avildsen 
58. The Gold Rush Charlie Chaplin
59. Nashville Robert Altman 1975
60. Duck Soup Leo McCarey
61. Sullivan's Travels Preston Sturges
62. American Graffiti George Lucas
63. Cabaret Bob Fosse
64. Network Sidney
65. The African Queen John Huston
66. Raiders of the Lost Ark Steven Spielberg
67. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Mike Nichols
68. Unforgiven Clint Eastwood
69. Tootsie Sydney Pollack
70. A Clockwork Orange Stanley Kubrick
71. Saving Private Ryan Steven Spielberg
72. The Shawshank Redemption Frank Darabont 
73. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid George Roy 
74. The Silence of the Lambs Jonathan Demme
75. In the Heat of the Night Norman Jewison
76. Forrest Gump Robert Zemeckis 
77. All the President's Men Alan J. Pakula 
78. Modern Times Charlie Chaplin 
79. The Wild Bunch Sam Peckinpah
80. The Apartment Billy Wilder
81. Spartacus
82. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans F. W. Murnau
83. Titanic James Cameron 
84. Easy Rider Dennis Hopper
85. A Night at the Opera Sam Wood
86. Platoon Oliver Stone
87. 12 Angry Men Sidney Lumet
88. Bringing Up Baby Howard Hawks
89. The Sixth Sense M. Night Shyamalan
90. Swing Time George Stevens
91. Sophie's Choice Alan J. Pakula
92. Goodfellas Martin Scorsese 
93. The French Connection William Friedkin
94. Pulp Fiction Quentin Tarantino
95. The Last Picture Show Peter Bogdanovich
96. Do the Right Thing Spike Lee
97. Blade Runner Ridley Scott
98. Yankee Doodle Dandy Michael Curtiz
99. Toy Story John Lasseter
100. Ben-Hur William Wyler

Hmmm.... I am not very happy with the number of unseen movies. I think I will start AFI Fridays... Watch a movie from this list every week... Seems like a fun idea. Let's see how it turns out :)

And the Oscar went to...

For a movie buff, I have come to realise, I am quite behind in my in my reading list (err...watch list). So here's one of the simplest benchmarks of cinema...the Oscars... and there's so much left to see...and so much more to see again :)

2009 - “The Hurt Locker” -  loved it

2008 - “Slumdog Millionaire” - eh

2007 - “No Country for Old Men” - has been on my watch list for too long now...

2006 - “The Departed” -  fantastic

2005 - “Crash” - seen, nice...

2004 - “Million Dollar Baby” - he he...inside joke...haven't seen it coz of it....but have to watch

2003 - “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” - ofcourse i've seen it

2002 - “Chicago” - in bits and pieces

2001 - “A Beautiful Mind” - long back..

2000 - “Gladiator” -- surprise surprise...i've not seen this.

1999 - “American Beauty” - seen it. only ok.

1998 - “Shakespeare in Love” - seen

1997 - “Titanic” - loved it then, dunno about now.. The 3d version is coming so will watch it again.

1996 - “The English Patient” - havent seen it yet

1995 - “Braveheart” - seen it... Love it.... Love Mel Gibson (why did he have to go and make a fool of himself?!?! Humph!!!!)

1994 - “Forrest Gump” - lovvvvvvvvvvvve it... I think another movie of this year needs a mention - shawshank redemption - amongst the best movies ever made

1993 - “Schindler’s List” - one of my all time fav movies. Reading the book now.

1992 - “Unforgiven” - which one is this again?

1991 - “The Silence of the Lambs” - oooh...not going to watch this one

1990 - “Dances with Wolves” - havent seen it

1989 - “Driving Miss Daisy” - saw it lonnnng time back...dont remember much... So its on the re-watch list

1988 - “Rain Man”

1987 - “The Last Emperor”

1986 - “Platoon”

1985 - “Out of Africa”

1984 - “Amadeus”

1983 - “Terms of Endearment” - i think i saw it on tv once lonng long ago...

1982 - “Gandhi” - Yes, i think once every year on 2nd oct for 20 years... And I think it's the first movie I saw (ever)

1981 - “Chariots of Fire”

1980 - “Ordinary People”

1979 - “Kramer vs. Kramer” - yup...long back... And have seen the horrid Indian version as well

1978 - “The Deer Hunter”

1977 - “Annie Hall” -

1976 - “Rocky” - Of course... am a die hard Rocky fan

1975 - “One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest” - no...but have to

1974 - “The Godfather Part II” -

1973 - “The Sting” - nope, but have to

1972 - “The Godfather” Saw the movie. Read the book. The book it better.

1971 - “The French Connection”

1970 - “Patton” -

1969 - “Midnight Cowboy”

1968 - “Oliver!”

1967 - “In the Heat of the Night”

1966 - “A Man for All Seasons”

1965 - “The Sound of Music”- Lots and lots of times, and i can watch it as many times again

1964 - “My Fair Lady”- Saw it last November. nice

1963 - “Tom Jones” -

1962 - “Lawrence of Arabia” -

1961 - “West Side Story” -

1960 - “The Apartment” - have seen the indian version ;) have to see this also

1959 - “Ben-Hur”

1958 - “Gigi”

1957 - “The Bridge on the River Kwai”

1956 - “Around the World in 80 Days”-

1955 - “Marty”

1954 - “On the Waterfront”

1953 - “From Here to Eternity”

1952 - “The Greatest Show on Earth”

1951 - “An American in Paris”

1950 - “All about Eve”

1949 - “All the Kings Men”

1948 - “Hamlet”

1947 - “Gentleman's Agreement”

1946 - “The Best Years of Our Lives”

1945 - “The Lost Weekend”

1944 - “Going My Way”

1943 - “Casablanca”- Here's looking at you kid

1942 - “Mrs. Miniver”

1941 - “How Green Was My Valley”

1940 - “Rebecca”

1939 - “Gone with the Wind”-yup... Reading the book as well

1938 - “You Can't Take It with You” \

1937 - “The Life of Emile Zola”-

1936 - “The Great Ziegfeld”

1935 - “Mutiny on the Bounty”

1934 - “It Happened One Night” - yup ... Lovely. the indian version isn't half bad either

1932/1933 - “Cavalcade”

1931/1932 - “Grand Hotel”

1930/1931 - “Cimarron”

1929/1930 - “All Quiet on the Western Front”

1928/1929 - “The Broadway Melody”

1927/1928 - “Wings”

That's a lot of un-seen movies! I guess I need to take a month off and change this to a respectable ratio... And now that we have gone through the Oscar list, the next post will carry the AFI top 100 - I hope that's a better number (fingers crossed).

Seems like a good movie

I used to be a good listener... it was fascinating – the perspective – the world-view and the narrative.

On my way back from North campus (DU… for the uninitiated) – I traveled with a friend... and I happened to mention that I hadn’t seen Forrest Gump – so for the next hour and a half he narrated the story… frame by frame… while we considered our travel options – to hitch or not to hitch! We decided ‘not to’ … and took a bus on a circuitous route…we walked…changed buses…walked some more…while Tom Hanks fell in love…went to war…lost her…played ping-pong…found her… lost her…ran… ran some more… got a boat…made some money…invested in ‘an apple co.’ … found her… found his boy.. lost her & lived on…

It seemed like a good movie – and I thought I should try it… we even began to ‘analyse’ it – but had to drop it coz hostel lunch time ended at 3…and we were already at 2.55!

I reached by 3.05…and after almost breaking down the door of the kitchen got served food which I left untouched…one thought that did not leave me was that i wanted to watch this movie…since I hadn’t eaten – I went to Kutty’s (the TAFS canteen that has kept generations in my hostel alive… strange coz these were the same ppl who were incharge of the kitchen – but this isn’t time for conspiracy theories) Anyway, so I went to Kutty’s and placed the standard order of double anda bhurji with extra hari mirchi – was lectured by Dutt saab abt how so much chilli is not good for health… -- finally I sat down to eat and told another friend about how I was thinking about watching Forrest Gump – he corrected me “how you want to see FG again”… I corrected him “I want to see FG”… he looked at me with suspicion befitting a vamp in a K series soap… with an arched-eyebrow and said “you haven’t seen FG…even once”… “It’s the best!!! You know what happens….”

And he went on to tell me how Tom Hanks is… bt the house they threw stones at …she gets into drugs…he gets in the army… the capitol hill… the song by the byrds… his single-mindedness… the meetings with the president after the war and tt… how he runs… how he fishes…and believes in the capt… how he waits for the bus sitting on a bench…narrating his life simply (the only way he knows) to this lady…how he runs to find her… how he worries if the boy is like him… how he sits there when the bus goes by… how fantastic the movie is…

It seems like a good movie I think… it seems like a lot of things :)

Nostalgia...Scene I

One of the blogs i follow has a post called time machine... one of the posts i had written years ago was abt nostalgia... and now with christmas & new year here... i am getting nostalgic again... and am missing everyone... including the people who i meet everyday... so this is an attempt to remember a few very very heart-warming moments... with people who once were or continue to be an integral part of who I am.

Scene I (am wathcing too many movies I guess)

Set in a cold december night in Delhi... AFWWA hostel... Divya's room... 

Dibiya is out partying... and we (read - me, taru, rakhi, dhara, neha) are all in her room  -- (there were party hoppers too)... wondering what to do... so we think of having our own party... music list prolly was Chunari-Chunari on repeat... with some help from FM... on the menu - maggi!!! and we danced like there was no tomorrow... how that hostel bed survived the foot stomping will always be a mystery... why on that day the warden did not even bother to come for a round dispite the blaring music we'll never know. Sometime around dawn we all collapsed and slept off in that little room... 

cut to.... 12 hours ago... the same set of people + divya + ira + preety + gauri... make a plan to watch kabhi khushiiii kabhi gammmmmmmmmmmmmm.......... at chanakya... we have to catch the morning show... no body would ditch etc etc...

cut to... early morning... knowing us... ira comes to wake us up...with senti tht none of us is ready for after the "saturday-night-fever"... so we drag ourselves out of the room and into a foggy delhi morning;this is the time when we saw movies in the front row coz they costed less than air... which meant standing in lines for hours on end... for a ticket window that opened only an hour before the movie

sooooooo we reach and the show is sold out... so we get in the line for the next show (which means we are in the line for 4 hours)... while ira goes to her would be mother-in-law to get us food... i dont think any of us had the heart to tell the 'good ppl who stuck to the plan' that we should cancel the movie...or prolly it didnt strike anyone that we could catch the show another day...annnnnyway... we got the tickets and we saw K3G.. preety cried her eyes out...and we all lived happily ever after...

one of the days that i'll always remember... probably not vividly... but the fuzzy feeling... i liked those girls... i like those girls... i miss them. and i will remember them... all of them. 

The Dark Knight...

WOW!!! many times over!!!

Batman Begins had given hope that the character which was made a joke of by the many many many earlier batman movies could be salvaged... and then came the dark knight... i really wanted to write this when I saw the movie but I had no words... Nolan is a Genius!!! How can one possibly make what he did...

I have found myself repeating every possible line of the movie in every possible situation... completely unintentionally...

And after many many weeks of having seen the movie also... i find that i yet can not write about it... this time coz there is so much to say that it would border on incoherence.