In Contention

Tag: 2001: A Space Odyssey

  • Guardian does the ‘all-time greatest’ meme

    Ah, lists. The gift that keeps giving — particularly in the world of film blogging, where they provide snappy short-form content, invite numerous comments and generate multiple hits when spread across a zillion pages.

    Last year’s flood of end-of-decade countdowns surely satisfied even the most ardent list fanatic for a good few months, but with no such milestone to mark this year, The Guardian has returned to an old chestnut: the greatest films of all time.

    The gimmick they’ve used for the project (the results of which have been unfolding on their website over the past week) is to subdivide the larger collective according to genre: the 25 best comedies, romances, action films, and so on. As if any all-time best isn’t prone to enough criticism, this doubles the opportunities for debate: now we can kvetch not only about the films that made the cut (or didn’t), but whether they’ve even been categorized correctly.

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  • Your ranked list of the 10 most influential films of all time

    Citizen KaneAnd with that, our poll series comes to a screeching halt.  I’ve already offered some thoughts on how all of this turned out.  I hope readers unfamiliar with some of the films I’ve been harping on will take that to heart and at least seek them out.  You owe it to yourself as a film lover, believe you me.

    Here is your ranked list.  For background on all of these shenanigans, click here.  I want to thank everyone who participated in the polls and made this a real community effort.

    1. “Citizen Kane” (Orson Welles, 1941)
    2. “Star Wars” (George Lucas, 1977)
    3. “2001: A Space Odyssey” (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
    4. “The Godfather” (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
    5. “The Wizard of Oz” (Victor Fleming, 1939)
    6. “Psycho” (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)
    7. “Jaws” (Steven Spielberg, 1975)
    8. “Pulp Fiction” (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
    9. “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” (David Hand, 1937)
    10. “Toy Story” (John Lasseter, 1995)

    Honorable mention: “Annie Hall,” “Apocalypse Now,” “Battleship Potemkin,” “The Birth of a Nation,” “Casablanca,” “The Godfather Part II,” “Gone with the Wind,” “The Matrix,” “Metropolis” and “Rashomon”

    One of these days I’ll cook up my own list.  Until then, once again, thanks for participating.

  • POLL: The most influential films of all time, round one, part five

    I’ve got family coming into town this afternoon, and since this week’s poll had three runaway winners in “2001: A Space Odyssey,” “The Godfather” and “Pulp Fiction,” and I doubt three more hours will close the gap on the stragglers (poor “Jurassic Park”), I think it’s time for a new installment.  Next week will be the final round one poll and we’ll be closer to the end and your view of the 10 most influential films of all time.

    Once again, check the background on this series here.  Have a look in the left sidebar and chalk up no more than three films to survive and move on to the next round.  This week should make for an easier selection than last week.  As always, though, it’s a random assortment.  Blame the fates if you find yourself facing a Sophie’s Choice.

  • Which moments hooked you?

    (from left) Lon Chaney and Mary Philbin in The Phantom of the OperaI love the current poll series about the most influential films of all time, but it got me thinking about the moments in movies that hooked me on cinema forever. You know, the ones we see as kids that have an enormous impact on us, forever bonding us to this art form we all so love?

    For me, as I’ve mentioned before, it was a scene in “The Ten Commandments,” Cecil B. DeMille’s remake of his own epic, which I saw in 1972 (I think) in a re-release of the picture. In the days before video (yep, that old) the studios would re-release their films every few years and this was a major re-release for Paramount. My dad, also a movie junkie (though not as bad as his son), had talked about this for years and now that it was back we were going.

    Admittedly, I was a tad cynical at 12 years old.  I fully expected to be disappointed.  Still I wanted to see it because I enjoyed going to the movies. Little did I know my life would be changed forever.

    We piled into the car and made the drive to the theater, which was packed with familes similar to ours. The lights went down and for the next four and a half hours I was swept back in time, stunned by the size and scope of the film, amazed at the colors, and most of all, astonished at Charlton Heston. Never before had I realized how an actor could command the screen.  I never felt like I was watching a performance, either.  In awe I watched the Exodus scene as literally thousands of actors moved out of Egypt, led by Moses.

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  • Neil Gaiman pens a love letter send-off to the Caped Crusader

    Cover of Batman #686I don’t know how many readers became regulars as a result of last year’s “Dark Knight” awards march, but I do know there are quite a few who share my enthusiasm for comics and Batman comics in particular.  This post is certainly aimed at that crowd, but anyone eager to get their hands on a great story, in any medium, this is for you, too.

    With the 70th anniversary of the character coming next month, author, screenwriter and comics scribe Neil Gaiman has been charged with writing up the final chapter of Batman’s existence in the books as we’ve known them throughout that history.  “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?” is his “love letter” to the Bat, fashioned after Alan Moore’s similar send-off to Superman 20 years ago: “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?”

    Wired recently posted an in-depth interview with Gaiman, already high off the successful adaptation of his novel “Coraline” this year, and you get some great insight into his off-the-wall graphic denouement, which culminates with a sequence at once touching and unsettling, an homage of sorts to the finale of Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.”  Asked whether the character has lived in his heart for a while, given the deep attention and appreciation for his history in just two swift volumes, Gaiman had this to say:

    When I was 5, I was in a car with my dad and he mentioned that there was this Batman TV show in America about a man who dressed up in a costume and fought crime. The only bat I ever knew was a cricket bat, so what I thought he looked like was rather odd, based on that. Months later, the series hit the U.K., and I remember watching and being affected by it. Really worrying, genuinely worrying, on a deep primal level, “Will he be OK?” That is the way it was with every deathtrap. If I missed the end of an episode, I’d get my friends to tell me he was OK.

    Because of the Batman TV show, my dad picked up Smash! comics for me, which reprinted a Batman cartoon strip, which were much more about continuity than the television program. Those were my gateway drugs into Batman. Even when batman went twee in the ’60s, Neal Adams reinvented him as a long-eared, shadowy character. And when I was in my 20s, Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns came out and I found myself writing my first piece of academic criticism on it.

    I wanted my comic to contain all of that, from the story to the art. I wanted it to have that love in there. I wanted to write the last Batman with honor and love.

    If you haven’t read these two books, I encourage you to do so, even if you aren’t up to snuff on what’s going on in the series at the moment.  It reads as an independent study of the Dark Knight’s final hour.  You can find “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?” in the pages of “Batman” (#686) and “Detective Comics” (#853).  And catch the rest of that Wired interview here.

  • Oscar might go for “Button”

    Cate Blanchett in The Curious Case of Benjamin ButtonThere is no good reason for me to think this, of course.  Call it a gut feeling, but I have a sneaking feeling the Academy might ignore “Slumdog Millionaire,” despite its countless awards, and go for homegrown studio product this year.  Let’s face it, the Academy has proven they march to their own drummer over and over again.

    “Slumdog” has already become a pop culture phenomenon around North America and Britain, making far more money than the filmmakers ever thought it would. Hell, before the festival season started the film was doomed, set for direct-to-DVD distribution.  Yes, Danny Boyle has won the DGA award, a solid predictor, but I’m not convinced.  Hollywood loves to congratulate itself, which we saw in 1997 with “Titanic” somehow winning a record 11 awards over the vastly superior “L.A. Confidential.”  David Fincher’s “Button” has been around for years, waiting for the right director, the right effects, the right time.

    So often in the past the Academy has gone for a film that is conservative and offends no one, ignoring the better work.”Driving Miss Daisy” over “Do the Right Thing” (which wasn’t even nominated), “Gandhi” over “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial,” “Oliver!” over “2001:A Space Odyssey.”  The list goes on and on.  “Button” is a handsomely mounted project, beautifully shot, meticulously crafted, with strong performances from the cast,and rock solid direction from Fincher.

    “Slumdog” may well prevail, but as a devil’s advocate, I am throwing it out there that “Button” could surprise, taking wins for both Best Picture and Best Director.  Am I crazy?

  • ‘WALL-E’ faces Academy bias against…the future?

    WALL-E

    A best pic nomination for Wall-E would be a rare honor for animation in general, but it would also be a long over due rarity for another reason: Wall-E would only be the second best pic nominated film in the history of the Oscars to be set in the future. The only one to date is A Clockwork Orange. When you consider how many nominees are period pieces (I didn’t care to count), this represents a massive bias on the part of the Academy. It’s clear that they love the past, but they hate the future.

    So says Spout Blog writer Kevin Buist in a smartly realized item.  Buist goes on to note seven futuristic AMPAS snubs, but I’m still hung up on the statistic.  Really?  ONLY one?  How bizarre.  Considering “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “Metropolis” have permanent fixtures on my list of the 10 greatest films of all time, it’s just one more reason for me to be pissy at the Academy.

    Get with the program, people!  Not that I’m advocating for “WALL-E,” mind you.  But it is an intriguing stat.

  • Alright…the 20 WORST endings of all time from The Times

    Olivia Newton John and John Travolta in GreaseSo The Times has followed up last week’s collective assessment of the 20 greatest movie endings of all time today with a list of the worst, and there are some reasonable choices here and there.

    Like “Grease” for starters, probably my favorite movie musical but with an undeniably wretched denouement. And then there’s the cheeky mirror of the “Planet of the Apes” saga (the original made the best list, while Tim Burton’s remake lands here), not to mention “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” which would definitely be near the top of my own list (ballsy to go so recent, too).

    I also like the shout out to the never ending ending of “The Lord of the Ring: The Return of the King.”

    But beyond those and perhaps a few others, the rest of the list is populated with terrible choices (many of which landed on my own best list). “There Will Be Blood” (which was deemed the #2 film of all time by The Times’ film critic James Christopher)? “Psycho?” “2001?” Fucking “Citizen Kane” at #1???

    Lots of eyebrow raisers. And from what I can gather, merely an attempt at being controversial.

    Their choices:

    1. “Citizen Kane”
    2. “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”
    3. “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King”
    4. “2001: A Space Odyssey”
    5. “The Maltese Falcon”
    6. “Grease”
    7. “Brief Encounter”
    8. “The Great Dictator”
    9. “Saving Private Ryan”
    10. “The Great Escape”
    11. “Apocalypse Now”
    12. “Psycho”
    13. “There Will Be Blood”
    14. “Magnolia”
    15. “Blade Runner” (original release)
    16. “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”
    17. “Star Wars – Episode VI: Return of the Jedi”
    18. “Planet of the Apes” (2001)
    19. “Cast Away” (totally disagree here…I think it’s a beautiful ending)
    20. “Velvet Goldmine”