Revisiting the AFI's Top 100 Movies
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- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
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0:00 - Introduction
7:09 - The AFI Top 100
11:09 - The Film Canon
13:26 - The Canon & The AFI
24:14 - Canon Bad
40:58 - Canon(s) Good
As a teenager, the AFI's Top 100 Movies list played a massive role in shaping my cinephilia. Now as an adult, it's time to look back and consider what the list got right, what it got wrong, and how it plays into the larger project of The Film Canon. Drawing on both personal experience and academic criticism, this video essay examines the AFI Top 100 as a gateway to consider canon writ large.
Artwork by Brooke Spencer
Filmography: letterboxd.com/eyebrowcinema/...
Works Cited: docs.google.com/document/d/1r...
Music Featured:
Overlook by ann annie
Martian Cowboy by Kevin MacLeod
Traversing by Godmode
The Plan's Working by Cooper Cannell
Marxist Arrow by Twin Musicom
MydNyte by Noir et Blanc Vie
Faultlines by Asher Fulero
Moonlight Sonata by Beethoeven
Setup With An E by Small Colin
Love Him by Loyalty Freak Music
AnaCaptainslogue by Noir et Blanc Vie
Dream Escape by the Tides
Maestro Tlakaelel by Jesse Gallagher
Shine on Harvest Moons by E's Jammy Jams
A Gradual Descent into the Chamber of Darkness by Scott Lawlor
Goat's Skull by Verified Picasso
The Wind by komiku
Escaping Like Indiana Jones by komiku
Facing It by komiku
Hello Michael! by Loyalty Freak Music
Both Flanks by Small Colin
Running Waters by Audionautix
Young and Old Know Love by Puddle of Infinity
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What is the best film in the AFI's original Top 100 list? And, perhaps more interesting, what is the worst?
Best Film- Godfather (predictable choice I know!)
Worst- Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (white liberal schmaltz)
Worst? Easy. Birth of a Nation. An evil, abysmal movie.
I can't tell you which is the best, but I can tell you which I like the best. Casablanca. I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Best film: gone with the wind - watching white people scramble to avoid saying this is funny . The racism displayed on screen was less than the racism displayed in the audience. Lol and stop making it hard for women/girls to watch or read gone with the wind . Pulp fiction is more racist .
Lawrence of Arabia at 5 or 6 in 97 , but I’m racist towards the British , they are just awful people
Best - Easy answer is Citizen Kane but of the top 10 Lawrence of Arabia is the most visually stunning, Godfather has the best score, and On the Waterfront has the best performances
Worst - Yes Birth of a Nation is extremely problematic, but Forrest Gump somehow managed to hang on and stay into the second 2008 list which I don't get at all... (and that film somehow seems to slip through the cracks whenever people complain about the White Savior Narrative films)
"I'd rather be doing something absent of politics, like continue to play Call of Duty". Masterfully done sir, 10/10
Mindless
Is this sarcasm
Call of duty is just a videogame, so actually there is nothing masterful in that shit
I came here for this comment specifically. Thank you for your service @ogto. O7
@@randyc8771????
I think the sheer volume of movies is why i've become a little kinder to the canon. You gotta start somewhere, and these kinds of lists can be helpful. Just remember that it doesn't stop with the classics and good interesting films are always being added.
Double Indemnity and Casablanca are among movies that reward multiple viewings, Birth of a Nation and Forest Gump among those that were huge hits, but do not.
Trump: if I had been there I would have gotten Kong to come down from the empire state building. You see I knew Kong for many years, wonderful guy, and and and I could've gotten him to come down
“Very smart guy. Destroying the city shows such strength!”
Please consider making a video about the curation and importance of Criterion Collection!
Nice one
Love Criterion but they are not the only game in town any longer. Arrow, Severance, Warner Archive, Kino and others are just as significant.
@@nicholasthill7151 well maybe a video of the force and synergy that all of them are creating together
This is why Turner Classic Movies Robert Osborne and other hosts are so important
Patiently waiting for AFI to update the list now that The Beekeeper is out and cinema has transformed
He protects the hive.
Crap
"To bee or not to bee isn't that fucking question?"
One of the greatest lines in cinema history
The last good movie was made in 2004 3 years before the updated list in 2007 came out so imo it shouldn't change
I think some of the critics miss the point because they think of a canon as a list of the greatest films. A canon is a set of works that you need to be familiar with to participate in conversation about that form of art. Of course the AFI canon is going to be dominated by establishment films, and exclude obscure movies. That’s the common set that film buffs talk about, almost by definition. And as you pointed out, there are multiple canons, because there are multiple groups having different conversations. And canons change over time as old participants die and new ones are born.
I was 17 when I first saw the AFI Top 100 in 2007 and I remember being completely humbled at my lack of film knowledge. Like seriously, this was where I first heard of Citizen Fucking Kane!!! It's one of the programmes I credit with turning me into the cinephile I am today.
I don't get Citizen Kane. I've tried twice to finish it but I just don't care. I guess I need to empathize, or at least identiry with someone in a story.
@@JerryBanks572Becoming "The Greatest Film Ever" has been a curse for Citizen Kane. It's widely considered so by film scholars because of its importance in the history of filmmaking techniques, not because it's considered the most broadly entertaining. But people keep checking out the film expecting to be blown away, and only end up disappointed. It's not an especially entertaining film, and it's absolutely not for everyone. To understand why the film is so popular with film historians and critics, you'd have to learn WHY, which would be like doing research to learn why a joke is considered so funny.
@@JerryBanks572 Many share that opinion. I've watched it 2 or 3 times, and I don't connect with the story either. I understand from a technical and storytelling standpoint why it's so important, but I certainly don't consider it a pleasurable watch.
When I finally watched Citizen Kane, it was much better than I expected, the editing and photography amazed me, but also how well paced was, even fun, I really got immersed in the story and the vanity of the american dream, the cast was also great, I loved Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten became one of my favorites the makeup aging also worked for me, not sure if it's the best movie ever, but it might be the best classic Hollywood film (which is how the AFI Top 100 list should've been called).
When the movie ended, I cried so hard😭 why? I watched it with my Mom who've never seen it before (we had already watched The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind which she loves, and even Casablanca which she found to love too), it didn't lived up to her hype, maybe if we watched it earlier she would have been more surprised, but that's when I learned that I couldn't convince everyone, on later rewatches, the film grown on her, maybe because of less hype, it's also a lesson about how hype influences how we receive things, possitively or negatively.
@@andrewklang809 The line burned into my brain: "You never really give me what I want."
So I am a 16 yr old who only got into film last year and I used/am using the AFI list. It's helped me find some of my favorite movies (12 Angry Men, Do the Right Thing) but I would say that it does have a bias towards Hollywood productions. As an example I watched Eraserhead a few months ago and loved it, and after learning how much it influenced Stanley Kubrick and others I don't see a reason why it should not be considered a canonical American film. The only reason I can think that it is not on the list is that is considered too unconventional. So the list has been helpful to me and because of it I have watched some films that I would have never thought about watching otherwise, but I also am looking other places to find more unconventional (and foreign) films. Such as for example, your channel.
Thanks for the insight. It's cool to hear how the list continues to be used by teens as a starting point so long after.
I was once in your path, so I can relate to you, not with AFI List which I discovered lately, but with IMDB Top 250 and the Sight & Sound lists, when I wanted to search for the "best films ever", I also searched for "cult films" and I'm surprised by how many of them are now mainstream, thanks to social media.
Good for you. You sound intelligent.
12 Angry Men is a great movie. I just saw it recently by accident.
Good point about Eraserhead. It’s challenging and probably not most people’s cup of tea, but it belongs in “The Canon” somewhere.
Growing into a cinephile in the age of CZcams has been really weird, especially in my teens. My main entry way to the film cannon was through film reviews online through a variety of creators, but I had 3 favorites:
My favorite of them were definetly the reviews by Jeremy Jahns and Chris Stuckman. I always felt the need to group them together because they almost seemed like foils to each other. Chris was a film nerd from a super early age, and clearly knew like a bajillion things about the history of film and how they were made, but he never came across as stuck up or snobby about it. The guy just really really loved movies and wanted to share that enjoyment with people online. His A+ movies playlist was basically a blue print for my formative film-nerd years between the ages of 14-16 and a half. He would hold up these classic movies like Citizen Kane, the Dark Knight and Die Hard, yes, but he'd also introduce me to modern classics like Collateral, Brick, and Insomnia. And he'd also give A+s to then contemporary greats like Silence, the Nice Guys and the World's End.
Jeremy Jahns was the opposite. He was super down to earth, even more so than Chris but he had a very frenetic and engaging editing style that Chris didn't. He would also break up his surface level comparisons with these out of nowhere incredibly insightful statements. And when the guy was in rant mode(either positively or negatively) he was everything a critic should be: articulating how you may have felt with a movie in a way you never thought to, and giving you a deeper understanding of why something may have sucked or worked well. If Chris was like your cool film teacher, Jeremy was like your smartest friend who was always hiding how smart he was.
That's the good side of growing up on CZcams reviews. The bad side was completely encapsulated by my third big influence: Doug Walker. Doug Walker is not without his talents as a writer and a critic, but a lot of his trappings really represent everything wrong with early internet film criticism. For instance, he spoke about movies(both in his own voice and vicariously through his horrible skits in his nostalgia critic vids) with an authority thats a little annoying. He talked about movies like "this is bad" or "this blows" and not "I think this is bad or blows". And he'd also be so busy trying to write jokes about the movies he was critiquing that he would miss really basic shit. I can't think of specific examples off the top of my head besides the entirety of his review of The Wall the movie. That review, frankly, was fucking infuriating to watch as someone who did and still does love Pink Floyd, because of how many times Doug says something incredibly stupid that he wouldn't have if he knew ANYTHING about Roger Waters' life or Pink Floyd in general.
He has a throw away joke in there about how the song "Us and Them" is about nothing and is just called that to sound cool, and that the guys who wrote it don't even know what it's about. Even though that song is about the "Us ve Them" mentality embodied by classiest, racist, and xenophobic systems of violence and oppression, something Waters would know a lot about since his dad died for stupid reasons during world war 2.
He also just phrases objective observations *as if* they were problems somehow. I remember watching his Jurassic Park video, where he talks about the "you didn't stop to think if you should" scene, and pointed out all the shots backlit by bright ass projectors and said "wow, Steven Spielberg must have a spotlight fetish hardy har har". Like, yeah? So? It's a striking visual flair that keeps the scene interesting visually in spite of the fact that it's just a half dozen characters having a philosophical debate. He says this the same way that he'd point out continuity errors and plot holes, which actually are problems.
The effect of this is that it made me paranoid about the movies I liked and made me go all cinemasins mode and pick apart things that weren't even problems.
All that to say, CZcams was pretty much my(and I think a lot of people my ages) AFI, for better and for worse.
I can relate to you, I really never caree that much abot Doug Walker and I never took him seriously (like, who does?) and Chris Stuckman, he's a very humble guy and easily accesible, I don't have much against him, he seems likeable, but he's become basic to me, I saw his Star Wars' reviews, in Attack of the Clones, he points candles in an Anakin & Padme scene which never was the case, a guy made a long movie essay defending the prequels and he pointed out that, btw he explained better the cinematic influences of Lucas.
I can relate to a lot of that. I was and still am a viewer of Doug Walker’s (the first step is admitting you have a problem and anyway, he also introduced me to Roger Ebert so there’s that) but I’ve also gotten most of my movie suggestions from people like Eyebrow Cinema. Once Upon A Time In America in particular is one of my favourite films and I might not have watched it if I hadn’t seen his great video on it. I’ve always more taken movies from their reputation rather than specific canons or lists.
The Dark Knight???? It was so violent I and my partner walked out on it.
As a late Gen X I was just a little older than you were when you saw Manchurian candidate when the original AFI list came out in '98. I was also a bit of a film buff at the time, and the full court media press around the list can't be overstated. It's helpful to remember that 1998 was sort of the last days of the monoculture--the internet was a thing but just barely, and your comments about blockbuster being our only source of movies isn't all that overstated in most parts of the country. (My medium-ish childhood suburb had a blockbuster and a mom and pop place with a smattering of indies that provided cover for the porn stashed behind a curtain in the back of the store.) Yes the list was middlebrow even for its day, but I think there were at least 20 movies on that list I'd never heard of at the time. I think all in all the list was a force for good in the world of film appreciation, and has been a jumping off point for many people like you into more complex and specialized canons.
The 1998 AFI Top 100 list (and subsequent other lists) was my also gateway to exploring a broader world of movies. I will always be grateful.
I had a similar life changing experience thanks to a movie on the list. The only reason I watched Doctor Zhivago was because of its inclusion. It sounded long and ungodly boring, but I was unprepared for its massive scope, which has always been something that draws me to my favorite movies, and while it didn't challenge much about what cinema can be, it was the death blow to judging movies based on what they're about and what genre they fall into before I watch them. I remember being appalled when I saw that it was the highest ranked movie removed in the remade 2007 list. While I know it's not a particularly highly acclaimed film these days, it's still a masterpiece in my opinion, and I'm glad that the AFI's flawed lists are still bringing it to people's attention.
Zhivago was also a key movie for me as a teen. It was my first David Lean film and the mix of sweeping scope and intimate character drama was stunning to me.
@@EyebrowCinemaMy first David Lean film was fortunately Bridge Over River Kwai, I was already a Star Wars fan and I heard of the film because Alec Guinness won an Oscar for it, this is one of my Great Uncle's favorite films, saying he could watch it over 10 times and never get bored, I got to agree with him, one of the reasons my Great Uncle says he liked Star Wars is because of Alec Guinness, Obi-Wan Kenobi is easily his favorite character.
David Lean is a great, great director. He made films as far afield as Lawrence and Hobson's Choice with Charles Laughton, an extremely funny comedy. Pple who don't know it are missing sth.
@@elizabethcsicsery-ronay1633Lean changed course in the mid 50s and stopped making the intimate small scale films he made his name on. People differ in which era they prefer.
@@Tolstoy111 thanks. I didn't know that. I loved his Hobson's Choice. Except I would have liked more Laughton and less of his eldest daughter. What other small-scale films did he make?
The idea of AFI doing a second 100 Greatest Movies List in 2008 seemed like a very forced one to me. Seemed as though they were trying to "correct" the complaints over the original 1998 list (replacing Birth of a Nation with Intolerance, taking out Fantasia and adding Toy Story, pushing Gone with the Wind behind Singin in the Rain in its top 10 which makes virtually no sense, replacing Guess Who with Do the Right Thing, moving the Searchers higher but not going so far as to crown another film #1 other than Citizen Kane so therefore what is even the point? etc.). Felt a little like AFI just bowing to the mob; where the newer list seemed like it was pandering to audiences the original list was pretty solid. These days doing a special like this would be nigh impossible because of all the salty fanbases AFI would wind up offending.
Also, whoever the editing team was behind those specials should have won an Emmy because the transitions between the clips were just so fluid it really made it incredible interesting to watch (watch AFI's 100 Heroes & Villains or AFI's 100 Songs to see what I mean)
Thank goodness they didn't update it in the 2010s, or people would have insisted they expand to 200 in order to include The Dark Knight 😅
Also, I am happy to see the Birth of a nation/Intolerance and Guess Who/In the Heat of the Night switches, as well as Do the Right Thing, which absolutely belongs there. But they freaking left off The Third Man! WTH, AFI?
I should clarify I LOVE Do the Right Thing and its tied with Malcolm X as my favorite Spike Lee film, and so my objection wasn't so much that it was included in the new list just that it came off as this kind of backtracking as if to say "ok we made the wrong choices the last time but that list didn't count this is the NEW list" - just feels a little gimmicky I dunno
And while Intolerance is undoubtedly a beautiful and well-made movie, I don't know how much it figures into the modern day conversation (seems like its more a movie people respect rather than "love" really). There was something bold about including Birth of a Nation in its original list because it was impactful for better or worse - I know people like to act like they're the first to realize the film was problematic af but Intolerance was essentially made as a response to the backlash DW Griffith received over BoAN and so ironically Intolerance's inclusion kind of feels like the same thing. I guess maybe a better choice might have been Night of the Hunter, which pays homage to Griffith's work throughout (including Intolerance in the famous "Leaning" duet scene) while also subverting the Griffith formula at the same time - and which unlike Intolerance blew up in popularity decades after it bombed (Spike Lee even borrowed from it for Do the Right Thing). That and AFI totally reworking their rankings was just legitimately confusing - GWTW may now have a more problematic place in history but that doesn't make Singing in the Rain aesthetically the better film because of it (that and their eliminating films like the Third Man, Fantasia, and Zhivago in order to keep films like Forrest Gump in which makes no sense to me whatsoever)@@melanie62954
@@jamesa.romano8500 Oh, there's definitely an element gimmickery to the redo, I agree! And true about Intolerance too. I haven't actually seen it. I've meant to watch it for years, but I fell asleep during Birth of a Nation, so jumping back into Griffith has seemed like a chore. I assumed they just had to include a Griffith film because he basically established the Hollywood narrative formula. I didn't know that the backlash against Birth was his impetus for making Intolerance.
Can you explain what Spike Lee borrowed from The Night of the Hunter? I knew he was a big fan of various classics (like his deeply saturated colors being inspired by Powell and Pressburger), but it's been a while since I watched DTRT.
Love-hate knuckles@@melanie62954
What a video! Keep it up, man, I love this. This year I'm watching more and more movies and I'm always fascinated at like definitive film lists. This video really made me look more into what the canon really is and what it entails. Bravo!
Thanks for this retrospective. It was my intro to "real cinema" as a teenager too. I still have only seen maybe 2/3 of the movies listed there but it's a great starting point for accessible, but still critically regarded movies from the USA. Love your content!
Love Gone with the Wind. Infinitely rewatchable.
This video is great. We're are basically the same age and had a similar experience with regards to discovering this list. I started exploring the films on AFI 100 around 13 years old and had already seen a few of the classics (Casablanca and Gone With the Wind) because of myl mother, so classic Hollywood cinema wasn't completely foreign to me, but this list opened my eyes to how great classic films truly were. I became a TCM addict after that and within a few years, I began my journey discovering foreign classics.
Good for you. Classics are classic bc they're good films, btw.
I will defend the first AFI 100 in that it was a different time in the world of broadcast television. You have to get through 100 movies really quickly because this isn't a 100 day programming special where you can take a half hour per movie. Your special is taking the place of other programming and you only have so long. I agree the comments were dumb for the movies given but we were never going to get the great insightful analysis. There isn't the time.
As an exercise, go back and watch some old Roger and Ebert episodes. They were remember for being such great critics. They are but I feel that doesn't come across on their TV show. It is clips and synopsis of a movie followed by 1, maybe 2 minutes of debate and then we need to move onto the next movie coming out this week. Compared to how we watch movie reviews today on CZcams with much longer commentary, it feels lacking. But at the time it was great and there is a reason they went from local PBS to national broadcast. I only bring that up because I feel like the AFI top 100 suffers in a similar way in retrospect. It was simply a different time in how these sorts of TV shows were made.
Just to be clear, I am mainly referring to the broadcast special and how it was made/aired. Not the list itself.
Fair points.
I'm so glad someome made a video about being a teen in the 2010s going through AFI's 100 years and learning about movies. That was my experience as well and it's probably the one film canon list that got me interested in movies most, at a time in my life I needed it. As of today, I have watched every film on both the original and the revised list and am working towards completing their nominees list. I'm at 393/400 from 2007's ballot and am planning on getting to 100% this year. It didn't limit my film canon, it helped me shape my own and I'm still doing it 13 years later. I never saw the broadcast but now I'm curious at seeing it. It looks cringe and uninformative haha. Thank you for your video and your analysis on the poll itself !
393/400 is massively impressive. Kudos.
For Carpenter I think his late recognition is linked to VHS. Teenagers and young adults all over the world during the late 80's and the 90s rented a lot of horror and slasher films. Then there are the directors of the mid and late 90s who talked a lot about him.
The same could apply for David Cronnenberg of and Wes Craven, "The Three C's of Horror".
Genre films like the ones Carpenter made often don’t receive much major critical acclaim until long after their release. The Shining is another example. Despite being directed by the legendary Stanley Kubrick, that film was met with a lot of vitriol from critics and two massively undeserved nominations at the inaugural Razzies for Worst Director (which to be fair, given the way Kubrick treated the cast, maybe he deserved) and Worst Actress for Shelley Duvall (a nomination they actually rescinded some time later). Nowadays it’s considered a classic and one of the greatest movies of all time by many, myself included.
But those are not good films. Except for a few.
@@samuelbarber6177 No.
What was fun about The Manchurian Candidate was that it had been out of release for so many years, and it was a movie that I had heard a lot about but knew nothing about it. So, when they re-released it in the theaters in 1988, the story and performances were still shocking and surprising. It was a thrill to watch a modern audience gasping out loud and at one point even screaming. A few years after seeing it, I met Angela Lansbury, and told her how I knew her from her previous movies, her stage musicals, and then Murder She Wrote, so I wasn't prepared for how frightening I thought she was in The Manchurian Candidate. She smiled and said to me, "You never thought this lovely face could be so evil?"
That feeling of enlightment you got with The Manchurian Candidate reminded me of the first time I saw Duck, You Sucker!, how I was floored by it and shifted my perception of cinema. That's why I still hold that movie so dearly and place it above all of Sergio Leone's movies.
That's awesome. I suspect it's rare for Duck, You Sucker to be anyone's intro to Leone. For me it was second last.
@@EyebrowCinema I did saw Once Upon a Time in the West prior to Duck, You Sucker!, but it didn't hook me at all, likely because I was too young when I saw it with my dad. Same with The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
Great video, as usual. But for Cecil B’s sake did ya have to drop the B word? Couldn’t you have said “older” or “50s generation”? Sorry, it’s just that that word gets tossed around so often that it’s annoying. Also, it’s the favorite word of internet trolling jerks to cheap shot older people who have *Gasp!* opinions more in line with their age group. I mean, your analysis was correct in regards to the people who picked the list, it was thoughtful and well-reasoned. Still, too many people use that word as an ignorant slap down to people who might have a reasonable or thoughtful point like yours, to the point where it’s just nails on a blackboard.
Also, being from Chicago I remember that Richard Roeper of the Sun-Times wrote a column in 1998 criticizing the AFI list, especially for the glaring omissions of black-centered films.
@@AgsmaJustAgsma I hate Westerns and avoid them. Except for Dances with Wolves and Little Big Man.
AFI's 1998 list was not their first list. Their first list was the 1977 AFI top 50 survey of best American Films. There was a CBS television special built around it hosted by Charlton Heston with guests like President Jimmy Carter. The show talked about the top 10 only but the list was 50 movies in all. The list is printed in full in an old movie book Cobbett Steinberg's Reel Facts. It's not surprising no one talks about this list anymore (most of its entries were ported over to the 1998 bigger list anyway) as the AFI seem to have scrubbed all mention of the 1977 list from their history. I made a video briefly talking about it last year.
Can you include a link?
I'll defend the African Queen. When I watched it, the first thing I thought was how charming it was. It's still top tier in the most charming movies of all time.
and so is Gunga Din
@@richierugs6544 The R stands for adventure!
You know, my baby-cinephile first steps began with WatchMojo lists of the greatest movies of each decade when I was 12, so the AFI list is really not the cringiest route for a beginner to choose, lel.
Totally agree with the sentiment that these lists may look "plebeian" to established cinephiles but are great gateways for teens/young adults who are only dipping their toes in the medium.
We all have to start somewhere.
I'm glad I stopped caring for WatchMojo's videos in general after I disagree with a lot of things they said.
@@EyebrowCinemaAgree
@@jesustovar2549 You should have stopped when they made a top 10 school shooters list
If I had to guess, I would say that The African Queen was entered into the list as a way of enshrining James Agee's legacy as an important member of American film. Obviously his tenure as a screenwriter was short, but his span in film criticism was much longer and remains vital, for me, as a guide metric for engaging with film of that time. Not just this, but Agee's legacy post Hollywood has become pronounced in American academics: his novel A Death in the Family was receiving renewed interest at the turn of the century, and his elegiac, experimental account of the South during the depression, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, has only grown in consideration as a foremost work of late American Avant-Garde literature, even though it was left incomplete at Agee's early death. Given the criteria that AFI set out for making the list, The Night of the Hunter wasn't going to pass muster for inclusion if they were working to honour Agee, so I would assume it fell to The African Queen if they were in fact looking to nod to Agee as a figure.
Very good point I hadn't considered.
Should’ve gone with The Night of the Hunter
I don’t get it, so all these movies take place in the same universe?
The list I credit with turning me into a classic film viewer was Leonard Maltin's 100 Must See Movies of the 20th century, which I stumbled across by fluke browsing Filmsite in high school years ago. His list primarily focuses on pre-1970s cinema - which I appreciate because that's the era of movies my generation is never exposed to. In more recent years, the Criterion collection along with Sight And Sound's 250 has been the source that's exposed me to a variety of foreign and indie masterpieces/stuff that normally would be outside my comfort zone.
I’ve had to stop halfway through to tell you that you are a remarkable young man (and I can say that cos you’re younger than me!). What a great clear analytical and thought provoking mind. Thank you for all of this.
One of the most formative gifts I ever received in my life was the AFI Desk Reference book, when I was thirteen. I couldn't have found a more perfect, hand holding gateway into the world of movies and filmmaking. I think that's the best thing that the AFI did for people like me. It's outdated and problematic as hell, but I can't totally spurn it either. It brought me to the dance.
I remember watching Lawrence of Arabia for the first time after watching the 10th anniversary version of the special. The section from the special made it sound like it was just another White Saviour movie with some pretty visuals and great music, which at the time, I wouldn’t have cared as much if it was just that. I remember being blown away by how subversive the real movie is against that exact premise and how ultimately bleak it was, I genuinely don’t know what movie it was talking about, because it wasn’t Lawrence of Arabia!
Hey, this is a really good video. I’m really glad someone I’m subscribed to finally made a video about the AFI Top 100 list, a rather divisive subject for cinephiles. You explain both sides of the argument well, and I’d like to leave some of my thoughts.
* I personally never used the AFI list when I started getting into movies. While there were movies that I understood many consider great, like Citizen Kane and The Godfather, picks like Star Wars and Forrest Gump made me put off the list, because pop culture pushed these movies in my face so much that I resisted just on principle. In retrospect, this was very dumb and just me being a rebellious bugger. Recently, I’ve been watching more of the films on the list for the first time, like the two Godfathers and Sunset Boulevard, and really enjoyed them. Still, the AFI list is kind of mid, being more of a popularity contest of movies.
* As for Rosenbaum’s article, I agree with him more than you do about the list’s value, but I can see where you’re coming from considering your experience with The Manchurian Candidate. Rosenbaum’s article is the first of his I’d ever read and it made me a big fan of his work, so I’m also biased. I would have loved to hear your thoughts on his alternative list. One thing I really like about it is how he seems more concerned with films that tell uniquely American stories or are about uniquely American attitudes, while the AFI’s list has five British productions because they had some American funding. You say that the AFI list being made by men in their 50s explains rather less-than-great choices like The African Queen, but Rosenbaum was in his 50s when he made his list, and some of his picks from the 1950s like Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Kiss Me Deadly and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? are far more analytical of America at that time and are still great watches today.
* Canonizing American films through the lens of gender still remains a problem today, as seen by BBC’s 100 Greatest American Films list in 2015. BBC did a much better job than the AFI, getting critics to make their own choices rather than giving them a pre-ordained list. The actual list isn’t bad, either, with some independent films like Night of the Living Dead and A Woman Under the Influence. The representation of women, though, is very mediocre. Despite there being many great Americans films by women in 20th century (Elaine May’s filmography and Paris Is Burning) as well as 21st (The Hurt Locker and Pariah), there are only two titles with woman directing credits, and even then, there are asterisks. Meshes of the Afternoon is the only short film in a list full of features, and Grey Gardens has two women co-direct with two men. The list is a bit better with non-white directors, with four feature-length films by black men on the list (Killer of Sheep, Do the Right Thing, 25th Hour and 12 Years a Slave). Still, there’s no directors of any other race, and actually, The Birth of a Nation is higher on the BBC list than the AFI list, now at 39 rather than 44. Going back to my original point, this list is still better than the AFI’s, but even with its interesting auteurism picks like The Shanghai Gesture and Marnie, BBC falters in not radically shaking up what many people think as great American cinema. I wish more critics did what Rosenbaum did back in 1998 and make their own 100 best list. That’d be a lot of work, sure, but the results would be far more interesting.
To end this comment, have you ever considered making your own 100 best American films list? If yes, would it look more like the AFI’s list or Rosenbaum’s?
Thanks and have a good day.
Fantastic video essay! Keep up the great work!
You make a great point towards the end of the video about the AFI Top 100 list being a good starting point guide for anyone looking to get into more historic or influential movies. Sometimes it's hard to know where to start with so many old movies available, especially for people who aren't used to quieter black and white movies, but in my experience, you are more willing to check out older or obscure movie choices after getting familiar with the classics listed on the Top 100.
Excellent work, Daniel, thoughtful, wide-ranging and nuanced.
But, but, he used "Cultural Marxism" TM in his talk, so it's bad
the afi lists are the greatest gateway to film ever attempted. it is flawed but it understood it's effort to educate rather than dub
Putting down D.W. Griffith for the subject matter being offensive is the same as banning Adventures of Huck Finn. It can be painful and inappropriate, and a work of genius. Both can be true.
How is a movie that glorifies the KKK genius?
Nothing quite like a new Eyebrow Cinema video :)
In 1998 I was sixteen and the previous Christmas I had watched It's a Wonderful Life (I'd seen parts of it on tv over the years, but never the whole film). I was head over heels for Jimmy Stewart and eager to check out more classic cinema. It was the '90s and I was sixteen, so I didn't think about the actual quality of the broadcast, but I went on a rampage at my local library. Like you, I discovered films I'd never heard of, like The Manchurian Candidate, and it blew me away. I had cable for the first time in my freshman college dorm, and turned TCM on as much as I could without flunking classes or pissing off my roommate too much. Robert Osborne provided a lot of knowledge in those pre-online criticism days. Like you, I've come to the conclusion over the years that canons are useful as introductory stepping stones for those of us who want to dip our toes in the water and don't know where to start. They should never be treated as gospel. I discovered Sight and Sound only in the social media days, largely because of how much I enjoyed going through the AFI list. I still seek out a variety of lists of movies and books, just to see what shows up on most them. Because let's be honest, I don't have time to wade through 700 films to find the best B-tier noirs.
The 10 year anniversary update seems largely driven by criticisms, but they did make some good choices switching out Guess Who's Coming for In the Heat of the Night, taking out Birth of a Nation, and including Do the Right Thing. But leaving off The Third Man?! Come on!
I think The Third Man, Lawrence of Arabia, and possibly others were cut because the British Film Institute raised a stink about those films being more British than American. BFI would put Third Man at the top on their own list later.
Seeing the cut between Zach Efron's HSM3 speech and the mom from the Jazz Singer was hilarious.
Greatest thing the AFI ever did was give David Lynch funding to start filming Eraserhead. Back in the day, they had money and would give talent a chance. Today they have to pimp the same old films over and over to make a buck. So I guess the moral of the story is: if you wanna work for the AFI (or in film preservation, or whatever) get a degree in fundraising, not film.
this is a really good video. Nice job! I have subscribed.
Another fantastic Video Sir! Great thoughts. And I do feel you!
me and the spouse just rented Manchurian Candidate tonight on the strength of your recommendation. And...it was really good, thanks
My “Manchurian Candidate” is Reservoir Dogs, the way it captivated me, made me think about what movies could be in a new way, and started my journey into other forms of cinema.
My "Manchurian Candidate" was A Clockwork Orange, I already watched european movies in "Eurochannel" and they came up with a documentary series about how it was made, from then I searched clips and then the whole film, it really changed how I viewed movies up to that point, I wasn't at the right age (I was 11 or 12), it had disturbing images that I wasn't supossed to like, but it kept me going on, it also lead me to read the book, then I wanted to research for more Stanley Kubrick and more "classic cult films", to read some of the books which he adapted (and to read more books), I wanted to search for more theories, analysis, symbolism in videos like Rob Ager, d'you know that guy? Also the film started my love for Malcolm McDowell, I wanted to search more films and series in which he was (including Phineas & Ferb and Bolt to my surprise) to the point that now I'm following him in Instagram. Here I am, a young cinephile (I'm 20 years old).
Love all your videos. One point: John Carpenter is an Academy Award winner- best short for “The Resurrection of Bronco Billy”
Wonderful video as always Dan! I value the AFI list because it's one of the main ways I've connected with my grandmother. We've had countless conversations over the years about the movies on that list, she was the person who first showed me Citizen Kane and Singin' in the Rain, and without that connection and her fostering my interest in classic cinema I don't know if I'd even be watching this video in the first place. (her favorite on the list iirc is The Third Man)
Your anecdote and experience with the Manchurian Candidate made me nostalgic for the time when I really got into movies in my teens. My college library had a huge selection of classic movies and it’s where the journey started- Movies like M, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and Some like it Hot, had much of the same impact for me. I also saw Manchurian Candidate around this time and remember that same profound feeling while watching it… like this is a DAMN good movie. Great work on this video and wonderful analysis of the culture of the film industry. 👏🏻
I've never actually looked at the AFI's Top 100 Movies list before. I did, however, grow up with Turner Classic Movies and my mother's extensive DVD/VHS collection of classic films, which stoked my passion for movies like you wouldn't believe. I can't remember when that moment of enlightenment you talk about happened for me since it happened when I maybe five or six, but if I had to hazard a guess it's a four-way split between Captain Blood, The Quiet Man, Jaws, or Das Boot.
Also, the first time I saw The Manchurian Candidate was in a theater in film school. It is an incredible theatrical experience.
The Manchurian Candidate it's so good that an episode from Gravity Falls was named in it's honour, "The Stanchurian Candidate".
Really thoughtful well done video. Good job.
Just wanted to correct a brief mistake in your video: Sight & Sound actually DID honor John Carpenter in their top 250 list with The Thing
Amazing video, great job! I can relate especially to the part about how canonization distanced Citizen Kane from the public: my semiotics professor at college showed the movie to our class, I was ready to be bored to death but instead I was surprised by how interesting, modern and dinamic the movie actually is!
This was a brilliant history lesson, thought piece, review and analysis. Great job 👏🏾 thank you ☺️
Masterful job as always
I wish the film had mentioned Charles Laughton movies, the Hunchback of Notre Dame (the best of the lot by far), Rembrandt, Hobson's Choice, Ruggles of Red Gap, one of the best comedies, Witness for the Prosecution. Night of the Hunter was mentioned but its director, Laughton was left out. We got a glimpse of Mutiny on the Bounty with Clark Gable, not Laughton who dominated every scene he was in. He's considered by many to be one of the greatest of actors. He's rather forgotten these days, inexplicably. He's so much better than the pretty boys.
Night of the Hunter was a minor masterpiece that the critics of the time just didn’t understand-it was pilloried. I think Laughton intended it as a modern fable. That lyrical, beautiful escape the children make on the river at night-
These lists have a definite domino effect.
First you watch one filmmaker’s “masterpiece”, then you watch their early stuff, then you watch a documentary or hear them talk about their influences
Then you watch their influencer’s favorites, and suddenly you’re watching ‘Das Boot’ followed by ‘The Cook, The Theif, The Wife and Her Lover’
The beauty of cinema is they never stop making dominoes!
What about...? Why the metric system? 100 movies. Why not best 127 movies or 211 best movies??
I was 14 when the 98 list came out and it was a major gateway for me into film canon. I still slightly prefer the original list to the 10th anniversary list while acknowledging that both lists have their problems. Loved the analysis and love the Manchurian Candidate!
The AFI is entirely invalid. The absence of 1959's Teenage Zombies, director Jerry Warren's existential dive into five teens and their search for their boat, is simply criminal.
I always wanted to watch the old and updated lists and created a book based on facts and behind the scenes. That idea was long ago. But glad someone has an interest in it.
The first list came out in 1998, 2nd in 2007. It was a missed opportunity for AFI to revise it in 2017 to continue that 10 year cycle.
I’m currently 17 and I’ve never actually looked at lists like the AFI top 100 too closely. Most of the great movies I’ve known have generally come from the film’s own reputation (or that of its director/star). And now I want to focus on expanding my horizons (ie, with more Golden Age/Silent or foreign films and films directed by a more diverse range of filmmakers).
I should also reference the CNN Documentary that I watched before I really started on my journey which provided a great, if very brief, overview of over a century of American cinema from the 20s to the modern era, a documentary which I personally love for being so special to me, though I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who was already well versed in American cinema. It serves as a fantastic introduction to various eras of American cinema but not as great analysis. That’s where I think these so-called canons work. Jumping off points for individuals to explore and discover at their leisure. Finding films in the canon that they like, and then going from there. Maybe they like a Frank Sinatra performance or a Martin Scorsese picture so they explore those filmographies. Or they fall in love with a genre like horror or era such as the Silent era or even cultures like the filmographies of Europe or Asia, and explore those. This is why I try to have a wide range of films in any of my own “Best Movies” lists.
However, this does make me think of Eureka’s great blu-ray series “The Masters of Cinema” of which I own two, Nosferatu and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.
These lists have a definite domino effect
You watch one movie by a filmmaker, then you check out more of their movies, then you listen to an interview or watch a documentary, then they list their influences and suddenly you’re watching ‘Metropolis’ by Fritz Lang followed by’Duck Soup’ with the Marx Brothers
The beauty of cinema is that there’s always more dominoes!
What a spectacular video. I still have print ups of AFI, Filmsite, IMDb that I started checking off 15 years ago when I started film journey
But i'm glad that as a teenager you gave an older movie a chance and really enjoyed it, and it opened up your view of cinema. Most teens i know have no passion for film culture and couldn't care less about movies. If more teens would just open themselves up to movies and film experiences and gain more of a knowledge and understanding of film, then this world would indeed be a better place. Film knowledge is an undervalued skill which more people need to develop and use efficiently. I hope you have bright future of film ahead of you!
I got into film in the late 90s and the original AFI list was a jumping off point for me and many of my peers. Yeah, it's not the best, but you gotta start somewhere.
The slow canonization of John Carpenter fascinates me because I feel like I saw it happen in real time. When I saw the films in the late 90s and early 2000s he was still working. The DVD release of Big Trouble in Little China was in 2001 and was not an especially well marketed event, but I still left a hotel in Boston and walked 35 minutes to a Borders to buy it on vacation. When I got to film school in 2004/5 and everyone began comparing DVD collections it turns out we all owned and loved every Carpenter film.
The pivotal moment in my memory was when the head of my film department (UCF) stood in front of the whole film school and casually mentioned that the Hawks version of The Thing was superior; we all simultaneously and spontaneously booed. The man was shocked and it felt like we had just blown over the Berlin Wall.
Almost, eerily similar to my experience in exploring classic movies, the AFI 100 came out the summer after my freshman year of high school. I'd probably seen less than 10 of them, but the first movie from the list that fully made me think there's something to these old movies - The Manchurian Candidate. I watched it at my grandmother's house on AMC (way back when they were a rival to TCM) and it remains a touchstone to that younger me. I could not agree more with your assessment of the list nowadays; and with the deluge of lists that came after, the Criterion Collection and also the influence of Roger Ebert and his list of Great Movies that helped expand my horizons. I've yet to fall down the rabbit hole of experimental cinema, it still gives me some pause, though I still (at age 41) hope to grow into it. The AFI list by any measurement is put mildly, quaint, yet it did introduce me to many of my favorite films. All that said, thank you for making this, it reminded me of the kid I was that thought that that list was the be all end all of movies and how small my movie world was back then and how much it has changed in a quarter of a century and how much it still has to expand.
Thanks so much for this! You’re honestly my favorite film CZcamsr! I appreciate the work you do!!
Brilliant editing
First AFI list I saw was the Heroes and Villains special in 2003... I would eagerly wait for the next special every year. I even still have the original 100 Movies VHS tape and the 50 Stars DVD I used to watch and rewatch constantly. I wish AFI would put its other specials on VHS or DVD - they keep copyright striking anyone who uploads them but what's even the point if they're not going to release it themselves?
This list was an absolute first guide for me when I decided I wanted to watch "old movies." Remember, when this list came out, streaming wasn't a thing and you basically might have a wall of these types of movies and you had no idea. But this give you a place to start. And, frankly, knowing that there was controversy behind which ones made it and which ones didn't, 1) let you as a viewer not like some things, and 2) opened you up to those "snubs" as your next steps. I'm so glad this list exists, but, yeah, knowing the flaws also is a gift.
As a current 16 year old, I haven’t really used the AFI list. Like, I’ve known about it of course, but I haven’t dived deep into it. Not because I didn’t like it, but just because the IMDb and Letterboxd top 250s have been more accessible to me. I should go through it soon.
But more importantly this just reminded me of the Criterion Blu-ray of The Manchurian Candidate that I bought last July that I still haven’t watched… should probably get around to that
Hope you enjoy it!!
I love that the movie is equal parts hysteria and out and out comedy: One character bleeds milk!
I was 15 when the original AFI top 100 list came out. While I did watch older movies occasionally, I didn't recognize most of the entries. A newspaper article reviewing the list and a British version of the TV special (which was more thorough than the American one), helped me to understand why those movies were chosen. 26 years later, I've seen all but four movies from the first list.
Fantastic video as always. When a new Eyebrow Cinema video drops, I look for the first chance I get to watch it.
I came to basically the same conclusion about canons. I think it's fine that a more populist and mainstream lists like AFI exists for the reasons you listed. There's also the Tarantino canon which mixes mainstream blockbusters, acclaimed classics and exploitation, Japanese bloodbaths and pink films, Chinese fantasy films, italian giallo, considering these films and styles just as important as the serious dramatic fare which is reflected in his style too. This earned him criticism from Paul Schrader: "There is a modern myth that you can be elitist and a common man at the same time. You can thank Quentin Tarantino for that. He'd say Killer Car Girls is the one of the great films. But Killer Car Girls is not one of the great. No matter how many times Quentin says stuff like that, it still doesn't make it true." Which I heavily disagree with, a film can be important and break cinematic ground regardless of its subject matter and marketing aspirations.
Recently I was asked by a friend to give him a sort of a shortlist of films that could be considered part of the canon as he wanted to expand his familiarity with cinema. I made a list of 67 films, accounting for my knowledge of his taste and personality. Like most non cinephiles today, he has a big aversion towards black and white films and has never seen one through to the end, so those are in the minority. This list includes Top Gun(THE ORIGINAL) for its cultural and stylistic importance and representing a certain type and era of movie, while also being just plain fun. There is not a single western on the list because he just plain hates westerns. But I still took care to have a lot of diveristy so that he can expose himself to new things and expand his taste. When he watched Basic Instinct, an acclaimed and interesting but still not an extremely obvious film for such a list totally blew him away and now he's eager to watch more Veerhoven, and that felt super super gratifying.
Eyebrow Cinema.. You are a contender!
I remember that spectacular cinematography near the end of Citizen Kane in which the camera moves continuously through a gigantic warehouse of Kane's possessions that just goes on and on and on and ON!! That was pretty impressive considering when that film was made.
You can certainly appreciate Streetcar without knowing its historical importance but knowing the context certainly helps explain some of its peculiarities.
On the other hand I‘m totally with you on Aftican Queen. Same goes for fucking Giant.
Giant sucks. So bad.
I'm glad that they made the list, even though I disagree with at least 50% of it. It gave me a reference list to explore some films I would never have watched.
Gate of Hell shout-out! An underappreciated classic.
My Personal Top 5
1. Apocalypse Now (1979) Coppola
2. Goodfellas (1990) Scorsese
3. Dog Day Afternoon (1975) Lumet
4. The Shining (1980) Kubrick
5. Mauvais Sang (1986) Carax
If they did the AFI list again today. And they should do another big network television special again like they did in the ‘90s and 2000s to remind people about all the movies they may have forgotten. I do think part of why movies don’t do as well anymore, is people aren’t reminded of them like they once were. The first two were just a decade part, but now it’s been 15 years. In the 1990s and 2000s the AFI list kind of came off as marketing gimmicks, but the way movies are in now such marketing gimmicks would actually come off as admirable. Movies could use something big to sell ones that aren’t brand new now, they definitely need it more than in the ‘90s and 2000s, which much of what’s on the list was mainstream movie pop culture stuff that you could just happen upon because it was still playing on television.
If it was done now, my guess would be the Kubrick picks change. Four Kubrick films, and one is Dr. Strangelove, a comedy that isn’t all that funny, is insane. There’d be a more Coppola. Don Siegel would probably enter the list. Pop Spielberg would go above Serious Spielberg. All these years out, I don’t think people are still pretending Schindler's List is better than Jaws. There’d probably be more Tarantino, and Paul Thomas Anderson would be on the list. I’d also imagine Brian De Palma would enter the list, and so would David Fincher. I think the Altman picks that are there would get knocked out (MASH is probably there more for the show than the movie, and the show doesn’t hold the same pop culture place it did in the ‘90s when you could still find it playing on prime network TV, [even thought it ended in the ‘80s] or in the 2000s) but McCabe & Mrs. Miller would probably be added. There’d definitely be more genre movies. Psycho is there but no Alien, The Shining, Exorcist, or Texas Chainsaw Massacre? Most everything that got added in 2007 but was low on the list is probably gone from the list. Forrest Gump probably goes away. Ben-Hur probably goes away. Stagecoach maybe comes back and The Grapes of Wrath goes away, even though Grapes was really high on both previous list.
African Queen making 17th and even 65th is hilarious. I am not easily put off by racism or bad effects in old movies, so that didn't even matter much to me despite noticing it, but the film just wasn't really that good? Especially considering the expectations I had going in. They had chemistry but the film fumbled through the plot that should've had a stronger emphasis on its location rather than simply a backdrop. I don't particularly care for the criticism of colonialism, though I agree with much of it.
You really inspired me to go watch "The Manchurian Candidate".
It's a pretty mediocre film. I honestly think the reason it gets so much respect is because it has two of the greatest American actors of the 20th century.
John Huston made much better flicks.
Really enjoyed this! I'm currently making a video about the AFI top 100 (07) which I went through a few years ago. I'll be sure to link to this one. Curious if you saw CNN's The Movies series? It felt like a similar type of program. Mostly focusing on American Hollywood big budget movies but did at least highlight female filmmakers, films by people of color. It was five or so episodes so it had a lot more room to breathe.
I saw CNN’s The Movies (in its UK form so it was 12 episodes with 2 per decade) and its one of my favourite documentaries just for how special to me it is in getting me into different eras and styles of film and it’s probably best watched in that context as someone only just getting into film
I think looking at the list as a flawed spring board to a deeper film journey and love is a balanced take.
I personally have no problem with a historical recognition of problematic works. The main reason is that they were products of their time, just as we are products of our time. It seems condescending to say that contemporary audiences need to be told that works made in the past may not conform to present-day values. Or worse, that because they don't adhere to present day values that their role in cinema history should be minimised or even excluded.
American Cinema even has its own cautionary tale for this: the adoption of the Hays code. The notion that audiences were too stupid to understand the difference between what's on screen and what's moral led to a narrowing of what was acceptable to see on screen. It took decades to unwind its malignant influence, even after it was formally abandoned it still had sway over movie content. Even today, remnants of that censorious intent can be found in criticisms of movies like The Wolf of Wall Street, where audiences are taken to be simply too dumb to realise that Jordan Belfort isn't someone to be emulated.
So I don't really fault the AFI for including problematic works. Given D.W. Griffith's importance to cinema, it would be remiss of the AFI to exclude his works for failing to meet today's moral norms. It would also be insulting to audiences to say that they can't distinguish between Griffith's expressed views and what's right, that either they need to be told that it's a product of its time or saved from seeing it because its content is morally unacceptable.
That’s all true, but surely the AFI should still acknowledge when a film they’ve inducted into the list does have such troublesome qualities? After all, The Birth Of A Nation is effectively neo-Confederate propaganda, which caused a resurgence in the then-dormant KKK after its release. And this even caused much controversy when it was released, let alone over a century on. I feel if the AFI is going to honour such a film, not just by acknowledging its existence and innovation, but also by naming it one of the top 100 greatest films ever made in the USA, then surely they should also discuss or at least mention the more problematic messages of the picture.
@@samuelbarber6177 I really wonder whether it needs to. Let's take another example from the list Billy Wilder's sublime Some Like it Hot (#14). There's a certain section of the population who find cross-dressing problematic, not to mention the film's homoerotic subtext. For some people, it's promoting something gravely immoral. Should the AFI put a warning on that film to appease the moralists among us who feel homosexuality is a moral evil and defined gender roles ought to be fixed?
I would worry about the precedent when contentious works need a disclaimer because it depends on who the disclaimer is for. As a film institute, it's not really the AFI's role to adjudicate on moral disputes, but about explaining the importance and impact of the films in question. I imagine you know where you stand on the issues that The Birth of a Nation brings up. Do you really need the AFI telling you about its moral failings when I'm guessing you know how the film fails in that regard already? Or do you worry that there's someone without your moral scruples who may come across this film and would be susceptible to the film's racist message if not for a warning that would keep them thinking right about race?
The original airing of this list was 3 hours long, subtract commercials, and it was about 150 minutes long. They had 100 movies to get through, so there was no time for subtle nuanced takes on these films. The program was there to talk about these classic films, did you really expect them to talk about the questionable parts of “The Jazz Singer” in the 90 they had to talk about it? Or delve deep into the symbolism of King Kong?
Also I remember the original airing of the program in 1998 and there was a big backlash that there were no films made by women or people of color, so your assertion that people back then just assumed while males made better movies is incorrect. I recall reading about the list in a New York paper the next day (which printed the whole list, which provided me my Blockbuster VHS rental choices for the next year) and a woman film critic wrote an op-ed blasting the whiteness and maleness.
Of course popular films had to be on the list. Why make a list of obscure Avant Garde underground films that hardly anyone knows? That would be absurd.
If they're good and should be known..
Hey there Eyebrow. Love you work and frequently share your video about the 007 film OHMSS.
I had a question about another canon. The BFI top films of all time. We use that as a guide of sorts in my weekly film society.
Had to stop 30 seconds in when you started to talk about The Manchurian Candidate in high regard after saying you were hesitant to watch it. I just watched it. Holy shit dude
I get criticism of the AFI for reaffirming what we already acknowledge but when you consider the criteria, I get it. From my experience, you start by looking at the ‘greatest’ and expand your watch lists from there. It is down to the viewer to find films and it is not like this information is not available on the internet
Side note: Manchurian Candidate was also one of my early classic films. Unlike you however, it was the synopsis that drew me in!
I like the schmaltz...
Although now that you are describing it, I guess I don't actually remember it much
It's not a bad starting point for the novice youth beginning to stoke a passion for art. But as a Cinefiend, it'd be nearly impossible for me to definitively distill down 100 American films as the essentially fundamental feature length narrative examples of cinema at its highest worth of recommendation. Because my list would probably tend to fluctuate in titles and position on a daily basis - depending on what is resonating with me in my life at the moment. There'd be some crossover of course, but my mercurial lists would likely never shift into being confused with the AFI's value assessments - and certainly not the Academy's (a politically charged quasi esoteric cliquishly sycophantic charade that I conclude stumble into incidentally rewarding correctly about 15% of the time), for that matter either.
Also, your TDS is soooo 2019. Get a grip on reality already, buddy boy.
My AFI Top 100 was a puff piece documentary called "That’s Entertainment", made by MGM in the 70s, about the history of the studio, especially its movie musicals. I checked out a lot of movies from the library because of that movie, and it introduced me to an Era of filmmaking and a bunch of performers I wouldn't have otherwise. It got me to like old movies, so I have always been more receptive to old movies. And that was a real gift. Black and White was never a stumbling block. Plus, I had a good library and a video store with a phenomenal classics selection. I do get really sad that streaming has such limited classic options. My kids have maybe watched one Black and White movie. I want to give them that gift of liking old things, but it's a lot harder to access these days.
Interesting. I see that doc pop up every so often on TCM. Maybe next time I'll give it a look, even if just for a bit.
@EyebrowCinema It's very fluffy, an attempt by the studio to leave a rosy image. But for a cursory look at the history and standouts of the movie musical, it wasn't a bad place for an 9-year-old movie lover to start.
I'd pair it with the mini-series "When the Lion Roars" for a more well-rounded view.
What bothers me is that they haven't updated since 2007. You'd think they'd this every 10 years like Sight & Sound does but they don't. Plus, it's only American movies, so the likes of Tarkovsky, Kurosawa, Bergman, Fellini, etc. won;'t be there.
The “this is definitively the best” shows up in all sorts of genres or categories (Citizen Kane in movies, Jimi Hendrix in guitarists, Ric Flair as wrestlers, etc) so much that I think it’s a lot more illuminating to see what someone’s second pick is. Or if they say “normally people will say X is the best, but I think it’s Y” rather than just going off the consensus.
I honestly think the AFI lists would benefit if they were to update each of them every 10 years just like with Sight & Sound, especially the big one.
as an elder millenial i was a little worried at the start here, but i'm so glad you dug into this list with the sociopolitical context(s) it deserves. one thing that i think you skirted around: The Monoculture. pre-2005, we were all given the illusion of choice because marketers, newspapers and corpos were able to work together and tell us that these films, these singers, these shows were the things to care about. the developments of the Internet post-Napster started breaking those barriers down. So AFI's list, at its release, was treated as not just A List, but The List, The Most Important And Relevant List, by AFI and its partners. and if you didn't subscribe to the monocultural idea that Yes, This List Is The Most Important And Relevant, well you were a jaywalking punk anarchist that needed immediate correction by state forces. you were on the subconscious level branded a deviant by your peers and it had the potential to affect your life and career. i'm glad the American Monoculture fell because holy crap is Friends, baseball and apple pie boring as all hell.
Great video ❤👍
I adore your videos, as a music and movie fan I´m in contact with those cannons a lot, and it´s a fault of mine to forcefully agree with them sometimes, that may have something to do with how I started my music and movie journeys, Queen and the MCU, allthought know I´m more comfortable with saying Queen has some of the best albums of the 70´s and I´m yet to revisit the MCU, am sure my opinion of it will change but I´ll be sure to not make the revisit just a reassurance to myselft and to others that "look guys, I´m not just a stupid comic book movie fan, I like silent movies and Kubrick, I have to have confidence in my movie apreciating and critiquing skils i´ve adquire trought watching the cannon, if I don´t like a classic movie it´s not because i´m a "bad movie fan" it´s just my taste, and so I have to thank you for making this video and making me reflect once more on this issue. Thank you!
When AFI renewed this in the 2010s I think it was, I was seriously underwhelmed by its pomp and superficiality and made my own list (and I'm not a list maker in terms of bests as in film No. 1 is better than film No. 2. I simply listed them chronologically by year of release to avoid that weighing of merit that my No. 100 is not as good as my No. 1) I think I agreed with around 30 or 40 of their choices, but the rest I chose I found artistically significant rather than merely popular although some I chose were certainly both. Anyway, great video essay. Much appreciated.