A “15 most influential films of all time” list criticised

The US magazine Vanity Fair has come up with its own list in protest against one put out by Turner Classic Movies just before the 2009 Oscar awards. 

Here’s the TCM list:

The Birth of a Nation (1915)
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Metropolis (1927)
42nd Street (1933)

It Happened One Night (1934)
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Gone with the Wind (1939)
Stagecoach (1939)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Bicycle Thieves (1947)
Rashomon (1950)
The Searchers (1956)
Breathless (1959)
Psycho (1960)

Star Wars (1977)

Journalist Bruce Handy notes that the most recent “influential” film in the list was made 32 years ago and that since then the American cinema has become overcautious, inward-looking, influenced only by itself and that the list doesn’t take this into account.

He excludes his own big favourites (such as GoodFellas, The Road Warrior, Manhattan, Rushmore and There Will Be Blood), admitting that “great films” aren’t necessarily influential, and presents an alternative list with many surprises:

Halloween (1978)

Animal House (1978)
Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)
Blade Runner (1982)
She’s Gotta Have It (1986)
Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989) 

Pretty Woman (1990)

Once Upon a Time in China (1991) 

Jurassic Park (1993)

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Toy Story (1995)

The Sopranos (1999) (TV)
Magnolia (1999)

Being John Malkovich (1999)

The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005)

Some of these choices seem provocative but they’re not.  Handy energetically justifies each with intelligence, knowledge and perspective.  What do you think?

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22/04/09

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