The Lists Project

[domino harvey]

Westerns are next, and we can follow that with horror if that's where the tide is going. After that, I'd in no order like us to do musicals and war films if there's interest. Other genre suggestions are of course encouraged

[tojoed]

I suppose "comedy" is such a personal thing, but do you think it would be worth a go?

[antnield]

A documentary project should provoke some interesting discussion - and an interesting outcome. I really couldn't imagine what the Top 10 would be, whereas I'm sure many could wager on how the top of most genre lists would generally turn out.

[Matt]

I'm very much up for musicals. Comedy, just in general, might be too broad. Suppose we limited ourselves to "romantic comedy," which would incorporate most screwball films, pretty much all Lubitsch, and more. Granted, just about everything from the last thirty years to which that label has been applied makes everyone here gag, but it encompasses a lot of great cinema. Action/adventure films would be fun, as would sci-fi. Both of those would bring out tastes of forum members we rarely see expressed. Something else that might appeal--and would be just as contentious as defining noir--is camp films. Or another way of framing that could be "so bad they're great" films.

It could be interesting to alternate "light" genres with "heavy" genres. I think after noir, Westerns, and horror, I'm going to need to be put on meds just to get out of bed in the morning.

[Lemmy Caution]

A documentary project should provoke some interesting discussion - and an interesting outcome. I really couldn't imagine what the Top 10 would be, whereas I'm sure many could wager on how the top of most genre lists would generally turn out.

Ooooh, seconded!

[knives]

I'm very much up for musicals. Comedy, just in general, might be too broad. Suppose we limited ourselves to "romantic comedy," which would incorporate most screwball films, pretty much all Lubitsch, and more. Granted, just about everything from the last thirty years to which that label has been applied makes everyone here gag, but it encompasses a lot of great cinema. Action/adventure films would be fun, as would sci-fi. Both of those would bring out tastes of forum members we rarely see expressed. Something else that might appeal--and would be just as contentious as defining noir--is camp films. Or another way of framing that could be "so bad they're great" films.

I really like the idea of splitting the broad genres. In a way we're already doing that by having a separate noir list. If we do go down this path I think splitting horror between supernatural and psychological would be best. While not as broad as comedy there are a lot of fish in that sea.
Also Action and adventure films I feel should be separate as should ramance from comedy, maybe different romatic-comedy and romantic-drama list. There really are a hundred ways to slice comedy though. Maybe romcoms, satire, and the absurd. Not sure where to put or describe the talky sort of comedy that's become popular now-a-days.

[domino harvey]

I think that's all getting a bit carried away...

[Matt]

I think that's all getting a bit carried away...

Which part? I have been restraining myself from suggesting limiting horror to gothic horror, at least for the first list, but that's mainly because I don't want to have to watch a bunch of Fulci nonsense.

[Yojimbo]

Westerns are next, and we can follow that with horror if that's where the tide is going. After that, I'd in no order like us to do musicals and war films if there's interest. Other genre suggestions are of course encouraged

hmm, Westerns

'Treasure of the Sierra Madre', oui ou non?
'Lonely Are The Brave', oui ou non?

speaking of war films, its only since purchasing a DVD player, only about 5 or 6 years ago, now, that I've come to appreciate just how many great war films there are out there

[Yojimbo]

I'm very much up for musicals. Comedy, just in general, might be too broad. Suppose we limited ourselves to "romantic comedy," which would incorporate most screwball films, pretty much all Lubitsch, and more. Granted, just about everything from the last thirty years to which that label has been applied makes everyone here gag, but it encompasses a lot of great cinema. Action/adventure films would be fun, as would sci-fi. Both of those would bring out tastes of forum members we rarely see expressed. Something else that might appeal--and would be just as contentious as defining noir--is camp films. Or another way of framing that could be "so bad they're great" films.

I really like the idea of splitting the broad genres. In a way we're already doing that by having a separate noir list. If we do go down this path I think splitting horror between supernatural and psychological would be best. While not as broad as comedy there are a lot of fish in that sea.
Also Action and adventure films I feel should be separate as should ramance from comedy, maybe different romatic-comedy and romantic-drama list. There really are a hundred ways to slice comedy though. Maybe romcoms, satire, and the absurd. Not sure where to put or describe the talky sort of comedy that's become popular now-a-days.

where to put the great Fred and Ginger films?
because the comedic aspects, especially their superb cast of character actor support, contributes greatly to their greatness, for me

[domino harvey]

I think that's all getting a bit carried away...

Which part? I have been restraining myself from suggesting limiting horror to gothic horror, at least for the first list, but that's mainly because I don't want to have to watch a bunch of Fulci nonsense.

Isn't horror just as subjective as noir? Limiting the scope at the outset makes for limited variations and surprises to my eyes-- aren't individual interpretations of the term part of the interest? Also, if we divide genres so specific like this, I think the genre project will fizzle out and die an early death. I know you're a librarian, but I think the widest we can make each genre while still being inclusive, the better. But whatever way it comes down, we won't have to worry about this for almost a year, given that the third genre, be it horror (whatever incarnation) or whatever comes after westerns, is still a while away...

[zedz]

Also, I've never bothered to figure out whether or not a given horror film is 'psychological' or 'supernatural' and I don't want to have to start now. What the hell would you do with The Innocents?

[Yojimbo]

Also, I've never bothered to figure out whether or not a given horror film is 'psychological' or 'supernatural' and I don't want to have to start now. What the hell would you do with The Innocents?

well, unless you believe in 'ghosts', what supernatural horror film isn't, in effect, psychological?

[Mr Sausage]

Also, I've never bothered to figure out whether or not a given horror film is 'psychological' or 'supernatural' and I don't want to have to start now. What the hell would you do with The Innocents?

well, unless you believe in 'ghosts', what supernatural horror film isn't, in effect, psychological?

Except what we believe of our world is irrelevant next to what a movie takes as true for its world.

[Yojimbo]

Also, I've never bothered to figure out whether or not a given horror film is 'psychological' or 'supernatural' and I don't want to have to start now. What the hell would you do with The Innocents?

well, unless you believe in 'ghosts', what supernatural horror film isn't, in effect, psychological?

Except what we believe of our world is irrelevant next to what a movie takes as true for its world.

Just put it all down to psychology

[colinr0380]

And unfortunately for Matt limiting to 'gothic' horror would not mean an escape from Lucio Fulci since The House By The Cemetery, for all its gore, is as gothic as they come - creaky old houses, bat attacks, ghosts, psychic links between children, creepy photographs etc (the recent, bizarrely awful Amityville Horror remake appears to have stolen a lot of material from this film).

And if we broke horror up into its component parts where would we classify the utterly lunatic Naked Werewolf Woman, which begins as a Hammer film period piece full of torch wielding villagers and Witchfinder General-esque werewolf woman burnings, turns into a modern day country house/lesbian bedroom farce mystery, swerves off into Exorcist/lunatic asylum territory, does a bit of rape/revenge stuff and then burns itself out in a blaze of glory with a gunfight sequence in a spaghetti western town?

[Matt]

I really wasn't serious about subdividing horror, which is why I never actually suggested it. I was serious about having a comedy list limited to romantic comedies, though. And that's why I asked domino to clarify what part of knives' post on the last page was objectionable. Yes, horror is probably too difficult to subdivide, but comedy is such a large genre and so subjective (would we get any kind of consensus?) that limiting a first comedy list to romantic comedy seems reasonable. But yeah, we don't have to worry about this now. Shouldn't we all be watching noirs right now?

And to answer Yojimbo's question about the Fred & Ginger films, I don't think a film's appearance on one list should preclude its inclusion on another. Could you imagine putting Top Hat on a romantic comedy list but excluding it from a musicals list with those great Irving Berlin songs? Or vice-versa?

And domino, I'll let that "I know you're a librarian" comment slide because I'm sure you didn't mean it as an insult, but not all librarians (not even most) want obsessively and narrowly to categorize everything. In fact, the popular DVD collection at my library is shelved strictly alphabetically by title, with not even a division between documentary and feature films.

[Zazou dans le Metro]

Me, I'm keeping to the decades lists. It's safer there..... or maybe there's some ontological rumblings gonna start over there too. Or should that be phenomenological or just old fashioned empirical with a dash of existentialism? Will the clock strike at midnight on December 31st 1929 or will we be locked in some Althusserian netherworld of ideological mayhem. Where's Sausage with his Webster's when you need him.

[colinr0380]

Don't worry Matt - and Naked Werewolf Woman is a complete anomaly anyway (I just thought of it since both that and House By The Cemetery feature Dagmar Lassander. She does look particularly striking in the Werewolf Woman film, but there is the drawback that she turns into a furry, buxom teddy bear at a couple of points!)

...not all librarians (not even most) want obsessively and narrowly to categorize everything. In fact, the popular DVD collection at my library is shelved strictly alphabetically by title, with not even a division between documentary and feature films.

These days I don't think even filmmakers have a distinction between documentary and fiction films!

From my limited librarian experience discussions mostly seemed to be about funds for material specifically related to courses and managing shelf space rather than arguments about how to order the work on their shelves, which had usually been set in stone for a long time and mostly dictated by the space available and shape of the building!

[domino harvey]

RE: Matt, my objection was to the subdivision of horror, much for the same reasons I don't want to get involved in the "What is noir debates" anymore than I want to participate in a Roman Polanski morality thread. Doing a romantic comedy genre and then that's it, as in we don't intend to revisit the comedy well, sounds fine to me. If it was to be one in an envisioned six part comedy genre series: vom. It does seem that there would be a lot of overlap between it and the musicals list, though...

[knives]

The less critically welcomed, but potentially just as fun slapstick (or some other comedy thing) than to avoid as much overlapping? Anyways, Romance at large probably deserves its own thing. Maybe or pick from the drama section, which would nicely cause us to avoid biopics.

[domino harvey]

I like that, just "Romance"

[reno dakota]

In fact, the popular DVD collection at my library is shelved strictly alphabetically by title, with not even a division between documentary and feature films.

How is the unpopular DVD collection shelved? ( . . . sorry, I couldn't resist )

[Matt]

Romance at large probably deserves its own thing.

I like that, just "Romance"

And at this development, I regret ever putting fingertips to keyboard on the subject of subdividing.

Reno, our nonfiction films on Vietnam atrocities, female circumcision, and sexual harassment training, as well as all silent films, nature programs that aren't Life or Planet Earth, and Otto Preminger movies are all shelved behind the circulation desk in Library of Congress call number order.

[puxzkkx]

Performances lists - would those be something the forum would be interested in?