The Lists Project

[colinr0380]

I'm not sure whether it would make it into the list but I particularly remember liking that episode of the 80s Twilight Zone,Gramma.

[zedz]

I'm with Sausage - there's way too much eligible already without including TV series, so I don't really see the point. (Though in relation to individual TV productions, La Cabina will definitely be on my list - unless it's ruled ineligible for some reason).

With episodes of portmanteau films, these were eligible in their own right for the main list project. I can see there are grounds for a different argument with regards to horror, however, since anthology films are really part and parcel of the genre, rather than an outskirt freak, and a large number of them are put together by a single creative team.

To put the issue in stark relief, just think about how many horror anthology films make perfect sense in a 'best of' list - Dead of Night, Black Sabbath, Asylum, for starters - whereas in a largely auteurist general 'best of' list, are there any non-horror portmanteau films which are good end-to-end?

Maybe a director-based rule makes the most sense - anthologies with a single director are single films (I mean, nobody would dream of splitting up Kwaidan for voting purposes, would they?), multi-director portmanteaus are splittable. But then there's Dead of Night. Oh dear, I don't know. (How dare somebody actually make a portmanteau film that's just about all good?)

[knives]

If I could take out that Ghost story I'd vote for Dead of Night, but I agree that horror anthologies in general have been too smart about working as a whole in general to split up.

[Mr Sausage]

With portmanteau horror films, the frame narrative is essential to the success not just of the whole, but of the individual episodes for the way it can lend an added layer of menace. As well, a poorly integrated frame narrative can make the whole feel less satisfying (The House that Dripped Blood anyone?). And just how would you extract Asylum from its frame narrative, considering the stories forward the plot of the frame narrative and, in the final instance, bleed over into it?

Plus, how would you rank them? Can people vote for both a single episode and the whole movie? Could both the movie and one of its sections figure on the same List? Isn't anyone who votes for the whole movie also technically registering a vote for the single sequence?

Portmanteau horror films by and large attempt to be unified, so breaking them up goes against the principle of their construction.

[Titus]

Plus, how would you rank them? Can people vote for both a single episode and the whole movie? Could both the movie and one of its sections figure on the same List? Isn't anyone who votes for the whole movie also technically registering a vote for the single sequence?

I think that ultimately you're probably right in that splitting up anthology films would introduce more confusion than it's worth, but I can still kind of see the benefit of it. For example, I think Park Chan-wook's segment from Three...Extremes is an almost complete misfire, and Fruit Chan's was decent but not particularly memorable. Takashi Miike's segment was enormously impressive, though. If I were to submit a list, I'd probably include Miike's segment were it eligible. But I couldn't justify including the entire anthology film given how ordinary 2/3s of it is.

[zedz]

Well my argument in that context would be: just let go of the Miike segment. It's not as if you don't have lots of other eligible Miike films to vote for; you can draw attention to the film in the discussion thread (which is where the heavy lifting of these projects really gets done); and given the inherent splitting issue, a vote for the episode is probably going to have no impact on the aggregate list. And whatever would otherwise have been number 51 on your list probably more than deserves its own shot at glory.

[colinr0380]

I would perhaps have difficulties with Tales From The Crypt and the segment "And All Through The House", involving a homicidal Joan Collins vs homicidal Santa Claus, along with a young child who is simply too excited to stay in bed and go to sleep on Christmas Eve! It is by far the best segment of that anthology (and in my opinion the best thing Joan Collins has been in, along with Land of the Pharaohs)!

Three...Extremes also poses another problem - this was released on DVD in the US, and then the original anthology film (originally simply called Three) to which Three...Extremes was a sequel was then released as Three Extremes II on US DVD! Very confusing!

[Mr Sausage]

Three...Extremes also poses another problem - this was released on DVD in the US, and then the original anthology film (originally simply called Three) to which Three...Extremes was a sequel was then released as Three Extremes II on US DVD! Very confusing!

Same thing happened when that Jackie Chan movie, Operation Condor, was released theatrically in North America. It was a sequel to a movie called Armour of God, but nothing in the North American release would tell you that. So when it came time to release Armour of God over here, they retitled it Operation Condor 2: Armour of the Gods and tried to pass it off as the sequel.

[duck duck]

I've always been entranced by single frames of films, think Lon Chaney in London After Midnight.... I plan on making a 13x19 poster of assorted cut a ways, inserts, and general un-iconic things I like.

Anyone else up for playing with screen shots and Photoshop to make a collage of their favorite stills or posters?

[domino harvey]

I hesitate to even bring this up, but... what the devil comes next for the genre list projects? War films? Romances? Documentaries? Sci-Fi? The major works of S.Z. "Cuddles" Sakall?

[swo17]

Has avant-garde/experimental been brought up as a possibility before?

[domino harvey]

Nope, but no reason why it shouldn't be in the running as well

[zedz]

I like the idea of avant garde and / or animation, since they're two very different ways of defining 'genre' compared to what we've already done, but I'm also interested in doing 'war movies.' It's not a genre I have much interest in per se, but there are so many tremendously great films that happen to be war movies of one kind of another, once you start to think about it (e.g. Ugetsu, Andrey Rublyov, Diamonds of the Night) - so I think it could make for some very interesting and diverse discussions.

The big risk with avant garde cinema is the patchiness of availability and the likelihood that we wouldn't reach critical mass in terms of compiling a consensus list (especially since we were struggling with musicals).

[knives]

I've been rooting for animation which should cover a lot of experimental work.

[domino harvey]

War Movies absolutely has my vote, followed by Romance, as both cast a fairly wide while still specific swath

[zedz]

I have to admit I have no idea how I'd define Romance, but that might make it fun.

[Mr Sausage]

Has anyone floated the idea of Comedies? Because that seems like a pretty fertile genre for this project (although it has similar problems with definition).

That said, I'm all for War films next. There's enough thorny political and aesthetic issues in that genre to make it ripe for discussion and debate.

[zedz]

I think the problem with Comedies is that it would be even more diffuse and vast than Horror, plus it's going to be insanely subjective. I mean, there are even people here that don't find Bringing Up Baby funny.

[Mr Sausage]

I think the problem with Comedies is that it would be even more diffuse and vast than Horror, plus it's going to be insanely subjective. I mean, there are even people here that don't find Bringing Up Baby funny.

True. There is always the possibility of doing just romantic comedies, or screwball comedies, or some sub-genre large enough to be its own genre.

[domino harvey]

I think Matt first facetiously floated the idea of "Romances" as a genre to address the tricky issue of comedies and I thought it was a brilliant solution, much to his chagrin

[Matt]

Nope, that was you and knives all the way. I wanted just a romantic comedy list. Which I still want. I can safely say I wouldn't participate in a broader romance or comedy genre list, it's just too much.

[domino harvey]

Let's just do a genre everyone can agree on, like Coolest Movies Ever

[swo17]

Children's movies?

[matrixschmatrix]

I'd be really, really on board for Animated Movies

[Murdoch]

Another vote for animation.