2014 was a good year for me and I hope it was for everyone else. The wife and I moved back to the Raleigh-Durham area, which cut my commute from 1 hour down to about 15 minutes, she started her second year residency, and I finally became a permanent employee at my job (basically a larger salary and benefits, glorious benefits). I got a new computer about two weeks ago, finally putting the ole Lenovo to rest. I must say it was an extremely good year with one main disappointment being the failure to post updates regarding my cinema shame. There were a few tweets here and there but no posts and I feel bad for not posting it when others provided their updates. I hope to change that this year and what better way to accomplish a new goal than by stretching to an even higher number. That’s right folks, instead of decreasing the list I will be increasing it, if I fail, I should feel 67% more like a failure than in 2014.
Is there a better way to signify the end of something than by putting it in the form of list showing an order?
- Seven Samurai
- Halloween
- Taxi Driver
- The Godfather
- On The Waterfront
- The Wild Bunch
- The Godfather Part II
- Seventh Seal
- Blade Runner
- It’s A Wonderful Life
- Infernal Affairs
- Citizen Kane
The first four in the list are can rightfully be called great films. I will put some blame on “Taxi Driver” for derailing my posts because I struggled writing about the film. I don’t know how many times I started the post and failed to get further than a few paragraphs, I had no idea where to start. I was shocked by the film, I just felt sympathy for Travis as a character which is what made it so hard to write about the film.
“The Godfather” was a joy but my main hang up was Pacino, compared to Brando and Caan he is not on their level, I never felt he really held his own until Part II when he argues with Keaton about the abortion.
October was “Halloween”, I knew it was a classic for the Horror genre but I was shocked by how great it is as just a piece of cinema. It can stand up on its own as one of the greatest films ever made. Also, it may be the best Blu-Ray transfer out of this group of films.
Then on December 31st at 6:00 p.m. I finished “Seven Samurai”, out of all the films, I really knew nothing about this movie went in completely blind, I take that back I knew the run time was 3 hours and 27 minutes. The lack of knowledge gave me no expectations about the film. I don’t know how to put its greatness into words. It’s just a masterpiece of cinema.
If there was one disappointment it had to be “Citizen Kane”. I had high hopes for this film, how could I not have high hopes, it is considered one of the greatest films of all time if not the greatest. The film is well crafted and I am amazed by the effects Welles was able to pull off. My issue with the film was related to the story I just didn’t find it interesting and I’m going to say I was bored with it. Saying I was bored isn’t good criticism so I plan to elaborate more in the future.
Well I’m kind of running against the clock for a 12:00 pm showing of Foxcatcher. I will post my 2015 Cinema Shame list tonight.