E-mediate

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FIFTY ESSENTIAL FILMS (x 2)

Obviously, these are not 'my 50 best films of all time'. Such catalogues are stupid. They are 50 films that I think essential to understand some of the power of cinema, how something as commercially compromised in every fibre could result in products that are some of the most moving experiences in art. The 50 films selected as worth detailed commentary and analysis (only some of which I have completed) have all made such innovations in film that (for me at least) they open up new vistas on the potential of the medium.

So why 50 (x 2?) Because I think that even the 50 benefit from being compared with another film by the same director/star/producer. I've also succumbed to Godard's influence, and don't like to make an assertion without taking back its apparent dogmatism in the next breath.

Why not the 100 best? Because the same basic points apply to both films by the people I select. Sometimes the choice of one over another is bound to seem arbitrary. In the texts I try to justify the choices.

L'Avventura (1960) d. Michelangelo Antonioni

     L'Eclisse (1962)

Cabaret d. Bob Fosse

      Jazz

Citizen Kane (1943) d. Orson Welles

      The Trial

Dead Man d. Jim Jarmush

      Down by Law

Mirror d. Andrei Tarkovsky

     Stalker

Mouchette (1966) d. Robert Bresson

     L'Argent

One-Eyed Jacks (1961) d. Marlon Brando

     Last Tango in Paris (1962)

Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid d. Sam Peckinpah

     The Wild Bunch

Pierrot le Fou  d. Jean-Luc Godard

     Russia

Quadrophenia  Pete Townshend

     Tommy

Que la Bête Meure / Killer! (1969) d. Claude Chabrol

     La Femme Infidèle (1968)

Seven Samurai d. Akiro Kurosawa

     Dreams

Zero de conduite (1933) d. Jean Vigo

     L'Atalante (1934)