If the wait is longer than a month or two, I usually restart. It isn’t ideal, but neither is forcing myself to stay half awake for a film in one sitting
You have to finish that one sooner or later. If we made a list of the most essential films of all time it would probably be in the top ten.
Stopping the slaughter because they saw an old man’s dick and balls is pretty funny, as horrific as that scene was
Narrowing it down to exactly ten would be so hard. Do you pick academic films that no one wants to ait through, like Intolerance? What about problematic movies like The Searchers or The Birth or a Nation? If I had to make a ten, just off the top of my head while I'm sitting in an Uber, would be: Citizen Kane The Birth of a Nation The Godfather Breathless 2001: A Space Odyssey Seven Samurai Tokyo Story Metropolis The Seventh Seal Pulp Fiction
On Saturday night I got into the wrong Uber at the airport and when the real passenger canceled the ride he started yelling at me and drove me back to the airport. It was terrifying.
I understand the argument for a film like Birth of a Nation, but I would simply pick a different film lmao
It has to be seen sooner or later if you really want to understand the history of film. In terms of techniques and the structure of movies, it has a claim to maybe being the most important movie ever made. It's also in the public domain so you don't have to worry about your money going to the Klan. It isn't the only time it happens either. Leni Riefenstahl is a hugely influential filmmaker whose subject happens to be the glorification of the Nazis. The Searchers is considered John Ford's best film and is pretty racist toward Native Americans. Roman Polanski and Woody Allen are going to show up eventually. There's a difference between academic viewing and viewing for pleasure. No one is going to invite over their friends and throw on the best remaster of The Birth of a Nation that they can find, but studying anything requires dealing with the unpleasant parts. It would be like learning history but skipping slavery and the Holocaust.
We fight over that stuff every year. A principal got fired in the state not too long ago for sending out waivers for parents who don't want their kids to learn about the Holocaust because "not everyone agrees on all the facts". When I taught U.S. History I showed Night and Fog every year. It's truly gruesome stuff: heads in buckets, bodies being pushed into graves by bulldozers, piles of hair from shaved victims. Some students would complain that it was too horrific and I would always say that I agree with them, which is why you have to be aware of what happened.
I'm trying to find the thread from 2020 where we made lists of the last decade or maybe the 2000s. I know I made a list then.