Best Films of …
The Alternative Film Guide’s "Best Films of …" lists consist of highly personal — and highly eclectic — suggestions of films you might want to check out (or avoid like the plague, depending on how you feel about our choices).
Those lists, we might add, have not been written in stone; they’re a work in perpetual progress (one that, in fact, is currently being corrected, updated, and expanded). In other words, new names and titles are added, whereas some old ones are removed as we keep on watching good, great, and/or so-bad-they’re-good films and performances.
The "Best Films of …" categories are: Film (including director/screenwriter), Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Cinematography, and Music. At times, you’ll find Short Film and/or Song Score categories as well.
Another category, "Check These Out," consists of — almost invariably lesser-known — films that are:
- Worthwhile efforts that for some reason or other — e.g., pacing, direction, screenplay, acting — weren’t included in our Best Film list. Admittedly, some of the lesser efforts in the Best Film category could just as easily be found in the Check These Out category, while some of the better Check These Out efforts could just as well be included in the Best Film list. Once again, those lists haven’t been written in stone; and, really, there’s no fine line clearly separating, say, "Really Good" from "Good," or "Good" from "Above Average."
- Deeply flawed efforts — e.g., poor screenplay or direction or acting, or cheesy production values — that despite their glaring inadequacies have more than enough going for them to make them well worth watching. (We found some of those so enjoyable, in fact, that they’ve been included in our Best Film list.)
- Every now and then, well-respected (sometimes downright revered) films not found in our Best Film lists. Those are widely admired classics that, despite their aesthetic qualities and all the talent involved, we found too slow-paced and/or emotionally uninvolving — or sometimes just not up to their reputation.
- As mentioned above, most films in the Check These Out category are "lesser-known" efforts. So, even though you won’t find Modern Times, The Wizard of Oz, Seven Samurai, Wild Strawberries, La Dolce vita, Lawrence of Arabia, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, or Brokeback Mountain in our Best Film lists, it would be pointless to include them (and other such well-known classics) in our Check These Out lists.
For obvious reasons, those lists are not meant to be complete — not even close. Instead, take them as just a few samples of movies we would recommend.
Below are a few extra notes about the lists.
- Listings are organized alphabetically.
- Films are listed by year according to their original release date to the best of our knowledge. Exceptions: Movies that saw the light of day, or rather, the darkness of a film theater, years after they were made, e.g., The Plot Against Harry (made in 1969, released in 1990). In such cases, they have been listed according to their production date.
- Credited screenwriters are those who, to the best of our knowledge, wrote the final — original or adapted — screenplay (as opposed to penning the "original story," at times a reference to a screenplay that has been so altered it became something else).
- Some East Asian names are alphabetized in reverse order (last name; first name), e.g., Gong Li (instead of Li Gong) and Zhang Yimou (instead of Yimou Zhang). Reason for this editorial choice: Gong Li is known around the world as Gong Li, not Li Gong, and that same rule applies to other East Asian film personalities.
- TV/cable feature-length films and miniseries may find their way into those lists.
"Best Films of …" Annual List
1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919
1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929
1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939
Comments
Leave a Reply
NOTE:
All comments are moderated and may take some time before they are posted. Different views and opinions are welcome, but courtesy is imperative. Rude/crass/bigoted comments and name-calling of any sort will be immediately deleted.
Also, please be aware that the Alternative Film Guide has no contact information for the talent mentioned in this blog and no information pertaining to or access to distributors'/producers' film prints.
