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5 reasons Total Film's top 100 Directors list is a sham

So if you haven't seen the links circulating the web to the latest (mostly meaningless) top 100 list, Total Film magazine has released a list of the top 100 directors of all time. Now, of course, a list so huge cannot possibly please everyone, but this list was assembled by people who do not like movies. There seems to be no guiding principles to the assembling of this list, more importantly, the list often forgets its title, THE BEST DIRECTORS, instead it seems more interested in star power, how often names appear in the press and box office sales (any of which could be a small factor) but they are not very concerned with the directing abilities of the chosen directors. Just, briefly, to skim a few of the blatant problems with this list:

1. Michelangelo Antonioni was not included. Of course he seems a little more in the media at the moment because of his recent death, but this is one of the great directors. You can't go including Sofia Coppola, Curtis Hansen and James Whale and then deny Antonioni. Poor decision.


-still from Antonioni's 'Blowup'-

2. D.W. Griffith at 91 and Sergei Eisenstein at 72. With the error of Antonioni I'm grateful that these people have ever seen films by Griffith and Eisenstein, but to give them so little credit for being the incredible innovators that they were is unthinkable. There is no modern cinema without these two men. Period. Somes examples of how these two don't seem to make much sense, Griffith, at #91, is beat out by Buster Keaton, at #88. Keaton is one of my favorite silent film directors, and I think, though he may not have been as funny as chaplin, he was certainly a better director than Chaplin ever was. But as Griffith and Keaton were both primarily directors of silent films (both short and feature length) saying the man who invented modern editing practices is less important than a man who continued the tradition (albeit very well) of slapstick comedy makes no sense. Sergei Eisenstein, at # 72, (the man who invented montage editing, and wrote countless essays on the uses of montage, that are still taught today) falls one place behind John Sayles, who is a great director, but is far less prolific or influential as Eisenstein...


-still from Eisenstien's 'Battleship Potemkin'-

3. Total exclusion of Italian Neo-realism. Again denying the importance of some figures in film history. No Vittorio De Sica or Roberto Rossellini. This time there is no independent film without these men. John Cassavetes would not have though that he could make a film for next to nothing without the Neo-realists. (Which we can through the early work Antonioni in here as a further denial of the neo-realists.)

This is just the tip of the iceberg, many important film movements are under-represented, I've just chosen the neo-realists for the complete exclusion. The French New-Wave is barely present, Dogme 95 is only represented by Lars Von Trier (whose placement at #86 seems a little odd, but this is subjective criticism and I'm going to avoid that as much as possible so this doesn't turn into an angry rant.) Also all movements of Asian cinema are heavily neglected, sure they've slipped in a couple of safe bets, one Indian director, three from Japan, one anime director (who is curiously high ranked)...but over-all, the movements are neglected.


-still from Rossellini's 'Open City'-

4. To further bash the Italian directors they have placed Federico Fellini at 67 (in my mind he is top ten material, but this should be subjective). The main issue here is the man made hoards of movies, countless numbers of them are still shown in cinema classes across the world and remain extremely important pieces of film art. (La Dolce Vita, 8 1/2, Nights of Cabiria, Amarcord, Roma, etc) The real jab at Fellini here is that people like Bryan Singer, Richard Linklater and John Carpenter are some of the names just ahead of him (65, 64, 63 respectively). Not that any of these directors are necessarily bad, but they certainly aren’t as important as Fellini, and Fellini never even thought about making the artistic compromises they have. (Which is a whole other debate, but is nonetheless relevant when deciding the BEST DIRECTORS EVER.)


-still from Fellini's 'La Dolce Vita'-

5. (John Cassavetes = #60, Jean-Luc Godard = # 59) = Abomination
(Hal Ashby = # 58, Brian De Palma = #54, James Cameron = #38) = Abomination

Again the Ashby, De Palma, Cameron is not all bad (though I'm not much of a fan of De Palma) they have all made some decent movies, successful at the box office, films people remember. But seriously, we are not talking sales here, or who had star power in their films, the label is "best directors." There are truly few directors who could even begin to be considered more visionary than Cassavetes or Godard. These two are rare specimen, directors who can truly be said to have changed cinema. Ashby, De Palma and Cameron are all on the Spielberg side of the best directors, which is fine, Spielberg should be ranked as high as he is, his films aren't really art, but he changed the way people see films. So did Godard and Cassavetes, De Palma hasn't changed anything. This is not a matter of taste; this is a matter of making an arbitrary list that has no sort of standard for judgment. (Godard leads me to the exclusion of Alain Resnais as well, but I'm limiting myself to 5 reasons.)


-still from Godard's 'Bande a part' (Band of Outsiders)-

This is just the beginning of my personal complaints about the list, but many of my complaints are subjective. These five reasons, I believe, are more objective complaints. A pure denial of the talent that has changed the way people go to theaters and the fashion in which people watch cinema.

I think there needs to be a new list made, with some reasonable criteria. Maybe a few more women involved too. Sofia Coppola over Jane Campion, Deepa Mehta and Maya Deren?

Other directors who maybe should have made it: Takeshi Kitano, Seijen Suzuki, Alain Resnais, Wes Anderson (though a long shot, but better and more prolific than Coppola), George Cuckor, Douglas Sirk, F.W. Murnau, Stan Brakhage, Maya Deren(though they've completely denied the existence of alternative forms of cinema besides the blockbuster, independent or classic), Jane Campion, Neil Jordan, Deepa Mehta, Vittorio De Sica, Matthew Barney, Hal Hartley(?), Roberto Rosselini, Guy Maddin, Jacques Rivette, Abbas Kiarostami and the list could continue...(anyone have any ideas?)

Jeremy Blake 1972-2007- part 2

Behold the Bubbles:
The man who made paintings move



Overshadowed by the death of visionary filmmakers Ingmar Bergman and Michelangelo Antonioni, Jeremy Blake’s tragic suicide earlier this month seems to have slipped under the radar of much of the filmmaking and film-going community. With the death of these two legendary directors, who worked against history and the conventions laid out before them, it begs that we examine Blake’s work and why it has not gotten furthur recognition. It should prompt, more than ever, our awareness of how important filmmakers of Blake’s candor are, without their experiments and awareness, there will be no future Bergman’s or Godard’s. Bergman and Antonioni, before they became influential, and had the ability to create anything they pleased (see Bergman’s insane soap commercials), saw things in a different way, and it wasn’t easy for the world of cinema to accept them. They were outsiders who believed in the cinema they could create. Blake was similar, perhaps a bit before his time, perhaps saw a little more outside of the box than they did, but he was certainly just as much, if not more, of an outsider. (Though he would be more easily likened to a present day Maya Deren. Ditto on seeing outside of the box.)



Blake’s, limited, catalogue of short films stands as a testament to his goal of bridging the gap between painting and cinema. His films were tasteful, lush, intriguing and beautiful. His most accessible work couldn’t bring him into the forefront of viewer’s minds, by the very type of work he was doing was never going to be a name like Bergman, but he was seen, whether viewers knew it or not. Particularly his work on Paul Thomas Anderson’s Punch Drunk Love and his music video for Beck’s “Round the Bend” created a platform from which viewers were exposed to his work, exposed to something new, irrational and completely logical. His work with Beck is so serene and conceptually synchronized that it should have gained him notoriety with music video directors like Spike Jonze and Michel Gondry. The flow of pieces like “Round the Bend,” or “1906,” is striking, it’s contrary motion of static, yet constantly resonating and dissolving images, speaks to a course of human nature that few filmmakers have ever had the capability of capturing. His work with digital photography, multiple interfaces and painting stand to be highly influential to future filmmakers who can see cinema outside of corporate movie houses, for those who see cinema on the walls of galleries, on the sides of crumbling brownstones, on crudely hung curtains in living rooms and night skies, Jeremy Blake will be a visionary they look back upon. Someone who will inspire the world’s future Deren’s, Brakhage’s, Anger’s and Blake’s.



Jeremy Blake's 'Sodium Fox'


Beck's music video "Round the Bend," directed by Jeremy Blake


A very short clip from Blake's video 1906:


Trailer for Paul Thomas Anderson's 'Punch Drunk Love' featuring pieces of Blake's color patterns for the film:

Cormac McCarthy to pen 'Toy Story 3'?

Has the success of the Oprah endorsed 'The Road' and the upcoming big screen debut of 'No Country for Old Men' gone to his head? I couldn't resist posting this. It's great. Click here for the article from Village Voice.

Hey! Tired of not being able to access endless troves of junk by Roger Ebert? Worry no more.

An endless myriad of reviews is now available online (as if there wasn't already) because an archive of the complete reviews of Siskel, Ebert and Roeper has been introduced. You can check out The Balcony here. It's actually pretty impressive. At the moment it's really pretty barebones (except for the thousands of reviews on the site) but I'm sure it's going to get the royal treatment in time.

The first feature available on the site is Ebert and Scorsese discussing films of the 90's, access it here

Jeremy Blake 1972-2007

Artist Jeremy Blake has passed away today, New York Police have said, in an apparent suicide at his New York City apartment. An up-and-coming avant-garde artist who sought to bridge the worlds of film and painting, his contirbutions to the world of art, by age 35, have been significant. One of his best known pieces of work were the hallucinatory sequences of blending primary colors between scenes in Paul Thomas Anderson's 2002 film 'Punch Drunk Love.' His long-time companion, Theresa Duncan, a filmmaker, artist and sometime video-game designed, commited suicide early last month in the couples Manhattan home. Blake was a visionary artist whose work will be missed.



for more on Jeremy Blake check out the article at Green Cine

Venice Film Fest announces Queer Lion Award

the Venice Film Festival has announced today that, after four years of negotiations, they will premiere the Queer Lion Award, paralleling their prestigous Golden Lion, for the best film with queer characters and/or themes. The award will be the first of it's kind at the major festivals of the world.

for more information check out the article at indieWIRE

Michelangelo Antonioni 1912-2007

At age 94 legendary filmmaker Michelangelo Antonioni has passed away last night at his home in Rome. Famous for his cinema of alienation and his fantastical visions, he, along with Federico Fellini, turned Italy away from the Neorealistic visions of Vittorio de Sica and Roberto Rossellini towards a cinema of the imagination.

Though he was far from being a typical Italian filmmaker, some of his most famous films created in England. With films such as 'Blow-up' and 'L'Avventura' he can only be considered one the world's greatest cinematic assets. His trilogy on alienation and the open spaces spaces surrounding the human psyche, including the aformentioned ' L'Avventura,' 'L'Eclisse,' and 'La Notte,' still stands, ironically along with Bergman's 60s trilogy, as one of the most tortured series of films on humanity, while remaining entirely humanistic.

Jack Nicholson once said of Antonioni, while presenting him with the lifetime achievement Oscar, "In the empty, silent spaces of the world, he has found metaphors that illuminate the silent places our hearts, and found in them, too, a strange and terrible beauty: austere, elegant, enigmatic, haunting." Nicholson starred in Antonioni's 'The Passenger' which is emblematic of his paced, contemplative style. The film ten minute finale is filmed in complete silence, which had (and has) some viewers ripping their hair out while still recieving standing ovations from others (this happened just last year when I went to see a restored print at the the cinema).

Antonioni made films through the end of his life, collaborating with Wong Kar-Wai and Steven Soderbergh on the pasted together 'Eros,' in 2004. Walter Veltroni, the mayor of Rome, put it lightly hen he said, "With Antonioni, not only has one of the greatest living directors been lost, but also a master of the modern screen."

A screenshot from 'L'Eclisse'


A clip from 'Blow-up' with the Yardbirds performaing in a studio. Emblematic of the tension filled shots that were charicteristic of Antonioni: at once static, quiet, paced while remaining intense, busy, cluttered. For a rock-n-roll scene the shot is so still and quiet, the soundtrack is loud, but he never focuses on the sound, it seems to be more about the group of collected people, the power of the moment, the intensity of community, the power of power. Anyhow, 'Blow-Up:'

Ingmar Bergman 1918-2007

Famed Swedish director Ingmar Bergman died Monday morning at his home in Sweden. Bergman was one of the world's greatest filmmakers, along with legends like Godard, Fellini and Kurosawa, he can be said to have revealed the potentials of cinema as an art form as much as an individual in film's short history. He was best known for his personal, tormented films on the human psyche, movies as divergent as meditations on mental illness, familial abuse and plague. He broke barriers, broke the fourth wall, and created what we consider cinema as much as Griffith did. Making films up until his continuation of 'Scenes from a Marriage,' 'Saraband,' in 2003, and writing a TV play in 2005. His death is great loss to art in the world at large. Woody Allen noted, in 1988, that Ingmar Bergman was "the greatest film artist, all things considered, since the invention of the motion picture camera."
This week, in the reviews section, look for the other two parts of his trilogy (along with Through a Glass Darkly, that was published last week) as tribute to his passing, as well as his close friend and frequent cinematographer, whom also passed this month, Sven Nykvist.

Woody Allen discusses Bergman's genius. From the New York Times

Click here for a photo essay of Bergman's career from The Gaurdian.

Podcast Review: The First Ten Years: ****

Artist: Elvis Costello
Podcast: The First Ten Years
Available for free at the iTunes store

Elvis Costello’s podcast, three episodes into the ten episode series, is thoughtful, if not slow, but exactly what the music industry needs from podcasts. Filled with clips from early albums and Costello waxing on his past, his music family and how he believes Elvis is merely a cultural image and has had no discernable impact on American music.

This is generally the kind of musical nugget that is best left for the fanatics. Music documentation has become so standard in America that it seems you need some form of documentary to be considered important anymore, even artists who have never been huge on the publicity train (Dylan) need a new documentary every year or two. But there is something special in Costello’s delivery, something charming and intimate about not having narrators, pictures and opinions, just Costello whispering in your ear in the coffee shop, in the car, at home. Point being, that, while it certainly is for Costello fans, it’s engaging enough to bring you to Costello if you’re not a fan. Clips from his songs, his lack of head spinning name-dropping, and his ability to draw you into this period in music history. This isn’t just about him, he was a part of something in the 70’s and he lets you know that, talking about seeing the early punk bands of London taking off, the aging legends of early rock-n-roll, and watching what was happening in the American rock scene from across the sea.

This series is a great introduction to a long prolific career of one of the most influential Londonites of the last 3 decades. Great bits about the London scene in the 70’s, Costello recording in the studio, trying to get started by stopping by studios and trying to audition in person for a job, just carrying an acoustic guitar. Easily worth the five minutes it’ll take you to download the three episodes you’ve missed.



The First Ten Years has only just begun, episode 4 is available for download July 10. A complete list of release dates for The First Ten Years podcast is available at myspace.com/elviscostello

Book Review: No One Belongs Here More Than You - Miranda July ****1/2

I've recently finished reading Miranda July's new book, 'No One Belongs Here More Than You.' If you aren't familiar with July she's a performance artist/filmmaker/author. She is one of the rare artists who is published and seen in many mediums, the kind you want to hate because they are doing so much. Though, unlike artists such as Nick Cave or Kevin Bacon, she is continuously successful at everything. 'No One Belongs Here More Than You' is not an exception. 



For July fans:

Her book floats. It's in another world. Not in the way that Judy Budnitz's 'Flying Leap' is only marginally grounded in reality (though not to its disadvantage) 'No One Belongs...' creates its own reality. If you try to place a finger on what its 'otherness' exactly is you won't find it. It is real, very grounded, but very distant. For any July fan the book is an tenacious lover that demands to be reread, it's her typical, overly-poignant, non-sequitor-esque dialogue. The stories wear bright colors (like the two pink or yellow covers available for the book) they leap in your face and sit on your tongue.



For everyone else:

The book is fresh and intriguing, she may very-well be one of the new voices of the American short story for the 21st century. It is a solid debut collection. Not perfect, solid. Stories like 'The Shared Patio,' and 'The Swim Team' are some of the best short story writing I've seen from any author in the last few years. The tone she has refined (or maybe the tone she was born with, either way, the tone that George Saunders has coined as July-esque) is omnipresent. It leaves you wondering if she is relentlessly, hopelessly optimistic in the face of the horrors of the every-day, or if the characters in her stories are so riddled with pain that they have adopted this tone, refusing to accept that the world is as bleak as it appears.


Read this book. If you have ever been intrigued by Judy Budnitz, Don DeLillo, Nick Flynn, Dave Eggers or need a good view of a harsh world through eyes that only see beauty you need this book as badly as the American short story needs someone of July’s varied talents