The Best Movie Of All Time

[Caesar of Bread]

What are the best movies of all time?

 

[Buster's Uncle]

Bladerunner might deserve a spot - it's a very good movie of the type they intended to make.

-Which was a Bogie and Bacall detective noir flic, in the future, with killer clones. I'm serious.

 

[Kyriakos]

"Morbius"?
Is this alluding to the meme?

 

[EgonSpengler]

I don't think I could pick one Best Movie. Even narrowing it down - to a decade, or a genre, or whatever - it's almost impossible.

 

[Caesar of Bread]

"Morbius"?
Is this alluding to the meme?

yes

 

[Kyriakos]

I am not a movies person, tbh... My favorite movie likely is Angelheart, which while having some style and a cool idea, isn't really a masterpiece.
But I don't prioritize cinematography, I am interested almost exclusively on the plot (thus, not really the person to ask about film-making)...

 

[Valka D'Ur]

The only one on that list that I've seen is Star Wars.

THE best movie is a subjective thing, and people's answers won't always be the same.

My answer would depend on what genre we're talking about, and what reaction I have (or want) from the movie.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Movies I've watched and rated the maximum 5 stars since I started using Letterboxd, about 14 months:

Almost Famous (2000)
Children of Men (2006)
The Commitments (1991)
Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)
Jaws (1975)
Palm Springs (2020)
A Quiet Place (2018)
Stop Making Sense (1984)

Everything Everywhere and A Quiet Place were my favorite films the years those came out, iirc. I think Palm Springs may've been, too. Just from this list, I'm tempted to put Jaws #1, owing not just to its age, but to its longevity (that is, I think it holds up well), as well as its place in history and its influence.

One aspect of the "Best Movie" question is how you choose to judge a movie, and how you weight different things. Particularly with older movies, judging them in their context seems "fairer", and older movies have an innate advantage in terms of the impact and influence they had. But in a lot of cases, the art, craft & science of movie-making has progressed over the decades, in some cases a lot. If you simply judge movies on whether they were enjoyable to watch, older movies can sometimes suffer their age. The list in the poll above appears to be trying to cover a lot of bases, but seems to lean towards older classics. There's also the question of a film's "rewatchability", which I consider to be different from - or, at least, merely a component of - its overall quality.

 

[Fippy]

I don't think I could pick one Best Movie. Even narrowing it down - to a decade, or a genre, or whatever - it's almost impossible.

I would say the same, if there was no Shawshank Redemption
It's not my favorite genre..but all things added together, TSR has the best storytelling of any movie imo.
Superb emotions without being cheesy..good actors as well. There are no weak spots here imo.

I def. don't always agree with imdb, but TSR being #1 for an eternity by now is spot on.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

One aspect of the "Best Movie" question is how you choose to judge a movie, and how you weight different things. Particularly with older movies, judging them in their context seems "fairer", and older movies have an innate advantage in terms of the impact and influence they had. But in a lot of cases, the art, craft & science of movie-making has progressed over the decades, in some cases a lot. If you simply judge movies on whether they were enjoyable to watch, older movies can sometimes suffer their age. The list in the poll above appears to be trying to cover a lot of bases, but seems to lean towards older classics. There's also the question of a film's "rewatchability", which I consider to be different from - or, at least, merely a component of - its overall quality.

Rewatchability... there are some movies I've seen over a dozen times, easily. I don't always rewatch for the same reasons.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Rewatchability... there are some movies I've seen over a dozen times, easily. I don't always rewatch for the same reasons.

Same. Likewise, there are movies I admire or respect, but don't want to watch again. Breaking the Waves (1996) was a master class, particularly in Emily Watson's performance, which may have been one of the best I've ever seen. I'd buy Emily Watson a drink for that movie, but I don't think I'd watch it again. Conversely, I've seen Unstoppable (2010), Tony Scott's runaway-train adventure movie with Denzel Washington, probably 5 or 6 times, and will surely watch it a few times more. Would I say that Unstoppable is better than Breaking the Waves? No, I don't think I would say that. Admittedly, it's been more than 20 years since I saw Breaking the Waves, but still.

Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever rewatched any of Lars Von Trier's movies. I think he would go around punching people in the stomach, if he could, just to watch them double over. Instead, he makes movies.

 

[9gkj548hkm20vk79dj689bnj4]

"Best" would not necessarily be my personal "favorite" (that's like a 5-way tie) but I would vote for The Godfather 1 and 2.
3 I haven't seen in forever, and very little of it, but I hear it's lousy.

Technical accomplishment means little to me compared to simpler things like character and dialogue. I can tune into The Godfather on TV or whatever, no matter what scene it is, and watch it from there to the end. Because I already know all the lines and they're so universal. Yes they're mob movies but they're also talking about businesses, friendships, loyalties, countries, and empires, etc.
It's like some Shakespeare, what little of it I know. I only have to listen to some lines to "get" the idea of what a scene is conveying.
Either has a very enduring quality to it which does not necessarily rely on a precise visual experience to get its point across. I hope that explains it.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Same. Likewise, there are movies I admire or respect, but don't want to watch again. Breaking the Waves (1996) was a master class, particularly in Emily Watson's performance, which may have been one of the best I've ever seen. I'd buy Emily Watson a drink for that movie, but I don't think I'd watch it again. Conversely, I've seen Unstoppable (2010), Tony Scott's runaway-train adventure movie with Denzel Washington, probably 5 or 6 times, and will surely watch it a few times more. Would I say that Unstoppable is better than Breaking the Waves? No, I don't think I would say that. Admittedly, it's been more than 20 years since I saw Breaking the Waves, but still.

The only movie I've ever seen Denzel Washington in is Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. In a behind-the-scenes video, Washington said he took the part because he wanted to challenge himself as an actor to see if he could do Shakespeare.

He pulled it off pretty well.

It's like some Shakespeare, what little of it I know. I only have to listen to some lines to "get" the idea of what a scene is conveying.
Either has a very enduring quality to it which does not necessarily rely on a precise visual experience to get its point across. I hope that explains it.

So many people don't "get" Shakespeare because their only exposure to it is in school, just reading it. Those plays were meant to be seen and heard, not just read. It makes all the difference in the world, when you can see it performed.

The first Shakespeare play I ever saw performed live was Twelfth Night. I had no clue what it was going to be about, as we hadn't studied that one in school (I was in high school at the time and the plays we did were all the depressing, all-the-important-characters-die kind). But seeing and hearing actions matched to words that were unfamiliar made it easier to get the humor and figure out what was going on.

 

[Plotinus]

For me, Twelfth Night suffers from the same problem as all the Falstaff plays, which is that you're supposed to like a bunch of tedious, vulgar tavern dwellers and laugh when they play lengthy and cruel practical jokes on far more sympathetic characters. It's possible that I'm not the target audience.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

For me, Twelfth Night suffers from the same problem as all the Falstaff plays, which is that you're supposed to like a bunch of tedious, vulgar tavern dwellers and laugh when they play lengthy and cruel practical jokes on far more sympathetic characters. It's possible that I'm not the target audience.

Yes, what they did to Malvolio was cruel. But not all the characters were vulgar tavern dwellers, and part of the humor was in the 'mistaken identity' trope where the other characters apparently couldn't tell the difference between Viola and Sebastian (because of course all fraternal twins look alike, particularly when one is male and the other female ).

All I can say is that it was my first time seeing a Shakespeare play performed live, I understood it, and my 15-year-old self was Blown. Away. So were a couple of my friends, one of whom literally bounced up and down in the lobby at intermission, excitedly saying, "Isn't it WONDERFUL?!"

(Mind you, the kids I hung out with in high school were the ones who were in the poetry club, either on staff or contributing to the school newspaper, or were in the yearbook club - the bookish types - and some of us hung out in the library until it closed, either doing homework or playing Hangman. Some of us were totally into Shakespeare.)

As for you not being the target audience, that's true. Shakespeare wrote for the people of his time, not ours. He couldn't have known his plays would still be popular over 400 years later.

Perhaps this will cheer you up:

I love what he says about Branagh's Hamlet. I enjoyed Branagh's version of Henry V and Much Ado About Nothing (even my grandmother loved Henry V and she'd never even heard of Shakespeare before). But I loathed his Hamlet so much that I never finished watching it. Mel Gibson, for all his personal crap, pulled off a much better version.

 

[Narz]

Avengers endgame in same category w seven samurai? Oh dear.

I voted for that out of those listed

Don't really have a #1 fave. Most I've seen a movie is four times or so (eternal sunshine of spotless mind, fight club, I'm sure a few others)

 

[Plotinus]

My vote would go to City Lights. If you don’t cry at the end of that, you’re probably clinically dead.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Different people cry at different things. One particular line in Contact has that effect on me: When Ellie travels in the Machine and sees things she has trouble describing in scientific terms because they're so beautiful, she says, "They should have sent a poet!"

 

[Winston Hughes]

All About Eve, On the Waterfront, Jaws, Aliens, Pulp Fiction, Parasite

 

[Kyriakos]

Probably Vertigo. It looks great and has a decently interesting story imo.