What Year Produced The Most "Great" Films? (1 Viewer)

[ScottHM]

How do you know its trash or a masterpiece if you don’t see it?

You can read about it. To be honest, I don't really care if it's a masterpiece if the film doesn't sound entertaining.

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[Robert Crawford]

You can read about it. To be honest, I don't really care if it's a masterpiece if the film doesn't sound entertaining.

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Well good for you as it’s time to move on.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Getting back to the subject of this thread, 1938 was one hell of a year for movies.

 

[John Dirk]

I can only name my preferred decade and that is easily the 1980's for me.

Scarface
Airplane
Year of the Dragon
The Amy Heckerling classics - Fast Times at Ridgemont High - Johnny Dangerously
The John Hughes classics - Sixteen Candles - Weird Science - Ferris Bueller's Day Off - The Breakfast Club

The 1970's are a close second.

Rocky
Animal House
and, of course, The Godfather

There are just so many great ones from all eras. Thanks for reminding me why I love films so much!

 

[Thomas T]

How do you know its trash or a masterpiece if you don’t see it? I don’t know what you mean by pushing it on someone as we’re all adults here and talking movies.

Obviously, I don't and won't. I've never seen, for example, Rain Man even though the film and Dustin Hoffman won Oscars. But every fabric of my being screams, "Unclean!". It may very well be a cinematic masterpiece but I don't care. I don't want to see it (I've seen trailers, clips and read reviews). Life is too short to waste on films you "should" see but have zero interest in. Am I missing some great movies? Probably but I'll survive When I was younger, I saw everything I could, always fearing I would miss something great. As I got older, I knew what I liked and let my movie radar guide my movie going path. When referring to "pushing", I wasn't referring to anyone here (although Scott did seem to be prodded a little) but in my own life and friends who are dumbfounded when I don't take their suggestions that some films are "must sees".

 

[Robert Crawford]

Getting back to the subject of this thread, 1938 was one hell of a year for movies.

Films from 1938:

The Adventures of Robin Hood
Bringing Up Baby
Boys Town
Angels with Dirty Faces
You Can't Take It With You
The Lady Vanishes
The Dawn Patrol
Pygmalion
Jezebel
Four Daughters
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Three Comrades
Merrily We Live
Test Pilot
Holiday
Algiers
La Bete Humaine
The Buccaneer
A Yank at Oxford

 

[SeanSKA]

I'm Still a fan of 1957;

The Bridge on the River Kwai
12 Angry Men
Witness for the Prosecution
Love in the Afternoon
Sweet Smell of Success
A Face in the Crowd
The Great Man
Funny Face
Les Girls
A Hatful of Rain
The Wrong Man
Sayonara
The Bachelor Party
Peyton Place
The Pajama Game
Paths of Glory
Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison
Jailhouse Rock (ok, a guilty pleasure...but still Elvis's best film)

 

[Robert Crawford]

I'm Still a fan of 1957;

The Bridge on the River Kwai
12 Angry Men
Witness for the Prosecution
Love in the Afternoon
Sweet Smell of Success
A Face in the Crowd
The Great Man
Funny Face
Les Girls
A Hatful of Rain
The Wrong Man
Sayonara
The Bachelor Party
Peyton Place
The Pajama Game
Paths of Glory
Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison
Jailhouse Rock (ok, a guilty pleasure...but still Elvis's best film)

You forgot some other fine films from that year, some of which I think are great while others are not, but are popular among us.

The Incredible Shrinking Man
3:10 to Yuma
The Seventh Seal
Wild Strawberries
Throne of Blood
Old Yeller
Gunfight at the OK Corral
Pai Joey
The Enemy Below
Raintree County
The Spirit of St. Louis
Nights of Cabiria
Desk Set

 

[Martin_Teller]

I'm Still a fan of 1957;

The Bridge on the River Kwai
12 Angry Men
Witness for the Prosecution
Love in the Afternoon
Sweet Smell of Success
A Face in the Crowd
The Great Man
Funny Face
Les Girls
A Hatful of Rain
The Wrong Man
Sayonara
The Bachelor Party
Peyton Place
The Pajama Game
Paths of Glory
Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison
Jailhouse Rock (ok, a guilty pleasure...but still Elvis's best film)

You forgot some other fine films from that year, some of which I think are great while others are not, but are popular among us.

The Incredible Shrinking Man
3:10 to Yuma
The Seventh Seal
Wild Strawberries
Throne of Blood
Old Yeller
Gunfight at the OK Corral
Pai Joey
The Enemy Below
Raintree County
The Spirit of St. Louis
Nights of Cabiria
Desk Set

I'll see these and raise you:

The Burglar
The Cranes Are Flying
Kanal
Black River
Plunder Road
Don Kikhot
Le Notti Bianche
Tammy and the Bachelor

Truly a fantastic year.

 

[JoeDoakes]

Hard to beat the late 1930s, but the early 1970s were also very good, particularly 1974:

Blazing Saddles
Young Frankenstein
The Godfather Part II
Chinatown
The Conversation
F for Fake
The Parallax View
Murder on the Orient Express
and don't forget
McQ

 

[PMF]

Hard to beat the late 1930s, but the early 1970s were also very good, particularly 1974:

Blazing Saddles
Young Frankenstein
The Godfather Part II
Chinatown
The Conversation
F for Fake
The Parallax View
Murder on the Orient Express
and don't forget
McQ

More from 1974:
Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore
Amarcord
Benji
Claudine
Day for Night
Earthquake
The Great Gatsby
Harry & Tonto
Hearts and Minds
Lacombe, Lucien
Lenny
The Longest Yard
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot
The Towering Inferno
A Woman under the Influence

 

[MartinP.]

Not necessarily. Is Schindler's List a great film? I think it might be but I derive no pleasure whatsoever from it. In fact, I doubt Spielberg wants us to derive pleasure from or be "entertained" by it. It affects us emotionally and that can be an indication of greatness. It could also mean we're being shamelessly manipulated by the film makers. I think that's why (at least when it was first released) a crappy movie like Love Story is thought of as great. "Hey, it made me cry so it must be great." I saw it opening night and I was dry eyed as I heard sobs and sniffles through out the theater!

The last couple lines say more about you than the film, but, as regards to the former, I think one can get pleasure from enlightenment and knowledge. Satisfaction can come from learning about history, or something you don't know. One can get satisfaction from that film knowing that there were some people who behaved in life affirming ways under difficult circumstances.

The thing about movie discussions is that people always seem to want to be agreed with as to their own tastes, but if you take food, for example, if you like a great tomato and someone else abhors them, neither of you really care.

Also, with movies, what's considered great at one time seems to change over time. I asked someone once what movies they thought were great and he said what I think is a wonderful answer, "The ones I'd still like to see,"

 

[Thomas T]

The last couple lines say more about you than the film .... The thing about movie discussions is that people always seem to want to be agreed with as to their own tastes.

I'll take the first statement as a compliment. Pauline Kael's (not to mention John Simon's) review which came out a few days after I'd seen it vindicated my feelings. As to the second statement, I couldn't care less about someone agreeing with my own taste. I've always marched to my own drum and my critical faculties have served me well. If someone agrees, nice but if they don't, so what? The thing is to respect different opinions. I may think ABC is a piece of crap and I'll say so but I would never chastise someone else for liking it. The problem is that people take it too personally. If they like ABC and I say it's crap, they get upset because the implication is that they have bad taste which they resent. Nothing is further from the truth. It simply means they liked it.

 

[John Dirk]

I remember when HTF was a nice distraction from my real world problems.

 

[benbess]

1940 was pretty good imho. My list for that year so far is below, although I know many of these movies are good rather great.
1.Rebecca
2.Fantasia
3.Pinocchio
4.The Philadelphia Story
5.Waterloo Bridge
6. His Girl Friday
7.The Shop Around the Corner
8. Foreign Correspondent
9. Boom Town
10. The Westerner
11. The Long Voyage Home
12. Abe Lincoln of Illinois
13. The Thief of Bagdad
14. The Grapes of Wrath
15. Dark Command
16. The Mark of Zorro
17. The Great Dictator
18. Strike Up the Band
19. The Grapes of Wrath
20. Brother Orchid
etc.

 

[Todd J Moore]

I have a fondness for 1953 myself. Oh, sure, a lot of that has to do with 3-D, but let's look at the list for 3-D and not 3-D:

1. Abbott and Costello Go to Mars
2. The Band Wagon
3. Beast From 20,000 Fathoms
4. Cease Fire!
5. Charge at Feather River
6. Devil's Canyon
7. Fort Ti
8. From Here to Eternity
9. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
10. The Glass Web
11. Gun Fury
12. Hannah Lee
13. Hondo
14. House of Wax
15. How to Marry a Millionaire
16. I, Confess
17. I, the Jury
18. Inferno
19. Invaders From Mars
20. Island in the Sky
21. It Came From Outer Space
22. Kiss Me Kate
23. Man in the Dark
24. The Maze
25. Miss Sadie Thompson
26. Money From Home
27. The Moonlighter
28. Peter Pan
29. The Robe
30. Robot Monster
31. Roman Holiday
32. Sangaree
33. Scared Stiff
34. Second Chance
35. Shane
36. Stalag 17
37. The Stranger Wore a Gun
38. Those Redheads From Seattle
39. War of the Worlds
40. Wings of the Hawk

There's more, of course.

 

[SeanSKA]

You forgot some other fine films from that year, some of which I think are great while others are not, but are popular among us.

The Incredible Shrinking Man
3:10 to Yuma
The Seventh Seal
Wild Strawberries
Throne of Blood
Old Yeller
Gunfight at the OK Corral
Pai Joey
The Enemy Below
Raintree County
The Spirit of St. Louis
Nights of Cabiria
Desk Set

I'll admit I haven't seen most of these...
I also forgot "Silk Stockings " on my initial list