Sorry if I reacted over the top in some parts. Just writing my opinion. I am not a huge fan of “Lord Of The Rings Trilogy” (not even a simple fan, either) but claiming that it climbed among the 1000 Greatest Films Of All Time List just because some fanboys wanted to is totally wrong. There is a big amount of critics and widely known film-makers that adore it.

“You might have been a bit more indulgent towards us if you only knew how many fences we have to cross to make a film. Filmmakers like us will be gratified if people just accept the fact that we are fenced in. You are a fence yourselves, the most ominous, perhaps.”

“A true film cannon should honor the most artistic achievements from every era, and every era should be represented in equal measure.”

This resonates with the earlier comment about how nice it would be to isolate specific genres, periods, etc. within the list of 1000 to give them their due recognition. I would love to embark on a series that focuses on one frame of reference after another. We'll see if I have time to do this after I finish the 1000…

In the film world, the same is true today. There is no respect for filmmakers working with the medium outside the established credos or entertainment industry (Hollywood). The art of film is evolving, and yet critics/viewers seem unable to adapt to new approaches. Filmmaking has evolved out of carnival entertainment, as vaudeville, as popular theater, and genre based narrative structures that peaked in the 50's, 60's, and 70's, taking on much greater realism before backsliding into the special effects blockbuster comic book (a hi-tech version of the virtual amusement park).

Meanwhile, filmmakers throughout the world are exploring qualities of the medium that have led to entirely different narrative structures (and experiences) which are full of creative possibilities that have largely been ignored.

A true film cannon should honor the most artistic achievements from every era, and every era should be represented in equal measure. Are there fewer, or lower quality films being made today in the world? Did the art form peak in the 50's and 60's? I don't think so. The medium has continued to evolve, and not only become more sophisticated in many ways, but more innovative at the same time as it has spread to the world at large.

In the last 25 years film has truly become a medium of expression that is world wide, and the films being made throughout the world not only reflect these different cultural sensibilities, but inform the medium with unique approaches to film narrative, all of which deserve recognition among the film canons.

How many John Ford films do we need to recognize before we understand his valuable contribution to cinema? Certainly not more than what make up the entire list of films recognized from the new millenium…. just a thought….

That's a good point. Even when you look at some of the polls of films focused only on post 1980 cinema (a couple conducted by Sight and Sound and Empire come to mind) they barely reflect this diversity and cater more to Hollywood in the Lynch-Scorsese vein, in other words, genre-influenced cinema in the post-genre era.

At any rate, sounds like you have some valuable resources at your disposal, which definitely speaks to an advantage we have in the online era of cinephilia.

Asian cinema is definitely horribly misrepresented though, especially considering how prolific they are; Japan alone has released as many great movies as any European nation, and have been for just as long if not longer than some, and I'd personally put them right behind the US. Yet only a few directors, out of potentially hundreds, are represented and even Kurosawa's films that are typically considered among his worst are included while no mention of others.

That's like complaining about the inevitable, though. I think TSPDT should create a few top lists for particular regions or nations of the world, particularly those that are lacking on the main list. For instance, there could be one for Asian cinema, eventually maybe for individual nations such as Japan, Eastern European cinema and so on, alongside maybe one for experimental cinema and one for documentary cinema.

After all, the main focus is still the top 1000, however there are a good deal of possible extensions and side projects that could fill its gaps and cover areas that such a canon can't accomplish by its very nature. This would leave room for many to broaden their scopes, or just for beginners to find a larger selection and maybe give some recommendations for those with alternative tastes. That's not to say there isn't some idiosyncrasy (Russell's 'The Devils' being a surprising dead center of the list!), but more variation on the site will only enhance the entire cinematic experiment.

I think this is possible because if such a course were taken those lists wouldn't need to be as explicit as, say, the yearly updated 20th century list; there could even by another link entitled 'other lists' that could include several others that wouldn't need to be constantly update or so detailed, more like continually in 'work in progress' mode.

http://www.imdb.com/board/bd0000010/thread/1476...

It happens that the weight of the polls (and especially the national polls) is smaller than individual votes in Bill's compilation. I know that TSPDT includes questionable lists (100 Most Daring Movies Ever Made, The 100 Greatest Guy Movies Ever Made, etc.) but his weight is very low (or zero).

I've written to Bill several times in the past about the lack of representation in World Cinema, and the general bias towards films made prior to the 1980's when cinema really became a world wide art form (even those films included from the last 30 years have mostly been made by directors who made their mark in earlier generations. It took Sight and Sound less than a generation to acknowledge the great European and Japanese filmmakers of the 50's and 60's, but contemporary innovators and masters of the medium barely seem to get a sniff from the historical cannons.
I think that one “problem” today is that the “art of film” has not only been expanded, but redefined by filmmakers in other parts of the world, and that comparisons are not so easy to make when considering the variety of sophisticated styles at play these days. Cinema has essentially outgrown the “genre film” almost everywhere except in hollywood where most films being produced are not only redundant and cliche ridden, but highly unimaginative, except where special effects are concerned.
That being said, I think that Bill's list is a very valuable resource (at least concerning films made up through the mid 1970's). But as for the last 35 years, there are much better resources for tapping the pulse of modern filmmaking. I quite like Film Comment as a domestic resource, but use multiple resources (The Cinemateque, metacritic, Fipresci etc,) to stay in touch with the best of what's out there…