Amazon's Hot 100 DVD's
I just found a list of Amazon's 100 Essential DVD's. I'm always intrigued by "100 best lists" and I often wonder how they will hold up over time. Many times I see lists where you can tell the age of the people involved in making up the list because all the top listed movies are limited to a particular period of time. I've seen lists where I know the people selecting the '100 Best' had to have been under forty just because most of the movies came out during the last thirty years.
Ordinary People and Schindler's List made the top ten on the Amazon list, which I found curious. Both are wonderful, well acted, and highly crafted movies but TOP 10! I had to look up Ordinary People because I didn't remember it. I'd put Star Wars, Godfather, and the Wizard of OZ well ahead of either of these two.
I sometimes wonder what criteria I would use to determine what makes a 'classic' movie. I think about the Dirty Harry Series. I just recently noticed that I don't have any of them on DVD, and for some reason several of them are out of print, but think about the impact Dirty Harry has had on American Culture. Just say "Make my day" and it immediately conjures up an image of Clint Eastwood with his hand cannon. I can't think of a similar impact that either Ordinary People or Schindler's List had on American Culture.
But there are several curiosities about the Amazon List, they have Hitchcock's Rear Window and Vertigo listed ahead of Psycho while Notorious isn't even on the list. They have Chicago on the list but not Top Hat. (I thought Chicago was unwatchable.) 4 Weddings and a Funeral, Usual Suspects, When Harry Met Sally and Blue Velvet are all good movies but are any these better than High Noon, which didn't make the list? How about Stage Coach, the Searchers, or the Hustler with Paul Newman? But all lists are subjective. I'm sure my list of the top 100 movies would change with the criteria I used. In the future will Back to the Future, Lethal Weapon, Die Hard, Batman, Spiderman, Indiana Jones, and Dirty Harry be considered Classics? Or will they fade? How about Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings? Who knows?
Ordinary People and Schindler's List made the top ten on the Amazon list, which I found curious. Both are wonderful, well acted, and highly crafted movies but TOP 10! I had to look up Ordinary People because I didn't remember it. I'd put Star Wars, Godfather, and the Wizard of OZ well ahead of either of these two.
I sometimes wonder what criteria I would use to determine what makes a 'classic' movie. I think about the Dirty Harry Series. I just recently noticed that I don't have any of them on DVD, and for some reason several of them are out of print, but think about the impact Dirty Harry has had on American Culture. Just say "Make my day" and it immediately conjures up an image of Clint Eastwood with his hand cannon. I can't think of a similar impact that either Ordinary People or Schindler's List had on American Culture.
But there are several curiosities about the Amazon List, they have Hitchcock's Rear Window and Vertigo listed ahead of Psycho while Notorious isn't even on the list. They have Chicago on the list but not Top Hat. (I thought Chicago was unwatchable.) 4 Weddings and a Funeral, Usual Suspects, When Harry Met Sally and Blue Velvet are all good movies but are any these better than High Noon, which didn't make the list? How about Stage Coach, the Searchers, or the Hustler with Paul Newman? But all lists are subjective. I'm sure my list of the top 100 movies would change with the criteria I used. In the future will Back to the Future, Lethal Weapon, Die Hard, Batman, Spiderman, Indiana Jones, and Dirty Harry be considered Classics? Or will they fade? How about Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings? Who knows?
posted by Rob Finch at 8:13 AM
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