Feeling List-Less

If you stop and think about it (though I really must advise that you don't), there is nothing more useless than any article titled "The List of the Greatest ____". It doesn't matter what the topic of that list is going to be, reading it is going to be a waste of your time. You see, every human brings their own bias into play anytime items are put into order. It could be as simple as the order at which things are packed, but every one will have their preferred way of doing it. There are some people out there who think shoes should be the first item put into a suitcase while others insist pants should be relegated to the bottom of the bag, because depending on your destination you may want to change into flip-flops as soon as you get there. (These people are stupid. It is clearly shoes first. Who can even argue this?) So, that list is nothing more than opinion. The worst place for lists like this may be in the sports world. Not only are sports fans notoriously biased towards their childhood heroes, they are also insanely stubborn. Trying to talk a sports fan out of a position they have held since they were 10 years old is like trying to get a statue to shift positions. At this point, I don't even argue "best players" anymore, I just try to get it down to five players and then agree that the order is subject to personal preference (and even that is a struggle). It is all heart, no brain. Still, I think I prefer that style to the way the second-most annoying group of list-makers (movie lovers) operate.

Every decade a UK Magazine called "Sight & Sounds" polls a group of directors, critics, producers and other movie enthusiast to determine what they believes to be the "Greatest Film of All-Time". This kind of poll is exactly what the insular world of movie-makers love - the chance snottily praise old, foreign movie while simultaneously feeling as though what they do needs to be taken seriously, instead of the insanely sweet gig it actually is. In reading some break-downs of the list you can almost hear the critics patting themselves on the back for only having two movie made in this century on the list while largely ignoring comedies, as though including those would take away from the gravitas of this exercise. Anyway, in every one of the previous polls completed since 1962, "Citizen Kane" had come out on top. Now, I never totally understood the praise for "Citizen Kane" but I figured they were taking into account the cultural impact (the poll makes it clear that you don't have to vote for what you think was the 'best' movie of all-time, just the 'greatest', which is a rather subjective term) and let them have it. Since I wasn't around when it was released I couldn't really argue the point. However, in this particular poll, "Citizen Kane" was dropped from the number 1 position and had to settle for runner-up. (You can see the entire list here.) The new "Greatest Film of All-Time?" Alfred Hitchcock's "Vertigo."

This result produced an emotion in me that normally only comes around when a baseball player is voted into the Hall of Fame (another process in which the voting population thinks far too highly of themselves) after being on the ballot for 10 years. I'll grant you that sometimes a guy has to wait a year or two based on other people up for debate, but if he hasn't made the Hall after that I'm left to conclude he isn't worthy of induction. After all, it is not like his stats will suddenly change 8 years into retirement. The same principle applies in this situation. It is not like "Vertigo" was re-released in the last couple of years with 10 minutes of previously unseen footage, nor was "Citizen Kane" digitally remastered to appeal to a younger audience by making Rosebud a laptop. They are the same movies they have always been, so what changed for the first time in 50 years? I know they expanded the number of voters for this year's poll, which can only lead me to one conclusion: too many people voting a new way just to appear different. There is nothing worse than a voter who feels it is their job to "mix things up" as a way of justifying their inclusion in a poll. I assume this is why insanely popular movies like "Wizard of Oz" or "Casablanca" were excluded - any one would vote for those films. It takes a real 'film buff' to think "Man With A Movie Camera" is the 8th Greatest Film Of All-Time.

Look, I will grant you that people have the right to change their minds. My own personal list for the Greatest Movies of All-Time is constantly-shifted based on my mood, how high-brow I'm feeling that day and the last time I caught "Shawshank Redemption" on TNT. (In thinking it over, my personal list of the Greatest Movies of All-Time would not excite many critics. There would be a lot of comedies, buddy-action flicks and sports movies. Also a lot more movies from this century, because I don't think old automatically equals good.) The difference is that I will concede that my list is personal and filled with the movies I like to watch. I can't help shake this feeling that a majority of these voters don't actually like these movies, they have simply become convinced that what they have come up with will change the way films are made. It is the same self-importance which resulted in "The Artist" winning the Best Picture Oscar this year - too many voters think Oscar winners also need to make statements and don't just pick the best movie which has come out in the last 12 months. It is almost as if they are afraid that voting for the most popular movie that year is a faux pas which would get their voting rights revoked. Honestly, if that is they way they are voting I would almost rather they go the sports-fan route and dig their heels in, never allowing their minds to be changed. At least that way we would know they were voting with their hearts, which is better than voting while trying to impress your peers.