Poking around on Sight and Sound's most recent critics/directors poll (from 2002), I somehow missed the lone Filipino critic Joel David's top ten:
Salò (Pasolini)
Manila by Night; City after Dark (Bernal)
Khalnayak (Ghai)
The Opening of Misty Beethoven (Metzger)
Hour of the Furnaces (Solanas)
La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
God Told Me To (Cohen)
La Région centrale (Snow)
Olympiad Berlin 1936 (Riefenstahl)
The Devil in Miss Jones (Damiano)
It's something of a shitstirrer of a list -- indeed, even folks like, say, Bruce LaBruce, John Waters and Roger Corman had fairly conservative choices. None of the usual suspects are here except for Renoir and Reifenstahl. Otherwise, David's list has:
- two films almost impossible for plebes like me to see (Snow and Solanas),
- one Bollywood film (and the description sounds somewhat ludicrous, but what do I know),
- one movie from the director of some favorites from my youth, The Stuff and Q (haven't seen it, but I have it on this cheapo horror anthology packaged with Pieces and Satan's School for Girls),
- two porn films (one, incidentally, enthusiastically reviewed by Roger Ebert upon its release),
- one Filipino film (not Brocka's Maynila Sa Kuko ng Liwanag or De Leon's Sister Stella L. or (my semi-obnoxious favorite) Tahimik's Bakit Dilaw Ang Gitna Nang Bahaghari?),
- and one designed, as it were, to be seen only once (also selected by, surprise, Catherine Breillat and Michael Haneke). (My pervy friend Jane was looking for a copy of Salò on DVD because, as she put it, "the sex was really hot.")
But I do agree, kind of, with David's concluding comments:
So are American porn films better than Citizen Kane? Almost all of them aren't, but a precious handful are... I already found Kane too whiney-white-guy precious the first time I saw it, 20-odd years ago.As fantastic as Citizen Kane is, I'd probably take Touch of Evil over it any day -- no "whiney-white-guy" preciousness there. Posted by the wily filipino at February 12, 2005 06:58 PM
nakakabusog naman ang blog mo! dami kong natutunan at nasilip ko ang marami pang bagay na hindi ko gaanong naiintindihan. tentyu.
Posted by: butch on February 14, 2005 05:30 AMkhalnayak would be an unorthodox choice as someone's top bollywood film, but not a ridiculous ridiculous one--khalnayak was innovative as well as popular. (think of choosing, say, 'pulp fiction' instead of 'citizen kane'. it's certainly a more orthodox choice than 'god told me to', though i also enjoyed it).
Posted by: df on February 19, 2005 12:44 PMJoel David was my thesis adviser in UP. Instead of making us watch classics like "Citizen Kane" or some such films, he showed us "Pink Flamingos" and "The Rocky Horror Picture Show".
I remember his telling me that Sight and Sound wanted him to re-think his list. Heh.
Posted by: kristine on February 28, 2005 09:05 PMKristine: oh do tell more! (Loved your blog.) I'd love to hear about his class as well.
Well, I can safely say that Joel David is one of the smartest people I've met (or ever will meet). His classes can get a little boring because he knows so much about film that he can go on and on and on.
He gave me a good grade on my thesis. Definitely more than I deserved.
Posted by: kristine on March 4, 2005 03:24 AM