Film Canon

Films Considered Best Ever

Aaron Weiss — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 22:31:49 +0000

CinemaFunk's Film Canon is a non-prioritized list of films considered best ever. Doing our very best to not include films that are personal favorites or specific tastes. The utmost consideration will be provide to ensure the below list contains the most important films across the world.

Vertigo

Aaron Weiss — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 00:02:41 +0000

After the mid-1950s Alfred Hitchcock had nothing to prove and attained total control of his filmmaking. Not worried about awards, box office receipts, Hitchcock only cared about telling the story in his head, making America face their biggest fears and fall in love in each of his movies. Nearly all 54 of his films featured the same motifs, Vertigo turned all his common signatures upside down in one of his most intriguing and personal films.

La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc (The Passion of Joan of Arc)

Aaron Weiss — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:44:03 +0000

One of the last great silent french films, La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc has an intensity that is only supplied by images. This silent film is indeed, silent. Director Carl Theodor Dreyer's tale of the last hours of Joan of Arc was originally conceived to not have any musical accompaniment like many silent films of that era.

La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc has no innovative technical achievement of lighting, sound, or anything most other films offer. Instead, this film's achievement is in the mise en scene, the characters, actors and the successful use of close-up and imaging.

Citizen Kane

Aaron Weiss — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:15:51 +0000

I've chosen to start CinemaFunk's Film Canon list with one of the most basic and often included films in any list of "best ofs", Citizen Kane. I don't care if it is cliché, I've had many arguments regarding the greatness of this film. One motion picture and two documentaries have been dedicated to examining the story of Citizen Kane, and for good reason. The story of how Citizen Kane was produced, alongside the story within the film, is one of the America's greatest stories itself.