perfect movies

[molly1216]

the Professionals (1966) which i like to watch at least once a year...is one my own personal 'perfect' movies...a movie to which nothing could be added nor subtracted to make it any better.
I have a few films which I watch periodically with no false notes, movies that that just hang together nicely. Brook's The Professionals is a delight from start to finish, cast, plot , dialogue.....the kind of action adventure you can use to say.. THIS is how such films should be made.

Hawk's Thing from another World..heck even Carpenter's remake have nothing i would change to make them better; one could only make them different. Hawk's film has the perfect cast, the perfect cheesy monster, great production values, great lines...lovely film.

Richard Lester's Three and Four musketeers...perfect balance of drama/action/comedy, sexiness, blood thirstiness, and historical accuracy - all the little side bits and incidental items either added by GM Fraser or Lester...such a rich texture, the kind of film that benefits from repeated watching. 35 years on and i'm still noticing new things.

Forbidden Planet. - lovely film...from the trivia i read that even the original test audience thought it was perfect and after test screenings, they made no more cuts to the film. the sound track, the foley art, the production art...even the goofy costumes and ray guns...marvelous film...from am age where science fiction was considered kiddie fare, this film has all the high art and production values as a big cinema production.

His Girl Friday (1940) you can make and remake the Front Page all you want, but they have never been as good as this version. it seems simply body swapping Hildy Johnson from a man to a woman was exactly what the story needed. It is harder to understand an editor's attachment to a good reporter, than Cary Grant not wanting his wife to remarry AND wanting his reporter back, it gives him twice the incentive to be a conniving jerk. There is nothing about it that could be changed without taking away from the entirety.


what are your perfect films? Blade Runner? Godfather II?

[HGervais]

Right off the top of my head, Rear Window, Rififi, Network, The Double Life of Veronique, Casablanca, Shaun of the Dead, Kung Fu Hustle, Duck Soup and Jaws. I'm sure there are many more but as I said, those were the first ones that popped in my mind where I don't think there is anything that could be changed to make them better.

[yellow ledbetter]

Fargo, The Prestige, Apocalypto, O Brother Where Art Thou, Unforgiven, Wizard of Oz, The Sandlot, Geronimo, The Big Lebowski and Observe and Report

[molly1216]

Fargo, The Prestige, Apocalypto, O Brother Where Art Thou, Unforgiven, Wizard of Oz, The Sandlot, Geronimo, The Big Lebowski and Observe and Report

Observe and Report?
it's hard to consider a seth rogen film on this list...i guess i will have to actually watch it

[yellow ledbetter]

I didn't expect it to be as great as it was, but to me it's very much in the Lebowski mode and it's nowhere near as mainstream as any of Rogen's other films. I think you'll like it

[Dan Mancini]

I'm not sure any movie is "perfect," but the ones I'd rate as damn close are:

Seven Samurai
Goodfellas
The Wizard of Oz
Casablanca
To Kill a Mockingbird

Maybe The Conversation.

It's also possible that I'd put Inception on the list, but I need to see it a couple more times to know for sure.

[Gabriel Girard]

12 Angry Men
Zodiac
The Godfather
Taxi Driver
Chinatown
M
Ali : Fear Eats The Soul
Dr Strangelove : Or How I Learned To Stopped Worrying And Loved The Bomb
Network
Night Moves

[BenShultz]

I'm not sure any movie is "perfect," but the ones I'd rate as damn close are:

Seven Samurai
Goodfellas
The Wizard of Oz
Casablanca
To Kill a Mockingbird

Maybe The Conversation.

This movie is perfect.

[Dan Mancini]

I'm not sure any movie is "perfect," but the ones I'd rate as damn close are:

Seven Samurai
Goodfellas
The Wizard of Oz
Casablanca
To Kill a Mockingbird

Maybe The Conversation.

This movie is perfect.

Fair enough. And Ikiru.

[Steve T Power]

Raiders of the Lost Ark


Close and lock this thread.

[Bryan Pope]

Among the movies in which I absolutely would not change a single thing (so, "perfect," as far as I'm concerned):

Jaws
Rear Window
Singin' in the Rain
Casablanca
The Godfather
Raiders of the Lost Ark
The Last Picture Show
2001
A Prairie Home Companion
Nashville
Short Cuts
A Christmas Story
Alien
Cabaret
The Wizard of Oz
12 Angry Men
Network
Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
The Conversation
Sunset Boulevard
All About Eve

Psycho would have made my list were it not for the horrid psychoanalysis at the end.

[BenShultz]

I'm not sure any movie is "perfect," but the ones I'd rate as damn close are:

Seven Samurai
Goodfellas
The Wizard of Oz
Casablanca
To Kill a Mockingbird

Maybe The Conversation.

This movie is perfect.

Fair enough. And Ikiru.

I just remember that because it was one of the main reviews that convinced me to check it out. And I definitely agree with you.

Some of my picks:

Alien
The Truman Show
The Godfather I and II
Le Samourai
Seven Samurai
Yojimbo
The Third Man
Hot Fuzz
No Country for Old Men
Fargo
Carpenter's The Thing
Dead Ringers

[Mach6]

Schlinder's List: Spielberg at the top of his game with an incredible cast in Neeson, Kingsley, & Fiennes giving unforgettable performances. Over 3 hours long, it never drags, every scene matters, & it still mesmerizes me every time I watch it. I wouldn't dare even think of changing a single second of it.

There Will Be Blood: The examination & character study of what greed & power can do to somebody in early 20th century America is executed perfectly. Daniel Day Lewis is phenomenal but let's also give a ton of credit to Paul Dano's performance as the equally ambitious preacher. The powerful soundtrack creates a dark atmosphere especially during the oil rig/drill on fire scene. Finally, those last ten minutes, damn(!), now that’s how you destroy your competition mentally & physically.

Ghostbusters: I agree with everything The F This Movie podcast had to say about it. It’s a once in a lifetime movie that had the right mix of a great cast, script, special effects, action, & comedy. Really, is there one scene or even one joke in Ghostbusters that falls flat?

Wall-E: Most of Pixar's movies deserve the “perfect” rating, but Wall-E is the best of them. The top-notch animation, the Wall-E/Eve love story that is 100X more compelling than most live action humans ones, the smart environmental message about us lazy humans having too much stuff that doesn’t beat you over the head with it like some movies we know (cough, Avatar, cough), & an ending that always make me shed a few tears in a good way.

Others: Apocalypto, The Godfather, Predator, Die Hard, Jaws, & The Usual Suspects.

Aliens would've made my list except for the part where The Alien Queen knew how to operate the elevator & also knew which floor to get off. I know I'm nitpicking, but there had to be a more logical way to get her on Bishop's ship.

[J.M. Vargas]

Off the top of my head:

LATE SPRING (Ozu)
THE USUAL SUSPECTS (Singer) - I've enjoyed this one more with each new repeat viewing; for a twist-at-the-end flick this is pretty remarkable.
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (Kubrick)
AIRPLANE! (ZAZ)
IKIRU (Kurosawa)
THE FRENCH CONNECTION (Friedkin)
THE SOUND OF MUSIC (Wise) - I'll pretend that 'Edelweiss' doesn't exist.
THE THIRD MAN (Reed)
THE GODFATHER I & II (Coppola)
NORTH BY NORTHWEST (Hitchcock)
DOUBLE INDEMNITY (Wilder)
METROPOLIS: THE COMPLETE VERSION (Lang)
THE FLY (Cronenberg)
CHUNGKING EXPRESS (Kar-Wai)
GOODFELLAS (Scorsese)
CASABLANCA (Curtiz)
SOUTH PARK: BIGGER, LONGER & UNCUT (Parker)

A few that came pretty close but found one or two irreversible-to-me flaws: Chinatown, Sansho the Bailiff, Ghostbusters, Fargo, Apocalypse Now, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Ran, Pierrot le fou, Raging Bull, Tokyo Story, Jaws, The Exorcist, Walkabout, Psycho (you know damn well what needs to be cut out!).

[Andrew Forbes]

Aliens would've made my list except for the part where The Alien Queen knew how to operate the elevator & also knew which floor to get off. I know I'm nitpicking, but there had to be a more logical way to get her on Bishop's ship.

Why do people always complain about this? The elevators automatically return to the platform level when not in use, which is why the elevator Ripley used to get down wasn't waiting for her when she returned. The second elevator was called when Ripley hit all the call buttons, the Queen got in (that seems like an appropriate level of reasoning) and the elevator returned to the platform level with her in it. Where is the problem?

[Andrew Forbes]

I've got to echo Ben's picks of Le Samourai, Yojimbo, The Third Man and Dead Ringers. Molly, excellent call on The Professionals. It might just be my favorite western with its intelligent script, flawless casting and stylish but unobtrusive direction. Also, Woody Strode shooting dynamite arrows.

As for my own suggestions: Master and Commander, Ran, Army of Shadows, My Winnipeg, The Furies, Sawdust and Tinsel, Pickup on South Street, Videodrome.

[Mark Van Hook]

Day of the Jackal

[hoytereden]

Off the top of my head-
King Kong-'33 version and while we're on that theme........
Beauty and the Beast-Cocteau
plus
Bringing Up Baby
Mr. Hulot's Holiday
The Haunting
The Narrow Margin
The Set-Up
Here Comes Mr. Jordan
Out of the Past

I agree with both of Molly's sci-fi pics.

[Steve T Power]

Have to add:

Master and Commander
Sword of the Stranger
Blade Runner

[ccb]

Assassination Bureau
The Cruel Sea
Cleopatra (1934)
Footlight Parade
L.A. Confidential
Radio Days
Sunset Boulevard

[yellow ledbetter]

Kingdom of Heaven
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
Inglourious Basterds
The Cable Guy

[Dimwitted]

Primer
Being There
Sixth Sense

[Dunnyman]

Casablanca-All the elements work perfectly, what more can you ask for?
Bringing Up Baby-Screwball, done perfectly.
Star Wars-Oh yeah.
The Godfather-How many stars did this make?
Suspicion and/or North By Northwest-The Master, at his finest.

[Future Man]

Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Alien
The Court Jester
The General
City Lights

[Future Man]

A few that came pretty close but found one or two irreversible-to-me flaws: ...Raiders of the Lost Ark,...Jaws (you know damn well what needs to be cut out!).

Do tell...

[J.M. Vargas]

That was attached to "Psycho" [Psycho (you know damn well what needs to be cut out!).]; the postcript scene explaining everything.

[Future Man]

That was attached to "Psycho" [Psycho (you know damn well what needs to be cut out!).]; the postcript scene explaining everything.

But these two were in your list of close-but-flawed films Mr. Vargas.

[azul017]

Blade Runner
The Adventures of Robin Hood

For some reason, Raiders just isn't perfect. There are at least two things I'd subtract/change from it, namely that huge plot hole near the end.

[J.M. Vargas]

OK then. For "Jaws" I simply can't get past the removal from the movie of the affair between Brody's wife and Hooper that's in the book; I know one shouldn't compare a book to its movie version (different beasts) but I loved the book so much that to see this key plot thread dropped just soured me completely from it and made the fully-developed-characters-in-print Hooper and Ellen into cinematic cardboards. Even without that fatal flaw though the fact Hooper survives the shark attack to his metal cage and then shows up later to swim ashore with Brody (where was he all that time?) is patently ridiculous. In "Raiders" there are just a surprisingly huge number of continuity errors (too many to mention; check IMDB's 'goofs' section about this movie) that, after seeing the movie countless times, just became too much for me to not notice.

The flaws in both "Raiders" and "Jaws" are minimal in the grand scheme of things but we're talking about PERFECT movies here, and these tiny flaws are just too much for me to ignore when expecting perfection.

[molly1216]

i have a problem with a number of the films here...but it's purely subjective i resist the urge to tell someone else what to like.

[Bryan Pope]

OK then. For "Jaws" I simply can't get past the removal from the movie of the affair between Brody's wife and Hooper that's in the book; I know one shouldn't compare a book to its movie version (different beasts) but I loved the book so much that to see this key plot thread dropped just soured me completely from it and made the fully-developed-characters-in-print Hooper and Ellen into cinematic cardboards.

Interesting perspective, and I can certainly respect that. Personally, though, I think this was one of the (many) examples of why the screenplay was a *vast improvement* over Benchley's novel. I think the change (1) allowed the movie to be a horror/adventure movie rather than a soap opera, (2) streamlined the conflicts aboard the Orca (there was enough tension without this added baggage) and (3) allowed me to sympathize with Ellen, who I thought was very well developed and had some interesting nuances.

I agree, though, about Hooper's reappearance at the end. As happy as I was that he survived, I think the ending would have been stronger had he not. On the other hand, his survival meant he could show up at the beginning of Piranha 3D -- so hooray!

[Tom B]

Just to toss out a few that haven't been tossed:

McCabe & Mrs. Miller
Thieves Like Us
Shadow of a Doubt
Salesman
Waterloo Bridge
The Virgin Spring
La Strada
Stage Door
Picnic at Hanging Rock
Make Way for Tomorrow
Bambi
Laura

[Ash22]

The Wild Bunch
Batman
Aliens
Seven Samurai
Animal House
The Straight Story
Midnight Run
Halloween (not the Rob Zombie version)

[Burson_Fouch]

I'll have to disagree about Psycho not being perfect. Even the cheesy psycho-babble at end the works for me, since I've always considered Psycho to be as much of a comedy, albeit the blackest of black comedies, as a horror film. That scene always makes me laugh and brilliantly sets up the close-up and fade out that immediately comes afterwards.


Other perfect films for me where I wouldn't want to change a thing:

2001: A Space Odyssey
On Her Majesties Secret Service
The Haunting(1962)
Suspiria
Petulia
Goodfellas
Citizen Kane
Frankenstein (1931)
Black Sunday (1960)
Midnight Cowboy
The Conversation

[Dan Mancini]

Batman

Just sayin'...

[Jim_Thomas]

Have to add:Blade Runner

Which version?

[Dunnyman]

"perfect films?" to me that's saying zero flaws as I see them, and that's pretty damn rare to me as I nitpick and obsess over little details. Depending on the type of film, I can and will overlook plot holes, but usually something shows up that keep it from ever being "perfect".
However:
The Trouble With Harry-Crackling script, incredible cinematography, superb acting, it has it all.
Star Wars, don't care if the FX are dated, don't care how hokey it gets, it got me out of my seat and cheering, and I completely forgot San Jose, CA as I was transported to another galaxy, far, far away.
Bringing Up Baby-Two of Hollywood's best, AT their very best, it never slows down, never drags, and the laughs keep coming. I was tempted to put His Girl Friday, but it moves almost too fast in spots, as the rapidfire dialogue hits so quickly, you'll see it again and again to get it all.
Robin Hood- swashes, perfectly buckled by the Man. Pageantry, thrills, diabolical villains, damsel in distress and one hell of a swordfight. 70 years of FX improvements and Ridley Scott still came up short...
Mame-ok, Rosalind Russell gets her due here, laughs non-stop, tons of heart, characters that you can never forget.
Bride of Frankenstein-this is how to make a scary, suspenseful monster movie, damnit! Talented actors, brilliant director, and a great story, and you have an enduring classic for the ages.
Up-animation perfection, and characters you care about until you're in tears, both sad and joyful.
Life and Death Of Peter Sellers-take an insane concept that can work only if your lead is one of the finest living actors on earth, and ask him to play the ultimate chameleon, and bring to life one of the most tortured guys in Hollywood. Too bad it was HBO for had it been released in theaters, Rush would have another Oscar. Damned effective movie making.

[tucco]

GOODFELLAS
FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE
THE SWIMMER
BLACK CHRISTMAS ('74)
RAN
OF MICE AND MEN (Chaney, Meredith)
STAR WARS
JAWS
DIRTY HARRY
RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK
THE WIZARD OF OZ
FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE
HARD TIMES (Bronson)
APOCOLYPTO
THE FELLOWHIP OF THE RING
THE DEPARTED
WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?

[Attrage]

I agree with a lot of the movies listed here so I won't repeat, but I will add one more: Michael Mann's Heat. From the brilliantly staged opening sequence involving the armoured car holdup, to the incredibly staged shootout after the bank robbery, to *that* amazing ending (no spoilers), it's just awesome from start to finish. A top director truly at his peak, IMO.

[Steve T Power]

I agree with a lot of the movies listed here so I won't repeat, but I will add one more: Michael Mann's Heat. From the brilliantly staged opening sequence involving the armoured car holdup, to the incredibly staged shootout after the bank robbery, to *that* amazing ending (no spoilers), it's just awesome from start to finish. A top director truly at his peak, IMO.

I love Heat, immensely, like just about everything else from Michael Mann, but as I get older, Robert DeNiro just sours on me more and more. Did this guy ever actually play anyone but "Robert DeNiro"? That whole "immersion method" school of thinking doesn't seem to do jack shit for him.

[Ptolemy]

I thought Robert DiNero did a good job of playing someone other than Robert DeNiro in that movie he made with Bill Murray and Uma Thurman - the name escapes me right now.

[Ash22]

I thought Robert DiNero did a good job of playing someone other than Robert DeNiro in that movie he made with Bill Murray and Uma Thurman - the name escapes me right now.

Mad Dog and Glory

[azul017]

i have a problem with a number of the films here...but it's purely subjective i resist the urge to tell someone else what to like.

Oh c'mon, point out the problems with Blade Runner and Robin Hood.

[ccb]

Great fondness for Quatermass and the Pit despite cheesy effects.

[Attrage]

I'd have to add Empire of the Sun to my list.

[Steve T Power]

I'd have to add Empire of the Sun to my list.

One of the most criminally neglected and underrated flicks in Spielberg's body of work. Should be considered a classic.