Tag: 1940s

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Features, Reviews

Something Like a Filmography: The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail (1945)

Something Like a Filmography takes a (brief) look at the filmography of Akira Kurosawa. Twice a month, Chris and Jon share their impressions of each film, both on its own terms and in terms of Kurosawa’s legacy and its intersection in the Cinema Dual hosts’ lives. FROM THE BOX: The fourth film from Akira Kurosawa is based on a legendary twelfth-century incident in which the lord Yoshitsune … Continue reading Something Like a Filmography: The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail (1945)

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Features, Reviews

Something Like a Filmography: Sanshiro Sugata Part II (1945)

Something Like a Filmography takes a (brief) look at the filmography of Akira Kurosawa. Twice a month, Chris and Jon share their impressions of each film, both on its own terms and in terms of Kurosawa’s legacy and its intersection in the Cinema Dual hosts’ lives. FROM THE BOX: Kurosawa’s first film was such a success that the studio leaned on the director to make a sequel. … Continue reading Something Like a Filmography: Sanshiro Sugata Part II (1945)

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Features, Reviews

Something Like a Filmography: The Most Beautiful (1944)

Something Like a Filmography takes a (brief) look at the filmography of Akira Kurosawa. Twice a month, Chris and Jon share their impressions of each film, both on its own terms and in terms of Kurosawa’s legacy and its intersection in the Cinema Dual hosts’ lives. FROM THE BOX: This portrait of female volunteer workers at an optics plant during World War II, shot on location at … Continue reading Something Like a Filmography: The Most Beautiful (1944)

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Features, Reviews

Something Like a Filmography: Sanshiro Sugata (1943)

Something Like a Filmography takes a (brief) look at the filmography of Akira Kurosawa. Twice a month, Chris and Jon share their impressions of each film, both on its own terms and in terms of Kurosawa’s legacy and its intersection in the Cinema Dual hosts’ lives. FROM THE BOX: Kurosawa’s effortless debut is based on a novel by Tsuneo Tomita about the rivalry between judo and jujitsu. … Continue reading Something Like a Filmography: Sanshiro Sugata (1943)

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Features

Lost in the Mail: Jon’s 2022 Sight And Sound Ballot

When it comes to compiling “Best _ of All Time” lists, I generally find the process more interesting than the final lists themselves. For me personally, I obsess for hours over the internal debates and criteria which only make sense to me. Once those decisions are made, all that is left to do is record it somewhere and throw it into the void of whoever reads it. For the Sight and Sound list, I find it fascinating how the simple passage of ten years along with structural changes result in movies being added, removed, or changed in ranking. Do I have a lot invested in how any particular movie is ranked on the Sight and Sound list? Aside from Seventh Seal, no. Do I think it’s cool that recent movies like Portrait of a Lady on Fire or Moonlight got onto the list? Absolutely. I’ll be absolutely curious how those movies mature in stature for the 2032 list. That’s why I mostly don’t get too hung up on particular rankings, because these “Best _ of All Time” lists don’t establish some kind of eternal metaphysical truth, but ironically mark a very specific moment in time for the people involved.

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Features

Lost in the Mail: Chris’s 2022 Sight and Sound Ballot

What’s in a list, anyway?

It’s something I’ve struggled with throughout my time as an online writer. But when you’re considering a set list of, as the BFI so brazenly puts it, the greatest films of all time, it becomes apparent that a list – any list – must encompass both a sense of inflexibility as well as transience. That’s what makes the Sight and Sound list so important, both in its cadence (the poll is only held once a decade) and its content. Our first episode of the new year has Jon and I catching up on our blind spots based on the most recent results, and it raised an important point about the nature of the list. Moreso than a canon of the greatest films ever made, it’s a sign o’ the times, to quote another legend who had their pulse on the shape of an art form over multiple decades. The changes in this year’s list reflects a broadening of critics who bring a level of diversity that reveals shifting viewpoints in cinema, and acts to push against the walls of an establishment that has held them back for decades. It’s a welcome shakeup to my mind, and it’s helped me to reconsider my own personal canon and question the biases that informed its creation.

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