Placenta Ovaries

BEST MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1960s

The 1960s were the decade where films really started catering to my personal interests. My favorite cinematic decades are the 70s and 80s, which produced the highest amount of perfect movies, the kind of films I dream about, and yearn to discover. And the 60s served as an incredible precursor to that. I've been blown away by a lot the films on my previous decades lists, but the films at the top of this 60s list are ones that make my life feel more complete having seen them.

On the flip side, however, the 60s were also the decade where films got really, really bad. The worst movie I've ever seen in my life is Werckmeister Harmonies from 2000. But the #s 2-6 Worst Movies I've Ever Seen are all from the 1960s, and there are a few more that would make my Bottom 20. It makes sense, I suppose, as this is when the ratings system and censorship laws changed, so film became much more experimental, leading to a wider spectrum of good and bad.

TOP 30 MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1960s


1. Planet of the Apes (1968, Franklin J. Schaffer)
2. Vixen! (1968, Russ Meyer)
3. Django (1966, Sergio Corbucci)
4. Rosemary’s Baby (1968, Roman Polanski)
5. The Collector (1965, William Wyler)

6. Inherit the Wind (1960, Stanley Kramer)
7. Spider Baby (1968, Jack Hill)
8. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964, Jacques Demy)
9. Homicidal (1960, William Castle)
10. Mr. Sardonicus (1960, William Castle)
11. Two Thousand Maniacs (1964, Herschell Gordon Lewis)
12. Viva Las Vegas (1964, George Sidney)
13. The Dirty Dozen (1967, Robert Aldrich)
14. The Gruesome Twosome (1967, Herschell Gordon Lewis)
15. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (1966, Sergio Leone)
16. The Apartment (1960, Billy Wilder)
17. Bye Bye Birdie (1963, George Sidney)
18. The Big Gundown (1966, Sergio Sollima)
19. Another Day, Another Man (1966, Doris Wishman)
20. Love Toy (1968, Doris Wishman)

21. True Grit (1969, Henry Hathaway)
22. Two Women (1960, Vittorio De Sica)
23. The World’s Greatest Sinner (1962, Timothy Carey)
24. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964, Kizo Nagashima & Larry Roemer)
25. Wait Until Dark (1967, Terence Young)
26. Black Sunday (1960, Mario Bava)
27. The Great Silence (1968, Sergio Corbucci)
28. From the Drain (1967, David Cronenberg)
29. Point Blank (1967, John Boorman)
30. For a Few Dollars More (1965, Sergio Leone)

Honorable Mentions: Hitchcock's Psycho, The Birds, and Marnie are all films I really liked when I saw them in 1999, but I haven't seen them since and simply don't remember them well enough to rank.

BOTTOM 5 WORST MOVIES OF THE 1960s
1. Last Year at Marienbad (1961, Alain Resnais)
2. Play Time (1967, Jacques Tati)
3. Faces (1968, John Cassavetes)
4. Two for the Road (1967, Stanley Donen)
5. L'Avventura (1960, Michelangelo Antonioni)

THE 2010 NOMI AWARDS!!!

Here I am, ladies. It’s good to see you again.

And to all you gentlemen out there who didn’t vote for me… here I am as well. And I forgive you.

John Travolta: Sike!!!!! It’s me, John Travolta, baby, and you just got face-off’ed! Nicolas Cage will never forgive you! He’s at home crying right now.

BEST MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1950s

Like the 1940s, I also feel very disconnected from the 50s. There's shitloads more I need to see. I like that this list ended up with a fair amount of variety, though (aside from some director repetition).

TOP 20 MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1950s


1. Singin’ in the Rain (1952, Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly)
2. Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957, Frank Tashlin)
3. House on Haunted Hill (1959, William Castle)
4. The Tingler (1959, William Castle)
5. Sunset Boulevard (1950, Billy Wilder)
6. The Girl Can’t Help It (1956, Frank Tashlin)
7. Summer Stock (1950, Charles Walters)
8. D.O.A. (1950, Rudolph Mate)
9. The Bad Seed (1956, Mervyn LeRoy)
10. The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)
11. Pickup on South Street (1953, Samuel Fuller)
12. Ace in the Hole (1951, Billy Wilder)
13. All That Heaven Allows (1955, Douglas Sirk)
14. Outrage (1950, Ida Lupino)
15. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, Don Siegel)
16. Roman Holiday (1953, William Wyler)
17. A Place in the Sun (1951, George Stevens)
18. Quicksand (1950, Irving Pichel)
19. Elevator to the Gallows (1958, Louis Malle)
20. Private Hell 36 (1954, Don Siegel)

It's also worth noting that the 50s brought about the earliest film I really fucking hate with Jean Renoir's The River from 1951.

January Top 10, Rest of January Reviews

January Top 10
1. Black Dynamite
2. Chopping Mall
3. The Road
4. Avatar
5. The Informant!
6. True Grit
7. Bring It On: Fight to the Finish
8. A Single Man
9. The Good Old Naughty Days
10. City of the Walking Dead

1/28

Chopping Mall (1986, Jim Wynorski, Projected DVD) - 9.0
Some teenagers stay the night in a mall that has recently put in “killbots” for their overnight security, and the killbots waste no time before going crazy and killing everyone in sight. It's really funny and cute. The low budget was likely put entirely into the incredibly-designed robots, and one incredible head explosion, and so it’s a little low on gore, but it still does the best it can, and the death scenes are fairly satisfying. Kelli Maroney, Barbara Crampton, and some dude named John Terlesky who hasn’t done much else I’m familiar with, were all amazing. Also, I should probably note that there’s no actual chopping in the movie, but I was ok with it, I guess.

1/30

The Road (2009, John Hillcoat, 35mm) - 9.0
Viggo Mortensen and his son are walking around in a post-apocalyptic landscape, and they occasionally run into trouble. Really bleak and horrifying, and I loved it. I haven’t read the book yet.

1/31

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (2009, Shawn Levy, Blu-ray) - 7.5
Ben Stiller’s night guard character is now a successful inventor, but when he finds out his friends from the museum are having trouble in their new location at the Smithsonian, he takes off to help them out, and in the process, learns that it was a mistake to follow his dreams of being an inventor, and overnight security is where he truly belongs, which is the most unlikely message I’ve ever seen in a kids’ movie, and I’m hoping screenwriters Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant put that in there as a subtle, absurd joke. Anyway, this is considerably better than the first movie, which was fun enough, but very generic and almost never funny. This one was even more fun, had way more laughs, spent almost zero time with Ben Stiller’s unlikable kid, and included Amy Adams in a substantial role as Amelia Earhart and she was, naturally, fucking amazing. Really liked this one.

Escape in the Fog (1945, Oscar "Budd" Boetticher, 35mm) - 8.0
A woman dreams about a man getting beaten up on a foggy, San Francisco bridge (it’s supposed to be the Bay Bridge, but according to the IMDb goofs page, nevermind, it doesn’t fucking matter), and then she wakes up and meets the man from her dream, and he’s a spy who has to deliver some shit to the Far East, but some evil Germans try to steal it, and at some point, the woman’s dream comes true, and she’s able to save his life due to her unexplained premonition. It’s pretty fun and good.

Rewatches
1/12 - Watchmen (2009, Zack Snyder, Projected Blu-ray) - 9.0
1/14 - Whip It (2009, Drew Barrymore, 35mm) - 10.0
1/27 - The Room (2003, Tommy Wiseau, DVD) - 10.0

The Top 50 Movies I Watched in 2009

In previous years, I've posted like a hundred lists of the best movies I saw the year before, broken down by genre. But last year, I mostly watched new releases (which will be a separate post) and not as much older stuff, so I decided to just condense it all into one brief Top 50 list. Below is just a list of the movies, but if you want to see it complete with reviews and some exciting images, then you can check that out right over here on Kittysneezes.

The Top 10 Greatest Movies I Watched in 2009
1. The War Zone (1999, Tim Roth)
2. Pieces (1982, Juan Piquer Simon)
3. Sorry, Haters (2005, Jeff Stanzler)
4. A Woman Obsessed (1989, Chuck Vincent)
5. Raw Force (1982, Edward Murphy)
6. Gang Boys (1994, Wings Hauser)
7. Spirited Away (2001, Hayao Miyazaki)
8. Johnny Mnemonic (1995, Robert Longo)
9. Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002, Park Chan-wook)
10. Lady Terminator (1988, Jalil Jackson)

40 More Movies I Saw in 2009 That I Also Loved (alphabetical)
Ace in the Hole (1951, Billy Wilder)
Airport (1970, George Seaton & Henry Hathaway)
Airport 1975 (1974, Jack Smight)
Bedroom Eyes (1984, William Fruet)
Black Book (2007, Paul Verhoeven)
Brighton Rock (1947, John Boulting)
Bye Bye Birdie (1963, George Sidney)
Choque (Short, 2005, Nacho Vigalondo)
The Dirty Dozen (1967, Robert Aldrich)
Double Blast (1994, Tim Spring)
Electric Dreams (1984, Steve Barron)
Event Horizon (1997, Paul W.S. Anderson)
Fright Night Part 2 (1988, Tommy Lee Wallace)
Gravity (Short, 1976, Michael Nankin & David Wechter)
Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988, Tony Randel)
Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008, Guillermo Del Toro)
Homicidal (1961, William Castle)
Ice Castles (1978, Donald Wrye)
Jumpin' Jack Flash (1986, Penny Marshall)
Junior High School (Short, 1978, David Wechter & Michael Nankin)
The Killers (1946, Robert Siodmak)
Megaforce (1982, Hal Needham)
Mister Scarface (1976, Fernando Di Leo)
Moving Target (1988, Marius Mattei)
Mr. Sardonicus (1961, William Castle)
Never Too Young to Die (1986, Gil Bettman)
New Year's Evil (1980, Emmett Alston)
Point Blank (1967, John Boorman)
The Quick and the Dead (1995, Sam Raimi)
Risky Business (1983, Paul Brickman)
School, Girls, and You (Short, 1978, David Wechter)
Seed (2008, Uwe Boll)
Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979, Robert Wise)
Sunrise (1927, F.W. Murnau)
Supervixens (1975, Russ Meyer)
To Let (2008, Jaume Balaguero)
The Tooth Fairy (2006, Chuck Bowman)
Vigilante (1983, William Lustig)
Virtuosity (1995, Brett Leonard)
West of Zanzibar (1928, Tod Browning)

BEST MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1940s

Even though I've seen about the same amount of movies from the 1940s that I have from the 30s or 20s, it still feels like the decade I'm most removed from, and am generally not that interested in. But when I make an actual list like this, I realize these were plenty of great films. This list is really more like a guideline for myself of directors and actors I need to get into more thoroughly, like Preston Sturges, Busby Berkeley, Barbara Stanwyck, and even Hitchcock. I've seen a fair amount of Hitchcock stuff, but there's still a shitload more to go, and quite a few I need to see again.

TOP 15 MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1940s


1. Unfaithfully Yours (1948, Preston Sturges)
2. Rope (1948, Alfred Hitchcock)
3. Brighton Rock (1947, John Boulting)
4. Kiss of Death (1947, Henry Hathaway)
5. Double Indemnity (1944, Billy Wilder)
6. Meet Me in St. Louis (1944, Vincente Minnelli)
7. Sullivan's Travels (1941, Preston Sturges)
8. Detour (1945, Edgar G. Ulmer)
9. The Killers (1946, Robert Siodmak)
10. Rebecca (1940, Alfred Hitchcock)
11. The Story of Molly X (1949, Crane Wilbur)
12. For Me and My Gal (1942, Busby Berkeley)
13. Black Narcissus (1947, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger)
14. Ball of Fire (1941, Howard Hawks)
15. Lady Scarface (1941, Frank Woodruff)

October Reviews, Part 4

TV

10/30

Tales from the Crypt Season 2 (Joel Silver, Walter Hill, Richard Donner, Robert Zemeckis, David Giler, DVD) - 9.0
More short horror tales by awesome directors, and a few unknown directors, and starring great actors. The episodes weren’t as consistently perfect as the first season, but there weren’t any duds, either. The best episode was definitely Richard Donner’s "The Ventriloquist’s Dummy", which appears to be about a dummy who is alive and homicidal, but it turns out to be something way stranger and grosser. I also loved Jack Sholder’s "Fitting Punishment", Howard Deutch’s "Dead Right", Fred Dekker’s "The Thing from the Grave", Jeffrey Price’s "For Cryin’ Out Loud", Tom Holland’s "Four-Sided Triangle", Peter Seaman’s "My Brother’s Keeper", and Kevin Yagher’s "Lower Berth" (which turned out to be The Cryptkeeper’s origin story). Speaking of the Cryptkeeper, he’s fucking adorable. I’m still charmed every single time he makes himself laugh.

MOVIES

10/30

Paranormal Activity (Rewatch, 2009, Oren Peli, 35mm, Balboa) - 9.0
First review here. Not as scary the second time around, but still a great movie about people being fucked with by a malevolent force. I also watched an alternate ending online that I liked a lot more (the one with the cops), though it still wasn’t perfect. There’s one other that I read about (with a throat-slitting) that sounded fucking awesome.

10/31 - Halloween Quadruple Feature

The Last House on the Left (2009, Dennis Iliadis, DVD) - 8.5
Two girls run into three criminals, who kill one of them, and rape the other, leaving her for dead. The criminals then end up at the raped girl’s house, with her parents, and when the parents find out what’s happened, they seek revenge. The violent scenes are suitably nasty, and the performances are convincing, making it into a solid horror thriller. I didn’t really think the lead guy suffered enough, though I did like his death. I haven’t seen the original in forever, not sure how they compare.

Homicidal (1961, William Castle, DVD) - 9.0
A woman pays a bellhop to marry her, and as soon as he does, she stabs the justice of the peace to death, and takes off. The woman returns to the family she’s staying with, and makes some people uncomfortable, and during the investigation of the murder, scandalous family secrets are uncovered. It’s fucking awesome, with a crazed performance from the lead, and a great twist that’s a little obvious now but probably completely blew the minds of people in ’61.

Basket Case (Prewatch, 1982, Frank Henenlotter, DVD) - 9.0
A man carrying a large basket with his deformed, formerly conjoined twin brother in it, stays at a hotel, and they seek out the doctors who had separated them, and the deformed brother kills them in ridiculous ways. The man meets a girl, and tries to start something up with her, but his brother is too much of a troublemaker. Pretty funny and sleazy, with cheap and amazing kill scenes. The climactic sex scene is one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen.

Trick 'r Treat (2009, Michael Dougherty, Blu-ray) - 8.0
Four interweaving stories that take place on Halloween. Interesting take on an anthology film, in that the stories occasionally cross over into each other. Really fun, occasionally kinda nasty movie, if a bit forgettable. The 80's Trick or Treat is definitely a lot better (not that they have anything to do with each other aside from the title). This one's worth rewatching, though, sometime.

October Top 10
1. Whip It
2. Basket Case
3. Jennifer's Body
4. Zombieland
5. Homicidal
6. Hellbound: Hellraiser II
7. Last House on the Left
8. Whatever Works
9. Black Book
10. Fright Night Part II

The Bottom 10 Worst Fucking Movies I Saw in 2009

Here are the worst movies (not including New Releases) that I watched in 2009. The links go to my full reviews. Best Of lists to follow.

The Bottom 10 Worst Fucking Movies I Saw in 2009
1. The Thin Red Line (1998, Terrence Malick)
2. Top Secret! (1984, Jim Abrahams/Jerry Zucker/David Zucker)
3. The Blind Waiter (Short, 1980, Scott Spiegel/Josh Becker)
4. Primer (2004, Shane Carruth) (Erin is going to slap me for not putting this at number 1. It's her least favorite movie of all time.)
5. Two or Three Things I Know About Her (1967, Jean-Luc Godard)
6. The Cat and the Canary (1927, Paul Leni)
7. Darkness Falls (2003, Jonathan Liebesman)
8. Lola Montes (1955, Max Ophuls)
9. The Defender (2004, Dolph Lundgren)
10. Six Months to Live (Short, 1977, Sam Raimi/Scott Spiegel)

BEST MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1930s

The first draft of this list was about 90% Fleischer Brothers shorts. So other than the #1 movie, I decided to cut them out, and just mention that the Fleischers were fucking geniuses and I absolutely adore all of their work from the 30's. Some other ones I have to mention are Snow-White (1933), Mysterious Mose (1930), Minnie the Moocher (1932), Swing You Sinners (1930), and nearly every single Popeye cartoon.
Also, 1939 is overrated.

TOP 21 MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1930s


1. Bimbo’s Initiation (1931, Dave Fleischer)
2. Freaks (1932, Tod Browning)
3. The Mascot (1934, Wladyslaw Starewicz)
4. Mad Love (1935, Karl Freund)
5. M (1931, Fritz Lang)
6. It’s a Bird (1930, Harold Muller)
7. The Story of the Fox (1930, Wladyslaw and Irene Starewicz)
8. The Black Cat (1934, Edgar G. Ulmer)
9. Child Bride (1938, Harry Revier)
10. King Kong (1933, Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack)
11. Bride of Frankenstein (1935, James Whale)
12. Modern Times (1936, Charles Chaplin)
13. Anna Christie (1930, Clarence Brown)
14. Swing Time (1936, George Stevens)
15. Ninotchka (1939, Ernst Lubitsch)
16. The Navigator (1936, Wladyslaw and Irene Starewicz)
17. The Wizard of Oz (1939, Victor Fleming)
18. The Women (1939, George Cukor)
19. The 39 Steps (1935, Alfred Hitchcock)
20. Triumph of the Will (1935, Leni Riefenstahl)
21. Scarface (1932, Howard Hawks)

BEST MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1920s

I've been debating over whether or not I want to do a Best of the Decade (2000's) list. It's hard enough trying to make a yearly list, where I have to compare movies I saw last week against movies I saw in January. How am I supposed to compare last week's movies with ones I saw when I was still in fucking high school? I just worry that it'll be highly biased toward the latter half of the decade, especially since I wasn't always keeping track of what I was watching as obsessively as I do now. I don't know, I'm sure I'll still do it (once the decade is fucking over, anyway, why is everybody so goddamn eager to post prematurely?). Anyway, here are my favorite films from the 1920s.

TOP 16 MOVIES OF THE DECADE - 1920s


1. The Unholy Three (1925, Tod Browning)
2. The Kid (1921, Charles Chaplin)
3. Safety Last! (1923, Fred C. Newmeyer and Sam Taylor)
4. West of Zanzibar (1928, Tod Browning)
5. He Done His Best (1926, Charley Bowers and Harold Muller)
6. The Playhouse (1921, Buster Keaton)
7. A Wild Roomer (1927, Charley Bowers and Harold Muller)
8. The Unknown (1927, Tod Browning)
9. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927, F.W. Murnau)
10. The Circus (1928, Charles Chaplin)
11. Egged On (1926, Charley Bowers, Harold Muller, and Ted Sears)
12. The Frogs Who Wanted a King (1923, Wladyslaw Starewicz)
13. The Town Rat and the Country Rat (1927, Wladyslaw Starewicz)
14. Say Ah-h! (1928, Charley Bowers)
15. Now You Tell One (1926, Charley Bowers and Harold Muller)
16. Metropolis (1927, Fritz Lang)

My knowledge of film pre-1920 is even more limited. My favorite film from the 1900s (and likely the only one I've seen) is Le Cochon Danseur (1907) and my favorite film from the 1910s is The Cameraman's Revenge (1912, Wladyslaw Starewicz).