Top tens

I've been spending an inordinate amount of time lately browsing through top ten lists. I haven't really made a "Favorite movies of all time" list in at least five years. It's a fun exercise in a lot of ways, and it forces you to make choices. Do I try to make picks from the broad range of the history of cinema, or do I just pick the ten that have affected me the most? Can I really have 2 Wong Kar-Wai films in my top 10? How do you make a list like that with no Hitchcock... or Wilder... or Welles or Sturges or Von Trier? It's infuriating. So that's the task I've set out for myself this month, to wrap up the year with a top ten for 2007 and a top ten films of all time post. I wish I still had the old top ten to compare it with, but it was lost when I closed the video store. I'd be willing to bet that only 5 of the films from that list will be on the new one. We'll see.

Until then Senses of Cinema has a page where a bunch of different people have submitted their top tens. I've spent a lot of time there. And here's a link to Sight and Sound's ten best of 2007 lists.