Sunday, May 2, 2010

The Moment You've All Been Waiting For

It's after midnight, which means it's Monday May 3, which means the list is upon us. I've been talking about it for the whole of this week, I've been dropping hints, and now it's time to reveal the banner. Check it out
Create your own banner at mybannermaker.com! You know when lightning strikes where it is least expected; a nothing movie that no one believed in becomes one of the most influential films of all time, shatters the box office, has critics and fans up in arms about it and all that? And then the knock offs come as feeble-minded execs want to cash in on the magic and movies seem get horrible for a while. Sometimes it lasts a couple months, a year, and in some cases, it's still happening as we speak. Those are the movies this list is about: the great movies that were trailed by a bunch of pretty bad ones that did everything short of tarnishing the original's legacy. It's both a celebration of great films and a condemnation of Hollywood's tendency to repeat trends until they are utterly and hopelessly dead. As I've said in other posts, this is a collaborative effort. Some of the entries will be written by me and some of them won't. I provided a list of films that I thought should be on such a list and some of the fine bloggers who will be participating suggested there own. I wasn't a tyrant, didn't close any possible ideas off and let the bloggers basically run free with their thoughts. If you agree, great, if you don't, let's hear about it in the comments. I will, right off the bat, apologize if the film that you thought should be in here isn't, but you know, if we looked at every film that suffered from this phenomenon, well we'd be here forever. Now that you know what's not on the list, I'll be revealing one entry per day, which will be posted at midnight (Toronto time) until we get to number one. The order, as I've posted before was left up to a vote and represents the collective opinion of everyone who cast their vote. I hope you enjoy, I hope you comment and spark debate, tell your friends and neighbours about this list and get them to follow along too. It should be a lot of fun.

2 comments:

  1. Nice idea. For awhile I've been thinking about writing a post called "The 20 Most Influential Films of the last 20 Years," which I think is similar in spirit to this. But then I ditched it/delayed it because the concept wasn't quite right. We haven't really seen the full influence of films that came out in the last five years, have we? Anyway, I won't spoil any of the titles I was considering here, because I suspect you'll tackle them in the coming weeks. Good luck!

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  2. Interesting idea! I've started going through your posts on the topic and you're so right. What is it about Hollywood that makes them feel the need to run a good idea to the ground until you can't even appreciate the original anymore?! sigh!

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