1959's Best Movies: 60 Years Later

The runners up:

INDIA: MATRI BHUMI (Roberto Rossellini, 1959, Italy-France, 90m, Col) #1049
THE INDIAN TOMB (Fritz Lang, 1959, West Germany-France-Italy, 95m, Col) #1087
RIDE LONESOME (Budd Boetticher, 1959, USA, 73m, Col) #1310
NIGHT TRAIN (Jerzy Kawalerowicz, 1959, Poland, 99m, BW) #1533
ROOM AT THE TOP (Jack Clayton, 1959, UK, 118m, BW) #1589
FIRES ON THE PLAIN (Kon Ichikawa, 1959, Japan, 105m, BW) #1605
LITTLE STABS AT HAPPINESS (Ken Jacobs, 1959-1963, USA, 15m, Col) #1637
THE LADY WITH THE DOG (Iosif Kheifits, 1959, USSR, 90m, BW) #1756
THE TINGLER (William Castle, 1959, USA, 82m, BW) #1808
THE HUMAN CONDITION I (Masaki Kobayashi, 1959, Japan, 208m, BW) #1824
BALLAD OF A SOLDIER (Grigori Chukhraj, 1959, USSR, 89m, BW) #1887
THE GREAT WAR/LA GRANDE GUERRA (Mario Monicelli, 1959, France-Italy, 118m, BW) #1946
GENERAL DELLA ROVERE (Roberto Rossellini, 1959, Italy, 129m, BW) #1965

Wow. Stiff competition.

Dead heat between Truffaut and Ray--I'll flip a coin and vote for one of them. Four or five key American auteur films, none of which mean a great deal to me. Ben Hur was a big kid film for me.

my longstanding fave would be Hitchcock, but Fires on the Plain may be close -- a war film tha truly tears at the gut.

BLACK ORPHEUS (Marcel Camus, Brazil) [#889]
FLOATING WEEDS (Yasujiro Ozu, Japan) [#961]
THE 400 BLOWS (François Truffaut, France) [#23]
HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR (Alain Resnais, France) [#107]
IMITATION OF LIFE (Douglas Sirk, USA) [#171]
NORTH BY NORTHWEST (Alfred Hitchcock, USA) [#61]
SOME LIKE IT HOT (Billy Wilder, USA) [#28]
THE WORLD OF APU (Satyajit Ray, India) [#301]

how could anyone choose

I've never saw any of the runners up! I think I've got a handle on classic film and then I encounter a list like this

Among Hitchcock's masterpieces, NxNW is by far the thinnest.

Hey, look at me admitting NxNW is a masterpiece! Softening in my old age.

Something from these five:

ANATOMY OF A MURDER (Otto Preminger, USA) [#848]
THE 400 BLOWS (François Truffaut, France) [#23]
HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR (Alain Resnais, France) [#107]
IMITATION OF LIFE (Douglas Sirk, USA) [#171]
PICKPOCKET (Robert Bresson, France) [#81]

But good on Ozu for having two options this year, just a few years from the end of his career.

I've never saw any of the runners up! I think I've got a handle on classic film and then I encounter a list like this

I've never heard of either The Lady with the Dog or The Great War.

1. North by Northwest
2. The Virgin Spring (though I thought it was 1960?)
3. Anatomy of a Murder
4. The 400 Blows
5. Imitation of Life

Some Like It Hot might have taken the #5 spot if I'd seen it again more recently. Shadows was the Cassavetes that I liked the least back when I binged on those Criterion reissues from the early 2000s. I should probably watch it again. I don't like Rio Bravo much, but I have a well documented Hawks problem. Ben-Hur is fine.

I haven't seen any of the others (or any of the runners-up at all) though I've been meaning to get to a number of them.

I too have a Hawks problem, but I've been getting over it, thanks to repeated viewings of Only Angels Have Wings.

on my list

Ozu's remake in 1959 of his "The Story of Floating Weeds" from 1934 was great! even better than the original

Where's Plan 9 from Outer Space?!

Agreed. If The Tingler qualifies, surely Plan 9 does.

Of all of these? maybe Some Like It Hot. It just meant so much to me, the both thrilling and embarrassing circumstance under which I first saw it

with a not-out gay friend's parents in Naples FL in the 80s. watching it with them and seeing their reaction was a shocking experience

shocking in a good way

SLIH, NxNW and Rio Bravo are all tied it’s ok to be basic. Ben hur is such a wonderful bucket of horse shit

I saw Anatomy of a Murder again last month, certainly the greatest courtroom drama; austerely beautiful except when Arthur O'Connell hams it up.

I ranked them thusly three years ago:

Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk)
Anatomy of a Murder (Otto Preminger)
The World of Apu (Satyajit Ray)
North by Northwest (Alfred Hitchcock)
Pickpocket (Robert Bresson)
Floating Weeds (Yasujiro Ozu)
The 400 Blows (François Truffaut)
Rio Bravo (Howard Hawks)
Some Like It Hot (Billy Wilder)
The Nun’s Story (Fred Zimmerman)

Among Hitchcock's masterpieces, NxNW is by far the thinnest.

You're the thinnest, honeybunch. <3

Pretty sure Good Morning is the only one with fart jokes, so...

I think Arthur O'Connell let a few fly.

I'm for World of Apu. Still haven't seen either Ozu.

I love that The Tingler is among the runners up. I could watch that goofy thing any old time.

I was thinking it was the first Apu film, not the third (which I like a lot, but not as much). So The 400 Blows.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

impossible not to love the big payoff in the tingler-- can't think of a better use of audience participation. voted the virgin spring.

Was gonna vote fo The World of Apu, but Anatomy of a Murder ranks among the best Hollywood pics of any year, so

Fires on the Plain

and NxNW is the most POPULIST Hitchcock, u pathetic phonies

Odd Obsession, An Actor's Revenge, and The Makioka Sisters are weirder, more original among Ichikawas.

war + cannibalism!

I saw Odd Obsession last year, apparently, and all I can tell you is I rated it 7/10.

Hiroshima Mon Amour. It's just so different from anything else

The only film that rivals it is Araya: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araya_(film)

NxNW has Martin Landau and James Mason. This is a Good Thing.

Landau and Mason as a subtexted couple no less!

Call it my woman's intuition.

Impossible to choose but I went for Black Orpheus even though Barack Obama hates it: https://www.slantmagazine.com/news/barack-obama-a-story-of-race-and-politics/

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

oh

I voted Imitation of Life in the end, but can't really argue against that winner.

no idea ILX had a robust Virgin Spring claque