Top Ten List at 155 – Pre-Publication Preview
(This entry was corrected at 2:40p on Saturday… more explanation below.)
The Top 20, and particularly the Top 10, is getting pretty well cemented in.
Sweeney Todd and Michael Clayton keep going back and forth in the 9 and 10 spots. Juno keeps moving up. The Lives of Others could be knocked out of the 20 by The Savages, which is just a half-point behind. (Lives had 74 points last year. If added, the total would put the film in the current Top 15.)
No Country For Old Men no longer has a twice-the-next-highest-point-and-list-total status
Hi
I just want to say that the total score for Zodiac is totally fucked up.
I count 58 mentions ( 51 with position and 7 mentions) and the total score is 337, counting 10 points for first mention and 1 for tenth) without adding anything by the mentions without position.
And then, in the big scoreboard, there are only 146 list, ommitting at least 9 ( by the 155 count)
including some 10 points lists for Zodiac, like Jeff Wells.
I counted Juno for confirmation, too.
It has 48 mentions, 38 with position and 10 mentions. It scored 219 points, without adding anything by the mentions without position.
Please, do a recount of the scores.
Something went utterly wrong since the last update ( not this last one with 155 list, the one before)
So, please, if you want to keep track of all the list, check it up the final scoreboard before posting it.
Thanks.
For lists that contain 10 unranked films, each film should receive 5.5 points, not 5 points.
That’s because if you added up the total points of a normal 10-film ranked list, it would equal 55 points. So, for an unranked list, each film must receive 5.5 points in order to reach the 55-point total.
I appreciate all the effort you put into this chart, which is the best of its kind on the internet, even if there are a few kinks to work out.
We’ve been doing it this way for years, JY. Consider it a slight penalty for not bothering to offer an order. Likewise, we decided this year to give 2 points per entry to the three people who couldn’t be bothered to do Top 10s or even Top 20s, but Top Whatever They Felt Like.
These are quirks built in to the MCN charting.
We quite miss Engin’s chart, which was more complete. We have always been about selecting a range that we feel is fair and represents all styles of criticism, from the most effete to the most quote-whoring (though I think Mr Travers imagines himself to be in one camp when he is in the other… Searchlight ruined a beautiful linen poster for The Savages by putting his quote on it).
Cool, David, everything is ok on list land now
Well, not everything but i’m not going discuss the tastes of critics now…
That said, and with the list fixed and now reflecting it ( with the permission of the Diving Bell and the Butterfly, very good movie, but not GREAT), i cant say that 2007 will be remembered as the year of the MACHO trilogy: No Country, Blood and Zodiac. All male characters driving the films, with little, almost none actress work in any of those.
Even more funny it’s that the trilogy has 3 males main characters (*), and they all are very seventies, not only Zodiac and No country in the period they are set, but in the style they’re done, very Malick-Coppola-Peckinpah.
So, for the first time since this lists exist…i think this is the first year that critics got it right (almost, but 3 of 4 it’s amazing). This is the first time that the 3 best pictures of the year are at the top of the list.
If you don’t believe me check previous list , and you will see the loads of forgettable movies at the top of the lists.
So, let me be the first to say it: Well done critics…well done
How Ratatouille is so low will remain a headscratcher to me. Stupid critics. They wet themselves over that movie – some calling for best picture and director nominations! – yet it still didn’t get out of the animation category ghetto.