Yes and no, I probably forgot to add that these are films that I all saw on TV with my mother in my youth and therefore also have certain sentimental values.
That’s why a film like “The Mark of Zorro” doesn’t actually belong and it doesn’t feel quite right to watch it in between.
Could do without the Grangers and Chamberlains, but would suggest to fit in Cartouche and Captain Horatio Hornblower 
Granger and Chamberlain are kind of childhood heroes to me, so I don’t want to hear a bad word about them. 
Belmondo is certainly one of my favorite actors and I watch his films all year round, including Cartouche.
Forever!
And Patrick McGoohan and Vivien Merchant.
I have loved this since I first saw it on television. Maybe Chamberain’s peak.
THE FIRST GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1978, dir. Michael Crichton)
This film has a few well-documented and oft-criticised faults, namely that its tone is somewhat undecided* and that its initial setup is such that we’re treated to an episodic first half before the actual robbery. Crichton adapted his own based-on-actual-events novel - and perhaps a different approach than the strictly chronological telling would have helped here.
Production values are quite excellent; we get to see a Victorian age recreated in loving detail as stage for an exceptional cast. This comes towards the end of Connery’s ‘historical period’ and my only gripe is that he - or Moore - didn’t get to play Flashman instead (and preferably ten years sooner).
However, the film is entertaining enough, if directed somewhat pedestrian. What really shines here is the train top sequence that Connery did indeed do himself - on a moving train at considerable speed, if you please. From the footage shown it’s obvious this was a particularly perilous affair; something most younger guys wouldn’t have dared sober or drunk.
Some time ago I watched a YouTube video with some of the not-authorised commentary by former Eon alumni. In it it was claimed Connery supposedly had been very difficult with risk shots - spiders, sharks, so on - and had to be kept extra safe during some sequences. You can’t help wonder how he ended up doing this stunt.
At any rate, an interesting historical adventure (emphasis on historical).
*I’m not sure that’s fair when other caper movies like TOPKAPI, HOW TO STEAL A MILLION or OCEAN’S 11 share that very comedy/thriller tone. By now it’s practically THE default setting of any heist film, the implicit assurance we’re watching a light comedy - not a serious crime - and it’s okay to enjoy it and root for its protagonists.
Hustle, White Collar and now Lupin have been massively acclaimed for having exactly that style.
The Italian Job did it best - I have spake.
Grabbing the argument like…
Offered as a possible guide to films worthy watching. Criteria for selection: played commercially in NYC in 2024.
Best Films of 2024
All We Imagine as Light (Payal Kapadia)
Kapadia moves from the world of the documentary to fiction film with grace and wit, combining both styles in something deeply pleasing and thrillingly new. Images seemingly caught on the wing combine with precise mise en scene to render a world complete.
Anora (Sean Baker)
Sean Baker’s best film to date, ANORA expands and evolves over its running time, until what seemed a simple story becomes a symphony of intersecting lives, with Mikey Madison at the center, and holding it all together.
Dahomey (Mati Diop)
A fleet 68 minutes, we saw DAHOMEY right after THE BRUTALIST at the New York Film Festival. Providing an antidote to the earlier film’s bloated bombast (VistaVision!! 3+ hours with an intermission!! Look at actors really acting!!), Diop’s images are simultaneously generous, precise, and economical. She makes the moral necessity of return palpable and necessary.
Femme (Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping)
Film noir in the world of contemporary British drag. Never settling for the easy narrative path or simplistic uplift, Freeman and Ping demonstrate the slipperiness of identity and desire, and eschew the clinch of romance for the paradox of violence.
Gladiator II (Ridley Scott)
The first of two sequels to make the list, GLADIATOR II is the finest example of Scott’s late style. Beginning with THE LAST GANGSTER, Scott has shot with multiple cameras, using as many as 7-9 at once (Denzel Washington quipped that it had been a long time since he was an extra on a movie set). Scott achieves a precision in editing and narrative momentum of the highest order. Combined with superb performances—Washington is all-universe, and treats his dialogue as if it were Shakespeare, finding eloquence in pauses—GLADIATOR II is the last of a dying breed of film. Strength and honor!
Green Border (Agnieszka Holland)
For more than 50 years, Holland has borne witness to the realities and dangers in historical/contemporary Poland and Eastern Europe at-large. There have been Hollywood movies and American television series as well, but her greatest accomplishments/legacy are her European films. Responding to the refugee crisis, she made GREEN BORDER, an unflinching look at the horror of what is happening. For her artistry and trouble, she was denounced by the President and government of Poland, and needed security. She is now working on a film about Franz Kafka.
Flow (Gints Zilbalodis)
Animation at the pinnacle. Devoid of Disney-fied cuteness and schmaltz, FLOW was made with open-source programming (Blender), and is suffused with sentiment instead of sentimentality; emotion rather than bathos. Made for $3,600,000 (not enough to cover the cost of craft services for MOANA 2), FLOW may be robbed of its well-merited Academy Award if corporate arm-twisting prevails.
Hard Truths (Mike Leigh)
Mike Leigh doing his thing. What more needs to be said? Marianne Jean-Baptiste is his collaborator once again, and HARD TRUTHS presents two master artists at their best.
Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell (Phạm Thiên Ân)
A fleet three hours, and given a limited release by Kino Lorber, An’s film follows the trail blazed by such masters as Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Tsai Ming-liang, without being derivative. Magical and mysterious in its narrative, there are shots that will remain with us for as long as memory holds. Winner of the Camera D’Or at Cannes in 2023.
Joker: Folie à Deux (Todd Phillips)
Our second sequel, JOKER: FOLIE A DEUX is the movie you get to make when your previous film earns more than $1 billion: a comic book movie crossed with a jukebox musical, concluding as a courtroom drama (with a soupcon of prison film mixed in). Meta-to the max, and a defiant middle finger to fans of his previous movie, Phillips redefines film maudit for the 21st century. Sublime.
We cannot resist quoting John Waters: “Finally, a love story I can relate to. So insane, so well thought out, so well directed, so much smoking! It’s “Jailhouse Rock” meets Busby Berkeley with a 9/11 “That’s Entertainment!” ending that will make you shake your head in cinematic astonishment. Stupid critics. Gaga so good. Joker so right. Die, dumbbells, die!”
Juror #2 (Clint Eastwood)
Old-fashioned Hollywood narrative filmmaking with a vengeance. If this is Eastwood’s last movie, he leaves showing everyone how it was/is done. Parable-like in its economy, Eastwood continues his exploration of how to act morally in a compromised world. Having an impressive per-screen gross for the handful of cinemas it was released in (and topping the box office in France and other places in Europe where it played), JUROR #2 was the #1 streamed movie when released on Max. Warner Bros. should be ashamed of themselves, but, of course, they aren’t.
Maria (Pablo Larrain)
Completing his trilogy of films on iconic 20th century women, Larrain presents Callas as a multi-faceted enigma, known to herself, but mysterious to others. Angelina Jolie is Larrain’s star and collaborator, and the film is unthinkable without her. Ed Lachman’s cinematography deserves every accolade imaginable (and maybe a few that have yet to be thought of).
Nickel Boys (RaMell Ross)
Another documentarian turned fiction filmmaker, with NICKEL BOYS, Ross does nothing less than expand the language of cinema. At first baffling, then seductive, and finally overwhelming, the film, like every entry on this list, grows deeper with each viewing.
Queer (Luca Guadagnino)
Guadagnino most personal and best film, QUEER at last brings William S. Burroughs to the screen with fidelity and intelligence, finding a satisfying way to complete his unfinished novella. Filmed at Cinecitta and on location in Ecuador, QUEER combines the tools of modernist filmmaking with aesthetic artifacts of its contemporary moment to produce not only a representation of time past, but also a work representative of the aesthetics of that time. As with many films on this year’s list, a stellar central performance is augmented by a strong supporting cast.
Scenarios (Jean-Luc Godard)
Last, but never least, Godard’s final movie (completed the day before his death) is a mere 18 minutes long, and serves as both valedictory and further exploration. Only Godard would find a way to integrate the shootout from THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI with the sounds of an MRI scan. CGI be damned—all we need is Uncle Jean at his worktable.
Honorable Mention
Emilia Perez (Jacques Audiard)
Evil Does Not Exist (Ryusuke Hamaguchi)
I’m Still Here (Walter Salles)
Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola)
The Room Next Door (Pedro Almodóvar)
The Seed of the Sacred Fig (Mohammad Rasoulof)
The Wild Robot (Chris Sanders)
NOSFERATU (2024)
I have been a fan of Robert Egger’s unique form of historical nihilism since The VVitch. The Lighthouse and The Northman only solidified him in my mind as a visual auteur who can be spoken of in the same realm as Stanley Kubrick. But Nosferatu is, for me, his coup de grâce. It is sumptuous, foreboding, deliberate, and absolutely dripping with menace and genuine dread. As a lifelong devotee to Dracula (I have read the original novel a half dozen times in my decades on this earth) and its many film incarnations, I can honestly say this is my favorite iteration to date (with a nod to the BBC production starring Louis Jourdan as the most faithful to the source material).
I was swept up, mesmerized, and yes, scared by this version of the story. There are some artistic liberties that may prove difficult for some, but I was sold across the board on Eggers’ vision. The performances are stellar and I love the inclusion of a far more deliberate folk horror component into the heady concoction. This is top-drawer quality stuff from a filmmaker at the height of his prowess.
Impressive once again, and I pale in comparison with the meager choice of mine (laugh at mine below). But at least I now have guidance what to seek out next year!
Films I have watched and even liked this year (hated a lot and forgot about those, so I won’t list them):
Horizon
Megalopolis
The Zone of Interest
Coup de chance
Fast Charlie
Carry-on
Alien: Romulus
Drive-away dolls
Want to see:
Salem´s Lot (2024)
Warner Bros. greenlit this after the mega success of the King adaptation “IT” which author/director Gary Daubman had co-written. While “IT” was split into two films, “Salem’s Lot” - having been adapted before by Tobe Hooper in the late 70´s as a tv miniseries (183 minutes) and by Mikael Salomon in 2004 as a modernized tv mini-series (174 minutes) - was now produced as a movie for the big screen, with Dauberman as director.
And, of course, as any movie adaptation of a Stephen King novel, “Salem’s Lot” also had to deal with the question: how much of the book can be adapted in a cinematic medium which has a limited running time of about 2 hours?
What makes even the most outrageous horror stories of King work so well are his characterizations of his protagonists and the communities in which they live. Those film adaptations who disregarded this often failed because the mere genre concept in any King story would be just too thin to really be interesting.
Also, a King story is never just about shocks and gores. Many studios desperate to be in the King business also never understood that, nor did they care. The slowburn of every King story, guiding the audience through an every day world, making them care about the average Joe-characters, and then confronting them with something which might be supernatural, is at the core of King´s work and effectiveness.
Which apparently irked Warner Bros. when they saw what Gary Dauberman had done with “Salem’s Lot”: an atmospheric slow burn adaptation of King´s famous second novel.
So they took it off the release schedule and - as rumor has it - demanded a heavily recut picture before they dumped it on max. Having King himself declare the film (in its original cut) an effective “old school”-horror film obviously made the studio think: What? We don’t want that sort of thing!
Okay, running now at 113 minutes, this film obviously shows the effect of the difference of at least 1 more hour which both mini-series had to tell the story, Dauberman´s adaptation faces an uphill battle with those audiences who wanted basically the same narrative as the Hooper mini-series, only updated.
Naturally, the characterization here lacks room to breathe and to invite the viewers into the story. And of course, this adaptation cherry picks all the needed events in order to tell the story at all.
But I was astonished how well this movie worked nevertheless.
The greatest thing about it is the cinematography and Dauberman´s superb choice of framing and shots, coupled with its fabulous 70´s set design and the effective score. This “Salem’s Lot” looks gorgeous, like a forgotten film from that era. Sure, the way some scary moments are handled reveals the contemporary approach, but still it is never gratuitously or clumsily put together as so many horror pictures are these days.
The performances are also quite good, although they have less chances to shine because they were cut down to the essentials (the always magnificent Alfre Woodard still manages to impress in her too few scenes).
On the one hand, one might argue that a longer film could have been a really great adaptation, maybe even the best yet. On the other hand, I think this cut surprisingly works very well as an alternate way to adapt this particular and also already overfamiliar story. I am always in favor of adaptations which are not too close to a novel, filming every scene because - what’s the point? I can read the novel, and no film will substitute that.
In that regard, this truncated but still effective version is an interesting variation. It still has the basic elements of the characters, but not enough to be a truly successful King adaption. However, Dauberman cleverly reimagines many key events of the book so the narrative can still surprise and delight with the many great ideas (i.e. the finale on the drive-in cinema lot). And that makes this film work for me.
The best a viewer can hope for–an interesting variation. After all, what is THE TRIAL (1962) but Orson Welles’ superb cover version of Kafka’s novel?
I didn’t get out to the theater much, but here are the 10 best older films I saw for the first time in 2024, in random order.
Paths to Paradise (1925, dir. Clarence Badger). Among the great silent comedians, the dapper and unflappable Raymond Griffith was something of a proto-James Bond. Along with Hands Up! this is his best surviving feature, full of smart gags and plot twists. Released on Blu-Ray last year.
Ivanhoe (1952, dir. Richard Thorpe). Surprisingly good and non-stodgy, perhaps because the castle-storming and combat scenes were directed by Yakima Cannutt. Looks luscious on Blu-Ray (with a young Elizabeth Taylor) and the script improves on the novel. An all-ages classic.
The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932, dir. Charles Brabin). A still-startling demonstration of how to turn indefensible material into high camp. Boris Karloff is outrageous (or delicious?) as the sick and slightly swishy doctor. The slick tortures and sparkling settings of the Bond series are evident here. Released on Blu-Ray last year.
Kongo (1932). Another inappropriate pre-code, the grimiest and most depraved one I’ve seen yet. Walter Huston is a crippled revenge-crazed ex-magician who’s bamboozled the natives and turned the whites into junkies. His greasy gusto is superior to Lon Chaney’s in the West of Zanzibar, the previous film of this material.
I agnostos (1954, dir. Orestis Laskos). For some reason I went through five adaptations of Madame X this year. The 1937 version was the best Hollywood attempt at the old suffering-mother melodrama, but the finest of them all was this Greek film, the most faithful and moving adaptation of the original play, sensitively and economically directed. Viewable on the Internet Archive.
Three Godfathers (1936, dir. Richard Boleslawski). Another often-filmed story. John Ford’s 1948 film is the most well-known but it was pictorial and sentimental, while this one is searingly bleak and haunting—much like William Wyler’s Hell’s Heroes, the previous film of the story, but with more time for characterization. Lewis Stone, as the Schopenhauer-quoting outlaw, was never better. My idea of a Christmas classic.
I Know Where I’m Going! (1945, dir. Powell and Pressburger). This recently restored oddball gem is an unclassifiable delight, from the delightful invention of its comedic opening scenes to the moody, near-supernatural feel of its romantic ones. Set in the Scottish Hebrides and full of genuine enchantment.
Shoeshine (1946, dir. Vittorio de Sica). This restored monument of neorealism lives up to its reputation for intense directness of feeling and aching humanism. The friendship—and innocence—of two boys is irrevocably destroyed when they go from poverty to prison. As in other examples of full tragedy, the sensitivity in its handling prevents its from being simply depressing.
The Lady (1925, dir. Frank Borzage). Norma Talmadge was one of the biggest stars of the silent era and is almost forgotten today, except when mentioned a model for Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard. But this mother-love melodrama (another recent restoration) shows what a consummate technician and superb actress she was, with impressive powers of expression. I shed a manly tear at the ending too.
Mahjong (1996, dir. Edward Yang). This stinging comedy, set in Taipei during the onset of globalization, was long neglected, probably because it fell between Yang’s masterpieces A Brighter Summer Day and Yi Yi, but it holds up not only well but presciently. Low-rent crooks mingle with Western floatsam in a world of new prosperity where nobody knows what they want.
Home video highlight for previously viewed films: the long-awaited Blu-Ray debuts of The Bat (1926) and its sound remake The Bat Whispers (1930, also directed by Roland West). Epitomes of the old dark house film, both make voluptuous use of darkness and shadow and take equal delight in spooky sets and skullduggery. At least one influenced the creation of Batman, and if a Batman film had somehow been made in the early 30s it would have looked like the first 10 minutes of The Bat Whispers.
As for new films, the most enjoyable one I saw in 2024 was undoubtedly Hundreds of Beavers (dir. Mike Cheslik), a riotous blend of silent slapstick, Looney Tunes, and Super Mario Brothers. Could visual comedy finally be making a comeback after nearly a century of slumber?
Great list Revelator.
Count me among the fans of SHOESHINE and THE LADY.
Seeing Borzage’s SEVENTH HEAVEN tomorrow at MoMA in a restored print (tinting) with live piano accompaniment.
Surprised that there are still people who haven’t seen this. One of my all-time favourites. Wake me up at three in the morning and I still know the names of the five Norman knights 
Give me a lazy Sunday afternoon with this one, The Adventures of Robin Hood and Prince Valiant, and I’m a happy man
For a long time I’d wrongly assumed it was just another bloated MGM film. But it’s a very effective adaptation. The film solved the problem of Ivanhoe being the least interesting character in his own book by giving him several of King Richard’s adventures. It also removed the more problematic elements from Scott’s conception of Isaac, the Jewish moneylender. The film is very much a post-Holocaust one.
Scholars have also pointed out convincing parallels to the McCarthy hearings in King John’s trial of Rebecca (held by the Knights Templar in the book). One of the screenwriters was Waldo Salt, who started work after being subpoenaed by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Salt elongated Rebecca’s trial and turned it into a red-herring political campaign by Prince John to smear his enemies. After Salt was blacklisted the next scriptwriter was Marguerite Roberts, who retained Salt’s revisions and was also subpoenaed to testify at the HUAC hearings. Neither Salt nor Roberts received screen credit for Ivanhoe, but their work was retained.
Elizabeth Taylor
Robert Taylor
George Sanders
Joan Fontaine
Freddie Young
Mikos Rozsa
1:33 aspect ratio (CinemaScope was around the corner)
Technicolor (Ansco Color was around the corner)
Such profound joy crammed into 107 minutes.
Whereas on the other hand Robert Taylor was a strong anti-communist whose testimonials at the HUAC hearings lead to the blacklisting of several people.
I watched 23 minutes of SECTION 31.
That’s it.