'Mudge and I used to own an independent video rental shop (Cinematheque) in Portsmouth, NH that specialized in foreign films, classic films and totally off-the-wall and independent films -- all the stuff the other shops didn't carry. Unfortunately, between being undercapitalized, the economy going to hell in a handbasket (1989-90) and Blockbuster moving to town, it went belly up in 1990, but we managed to escape with our lives (more or less).

I've been keeping a chronological list of all the films I've seen since about 1985 and recently I've also been trying to reconstruct lists from, say, 1965 onward. What a wonderful bunch of films I've seen -- and how many I've missed (sometimes by inches).

Many times over the past 15 years or so I've tried to put together my "Top-10" list -- to no avail. I have MANY "Top-10" lists -- just depends on what mood I'm in at any given moment or what my top criteria are when put on the spot.

And the lists above have reminded me of so many more that should have been on my list.

I LOVE "Shirley Valentine"!

And how about --

Captain's Paradise with Alec Guinness (or ANYTHING with Alec Guinness?!?)
Women In Love
Sunday Bloody Sunday
The Enforcer (Humphrey Bogart)
Any Errol Flynn film even the bad ones
The Virgin President (very funny but very very obscure; I saw it in a theatre in 1967)
Swiss Family Robinson (for the wonderful tree house)
Two for the Road (for the T-series MG)
Spaceballs (one of the best Mel Brooks parodies -- everything works)
Killer Klowns From Outer Space
Over-Sexed Rugsuckers From Mars
A Polish Vampire From Burbank
Elizabeth of Ladymeade (one of the most feminist films I've ever seen -- from 1949)
Hullabaloo Over Georgie and Bonnie's Pictures
Last Picture Show
John Huston's Moby Dick (with A.L. Lloyd)
The Snapper
Best of Show, Waiting for Guffman, etcet etcet (and including This Is Spinal Tap)
A Hard Day's Night
Beautiful Dreamer (about Walt Whitman -- love the asparagus eating scene)
Tom Jones
Breaker Morant
Picnic at Hanging Rock
The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith
We of the Never Never
Jesus of Montreal

And one of the most irreverant (and funniest) films ever made -- "The Thorn" originally made as "The Incredible Mr. J" with Bette Midler as the Virgin Mary, God is a Harpo Marx character, John the Baptist is a flasher and the Three Kings are the Three Queens. Joseph is an inventor who creates items that are combinations of things -- he calls them "crosses." When we first see Bette Midler she's humming, "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas."

Dim Sum
Marnie (that's where I fell in love with Sean Connery)
Vertigo
Rear Window
Heat and Dust
Fistful of Dollars (for the soundtrack as well as it's innovation)
Anything by David Lynch, John Waters, Kenneth Anger, Peter Greenaway, Luis Bunuel . . .
King of Hearts
Tapeheads
Matewan
Margaret's Museum
Cousin Cousine (original, of course)
Blue Country (not sure of the French title)
My Dinner With Andre (and I'd LOVE the "My Dinner With Andre action figures" from Waiting for Guffman)
Mindwalk


Well, that's TODAY's additions . . .

Too many films; not enough time.

Linn