Letterboxd Stats Showdown: Fritz Lang/Ernst Lubitsch

[kanafani]

Notes on divisive Lubitsch movies:

[kanafani]

Every Lubitsch movie that received a 2 star rating (or less):

lub4.PNG (12.75 KiB) Viewed 5229 times

[kanafani]

Every Lubitsch movie that received a 5 star rating:

lub5.PNG (39.22 KiB) Viewed 5229 times

[kanafani]

Lubitsch ratings spread:

[kanafani]

Champs sorted by number of Lubitsch movies logged:

[kanafani]

Champs sorted by average rating of Lubitsch movies:

[kanafani]

Highest rated Lubitsch movie for each champ (in case of a tie, I only list one):

[kanafani]

Lowest rated Lubitsch movie for each champ (in case of a tie, I only list one):

[kanafani]

All ratings for Lubitsch movies from all champs:

[kanafani]

Combined top 10 from the 2 directors (minimum 2 ratings per movie)

[kanafani]

Combined bottom 10 from the 2 directors (minimum 2 ratings per movie)

[kanafani]

Showdown results. Each champ gets one vote. As discussed last month, if you haven't voted for both directors, then you are disqualified.

[kanafani]

OMG you guys, IT IS A TIE!

Lang 14 - Lubitsch 14

[kanafani]

Scores:
* gregx: 1 point
* John Ryan: 1 point
* Flip: 2 points
* thoxans: 2 points
* liquidnature: 4 points
* Brian: 4 points (guessed the final score = one extra point)

liquidnature got four questions right (all except the first one). Brian got 3 right, including the final score.

Both are winners in my book. You guys sort it out!

[rischka]

i looked everywhere for the lang/lubitsch pool party picture but can't find it anymore so here's a photo of ernst with jimmy stewart and margaret sullavan ♥



thx for your work kanafani1!

[sally]

okay how has anyone seen three women or the patriot.

[sally]

anyway hurrah! thanks kanafani. and i totally didn't cheat watching two lubitschs this week. (so this is paris is SO lubitsch)

tie my bum

[brian d]

I’ll let liquidnature pick. i've already picked a couple of these.

[liquidnature]

Neat. I have some ideas, though I may need some input from others with finding the most compatible matches.

We've yet to do John Ford, but I'm not sure who would be the best match. Some starting ideas:

John Ford (130 films) / Michael Curtiz (119 films) / (Hathaway, A. Mann, Hawks?)
Fellini / Kurosawa / Bergman
Michael Mann / David Fincher / Christopher Nolan
Francis Ford Coppola / Martin Scorsese
Antonioni / Kiarostami

[kanafani]

Neat. I have some ideas, though I may need some input from others with finding the most compatible matches.

We've yet to do John Ford, but I'm not sure who would be the best match. Some starting ideas:

John Ford (130 films) / Michael Curtiz (119 films) / (Hathaway, A. Mann, Hawks?)
Fellini / Kurosawa / Bergman
Michael Mann / David Fincher / Christopher Nolan
Francis Ford Coppola / Martin Scorsese
Antonioni / Kiarostami

All interesting choices.

I'm beyond busy at work for the foreseeable future, so there won't be a showdown in November. We'll pick things up in December (I hope?), so I guess we can decide at that point.

[flip]

okay how has anyone seen three women or the patriot.

the 75 people on letterboxd who have logged the patriot all seem to have rated/reviewed the three-minute trailer that survived. don't know anything about three women though!

[flip]

and thanks as always kanafani for running the data!

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

Lubitsch's Three Women survives! There's a copy at the George Eastman House, and perhaps other archives?, and it occasionally screens (e.g. at the Film Forum in New York in 2017). Not available otherwise though

[---]

Neat. I have some ideas, though I may need some input from others with finding the most compatible matches.

We've yet to do John Ford, but I'm not sure who would be the best match. Some starting ideas:

John Ford (130 films) / Michael Curtiz (119 films) / (Hathaway, A. Mann, Hawks?)
Fellini / Kurosawa / Bergman
Michael Mann / David Fincher / Christopher Nolan
Francis Ford Coppola / Martin Scorsese
Antonioni / Kiarostami

my thoughts:

Ford / Curtiz or Ford / Curtiz / Hawks would be sick. I think Hathaway and Mann made relatively unfamous pictures. They're famous to us cinephiles, but Ford/Curtiz/Hawks made movies that people who have seen a low-to-medium number of movies think are The Best Movies, The Great American Moving Pictures of the Golden Age of Hollywood, etc, although they're all identified as auteurs to different extents. But yeah, imo even Mann is not canon enough to belong in a showdown with Ford and Curtiz. Like Raw Deal and Desperate appear typically on DVDs that have two noirs... I guess his Jimmy Stewart westerns are famous but they're famous for being a run of westerns which a quintessential Western star, I mean Budd Boetticher doesn't belong in a showdown with Ford either... just my opinion!

Any combination of Fellini / Kurosawa / Bergman would be sick, obviously, as those are three giants. If it's just two of them I'd say Kurosawa vs Bergman is the most interesting, not because Fellini wouldn't be neat to see but because I see him making sense down the road vs De Sica or even like Antonioni (although Fellini & Antonioni make very different movies) whereas Ozu and Mizoguchi have already been done without Kurosawa. And there's no Scandinavian that compares to Bergman in output, fame, or contribution to cinema's history. But Kurosawa vs Bergman is like cinema's ultimate optimist vs cinema's ultimate pessimist, it sounds fucking fascinating. I think Kurosawa is the most logical and appropriate opponent for Bergman, and, outside of Japan, Bergman is for Kurosawa. And they both made incredibly famous movies with "Seven" in the title, and it would be interesting to see if those two movies came out on top!

Mann / Fincher / Nolan - if I'm being honest I think your other suggestions are all better.

Coppola / Scorsese is obviously about as interesting as it gets for 70s canon American cinema, and especially relevant given that these two have been in the news for their views on comic book movies. If you go for living Americans, please pick this and not the one with Chris "makin' some average-ass movies over here" Nolan

Antonioni / Kiarostami - interesting individuals, but why these two in a matchup? Not saying it wouldn't be cool, just curious.

Of all these, I think Kurosawa vs Bergman would be the coolest, although throw Fellini in there if you'd like to see him too. Would love to hear what others think of the examples liquidnature suggested!

[flip]

coppola/scorsese/altman might be an interesting tripleheader too

[liquidnature]

Neat. I have some ideas, though I may need some input from others with finding the most compatible matches.

We've yet to do John Ford, but I'm not sure who would be the best match. Some starting ideas:

John Ford (130 films) / Michael Curtiz (119 films) / (Hathaway, A. Mann, Hawks?)
Fellini / Kurosawa / Bergman
Michael Mann / David Fincher / Christopher Nolan
Francis Ford Coppola / Martin Scorsese
Antonioni / Kiarostami

my thoughts:

Thanks for the detailed reply bure! I actually completely agree with everything you wrote. Mostly I was just slinging names around with Mann and Hathaway (they'd probably be a better match together than with a giant like Ford).

Agreed that Curtiz and/or Hawks would be the best match for Ford.

Not much of a fan of Fellini personally, so I'd vote for Kurosawa / Bergman.

Not much of a fan of Nolan either, just thought his name fit in with the other two based on genre and era. I personally like Michael Mann and Fincher quite a bit, might be cool to see at some point.

Coppola / Scorsese would be classic, should be done at some point I think.

Antonioni / Kiarostami - not sure why I put these two together, just sounded interesting and they made roughly the same number of films. Obviously there would be better matches for both. Antonioni / Fellini might even be the best option there.

There are so many possibilities though. Cinematographers, actors, duo vs. duo, writers, etc.

[kanafani]

Coppola / Scorsese?

[thoxans]

de niro/pacino would be dope for a future showdown (even tho pacino would be the obvs winner duh)

[ofrene]

Antonioni / Fellini ???