SCFZ poll: Alan Parker

[flip]

Polling the films of Alan Parker

The rules:

- your list can include no more than half* of the Parker films you've seen, up to a maximum of 8. So if you've seen 6 films, you can vote for 3, and if you've seen 20, you can vote for up to 8.

* If you've seen an odd number, you can round up when deciding the length of your ballot -- e.g if you've seen 7, you can vote for 4, and if you've seen 15, you can vote for the maximum of 8.

- i'll assume ballots are ranked unless you tell me otherwise. unranked ballots are fine.

- deadline for ballots: next Tuesday, in seven days, whatever day that is

umbugbene created an index on letterboxd of all of our previous polls here: letterboxd.com/umbugbene/list/index-of-all-scfz-director-polls/

[flip]

again used a random number to pick our poll, if anyone wants to suggest a director, please post in the waiting room thread!

[flip]

Midnight Express
Mississippi Burning
The Evacuees

seen six, don't really like any of them though

[Silga]

Seen 2

Angel Heart

[brian d]

seen 3

mississippi burning


let's mix things up and go with roberto gavaldón next?

[nrh]

always think of him as leading a push to defend support for art filmmaking in england, ranting and raving about jarman and greenaway and so on...

repulsive director on aesthetic merits too!

[wba]

Seen 3, enjoyed all of them.
A director I need to rewatch and check out more.

01. Angel Heart (1987)
02. Mississippi Burning (1988)

Parker seen: 3

[deepbluefunk]

seen 8

1. Angel Heart
2. Midnight Express
3. Pink Floyd the Wall
4. Mississippi Burning

[oscarwerner]

Seen 14.
1. Midnight Express (1978)
2. Mississippi Burning (1988)
3. The Commitments (1991)
4. Angel Heart (1987)
5. Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982)
6. Fame (1980)
7. Bugsy Malone (1976)

[flip]

not many ballots for this, greg x said he'd seen 10+, so i hope he sees this and can post a ballot

[...]

oh. crap. yeah I forgot, another of the seen more than I like to admit directors rather than an enthusiasm, but here ya go.

Fame
Birdy
Midnight Express
Road to Wellville
Shoot the Moon

[flip]

perhaps surprisingly, alan parker has had five different films in competition at cannes, the same number as shohei imamura or emir kusturica (two directors i think of as cannes' most celebrated from around that time). that actually ties him with ingmar bergman and abbas kiarostami, and he's had more films at cannes than herzog, fassbinder or fellini, to mention just the first few famous names i looked up. he's only won one thing, the cannes grand prix for birdy, which didn't do nearly as well in our poll as his two best picture-nominated films, which came 1st and 2nd (tied).

results
1. Midnight Express (1978) — 14 pts
2. Angel Heart (1987) — 9 pts
2. Mississippi Burning (1988) — 9 pts
4. Fame (1980) — 5.5 pts
5. Birdy (1984) — 4 pts
6. The Commitments (1991) — 3 pts
6. Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982) — 3 pts
8. The Road to Wellville (1994) — 2 pts
9. Shoot the Moon (1982) — 1 pt
9. The Evacuees (1975) — 1 pt
11. Bugsy Malone (1976) — 0.3 pts

[...]

That's just bizarre and idiotic. It's not like his movies have been that popular or so critically successful for that to make sense. I mean some have done well enough in box office and some decent notices for Parker to have a little attention, deserved or np, but there's no good reason at all for him to have had that many films in competition unless he's somehow much much more popular overseas or he was able to brute force his way in.

[flip]

yes it is very strange. i don't know how they pick films for cannes, but they do seem to have some favourite directors who they program almost no matter what. the coen brothers and ken loach come to mind, though they also win a lot of prizes, so maybe it's understandable they keep getting in. but then there are others who do not win many prizes, but who got in over and over. i made a little trivia game about it -- possibly not fun no matter how you play, but probably more fun if you pretend you're unaware of the point i'm trying to make: from each trio of directors, pick the one who has had the most films in the official competition at cannes!

#1: Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, Carlos Saura
#2: Luis Bunuel, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ettore Scola
#3: Martin Scorsese, Federico Fellini, Marco Bellocchio
#4: Werner Herzog, Robert Bresson, Andre Techine

[greennui]

I'm pretty sure the Dardennes only make films in order to compete at Cannes.

[wba]

Saura, Scola, Bellocchio, Techine.

[flip]

those are the correct answers

[nrh]

yes it is very strange. i don't know how they pick films for cannes, but they do seem to have some favourite directors who they program almost no matter what. the coen brothers and ken loach come to mind, though they also win a lot of prizes, so maybe it's understandable they keep getting in. but then there are others who do not win many prizes, but who got in over and over.

certainly during the endless thierry fremaux era one of the major criticisms was of a kind of inner circle of directors who get in no matter what, while other major directors eternally languish in sidebars. this criticism can be fair or not (people really seem to be annoyed to see naomi kawase for example, though i think her cannes films often tend to be among the better movies of any given year, while the dardennes have largely gotten a pass for their weakest work), but it can often feel like the "politics of friendship" that roger koza mentions in his paragraph about programming in his 2021 year end wrapup.

i am sure it must be even more infuriating if you are french, and see the token french slots every year go to people like maiwenn!

[wba]

those are the correct answers

I thought so.

[flip]

this is up at lbox

https://letterboxd.com/fliptrotsky/list ... -poll-317/