the 1940s FILM POLL voting thread (ballots due by Nov. 3)

cribbing, with some modifications, from the rules of the 1950s poll:

THE RULES

You may vote for up to 50 films from the 1940s. The list of movies from the nominations thread is below, but it is for advisory purposes only: votes do not have to come from that list. Any film from the 1940s is eligible.

Standard point system: Your Number 1 pick is worth 50 points, Number 2 is 49, and so on down to Number 50. If you vote for fewer than 50 films, points will still be allotted on the same descending scale. But to be an eligible ballot, it must have AT LEAST 10 MOVIES on it.

Please format your ballots with your #1 film at the top and the rest in descending order.

If you choose to send comments (and they are most welcome, even if just about one or two films), please place them at the end of email, after your rankings.

EMAIL BALLOTS TO:

tipsymothra (AT) live(dot)com

The voting period starts now and will end @ 12:00 AM Central Standard Time on Tuesday Nov. 3 (Election Day in the US of A), into Wednesday Nov. 4

I will bump this thread periodically with what will begin as friendly nudges and, if history is any guide, eventually descend into increasingly desperate and pathetic-sounding pleas for ballots.

anyway, here are THE NOMINEES to date:

3 Godfathers
A Canterbury Tale
A Diary for Timothy
A Letter to Three Wives
A Plumbing We Will Go
A Matter of Life and Death
A Royal Scandal
A Run for Your Money
A Scandal in Paris
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
A Woman's Face
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein
Above Suspicion
Across the Pacific
Adam's Rib
All That Money Can Buy (The Devil and Daniel Webster)
Arsenic and Old Lace
At Land
Bambi
Bedlam
Begone Dull Care
Beyond the Forest
Black Narcissus
Blood of the Beast
Border Incident
Born to Kill
Brief Encounter
Brighton Rock
Brute Force
Cabin in the Sky
Calendar Girl
Casablanca
Cat People
Caught
Centennial Summer
Champagne Charlie
Christmas Holiday
Christmas in July

Citizen Kane
Colorado Territory
Crossfire
Curse of the Cat People
Daisy Kenyon
Dance, Girl, Dance
Dark Passage
Day of Wrath
Dead of Night
Der Fuehrer's Face
Detour
Devil in the Flesh
Diary of a Chambermaid
Double Indemnity
Duel in the Sun
Dumbo
Ecole des Facteurs
Fallen Angel
Fantasia
Fires Were Started
Fireworks
Five Women Around Utamaro
Flamingo Road
Force of Evil
Foreign Correspondent
Forever Amber
Fort Apache

From This Day Forward
Gaslight (U.K.)
Gaslight (U.S.A.)
Gentlemen's Agreement
Germany Year Zero
Gilda
Good Sam
Great Expectations
Green for Danger
Gun Crazy
Hail the Conquering Hero
Hamlet
Hangover Square
Heaven Can Wait
Hellzapoppin'
Henry V
Her Cardboard Lover
His Girl Friday
Hitler's Madman
How Green Was My Valley

Humoresque
I Know Where I'm Going!
I Walked With a Zombie
I Was a Male War Bride
In This Our Life
It Always Rains on Sunday
It's a Wonderful Life
Ivan the Terrible, Parts 1 and 2
Jammin' the Blues
Jour de Fete
Key Largo
Kind Hearts and Coronets
Kiss of Death
La Belle et la Bete
La Ciel Est a Vous
La Terra Trema
Late Spring

Laura
Le Corbeau
Le Silence de la Mer
Le Tempestaire
Le Vampire
Leave Her to Heaven
Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne
Les Enfants du Paradis
Les Enfants Terribles
Les Visiteurs du Soir
Letter from an Unknown Woman
Lifeboat
Listen to Britain
Little Rural Riding Hood
Louisiana Story
Lumiere d'Ete
Lured
Madame Bovary
Meet Me in St. Louis
Meshes of the Afternoon

Mildred Pierce
Ministry of Fear
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Monsieur Beaucaire
Monsieur Verdoux
Moonrise
Motion Painting No. 1
Murder, My Sweet
My Darling Clementine
My Love Has Been Burning
My Name Is Julia Ross
Nightmare Alley
Notorious
Now, Voyager
Odd Man Out
Old Acquaintance
On the Town
Ossessione
Out of the Past
Paisa
Passport to Pimlico
Phantom Lady
Pinocchio
Portrait of Jennie
Possessed
Puce Moment
Pursued
Quai des Orfevres
Railroaded!
Ramrod
Raw Deal
Rebecca
Red River

Red Hot Riding Hood
Reign of Terror
Roadhouse
Road to Utopia
Rome, Open City
Rope
Ruthless
Saboteur
Samson and Delilah
Scarlet Street
Scott of the Antarctic
Shadow of a Doubt
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Shockproof
Shoeshine
Slattery's Hurricane
Sleep, My Love
Spellbound
Spring in a Small Town
Sredni Vashtar
Star Spangled Rhythm
Strange Cargo
Stranger on the Third Floor
Stray Dog
Sullivan's Travels
Summer Storm
Susan and God
Suspicion
Swamp Water
T-Men
That's My Man
That Uncertain Feeling
The 47 Ronin
The Bank Dick
The Bells of St. Mary's
The Best Years of Our Lives
The Bicycle Thief
The Big Sleep

The Clock
The Dead of Night
The Fallen Idol
The Fan
The Fantastic Night
The Fountainhead
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
The Ghost Ship
The Grapes of Wrath
The Great Dictator
The Great McGinty
The Great Moment
The Heiress
The Horn Blows at Midnight
The Kissing Bandit
The Lady Eve
The Lady From Shanghai
The Leopard Man
The Letter
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
The Little Foxes
The Lodger
The Long Voyage Home
The Lost Weekend
The Magnificent Ambersons
The Maltese Falcon
The Man I Love
The Miracle of Morgan Creek
The Naked City
The Palm Beach Story
The Philadelphia Story
The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Pirate
The Reckless Moment
The Red Shoes
The Seventh Victim
The Shanghai Gesture
The Seventh Veil
The Shop Around the Corner
The Silent Duel
The Sin of Harold Diddlebock
The Small Back Room
The Southerner
The Stranger
The Thief of Baghdad
The Third Man
The Three Caballeros
The Tower of the Seven Hunchbacks
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
The Uninvited
The Window
The Woman in the Window
The Woman on the Beach
They Died With Their Boots On
They Live by Night
They Were Expendable
Thieves Highway
This Land Is Mine
Till the Clouds Roll By
Till We Meet Again
To Be or Not to Be


To Have and Have Not

Tobacco Road
Under Capricorn
Under the Bridges
Unfaithfully Yours
Went the Day Well?
Whirlpool
Whiskey Galore!
White Heat
Woman on the Beach
Yolanda and the Thief
Ziegfeld Follies




this is, among other things, the poll where ilx gets to put citizen kane in its place. wherever that might be.

citizen kane: around #6 for me

i'm waiting for the spiteful ballot that grudgingly gives it a #50

for reference, the nominations thread.

Citizen Kane will win here too, obv.

This is the worst month ever for me to do any re-viewing.

Ditto, so I won't.

who needs to re-view? i'm going totally on overall levels of fondness and respect, even if i can't always remember exactly why i was fond...

There are definitely some I want to re-view before voting here. Also some I will try to check out for the first time. From a quick scan, and going only in terms of fondness, Citizen Kane looks like it will be #3 or #4 for me.

This gives me an excuse to check out some movies I've been meaning to watch for a long time.

I can't find a 1940s Sredni Vashtar on IMDB - would like to see this as I love the story. For those of you who are aware of it, is it worth further hunting?

Remember: a vote for Out of the Past is a vote for Build my Gallows High. That's because they are one and the same. So vote.

Ditto, so I won't.

You'll just be seeing Miracle of Morgan's Creek for the first time, eh?

I can't find a 1940s Sredni Vashtar on IMDB - would like to see this as I love the story. For those of you who are aware of it, is it worth further hunting?

It's on youtube in its entirety (see below). It's also on the highly recommended, frequently sensibility flip-flopping Unseen Cinema box.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8S1Pwra7r2g

should Sredni Vashtar count if it wasn't completed/edited til '83? just askin'.

Yup.

It shames me to think how few of these I've seen. I couldn't begin to fill out a full ballot.

I've got a solid ballot of 25-ish and I'm thinking of leaving it at that, rather than throw points to the obvious frontrunners, et al.

yes, you have to pay heed to the '00s and watch Eureka.

and Still Life ... and Into Great Silence ... and Battle in Heaven and Offside and Hunger and so on and so forth

and then the complete works of P Sturges

I'll be voting just to make sure Le Silence de la Mer gets a vote (the Masters of Cinema disc was uploaded on youtube last I checked).

there's a lot of these that i haven't seen that i'm bumping up in my netflix queue...

just noticed imdb has les enfants terribles as 1950, so that's out unless someone can make a contrary case.

Bah, we missed the Lean Oliver Twist, and In Which We Serve too.

you can add them. nominations remain open for the duration of the voting.

Sullivan's Travels is on TCM tonight

I watched "Meshes of the Afternoon" and "Listen to Britain" this evening and I enjoyed them both, especially "Listen to Britain". Great film.

There's no doubt, as I try to pare down a list, that this was the peak decade of US (and UK) studio filmmaking. After the first 25 no-brainers, I could pick any of 100 films randomly as the next 25.

Nah, though the qualities that you prefer in movies were more reliably consistent. The 50s and 70s both had much higher highs.

My ballot is likely to be only 25 films.

perhaps you haven't seen some of the '40s "highs"!

Yes, I have seen Citizen Kane and almost all the Val Lewtons.

this poll is shaming me into finally watching black narcissus (due from netflix tomorrow). and several others.

Eric, don't be so Bosley Crowther

In Which We Serve just made my queue; I don't know how I've kept forgetting to watch this.

Eric, don't be so Bosley Crowther Manny Farber

Yeah, he hated a lot of great films too.

Bummer that I can't find a Shoeshine DVD abywhere -- apparently there is one...

Farber hated Magnificent Ambersons. And most of the movies I like from the '60s.

Billy Wilder's very funny A Foreign Affair is not on that list.

It might be if it was available.

"unavailable"? there was a VHS in the late '90s! and I see TCM has scheduled it again -- for January 24.

Ambersons is also "unavailable." This is not a worthy excuse.

Yeah what did you mean by "unavailable?"

If I don't own it for "rescreening" purposes, it's unavailable.

(ha -- my copy of Ambersons is on a VHS recorded on PBS in the early nineties)

i had no idea ambersons isn't on dvd. madness.

No one's posted a ballot yet; I guess I'll be the first.

1. Double Indemnity (1944)
2. The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
3. The Big Sleep (1946)
4. Citizen Kane (1941)
5. White Heat (1949)
6. Red River (1948)
7. The Third Man (1949)
8. Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
9. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
10. Odd Man Out (1947)

I don't know if it's humanly possible to have more conventional tastes in '40s films than I do.

I know at least three of those will make my list easily.

That's OK, clemenza, just very American (save for #10, and semi-7).

Another nom: Drunken Angel

this is hard. spent a lot of my childhood reading film guides and watching lots of telly (england in the 70s/80s when there were only three channels - the christmas radio times was always a treat to see what gems they would bring out). i can't quite get to 50 out of the list that i know i've seen.

the difficulty was how to rank them, so various criteria were applied, in no order and without consistency:

which out of (a) or (b) would i rather see RIGHT NOW?
which film can i remember REALLY enjoying at the time i first saw it?
which film have i seen more than once and still enjoyed or enjoyed more or less than the previous time?
which have special memories (e.g. Sunday afternoons after lunch with 'Scott of the Antarctic' or staying up way past bedtime to catch a Preston Sturges film at 1am on Boxing Day)?

i think what i'm trying to say is that whether a film is "good" or not hasn't come into it for me. and i like that.

hi, middle age, come on in...

i think what i'm trying to say is that whether a film is "good" or not hasn't come into it for me. and i like that.

so citizen kane keeps slipping down the rankings

OK, here's my top ten, pretty MOR, but damn meaty

It's a Wonderful Life
Casablanca
The Maltese Falcon
Brief Encounter
Dead of Night
The Philadelphia Story
Went the Day Well?
The Big Sleep
Whiskey Galore!
Pinocchio

the nominations have 'dead of night' and 'the dead of night'. votes for these will presumably be assimilated into one?

nein! definite articles matter.

yes, of course. i just didn't notice.

"Well does it have it have to be in black and white?"

Maybe not. In the '40s it did. I love Meet Me in St. Louis, but it looks like a candied postcard compared to those other ones.

I'm a bit confused as to what you're saying exactly. But if you're looking for relatively current films that possess some of the qualities you laid out above, I'd try:

Autumn Tale (Eric Rohmer 1998)
The Chambermaid on the Titanic (Bigas Luna 1998)
Distant Voices, Still Lives (Terrence Davies 1988)
Down With Love (Peyton Reed 2003)
8 Women (François Ozon 2000)
The Five Senses (Jeremy Podeswa 1999)
Kikujiro (Takeshi Kitano 1999)
Oasis (Chang-dong Lee 2002)
Women of the Night (Zalman King 2000)
and yes,
Xanadu (Robert Greenwald 1980)

Ooh good point. I should add Xanadu to my ballot.

?

http://www.math.osu.edu/~mdavis/ShanghaiLady.gif

THREE DAYS LEFT TO VOTE

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http://www.imaginaryyear.com/raccoon/images/filmclub/2008/deren-08.jpg

TWO DAYS LEFT TO VOTE

x-p I've only seen Xanadu on that list but it's a good reflection on you that I will give the rest the benefit of the doubt, ugh.

I forgot to mention music, which is so key in '40s American movies, even key in the way it's taken out for effect sometimes (The Grapes of Wrath), and key in within-story usage too (singing in Casablanca, The Big Sleep, etc.).

Music is key to American movies period, in all eras, even the "silent" era.

http://auteurs_production.s3.amazonaws.com/stills/21638/red__hot_riding_hood_1943_2.jpg

Don't be shy! ONE DAY TO VOTE!

by selecting any 10 movies from this decade, you too can make your voice heard! any vote could tip the balance!

x-p But '40s movie music was arguably more integrated into the story/direction/emotions on a moment-to-moment basis--a more complete dream

I sent in my top 25 just now.

excellent. keep them cards and letters coming.

at a quick glance i can already say that (unsurprisingly, i guess) there is no movie that appears on every ballot.

Just sent in a Top 30.

Oh damn, I never got around to watching any extra films for this. It may have to just be a top 10, if at all.

a top 10 is totally fine.

http://www.basetree.com/thumbs2/Every_Vote_Counts.jpg

Right, I have sent in my top 15. I did get around to watching Sredni Vashtar, which I liked very much, but as it has had so little time to settle in my mind I had to just pop it in on the bottom. I won't post the whole ballot but I did end up doing things like putting Nightmare Alley above Citizen Kane - the latter is most certainly a more finely crafted film, but I adore the former, and would almost invariably pick it to watch if given a choice between the two.

Also, I have probably only seen another 10 on this list that did not make my ballot, and couldn't think of any non-nominated films to add - I seem to have a horrendous knowledge of this period, as the only things that sprang to mind were either from the 1920s or the late 1950s.

I submitted my 50, by instinct... only one Bob Hope.

no Cluny Brown!

I just sent mine.

http://www.icicom.up.pt/blog/take2/2005-Casablanca-Bogart-Bergman.jpg

LAST DAY TO VOTE
(balloting extended two hours to midnight pacific time. i don't know why i originally set it at central time...)

listen, maybe the votes of one little ilxor don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy poll. but if the poll closes at midnight tonight and your ballot's not in it, you'll regret it. maybe not today. maybe not tomorrow (because, you know, it'll take a little while to tabulate them). but soon! and for the rest of your life.

just sent a ballot. almost missed this completely somehow.

fwiw, the top 20 of my 50. apart from the top 5 or 6, a lot of the rest could easily swap places:

The Maltese Falcon
Les Enfants du Paradis
Casablanca
Late Spring
Meshes of the Afternoon
The Big Sleep
The Third Man
The Magnificent Ambersons
Kind Hearts and Coronets
To Be or Not to Be

Double Indemnity
Fireworks
I Know Where I'm Going!
His Girl Friday
Citizen Kane
Meet Me in St. Louis
Out of the Past
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Mildred Pierce
Red River

Only submitted 30. No point in giving Sturges any unnecessary help.

Mine are coming a bit later. I'm just watching one more Sturges film....

in thinking about my placement of kane, i realized that my issue with that movie -- to the extent i have one -- has always been a lack of emotional engagement. i've seen it god knows how many times, and i always enjoy watching it, but kane is kept at such a distance (deliberately) that it's hard to care too much. (as opposed to ambersons, which i think is richer emotionally.)

(or the third man, for that matter. as shifty and slippery as harry lime is, he's more alive on screen than kane.)

I think old Kane trashing the room is his most empathetic scene.

it is a nice illustration of his fundamental arrested development (much more than the "rosebud" device) -- part of him stays a frustrated child until the end.

Tipsy just sent you my 50. I started out thinking "Eh...this isn't such a hot decade" given my indifference to film noir and message pictures. But then I, um, started watching some films. Boy I hope someone through a vote to The Fountainhead. Or Gun Crazy. Or Naruse. Or Zarah Leander. Or...

My top ten:

1. Meet Me in St. Louis (Vincente Minnelli 1944)
2. Lumiere d'été (Jean Grémillon 1943)
3. The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges 1942)
4. The Seventh Victim (Mark Robson 1943)
5. Le Tempestaire (Jean Epstein 1947)
6. Curse of the Cat People (Gunther von Fritsch and Robert Wise 1944)
7. Fallen Angel (Otto Preminger 1945)
8. Late Spring (Yasujiro Ozu 1949)
9. Les parents terribles (Jean Cocteau 1948)
10. Rebecca (Alfred Hitchcock 1940)

I think at least three of those are also in my top 10.

well, four are in my top 50.

My list is really boring. Very canon-heavy.

the decade has a pretty huge canon. you'd have to be trying really hard to not wander into it...

http://www.filmreference.com/images/sjff_01_img0532.jpg

hahaha coppers! i've still got SIX HOURS TO VOTE! six hours! y'hear me?

lol

how many ballots ya got?

21, counting mine. a decent turnout for this kind of thing.

still happy to accept more for the next 4 1/2 hours...

oop, make that 23.

My fifty:

Letter from an Unknown Woman
The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
Citizen Kane
Red River
Rome, Open City
The Lady From Shanghai
Shoeshine
The Maltese Falcon
The Third Man
My Darling Clementine

Out of the Past
Notorious
The Lady Eve
The Big Sleep
The Shop Around the Corner
The Thief of Baghdad
I Know Where I'm Going!
His Girl Friday
Meet Me in St. Louis
Hail the Conquering Hero

Double Indemnity
The Bank Dick
Shadow of a Doubt
Force of Evil
Les Enfants du Paradis
The Letter
Sullivan's Travels
La Belle et la Bete
Bicycle Thieves
Great Expectations

Casablanca
Ossessione
The Palm Beach Story
The Magnificent Ambersons
Scarlet Street
Rebecca
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
The Grapes of Wrath
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
Adam's Rib

Laura
Late Spring
Brute Force
Road to Utopia
Daisy Kenyon
Day of Wrath
The Philadelphia Story
It's a Wonderful Life
A Foreign Affair
Le Corbeau

Hellzapoppin' thanks you for your support.

yeah, Olsen & Johnson so outshine WC Fields & Hope....

ok, the voting she is over. 24 ballots in -- thanks, all -- and now the fun begins.

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/qf/c/PopularScience/12-1947/lrg_adding_machine.jpg

barring unforeseen events, i'm aiming to start the countdown on monday. anyone who still wants to add thoughts and comments can email them between now and then, or just toss them in as the countdown goes.

Planning the vote count:

http://tcmmoviemorlocks.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/great_mcginty_screenshot.jpg

in thinking about my placement of kane, i realized that my issue with that movie -- to the extent i have one -- has always been a lack of emotional engagement. i've seen it god knows how many times, and i always enjoy watching it, but kane is kept at such a distance (deliberately) that it's hard to care too much

Isn't this the point though? I like Jedediah's less than generous assessment of Charlie (and even that rather accurate one, it's clear, doesn't fully account for the man's charm)

it is the point in a way, and i admire the skill and intelligence of it all. it just keeps me from loving it, i think.

I'm more conventionally moved by Ambersons.