The American Film Institute recently published a number of Top 10 lists specific to genres. Not long after, bloggers ’round the world derided them for any number of reasons. Now that some time has passed, let’s focus on something more positive. Fox from Tractor Facts (LAMB #66) had the excellent idea of the LAMB members voting on their own Top 10 lists from the various genres.
We’ll start with something easy and go from there – click on the link below and give me your Top 10 Comedies, in order. I’ll tally up the results using the 10-9-8 scoring method (10 points for a first place vote, 9 for 2nd, etc.), and I’ll post the “winners” in two weeks. We’ll run through the general categories (Drama, Horror, Action/Adventure, Sci-Fi), but if you’ve got a suggestion for an off-the-beaten-path category, comment now and perhaps an audible will be called.
Boo-ya-ka-shah! My vote is in.
My vote is in too…but i suck at some of these more general titles…at least my mind went blank trying to fill it out.
I’m assuming that there is some sort of time limit on this? How long do I have to vote? This could take a bit of thought.
2 weeks.
Why not eleven weeks? I thought this thing goes all the way up to eleven. (And I type this comment with a sarcastically straight face.)
BAH… blogger went down and I lost an uber-huge comment I had typed out. This gist of it is basically the following:
1) It was really hard and might have been easier had there been sub-genres for comedy (since it’s such a huge, all-encompassing genre) instead. The same thing might hold true for horror.
2) I tried to be as fair as possible with my choices… I tried to mix a good bit of my favorite comedies with classic comedies that might be on an AFI list (except movies that people actually care about).
Hey Fletch,
Any chance we could do this thing in two stages – we all vote and then every film that got five or more points is a “finalist” and we vote again? People are complaining that it’s hard to narrow a genre down, and if everyone else here hates zoolander i’d rather not throw my vote away on it. Stuff like that. What do you think?
@ Nick – didn’t you have a problem with AFI using Rom-Coms as a genre?
I thought we’d start with the macro categories and can get to the micro categories later.
@ Graham – I think you make a good point…but…if there are enough people voting (and I have 14 already), I wouldn’t worry too much, as there’ll be enough distribution of movies. Also, if the movie you’re wanting to not throw away your vote on (let’s say Zoolander) is a high enough pick on your list, with the scoring the way it is, a high pick (your number 1) will count as much as ten 10s.
Do they have to be American movies?
Nope.
How exactly do you define ‘comedy’? If a film is comedy/drama for instance, can I include it?
Fletch: I didn’t have a problem with Rom-Com BEING a genre… I had a problem that it was the ONLY Comedy genre. There’s so many types of comedy out there, and to only include rom-com out of all of them is silly. And since they could only choose 10 main genres instead of having any kind of infinite amount to go through, they could have just done comedy in general.
But since we’re not limited two just 10 genres, we could do the sub-genres.
One idea I had to do on my own blog AGES ago (but never did) was to list my top 10 movies in the different sub-genres. Then I would take the number 1 spot from each sub-genre (let’s say of comedy), and put them in a top 10 of all-time comedy (did that make sense?).
But this way is fine, too. It’s just so hard for me, personally, who really likes comedy movies, to narrow down to 10 in a respectable fashion
.
In line with my previous question, am I going to take IMDb as the source that tells me which films are comedy and which films are not? I think Sleuth (1972) is essentially a comedy but IMDb does not agree. What shall I do?
Sorry for asking the same question in two posts…
Another question that popped up just now: Are we going to select the best comedies or the funniest comedies? I believe they are dramatically different concepts.
Excellent! As soon as I get back from vacation today I will be putting in my vote. Marilyn has a good question, but I am taking Fletch’s “nope” as the answer.
@ Nick – everything you said make sense. You should still use that idea for your blog – it’s a good one.
@ Anil – Break free from the schackles, my friend. There is no spoon – you define the genre as you see fit. Besides, I’ve already seen some choices come through that I’ve thought “Really? That’s a comedy?”
But that’s the point, at least with this high-level view. If you think Silence of the Lambs is a comedy, go for it. Just don’t expect it to make the final top 10, as you’re probably in the minority there.
lol… did somebody really put Silence of the LAMBs as a comedy? Or was that just an example? Was this person thinking of SIRENS of the LAMBs? Though, that seemed to be a tragedy, as well
.
Haha – that was just an example.
Damn, I should have cast all ten votes for Young Frankenstein. That would have added up to some kind of score that would be good, I’m sure.
I went with the films that made me laugh the most.
That sounds like an excellent method to me, Marilyn.
DAMN… I wish I had gone with Marilyn’s method…
-_-
The movies that make me laugh the most are the ones that were featured on MST3K. Some how I don’t think they’ll be at the top of everyone else’s lists.
rachel: Similarly, movies that make me laugh the most aren’t always considered some of the greatest movies in the world. They typically aren’t MST3K awful, but they’re not always classics, either. That’s why I didn’t focus primarily on MY favorite comedies.
I just realized I left out Blazing Saddles. I suck.