Stanley Fish, on his New York Times blog, just made his list of the 10 Best American Movies Ever. Five of them are from the forties, and the most recent, from 1993, is Groundhog Day. Double Indemnity, Vertigo, Sunset Boulevard, all fine. But Groundhog Day?
What the hell?!?
I have never, ever understood people’s obsession with this movie. And, while lists like that are totally subjective, I can’t imagine anyone thinking it’s better than, say, Short Cuts or Pulp Fiction or Welcome to the Dollhouse or Fargo or Flirting With Disaster or Boogie Nights or Happiness or Magnolia or Three Kings. Never mind anything from this millennium, like Punch-Drunk Love or Chicago or There Will Be Blood or Michael Clayton. Or probably hundreds of others I haven’t thought of yet. Shrek. Tape. The Virgin Suicides. Down With Love. The Devil Wears Prada. Hell, I don’t know.
Filed under: music
In an attempt to make my work day less dull, I put on the station of music that last.fm thinks I’d like. (I’ve been thinking a lot about music recommendations, and how everybody’s always working under the constant assumption that you always need to be discovering new music. If I have more time some time I’ll maybe write an essay about that or something.) Anyway, here’s my feelings about the first twenty songs they played me.
Saturday Looks Good To Me – The Girl’s Distracted
This song is terrible. I can’t believe I liked them so much a couple of years ago.
Jordan Knight – Give It To You
Sometimes he’s goody goody. Right now he’s notty notty. Chorus is a little Ghost Town DJs-ish, though.
Jarvis – Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time
I got this album at the same time as all the Pulp reissues and the Peel sessions so I probably didn’t give it enough of a chance because I was too busy listening to Turkey Mambo Momma and Mile End and whatnot. Probably just because I knew it first, I still prefer the Nancy SInatra version of this song.
Visage – Tar
I think I only know Fade To Grey, but this song’s pretty nice in a rawer Human League sort of way.
Looper – Mondo ’77
I forgot about this song! I mostly knew Uncle Ray, and the songs on the Up A Tree album, and that one Hurray For Y2K song that I can’t find anywhere on the internet. But this one’s pretty good, too. And who knew it was on the Vanilla Sky soundtrack? It’s long, though.
