Lists, 10/21.

"On January 26, 1958 (the date is written in pencil), I began keeping a list of all the movies I'd seen, using lined notebook paper that I further divided in half so that I could get upwards of 50 movies per page. I was 12 years old." Newsweek's David Ansen is still updating that list and he's closing in on 8000 titles:

It's the diary of my life: the titles transporting me back to the theaters and cities I saw them in, the people I saw them with....

These titles defined my generation: they told us who we were, what others thought we were supposed to be (John Wayne, Doris Day), who we wanted to be (Bogie, Audrey Hepburn, Brando, Kim Novak, Cary Grant, Elizabeth Taylor). Between the lines of my list I can read the convulsions of a country that was radically redefining itself as it passed from the big, affluent, homogenized Eisenhower 50s through the roller-coaster ride of the 60s, all the way up to our fragmented and fearful present. It's a long way from Prince Valiant and Three Coins in the Fountain to Borat and Brokeback Mountain.

The Toronto Star's Peter Howell presents an "alphabetical and highly subjective list of the 10 coolest movies currently in production." Via Movie City News.

In the Independent, Anthony Quinn counts down the "10 best film endings."

"Far from being the wilful travesty, [Todd] Haynes's [I'm Not There] actually taps into a great tradition of 'out-there' pop movies." In the Financial Times, Ben Thompson lists five.

Queens on film. No, not what you're thinking... real blue-blooded royalty: Bronwyn Cosgrove picks the ten best for the Guardian.

Posted by dwhudson at October 21, 2007 7:57 AM