Doctor Gonzo

Another in the ongoing AFI movie series, this one honors the top 10 movies in ten different film genres. I like these shows, they're fun and interesting - see below if you want to take a peek at the actual ballot!

The American Film Institute to Award Top Honors Ten Times With Newest Celebration in AFI's 100 Years... Series
AFI's 10 TOP 10 TO HONOR AMERICA'S GREATEST ANIMATED, FANTASY, GANGSTER, SCI-FI, WESTERN, SPORTS, MYSTERY, ROMANTIC COMEDY, COURTROOM DRAMA AND EPIC FILMS
Lists Revealed Live During CBS Television Event in June
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 17 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Film Institute (AFI) today introduced a new chapter in its Emmy Award-winning AFI's 100 Years... series. AFI's 10 Top 10 will count down the top 10 films from 10 classic American film genres including animation, fantasy, science fiction, gangster, western, sports, romantic comedy, courtroom drama, mystery and epic films.
AFI's 10 Top 10 turns a page in the institutes' ongoing celebration of the American cinema centennial with a more diverse version of AFI's highly anticipated annual countdown special. Celebrating film genres that have never been honored before, AFI will create 10 new lists within the format previously designed for a top 100.
"Ten years ago, AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies launched an unprecedented celebration of American film to mark cinema's centennial. As we continue this program into a new decade, we look forward to catalyzing a national conversation 10 times greater -- for the ultimate goal of this program is to drive audiences to discover and rediscover the classics of American film," said AFI President and CEO Bob Gazzale.
AFI's 100 Years... series has included AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (1998), 100 Stars (1999), 100 Laughs (2000), 100 Thrills (2001), 100 Passions (2002), 100 Heroes & Villains (2003), 100 Songs (2004), 100 Movie Quotes (2005), 100 Cheers (2006) and AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies-10th Anniversary Edition (2007).
The primetime special will be executive produced and directed by Gary Smith; executive produced for AFI by former AFI Board Chair Emeritus Frederick S. Pierce; and produced by Dann Netter. SFM Entertainment LLC is the distributor of the program. Past sponsors of the series have included General Motors, Pepsi, Best Buy, Procter & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, Apple, Anheuser-Busch, Colgate-Palmolive, Sony and all major motion picture companies.
About the Jury Process
Today, AFI distributed a ballot with 500 nominated movies (50 per genre) to a jury of over 1,500 leaders from the creative community, including film artists (directors, screenwriters, actors, editors, cinematographers), critics and historians.
This year, the jury will be asked to choose up to 10 movies per genre from a comprehensive list, including entries such as: Animated: PINOCCHIO (1941) and SHREK (2001); Fantasy: KING KONG (1933) and THE LORD OF THE RINGS (2001); Sci-Fi: THE WAR OF THE WORLDS (1953) and THE MATRIX (1999); Gangster: SCARFACE (1932) and THE DEPARTED (2006); Westerns: THE SEARCHERS (1956) and UNFORGIVEN (1992); Sports: THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES (1942) and SEABISCUIT (2003); Romantic Comedy: IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934) and MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING (1997); Courtroom Drama: WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION (1957) and A FEW GOOD MEN (1992); Mystery: SHERLOCK HOLMES (1939) and THE USUAL SUSPECTS (1995); and Epics: BEN-HUR (1959) and BRAVEHEART (1995).


Interesting Facts About the Ballot -- Animation -- 13 of the 50 films on the ballot were produced by Walt Disney. -- Fantasy -- 11 movies feature ghosts. -- Gangster -- Robert De Niro is the most featured actor with seven movies; James Cagney and Al Pacino are featured with five movies each. -- Sci-Fi -- 22 of the 50 movies contain an alien presence. -- Western -- 11 of the 50 movies feature John Wayne; 10 of the 50 movies were directed by John Ford. Seven of these 21 movies feature both John Ford and John Wayne. -- Sports -- 12 movies are based on baseball; nine movies are based on boxing; eight movies are based on football. -- Mystery -- Nine movies were directed by Alfred Hitchcock. -- Romantic Comedy -- Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn are featured together three times. Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are featured together twice. -- Courtroom Drama -- 20 of the 50 films involve a falsely accused defendant. -- Epic -- 16 movies are war films; 11 movies are based on biblical events.


------->>>>> Wanna see the ballot for yourself? it's at:
http://www.AFI.com/drop/ballot.pdf

password? AFIpress

Ronnie Dobbs

Jesus Christ how many lists can the AFI make?

Merkin Muffley

Now this is getting just silly. THESE are the 10 genres they come up with? Where is horror? Courtroom drama? Seriously?

I was behind all the other specials, but now they're really scrape the bottom of the barrel.

Drexl

I take it the 13 films "produced by Walt Disney" were actually produced by Mr. Disney and don't include the Pixar and modern Disney titles. 13 out of 50 would be an awfully low number if that includes everything affiliated with the Disney company. (Remember, these are only American films so anime is out.) I hope nothing really deserving got passed over in favor of something like Ice Age or Madagascar.

Yeah, with 10 genres, I don't know why they skipped horror.

dhmac

Leaving out Horror as a Top-10 genre is ridiculous. They should've omitted Courtroom Drama or, at least, combined Sci-Fi and Fantasy into just one genre.

PopcornTreeCt

I was thinking the same thing. Seems like a real low number.

I noticed that for sports movies 9 of them are boxing related. Seriously? Are there actually 9 movies about boxing? Let's see:

Rocky
Raging Bull
Cinderella Man
The Boxer
umm that's all I got.

Lastyear

Million Dollar Baby,Golden Boy,Somebody Up There Likes Me,Hard Times,The Set Up-lots of boxing movies.

PopcornTreeCt

Wow, Million Dollar Baby is the only one I heard of.

Sean O'Hara

So AFI's Top 10 Top 10 Lists List?

Lastyear

Somebody Up There Likes Me is the bio of Rocky Graziano starring Paul Newman.Golden Boy is with William Holden.Hard Times is with Charles Bronson and James Coburn-Bronson plays a bare knuckle fighter.There are a ton of boxing movies out there.And everyone better than Rocky.

PopcornTreeCt

^^Cool I have to check those out.

Here's what I would say is the best from each genre:

ANIMATION
Pinocchio (1940)

FANTASY
The Lord of the Rings The Towers Extended Edition (2002)

GANGSTER
Donnie Brasco (1997)

SCI-FI
Solaris (1972)

WESTERN
High Noon (1952)

SPORTS
Raging Bull (1980)

MYSTERY
The Maltese Falcon (1941)

ROMANTIC COMEDY
The Philadelphia Story (1940)

COURTROOM DRAMA
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

EPIC FILMS
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Count Dooku

25 of the 50 are Disney productions.
7 more are Pixar/Disney
and one is Touchstone.

So Disney can claim 66% of the nominees

MoviePage

They should include TORTURE PORN as well!

wilky61

PopcornTreeCT, you do realize that more movies have been made about boxing than any other sport, right?

Brack

I call bullshit. There are far more baseball movies.

Zen Peckinpah

Am curious about this, but I will admit that last year's "10th Anniversary" list was insulting IMO. They virtually ignored all of the post-1996 movies save for 3 or 4 entries and still shafted Goodfellas and Pulp Fiction in terms of a higher place. Still, I like this idea. Some REALLY interesting and pleasantly surprising nominees on the list too:

Gangster - Miller's Crossing, Once Upon a Time in America

Sci-Fi - Children of Men (yay!), Escape from New York (the AFI has respect for Snake Plissken! HOLY SHIT), Repo Man (won't make the list, but this made me smile)

Sports - Any Given Sunday (CRIMINALLY underrated, my favorite football movie because it's not inspirational)

Mystery - THE BIG LEBOWSKI!!, Blow Out (De Palma's best suspense film), The Game, House of Games

Romantic Comedy - The 40 Year Old Virgin (this was an ingenious move), Say Anything (the definitive one as far as I'm concerned)

Courtroom Drama - My Cousin Vinny (WTF? This isn't even a drama! Still, I love it), The People vs. Larry Flynt (a personal favorite)

And why is They Live not considered an epic? I don't care if Godfather II and Last Temptation of Christ are there, THAT is an epic!

Gerry P.

There are more Rocky movies than baseball movies.


p.s. I'll add Fat City and Gentleman Jim to Lastyear's list.

wilky61

Well I don't have a specific source to back this claim, but this came up at a trivia night that I routinely attend about a year-and-a-half ago and I correctly guessed boxing. I'll see what google turns up...

PopcornTreeCt

Happy to see they nominated Cool Runnings. It's a childhood fav.