Reviewing the Best Movies Ever Made: 12 Angry Men, Vertigo, Jeanne Dielman, Tokyo Story
It’s time to take a look at the final four movies in this series! I’ll be writing a post reflecting on watching all 25 films that I’ll post in the next few weeks — it’s definitely been a worthwhile (and interesting) experience overall.
The four films we’ll be going over today are quite different from one another, though coincidentally, three of the four were released in the 1950s. Are they worthy of being on Best Film lists so many decades after their releases?
12 Angry Men (1957)
IMDb No. 5
United Artists, 95 minutes
12 Angry Men centers around 12 (not happy) white men who make up a jury. Almost all of the movie’s runtime is spent in a jury room where the men must come to a unanimous decision as to the guilt of an 18-year-old on trial for murdering his father. You might think that a movie centering on a 1957 jury that would look quite different from a far more diverse 2024 jury would be really outdated. However, that assumption would be wrong as 12 Angry Men still feels relevant today.
While the men in the movie are all white, they all come from different backgrounds and are approaching how they get to their guilty or not guilty decisions in different ways. As the 18-year-old on trial is a minority, several of the men express bigoted attitudes, which is something you could expect to (sadly) still find on many juries across America.
It would’ve been nice to have watched 12 Angry Men and come away from the film thinking, “Wow, some people sure held some racist and outdated views back in the 1950s.” Unfortunately, I think that if a similar case were to present itself in 2024, the jury, though it would be made up of a more diverse pool of people, would have similar debates to the ones had by characters in this movie.
12 Angry Men also focuses heavily on the idea of reasonable doubt and what really qualifies as falling under this term. As the story progresses, many of the men change their views as they further explore, and then begin to question the murder case.
The acting in 12 Angry Men is solid. Despite having an ensemble cast, each of the characters feels distinct from one another. These also feel like they could be real people; they aren’t just each a different stereotype of a type of individual.
For a movie set almost entirely in a single room, 12 Angry Men still manages to never feel at all boring. It’s well-paced, with the story moving quickly from one idea to the next. For a 2024 audience, I think 12 Angry Men will still provide an engaging and thought-provoking watch.
Grade: 8/10
Vertigo (1958)
AFI No. 9, Sight & Sound No. 2
Paramount Pictures, 128 minutes
Vertigo is a psychological thriller that has minimal amounts of actual thrills, but plenty of scenes of James Stewart’s character tailing the attractive female character in his car. I’m being a little harsh here as there’s still a bit that Vertigo does well, even if there is a bit more that the movie does less well, or that simply doesn’t hold up 66 years after the movie’s initial release.
Let’s start with the positives though. Alfred Hitchcock’s films are often known for having great settings, and that’s definitely the case here. The locations where our characters find themselves feel very distinct, whether it’s a scene in the Muir Woods, at the Golden Gate Bridge, or a dramatic scene at a Spanish mission. Hitchcock is great at coming up with settings that feel unique and that helps scenes stand out more than they would if the locations or settings were less noteworthy.
Another thing Hitchcock employs that helps his scenes really pop is a good use of color. The movie was shot with Technicolor, and it takes full advantage of this fact, whether it’s vibrant flowers or jewelry, or when color is being used more directly with having a character change the color of her hair.
As far as the story itself is concerned, there are both positives and negatives. I think that the mystery of the film is fine, though a 2024 audience will likely have an easier time guessing fairly early what’s actually going on.
The movie chooses to reveal the truth behind what’s happening pretty quickly after the dramatic scene at the Spanish mission, and I think the story really could’ve benefited from waiting until later in the film to show the audience what’s happening. Put more simply (but to still avoid spoilers), I think that it definitely would’ve been more effective for the audience to learn the truth when James Stewart’s character, John Ferguson, does, and not way earlier.
I think that this might have something to do with the way movie audiences view movies in different decades. A 2024 audience might be more appreciative of a big, climactic reveal near the end of a movie, while a 1950s audience would want things explained immediately and wouldn’t like the feeling of not knowing what’s going on with the plot.
A major issue that I think audiences in 2024 will take with the film is that it’s fairly boring. As I stated earlier, there’s a lot of John Ferguson driving around following the female lead’s green car. Then, he’s walking around following her from place to place around San Francisco. Vertigo is more boring than suspenseful, and that’s a huge problem.
Another off-putting aspect is that the male lead is twice the age of the female lead, who’s also supposed to be completely taken with him. When the film was released, James Stewart was 50 years old and Kim Novak, who plays Madeleine, was 25. There are scenes later in the film where the older man is yelling at the young woman demanding she change her appearance for him, and she goes along with it since she’s so enamored with him. It feels very cringy today.
Vertigo is a decent example of a 1950s detective-type movie, but it’s been really overrated and isn’t deserving to be on any Top 10 lists. It’s fine to appreciate that other stories drew inspiration from Vertigo without that fact also necessarily meaning the Vertigo holds up as a great film.
Grade: 6/10
Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975)
Sight & Sound No. 1
Paradise Films, 201 minutes
Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles is a movie so boring that I have serious doubts that anyone in the nearly 50 years since it has been released has ever sat through it without taking a break. To call Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles a slog to get through would be an insult to other boring movies, which are just a normal level of boring, and don’t actually reach the cruel and unusual punishment threshold that I’d argue anyone forced to sit through this disaster is being subjected to.
Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles is hailed by those who champion it as a feminist masterpiece. This is largely because we are following a female character, and also because the film was directed by a woman at a time when this was even less common. I’m all for praising the merits of a film (no matter the gender of whoever lead its creation) but, if certain critics were specifically looking to include a feminist picture in their Best Movies Ever rankings, they could’ve found a better example than this pretentious mess.
The story of the film (if you can even call it a story) follows a woman named Jeanne Dielman, who is a widowed mother and prostitute, throughout her daily tasks. If that sounds potentially interesting to you, let me assure you, it is most certainly not. We get to watch Jeanne do chores at basically real-time speed. If most movies want to show that a character is washing dishes, for example, they will show viewers a quick scene of dish washing, and everyone gets the idea. Here though, such a scene is five minutes of no dialogue while a woman washes dishes.
Advocates of this film will say that part of the point of the movie is to show the boring monotony of this woman’s life. And, sure, maybe that was some of the director’s intention, but that same point could’ve been equally accomplished in a 25-minute short film. There is absolutely no reason for over three hours of this dullness.
Sometimes, you’ll be watching an indie film and there will be a slower, more deliberate scene, but there feels like there’s a purpose to it – the scene is given more importance because of its slow deliberation compared to other, more normally-paced scenes. Here, every scene is painstakingly slow.
I don’t think that audiences in 2024 will enjoy Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, but that has nothing to do with how poorly (or not poorly) it’s aged. In reality, I don’t think any average moviegoer has ever/will ever enjoy this film. I think that the inclusion of this movie on Best Film lists is based solely on the fact that certain critics feel obligated to include a feminist movie and this movie has (sadly) picked up steam as being the movie of choice in that category of films.
Watching Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles was one of the least enjoyable experiences I have had overall so far in 2024, and it was definitely the most boring. I’ve said it in a number of times in these reviews now, but it’s important to acknowledge that you can appreciate what a movie is trying to get across (a feminist message in this instance), but that just because you appreciate the meaning of something, it doesn’t also inherently make it a movie great. This is my least favorite film I’ve sat through since beginning this site (and possibly ever).
Grade: 1/10
Tokyo Story (1953)
Sight & Sound No. 4
Shochiku Films, 136 minutes
Tokyo Story benefits from being the first movie I’ve watched since enduring Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. How does it benefit? Well, it’s impossible for Tokyo Story to be the most boring movie ever since Jeanne Dielman has a stronghold on that designation for the foreseeable future. Still, this one is quite the snoozer.
When making Tokyo Story, writer-director Yasujirō Ozu cranked the boring meter all the way up to a nine (out of 10) and then raised the depressing-story meter up to a solid eight. If this movie has anything setting it above other pretentious films that found themselves on the Sight & Sound Best Movies list, it’s that it does have an actual story. However, it’s a very boring one.
Basically, an elderly couple decide to pay several of their adult children a visit in Tokyo. After they arrive, it’s pretty clear that their children and grandchildren don’t really appreciate them or want them there. Oh, kids these days. There’s a little bit of family drama, but (trust me) it is not at all interesting.
The film is shot in a way where the camera is set up in a stationary position and then the scene just plays out in front of it. Some critics seem to get a real kick out of this, but for me, the stationary camera just added to the stagnant dullness of the film.
The acting of the cast doesn’t help matters much either. A good portion of the ensemble seem to be simply reading lines as opposed to acting them out with any sort of emotional weight. As a whole, I found the acting in Tokyo Story to be very, well, not good.
In 2024, this movie definitely has a very amateurish, film school feel about it. Tokyo Story doesn’t feel polished the way that a lot of older movies do despite their age. If you’re a big fan of Japanese cinema and want to watch this one since it’s historically relevant, then go for it. To give credit where it’s due, the movie does give some insight into what it was like in post-war Japan. It’s boring, sure, but it’s never not watchable. Still, I think the majority of people will agree that Tokyo Story is an example of another classic movie that does not live up to the hype.
Grade: 3/10
Rankings: The 25 “Best” Movies
Schindler's List (1993): 10/10 (AFI No. 8, IMDb No. 6)
The Shawshank Redemption (1994): 10/10 (IMDb No. 1)
In the Mood for Love (2000): 9.5/10 (S&S No. 5)
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001): 9.5/10 (IMDb No. 9)
The Wizard of Oz (1939): 9.5/10 (AFI No. 10)
Casablanca (1942): 9/10 (AFI No. 3)
The Godfather (1972): 9/10 (AFI No. 2, IMDb No. 2)
Man with a Movie Camera (1929): 9/10 (S&S No. 9)
Singin’ in the Rain (1952): 8.5/10 (AFI No. 5, S&S No. 10)
12 Angry Men (1957): 8/10 (IMDb No. 5)
The Godfather Part II (1974): 8/10 (IMDb No. 4)
The Dark Knight (2009): 7/10 (IMDb No. 3)
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966): 7/10 (IMDb No. 10)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003): 7/10 (IMDb No. 7)
Pulp Fiction (1994): 7/10 (IMDb No. 8)
Vertigo (1958): 6/10 (AFI No. 9, S&S No. 2)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968): 4.5/10 (S&S No. 6)
Citizen Kane (1941): 4/10 (AFI No. 1, S&S No. 3)
Raging Bull (1980): 4/10 (AFI No. 4)
Tokyo Story (1953): 3/10 (S&S No. 4)
Gone with the Wind (1939): 2.5/10 (AFI No. 6)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962): 2.5/10 (AFI No. 7)
Mulholland Drive (2001): 2.5/10 (S&S No. 8)
Beau Travail (1999): 1.5/10 (S&S No. 7)
Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975): 1/10 (S&S No. 1)