Neil G

How do you see who’s voted for each option in a poll? Never been able to work it out since the forum was last upgraded.

Rep for Pi. Was never going to make my top ten but I love that film.

Terminator 2 The Matrix The Usual Suspects Seven Silence of the Lambs Last of the Mohicans Miller’s Crossing La Haine The Thin Red Line Carlito’s Way

Those unintentional inaccuracies just keep on coming. Talk about bad luck!

Just to confirm, then, criticising the Jewish Chronicle for consistently producing verifiably inaccurate and misleading journalism constitutes an attack on the Jewish community and is therefore antisemitic. Is that right? Just so we’re clear what the parameters of the debate are here.

Group E? I’ve shit ‘em.

Yes. It’s an absolute masterclass in building suspense and interspersing with action in just the right places, leading up to imo the greatest 1 v 1 showdown ever committed to screen. The combination of cinematography, effects, music and set pieces is flawless. Sure the dialogue and acting are hammy as fuck, but to get hung up on that is kind of missing the point of the film.

Ripley > Dutch > McClane > the rest

Not a strong group? There are at least five bona fide classics of their respective genres here.

Much more competition from the sci-fi and action genres in this decade. Empire will have a tougher time of it than Star Wars did.

Close Encounters isn’t suitable for younger kids either. The abduction scene scared the shit out of me the first time I saw it.

I haven’t seen this much bitterness over a GF poll since the animal tournament of 2006.

For all those wailing about the GF being a hive of philistines, it shouldn’t need pointing out that the Godfather films combined beat Star Wars comfortably, and the three “proper” films combined received more than double its votes. If we’d used transferable votes one of the Godfathers would have won. I suspect a fair bit of the scorn is a result of the way Star Wars’ legacy has been soiled by the prequels, the commercialisation and the needless endless editing. If you’ve got a downer on Star Wars I’m pretty certain you’ll have it fused in your mind’s eye with Ewoks and Jar Jar Binks. Guess what, loads of fans of the original don’t like them either. As for the film itself: while in terms of dialogue, characterisation and plotting it’s clearly behind the other three, in the creative, technical and experiential stakes - has anyone mentioned the music? - it pushed the boundaries of an artistic medium like few other pieces of work ever have. It’s the film that possibly more than any other has made people fall in love with cinema. Taking their first step into a larger world, indeed. On that basis it’s a deserving winner.

Fuck all you haters. Star Wars is simply one of the greatest pieces of storytelling the human imagination has ever produced.

Aliens The Empire Strikes Back Predator E.T. Blade Runner Back to the Future This is Spinal Tap Die Hard Platoon The Long Good Friday

No worries. I’m not saying there wasn’t a hangover from Corbyn in Hartlepool, but I was responding to Paulie’s claim that he’s fucked Labour for decades to come which is a ridiculous exaggeration. Starmer could have done much better and has to take responsibility for failing to do so.

You haven’t answered my question.

I’ll refer you to the question I put to Paulie. What reason did Starmer give the voters of Hartlepool to vote Labour?

No, I don’t think we’ll all admit it. If Corbyn had made the Labour brand so irredeemably toxic Labour’s poll ratings wouldn’t have climbed over the summer and autumn last year and been level pegging with the Tories at Christmas. This is on Starmer. He got himself into a good position with a platform to push on and articulate a compelling alternative offer to voters, and he’s done absolutely nothing with it. As a consequence Labour are going backwards. What is Labour’s identity, purpose and selling point now beyond “Corbyn is gone and look, we’re really patriotic”? There are barely any policy proposals at all, not even broad outlines. The competence message isn’t cutting through any more because people are happy with the vaccine rollout, and the sleaze allegations aren’t landing because the media is glossing over them and most voters have priced them in with Johnson anyway. I challenge you to name a single positive reason Starmer gave for anybody to vote Labour yesterday.

Jaws Star Wars Alien The Godfather Taxi Driver Monty Python and the Holy Grail The Life of Brian Dirty Harry Chinatown Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Far too small in scope and ambition to cut through. Got to have much bigger and bolder proposals if they want to get a hearing.

It’s the keeping the head down that’s the reason for the abysmal polling. Voters have no idea what Labour under Starmer stands for, what they would do in government. It comes through again and again in polls, vox pops and focus groups. Until Starmer sets out a clear vision and programme for government the polls aren’t going to shift unless the government completely fucks things up, whether on Covid, the economy or something else. Given the unstinting support they’ve had from the media it would have to be something utterly cataclysmic - we’re talking Winter of Discontent plus Black Wednesday plus GFC all rolled into one, that kind of level. The polls will improve once Starmer sets out a policy programme, but the longer he leaves it the less time he’ll have to persuade doubters that the programme is valid and achievable, which is always going to be a big challenge for Labour. There really is no excuse to delay it beyond this autumn.

Nice one.

I’d be happy to count them up if you want Stig, as long as you still start and manage the thread. There will be too many bona fide classics that won’t even make the cut otherwise. Still have the same number of films in the tournament, just drawn from a wider pool.

I’ve been thinking the same about the 80s. Would prefer more nominations each though, and keep it as one decade. The 80s is the decade when the majority of this forum fell in love with cinema I reckon, it’ll be impossible to narrow it down to 5. I would struggle to do it just with sci-fi films alone.