Top 10 Films of 1970_ the year I was born

I had debated about putting up this blog entry, but I think it is a good idea after all. Incidentally, I am on Spring Break from school (I now teach at Danville Community College in Va.). I should add that by 'favorite,' I mean that at least one of these films should not be on anyone's top 10 list if one is refering to quality!

Here are my choices:

1. "Claire's Knee"_ This is the best film from French filmmaker Eric Rohmer, who is still alive and was directing films even as he was approaching 90. I think this film, which I found in the Hollins University library, is a touching film about lust........I should see it again!
2."The Conformist"_ My friend Bilge Ebiri, a New York critic/filmmaker, has championed this film and considered it one of his personal favorites. It is from Bernardo Bertolucci, and it is an excellent piece of social commentary molded around a thrilling plot. I should see it again too!
3. "MASH"_ This film is right up there with "Nashville" and "The Player" as the best film made by Robert Altman, who passed away in November. "MASH" is worth watching for the hilarious shower scene alone! Donald Sutherland and Elliott Gould actually tried to overthrow Altman on the set, and screenwriter Ring Larnder Jr. wasn't thrilled with the changes to his script. But, the end product was a huge commercial and critical success.
4. "Le Cercle Rouge (The Red Circle)"- A wonderful film from Jean-Pierre Melville who was a master at directing capers. One of his earlier films "Army of Shadows" was rereleased theatrically last year and finished as the third best film of the year in a "Film Comment" critic's poll.
5."The Honeymoon Killers"_ This film will give you the creeps as it shows how love and lust leads an overweight woman to commit heinous murders with her new-found Romeo. This is a very unsettling film, but it was brilliantly shot and editted. It was remade into an even more grissly Mexican film called "Deep Crimson," which I saw last week. I must say the later brought out my 'inner Jesse Helms!'
6."Five Easy Pieces"_ Jack Nicholson made a few good films before "Chinatown," and this is certainly one of them.
7."The Ballad of Cable Hogue"_ A moving Western from Sam Peckinpah. I ran into the since-deceased Jason Robards Jr. at the Virginia Film Festival some ten years ago. He told me this was one of the best films he was involved with. If you see it, you'll understand why he felt that way!
8. "Gimme Shelter"_ Jason Garnett showed this movie at the Grandin Theatre in Roanoke for a midnight screening last year. I alas missed out on that, but I did catch the film on DVD. Criterion did an excellent job on this one, per usual. I had a chance to see Albert Maysles, the co-director of this film, at the 2005 Full Frame Film Festival.
9."Zabriskie Point"_ This film by Michelangelo Antonioni is hardly his best, but it is very interesting! One can find the soundtrack with a score by Pink Floyd in virtually every record/music store in the country.
10. "Hayatim Sana Feda_I Love You, Feda" (loose translation). Turkish matinee idol Cuneyt Arkin, of "The Turkish Star Wars" fame," made a half-dozen bad films in 1970 alone. I saw this melodrama, also with Turkish cinema queen Turkan Soray, for free on the Internet. It is among the most amusing Turkish films I've ever seen, and there are many too choose from! It is an 'ode' to Douglas Sirk and those Rock Hudson/Doris Day movies where Tony Randall was always the third wheel. Believe it or not, I used this as one of the dozen or so Turkish films that I analyzed in my college thesis on Turkish cinema!