griggs's - 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die List

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Manic stunt work, elaborate sight gags and mind-boggling mechanical comedy are just some of Keaton's work featured in these movies.

Known the world round as the 'Stone' face comedy actor, with charming moments of intimate humour flavoured with rich pathos, uniquely graceful and characteristically hilarious. That's Buster Keaton'

Our Hospitality (1923)
Keaton plays a New Yorker who returns to his roots in the South and finds himself involved in a feud between his family and those of the woman he loves. Packed with superb visuals and sight gags including a train journey, which has to be seen to be believed.
Sherlock Junior (1924)
A mild mannered theatre projectionist dreams of becoming a great detective when he enters the film he is projecting! This is one of Keaton's finest masterpieces which within its fourty-four minutes manages to present a dazzling display of cinematic inventiveness, non-stop comedy and dare-devil stunts.

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One of the first feminist movies, 'The Smiling Madame Beudet' is the story of an intelligent woman trapped in a loveless marriage. Her husband is used to playing a stupid practical joke in which he puts an empty revolver to his head and threatens to shoot himself.

One day, while the husband is away, she puts bullets in the revolver. However, she is stricken with remorse and tries to retrieve the bullets the next morning. Her husband gets to the revolver first only this time he points the revolver at her.

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Imprisoned by the evil Grand Vizier Jaffar (Conrad Veidt), Ahmad (John Justin) the rightful King of Bagdad meets young Abu (Sabu), the greatest thief in the land.

Together they escape and embark on a series of fantastical adventures, only just surviving a terrifying encounter with a Djinn (Rex Ingram), from whom Abu manages to extract three wishes...

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A film projectionist (and amateur detective) offers to solve the case of a missing watch, but is instead framed for the crime himself. Desperate to clear his name, the projectionist dreams of being the great Sherlock Jr.

(Buster Keaton), and in one of cinemas most iconic sequences, literally steps into the screen to bring his fantasies to life.

Herbert Ponting's official record of Captain Scott's legendary expedition to the South Pole, restored by the BFI and featuring a new musical score by Simon Fisher Turner, captures in breathtaking detail the alien beauty of the landscape, and ensured that the heroism involved would never be forgotten.

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John McTeague (Gibson Gowland) was a simple slow man who became a dentist after working at the Big Dipper Gold Mine. He is now being hunted in Death Valley by his ex-best friend Marcus (Jean Hersholt) and the law.

His lot was cast the day that he meet his future wife Trina (Zasu Pitts) in his office. She was with Marcus and she bought a lottery ticket. Well Mac fell for her and Marcus stepped aside. When Mac and Trina married, she won the Lottery for $5000 and became obsessive about the money in gold. Marcus is steamed as he stepped aside and now she is rich so he has the law shut down Mac as he has no official schooling for his dentistry. Trina fearful that they will take her gold away sells everything and takes all Mac earns when he is working. She adds to her stash of gold as they both live as paupers. When Mac has no job and no money, he leaves and Trina moves. Driven to desperation at being poor and hungry he finds Trina and demands the gold.

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A landmark work in the history of the cinema, Der letzte Mann represents a breakthrough on a number of fronts.

Firstly, it introduced a method of purely visual storytelling in which all intertitles and dialogue were jettisoned, setting the stage for a seamless interaction between film-world and viewer. Secondly, it put to use a panoply of technical innovations that continue to point distinct ways forward for cinematic expression nearly a century later. The lesson in all this? That a film can be anything it wants to be... but only Der letzte Mann (and a few unforgettable others) were lucky enough to issue forth into the world under the brilliant command of master director F. W. Murnau. His film depicts the tale of an elderly hotel doorman (Emil Jannings) whose superiors have come to deem his station as transitory as the revolving doors through which he has ushered guests in and out, day upon day, decade after decade. Reduced to polishing tiles beneath a sink in the gents' lavatory and towelling the hands of Berlin's most vulgar barons, the doorman soon uncovers the ironical underside of old-world hospitality. And then - one day - his fate suddenly changes...

Lon Chaney, the man of a thousand faces, stars in this, the original adaptation of Gaston Leroux's celebrated novel. When the Phantom falls in love with the voice of a young opera singer (Mary Philbin) he drags her to the catacombs beneath the Paris Opera House and forces her to sing only for him.

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Taking an historical event from 1912, Eisenstein marries the new Soviet propaganda ideals of the heroic worker with his own theories of avant garde art. Following the suicide of a sacked factory worker, his colleagues hold a peaceful strike, but their bosses retaliate with savage force.

Capturing the brutality with power and immediacy, Eisenstein's visuals move from the slaughter of cattle to the butchery of the Cossack army, simultaneously inventing and breaking cinematic rules.

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'The Gold Rush' is widely reported to be the film that Chaplin most wanted to be remembered for. It sees The Tramp as a lone prospector venturing to Alaska looking for gold.

He gets mixed up with some burly characters, falls in love with the beautiful Georgia (Georgia Hale) and tries to win her heart with his singular charm.

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Wealthy young idler Jim Apperson (John Gilbert) enlists during the early days of World War I, to the worry of his mother (Claire McDowell) and the pride of his father (Hobart Bosworth).

Sent to the front lines in the French countryside, Jim bonds with his working-class bunkmates Slim (Karl Dane) and Bull (Tom O'Brien) and falls in love with young French farm girl Melisande (Renée Adorée), despite having a girlfriend (Claire Adams) back home. But the romance of war is soon shattered for good.

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This romantic story of Czarist Russia was adapted from a story by Alexander Pushin. A young cossack officer becomes the object of the amorous Czarina's affections. He is banished when he rejects her, and becomes the dashing Robin Hood-like bandit: The Eagle (Rudolph Valentino).

Charmingly acted, Louise Dresser is a stand out as Czarina. One of Valentino's best films.

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Planned by the Soviet Central Committee to coincide with the celebrations for the 20th anniversary of the unsuccessful 1905 Russian Revolution, this film was developed by the 27 year-old Sergei Eisenstein from less than one page of script from a planned eight-part epic that was intended to

chronicle a large number of revolutionary actions. Starting with the Potemkin's crew's refusal to eat maggot-infested meat, the mutiny develops and their leader Vakulinchuk is shot by a senior officer. The officers are overthrown and when the Potemkin docks at Odessa, crowds appear from all directions to take up the cause of the dead sailor and open rebellion ensues. What became the most celebrated sequence in world cinema history follows as the Czarist soldiers fire on the crowds thronging down the Odessa steps; the broad newsreel-like sequences being inter-cut with close-ups of harrowing details. Returning to sea, the Potemkin's crew prepares the guns for action as the ship, flying the flag of freedom, steams to confront the squadron. When they finally meet their worst fears are allayed as, with relief coupled with joy, they are universally acclaimed. This film, which was destined to become such an influential landmark in cinematographic history, opened in Moscow in January 1926. It ran for only four weeks.

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'The Adventures of Prince Achmed' premiered in Germany on 23rd September 1926, hailed as the first full-length animated film in the history of cinema.

Seventy-five years on, this enchanting film still stands as one of the great classics of animation - lively, delicate, inventive, stirring and romantic. Taken from "The Arabian Nights", the story tells of a wicked sorcerer who lures Prince Achmed onto a magical flying horse and sends him off on a flight to his death. The Prince foils the magician's evil plan, however, and flies headlong into a series of adventures - joining forces with Aladdin, doing battle with assorted ogres, monsters and spirits, and falling in love with the beautiful Princess Peri Banu.

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Train engineer Johnny Gray (Buster Keaton) is turned down when he tries to enlist in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War as his occupation is deemed too important.

When his train (The General) is stolen by Union soldiers so that it can be used to attack Confederate forces, only Johnny and his girl Annabelle Lee (Marion Mack) can save the train and warn the Confederates about an impending attack.