Personal Canon (9/5/16 Update)

Happy Labor Day, all. While we're in a little bit of a lull for major motion picture releases, I thought it was the opportune moment to revisit the Personal Canon.

First, a reminder:

It's a list of fifty films that mean the most to me, for one reason or another. I don't purport that these are necessarily the fifty objectively greatest films of all time or the most important films. They're not even ranked in order of favorite-ness, nor do I suggest that they're better than a film that doesn't appear here. Instead, these are my movies. In fact, you might call them perfect movies - at least, as I define perfection, because these movies don't do anything wrong. They don't miss a beat. [. . .] These are the films that reach the pinnacles and plumb the depths of the human condition. They're films that represent my ideals of the best humanity and the aesthetic community have to offer, films I'd put in a time capsule or a Voyager-esque space probe. They're films I can't wait to introduce to my children, contenting myself in the meanwhile to stop and watch them any time they're on television. They're films that, if someone close to me hasn't seen, I take it upon myself to share with them. I get angry if you haven't seen these, sad for the wasted years you've gone without these. Indeed, for one reason or another, the reason I love movies so much is this collection of fifty movies.

As you'll see shortly, part of that definition doesn't hold up any longer. After careful consideration, the limiter of fifty films is gone. It was an arbitrary designation - I could have easily gone with ten, twenty-five, or one hundred - useful as a thought experiment to get my list organized, but I'm realizing that very few of us limit ourselves in that way. If I only had fifty films, suppose a film knocks me out of the water; would that mean excising one of the entries? In the interest of egalitarianism, then, the Personal Canon is henceforth open-ended.

For those playing the home game, last time we had fifty films. This time, we're up to 62, including two new favorites from 2016. Last time, I had said the jury's still out on 2016 movies, but I'm pretty confident in these two.

Next, pairs and trios. And really, this one is all the fault of one film: The Godfather Saga, which joins The Godfather and The Godfather, Part II, rearranges its parts in sequential order, and expands with deleted scenes. But really, how can I separate the two in my memory? Ditto for the Toy Story Trilogy, whose holy trinity of animated movies is now together again on the Personal Canon - to be perfectly honest, Toy Story 2 was only cut because of the 50-film limit.

Finally, one cut: Father of the Bride. I had just watched the movie the night I finalized my Personal Canon, and it was a hasty decision. Now that I've had a few months to mellow, I'm not sure it's Personal Canon material. That's not to say it isn't a fantastic film, but it's just not up there for me.

With that said, on with the list! (Films listed in blue have been added since June 2016.)

Duck Soup (1933)

Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)

Citizen Kane (1941)

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Casablanca (1942)

Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

Adam's Rib (1949)

Stalag 17 (1953)

12 Angry Men (1957)

Inherit the Wind (1960)

Psycho (1960)

Goldfinger (1964)

The Godfather (1972) / The Godfather, Part II (1974)

Annie Hall (1977)

Star Wars (1977)

Superman (1978) / Superman II (1980)

The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Batman (1989)

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)

Goodfellas (1990)

The Rocketeer (1991)

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)

Groundhog Day (1993)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Toy Story Trilogy (1995-2010)

The Usual Suspects (1995)

Hamlet (1996)

Air Force One (1997)

The Big Lebowski (1998)

The Mummy (1999)

American Psycho (2000)

Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003)

Pirates of the Caribbean (2003)

The Incredibles (2004)

The Dark Knight Trilogy (2005-2012)

The Departed (2006)

Stranger than Fiction (2006)

Charlie Bartlett (2007)

No Country for Old Men (2007)

Ratatouille (2007)

There Will Be Blood (2007)

Iron Man (2008)

Taken (2008)

Black Swan (2010)

Easy A (2010)

Inception (2010)

The Avengers (2012)

Skyfall (2012)

Man of Steel (2013)

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)

Captain America: Civil War (2016)