Sunday Showdown: AFI vs. IMDb Battle #92

In continuation of my comparison of the AmericanFilm Institute’s (“The Scholar’s”) Top 100 films and the Internet Movie Database’s(“The Masses’”) Top 100 films, this week I watched Up! and Goodfellas.

I’m not a big mob movie fan. They are generally too violent with accents too Northern for my taste.  But I enjoyed watching Goodfellas again, since I haven’t seen it in probably 20 years.  It’s a different take on the mob, trying to include a bigger glimpse into the lives of the wives/children.  It was nominated for Best Picture (ironically, with The Godfather, Part III) but lost to Dances With Wolves (speaking of someone needing to hire a hit man…). 

I am also not a big animated film fan. As a matter of fact I am delighted my kids have moved out of the Happy Feet phase and are now interested in going to see films I don’t need to take a Xanax before watching. 

But Up! is one of the few animated films I don’t mind watching.  When I first saw it, those beginning clips – you know, the story of Carl & Ellie – had me sobbing out loud in the movie theater.  My two youngest kids even started crying, I was crying so hard.  Ellie had an “Adventure Book” with a section entitled “Stuff I’m going to do” – the adventures she wanted to take in her life. Carl wanted to take those adventures with her, they always planned to, but then life passes and before they know it they’ve run out of time.  In case you live in a cave (or don't have children), and haven't seen the clip, this is most of it:

(As an aside, I am pretty sure this movie in a weird conjunction with the movie Fight Club and a log on the side of a road, started me on my mid-life crisis of 2010-11. But that’s another story for another time…)

Other things happen in Up!: an annoying kid, some balloons, a female bird named Kevin…  All enjoyable stuff that cheered me up from my original sobbing jag. BUT THEN, Ellie’s Adventure Book comes back out, and we realize she did get to live her adventure: her long, happy life with Carl. Cue water works from Janie again.

So I give this week’s vote to Up! not only because Pixar was able to make me cry (twice) but because they made a more beautiful love story in five minutes, with no talking, than most romantic films can do in two hours.  And just for my geek friends, I found this, possibly my favorite mash-up of all time (it's entitled "Someone Who Loves You"):

So AFI wins again this week…

	AFI’s Top 100	IMDB’s Top 100 (as of 1/1/12)
#92	Up! (2009)	Goodfellas (1990)
#93	The French Connection (1971)	Downfall (2004)
#94	Pulp Fiction (1994)	Gran Torino (2008)
#95	The Last Picture Show (1971)	Metropolis (1927)
#96	Do The Right Thing (1989)	The Sting (1973)
#97	Blade Runner (1982)	Gladiator (2000)
#98	Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)	The Maltese Falcon (1941)
#99	Toy Story (1995)	Unforgiven (1992)
#100	Ben Hur (1959)	The Elephant Man (1980)

Next week: Sophie’s Choice vs. The Apartment.  Believe it or not, I have never seen either of these, so I go into it completely neutrally.