Top 10 films #4 Kramer vs Kramer

Kramer vs. Kramer is a 1979 American drama film adapted by Robert Benton from the novel by Avery Corman, and directed by Benton. The film tells the story of a married couple's divorce and its impact on everyone involved, including the couple's young son. It received the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1979. Ted Kramer (Dustin Hoffman), a workaholic advertising executive, is just given his agency's biggest new account. After spending the evening chatting with his boss about handling a new and very large account, he returns home to find his wife Joanna (Meryl Streep) in the process of leaving him.
Ted is left to raise their son Billy (Justin Henry) by himself. Ted and Billy begin to resent each other as Ted no longer has time to carry his increased workload, and Billy misses the love and attention he received from his mother. After many months of unrest, Ted and Billy begin to cope with the situation and eventually grow to love and care for one another.
Ted befriends his neighbor Margaret (Jane Alexander), who initially had counseled Joanna to leave Ted. Margaret is a fellow single parent and the two become kindred spirits. One day as the two sit in the park watching their children play, Billy falls off the jungle gym and severely cuts his face. Picking him up, Ted sprints several blocks through oncoming traffic to the hospital, where he comforts his son tenderly, representing his increased emotional connection and sense of responsibility for the child since his wife left.
Fifteen months after she walked out, Joanna returns to New York in order to claim Billy, and a custody battle ensues. During the custody hearing, both Ted and Joanna are unprepared for the brutal character assassinations that their lawyers unleash on the other. For instance, Margaret is forced to confess that she advised Joanna to leave Ted if she was as unhappy as she professed, although she also attempts to tell Joanna on the stand that her husband has profoundly changed. Eventually, the damaging facts that Ted was fired because of his conflicting responsibilities with his son, forcing him to take a lower-paid job, come out in court, as do the details of Billy's accident.
Finally, the court awards custody to Joanna, not so much due to the evidence on both sides but due to the assumption that a child is best raised by their mother. Ted discusses appealing the case, but his lawyer warns that Billy himself would have to take the stand in the resulting trial and Ted cannot bear the thought of submitting his child to such an ordeal. He therefore decides not to contest custody.
On the morning that Billy is to move in with Joanna, Ted and Billy make breakfast together, mirroring the meal that Ted tried to cook the first morning after Joanna left. They hug in a very tender moment as they both know this is their last breakfast together. Joanna calls from the ground floor, asking Ted to come down to talk. She tells Ted that, while she loves Billy and wants him with her, she knows that he is already home, and that his true home is with Ted. She will therefore not take him. As she enters the elevator, she asks her ex-husband "How do I look?". The movie ends with the elevator doors closing on the emotional Joanna, right after Ted answers, "You look terrific," as she heads upstairs to talk to Billy.

Top 10 films #3 Network

Network is a 1976 American satirical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer about a fictional television network, Union Broadcasting System (UBS), and its struggle with poor ratings. The film was written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet, and stars Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch and Robert Duvall and features Wesley Addy, Ned Beatty, and Beatrice Straight.

The film won four Academy Awards, in the categories of Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.

Network has continued to receive recognition, decades after its initial release. In 2000, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2002, it was inducted into the Producers Guild of America Hall of Fame as a film that has "set an enduring standard for U.S. American entertainment."^[1] In 2006, Chayefsky's script was voted one of the top ten movie scripts of all-time by the Writers Guild of America, East. In 2007, the film was 64th among the Top 100 Greatest U.S. American Films as chosen by the American Film Institute, a ranking slightly higher than the one AFI gave it ten years earlier. It is also one of the top 250 films of all time at number 210 on the influential film website the Internet Movie Database (IMDb).^[2]

Howard Beale (Peter Finch), the longtime anchor of the UBS Evening News, learns he has just two more weeks on the air because of declining ratings. The following night, he announces on live television that he will commit suicide by shooting himself in the head during next Tuesday's broadcast.^[3] UBS fires him after this incident, but — after some persuasion from UBS News' old guard president and Beale's best friend, Max Schumacher (William Holden) — lets him back on the air, ostensibly for a dignified farewell. Beale promises he will apologize for his outburst. However, once on the air, he launches into a rant claiming that life is "bullshit". Beale's outburst causes the newscast's ratings to soar.

Much to Schumacher's dismay, the upper echelons of UBS decide to exploit Beale's antics rather than pulling him off the air. In one impassioned diatribe, Beale galvanizes the nation with his rant, "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" and persuades Americans to shout out their windows during a lightning storm. Soon Beale is hosting a new program called "The Howard Beale Show", top-billed as a "mad prophet." Ultimately, the show becomes the highest rated program on television, and Beale finds new celebrity preaching his angry message in front of a live studio audience that, on cue, chants Beale's signature catchphrase en masse: "We're as mad as hell, and we're not going to take this anymore."

Beginning as a producer of entertainment programming, Diana Christensen's (Faye Dunaway) desire to produce a hit show for the network results in her cutting a deal with a group of radical left-wing terrorists (a parody of the Symbionese Liberation Army, called the "Ecumenical Liberation Army") who film themselves robbing banks, footage to be used as the cold-opening for a new series based on terrorists for the network that she wants developed for the upcoming fall season. When Beale's nervous breakdown-fueled rants bring in high ratings, Christensen approaches Schumacher and offers to help him "develop" the show. He says no to the professional offer, but not to the personal one, and the two begin an affair. When Schumacher decides to end the "Howard as Angry Man" format, Christensen convinces her boss, Frank Hackett (Robert Duvall), to slot the evening news show under the entertainment division so she can produce it; Hackett fires Schumacher at the same time. The romance withers as the show flourishes, but in the flush of high ratings, the two ultimately find their ways back together, leading to Schumacher leaving his wife of over 25 years for Christensen. But Christensen's fanatical devotion to her job and emotional emptiness ultimately drives Max back to his wife, warning his former lover that she will self-destruct at the pace she was running with her career. "You are television incarnate, Diana," he tells her, "indifferent to suffering, insensitive to joy. All of life is reduced to the common rubble of banality."

When Beale discovers that CCA, the conglomerate that owns UBS, will be bought out by an even larger Saudi Arabian
conglomerate, he launches an on-screen tirade against it, encouraging viewers to send telegrams to the White House telling them, "I want the CCA deal stopped now!" This throws the top network brass into a state of panic because the company's debt load has made merger essential for survival. Beale is then taken to meet with CCA chairman Arthur Jensen, who explicates his own "corporate cosmology" to the attentive Beale. Jensen delivers a tirade of his own in an "appropriate setting," the dramatically darkened CCA boardroom, that suggests to the docile Beale that Jensen may himself be some higher power — describing the interrelatedness of the participants in the international economy, and the illusory nature of nationality distinctions. Jensen's world view ultimately persuades Beale to abandon his populist messages. However, television audiences find his new views on the dehumanization of society to be depressing, and ratings begin to slide. Despite this, Jensen will not allow executives to fire Beale as he spreads the new 'evangel.' Seeing its two-for-the-price-of-one value — solving the Beale problem plus sparking a boost in season-opener ratings — Christensen arranges for Beale's on-air assassination by the same group of urban terrorists whom she discovered earlier and who now have their own UBS show, The Mao Tse-Tung Hour. It is, the voice-over assures, "the first known instance of a man who was killed because he had lousy ratings."

Top 10 films # 2 Annie Hall

Annie Hall is a 1977 American
comedy film directed by Woody Allen from a script co-written with Marshall Brickman. One of Allen's most popular films, it won numerous awards at the time of its release, including four Academy Awards and one for best Best Picture, and in 2002 Roger Ebert referred to it as "just about everyone's favorite Woody Allen movie".^[1]
Annie Hall was also the last comedy film to win the Academy Award for "Best Picture" until 1998's Shakespeare in Love.

Allen had previously been known as a maker of zany comedies; the director has described Annie Hall as "a major turning point",^[2] as it brought a new level of seriousness to his work.^[1]

The film is set in New York City and Los Angeles.

Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) is a neurotic comedian, attempting to maintain a relationship with the seemingly ditzy but exuberant Annie (Diane Keaton). The film chronicles their relationship over several years, intercut with various imaginary trips into each other's history (Annie is able to "see" Alvy's family when he was only a child, and likewise Alvy observes Annie's past relationships). In the first flashback showing Alvy as a child, we learn he was raised in Brooklyn; his father's occupation was operating a bumper cars concession and the family home was located below the Thunderbolt
roller coaster on Coney Island.

After many arguments and reconciliations, the two realize they are fundamentally different and split up. Annie moves in with Tony Lacey (Paul Simon). Annie likes California, but Alvy hates it. Alvy soon realizes he still loves her and tries to convince her to return with him to New York. He fails and, resignedly, returns home to write a play about their relationship, recycling the conversation they had exchanged in California, but ending with him winning Annie back.

Later, with Annie back in New York, the two are able to meet on good terms as friends, now with different lovers. Alvy ends the film by musing about how love and relationships are something we all require despite their often painful and complex nature.

Top 10 films # 1 The Godfather

The Godfather is a 1972 American gangster film based on the novel of the same name by Mario Puzo and directed by Francis Ford Coppola from a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola, and Robert Towne (uncredited).^[3] It stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Richard S. Castellano, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard Conte and Diane Keaton, and features John Cazale, Talia Shire, Al Martino, and Abe Vigoda. The story spans ten years from 1945 to 1955 and chronicles the fictional Italian American
Corleone crime family. Two sequels followed: The Godfather Part II in 1974, and The Godfather Part III in 1990.

The Godfather received Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Adapted Screenplay, and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. In addition, it is ranked second, behind Citizen Kane, on the AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) list by the American Film Institute.

In late August 1945^[5], as the movie opens, Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) and consigliere Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall) hear requests for favors during the Don's daughter Connie's wedding reception. Singer Johnny Fontane (Al Martino), Corleone's godson, asks for help in landing a movie role that will revitalize his flagging career. Hagen is dispatched to California to meet with studio head Jack Woltz (John Marley). After initially refusing to cast Fontane, Woltz caves in when he finds the severed head of his prized racehorse "Khartoum" in his bed the next morning.

Upon Hagen's return, the family leadership meets with Virgil "The Turk" Sollozzo (Al Lettieri), who asks Don Corleone to protect the rival Tattaglia family's planned heroin business. Don Vito disapproves of drug trafficking and feels his political influence could be jeopardized and he rejects the potentially lucrative proposal. He then sends his primary enforcer, Luca Brasi (Lenny Montana), to infiltrate Sollozzo's organization, but Brasi is stabbed in the hand by Sollozzo and garroted to death by Bruno Tattaglia.

Don Corleone is shot five times in the back at a fruit stand in an assassination attempt. Sollozzo abducts Hagen and persuades him to offer Corleone's eldest son, Sonny (James Caan), the deal previously offered to the Don. The youngest son, Michael (Al Pacino), whom the other Mafia families consider a "civilian" uninvolved in mob business, averts a second murder attempt at the hospital where his father is being treated, but his jaw is broken by corrupt Irish American police Captain McCluskey (Sterling Hayden). Sonny retaliates by having Don Philip Tattaglia's son, Bruno, killed.

Sollozzo and McCluskey meet with Michael at a local Italian restaurant in an attempt to settle the dispute. Michael pretends he needs to use the bathroom, and following a plan he initiated, retrieves a gun hidden there. Michael returns to the table and kills both Sollozzo and McCluskey. He leaves the country and takes refuge in Sicily, where he soon marries a young local woman named Apollonia Vitelli (Simonetta Stefanelli). The third Corleone brother, Fredo (John Cazale), is sent to Las Vegas where he is sheltered by casino operators the Corleones financially back. Open warfare soon erupts between the Corleones and the other members of the Five Families, while the police and other authorities begin to clamp down on Mafia activity. Don Vito is particularly distressed when he learns of Michael's involvement, since he had planned for Michael to remain uninvolved in the "family business."

Sonny impulsively leaves the guarded family compound to confront Carlo (Gianni Russo) who has been abusing Connie (Talia Shire). Sonny beats Carlo on the street and threatens to kill him if he ever touches Connie again. A few days later Carlo beats Connie again, and upon getting her phone call, Sonny leaves the compound again. En route, he is ambushed and killed at a toll booth. Meanwhile, Michael narrowly escapes death in Sicily when his wife is killed by a car bomb.

Don Vito meets with the other Five Family dons and settles their dispute, withdrawing his opposition to the Tattaglia's heroin business. He deduces from the negotiations that the Tattaglias were acting on behalf of the more powerful Don Barzini (Richard Conte). With his safety now guaranteed, Michael returns home. More than a year later, he marries his long time American girlfriend, Kay Adams (Diane Keaton). As his father withdraws from active control of the Corleone family, and as middle brother Fredo is seen as incapable of shouldering the Don's responsibilities, Michael takes control of the family and its business. He promises Kay he will legitimize its businesses within five years.

Biding his time, Michael allows rival families to pressure Corleone enterprises and eat away at their revenues, disturbing several of his caporegimes. He directs them not to retaliate, disclosing plans to move family operations to Nevada while spinning off New York operations to family members who stay behind. Michael chooses Carlo to go to Vegas and replaces Hagen with a new consigliere; Vito explains to the upset Hagen that he and Michael have longer-range plans for him and for the family.

Michael travels to Las Vegas, intending to buy out their casino partner, Moe Greene (Alex Rocco). Greene angrily rejects the proposal, deriding the Corleones as a failing organization. Michael is particularly angered when Fredo, under the sway of Greene and his associates, warns his brother that Greene is too important to be treated in that fashion.

Vito Corleone collapses and dies while playing with his young grandson Anthony in his tomato garden. At the burial, caporegime Tessio (Abe Vigoda) arranges a meeting between Michael and Don Barzini, now seen as the dominant figure in the New York families. As Vito had warned Michael, Tessio's involvement signals his shift of allegiance to the Barzini family; the planned meeting is intended to result in Michael's execution. The meeting is set for the same day as the christening of Connie and Carlo's son, where Michael will stand as his godfather.

As the christening proceeds, Corleone assassins murder each of the Dons heading the other New York families and Moe Greene in Las Vegas. After the christening, Tessio learns that Michael is aware of his betrayal, and is taken off to his death. Michael confronts Carlo over his suspected involvement in setting up Sonny's killing, promising him safety; after Carlo confesses, he is garotted at Michael's direction.

Later that day, Connie accuses Michael of murdering the vanished Carlo as Kay watches. When Kay confronts him privately, he denies the accusation to her, an answer she appears to accept. As the film ends, Kay sees Michael receiving gestures of respect from other mafiosi, paralleling the treatment given his father, just before the door to his office is closed.