Robert Benayoun - 10 Best Films - Cahiers - 1963-1968

Robert Benayoun was a Positif staffer in the 1960s who often – at least in the mid 60s – was a panelist on Cahiers du Cinema’s conseil des dix. As such, he bulleted “Contempt”, “A Married Woman”, “Alphaville”, “Week End ”, “Pierrot le Fou”, “Masculin/Feminin”, “Made in U.S.A.”, “La Chinoise”, and the Godard segments of "Paris vu par… ”, and “The Oldest Profession”. Making him thus the true anti-Godard. In 1965 when the televesrion of Cahiers “Cinéma de Notre Temps” inquired on Godard, Benayoun was one of those interviewed. Along the way, Benayoun also bulleted Dreyer “Gertrud”, Bergman “Winter Light”, Pasolini "The Gospel According to St. Matthew", Bresson “Au Hasard, Balthazar”, Tati “Playtime”, Autant-Lara “Journal d’une Femme en Blanc ”, Rene Clair “Les Fêtes Galantes”, Sam Fuller “The Naked Kiss”, and Robert Aldrich “The Dirty Dozen”. So now that we know what Robert Benayoun did not care for let’s see what he did like. Here are his ten best film lists as they appeared in Cahiers du Cinema from 1963 to 1968.
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1963
1......The Exterminating Angel (Luis Buñuel)
2......Salvatore Giuliano (Francesco Rosi)
3......Cronaca familiare (Valerio Zurlini)
4......Muriel (Alain Resnais)
5......Les Abysses (Nikos Papatakis)
6......The Nutty Professor (Jerry Lewis)
7......Le Feu Follet (Louis Malle)
8......Hallelujah the Hills (Ed Emshwiller / Adolfas Mekas)
9......The Leopard (Luchino Visconti)
10....Le Joli Mai (Chris Marker)
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1964
(alphabetical in French)
A Hard Day’s Night (Richard Lester)
America, America (Elia Kazan)
The Red Desert (Michelangelo Antonioni)
Dr. Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick)
Freud (John Huston)
L’Insoumis (Alain Cavalier)
Diary of a Chambermaid (Luis Buñuel)
The Patsy (Jerry Lewis)
The Servant (Joseph Losey)
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1965
1......The Knack... and How to Get It (Richard Lester)
2......The Family Jewels (Jerry Lewis)
3......Vaghe Stelle dell'Orsa... (Luchino Visconti)
4......Black Peter (Milos Forman)
5......Help! (Richard Lester)
6......Yoyo (Pierre Étaix)
7......The Loneliness of a Long-Distance Runner (Tony Richardson)
8......The Sandpiper (Vincente Minelli)
9.......The Disorderly Orderly (Frank Tashlin)
10.....Major Dundee (Sam Peckinpaugh)
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1966
1.......Tini Zabutykh Predkiv (Sergei Parajanov)
2.......Cul-de-Sac (Roman Polanski)
3.......Démanty Noci (Jan Nemec)
4........Kazdy Den Odvahu (Evald Schorm)
5........Falstaff (Orson Welles)
6........La Guerre est Finie (Alain Resnais)
7........Un Homme et une Femme (Claude Lelouch)
8........The Loved One (Tony Richardson)
9........Fists in the Pocket (Marco Bellocchio)
10......The Professionals (Richard Brooks)
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1967
1.......Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni)
2.......Belle du Jour (Luis Buñuel)
3.......Accident (Joseph Losey)
4.......Daisies (Vera Chytilova)
5.......Le Voleur (Louis Malle)
6.......The Big Mouth (Jerry Lewis)
7.......Shakespeare-Wallah (James Ivory)
8........Elvira Madigan (Bo Widerberg)
9........An Affair of the Heart (Dusan Makavejev)
10......Two for the Road (Stanley Donen)
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1968
1.......Petulia (Richard Lester)
2.......Stolen Kisses (François Truffaut)
3.......2001 A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick)
4.......Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski)
5.......Reflections in a Golden Eye (John Huston)
6.......Bedazzled (Stanley Donen)
7.......Je t’Aime, Je t’Aime (Alain Resnais)
8.......Bonnie and Clyde (Arthur Penn)
9.......Terra em Transe (Glauber Rocha)
10.....Duffy (Robert Parrish)