Slowly, but surely these last few years the Letterboxd Top 250 has surpassed IMDB’s own Top 250 as the go-to all-time user list on the internet. At least for the hardcore cinephiles it has.
Then again, I’m impressed by neither of these lists, although the IMDB one seems to make much more sense in terms of populist sentiment. One can definitely see the mainstream ranking films such as “The Shawshank Redemption,” “The Dark Knight,” and “The Godfather” as the greatest ever.
Meanwhile, on the more high-brow Letterboxd you have an assortment of highbrow classics, but also, more peculiarly, “Everything Everywhere All At Once” comfortably sitting in the all-time top 20, what!? Regardless, a milestone occurred today as the Letterboxd user list champ, Bong joon-ho’s “Parasite,” was dethroned by Elem Klimov’s 1985 masterpiece “Come and See.” I approve.
Klimov’s World War II film was initially not that well-known upon release in the U.S, it took years for it to garner its reputation. What really kickstarted the re-assessment were two notable reviews: A 2001 writeup from The Village Voice’s J. Hoberman and, more importantly, Roger Ebert watching it for the first time in 2010 and immediately placing it on his “Great Movies” list.
The only reason Ebert watched the movie was after filmmaker Rod Lurie had recommended it to him at a film festival: “The last time I saw Roger … he asked "What movie would you recommend I see that you don't think I have seen"? My answer was COME AND SEE, The Russian WW2 film. A few weeks later he wrote one of his last GREAT FILMS column on that movie.”