Deep focus

DAVID Thomson's thumb is not for sale. Whether it's pointed up or down, you're not likely to see the noted film critic and historian endorsing blockbusters on opening weekend. That is because Thomson doesn't specialize in writing pithy quotes and -- unlike many of today's movie pundits -- he does not appear particularly concerned whether Hollywood "likes" him or not.

Instead, the acerbic Brit pens thought-provoking essays and books that examine films and stars and what their creation, success and/or failure say about the world that created them. (That's not to suggest Thomson can't deliver short, stiletto-like assessments. He once dismissed the popular Tom Hanks film Castaway (2005) as a "two-hour Fed Ex commercial." Even more on point, he described David Fincher's Se7en (1995) as having been shot through a "shit-smeared lens.")

Now Thomson offers up his most enjoyable book to date: Have You Seen ... ?, which he says was written as a reference guide for people wondering what movie they should watch next. No, it's not another overstuffed collection of paragraph-long film encapsulations. Nor is it Thomson's "best movies" list. Instead it contains 1,000 essays covering 1,000 films. Not the 1,000 "best" movies -- just 1,000 films you should consider watching, including many for which Thomson himself has no use.

The new book has been many years in the making and serves as something of a companion-piece to his popular Biographical Dictionary of Film. Where Dictionary considered actors and directors, this new one focuses on domestic and foreign movies produced between 1895 through 2007. It examines favorites and failures, head-achy intellectual excursions and cheap B-movie knock-offs. It even covers one movie now impossible to see (1927's London After Midnight -- prints no longer exist). To put it in perspective: it opens with Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein and it ends with Michelangelo Antonioni's Zabriskie Point. In other words, the whole sublime-to-ridiculous thing.

If you have read any of Thomson's work, then you already know he is a skilled writer, and that he is probably smarter than you or me. But, you also know his biases. Hawks, Renoir, Goddard, Hitchcock and Welles get a lot of his attention (not necessarily a bad thing). Meanwhile, there are some filmmakers of whom he has always been suspicious -- William Friedkin and Sergio Leone to name just two -- so their works receive less enthusiastic endorsements.

But we don't open a book like this because of what we expect to see. Rather, it's the surprises that are most rewarding. So when Thomson goes to bat on behalf of monumental bombs such as Arthur Penn's The Missouri Breaks (1976) and Michael Cimino's 1980 Heaven's Gate (which he calls a "wounded monster.") it is a welcome surprise. On the flip side, his butchery of certain cinematic sacred cows such as Last Tango in Paris (1972), Annie Hall (1979) and The Last Laugh (1924) is welcome if only because so few dare to question such landmarks anymore.

Some films appear to have him torn. He acknowledges the talent behind The Silence of the Lambs (1990), but he laments the cheesy franchise it spawned as well as the overarching trouble with all horror films -- namely that they are the victims of their own success. "[The] movies have only themselves to blame," he writes, "for film has been falling in love with monsters for decades."

There are head-scratching oversights that may bug budding cineastes: There is no mention of John Sayles, Budd Boetticher or Harold Lloyd. Thomson champions Michael Mann's Heat (1995), but he ignores Thief (1981); he prefers Melville's Le Samurai (1967) over the earlier, better Bob, le flambuer (1956). Star Wars (1976) but no Hidden Fortress (1958)? But that's the point -- books like this are meant to provoke arguments.

Instead it's better to appreciate what Thomson includes. He praises several Buster Keaton films (most critics only get as far as The General (1926). He shines a light on a few overlooked gems, like criminally neglected French film Ube Si Jolie Petite Plage (1949). And he offers up the following in appreciation for Laurel and Hardy's apocalyptically-comic The Music Box (1932), which could easily be the last word on both movies and their audience:

"We are enormous neurotics in life: We can't stand a scratch on our car, a leak in our house, or a typo in our wills ... And then film comes along with this insatiable urge to destroy and damage and leave ruin in its wake -- even when it's your birthday. There's no need to be too solemn about the consequences of such silly stuff as this, except to say that destruction is the natural end of man's plans."