What is the Best Movie Ever Made?
Best is an ambiguous term when applied to movies. What would qualify as the best movie ever made? What qualities would such a movie possess? Surely the box office draw would not serve as a good criterion, since the number of movie goers paying to see the film is as much a factor of marketing as it is a factor of the intrinsic value of the film. I believe that there are better qualities by which to rank a film than its initial popularity or the amount of money it makes for the studio.
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When a person is asked what he considers to be the best movie ever made, he usually responds by recalling his initial reaction to the film. Under this criteria, action flicks rate high. I rank films from a different prospective; I rate it by my reaction on my fiftieth viewing of the film. In my idiosyncratic system, no action movie has ever been rated; I just don’t watch action flicks that repeatedly. The action scenes are just not as riveting after ten or more viewings. Without the compelling stunts, the action movies are lifeless. Really, is there any significant character development in an action movie? Does an action movie even have a plot? Or is the movie-goer carried along by the suspense of wondering when the next building or vehicle is going to blow up?
I am quickly bored with the repeated viewing of an action flick. The typical action-movie audience is filled with thrill junkies. They paid their admission price to get a high. With repeat viewing, the high quickly diminishes. The movie industry capitalizes on the quick disappearance of the thrill factor by producing a great quantity of action films each year. The action-film audience needs new stunts to recharge their buzz. In some sense, the last action-movie is always the best because some of its kick remains with the movie-goer.
My take on movies is quite idiosyncratic. I believe the manner in which a film ages is more important than its initial reception or the profit it rakes in. I rate only comedies, since they are the only flicks I watch at least fifty times. Unlike action films, the emotional response to a good comedy matures with repeated viewing. A comedy makes a person feel good, and remembering a line from a comic film can bring back the original joy of seeing that film.
A great comedy is funny from beginning to end. A laugh a minute is a cliché appropriate for the slower parts of the film. Laughs are generated at multiple levels in a great comedy. Slapstick plays seamlessly by the side of subtle humor. Finally, a great comic movie has a dramatic plotline.
These qualities for ‘the best movie ever’ are creditably met by the 1988 film, Funny Farm. The screenplay for the Warner Brothers film was written by Jeffrey Boam from a book by Jay Cronley. The movie pre-dates both the personal computer and the cell phone. Funny Farm is a film in which the typewriter has a couple of pivotal lines. Andy Farmer, played by Chevy Chase, types ‘The Heist’ on a title page and ‘Chapter One’ on the next page. Then he sits and peers out the window. The typewriter informs the audience about the writer’s block faced by Andy Farmer, which is the root cause of the dramatic conflict and the set up for many of the movie’s gags.
Most viewers will recall the big comic scenes from the movie. The covered bridge which collapses as the moving van tries to cross is probably the biggest laugh getter. The fishing contest where Art Farmer almost beats his fellow fisherman unconscious while removing a fish hook from the poor individual’s eye is the either the worst or the best slapstick in the film. The bolder that Art Farmer tries to smash into the drunken mailman, only to have it damage his publisher’s new luxury vehicle, highlights the middle of the film. These scenes provide the big laughs.
The smaller laughs are the genius of the film. The apple eaten by Andy’s wife, Elizabeth played by Madolyn Smith Osborne, becomes funnier with each viewing. The best small laugh is Yellow Dog, a lethargic hunk of a retriever. Yellow dog would not have been funny without the setup provided by the hyperactive Irish Setter, which quickly runs away from Andy’s place in the country. Yellow dog is funny by just spending most of the movie just lying around.
The movie has a plot worthy of a dramatic feature. A couple leaves New York for an idyllic country life, where Andy Farmer plans to write his novel. When Andy asks his wife to read the work, all Elizabeth can do is cry. Andy gets more dysfunctional as the movie progresses, but Elizabeth writes a children’s book long hand on a legal pad. Her book gets published, and she is delighted to receive a typed manuscript of her story. Eventually, Andy pawns off his wife’s manuscript as his own. When Andy’s publisher calls and gets Elizabeth on the phone, he tells her how much he enjoyed the child’s book Andy wrote. This ultimate betrayal makes Elizabeth and Andy decide to divorce. Because Funny Farm is a comedy, the divorce never materializes; Andy, a pregnant Elizabeth, and Yellow Dog are watching a baseball game in the final scene.
One of the more inspired aspects of the movie is that the film’s mood remains light during the divorce. Andy and Elizabeth each retained one of the two attorneys in town. Both lawyers were as old as writing a novel on a typewriter or a children’s book on a legal pad. One attorney was in a neck and arm cast and he was suing the other attorney for damages. The parody of the two attorneys was just the comic element needed to take the bite out of the divorce plot line.
When the Farmers decided to sell their dream country home, they arranged to bribe the townspeople into acting ‘normal’. As part of the ploy to sell the house, the crazy mailman delivers Andy’s mail with a friendly smile; and that smile becomes a gag. In the end, Andy and Elizabeth decide to keep their place and their marriage intact.
Funny Farm is one of the great films and very possibly the best film ever made. It gets funnier with each viewing. Even when you know the gag, it is funny when you see it. I’ve been watching the film for over twenty years. How many good action films were made in the 1980s?
