The MoFo Top 100 Musicals Countdown

Interesting...

Not a Disney fan?
Belief that a mandrill holding a lion cub aloft is no basis for a system of government?
Jonathan Taylor Thomas tailgated you that one time?

Hard to argue with The Lion King being peak Disney, peak musical, or just peak cinema, period. It's just a gorgeously animated story with charm, drama, thrills, emotion, and everything you might want for both children and adults. And obviously, the music is a big part of that, from the iconic opening with "The Circle of Life" to the ominous "Be Prepared" or the fun "Hakuna Matata". Personally, I still put Aladdin above it, but this one's not that far. I had it at #11.


Here's where I stand...

SEEN: 34/95
MY BALLOT: 16/25

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I had a feeling that it was going to be Lion King today, it's one of my favorite animated Disney movies.

My predictions for the top 5

The Wizard of Oz
Singin in the Rain
West Side Story
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
The Sound of Music

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I know most people will drool over the other songs, deservedly so, so I will give a shout-out to this one. Infinitely catchy and fun!

Some other countdown facts...

The Lion King just snatched the top spot as far as IMDb scores go, with 8.5, followed by Amadeus at 8.4 and a handful tied at 8.0. Meanwhile, Into the Woods remain the film with the lowest IMDb score at 5.9.

As far as RT score, no change from my last post about this: Pinocchio, Meet Me in St. Louis, and Top Hat remain the only ones with 100% (i.e. overall positive consensus across critics). Meanwhile, The Greatest Showman, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Annie remain the only ones with a "Rotten" RT score (below 60%).

The 13 point gap between Cabaret and The Lion King is the fourth biggest gap.

Hmm. I don't know whether or not to call myself a "fan" of Disney. I like their classics of course. Not the generational type classics like Beauty and the Beast, Lion King, Aladdin, Little Mermaid etc. but old school ones. And I do love the Pixar stuff. Maybe that "ever" was too strong. TLK came along too late for me and I really don't have a reason to ever watch it.

Makes sense. I first saw it as a teenager who had to be dragged to it, believing I was similarly done with Disney and it won me over anyway, FWIW.

I was too old for The Lion King when it came out and too young to have my own kid(s), so I didn't actually see it until 2016 (when I did have a kid to watch it with). It's perfectly fine! Not a favorite, but not something I'd sniff at.

I have zero connection to Disney. I didn't watch it when I was a kid back in the paleolithic. I don't have kids so I wasn't obligated to have it play in the house 100 times over. I don't like Mickey and you'd have to pay me to go to Disneyland or Disneyworld...and pay me well to deal with those crowds. So guess which animated movie I didn't see

Interesting numbers in looking at that breakdown. I made a somewhat conscious effort to include musicals from a large variety of years/decades. Obviously that wasn't a huge factor, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't cross my mind when making my top 25 musicals list. My spread in years goes from the most recent musical on my list, Dancer in the Dark in 2000 clear back to the oldest being in 1931 with The Smiling Lieutenant.

Taking a look at that breakdown for the top 100 musicals, it's interesting... or kind of sad really to be perfectly honest, that only a whopping 12... 12 out of a hundred, and yes it will be 13 to be fair when The Wizard of Oz shows up, but only 13 out of 100 musicals in this countdown are from before 1950. Before 1950 for a musicals list of all things. In the era where Vicente Minnelli (the greatest of all musical directors) was making some of his best films, where Fred Astaire was taking off the ground with Ginger Rogers, where acts like the Marx Brothers incorporated so much music into their films, Marlene Dietrich was at her most beautiful making musical-ish films with Josef Von Sternberg, some dude name Busby Berkeley was making huge extravaganza musicals to spit in the face of the Great Depression, and there's a whole treasure trove and unexplored world of pre-code musicals out there too just waiting to be discovered.

Yeah, definitely a bit of recency bias going on I think... especially considering there are 47... count em' 47 musicals on this list post 1980 in an era where there really aren't the big production glamorous and adult-geared lyricist/composer charming musicals of the pre fall of the studio system age 1967 and before... what in the world? Obviously the 1950's and 1960's were the pinnacle of musicals in terms of lavish productions and beautiful song-writing with highly developed stories, characters, and thematic elements. The 1970's produced some great off kilter material in the world of musicals that subverted while embracing the genre, but after the 1970s it was a rapid decline as it was the start of the era of the multiplex HUGE opening weekend box office blockbusters, action films, special effects, superhero movies, and on and on. And with the exception of a few rare "Oscar bait" musicals like Moulin Rouge and La La Land, musicals just became fewer and far between as it's not really a genre that lends itself to smaller more independent productions which is where the films geared toward adults are pretty much relegated to live now. There's some great smaller stuff like Inside Llewyn Davis, but those films aren't as common today.

My breakdown by decade in my top 25

1920s - 0
1930s - 4
1940s - 4
1950s - 4
1960s - 6
1970s - 4
1980s - 2
1990s - 0
2000s - 1
2010s - 0
2020s - 0

So I was definitely the inverse of the MoFo list with only a whopping seven of my 25 picks arriving after 1970.

Anyway.

So far with five films left to go, my number one: My Fair Lady and my number two: Cabaret are the only two to show in my top five musicals. I imagine my third, fourth, and fifth pick will pop up in the top five. There's no way they couldn't.

What I am happy about is that the big kitty Elton John/Di$ney cash cat thing didn't make it to number one or even in the top five. It would be no where near my top 100 if I had to make a list of my top 100 musicals. I think at this point Disney was more concerned about getting big names of the time like Elton John and Jonathan Taylor Thomas to sign up... all apologizes to Jeromy Irons, and also selling not only movie tickets, but albums and music rights along with radio play and yes a GAZILLION dollars in merchandising, more than making genuine art AND since it was drawing from source material that was Hamlet, Disney wasn't exactly having to pay any royalty rights for that. The Lion King was a big risk for Disney... the previous three big renaissance hits The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin all being well known stories and fables and they featured human protagonists not anthropomorphic animals, but it was a financial gamble that paid off.

The Lion King, and these are numbers from five years ago, as a franchise has brought in over $9 BILLION dollars. The title alone has a greater GDP than some third world countries.

Yeah the voice acting is meh... the story is neutered down from its source material and not really up to the creative standards of previous Disney films, and the music is meh with Elton John amped up to level 11.... CIRRRRRCCCCLLLLEEEE OFFF LIFFFFEEEEEE!!!!!

https://www.forbes.com/sites/markbee...ranchise-ever/

OK, now with that out of the way, can I predict number one? It's gotta be Camelot. Camelot!

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The Lion King is pretty good, but while the story is very memorable, I actually find the songs hit-or-miss, which lessened my admiration of it when I watched it, so it didn't make my ballot.

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Since we've reached top 5, I also start revealing some of my picks:

I had at #22. Funny Face (1957)

Directed by Stanley Donen
Starring Audrey Hepburn, Fred Astaire, Kay Thompson

Saw it specially for the countdown. I Liked its modern visual style and production design and decided to include it on the ballot at the lower slots since the screenplay was not so good.
Honestly, I'm surprised it not making the list, even not the near misses. After all there are Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire and the movie is so colorful... Hm.

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Cabaret, from yesterday, not only was in the 2nd spot for the top 25 list, but it's also a film that has a solid place in my top 100 of all time movies. My write up is in that thread for those who are interested in why I view it as such a great movie:

https://www.movieforums.com/communit...95#post2510395

I wonder if you are I are the only ones who voted for Funny Face. I just absolutely love it and there's no way it wouldn't be on my list. I placed it at 24. We get to see Audrey in her full glory at her most youthfully exuberant and alongside none other than Fred Astaire... age difference be damned, I really don't care! It's a fun and charming musical as you can hope to find. I love, just absolute adore, her jazz dance at the Bohemian Club/Cafe. Also the lightning and cinematography in that scene is perfect as it's not an easy thing to make low light actually look like low light but also have the shot bright enough that at no point it is too difficult to see. In fact, speaking of Cabaret, the photography is very similar to Fosse's film with the smoky rooms and muted diffused shadowy lighting.

The whole build up to that is great too with Audrey and Astaire debating over empathaticalism and how it leads to later on in the film when the professor (Flostre) of that school of thought really just using all that nonsense to get into her character's pants. It's a bit wicked, but the whole thing is presented in a way that is Hayes code appropriate and toned down for the 1950's but really it's essentially the whole bit where Dennis in "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" goes to a pro-choice rally just to pretend he cares in order to take advantage of women.

Oh and another thing about Audrey's Bohemian dance scene in Funny Face. I was listening to a podcast about the film and apparently director Stanley Donen and Audrey Hepburn nearly came to blows over a matter of whether or not she would be wearing white socks with her all black outfit. Audrey said yes and Donen said absolutely not as it wouldn't translate well on film to her the movement of her steps. Audrey apparently had a fit and nearly walked out, but eventually relented, realized and saw that Donen was correct and then apologized for her horrible behavior and emotional outburst.

Geez even I would know she should have wore black socks with her black outfit. I might have voted for Funny Face only I didn't get a chance to rewatch it and the last and only viewing was 10-12 years ago.

I really like Funny Face but it just missed out on my ballot.

Hey, it was my No.14.
Dunno what the hell the rest of you guys are watching.

I do not really wanna rain on everyone else's parade so I will only say of The Lion King that every song in that movie is like nails on a chalkboard to me, it is the low point of Elton John's career as a great musician in my mind, and The Little Mermaid (which I also did not vote for) is literally seven times better than The Lion King.
That is all. Please continue with the celebration. Hakuna matata and shit.