Empire's List of the Top 50 Independent Films

[Derf]

Or, another pointless list to complain about. But hey, where's the fun in life if you can't complain about pointless lists, right?

The List

[BeyondTheGrave]

I thought some of them were out of place. I mean Mad Max and Terimnator? I never really considered them Indie flims. Good to see Night of the Living Dead get some respect.

[Scottie]

Let the complaining begin!

I think the misuse of the term "independent" by this list is what put me off to begin with. In my opinion, "independent" refers to a movie that is made and released without a major company for financial backing. And 'major' refers to Columbia, Paramount, MGM, and the likes; and no less than the five I could count have had generous amounts of money poured into them by large studios.

Sideways had Fox Searchlight, Passion of the Christ has Icon Productions, Lost in Translation had daddy's American Zoetrope, Memento had Summit Entertainment, and The Usual Suspects had Polygram.

These are all production companies who helped to fund the movie by providing studio space and equipment as well as contacts to actors and crew. These don't even cover distribution, for which MIramax can be held 50% accountable. In order to be "independent," it must be done without any major help. The guy down the street who lets you borrow his Eclair or Bolex isn't the same as the guys in business suits who draw up contracts for your talent with exclusive rights to advertising, distribution, promotion, and a 30% share in gross profits, etc etc...

Blood Feast is an excellent example, not only because most of us here have seen it, but because we know of it's background. We know for how little it was made, how poor most of the quality is, its drive-in distribution, and even who its musical composer is. We also know how insanely popular it is among cult followers because of its poverty-level budget.

El Mariachi works the same way, as well as Clerks, Mean Streets, Evil Dead, or Pink Flamingos. They were made with people (or without people in Rodriguez's case) the director was friends with, and was successful for one reason or another. Most of the films in this list I suspect are trophy pieces for studios that have money invested into Empire Magazine, and this is their way of paying them back with publicity.

If it weren't for that, we might see real movies like Menilmontant, Rose Hobart, Pather Panchali, Fritz the Cat, or A Fistful of Dollars on the list.

[dean]

I'm pretty sure Mad Max can be classed as an independent film: I'm almost certain it didn't get funding when it was made from major studios.  As for Terminator, I'm not too sure about that either, but what do I know...

As for the list, there's a few I'm a little unsure about, but my only real gripe is no Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles??

Wasn't that, at the time of it's release, the most succesful independent film ever?  Bah...

As for the whole criteria thing, I think some of those 'big name production companies' are just offshoots of the major production houses, and as such are in charge of independent film development.  

I read something on it a while back when we were studying independent and semi-independent films, and yes, I also think that those films produced by those companies [even the small ones] kind of shouldn't be on the list, but I think it's a technicality [I don't think a film needs a shoe-string budget to be classed independent]

[dean]

I'm pretty sure Mad Max can be classed as an independent film: I'm almost certain it didn't get funding when it was made from major studios.  As for Terminator, I'm not too sure about that either, but what do I know...

As for the list, there's a few I'm a little unsure about, but my only real gripe is no Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles??

Wasn't that, at the time of it's release, the most succesful independent film ever?  Bah...

As for the whole criteria thing, I think some of those 'big name production companies' are just offshoots of the major production houses, and as such are in charge of independent film development.  

I read something on it a while back when we were studying independent and semi-independent films, and yes, I also think that those films produced by those companies [even the small ones] kind of shouldn't be on the list, but I think it's a technicality [I don't think a film needs a shoe-string budget to be classed independent]

[trekgeezer]

Yeah Dean, they don't have to have a shoestring budget. The last three Star Wars movies could be classified as independent because Lucas provided all the funding .  Fox  got 20 % of the gross for distributing them.