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New York City Films

Inspired by New York Magazine's recent piece 'At Home on Screen' and the passing of Sidney Lumet, a legendary 'cinematic captor' of NYC, I took a shot at ranking my favorite films set in New York City. With such a vast number of NYC movies, I ended up with a ranking that looks very much like the scores of others who have identified their favorite iconic NYC pictures: Manhattan (or almost anything Woody Allen), Network, When Harry Met Sally, Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Godfather, Do the Right Thing, Taxi Driver, etc.

So, instead of recapping the obvious quintessential NYC movies, here are five interesting New York movies that you may have forgotten:

The Sidewalks of New York (2001):


The Last Days of Disco (1998):


Metropolitan (1990):


The Squid and the Whale (2005):


Six Degrees of Separation (1993):


(*Click film titles for IMDb details and accompanying photo for film trailer)

Congratulations to our January/February Ranking Promotion Winners

One quick note before we get to the Promotion Winners, we have added a couple of "Badges" on the site. It is a searchlight badge with either white lights or gold lights. You will earn the white searchlight badge when you rank at least 25 movie categories and the gold searchlight badge when you rank at least 100 movie categories. You can see an example of the gold badge our top ranker's profile, garv.

Well another ranking promotion winners and congrats to garv who took home the top prize ($40 Amazon gift card) again. During the two month period, garv added 59 ranked categories to bring his complete total of ranked categories up to a very impressive 325 categories. You can check out all of garv's rankings here.

TheHollywoodRevue took down second place ($25 Amazon gift card) in the contest with 43 additional categories ranked during the period. THR now has a total of 87 total categories ranked and given her strong interest in classic movies, she has add a lot of interesting classic movie categories. Check out TheHollywoodRevue's rankings here.

Third place ($15 Amazon gift card) went to Starlight757. She just joined during February and jumped out to a great start by ranking 22 categories during the month. You can check out Starlight757's rankings here.

Finally, our fourth place ($10 Amazon gift card) finisher was BigThoughtsFromASmallMind who ranked 4 additional movie categories.

Thanks to everyone who participated in the rankings and don't forget to check out our Facebook Fan page where we have over 32,000 fans and discuss interesting movie topics each day.

Any HBO True Blood Fans Out There?

I thought this was pretty funny.  They are selling an orange drink at HBO.com inspired by Bill's synthetic blood drink.  They come in bottles that look surprisingly like the bottles on the show.  Pretty cool novelty gift for crazy True Blood fans.

Best Jim Carrey Movies

Check out this Squidoo lens that we wrote on the 8 best Jim Carrey films as they appear on the Composite Ranking of Rankography movies.  Members ranked their favorite Jim Carrey movies and we compiled the rankings to create this collective rank.  The excellent movie The Truman Show topped the list but I think you will find that there are several other great lesser known Carrey films on the rankings.

New Ranking Promotion Through the End of February 2011

ANOTHER PROMOTION!!

We are running another rankings promotion from January 10th through the end of February.  We will be giving away four (4) more Amazon gift cards to certain members in a Rankings promotion during the rest of January and February. We loved all the activity during the promotion in November and again we hope to dramatically increase the number of rankings per category to benefit everybody looking to discover great movies.

This time around we are awarding the 4 gift cards to the members that rank the most additional categories (with at least 5 entries per category) during the promotion period.  We have benchmarked the number of categories that each member has ranked so far and you can see those results after the main rules below.  Prizes paid will be as follows:   

First Place        $40 Amazon gift card
Second Place   $25 Amazon gift card
Third Place      $15 Amazon gift card
Fourth Pace     $10 Amazon gift card

Now there are a couple of rules you need to be aware of in the Promotion.

1. Only category rankings with at least 5 movies will be counted as a ranked category. We prefer that members fully rank a category with all of the movies they like that applies to a category, but you must have at least 5 valid movies in a ranking to be counted.

2. Your rankings will not count if it is clear that you are just randomly inputting movies or using the same movies on all your rankings just to increase the number of ranked categories. We understand rankings are subjective and we will allow latitude if it is clear you are making an effort to create actual rankings for each category, but we reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to disqualify any member that we believe is trying to thwart the spirit of the contest to create bulk rankings with bogus rankings.

3. Rankings that are clearly copies of another member just to increase rankings will also be disqualified. That is not to say that you can't have the same rankings as another member because we know that will happen. But if all of your rankings appear to be simply copied from one or more members in order to quickly increase your total rankings, you run the risk of disqualification, again at our sole discretion. Bottom line, just make an honest and valid effort and you shouldn't run into trouble.

4. You do not need to be an existing member to participate, but you do need to register to become a member if you are not yet a member.

5. You still need to adhere to the normal Terms of Service of the site. So, please take a read through those Terms to avoid running the risk of disqualification or losing your account.

6. Several members that are affiliated with the site are not participating in the promotion and they include Tonto, brooklyn77, CallingDrBombay, Brewster, Roundersbuzz and Keysersoze.

7. Winners may not request substitutions of prize winnings. All winners are solely responsible for any and all taxes and/or fees as well as all additional costs that may be incurred.

8. In the event of a tie for any of potential prizes, the member with the most ranked categories will be deemed the winner.

9. See below for some additional contest terms.


Below we have included a benchmark of categories ranked by each member as of January 9th for calculating the results of the promotion. January 10th will be considered the first day of the Challenge and any rankings today will count toward the promotion.

So here are the number of ranked categories for members (with at least 5 ranked entries) as of the end of January 9th. All members not listed below or in Rule 6 above will be deemed to have one ranked category (when calculating the increment) as of the end of January 9th:

Categories Ranked as of 01-09-2011
garv  266.00
david_mikec  205.00
TheHollywoodRevue  44.00
MDotMovieMan  22.00
Izzy  15.00
filmforager  12.00
MosaicMan  10.00
LolitasClassics  10.00
john49  8.00
24hourstomidnight  8.00
Pokernutz  8.00
Evil Dead Junkie  7.00
Clarabela  6.00
blogcabins  5.00
rebzombie  5.00
The Resident Film Snob  5.00
DEMayo2     4.00
DVDSpinDoctor  4.00
goodoldparanoia  4.00
hal0000     4.00
Red  4.00
AaronIMTV  4.00
The Media Bunker  4.00
filmgeek  3.00
mugison  3.00
nicola-t  3.00
eangevine  3.00
TheOpinionatedB  3.00
amiableamy  3.00
sreejithkamalanayanan  3.00
bitchinfilms  2.00
Dancinghotdogs  2.00
GloriaOliver  2.00
J_Jammer  2.00
Joeeholman  2.00
MyFilmHabit  2.00
utsav  2.00
writer89  2.00
All other members deemed to have ranked 1 category as of January 9th.

Best of luck everyone and get ranking!!

Additional contest/promotion terms and conditions:
10. Rankings after 02/28/2011 will not count toward the promotion.

11. JT Webmedia Inc. and its site, Rankography.com are not responsible to any interruptions of internet service either for the Rankography.com website or any of its members access to the internet. In the event of such an outage of service for Rankography.com, such time will be lost from the promotion and NO additional time will added to the promotion.

12. All winners will be notified via the email address provided during site registration. If the winner does not respond within five (5) business days, another winner will be selected. Failure to respond to the notification email within five (5) business days shall mean that the winner forfeits the prize.

13. You acknowledge and agree that JT Webmedia Inc and Rankography.com have the right to publicize the winners of the promotion awards using the Usernames registered on the Rankography.com website.

14. The contest is null and void in any jurisdiction where prohibited by law.

15. JT Webmedia Inc. and Rankography.com reserve the right in their sole and absolute discretion to terminate any contest at any time without prior notice.

16. JT Webmedia Inc. and Rankography.com reserve the right in their sole and absolute discretion to alter any contest rules at any time.

17. By entering a contest, you conclusively are deemed to have agreed to be bound by these contest rules and terms and conditions as well as by any rules specific to such contest. This is an irrevocable condition of entry.

18. No purchase or payment of any consideration is necessary to enter the contest.

19. JT Webmedia Inc. and Rankography.com reserve the right to require the winner to execute an affidavit of eligibility as a sworn document and provide other proof of eligibility as a condition of receipt of the prize or award.

7 Great Films You Likely Didn't Know Existed

Discovery was the main reason we started Rankography.  We thought that if lots of knowledgeable movie fans started ranking their favorite movies in different categories, then we could find great unknown movies.  Well, for me at least, that has been true in spades.  Since we launched in May, my Netflix queue has tripled in size and I have watched many outstanding movies that I found on others' rankings.

I thought I would highlight 7 of the best "unknown" movies that I found during the last several months.

Sin Nombre (2009 - Mexico)
Stark drama about two Honduran teenagers, strangers brought together on the epic journey to the United States through Mexico.  It is a graphic depiction of gang life in Honduras and the utter desperation to get to a better life in the US.  If you can handle stark gangland dramas, in the vein of City of God, this is a very good film.



The Thin Man (1934)
I have garv to thank for highlighting this Classic on several of his ranked lists.  This is a murder mystery comedy starring William Powell and Myrna Loy.  This pair had such great comedic onstage presence together that there were several sequels to this movie.  In total, the pair went on to partner for 14 films.  They are naturally funny together.  You will also enjoy the different attitudes toward drinking.  This movie came out right after the end of Prohibition and you can tell by this timely film that the country was ready for a party!




Eastern Promises (2007)
Many of you may have heard of this Russian mafia movie, but given that it only cleared $16 million at the box office it is probably new to most folks. I found it on the rankings of the best Gangster Movies and I was not disappointed. This is an unraveling story about a young girl that dies in child birth after a brutal beating from an unknown abuser. The cast is excellent, including Viggo Mortenson and Naomi Watts, but Armin Mueller-Stahl really steals the show as the cold-blooded family patriarch.




Meet John Doe (1941)
Talk about bad timing, Meet John Doe is a Frank Capra/Gary Cooper meeting that was released in 1941, the same year as Citizen Kane, The Maltese Falcon, Hitchcock's Suspicion and How Green was My Valley. As a result, it has not survived in classic lore as well as many other movies, however this is one of my favorite Gary Cooper movies. The story is a bit of a feel good Depression-era film about how an unknown guy can change the world if given the chance.  If you like Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, I think you will also like this one.




Darkon (2006)
Okay, I am going a little off the beaten path for this one.  Darkon is a documentary about LARPers (Live Action Role Playing gamers).  I have never played these games and frankly watched this film because I wanted to understand what they people were thinking.  However, the film-making in this low budget documentary is so good, that I felt myself hanging on the outcome of a major fake battle between to opposing sides.  The camera angles, musical score and editing are very cool.  It creates an illusion of watching a real Fantasy Adventure movie.  You can watch this one on Netflix and its a fun watch.  I highly recommend you check out this hidden gem.




Runaway Jury (2003)
Runaway Jury is the biggest box office success in this list.  It grossed about $40 million at the box office, but that is still a paltry sum and means very few people have seen this excellent courtroom drama.  The cast is outstanding Gene Hackman, Dustin Hoffman, Rachel Weisz and John Cusack.  It is a look into the backroom drama in jury selection and jury management in the big class action personal injury lawsuits.  Gene Hackman is excellent as a ruthless jury consultant for the defense.  As if the acting and drama were not enough, the plot takes some interesting twists and turns that is very entertaining.  This movie is right up there in my Top 5 courtroom drama films.




And God Spoke... (1993)
And finally we end with a comedy way, way off the beaten path.  And God Spoke...is a hilarious mockumentary in the tradition of This is Spinal Tap.  It follows the drama of a film-making team as they try to produce their latest film with the same title.  There is a lot of the normal behind the scenes mockumentary comedy, but the characters carry the day.  Stephen Rappaport really stole the show for me.  His character is so over the top that you actually feel like he believes what he is saying at time.  It is amazing to me that he has not been cast in other comedic movie roles since this movie.  Andy Dick also has a very funny cameo appearance as Abel to Lou Ferrigno's Cain -- you can imagine where that is going.  I was laughing out loud by myself watching it on my computer through Netflix!  Unfortunately, there is not an embeddable trailer, but there are a couple of clips available on youtube.