This Week in Rankings

Since the last rankings update, I launched a new review series on Johnnie To and Hong Kong Cinema that I'm calling Running Out of Karma because I couldn't come up with a snappier title. So far I've covered his debut film The Enigmatic Case, John Woo's A Better Tomorrow II, Tsui Hark's Peking Opera Blues, Ringo Lam's Prison on Fire as well as the Happy Ghost series, of which To directed the third installment. Those reviews and more can all be found in the Index.

I've also recorded some more podcasts, four episodes of The George Sanders Show (The Big Parade and The Red & The White; Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure and Three Ages; Monsieur Verdoux and Bonfire of the Vanities; and Computer Chess and The Chess Players) and a new episode of They Shot Pictures on Claire Denis, focusing on Beau travail, L'intrus and 35 Shots of Rum.

These are the movies I've watched and rewatched over the last few weeks, and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Three Ages (Buster Keaton) - 3, 1923
Monsieur Verdoux (Charles Chaplin) - 4, 1947
The Red and The White (Miklós Jancsó) - 2, 1967
The Chess Players (Satyajit Ray) - 4, 1977
The Contract (Michael Hui) - 7, 1978

All the Wrong Clues (...For the Right Solution) (Tsui Hark) - 29, 1981
Aces Go Places (Eric Tsang) - 25, 1982
Aces Go Places II (Eric Tsang) - 15, 1983
The Happy Ghost (Clifton Ko) - 21, 1984
Happy Ghost II (Clifton Ko) - 35, 1985

Peking Opera Blues (Tsui Hark) - 4, 1986
Happy Ghost III (Johnnie To) - 23, 1986
Prison on Fire (Ringo Lam) - 25, 1987
A Better Tomorrow II (John Woo) - 35, 1987
Seven Years Itch (Johnnie To) - 40, 1987
The Eighth Happiness (Johnnie To) - 29, 1988

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (Stephen Herek) - 16, 1989
The Bonfire of the Vanities (Brian DePalma) - 41, 1990
Only Yesterday (Isao Takahata) - 8, 1991
Whisper of the Heart (Yoshifumi Kondo) - 5, 1995
Computer Chess (Andrew Bujalski) - 7, 2013