Dead good

  • 2004-05-27
The notorious shower scene from Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho" was voted "best movie-death of all time" in a poll for Total Film magazine.

It's not so much the sight of Janet Leigh being slashed to death that makes it so gruesome, as Hitchcock's frenzied edit and Bernard Hermann's jarring score. Kubrick's "Dr. Strangeglove" came second, in which Slim Pickens memorably rides an atomic bomb, and "King Kong" came third, for the giant ape's fatal fall from the Empire State building. Other films on the list include "Bambi" (sixth), "The Wizard of Oz" (13th) and "The Godfather" (22nd).

Michael Moore's controversial "Fahrenheit 9/11" became the first documentary to win the prestigious Palme d'Or award at the Cannes film festival for almost 50 years. The film is a scathing attack of all things George Bush Jr. and beat off competition from directors such as Wong Kar-Wai and Emir Kusturica. Moore was given a standing ovation at Cannes, in stark contrast to his Oscar-acceptance speech in which he was heckled by the audience. "Farenheit 9/11" doesn't have an American distributor after Disney backed out for fear that the film was too provocative.