Has it really been ten years since the American Film Institute named the AFI 100, its top 100 films from the first century of filmmaking? It has, and for the 10th anniversary, the AFI is ... what? They're doing a new list? Damn, I haven't gotten through the first 100 yet!

Well, the AFI ain't waiting for me. On Wednesday, June 20, the AFI will announce a new AFI 100 (airing on CBS), and we'll all have to start all over again with a new list of films to watch.

Actually, no, I don't think we will. See, there aren't all that many new films nominated this time around that either weren't nominated last time or aren't already on the old AFI 100. Some are older films that somehow have taken on a new luster; most are films released since the first AFI 100 was assembled. I think we can make some educated guesses about how the new top 10 -- let's say top 10 just to keep it manageable -- will look.

(If you really want to get serious about this, you can enter the contest the AFI is sponsoring: guess the new top 10 and win a widescreen HDTV. Since I just indulged myself a bought a lovely new HD widescreen, I'll recuse myself. But feel free to steal my ideas from here.)

Okay, here's what the current top 10 of the current AFI 100 looks like:

1: Citizen Kane (1941)

2: Casablanca (1942)

3: The Godfather (1972)

4: Gone with the Wind (1939)

5: Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

6: The Wizard of Oz (1939)

7: The Graduate (1967)

8: On the Waterfront (1954)

9: Schindler's List (1993)

10: Singin' in the Rain (1952)

I seriously doubt this list will change at all. If you wanna talk about "movies that changed the way we look at movies" -- which is what the AFI list has been saying to me for 10 years -- then there are a few new nominees that might have a chance of landing in the top 10. They are:

Being John Malkovich (1999)

The Matrix (1999)

all three Lord of the Rings films (2001-4)

Brokeback Mountain (2005)

My new top 10, incorporating these films would look like this:

1: Citizen Kane (1941)

2: Casablanca (1942)

3: The Godfather (1972)

4: Gone with the Wind (1939)

5: Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

6: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) [to pick just one of the trilogy]

7: Brokeback Mountain (2005)

8: Being John Malkovich (1999)

9: Schindler's List (1993)

10: The Matrix (1999)

As I said, I don't see the top 10 changing much, if at all, but I do think it's fair to say that a movie like Brokeback Mountain shook us up as much as The Graduate probably did. (I don't remember -- I hadn't been born yet. But people go on about The Graduate like it was earthshattering.) And The Matrix is as much about coping with technology as Singin' in the Rain is, right?

I dunno. I look back at 1999 and I see a movie year as great as 1939 was -- the other 1999 nominees for the new AFI 100 are Fight Club, The Insider, and The Sixth Sense -- but we might be too close to those movies and that time right now for enough perspective.

And I certainly think it's way too soon to be thinking about another AFI 100. Give it a quarter century, minimum.

(For a complete list of all 400 nominated films, go here.)

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

MaryAnn Johanson (email me)

reviews, reviews, reviews! at FlickFilosopher.com