Favorite Movies

Movies
21

A few years ago, I donated 100 movies to a new library being built in our town. I wanted to go for “non-mainstream” movies…things people should try out. It doesn’t include movies from past 2-3 years, but still a decent list.

Family Most are appropriate for ages 7 & above
Second Hand Lions, 2003
Fly Away Home
SeaBiscuit, also PBS Seabiscuit special
Freaky Friday, 2002
Holes
October Sky
Wallace and Grommit
Galaxy Quest
The Straight Story
Nightmare before Christmas
Titan AE
School of Rock, 2003
Chicken Run
The Rookie
The Last Starfighter
The Iron Giant
Anne of Green Gables (series)

Teens & Above
Bend it like Beckham
Powder
Frequency
Lost Boys
Evolution
Eight Legged Freaks

Adult Action / Violent
Dusk Till Dawn
True Romance
Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels
Snatch
Freeway
We were soldiers
Full Metal Jacket, 1987
American History X
ManHunter

Adult Date
Gosford Park
Run Lola Run
Tortilla Soup
Love Actually, 2003
The Last Seduction, 1994
Amelie
Elizabeth
Shipping News
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
50 First Dates
Shakespeare in Love
Sea of Love

Adult Left Brain
Fight Club
Repo Man
21 Grams
Angel Heart
Clerks
Dark City
Twelve Monkeys
Eyes Wide Shut
Social Intercourse
AI: Artificial Intellegence
Waking Life
Short Cuts, 1993
Fresh
Hedwig & the Angry Inch

Adult Comedy
An Evening with Kevin Smith
Dogma
Super Troopers
Undercover Brother, 2002
A simple plan
Barbershop

Just Plain Good Teens & above OK in most cases
Fresh
12 Angry Men
Band of Brothers
Shawshank Redemption
Smoke
Citizen Kane
Touching the Void
Cookies Fortune
Red Rock West
Lone Star
Oh Brother Where Art Thou
Lantana
The Station Agent, 2003
Whale Rider
Blood In, Blood Out (Bound by Honor), 1993
Down by Law, 1986
Adaptation, 2002
Life as a House
61
Waking Ned Devine

Documentary Teens & above OK in most cases
Fog of War, 2003
Bowling for Columbine, 2002
Fast Cheap and Out of Control
Brothers Keeper, 1992
Control Room, 2004
Outfoxed, 2004
SuperSize Me, 2004
Spellbound, 2000
The Endurance, 2000

Anime Teens & above OK in most cases
Tokyo Godfathers, 2003
Ghost in the Shell
Metropolis, 2001
Spirited Away, 2002
Castle in the Sky, 1986
Perfect Blue, 1997 *
Ninja Scroll, 1993 *
Grave of the Fireflies, 1988
Jin Roh, 1998

Foreign Teens & above OK in most cases
No Man’s Land
Eat Man, Drink Woman
Abres Los Ojos, 1997 *
Ran
Rashomon
Bread & Tulips
Princess and the Warrior, 2000
Jean De Florette, 1986
Manon des Sources, 1986
Hero, 2002
City of God, 2004

  • Definately not a “teen OK movie…maybe 16-18, but not 13-15”
22

Hooray! I found Qt3’s other Fellini fan.

23

Satyricon.

I watch every couple of years.

24

The Lives of Others

Ohhh, that movie is so near and dear to my heart.

A few years ago, I donated 100 movies to a new library being built in our town. I wanted to go for “non-mainstream” movies…things people should try out. It doesn’t include movies from past 2-3 years, but still a decent list.

What a cool thing to do, and what a great list. Speaking as someone who depended on her library’s DVD and VHS collection as her only form of televised entertainment for years (I watched every. single. episode. of Upstairs Downstairs…), I thank you.

25

Since I have so many “favorites” it’s easier to name a genre than a list of specific titles.

Action movies in a SyFy (sorry, lol) SCI-FI setting.

This would include Godzilla monster movie style movies, British Sci-Fi movies and Anime Sci-Fi also.

And alot of times, the cheesier the better.

Actually, since i like the low action sci-fi also, 2001 for example, I guess it would be just Sci-Fi in general.

26
  1. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
  2. Minority Report
  3. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
  4. Hot Fuzz
  5. Children of Men
  6. Zoolander
  7. 2001: A space Odyssey

These are by no means the best movies ever made, but they are definitely movies I could watch over and over and still enjoy them.

27

Memento
Leon
12 Monkeys
Terminator 2
The Matrix
Se7en
Ong-Bak

28

Finding Neverland
Crash
Dead Poet’s Society
Airplane II
It Happened One Night
Eraserhead

 -Tom
29

This seems an unlikely list for you, Tom, but if it’s authentic, I’m guessing that ‘Crash’ is the Paul Haggis film and not David Cronenberg’s excellent adaptation of the J.G. Ballard novel, yeah?

30

Oops, I forgot Con Air.

 -Tom
31

I need to resee the Cronenberg Crash. I think that’s the transition from the old Scanners through ExiSt3nz Cronenberg to the new Spider and History of Violence Cronenberg, who I like much better.

 -Tom

P.S. Also, add Spanglish to my list! That might go at the top.

32

Trying to do this makes my brain hurt. I am paralyzed by the fear I will miss one and, thereby, disrespect its memory and make the movie gods mad at me.

Waterworld
Speed Racer
Ishtar

33

I think Cronenberg has always been pretty specific about his interests and if you look closely you’ll see a more linear path from his early schlocky stuff to what he’s doing now.

Remember he made The Dead Zone and The Fly and Dead Ringers before he made Crash, and I think Dead Ringers belongs up there with his most recent work.

Didn’t you ever wonder why, when Jeremy Irons won the Best Actor Oscar for Reversal Of Fortune he thanked David Cronenberg, even though he, Cronenberg, had nothing to do with the movie?

Anyway, I think Cronenberg’s work is always interesting even when it doesn’t quite hang together properly.

34

Ah, good point about Dead Ringers. But The Fly is very Videodrome Cronenberg to me. Even though I really like the script and perforances, it leans pretty heavily on ick factor.

Cronenberg directed Dead Zone? Where Martin Sheen shields himself behind a baby? Spoiler, BTW. I don’t think that’s right. That must have been Peter Hyams or someone like that.

-Tom

P.S. I forgot to put Footloose on my list, mainly for John Lithgow’s performance. Can one of the admins edit my earlier post?

35

That’s unfortunate.

36

Incomplete, off the top of my head

The Hospital
Network
Used Cars
Dog Day Afternoon
Serpico
In the Bedroom
Grave of the Fireflies
Juno
Repo Man
The French Connection
Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai
Ikiru
Out of Sight
Raising Arizona
American History X
Oh Brother, Where Art Thou
Fargo
Being There
Sideways
Rushmore
Zoolander
The Station Agent
Wild Strawberries
The War Room
Street Fight
Ed Wood
Bloody Sunday
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Sunset Boulevard
Superman
American Graffiti
The Warriors
THX 1138
Coming Home
The Last Detail
Bound for Glory
Planes, Trains & Automobiles
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Annie Hall
The Truman Show
Trainspotting
RoboCop
Zelig
Babe
Babe: Pig in the City
Sleeper
Taxi Driver
Munich
King of Comedy
Raging Bull
Schindler’s List
Dr. Strangelove
Rear Window
Malcolm
Good Night, and Good Luck
Mean Streets
MASH
My Left Foot
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Monsters Inc.
Paradise Now
Punch-Drunk Love
Rocky
Citizen Kane
E.T.
Half Nelson
Good Will Hunting
Pi
Adaptation
Being John Malcovich
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Jaws
Dark Days
City Lights
Election
Shattered Glass
Waltz with Bashir
Hoop Dreams
The Iron Giant
The Thin Blue Line
Fog of War
Office Space
Primer

I am also an advocate of works gone unchampioned by the bourgeois cineastes.
The Adventures of Pluto Nash
Envy
The Whole Ten Yards
The Hottie & the Nottie
I Spy
Bulworth

37

Isn’t it, though? But I thought it better to admit it here rather than risk you guys discovering it on my Facebook page. I still haven’t lived down the time everyone made fun of me for posting on Facebook that Tori Amos is my favorite vocalist.

-Tom

P.S. Please add Narrow Margin and Kentucky Fried Movie to my list of favorite movies.

38

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
American Beauty
Rashoman
Throne of Blood
Dreams
Sideways
In the Bedroom
The Incredibles
Monster’s Inc
Wall-E
Up
Clockwork Orange
Forrest Gump
Happiness of the Katakuris
Rainy Dog
Dead or Alive 2
The Big Lebowski
Romeo is Bleeing
Death Race 2000
Snatch
Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
2001 a Space Odyssey
Intermission
American Movie
American Splendor
Caligula (the non-porn parts)
Kill Bill
Jackie Brown
Commando
Goodfellas
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
About Schmidt
Juno
Election
Fargo
Raising Arizona
In Bruges
There will be Blood

Many more to be added later. I would also like to comment that alexlitel has an amazing taste in movies, I approve!

39

Favorite movies? I have just one, Fight Club.

40

100 movies is maybe a little ambitious, but I can do a short list in rough order of how much I love them:

Miller’s Crossing
Blue Velvet
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Salvador
Dangerous Liaisons
Me and You and Everyone We Know
Raiders of the Lost Ark
House of Games
Swingers
Glengarry Glen Ross
Manhattan
Brazil
Wild Strawberries
24 Hour Party People
Solaris (the original, not the execrable Clooney remake)
Mulholland Drive
Double Indemnity
Wings of Desire
McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Vernon, Florida

Kind of off the top of my head, but I think that about represents my favorites.