My Favorite Movies
This is not my first list of my favorite movies. This sure as hell will not be my last. I made one for my own recreation and I immediately found it arbitrary and outdated to my tastes. I made another one for my movie blog and refused to move it along when the blog upped and moved to a new site. I made a third one for my radio show and then was begrudging to read it again in on the air.
I love movies too much sit still with the ones I really really love. There's too many and the arrangement is always changing. So this will be another failed attempt at catching all of my favorites and explaining to both y'all and myself why they hold dearly in my heart.
This list is also going to be constantly growing from scratch with each favorite I watch as I decide what resonates with me and what doesn't.
So I down the whiskey shot and move on...
I love movies too much sit still with the ones I really really love. There's too many and the arrangement is always changing. So this will be another failed attempt at catching all of my favorites and explaining to both y'all and myself why they hold dearly in my heart.
This list is also going to be constantly growing from scratch with each favorite I watch as I decide what resonates with me and what doesn't.
So I down the whiskey shot and move on...
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- DirectorCarl Theodor DreyerStarsMaria FalconettiEugene SilvainAndré BerleyIn 1431, Jeanne d'Arc is placed on trial on charges of heresy. The ecclesiastical jurists attempt to force Jeanne to recant her claims of holy visions.If there is any greater accomplishment in cinema making us entirely feel the trials and tribulations of a doomed character, I have yet to see it. Maria Falconetti's gaze owns you completely and the monstrous showcase of Dreyer's complete control of angles and camerawork work incredibly.
This is drama at its most potent, one that keeps you at the edge of your seat, despite the silence (I personally watch it with a soundtrack of select Buckethead instrumentals) and weighted progression and the not very kinetic setting. It is firey enough though in its intimacy that we want to keep finding out where Joan's mind is, how she can keep her values and stay steadfast, does she have doubts, does she know the fear of dying...
All of this is encapsulated in only an hour and 20 minutes in gorgeous close-up and editing rapid and overall humanity that Dreyer has a hold on and continues to provide...
... It never got boring. Not once. - DirectorAlfred HitchcockStarsJames StewartKim NovakBarbara Bel GeddesA former San Francisco police detective juggles wrestling with his personal demons and becoming obsessed with the hauntingly beautiful woman he has been hired to trail, who may be deeply disturbed.Hitchcock’s true magnus opus, as he juggles psychosexual frustrations and the endless feel of the dream, like a Freudian masterpiece. Possibly the greatest indictment of Hollywood hero motivations and hence, the movie is impossible to ignore.
Its eerie romanticism mixed around by its dark and very scandalous subject matter is quite a piece of brilliance that so many current filmmakers try to imitate with their shock culture, but it's too ingrained and built up to a fine precision here to ever be again composed. Which suits me just fine in all its colorful and wonderous images and its divided plot... - DirectorMartin ScorseseStarsRobert De NiroJodie FosterCybill ShepherdA mentally unstable veteran works as a nighttime taxi driver in New York City, where the perceived decadence and sleaze fuels his urge for violent action.Between Paul Schrader’s subjective tension, Martin Scorsese’s weather-weathered lens and Robert De Niro giving possibly the greatest performance ever captured on film, an romantic outsider icon is at once built up hesitantly and then violently collapsed and subverted in this perfectly collaborative character study.
- DirectorOrson WellesStarsOrson WellesJoseph CottenDorothy ComingoreFollowing the death of publishing tycoon Charles Foster Kane, reporters scramble to uncover the meaning of his final utterance: 'Rosebud.'A mystery not only on who is Charles Foster Kane, but who is the man who has everything and nothing at once. Utilizing every film and storytelling technique in the book at the time, Orson Welles’ breakout film establishes a compelling portrait of an American mythology, like a twisted Capra.
Nothing has ever come close to the innovation of the film technique medium since our Charles Foster Kane. - DirectorJoel CoenEthan CoenStarsJeff BridgesJohn GoodmanJulianne MooreJeff "The Dude" Lebowski, mistaken for a millionaire of the same name, seeks restitution for his ruined rug and enlists his bowling buddies to help get it.Began unsung, the Dude rose as a cult hero and with him, the Big Lebowski has slowly become a cult classic - namely for its unforgettably unusual characters led by Jeff Bridges' natural performance, John Goodman's intense demeanor, frustrating maybe but none of them easy to hate.
But moreso, it gets it's popularity for its unrelenting laughs following the Coens' tumbling absurdist script in the Los Angeles shaggy dog noir atmosphere. You will not have room to breathe you laugh so hard.
It's a movie I absolutely refuse to look at thematically (especially when I know, being that its the Coen brothers, that there is more underneath than meets the eye) - Only intimately. I love it unforgivingly. - DirectorFrancis Ford CoppolaStarsAl PacinoRobert De NiroRobert DuvallThe early life and career of Vito Corleone in 1920s New York City is portrayed, while his son, Michael, expands and tightens his grip on the family crime syndicate.On one film, an engaging and entertaining yet romantic and condemning form of storytelling, on the other, an intense generational look at the rise and fall of father and son’s humanity to reach a hypnotizing position of power. Together, there is a complete tragic family portrait and an American masterpiece that sets a benchmark nobody even dreams to surpass.
- DirectorStephen QuayTimothy QuayWeiser QuayA doll interacts with lifeless objects like screws, magnets, spoons and a cereal bowl filled with similar metal objects.Alongside Stille Nacht II: Are We Still Married (1992)
Stille Nacht III: Tales from the Vienna Woods (1993)
Stille Nacht IV: Can't Go Wrong Without You (1994)
Like Kafka’s childhood daydreams, these short films’ post-lullaby stylizations of stop-motion, fairy-tales and eroticism leaves behind a nightmare that feels more eerie and inviting than frightening and repelling. The rabbit is a boss. - DirectorStephen QuayTimothy QuayA tear falls from the eyes of a veiled face. A white ball whips around a heart-shaped paddle. A mournful voice sings, "Are we still married?" A child's stuffed rabbit watches, sees someone's legs hanging and shoes jiggling, and sees a girl holding a heart-shaped paddle. A hand seen through a door's glass knocks incessantly; the lock jiggles, the child holds the heart-shaped object and leans against the wall, sometimes moving up and down on the toes of her shoes. The rabbit watches, plays with the ball, tries to keep the door shut. The child raises her face; we see a woman's eyes.Alongside Stille Nacht I: Dramolet (1988)
Stille Nacht III: Tales from the Vienna Woods (1993)
Stille Nacht IV: Can't Go Wrong Without You (1994)
Like Kafka’s childhood daydreams, these short films’ post-lullaby stylizations of stop-motion, fairy-tales and eroticism leaves behind a nightmare that feels more eerie and inviting than frightening and repelling. The rabbit is a boss. - DirectorStephen QuayTimothy QuayWeiser QuayNear an extraordinary chair with many legs, a hand is visible gripping an edge. The hand is weathered, the fingers cracked and scarred. The end of a rifle appears and a shot fires. The bullet is visible whirling through space; it caroms and then goes through a pine cone. A long spoon emerges from a drawer in the chair and stretches toward the hand. The bullet is on the spoon. Later, the hand holds the bullet between two fingers; another shot is fired.Alongside
Stille Nacht I: Dramolet (1988)
Stille Nacht II: Are We Still Married (1992)
Stille Nacht IV: Can't Go Wrong Without You (1994)
Like Kafka’s childhood daydreams, these short films’ post-lullaby stylizations of stop-motion, fairy-tales and eroticism leaves behind a nightmare that feels more eerie and inviting than frightening and repelling. The rabbit is a boss. - DirectorStephen QuayTimothy QuayA short black and white animated film with a contemporary musical accompaniment.Alongside
Stille Nacht I: Dramolet (1988)
Stille Nacht II: Are We Still Married (1992)
Stille Nacht III: Tales from the Vienna Woods (1993)
Like Kafka’s childhood daydreams, these short films’ post-lullaby stylizations of stop-motion, fairy-tales and eroticism leaves behind a nightmare that feels more eerie and inviting than frightening and repelling. The rabbit is a boss. - DirectorJoshua OppenheimerAnonymousChristine CynnStarsAnwar CongoHerman KotoSyamsul ArifinA documentary which challenges former Indonesian death-squad leaders to reenact their mass-killings in whichever cinematic genres they wish, including classic Hollywood crime scenarios and lavish musical numbers.I've said almost everything I wanted to say about it on my Favorites of 2013 list and yet there's still more I want to find to say about it. It's shocking, it's abhorrent, it's revealing and it's all the more important and mandatory a watch for it. But that's its political elements.
It's still all the more mandatory a film for its ability to give an unaggressive confrontation to horrors and completely display the power of true documentary cinema. It's not so much about the atrocities of the Pancasila Youth as it is about the gripping and dangerous plight of the documentary (and film in general) to make things as real as possible and not let the nostalgia or sentiments get in the way of cinema's integrity. - DirectorCarl Theodor DreyerStarsThorkild RooseLisbeth MovinSigrid NeiiendamThe young wife of an aging priest falls in love with his son amidst the horror of a merciless witch hunt in 17th-century Denmark.The film's sentiments are quite hard to get a complete grasp of. It is not entirely an indictment of religion, but it understands that religion is the source of the strife in the film and neither stands beside its organization nor supports it. In fact, if there's any tragedy in this film, with all its personal ties bound and then severed, it is for the perversion and usage of Christianity for evil means in this story - all the more tragic because the perpetrators don't understand their deeds as ghastly but instead godly.
What makes it worse is how relevant this message is for most of the social and political strife we see endured today. - DirectorDavid LeanStarsPeter O'TooleAlec GuinnessAnthony QuinnThe story of T.E. Lawrence, the English officer who successfully united and led the diverse, often warring, Arab tribes during World War I in order to fight the Turks.When you ask for a better form of visual motifs look at the desolate and empty landscapes of this epic, reflecting the status of identity and self for our hero - the perfect balance of character and spectacle, giving a more transcendent psychological adventurous war epic matched by very few. Not that you’ll be complaining, the sweeping vistas are a beauty to look at in themselves.
- DirectorAlbert MayslesDavid MayslesCharlotte ZwerinStarsMick JaggerKeith RichardsMick TaylorWhen three hundred thousand members of the Love Generation collided with a few dozen Hells Angels at San Francisco's Altamont Speedway, the bloody slash that transformed a decade's dreams into disillusionment was immortalized on this film.So many things are said from this movie about one simple event. Of course, the trick is that it is not just about said event – It demands artistic responsibility or at least acknowledgment, the capture of the collapse of a cultural movement in one fell knife and a huge reality check as the Rolling Stones are forced to reflect and review the actions that took place in the infamous Altamount Concert.
- DirectorFrank CapraStarsJames StewartDonna ReedLionel BarrymoreAn angel is sent from Heaven to help a desperately frustrated businessman by showing him what life would have been like if he had never existed.Sure, there are some that may find it depressing, but I don’t get why. It is a most certainly darker film than its legacy portrays and there is a central dissatisfaction in unrealized dreams; but that’s not even the point of the film… which is as a celebration of the common man, the man who takes responsibility and stands for America as an underdog… and a message to that man to let him know that he has realized more than his dreams, he has realized a humane spirit most would reject.
- DirectorGeorge LucasStarsMark HamillHarrison FordCarrie FisherLuke Skywalker joins forces with a Jedi Knight, a cocky pilot, a Wookiee and two droids to save the galaxy from the Empire's world-destroying battle station, while also attempting to rescue Princess Leia from the mysterious Darth Vader.A technical marvel that is held underneath the blissful joy of the hero’s journey told in this large blockbuster, popcorn-munching form.
- DirectorGjon MiliStarsLester YoungGeorge 'Red' CallenderHarry EdisonCreated under the guidance of jazz impresario and Verve Records founder Norman Granz, this short captures the spontaneity of a jam session and is one of few film records of black jazzers of the day including tenor sax legend Lester Young.A relentless and selfishly cool jam document that brings out all the stops in musical sense… with every component, by the end of the film, turning itself crazy on its head.
At least once, I heard this described as a musical, but if it is one... it surgically removed all the *beep* from the musical and gave it solely it's namesake. I don't care what this short film is beyond the fact that it is *beep* fun. - DirectorMaya DerenAlexander HammidStarsMaya DerenAlexander HammidA woman returning home falls asleep and has vivid dreams that may or may not be happening in reality. Through repetitive images and complete mismatching of the objective view of time and space, her dark inner desires play out on-screen.Possibly one of the purest pieces of horror in cinema and it is in broad daylight, repetition that doesn’t sensitize our shock and a constant sense of dread that never dies.
- DirectorCarol ReedStarsOrson WellesJoseph CottenAlida ValliPulp novelist Holly Martins travels to shadowy, postwar Vienna, only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, Harry Lime.A gorgeously engaging noir film with subtle and easily dismissive political commentary drowned out by the entertaining conflict on screen, guided by a nearly untouchable script, save for one brilliant piece of adlibbing by an uncanny Orson Welles performance.
I mean it does the near impossible task of making its moral cynicism completely enjoyable as a film through its charisma towards its dark narrative. I don't know if the Big Lebowski or Seinfeld fancy themselves kings of artistic nihilism, but The Third Man takes that cake and doesn't share it with either of them. - DirectorDavid LynchStarsNaomi WattsLaura HarringJustin TherouxAfter a car wreck on Mulholland Drive renders a woman amnesiac, she and a Hollywood-hopeful search for clues and answers across Los Angeles in a twisting venture beyond dreams and reality.A poisonous anti-valentine to Hollywood. Its surreal landscape is exquisitely accented by heavy moments of disassociation and displacement as Lynch’s uncanny direction makes you question the dream at every given moment.
- DirectorFederico FelliniStarsGiulietta MasinaFrançois PérierFranca MarziA waifish prostitute wanders the streets of Rome looking for true love but finds only heartbreak.While it's not as ambitious as many of Fellini's works, to me that makes it the most touching, the most honest work of his career. It doesn't drown in outright pessimism while it makes sure that its magic realism doesn't ere on the side of unbelievable fantasy... It's a struggle of romanticism in an environment of selfishness, and it makes little sense to let it win so much as it is a sigh of relief that Cabiria's beautiful character is unbroken.
- DirectorF.W. MurnauStarsGeorge O'BrienJanet GaynorMargaret LivingstonA sophisticated city woman seduces a farmer and convinces him to murder his wife and join her in the city, but he ends up rekindling his romance with his wife when he changes his mind at the last moment.
- DirectorFrancis Ford CoppolaStarsMarlon BrandoAl PacinoJames CaanThe aging patriarch of an organized crime dynasty transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant son.On one film, an engaging and entertaining yet romantic and condemning form of storytelling, on the other, an intense generational look at the rise and fall of father and son’s humanity to reach a hypnotizing position of power. Together, there is a complete tragic family portrait and an American masterpiece that sets a benchmark nobody even dreams to surpass.
- DirectorEduardo NunesStarsJulio AdriãoRegina BastosRaquel BonfanteIn a Brazilian coastal village where everything seems motionless, Clarice grasps her life in a single day, unlike those she meets and who are living this day like any other. She tries to understand her obscure reality and the destiny of the people around her in a circular time that haunts and disorients.It is stylistically controlled - the fairy tale dream is there but it's not in your face. Because of this, Southwest provides a more digestible form of storytelling and yet just as powerful in its fantastical and dark subject matter, never even asking us to suspend our disbelief in the child living her whole life in one day.
We don't need to. In addition to its extraordinary story, it's also an extraordinary treat for the eyes. - DirectorIngmar BergmanStarsMax von SydowBirgitta ValbergGunnel LindblomIn 14th-century Sweden, an innocent yet pampered teenage girl and her family's pregnant and jealous servant set out from their farm to deliver candles to church, but only one returns from events that transpire in the woods along the way.A sobering consideration of brutality and innocence fading that resonates even despite its period-placed setting and morality play feel. In fact, such factors enhance the play’s timelessness.
- DirectorJean-Luc GodardStarsJean-Pierre LéaudChantal GoyaMarlène JobertA romance between young Parisians, shown through a series of vignettes.Jean-Luc Godard's style just pops out most in this film, showcasing his manic energy mistaken for youth at its most potent with all the editing, texts, the naturalistic acting and the sudden moments of inauthentic cinema (namely violence) as though to bookend and heighten the false honesty of the scenes.
It doesn't distract from the fact that it half a love story and the other half a cultural document. - DirectorElia KazanStarsMarlon BrandoKarl MaldenLee J. CobbAn ex-prize fighter turned New Jersey longshoreman struggles to stand up to his corrupt union bosses, including his older brother, as he starts to connect with the grieving sister of one of the syndicate's victims.A tour de force of acting tapping into natural emotion and projecting it broadly to surround the energy of the scene, not least of which Marlon Brando’s classic moment in the back of a cab with Rod Steiger, but especially the genuine romantic chemistry between him and Eva Marie Saint.
I mean, we got some very powerful performances here... neither realistic nor stylized, but a balanced natural nuance, where we can be more attached to Marlon Brando and Eva Marie Saint's ordeal and really hold it against Lee J. Cobb's character, with the emotion pretty much seeping through. - DirectorMarco BellocchioStarsLou CastelPaola PitagoraMarino MaséA young man takes drastic measures to rid his dysfunctional family of its various afflictions.
- DirectorForugh FarrokhzadStarsForugh FarrokhzadEbrahim GolestanHossein MansouriSet in a leper colony in the north of Iran, The House is Black juxtaposes "ugliness", of which there is much in the world as stated in the opening scenes, with religion and gratitude.Yet another obvious piece of evidence that it's not so much the content of a piece than the cinematic approach to it, that a film becomes near to my heart. This film's a poem, both literally because one of the two narrators recites her poem and the film's shots and content simply exude a form of expression that transcend beyond its survey of a leper-ridden colony. It's a type of new wave that is not at all fake or artificial, but involved in the plight of them and willing to both inform and provoke, only having a bit of time to make you experience what these people have had a great deal of their life
- DirectorWes AndersonStarsRalph FiennesF. Murray AbrahamMathieu AmalricA writer encounters the owner of an aging high-class hotel, who tells him of his early years serving as a lobby boy in the hotel's glorious years under an exceptional concierge.A tragic yet laughable tale of loss and lost view and all the banality in between, the movie has an outstandingly beautifully delicious presentation behind its look with a cast that carries the class and humor with ferocity all the way, not least of which a fantastic performance by Ralph Fiennes.
- DirectorAndrei TarkovskyStarsMargarita TerekhovaFilipp YankovskiyIgnat DaniltsevA dying man in his forties remembers his past. His childhood, his mother, the war, personal moments and things that tell of the recent history of all the Russian nation.It's most definitely far from immediately accessible - at least from my experience with it. But when you channel yourself into the proper mindset to watch this movie, you will find yourself very much put into a very beautiful array of memories with Andrei Tarkovsky's help.
That's what the Mirror essentially is. It's a dream and it's a dream made out of real parts of reality. From Tarkovsky's memories of life to his experimental instinct to his documentary archives, what ends up on the screen is a manipulated form of time and event and consequence that feels probably like how Tarkovsky felt trying to find the answers to his own life... - DirectorJohn FordStarsJohn WayneJeffrey HunterVera MilesAn American Civil War veteran embarks on a years-long journey to rescue his niece from the Comanches after the rest of his brother's family is massacred in a raid on their Texas farm.
- DirectorÉric RohmerStarsJean-Louis TrintignantFrançoise FabianMarie-Christine BarraultA devout Catholic man's rigid principles are challenged during a one-night stay with Maud, a divorced woman with an outsize personality.It's very very very easy to see how somebody can be incredibly attracted to Francoise Fabian. She is just that type of personality that pops beyond the screen.
Half wonderful conversation, the kind that goes on to 3 am and makes you sleep the best sleep you've ever slept after having it.
But also, half moral crucible in the most reserved sense as the company we happily keep also becomes a ticking time bomb of chemistry. - DirectorTex AveryStarsElvia AllmanSara BernerDaws ButlerThe characters of the traditional fairy tale demand a new approach to the story as a sexy urban comedy with Red as a nightclub singer.
- DirectorIngmar BergmanStarsHarriet AnderssonGunnar BjörnstrandMax von SydowRecently released from a mental hospital, Karin rejoins her emotionally disconnected family in their island home, only to slip from reality as she begins to believe she is being visited by God.
- DirectorJohn FordStarsHenry FondaAlice BradyMarjorie WeaverA fictionalized account of the early life of the American president as a young lawyer facing his greatest court case.There's a true goliath task accomplished in portraying a historical icon in this film and it's not from portraying Abraham Lincoln, but instead taking a simple storyline that happens to feature Abraham Lincoln and making it instead focus on Abe Lincoln, just a man who does the right thing and is not yet the man who would be President. Not yet.
- DirectorPier Paolo PasoliniStarsAnna MagnaniEttore GarofoloFranco CittiAn ex-prostitute reunites with her son, but an extortion scheme threatens her aspirations for a decent life.A charismatic performance of Anna Magnani coaxed by the very particular direction of Pier Paolo Pasolini makes this story most resonant with me, particularly in the consideration of the relationship I have with my father which mirrors this (while my mother and I have a more amicable relationship.
Ignoring my own investment in the story though, dat final cut tho. Abrupt, ominous and ultimately depressingly apathetic. - DirectorTerence YoungStarsSean ConneryRobert ShawLotte LenyaJames Bond willingly falls into an assassination plot involving a naive Russian beauty in order to retrieve a Soviet encryption device that was stolen by S.P.E.C.T.R.E.
- DirectorUb IwerksWalt DisneyStarsWalt DisneyMickey Mouse is a mischievous deckhand on a riverboat that is under the command of the tyrannical Captain Pete.
- DirectorJonathan GlazerStarsScarlett JohanssonJeremy McWilliamsLynsey Taylor MackayA mysterious young woman seduces lonely men in the evening hours in Scotland. However, events lead her to begin a process of self-discovery.
- DirectorJean-Luc GodardStarsBrigitte BardotJack PalanceMichel PiccoliA French writer's marriage deteriorates while working on Fritz Lang's version of "The Odyssey", as his wife accuses him of using her to court favor with the film's brash American producer.
- DirectorPreston SturgesStarsBarbara StanwyckHenry FondaCharles CoburnA trio of classy card sharks targets a socially awkward brewery heir, until one of them falls in love with him.
- DirectorKarl FreundStarsBoris KarloffZita JohannDavid MannersA resurrected Egyptian mummy searches Cairo for the girl he believes to be his long-lost princess.
- DirectorGuy HamiltonStarsSean ConneryGert FröbeHonor BlackmanWhile investigating a gold magnate's smuggling, James Bond uncovers a plot to contaminate the Fort Knox gold reserve.