films

I didn’t always enjoy watching movies. As a child, my television viewing was restricted to “Sesame Street” and “Masterpiece Theatre”; I didn’t get to see a lot of films, either, unless they were approved by my parents. As a result, I’m not quite desensitized to simulated violence, and I am fairly particular about which movies I care to experience on such a visceral level. I recommend the inimitable Internet Movie Database, purveyor of all film knowledge, whom I must thank for most of the links contained on this page.

Here are my top-ten favorite films:

  1. Lost in Translation
  2. Memento
  3. Donnie Darko
  4. Brazil
  5. Big Fish
  6. The Princess Bride
  7. The Royal Tenenbaums
  8. The Five Obstructions
  9. The Usual Suspects
  10. V For Vendetta

Here are some of my other favorites, in alphabetical order:

  • 12 Monkeys
  • 101 Reykjavik
  • 2046
  • 301/302
  • A Clockwork Orange
  • Amadeus
  • Adaptation
  • The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
  • Almost Famous
  • American Beauty
  • Batman Begins
  • Being There
  • Bend it Like Beckham
  • Best in Show
  • The Big Empty
  • The Big Lebowski
  • Blazing Saddles
  • Boogie Nights
  • Bottle Rocket
  • Braveheart
  • Chasing Amy
  • Clerks
  • Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
  • Dangerous Beauty
  • The Dark Crystal
  • Dirty Dancing
  • Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
  • Dogma
  • Edward Scissorhands
  • Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
  • Event Horizon
  • Fahrenheit 451
  • Fargo
  • Fearless
  • Finding Nemo
  • The Fisher King
  • The Fog of War
  • Garden State
  • Gattaca
  • Ghost World
  • Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns
  • Le Grand Bleu
  • Happiness
  • Harold and Maude
  • Hedwig and the Angry Inch
  • The Hours
  • The Hudsucker Proxy
  • Hustle and Flow
  • In The Mood For Love
  • The Jerk
  • Lethal Weapon
  • The Life Aquatic
  • The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King
  • Lost in La Mancha
  • The Machinist
  • Magnolia
  • The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
  • The Matrix
  • Minority Report
  • Mirrormask
  • Moulin Rouge
  • My Dinner With Andre
  • The Nightmare Before Christmas
  • Northfork
  • O Brother, Where Art Thou?
  • Office Space
  • One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
  • The Others
  • Out of Sight
  • Pieces of April
  • The Pink Panther
  • Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
  • The Producers
  • The Professional
  • Pulp Fiction
  • Raiders of the Lost Ark
  • Raising Arizona
  • Rushmore
  • Se7en
  • Sleeper
  • So I Married an Axe Murderer
  • Soylent Green
  • Spanglish
  • The Spanish Prisoner
  • Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
  • Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
  • Strictly Ballroom
  • Time Bandits
  • This Is Spinal Tap
  • To Be or Not to Be
  • Toy Story
  • Transamerica
  • Una Pura Formalità (only released on VHS)
  • Vanilla Sky
  • Vanya on 42nd Street
  • Waiting for Guffman
  • Welcome to the Dollhouse
  • Wilde
  • Young Frankenstein
  • Zoolander

Some actors I will see in anything, even if it is horrible:

Luckily, I have a horrible memory for horrible cinema, but here are some films to avoid at all costs:

  • 25th Hour
  • A.I. Artificial Intelligence
  • Battlefield Earth
  • Birth
  • The Deep End
  • Headless Body in a Topless Bar
  • The Matrix: Reloaded
  • The Matrix: Revolutions
  • The Ninth Gate
  • Red Planet
  • Showgirls

And no page of mine on films would be complete without my tribute to Raymond Barry, God of Suck.