A Casual Favorite Movies / Films List

[Todd]

I think I could only ever come up with a casual list, never a formal one.  I'm sure I left some off.

Raiders of the Lost Ark
Star Wars
The Empire Strikes Back
The Fifth Element
Blade Runner
Alien
Aliens
The Terminator
Terminator 2
Ghostbusters
12 Monkeys
The Matrix
Pulp Fiction
Inglorious Basterds
The Godfather
Apocalypse Now
A Clockwork Orange
Barry Lyndon
Dr Strangelove
2001
The Shining
Full Metal Jacket
Fight Club
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
Airplane!
Blazing Saddles
The Big Lebowski
Monty Python and The Holy Grail
The Dark Knight
Die Hard
Die Hard with a Vengeance
The Fly (1986)
Forest Gump
Back to the Future
Saving Private Ryan

Re-Animator
...
The Thing (80s)

Good choices, indeed.  Haven't seen Re-Animator in over twenty years.  I remember it being a hoot.  John Carpenter's The Thing is one of the best horror flicks ever.  A few years ago my teenage son (then 13), who claimed to be inured to all things scary by video games, watched it.  Wouldn't you know it, video games did not prep him for the movie.  The crawling head and the chest opening up and biting off arms are apparently still quite shocking.  Great stuff.

[Ataraxia]

I shoulda probably wedged a Batman movie into my list. 

[Bogey]

Cool, I will definitely check it out. 

Definitely a dvd rental since it was in the theater for about 20 seconds....which was about 30 seceonds too long IMO.  Man, they lost their shirts on this one.  I am betting that Andrew Stanton won't sniff a live action movie ever again.  Guess its time for him to return to his Nemo formula....which ain't much better.  I did not take it in because Mars looked as if it were filmed on earth  in a desert....which it was!

[Bogey]

I shoulda probably wedged a Batman movie into my list. 

If you are talkin' the Adam West full length feature from '66, I am in!

[Ataraxia]

Definitely a dvd rental since it was in the theater for about 20 seconds....which was about 30 seceonds too long IMO.  Man, they lost their shirts on this one.  I am betting that Andrew Stanton won't sniff a live action movie ever again.  Guess its time for him to return to his Nemo formula....which ain't much better.  I did not take it in because Mars looked as if it were filmed on earth  in a desert....which it was!

How can you criticize it if you haven't even seen it?

[Karl Henning]

If you are talkin' the Adam West full length feature from '66, I am in!

Lucky you brought that shark repellent!

[Bogey]

How can you criticize it if you haven't even seen it?

Well, I did not need to see Disney's animated Tarzan to know that it was not up to snuff with ERB's books, and this one seemed at the same level based on previews alone.  If you have access to the best CGI folks and cannot make Mars look like anything but the stretch of desert between Las Vegas and CA, then I probably am not going to bite. 
In fact, you are the first person I have heard praise the picture that was familiar with the books, which I must say has me a bit curious....because you read cool stuff.

[Bogey]

Lucky you brought that shark repellent!

Holy Dickens!  A classic line, chum!

[Ataraxia]

If you have access to the best CGI folks and cannot make Mars look like anything but the stretch of desert between Las Vegas and CA, then I probably am not going to bite. 

When it took them one hundred years to make it, I'm not going to let something like that stop me.

[TheGSMoeller]

8 1/2 (1963)
Songs from the Second Floor (2000)
The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover (1989)
In the Mood for Love (2000)
Chungking Express (1994)
The Sacrifice (1986)
Andrei Rublev (1966)
Broadway Danny Rose (1984)
The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
Wings of Desire (1987)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
The King of Comedy (1983)
Nosferatu the Vampyre - Herzog(1975)
Fanny and Alexander (1982)
Amadeus (1984)
Shadows and Fog (1991)
Lady Vengeance (2005)
Barry Lyndon (1975)
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
The Holy Mountain (1973)
The Color of Pomegranates (1968)
Contempt (1963)
Alphaville (1965)
The Fountain (2006)
Ran (1985)
Inland Empire (2006)
Heat (1995)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Good Bye, Dragon Inn (2003)
The Thin Red Line (1998)
Last Year at Marienbad (1961)
Metropolis (1927)
L'Atalante (1934)

[Bogey]

Interesting list, Greg.  Many of these I have not seen.

[TheGSMoeller]

Interesting list, Greg.  Many of these I have not seen.

I had the fortune of living near a few movie rental stores and independent theaters with great foreign film selections while growing up. It was a great discovery that there are other countries making films of equal or better quality than America. 

[Karl Henning]

More than one on Greg's list which I've long meant to watch.

[Drasko]

Short and long lists

Carne - Les Enfants du paradis
Kubrick - Barry Lyndon
Melville - Le Samourai
Wong Kar Wai - In the Mood for Love
Kalatozov - The Cranes are Flying
Huszarik - Szindbad
--------
Resnais - L'annee derniere a Marienbad
Kobayashi - Harakiri
Rivette - La Belle Noiseuse
Carol Reed - The Third Man
Sternberg - The Docks of New York
Leone - The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
Greenaway - The Falls
Herzog - Stroszek
Leigh - Naked
Ophuls - Le Plaisir//Madame de ...
Welles - Chimes at Midnight
Fellini - La Dolce Vita//I Vitelloni//8 1/2
Visconti - Senso
Ozu - Late Spring
Vertov - Man with a Movie Camera
Tarkovsky - Rublev
Lubitsch - Shop Around the Corner
Sautet - Un Coeur en hiver
Rocha - Deus e o Diabo na Terra do Sol
Bergman - Cries and Whispers//Persona
Wilder - The Apartment

[TheGSMoeller]

Short and long lists

Carne - Les Enfants du paradis
Kubrick - Barry Lyndon
Melville - Le Samourai
Wong Kar Wai - In the Mood for Love
Kalatozov - The Cranes are Flying
Huszarik - Szindbad
--------
Resnais - L'annee derniere a Marienbad
Kobayashi - Harakiri
Rivette - La Belle Noiseuse
Carol Reed - The Third Man
Sternberg - The Docks of New York
Leone - The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
Greenaway - The Falls
Herzog - Stroszek
Leigh - Naked
Ophuls - Le Plaisir//Madame de ...
Welles - Chimes at Midnight
Fellini - La Dolce Vita//I Vitelloni//8 1/2
Visconti - Senso
Ozu - Late Spring
Vertov - Man with a Movie Camera
Tarkovsky - Rublev
Lubitsch - Shop Around the Corner
Sautet - Un Coeur en hiver
Rocha - Deus e o Diabo na Terra do Sol
Bergman - Cries and Whispers//Persona
Wilder - The Apartment

Great list, Drasko. I just recently purchased the Greenaway collection of his earlier and short films, have yet too watch them.
Have you seen Man with a Movie Camera with Michael Nyman's new score?

[TheGSMoeller]

Of course, looking back I'm now upset I didn't include any of Guy Maddin's films, so...

The Heart of the World (2000) - the only short film I would add.
Brand Upon the Brain! (2006)

[Drasko]

Great list, Drasko. I just recently purchased the Greenaway collection of his earlier and short films, have yet too watch them.

I love his short films. Often prefer them to features.

Have you seen Man with a Movie Camera with Michael Nyman's new score?

No, I have some old local plain-vanilla release with no soundtrack whatsoever. I do have Germand DVD on my shopping list and that has a Nyman plus two more scores.

http://www.absolutmedien.de/main.php?view=film&id=1107

Of course, looking back I'm now upset I didn't include ...

... Pasolini's Edipo Re, Bertolucci's Spider's Stratagem, Almodovar's All about my Mother, Godard's Une femme est une femme, Norstein's Tale of Tales, Jancso's Round Up .... you can go mad like that

[Todd]

The Fountain (2006)

Knew I'd forget some.  An absolutely brilliant film. 

I also forgot to mention Children of Men the first time around.

[TheGSMoeller]

I also forgot to mention Children of Men the first time around.

Another good one, Todd. The car scene shot in one take is brilliant.

[Zizekian]

Knew I'd forget some.  An absolutely brilliant film. 

I also forgot to mention Children of Men the first time around.

I love this movie's use of Penderecki's Threnody, as well as the movie in general!