The antithesis to this thread A little over 6 years ago, when I met my wife, one of my first sobering discoveries (besides the fact she had never had sex before) was that her movie tastes consisted of "which Fast and the Furious is your favorite?" and a plethora of lifetime showings. So began my crusade to educate her on the movies that shaped me. Maybe not so much cultural touchstones -- though some of them, by nature, were -- but rather me-specific movies. (Yes I'm selfish. Like modeling clay, I molded her to enjoy my tastes under the auspices of "culturing" her.) It's been a long half-decade, but she has finally learned the joys of "Caddyshack," "The Sandlot," "Blazing Saddles," "Spaceballs," "Dumb and Dumber," "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation," "Field of Dreams," "Five Alive," "Space Jam" and the entire "Ace Ventura" series. She knows who Monty Python is and now she gets it when I make a reference to the "knights who say ni!!" If I'm playing "The Three Stooges" on a tv, she's gonna stop and watch for a bit. Focus: You just met someone who has no clue about cinema, and your goal is to bring them up to speed. You've got five chances to do it, five movies. Alt. Focus: How did those movies shape you? Did they add to your understanding of other cultures? Did they diversify or clarify your sense of humor? Did they give you spank bank material? What's up? Looking back, my favorite movies had a heavy sports theme, combined with a slapstick and dry humor. I'm still very much into sports, and my sense of humor can be directly traced to those earlier flicks.
Kind of relevant today: Alien. Giger was a force to be reckoned with, and I'm sad for his passing. With his passing, the official site for his bar/museum has been redirected due to being hugged to death, but here is a LINK to a Google image search of his bar. One day I will go there.
There are several movies that shaped me: "Back to the Future" - This is my all time favorite movie. I find myself constantly asking 'what if I could go back in time and change things.' This movie speaks to my desire (and may well have informed it) to change the unchangeable. "American Beauty" - There is something about Kevin Spacy's character just 'letting go' of all the normal concerns that I emulate. Even though he dies, there is no bitterness to it. He 'woke up' and lived the life he wanted and died happy. Not the typical ending we hope for where the good guy gets the girl and wins an easy life at the end, but maybe that's why I like it: you can get what you want, but you're going to pay for it, sometimes at the cost of what you wanted. "My Best Friend" - This is a French film and examines the nature of friendship. It really asks some difficult questions about the nature of friendship and why we are the way we are in a very funny way. It made me see that sometimes I'm not a very good friend and this movie makes me want to be a better one. "Super Troopers" - Also a movie about friendship and how necessary it is. Besides being one of the most hilarious films of all time, it is incredibly sweet in a twisted way. I always wanted a workplace like that, and have come close a few times. It's amazing how little work seems like work when you have great funny people around you. I keep searching for my Highway Patrol squad. "Rocky" - Yes, I know, it's trite as I'm from Philly, but sometimes you win without winning. A strange concept, but one that's been important to me all my life.
Terminator 2 My favorite movie ever. Its probably one of the all-time best movies, let alone action movies. Forget movies like Avatar and Titanic, this is James Cameron's magnum opus. This was also the first R-rated movie I saw. My dad took me to see in the theaters. I was 5 years old. Mama Juice was not pleased. Back to the Future Ditto to everything VI said. Its a Wonderful Life Probably the first movie to ever evoke an emotional response out of me. Its classic, feel-good cheese but the message is timeless. And Mr. Potter is a greedy prick. Wall Street Count me into the legions upon legions of young 20-something males that saw this movie, completely misunderstood the message, and salivated for the lifestyle rather than seeing it as a cautionary tale. Its probably what prompted me to start my career on Wall Street in banking. Thankfully I learned early how soul-sucking the lifestyle is, regardless of the money. I still work heavily in finance to this day, probably initially as a result of this movie.
Good Will Hunting I'm not claiming to be Will Hunting or some sort of transcendental genius, but I truly watched Good Will Hunting for the first time after my freshman year of college. At that time I had just been put on a parental probation after barely escaping academic probation for my freshman year. Between sleep walking through High School academically, and then stumbling through freshman year due to a poor work ethic and bad time management, the themes of wasted talent and ability resonated and really kind of made me rethink things. That coupled with a tortuous semester at home commuting to continuing education classes at a college nearby while my friends were back at school, living it up, really changed the way I approached things and didn't take anything for granted.
Clerks is high on the list. Watching two guys working a shitty, dead end job resonated with me, as I was working a shitty, dead end McDonalds job and contemplating staying there and dropping out of college. Then you see the Dante have the shittiest day of his life as he realizes everything is self-inflicted wounds when Randal takes him to task, and he makes the decision finally try and move forward. You don't have to accept a shitty life and a shitty job, you have to instigate change and make things better on your own. Basically, stop letting life happen to you, and do something. This actually inspired me to say fuck it with my shitty McJob and stop caring about a dead end job, and move my life on to other things. This movie also influenced my sense of humor. It makes me sad that Clerks II put them right back in crappy jobs without having progressed at all (though I still enjoyed Clerks II for what it was). Fight Club was another I watched during a formative time, and more than anything else it reinforced my dark sense of humor, as I found this to be one of the best dark comedies I've ever seen, and I probably laughed more at this movie than most regular comedies.