Since it seems everyone likes lists, I decided to list my ten favorite movies. Granted, in the past ten years I have seen fewer than ten in a theater and probably rented fewer than ten in the past ten years as well. We bought a DVD player in December and up until a few days ago, had yet to rent, borrow, or buy a movie to play in it. We know it works because we have an "I Spy" DVD game that we have played in it a few times. Over the weekend, someone gave us our first DVD as a gift so know we own one DVD for our player.
Nonetheless, I do like some movies and my aversion is because most of what Hollywood puts out is junk and recycled junk at that so I have given up on going to the movies. I have seen two movies in the theater (both were at drive-ins, every time one closes, a bit of Americana is lost) since 2000. My list is a snapshot of how good movies used to be. Anyway, here are my top ten, in no particular order:
10. Patton - What's amazing about this movie is that is was released at the peak of the anti-war movement during Vietnam and yet it still won big at the Oscars.
9. Platoon - Oliver Stone's magnum opus
8. Saving Private Ryan - Forget Jaws, E.T., or Schindler's List, this is Spielberg's masterpiece
7. Stalag 17 - great to watch around Xmas as this takes place during Xmas, 1944; complete with some BBC "play by play" of the Battle of the Bulge.
6. Apocalypse Now - creepy, funny, and powerful, my favorite Coppola film. Normally I am not a big fan of Robert Duvall but he's fantastic in this one;
"Charlie don't surf!"
5. Blazing Saddles - Absolutely hilarious, some great one liners - "scuse me while I whip this out" "the sheriff is near..."; great stuff
4. Airplane! - way too many funny things to comment on but I can watch this, uncut, anytime
3. Dr. Strangelove or How I stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Bomb - Stanley Kubrick's other great film, Peter Sellers at his finest showing why he was one of the premier actors of the 20th century
2. The Empire Strikes Back - the best of the five I have seen
1. 12 Angry Men (1957) - if I were to pick my favorite movie ever, this one might be it; so well done with superb acting, no special effects, no glitz, nothing, just a plain room with a few minutes from inside the men's room. The viewer is forced to follow the actors' words and actions and the movie delivers; a true masterpiece.
I used to have several favorite movies: anything starring Jerry Butler, or at least the man who I thought was him. Then one day a friend pointed to a different actor and said "THAT'S Jerry Butler" at which point I decided I had no more favorite movies and donated them all to local educational institutions. After I got out of jail, I decided to study global warming. So now "My Inconvenient Truth" is my favorite.
Dear. Mr. Emmenn,
Although I agree with all of your stated observations about global warming (except for two.) I think you're a pervert.
Plus, the movie you mean is "AN Inconvenient Truth", not "My". I rented that movie by mistake, and it has nothing to do with global warming. Rather, the "inconvenient truth" in that movie has to do with the PRESENCE of "icicles" (if you catch my drift) rather than the absence of glaciers. Let's just say the hero"ine" was convincing until "she" was revealed at the very end. Nobody was more surprised than Jerry Butler!!
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