Movie Favorites

I am not on Twitter but I always enjoy reading lists people create about their favorites. It reminds me of conversations I have with my five year old niece. They go something like this: “What’s your favorite color? You can pick two if you want? Ok…mine is ummm..pink! So what’s your favorite animal? I’ll give you 30 seconds, Go!...No wait, stop! You can’t say dog cause that’s too easy. Now you have 10 seconds”

I’ve thinking about movies. Not so much ones that are ‘critically acclaimed’ but ones I like, a lot. So here is my short list.  

7. Red Dawn because it’s awesome! If you were a kid in the eighties you knew two things for certain. 1. Michael Jordan was the best. 2. The Russians were going to attack us any day. So someone did the only sensible thing and made a movie about it. It was pretty broad in scope and didn’t bog down in geopolitical realities. The ruskies are the enemy but one gets the sense any country would do as a villain. It isn't an ideological movie despite the crack-down by the Communist occupiers. At its core this film is about boys becoming men and facing nearly impossible choices. The Cold War and potential nuclear disaster were in the ether. The USSR dominated Eastern Europe through fear and oppression, the West through democracy and Capitalism. This one is great because the heroes are kids.

6. Braveheart—because passion and violence make a wonderful mix. Who doesn’t love films with romance, betrayal, fraternity, and tribal loyalty? This one covered a lot of ground and has been criticized for its un-truthfulness. Hollywood always reminds us that in order tell a riveting story, directors and writers must take liberties with the facts. If Hollywood despises an actor/director they tell us it was terribly inaccurate or completely fictional. I imagine everyone knows where Gibson falls on the scale. Gibson makes viewers winch in imagined pain and recoil at the cruelty of the characters. It has to be graphic and messy or we don’t feel the intensity coiled like a spring in every scene. This is a Mel Gibson signature, the wronged man seeking revenge with nothing to lose.

5 and 4. Godfather I and Godfather II--because it has everything to do with accepting leadership and ruling an empire. Ok, so maybe it’s a drug and prostitution empire controlled through crime syndicates in New York and Vegas. Still, it’s an empire and Michael’s reluctance to be involved initially pushes the story along. Leadership is the theme dominating the second half of part 1 as Michael falls into the role of ‘Don’. Each decision he makes for the ‘family’ further isolates and insolates him from them. I am not sure if the movies were written for the viewer to imagine being this powerful and having to make these tough decisions. When I see the movies I feel the anger Sonny feels when his sister is beaten, I sympathize with Tom forced to deal with a cruel ‘Don’, and feel Kay’s hatred toward Michael when He tells her ‘she won’t leave’. The Godfather is a Greek tragedy set in 1960’s America. 

  

3. Back to the Future—because time travel is wonderfully decadent if done right. The film is a grab bag of eccentric characters, fast moving plots, family history, and clever contrasts between fifties button-down culture and 80’s looseness. It also has fun with the question every kid with an imagination has asked “What if we could travel back in time?” While the guitar jamming Marty McFly and his time traveling Delorean are the fun effects, this is essentially an adult movie about do-overs and changing realities. It is about undoing mistakes of the past and writing the novel, punching the bully, fighting for the girl and becoming an alpha. People everywhere have regrets. A high school dance is a perfect setting for a do over on life. What adult hasn’t wanted to ‘fix’ some decision or mistake early in life?  

2. Tombstone—because Western genres tell the unvarnished reality of life during the Cowboy era. I don’t know how true to life the versions of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday are, but I love the relationship the two friends have and how it transcends law and order. The OK Corral gunfight is one of those historical debates where little is known about who fired first or which side, the Earps or the cowboys, fired first. This one is probably another example of Hollywood making the story a little more palatable by filling in the details? The film explores the lawman tradition of the Earps and the lawlessness of the town as two contrasting elements bound to collide, despite the brothers’ efforts to sit-this-one-out and make money. Mining towns were known for gambling, booze and prostitution; Tombstone was no different.

1. Forest Gump—because I adore American history and this movie tells the controversial parts of it delicately. The character of Forrest is really just a vessel by which a story of America in its turbulent period (1950-1960’s) gets retold. By making Forrest a mentally challenged boy, the viewer watches with detached amusement as he witnesses segregation, the Vietnam War (and protests), Ping Pong diplomacy and addictions of his friends. Forrest Gump essentially holds a mirror up to society and shows us the good and the bad. Gump is uncontroversial as a person precisely because he doesn’t understand the intricate politics of the time he is in and he isn’t jaded by it. He is a static character in a film where America is the main actor. It undergoes massive change, and charts a path from the conservative 50s to the explorative 60’s and 70’s. Jenny and Lieutenant Dan are at opposite ends of the cultural upheaval. Both go through similar turmoil as their lives follow the essential thread running through the entire film “Is a life random or does fate play a role?”

The list is hardly exhaustive but these ‘lists’ always make me think. Ask me again in a year and it might look different.