'Some
amazing picks from all you guys so far. I'm so happy to see
Her and
Eternal Sunshine get nods as well. I think Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman's work deserve far more recognition.
A Clockwork Orange is one I've seen a lot of people mentioned here, and I remember being so viscerally shaken by it when I caught it on a plane ride.
I can't imagine what it'd be like seen in a cinema.
Anyways, I'll try to list some favourites of mine here that I don't think have been mentioned yet, which, I'm sure, will be extremely difficult.
Synecdoche, New York: That one's another Kaufman film that's one of the most brutal, yet cold looks at morality I think I've ever seen. The soundtrack fits the film to a
tee, and there are songs there like
Little Person that are just oh, so haunting as well. And, it's another stunning performance from the late Phillip Seymour Hoffman, who was just mentioned here.
Doubt is another I'd recommend from his filmography, if you haven't seen it. He's in it with Meryl Streep, Amy Adams and Viola Davis;
stellar cast.
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy: Everything that's loved about trilogies like
Star Wars is abundant in this epic saga. Apart from old Disney films and the original, Raimi
Spider-Man, these were the first films I truly got to see in cinemas, and they're films that are ultimately about friendship, courage and doing good. It's a world I always feel nostalgic and warm coming back to, despite how I feel about the
Hobbit films, and I'm cautiously optimistic towards this new series they're making. 'Hope it holds up.
Oldboy: When it comes to revenge thrillers and surprise ending twists, very few come close to this one. It's genius work from Park Chan-wook, genius work from all the actors in it, and - with films like
Parasite winning Best Picture at the Oscars recently - I'm glad to see more deserved recognition given towards foreign cinema. It's also known as the film that brought the "oner" (or one-take scene) back into mainstream action, so even only for that, this one's worth a watch.
Inside Llewyin Davis: The Coen Brothers are definitely more well-known for films like
Fargo and
No Country, but this one, I think, is one of their more human, touching endeavours. It's a simple tale of a musician trying to get by in life, and it's credited as the film that brought Oscar Isaac to the public eye. If you love folk music and/or film photography, this one's gonna be a hit.
Grand Budapest Hotel: Hear ye, hear ye, those who wish to study art direction and production design. It's probably the Wes Anderson film I've most enjoyed from beginning to end, and it features one of the most hilarious Willem Dafoe performances I've seen as well. I've yet to see
The Lighthouse, by the way, which I'm
itching to do.
The Nice Guys: This and
Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang are two of my favourite Shane Black films, but this one's definitely the more underrated of the two. It's a buddy cop film with Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe as the main pair, if you can believe it, and they're both flawless in it. The film also features lines such as, "You made a p*rno where the plot is the point?” So, yeah, I don't think I need to sell it any more than that.
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: 'Definitely up there as one of my most-watched films of all time. Someone else here mentioned
Hot Fuzz, but this one has a special place in my heart as far as Edgar Wright's filmography goes. He's at his sight-gag peak here, and the amount of
before-they-were-famous cast members this film has is incredible too.
Mad Max: Fury Road: As far as prop work, practical effects and high-octane action go, this one is a stunner. I remember going into it in the cinema, notepad ready for the film review blog, and walking out without having written a single smidgeon down. It's an enthralling watch best enjoyed on the bassy-est, DD-est transducer you have, and it's simply endless fun from start to finish.
Se7en: I don't know whether or not this one's been mentioned, but
Se7en has to be up there with some of the best crime thrillers ever. Everyone's on their A-game there, I love the water-tight theme and script, and, despite what's since come to light about his portrayer, John Doe remains one of the scariest villains ever put to film to me.
Upstream Colour: This is another film I've come to admire a bit less once I found out what kind of person its creator turned out to be. But, if you're like me and you can - to a degree - separate the artist from the art,
Upstream Colour is such a unique film to me, because of how little of it I understood intellectually, yet how viscerally moving it was emotionally. I can't think of another film where I barely understand what's happening, yet I'm moved to tears by the end, which doesn't happen very often with me in movies.
Prisoners: This is the film that introduced me to the absolute genius that is Denis Villenueve. The world he builds here (as, I've come to learn, they always are) is so tangible and engrossing, and he shoots his actors with such rawness and truthfulness, that their performances come through clear as day. This is in large part thanks to the brilliant Roger Deakins behind the lens too. I've since gone on to love
Sicario,
Arrival,
Blade Runner 2049 and
Dune equally (if not more, in some cases), but
Prisoners was my gateway drug, and I can't wait to see what Denis has in store for
Dune: Part 2.
Whiplash: Similar to
Prisoners, this is the film that introduced Damien Chazelle to the world, and it's a film I've endlessly watched
and listened to ever since. I think
La La Land is his bigger, more sweeping achievement, but
Whiplash is the grittier, more guttural, more
down-and-dirty film. It's come under fire for not being 100% accurate as far as depicting musicians and/or its statements about jazz, but screw all that!
It's an incredibly effective film with a deservedly Oscar-winning performance by JK Simmons, and I can't wait to see Chazelle's next film
Babylon too.
The Raid &
The Raid 2: I can't make a film list without throwing something Indonesian up there too, right? If you thought the martial arts in
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings was top-tier (which, to be fair, it was for Hollywood's standards), wait 'til you get a load of this one. As crazy as this sounds, I have full confidence that
The Raid (and its sequel)
will rank within the Top 5 best martial arts films any of you will ever see. It's a film I'm so, extremely proud is Indonesian, and I can't wait to see you guys' reactions when you see it.
I'll be honest - one of the main motivators for me to eventually have children is to share movie classics with them.
Matrix 1,2 and 3 are best watched in short succession but to this day I feel the first one could have been left as a standalone outing. Let me know what your kids think. I remember watching it when I was about 11 or 12 younger and recreating the dojo fight scene in my front room - jeez, a long time ago now...
I remember my parents showed me all three (at the time)
Matrix films in succession when I was probably 5 or 6. All I could recall from it were the sunglasses, black leather and slow-mo, but I've only grown to love it infinitely more since then. And, yes, I did recreate all the slo-mo scenes with my cousins as well.
Oh unrelated to this wonderful topic, but I was thinking this morning before getting out of bed how it might be interesting to hold sort of Fireside chats with guests from various brands or subject matter experts. Open discussion, Q&A type stuff - it occurred to me following the recent brief chat on how brands decide on tuning. Maybe a monthly slot to begin.
I'm sure it's been done elsewhere on Head-Fi but obviously not this group.
What do folks think?
That's what I've been trying to do with
An Inner View, but COVID unfortunately got in the way of all the interviews I had planned around CanJam SG 2020. I hope to be able to do more of those if CanJam SG goes through next year, or perhaps on Zoom, but we'll see what happens then.