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Thursday, June 3, 2010

My Favorite Movies

I was talking with some students and the topic of movies came up. They wanted to know what my top five movies of all time were. I had a hard time telling them because I don' think you can compare The Godfather to Ghost Busters. Both are quality movies and are great in their own right. As I sat down to write out my list with a few genres, it turned into 17 Genres that could have grown if hadn't stopped myself. I want to say that these are my favorites movies. I'm not declaring these to be the best, just my personal selections. Now, there are many movies I left off the lists and it breaks my heart to do so. I basically went with the desert island concept when choosing which I wanted. The other factor was if I found it accidentally on the TV, would I stop everything and watch the rest of the movie. Here are the top 5 in each category in no particular order.

Comedy
Clerks
Ghost Busters
Groundhog Day
Dumb and Dumber
Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy

Drama/Suspense (This is an odd category, but it works for me.)
The Godfather 1 and 2
Fight Club
The Departed
Se7en
Reservoir Dogs

Action
Die Hard
The Warriors
Terminator II: Judgment Day
Kill Bill Vol 1
Casino Royale

War
Glory
Full Metal Jacket
Saving Private Ryan
The Dirty Dozen
Apocalypse Now

Action/Adventure (More light hearted than just Action)
The Goonies
Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Romancing the Stone
Ladyhawke
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Horror
The Blair Witch Project
The Omen
Poltergeist
The Ring
The Exorcist

Science Fiction
Star Wars Episodes 3-6 (Really only the last 30 minutes of Episode 3 and the original theater release of Episodes 4-6. Han fired first!)
The Matrix (First one only. The other two are not needed.)
Gattaca (Underrated)
Aliens
Star Trek: The Wrath of Kahn

Christmas Movies
Christmas Vacation
Love Actually (Can't help it, I love this movie.)
Gremlins
Scrooged
A Christmas Story

Musicals
The Wizard of Oz
Across the Universe
Labyrinth
South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
Grease

Zombie Movies
28 Days Later... (Not really undead creatures, but act like zombies despite the running and the living part)
Night of the Living Dead (The Original)
Shaun of the Dead (Yes it's a comedy, but Zombies play a major part. It could also fall under the spoof category.)
Dawn of the Dead (I actually like the re-make more than the orginal)
The Evil Dead

Teen Comedy
Clueless
Can't Hardly Wait
Weird Science
American Pie
Varsity Blues

Spoof
Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Life of Brian
Spaceballs
The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!
Airplane!
This is Spinal Tap!

Superhero/Comic Book
The Crow
The Dark Knight
Hellboy
Superman II
Sin City

Animated
The Lion King
Shrek
Finding Nemo
Toy Story
The Simpsons Movie

Westerns
Young Guns
Tombstone
Unforgiven
The Magnificent Seven
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Shakespeare
10 Things I Hate About You
Hamlet (Ken Branagh Version)
Romeo + Juliet (Claire Danes and Leo DiCaprio)
Richard III
Othello

Romance/Date Movie
The Princess Bride
You've Got Mail
The American President
Father of the Bride
While You Were Sleeping

Sports (Yes, there is 7 but I love them all for different reasons)
Slapshot
Bull Durham
The Natural
Major League
Raging Bull
Brian's Song
Happy Gillmore

Coming of Age
Stand by Me
The Outsiders
The Breakfast Club
Rushmore
Dead Poets Society

Prison
The Shawshank Redemption
Cool Hand Luke
The Great Escape
The Green Mile
Escape from Alcatraz


@JenniferPro, my wonderful wife, will be writing a guest post where she will have her own list of movies with what she calls, "a feminine mystique". Look forward to the Mrs. Nerdy Teacher list shortly.

9 comments:

  1. Great List! In no particular order, place these in whatever category you like. Some of my favorites:
    The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
    The Last Samurai (2003)
    Breaking Away (1979)
    The Breakfast Club (1985)
    Animal House (1978)
    Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
    Somewhere in Time (1980)
    Hoosiers (1986)
    Old School (2003)
    The Blues Brothers (1980)

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  2. I totally agree on the Gattaca comment! I had to study that film for English in Year 12(Senior year? Aussie) and started out pretty negative about it, being strictly against all things science fiction at that age.
    But wow, it seriously is an awesome movie! I was glad to see it (and Clueless) on your list.

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  3. No "Shakespeare in Love"? Really? As a fellow English teacher, I find that surprising. Every time I watch it, I find some new gem, some new word play or allusion that warms my nerdy heart.

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  4. Nice list. Have to say that I have never seen ANY of the movies in your Sci-fi or horror category.
    Also, way to man up with Love Actually :) Looking forward to Mrs. The Nerdy's list.

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  5. Yo have to see the movies on the SciFi list. Classic movies that happen to be SciFi. I hope you enjoy the Mrs. List.

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  6. Yes, I'm behind in getting to this blog post to read, but here I am -- FINALLY! I just want to say that I'm soooo happy that you included The Princess Bride, Clueless and Can't Hardly Wait!! All 3 of those movies definitely top my "if I find it accidentally on TV I'll stop everything and watch it" criteria that you mention.

    Can't wait to see what your wife picks :)

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  7. Great list! We have many favorites in common. I loved the coming of age category too--I'm a sucker for those...and rom. comedies of course!

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  8. Love Ladyhawke. Are you not a Ferris Bueller fan?

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  9. The Boxer is another film that is worth mentioning because it is one of the few sports genius Daniel Day Lewis role. This film was released in 1997 limited edition, but deserves to be seen by a wider audience.

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