15 Movies Revisited

A few days ago I posted one of those “Name 15 movies that have influenced you” lists. I also included a disclaimer:

DISCLAIMER: As the rules state, these are fifteen movies that will always stick with me. Some of them I haven't seen in years. Some of them I don't WANT to see again! Others I revisit every year. But they all have something in them that had a powerful effect on me, be it fascination, revulsion, or all points in between. So, in no particular order:

1. Bonnie and Clyde
2. Magnolia
3. Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)
4. 2001: A Space Odyssey
5. The Maltese Falcon
6. It's a Wonderful Life
7. The Blues Brothers
8. Vertigo
9. The Searchers
10. The Shawshank Redemption
11. The Verdict (1982)
12. La Dolce Vita
13. Chariots of Fire
14. Blue Velvet
A Passage to India

Erin G. asked me to elaborate. So I shall.

I saw Bonnie and Clyde (1967) when I was in the third grade. (I wasn’t in the third grade in 1967, but it took movies awhile to come to my hometown theater in Forest, Mississippi.) Maybe I was a little overwhelmed: I thought Faye Dunaway was a knockout and all that shooting (before the ending) was the loudest thing I’d ever heard after a steady diet of Disney films and the like. I was young enough to take Warren Beatty’s proclamation of “Let’s go straight/come clean/give up this life of crime” as a true admission of guilt and a promise to become a model citizen. In my naivety I somehow assumed that all of the law enforcement officials in the film would also be as understanding and forgiving as I was. Then came the ballet of bullets and mayhem at the end. And just like that, it’s over. My young mind couldn’t get over what I felt was a huge injustice. “They were going to go straight! This is terrible! And...how could they do that to Faye?” Ah, youth.


I saw Magnolia (1999) just a few years ago and for the life of me can’t recall any other recent film that has affected me so deeply. I cannot think of another movie that conveys forgiveness and redemption with such power. I don’t think I have ever watched the film’s final scene without bursting into tears. The film is not for everyone. It offends and confuses many people. It amazes me, as does the incredible talent of its director Paul Thomas Anderson.


Maria Falconetti’s performance in Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) has been called the greatest acting performance ever captured on film. I will not dispute that claim, but the film’s greatness does not rest on Falconetti alone. Watch it in wonder, then reflect on the fact that this film was almost lost forever. (It was long thought lost until discovered in a janitorial closet in an Oslo mental institution in 1981.)

A lot of people never make it past the first 20 minutes of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). I certainly didn’t the first time I rented it in college, but the second time blew me away, especially the ending. It seems to be somewhat fashionable these days to poo-poo on 2001, but I still find it filled with wonder. And isn’t that a big part of why we watch movies?


The Maltese Falcon (1941) is about as close to perfection as a movie can get. There’s not one weak link in the cast, not even the hint of one. I love everything about this film. Not bad for first-time director John Huston.

It's a Wonderful Life (1946) is set in Bedford Falls, and though it’s really not all that much like my hometown, I like to think that the two are similar. You can call it cheeseball, sentimental or Capra-corn, but I must watch it at least once a year.

The Blues Brothers has so many great lines, great scenes and fun music, (to say nothing of ridiculous mayhem), I’ll probably never tire of watching it. It was one of my late friend David’s favorite movies. I recently watched it with David’s brother and we had a great time.

Vertigo is Alfred Hitchcock locked in a dark, dark closet dwelling on dark, dark things. The more I think about the film, the darker it gets. Very dark for 1958.

The Searchers, in my mind, showcases John Wayne’s greatest performance. There’s an obsessive darkness in his heart and soul that you can almost feel. Although I’ve always thought the mixture of levity and darkness creates something of a flaw, the movie still stands as a masterpiece.

There’s a moment in The Shawshank Redemption where Andy Dufrense blasts Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro through the speakers out into the prison courtyard, a moment of otherworldly and indescribable beauty. Something about that scene encapsulates the whole movie for me.


Paul Newman gave many great performances, but The Verdict (1982) is my favorite. I’ve probably seen it a dozen times and have been fascinated each time.


I can’t express my thoughts about La Dolce Vita better than Roger Ebert does:

Movies do not change, but their viewers do. When I saw "La Dolce Vita'' in 1960, I was an adolescent for whom "the sweet life'' represented everything I dreamed of: sin, exotic European glamour, the weary romance of the cynical newspaperman. When I saw it again, around 1970, I was living in a version of Marcello's world; Chicago's North Avenue was not the Via Veneto, but at 3 a.m. the denizens were just as colorful, and I was about Marcello's age.
When I saw the movie around 1980, Marcello was the same age, but I was 10 years older, had stopped drinking, and saw him not as a role model but as a victim, condemned to an endless search for happiness that could never be found, not that way. By 1991, when I analyzed the film a frame at a time at the University of Colorado, Marcello seemed younger still, and while I had once admired and then criticized him, now I pitied and loved him. And when I saw the movie right after Mastroianni died, I thought that Fellini and Marcello had taken a moment of discovery and made it immortal. There may be no such thing as the sweet life. But it is necessary to find that out for yourself.

Chariots of Fire is probably one of those films that shouldn’t have happened. It portrays a Christian as an intelligent, devout individual who knows where true obedience lies. It’s an incredibly respectful look at Christianity. The kicker is that (as far as I know) no one associated with the project ever claimed to be a Christian.

There are so many things I remember about Blue Velvet: Watching it with my good Terry on his satellite in 1986, the crazed and depraved Dennis Hopper, the terrible things that actress Isabella Rossellini had to endure, the violence, the weirdness... Most of all, I’ll never forget the look of pure horror and revulsion on Laura Dern’s face when she discovers what Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachan) has been doing. It’s a film I can’t watch again, but will never forget.

Nobody “paints” a film like David Lean. A Passage to India, while not his greatest achievement, is a fascinating study of cultures, desires, misunderstandings and more. Lean worked on large canvases that seemed to stretch on forever, like the darkness of the Marabar Caves. And what really happened in there?

Hmmm.... Maybe I'll come up with another 15....