My Favorite Movies

Without a doubt one of the most audacious and influential shifts in cinematic history alongside CITIZEN KANE (1941) and probably my favorite film. With this film Stanley Kubrick changed the way films were made forever. He changed "the form" so to speak. The way they were scripted, photographed, edited, designed, the use of music, etc...the list goes on and on.

This enigmatic work of art continues, to this day, to cause major culture shock. Controversy and questions still erupt over the meanings of the film's countless metaphysical symbols.

Kubrick wanted audiences to clash against conventional and nationalistic outlooks on a wide range of aspects of human life. He understood that we as a species are curious creatures that must raise our level of consciousness to more planetary concerns and he wanted to present us with a motion picture that could articulate that concept in a poetic and operatic way.

I believe this film is ultimately about mankind needing to transcend narrow logic and ascend into dimensions that are greater than his limited aim. I do not believe it to be a pessimistic film as many have suggested. I feel like it's a work based in self-discovery and intelligent contemplation.

I truly believe Jane Campion to be the greatest living female director. Her work is so brave and poetically moving.

There aren't enough words to describe the transcendental qualities and assured brilliance of THE PIANO - my personal favorite of 1993.

The crowning achievement of Robert Bresson's career.

I think people who love this film pretty much agree with Godard when he said the film was "the world in an hour and a half."

If I had to pick a film that could encapsulate most of my spiritual convictions, BALTHAZAR and Terrence Malick's THE THIN RED LINE (1998) would be two of the only contenders..that sure argues for something special, when a work of art can articulate someone's intangible qualities.

Essential viewing for anyone seriously interested in the cinema.

A distinctly American piece of refined film art, reflective particularly of segments of the American south.

I feel it's as important to the collective fabric of Americana as David Lynch's BLUE VELVET (1986), Robert Altman's NASHVILLE (1975), and Norman Rockwell's entire body of paintings.

Although it is not an adaptation of any of his novels, this lyrical film articulates the similarly elegiac texture and literary depth of William Faulkner's style.

This is still my favorite David Gordon Green work. How he and cinematographer Tim Orr managed to excavate these startling images of beauty from these devastated post-industrial landscapes is beyond me.

My personal favorite Fellini film.

8 1/2, LA DOLCE VITA and others may be bigger contributions to world cinema in the grand scheme of things, but this one just gets to me on a childish level, like Charlie Chaplin's CITY LIGHTS (1931). Every time I catch it on TV, I'm suddenly glued to it until it's over.

One of the greatest religious films I've seen.

ANDREI RUBLEV is my favorite Russian film made under the Soviets. Tarkovsky may be a difficult director for western audiences to appreciate, but then again what great artist of the past century didn't polarize audiences and critics? Definitely one of the most interesting filmmakers ever, all of his work is incredible and I believe this one to be his greatest.

A surprisingly humble and restrained work of art.

Even though Claude Lanzmann's SHOAH (1985) is a much greater achievement for the documentary form sociologically, and the craft of most modern documentaries owe more to Errol Morris' THIN BLUE LINE, TO BE AND TO HAVE has been my favorite non-fiction film since I first saw it in 2003.

This small and patient cinematic treasure is a moving portrait of a human being who turns his everyday job of teaching a whole community's children into an near art form.

This film manages to transcendentally evoke bittersweet memories I have of early youth and grade school.

In my eyes this is still the triumph of Scorsese's career. Arguably De Niro's best performance.

This is what it would probably look and feel like if you could photograph the inner workings of David Lynch's mind while he was having a fever induced nightmare. Personally for me, it's the only filmed art that has come strangely close to actually resembling the atmosphere and imagery of my weirdest nightmares. The kind of dreams you wake up from scared but then start to laugh once you think about them in detail.

One of the more uncompromising works ever committed to celluloid alongside UN CHIEN ANDALOU and BEGOTTEN.

I can't recommend this picture for most people, and that's not because i feel like the majority of American audiences are ignorant or dumb, it's because I believe most people are systematically conditioned to intellectually respond only to much more traditionally structured and narrative films that have very clear stories and obvious themes. Possibly conditioned by televised programming? I don't know.

I don't mean to sound arrogant or condescending if you take it that way. I just feel like it's polite and probably best to not expose someone to this film who you suspect only appreciates films that are aesthetically similar to genre literature. Lynch's work is aesthetically more similar to surrealist poetry and paintings. It appeals more to the right hemisphere of the human brain. I can imagine how frustrating and pointless a picture like ERASERHEAD could be perceived by a person who is analytically on a different track. I've observed many personality types that are much more comfortable and content in a proverbial psychological bubble where all film and art is similar and realistic and nothing too strange ever happens without being deciphered or explained in the end.

I suppose there is a rule somewhere that states the cinema is not allowed to evolve or be unconventional or daring or personal or anything all of the other fine arts are allowed to be.

Every frame of the Coen brothers' wildly aestheticized debut BLOOD SIMPLE is something to admire. It's still shocking to me that it's there first film anything. it's crafted with a skill and precision few veteran cinema masters possess.

I believe this is still their twin masterpiece alongside their equally expressionistic anti-sophomore slump RAISING ARIZONA (1987).

I think the Coens are still the most exciting of the filmmakers to emerge from the American independent film movement of the late 80's. Spike Lee, Jim Jarmusch, and Gus Van Sant follow closely behind.

Still Gus Van Sant's greatest and most personal film. Anyway, I feel it's his biggest cinematic contribution, ELEPHANT comes in second for me.

MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO's inventive narrative slips between a modernized Henry IV and a poignant story of street hustlers, as frequently as the narcoleptic protagonist slips in and out of consciousness. I've always wondered if the Shakespeare segments in this influenced Baz Luhrmann on some level to do his ultra-hip 1996 update of ROMEO AND JULIET.

Definitely one of the most ambiguous treatments of alienation and disaffected youth on film. This third installment is my favorite of Van Sant's Portland OR trilogy, that began with MALA NOCHE (1986) and DRUGSTORE COWBOY (1989)

The triumph of David Lean's career.

A debut as refreshing as Godard's BREATHLESS (1960).

I think the little to no production values on this small film by Austin TX HERO Richard Linklater will turn off most average moviegoers, but cine geeks and younger filmmakers should embrace it's brave unconventional narrative and gung ho DIY mentality.

Like AMERICAN GRAFFITI (1973) and MEDIUM COOL (1968), SLACKER captures the spirit and atmosphere of a time and a place in history perfectly. No other film has depicted Austin's drop-out culture with more sincerity and wit than Linklater's feature debut.

A cinematic work of American mythology as iconic as Clint Eastwood's UNFORGIVEN. Though removed from the classic setting, A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE is a morality play in top western form. Both this film and its source graphic novel imaginatively paint a chilling portrait of the effects of violence on the fabric of the human psyche, the family unit, and society as a whole.

For so late in his career, this film really marks a departure for director David Cronenberg. It is slightly more commercial than anything he has done.

Arguably one of the best english language films of 2005. It's a crying shame to me that Cronenberg's uncompromising and melodramatic directing can go completely ignored by most American award ceremonies. Not that any of them have any credibility anyway.

This is my second favorite Cronenberg picture next to his highly philosophical remake of THE FLY (1986). This is probably the more mature work though, I just still have a soft spot for his early existential body horror.