My Top Five Favorite Movies

by Brendan Cavanagh

In order to prove to you all that I do other activities besides read books all the time, I'm devoting this week's blog post to one of my other passions: cinemaaaaaaa.

In the last week I've been repeatedly asked by a friend to recommend to him movies that I enjoy and deem important to view. Inevitably, this conversation always winds up with my buddy and I listing with fervor our top five favorite movies of all time. This is conflicting- I simultaneously love choosing movies that I feel define me, movies that are of major significance to me and hate limiting my selection to only five. How can one person narrow his or her numerous favorites to just five? Usually I think about it way too much and I struggle pathetically to make that fifth pick. But now that I am devoting a blog post to my Top Five, I've decided it's worth very seriously considering, and as of September Thirtieth in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Ten, these following five movies are My Favorite Movies of All Time (YES, in order, and no, not necessarily the best-made):

One. Shaun of the Dead (2004)




Have you ever seen a movie a second time, and picked up a couple jokes here and there that you missed the first time around? Yeah, that happens to me every time I watch Shaun of the Dead. And I've seen it maybe twenty five to thirty times. No, I'm not an idiot or anything, but this movie is so densely layered with jokes and references and recurring themes it's unbelievable. I was at a friend's house in maybe seventh or eighth grade, and he told me about this funny zombie movie his uncle showed him, and it sounded decent, so we watched it at his house late one night. I was too timid to ask if we could turn up the volume, so I caught very little of what was actually said initially. However, from what I did manage to hear and see, I was amazed. The "romantic zomedy" is about Shaun, who lives with his best friend, an unemployed, fat slob named Ed, and whose girlfriend, Liz, just dumped him. Just as Shaun thinks that nothing could be worse in his life, a chemical outbreak incurs a zombie apocalypse. Consequently, Shaun and Ed decide to take control, and, cricket bat in hand, save Liz (and reluctantly her friends) and Shaun's mother (but not his stepdad). What I love about this movie is its blatant British humor, its gratuitous use of gore, and frequent quick quips, as well as its multiple eccentric characters. But what really drew me in initially is a scene involving a zombie, a pool table and Queen (horrible quality, I apologize). For some reason, I've never been able to allow any other single movie top this one. I figure everyone has their Favorite Movie, so I want this to be Mine.

Two. Annie Hall (1977)



Since last year, I've really gotten into Woody Allen's films. For some inexplicable reason, I identify heavily with aging Jewish comedians, Woody Allen in particular. Maybe it's because he's a hopeless neurotic, and I can't help but over-think nearly every situation I get involved in. Woody Allen's got a huge filmography, movies he's written/directed/starred in, and to be honest, there are some bad ones and some good ones. But the best ones in my opinion are the ones in the late Seventies dealing with relationships and, inevitably, breakups. Annie Hall is especially interesting because it's told in flashbacks by Allen a couple years later. Not only does he narrate the whole movie with unscrupulous and painfully relatable monologues, but also he'll even break the fourth wall at times and talk to people in his memories, providing the viewer with a more well-rounded perspective of the situation. It's pretty similar to how most of us think on events in the past- we retreat into our subconscious and probe our memories for clues or explanations as to why events transpired the way they did. This movie is brilliantly written and smartly filmed in wide shots, and although I laugh through a lot of the scenes dealing with Allen's self-confidence issues and his relationship with Diane Keaton's Annie Hall, there are often very poignant scenes that can't help but make you crack the slightest knowing smile or feel a general empathy for Allen's situation. What also strikes me is the fact that Allen doesn't sugar-coat his movie; he is comfortable in displaying that not all relationships work out like they do in the movies.

Three. In Bruges (2008)




When I saw the trailer for In Bruges during the never-ending slew of trailers before There Will Be Blood, I thought it looked goofy and darkly humorous, and naturally, with the number of actors from the Harry Potter-films' cast in it, I was drawn to it. But that wasn't what kept me going when I finally garnered a copy of it and viewed it at home. What stood out to me was the incredible writing, the kind that you don't often see in movies these days. Not only that, but I was rather impressed with the acting- even Colin Farrell, whom I used to dismiss casually as a cocky, action-film star, was able to adeptly portray the role of a hitman haunted by his personal demons. After a hit goes wrong, Farrell and partner-in-crime Brendan Gleason (Mad-Eye Moody to you) go on the run and are told to hide out in Bruges, Belgium by their snarky and F-bomb-dropping boss (skip to 0:35), played by Ralph Fiennes (Voldemort). "It's like a fuckin' fairytale," he frequently states. The movie gets to be somewhat lighthearted once they arrive in Bruges, as Farrell strikes up a relationship with femme fatale-gone straight for love Clémence Poésy (Fleur Delacour, who happens to be my biggest celebrity crush, but NOT because she's in HP). But after a while, it becomes clear to the viewer that there are hidden intentions for their stay in Bruges, and the movie quickly transforms into a tense, gun-poppin' thriller. But the real jelly in this doughnut resides in the film's final few moments, when several elements from earlier in the film come back into play, and you realize that there's a much deeper message in the whole thing than you realized. It's astounding, and really makes you think when it's over.

Four. Cool Hand Luke (1967)



Aside from Catcher in the Rye, I can attribute any of my non-conformist principles to Paul Newman's role as Cool Hand Luke. Luke is a guy who's been in the Army, and when he gets back to town, he finds that he doesn't want to take any more bull from anyone, so he commits petty crimes here and there until he's eventually arrested and sentenced to work on a chain gang. He learns pretty quickly that it's tough to act out and he starts to pick up the tricks of the trade. After repeatedly refusing to conform to the uniform respect for one of the inmates, Dragline, Luke earns himself the respect of every man in the outfit, as well as a new name: Cool Hand Luke. Because "sometimes nothing can be a real cool hand." It becomes clear after a while that Luke, as usual, doesn't plan on crumbling under authority and remaining in the chain gang long. Eventually he plans escape. And when he gets caught, he escapes again. And so on. I admire Luke, not so much for his brazenness and headstrong refusal to conform to anything, but because he did make me question some of the pointless rules I follow. I figured out that I can "fight the system" quite effectively by just playing it cool and being charismatic. Kind of like Invisible Man- I can speciously "overcome them with yesses" and when the time comes, light out. Also, the movie has one of the greatest accompanying soundtracks for any film, especially evident in the closing scene of the movie, one of the most lifting and inspirational yet simultaneously heartbreaking scenes in any movie I've seen.

Five. Little Miss Sunshine (2006)



I don't remember exactly, but I think I wanted to dislike this movie before I saw it. I think because it was about a little girl, and my whole family fell in love with it, which inexplicably made me hesitant. But I might be wrong. In any case, pretty much from the first scene, I was instantly drawn to Little Miss Sunshine for its quaintness and charm and dialogue (or lack thereof). Every one of the characters is so darn interesting, and you wind up loving them or hating them (hating Greg Kinnear? No way!). From a drug-addicted, beauty queen-molding grandpa to a hopelessly existential, mute Air Force hopeful to the cutest damn girl of all time, there's at least one character each viewer can relate to and strike up an attachment to. Basically, this girl, Olive, winds up qualifying for the Little Miss Sunshine beauty contest to be held in California in two days, but her family lives all the way over in New Mexico. They decide to bite the bullet and make the trek, which you would think would be a fairly simple, two-day car ride, right? Nah. They're confronted with innumerable obstacles, some that you wouldn't even believe unless you saw the movie. One scene that really stood out to me is the nihilistic son's explosive breakdown when he gets really upset because it really allows him to open up and reveal to the audience and his family the deeper, lesser-seen layers of his personality. Which is what the movie's all about, personality and the unity of family. Towards the end, there's a ridiculously hilarious dance scene that really shows you that no matter who you are, through your strengths or weaknesses, your family's always going to come together to support you. And that, aside from the sampling of Sufjan Steven's "Chicago," is what makes Little Miss Sunshine shine with that cute, "indie" flare.

I really desperately want to list a few honorable mentions here, but I just can't allow myself to do it. I would be opening the floodgates, spewing forth an unnecessarily long trail of cinematic vomit, and detracting from the significance of the five aforementioned films. Is that pretentious? "Films?" Is "movies" better for you? Anyway, feel free to post your Top Five in the comments section below, or criticize mine...if you have the guts.