Film Lists

🍿

📼 The Video Store

Respect for the disrespected; attention for the overlooked. My favorite underseen and/or underrated. English-language films with mainstream appeal that, for whatever reason, haven't found a proper audience or critical respect.
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  • Targets (1968)
    Night Moves (1975)
    Sorcerer (1977)
    Runaway Train (1985)
    Little Nemo (1989)
    The Abyss (1989)
    Deep Cover (1992)
    Light Sleeper (1992)
    The Daytrippers (1996)
    Breakdown (1997)
    Contact (1997)
    Armageddon (1998)
    Matchstick Men (2003)
    Fever Pitch (2005)
    Flight Plan (2005)
    Déjà Vu (2006)
    Knowing (2009)
    A Perfect Getaway (2009)
    Youth In Revolt (2009)
    The Box (2009)
    Untstoppable (2010)
    Margin Call (2011)
    Kill List (2011)
    Blue Ruin (2013)
    Blended (2014)
    Song to Song (2017)
    Time Trap (2017)
    Support the Girls (2018)
    Blinded by the Light (2019)
    Triple Frontier (2019)
    Bad Education (2019)
    The Wrong Missy (2020)
    The Kid Detective (2020)
    The Empty Man (2020)
    Together Together (2021)
    Those Who Wish Me Dead (2021)
    The Voyeurs (2021)
    Old Henry (2021)
    Ambulance (2022)
    Deep Water (2022)

 

📽️ Classics That Still Rip

Celebrated classics* that are not only as good as advertised but, just as importantly, are still fun to watch today.

*Classics defined here as "AFI 100 Years, 100 Movies"-type films released through 1975––the year Jaws invented the modern blockbuster.
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  • Casablanca (1942)
    The Third Man (1949)
    The Wages of Fear (1953)
    Rear Window (1954)
    12 Angry Men (1957)
    Vertigo (1958)
    The Apartment (1960)
    Psycho (1960)
    Dr. Strangelove (1964)
    The Godfather (1972)
    The Godfather: Part II (1974)
    The Conversation (1974)
    One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)
    Jaws (1975)

 

🎃 The Halloween Canon

Horrors, thrillers, and mysteries with 🍂 fall vibes. 🍂
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  • Psycho (1960)
    The Conversation (1974)
    Carrie (1976)
    Halloween (1978)
    The Shining (1980)
    Possession (1981)
    The Vanishing (1988)
    Silence of the Lambs (1991)
    Cure (1997)
    The Blair Witch Project (1999)
    Panic Room (2002)
    Memories of Murder (2003)
    Kill List (2011)
    Prisoners/Enemy (2013)
    The Witch (2015)
    The Empty Man (2020)

 

⛱️ Drive-in Thrills

Horrors and thrillers set in and/or built for summer.
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  • Duel (1971)
    The Wicker Man (1973)
    The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
    Jaws (1975)
    Breakdown (1997)
    Signs (2002)
    Death Proof (2007)
    A Perfect Getaway (2009)
    It Follows (2014)
    IT (2017)
    A Quiet Place (2018)
    Midsommar (2019)
    Old (2021)
    Nope (2022)
    Barbarian (2022)

 

🧣 November

A lot of the same cozy vibes as Christmas movies, but without being overtly about Christmas. (Also known as Blanket Movies.)
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  • The Apartment (1960)
    Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971)
    Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987)
    Dead Poets Society (1989)
    When Harry Met Sally (1989)
    Hook (1991)
    Groundhog Day (1993)
    Hard Eight (1996)
    Fargo (1996)
    Titanic (1997)
    Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
    Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)
    Catch Me If You Can (2002)
    2046 (2004)
    The Terminal (2004)
    Phantom Thread (2017)
    Little Women (2019)
    Knives Out (2019)
    The Wolf of Snow Hollow (2020)
    The Green Knight (2021)

 

🕵️ The Modern Mystery Film Canon

(Or at least mine.)
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  • The Conversation (1974)
    Chinatown (1974)
    Night Moves (1975)
    Hardcore (1979)
    Blow Out (1981)
    The Thing (1982)
    To Live & Die In LA (1985)
    Manhunter (1986)
    The Vanishing (1988)
    The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
    Deep Cover (1992)
    Se7en (1995)
    Cure (1997)
    Mulholland Drive (2001)
    Memories of Murder (2003)
    Oldboy (2003)
    Birth (2004)
    The Prestige (2006)
    Zodiac (2007)
    Mother (2009)
    Kill List (2011)
    Enemy (2013)
    A Cure for Wellness (2016)
    The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017)
    Burning (2018)
    The Empty Man (2020)
    The Stranger (2022)

 

✨ The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die

Existential movies specifically about the joys and pains of life. (This is more of a working list than a complete one.)

  • Magnolia (1999)
    Tree of Life (2011)
    Cloud Atlas (2012)
    Boyhood (2014)
    The Hand of God (2021)
    Past Lives (2023)

 

⚾️ 9 Innings

The best sports movies are baseball movies. These are my nine favorites.
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  • The Natural (1984)
    Field of Dreams (1989)
    Major League (1989)
    Sandlot (1993)
    Little Big League (1994)
    The Rookie (2002)
    Fever Pitch (2005)
    Moneyball (2011)
    Everybody Wants Some!! (2016)

 

⏲️ 99 Minutes or Less

Not just the best movies that happen to be short, but movies that are a specific type of fun or engaging in a tiny package. These are either quick-hit satisfaction (built for short flights!) or demonstrate a breadth of filmmaking vision and/or economy of storytelling in a limited runtime.
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  • Bad Day at Black Rock (1955)
    Dr. Strangelove (1964)
    Duel (1971)
    Blood Simple (1984)
    Stand By Me (1986)
    Raising Arizona (1987)
    Breakdown (1997)
    The Squid and the Whale (2005)
    Once (2007)
    Youth In Revolt (2009)
    Frances Ha (2012)
    Only God Forgives (2013)
    Locke (2013)
    Blue Ruin (2013)
    Enemy (2013)
    Krisha (2015)
    The Witch (2015)
    Thoroughbreds (2017)
    Support The Girls (2018)
    A Quiet Place (2018)
    I Lost My Body (2019)
    Shiva Baby (2020)
    Luca (2012)
    Funny Pages (2022)
    Rye Lane (2023)
    Fallen Leaves (2023)

 

💔 Love & Heartbreak

Not all my favorite romances and rom-coms, but ones I feel say something specific about love.
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  • Casablanca (1942)
    The Apartment (1960)
    The Heartbreak Kid (1972)
    When Harry Met Sally (1989)
    Light Sleeper (1992)
    Chungking Express (1994)
    Fallen Angels (1995)
    Happy Together (1997)
    Titanic (1997)
    In the Mood For Love (2000)
    Before Sunset (2004)
    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
    Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
    Certified Copy (2010)
    Phantom Thread (2017)
    A Star Is Born (2018)
    Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)
    Shithouse (2020)
    Palm Springs (2020)
    Past Lives (2023)

 

🌴 Vacation Through Film

Not movies about vacations, necessarily, but movies that take you on a trip to someplace exciting and often sunny. Interestingly, these are often perfect to watch while on vacation.
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  • Stand by Me (1986)
    Weekend At Bernie’s (1989)
    Thelma & Louise (1991)
    Jurassic Park (1993)
    Before Sunrise (1995)
    The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)
    The Beach (2000)
    50 First Dates (2004)
    Sideways (2004)
    Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
    A Perfect Getaway (2009)
    Just Go With It (2011)
    Midnight In Paris (2011)
    The Descendants (2011)
    Moonrise Kingdom (2011)
    Blended (2014)
    A Bigger Splash (2015)
    Call Me By Your Name (2017)
    Crazy Rich Asians (2018)
    The Peanut Butter Falcon (2019)
    Palm Springs (2020)
    Barb & Star Go to Vista Del Mar (2021)
    Luca (2021)
    Ticket To Paradise (2022)
    Glass Onion (2022)
    Anyone But You (2023)

 

🌙 Sleepovercore

Short movies best watched in the middle of the night. These were once the type that would be shown on cable networks like Comedy Central, TNT, or HBO. Now they're the type that are easy to find on streaming services.
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  • Airplane! (1980)
    Dirty Work (1998)
    Half Baked (1998)
    Belly (1998)
    The Blair Witch Project (1999)
    Emperor’s New Groove (2000)
    Spy Kids (2001)
    Orange County (2002)
    Old School (2003)
    Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004)
    Red Eye (2005)
    Borat (2006)
    Hot Rod (2007)
    Walk Hard (2007)
    Spring Breakers (2012)
    The Visit (2015)
    Game Night (2018)
    Zola (2020)
    The Wrong Missy (2020)
    Bad Trip (2021)
    Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022)