Not a classic, like the rest of you have listed, but one of my favorites is Robin Hood Prince of Thieves. First time I saw it was on a vcr tape...watched it, rewound it (remember having to do that? lol) and watched it again!
I do watch Christmas Vacation every year, too! My favorite Christmas movie!
Sometimes I wish I had it in me to love that movie in the way that you probably do, but I don't. I just love it for the dialogue, the sarcasm, the blasphemy, and because it's Kevin Smith's best work. I also love Chasing Amy, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and Clerks I and II.
God is definitely a dude ... but then again, He is omnipotent, omnipresent, etc., so I guess He could be a she if He wanted to, but it would be blasphemy to capitalize 'she'.
I just love it for the dialogue, the sarcasm, the blasphemy,
So, essentially we do love it for the same things, with a teeny difference:
There's no blasphemy there as far as my faith takes me, because there is always room to question, especially when you see religion place hardship and suffering on people. That's what discourse and revision are all about in faith. Your faith has to breathe; it has to take the ancient canonical text and perpetually ask the question, "Does this apply to the faith today?".
Carlin takes it to a level that makes it uncomfortable, but took all the layers of pretense off the fact that religion is too often about business and protecting your fiefdom. His role was essential in the message of the film.
I applaud the dialogue and the sarcasm and the "blasphemy", because that's what faith is really about. It's about extracting the value - the edible kernels - and discarding the husk.
The movie speaks to that in a way that no other form of media has.
The fact that religionists have no choice but to ask themselves this question, is what makes most of us atheists non-believers. Who else are they going to ask? God? Good luck getting an answer that way.
It's like the duck test: if it looks like a duck, acts like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck. Similarly, if there's no indication that it's there, doesn't react when you try to communicate with it, and a world full of people can't agree on any of its attributes, then it doesn't exist. Spending your life trying to please something that isn't there is counter productive.
In a manner of speaking, yes. There is the compilation of canonical text. We look to that and we go back and reflect on that. And when the world changes, the majority of the people who follow their faiths understand that there are some things that no longer apply, as our world has changed. We make adjustments, so that we keep moving with the world, instead of being left behind. We are fortunate that most of us have made this choice. I think there is more than enough bad stuff going on, even with the majority of us who walk the straight and narrow.
I think it's most important to reflect on the debate that Affleck and Damon were having in the underground parking lot, early on in the movie. They were lamenting the fact that, up in heaven, they were completely controlled by G-d. No free will, no say in anything. They were pissed because G-d gave the mortal something that they pined for - free will.
That's the whole story, Hal. You can stop right there. My faith is my choice, and your atheism is your choice. That's what we have, and no one can take it from us. We do with it what we may, and hope that everyone else is as nice as we are. And please take due note of the fact that there is a decent amount of overlap between what you and I determine to be right. I will not judge you.
"We make adjustments, so that we keep moving with the world, instead of being left behind."
"We do with it what we may, and hope that everyone else is as nice as we are."
I'd love to dissect all that, but this isn't the venue and you likely aren't interested in a prolonged dialogue. However, let me point out that the two quotes above are a roadmap to the religiously affiliated chaos that exists in the world today. "Nice" is a very subjective word, and with the backing of god's (supposed) will, those 'adjustments' are just a function of group think, in a sea of groups that think differently.
No, Hal. It's not. Nice is NOT a subjective word to the overwhelming majority of those of us that inhabit this world, whether or not we are G-d fearing. I would argue that, perhaps the world is in the shape it's in because most of us are too nice, and too trusting and simply cannot imagine that the people who do things that are not nice could ever do such things. That's where equivocation and rationalization come from. That's where that paralysis to take appropriate action comes in. There's that darn free will again. Things that aren't even close to the gray area are being written off. We recognize evil, and are paralyzed by analysis.
Is anyone who has been raised to believe Sharia is a legitimate form of justice, not nice? Those otherwise perfectly normal relatives who kicked their kid out of the house for coming out, are they nice? There's a Christian in our NT membership right now, who said he would willingly vote for a guy who could potentially cause the world to end, as a last ditch effort to reverse marriage equality. Other than that, his demeanor and intelligence would lead you to the conclusion that he seems like a pretty nice guy.
I would choose similarly to others here, but you know I'm a movie buff and my list of "at least 5 times watched" would be too long for one page. Most watched, (everyone knows it's the number one) is Casablanca. The Adventures of Robin Hood (Errol Flynn) could be second, Shawshank Redemption and Field of Dreams comes in there somewhere, and A Christmas Carol with Alastair Sim. Add about a hundred more and you would have a list of "at least 5 times watched" from me.
Oh, I had to return to amend my list to add The Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven.
And yet another one The Third Man. The avatar I used for the Classic Cinema group is Orson Welles' face as he is first seen coming out of the shadows in that movie.
I'm with you, Buzz! My list of watched at least 5 times is also looooong!
I love The Wind and the Lion , with Sean Connery, Candice Bergen, Brian Keith, and a whole slew of people you know... Key Largo ... Death Takes a Holiday ... Love, Actually ... On the Beach ... and lots more!
The first time I watched The Thin Red Line, I really disliked the movie. It was very slow, boring, and unfocused.
I decided about a year later to give it a second chance and I did a 180 on it. It wasn't a war movie then, but a philosophic rumination on man's inhumanity to man and man's hopeless disconnection with nature. I saw it as a film of great meaning and terrible beauty.
I recall not bothering to watch the whole Thin Red Line movie as I too found it boring. However, having read your comment I will try to watch it again.
This is not at all an exclusive or exhaustive list, I could add more and more well over 100, like The Searchers, El Dorado, Fargo, It Happened One Night, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Train (Burt Lancaster's version), D-Day; The 6th of June, Pour le' Merite (The Blue Max), All Quiet on the Western Front, Red Badge of Courage, In the Heat of the Night, The Bedford Incident......
The list is endless for me.
I have watched all of the above movies at least five times most over ten times.
I can sit and watch any of these and many, many more at anytime and anywhere and be thoroughly entertained.
I'll have to add one that I've never seen before but I have it on tape and plan on watching it many more times.
Ronin, with Robert De Niro and Jean Reno. Fantastic action, intrigue, betrayal, mystery and great car chases! Filmed entirely in France in Paris and Nice.
I'll have to watch that. I think Jean Reno is a super actor - enjoyed watching him in DaVinci Code and the one with a very young Natalie Portman (forgot the name of it)
I am a sucker for old westerns, but would be hard pressed to name a "favorite".
A movie that I never seem to tire of watching on a variety of channels -
What movies glues you to the tube, no matter how many times you have seen it?
Movies I've watched over 5 times
Goodfellas
The Magnificent 7
Duck Soup
The Godfather
Lonesome Dove
The Graduate
There are probably a few more, these are the ones that first come to mind.
A little of this and a little of that - all good movies!
I have to add a few more I have watched 5 or more times
Casablanca
The Great Escape
Gone With The Wind
Groundhog Day
Rio Bravo
Speed
The thing about Groundhog Day is that you can watch it over and over again and it's always the same. LOL
LOL...good one Buzz!
Casablanca. Every other movie is something less.
Though I have become addicted to watching "John Wick" several times lately.
Casablanca. Every other movie is something less.
Yup
A great movie for sure
Comedy: Blazing Saddles/ almost any Mel Brooks
Bogart: all of them
Epics: Ten Commandments/ Ben Hur/ The Robe
Crime/Mafia: All of the Godfathers
Sci. Fi: All of the Aliens/Predators
Westerns: All the Clint Eastwoods. Almost all made before 1960
Just to name a few.
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
To Kill a Mockingbird
Splendor in the Grass
Harry Potter Movies/Lord of the Rings (I have 3 sons)
Unforgiven
Oh I forgot about the kid's movies! In that case Wizard of Oz...swear, every day (usually 3 or 4 times) for a year solid. He was 2!
Not a classic, like the rest of you have listed, but one of my favorites is Robin Hood Prince of Thieves. First time I saw it was on a vcr tape...watched it, rewound it (remember having to do that? lol) and watched it again!
I do watch Christmas Vacation every year, too! My favorite Christmas movie!
Someone must like Kevin Costner in tights, LOL!
Paper Moon
Pulp Fiction
Fight Club
Dogma
Dumb and Dumber
The Man With Two Brains
Sleeper
Dogma
Very interesting! I love that movie, but I guess for a completely different reason than you.
Sometimes I wish I had it in me to love that movie in the way that you probably do, but I don't. I just love it for the dialogue, the sarcasm, the blasphemy, and because it's Kevin Smith's best work. I also love Chasing Amy, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and Clerks I and II.
Would fellow Canadian Alanis Morrisette playing God be considered blasphemy?
I don't think a fatwa has been declared naming her, and I doubt that she needs to go into hiding or hire bodyguards.
God is definitely a dude ... but then again, He is omnipotent, omnipresent, etc., so I guess He could be a she if He wanted to, but it would be blasphemy to capitalize 'she'.
I just love it for the dialogue, the sarcasm, the blasphemy,
So, essentially we do love it for the same things, with a teeny difference:
There's no blasphemy there as far as my faith takes me, because there is always room to question, especially when you see religion place hardship and suffering on people. That's what discourse and revision are all about in faith. Your faith has to breathe; it has to take the ancient canonical text and perpetually ask the question, "Does this apply to the faith today?".
Carlin takes it to a level that makes it uncomfortable, but took all the layers of pretense off the fact that religion is too often about business and protecting your fiefdom. His role was essential in the message of the film.
I applaud the dialogue and the sarcasm and the "blasphemy", because that's what faith is really about. It's about extracting the value - the edible kernels - and discarding the husk.
The movie speaks to that in a way that no other form of media has.
"Does this apply to the faith today?"
The fact that religionists have no choice but to ask themselves this question, is what makes most of us atheists non-believers. Who else are they going to ask? God? Good luck getting an answer that way.
It's like the duck test: if it looks like a duck, acts like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck. Similarly, if there's no indication that it's there, doesn't react when you try to communicate with it, and a world full of people can't agree on any of its attributes, then it doesn't exist. Spending your life trying to please something that isn't there is counter productive.
Who else are they going to ask? God?
In a manner of speaking, yes. There is the compilation of canonical text. We look to that and we go back and reflect on that. And when the world changes, the majority of the people who follow their faiths understand that there are some things that no longer apply, as our world has changed. We make adjustments, so that we keep moving with the world, instead of being left behind. We are fortunate that most of us have made this choice. I think there is more than enough bad stuff going on, even with the majority of us who walk the straight and narrow.
I think it's most important to reflect on the debate that Affleck and Damon were having in the underground parking lot, early on in the movie. They were lamenting the fact that, up in heaven, they were completely controlled by G-d. No free will, no say in anything. They were pissed because G-d gave the mortal something that they pined for - free will.
That's the whole story, Hal. You can stop right there. My faith is my choice, and your atheism is your choice. That's what we have, and no one can take it from us. We do with it what we may, and hope that everyone else is as nice as we are. And please take due note of the fact that there is a decent amount of overlap between what you and I determine to be right. I will not judge you.
Never really did.
"Nice" is a very subjective word,
No, Hal. It's not. Nice is NOT a subjective word to the overwhelming majority of those of us that inhabit this world, whether or not we are G-d fearing. I would argue that, perhaps the world is in the shape it's in because most of us are too nice, and too trusting and simply cannot imagine that the people who do things that are not nice could ever do such things. That's where equivocation and rationalization come from. That's where that paralysis to take appropriate action comes in. There's that darn free will again. Things that aren't even close to the gray area are being written off. We recognize evil, and are paralyzed by analysis.
Because we're nice.
Is anyone who has been raised to believe Sharia is a legitimate form of justice, not nice? Those otherwise perfectly normal relatives who kicked their kid out of the house for coming out, are they nice? There's a Christian in our NT membership right now, who said he would willingly vote for a guy who could potentially cause the world to end, as a last ditch effort to reverse marriage equality. Other than that, his demeanor and intelligence would lead you to the conclusion that he seems like a pretty nice guy.
“A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person.”
― Dave Barry
Hal cheated and added more than 5 so if we can add more I'm adding the following:
This is the End
RIO - I know the instructions are to name "A" movie, sorry too many to choose from!!
Bourne Trilogy
Star Wars
Robin Hood (Errol Flynn)
Polar Express
Them (classic B movie)
Field of Dreams, Jeremiah Johnson, Shawshank Redemption, Godfather !, II, Rocky I, and others.
Shawshank Redemption for me too. Gone with the Wind, Dumb and Dumber, Psycho, The Shining.
Field of Dreams, Jeremiah Johnson, Shawshank Redemption, Godfather !, II, Rocky I, 2001 …
The Seven Samurai, back to back with The Magnificent Seven.
I would choose similarly to others here, but you know I'm a movie buff and my list of "at least 5 times watched" would be too long for one page. Most watched, (everyone knows it's the number one) is Casablanca. The Adventures of Robin Hood (Errol Flynn) could be second, Shawshank Redemption and Field of Dreams comes in there somewhere, and A Christmas Carol with Alastair Sim. Add about a hundred more and you would have a list of "at least 5 times watched" from me.
Oh, I had to return to amend my list to add The Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven.
And yet another one The Third Man. The avatar I used for the Classic Cinema group is Orson Welles' face as he is first seen coming out of the shadows in that movie.
I'm with you, Buzz! My list of watched at least 5 times is also looooong!
I love The Wind and the Lion , with Sean Connery, Candice Bergen, Brian Keith, and a whole slew of people you know... Key Largo ... Death Takes a Holiday ... Love, Actually ... On the Beach ... and lots more!
Cheech and Chong - Up in smoke
BWAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Keep ah knockin but you can't come in!
Thanks to everyone for participating
Every movie named is one that I have seen or would like to very soon (don't know how I have missed watching a couple of them more than once)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
The Deer Hunter
Little Big Man
Smoke Signals
The Outlaw Josey Wales
Casablanca
Hard Times
I just watched The Windtalkers again yesterday - a lot of battles, but a pretty significant movie.
Seeing things and hearing dialogue you missed the first time is a really good reason to watch movies more than once.
I agree Buzz, watching movies for the second or third time can bring a whole new understanding of the movie.
The first time I watched The Thin Red Line, I really disliked the movie. It was very slow, boring, and unfocused.
I decided about a year later to give it a second chance and I did a 180 on it. It wasn't a war movie then, but a philosophic rumination on man's inhumanity to man and man's hopeless disconnection with nature. I saw it as a film of great meaning and terrible beauty.
I recall not bothering to watch the whole Thin Red Line movie as I too found it boring. However, having read your comment I will try to watch it again.
Hard Times, WOW that brings back memories....
OMG.. This is hard for me...
Shawshank Redemption
The Graduate
The Deer Hunter
The Crying Game
Gran Torino
Little Big Man
V for Vendetta
Field of Dreams
High Fidelity.
And now for my sci fi collection:
Blade Runner
Soylent Green
Alien / Prometheus
Highlander
2001
Wrath of Kahn
Close Encounters
Original Planet of the Apes
A Clockwork Orange
[Perrie takes a deep breath!]
Thumbs up for Gran Torino, Little Big Man, The Deerhunter. You have a lot of really good movies there.
Great movies, I don't know how I missed Field of Dreams and Blade Runner in my list.
Glad you remembered them!
OMG! Where to begin?
This is not at all an exclusive or exhaustive list, I could add more and more well over 100, like The Searchers, El Dorado, Fargo, It Happened One Night, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Train (Burt Lancaster's version), D-Day; The 6th of June, Pour le' Merite (The Blue Max), All Quiet on the Western Front, Red Badge of Courage, In the Heat of the Night, The Bedford Incident......
The list is endless for me.
I have watched all of the above movies at least five times most over ten times.
I can sit and watch any of these and many, many more at anytime and anywhere and be thoroughly entertained.
How can anyone pick a best?
Most seemed to have a good time with this simple seed.
I am pleased by that
Thanks to everyone for sharing their favorite movies - a lot of great movies
I'll have to add one that I've never seen before but I have it on tape and plan on watching it many more times.
Ronin, with Robert De Niro and Jean Reno. Fantastic action, intrigue, betrayal, mystery and great car chases! Filmed entirely in France in Paris and Nice.
That is the best car chase in the history of film.
I think so too. I used to think the one in Bullitt was the best, but this one is way better!
I'll have to watch that. I think Jean Reno is a super actor - enjoyed watching him in DaVinci Code and the one with a very young Natalie Portman (forgot the name of it)
I just finished watching him in the version of Godzilla with Matthew Broderick. I agree. Great actor.