My Top 10 Most Influential Movies: Part II
There is a Facebook game going around among filmmakers, film industry workers, and cinephiles. The game is to post the movie poster of your 10 most influential movies. They don’t have to be your favorite films, but they should be films that inspired you to go into filmmaking. I thought I would share my ten films and why they inspire me:
Films #1–5 can be found here.
#6: Becket (UK, 1964)
Becket won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. It’s part of the weird tradition in mid-20th century British filmmaking when Brits started to make large productions out of their national plays. Politically, this would have been around the time several parts of the British Commonwealth were gaining independence simultaneously and the UK was quickly losing its empire identity.
I’ve included Becket because of its cerebral take on the separation of church and state debate. On the surface, the filmmakers seem to frame our hero to be Saint Thomas Becket against his king, Henry II. But upon closer examination, you’ll start to wonder if both men are using church and state to serve their own means. Is Becket the saint the Catholic Church declared him to be or is he a self-serving narcissist who believes himself to above the law?
The movie leaves this reasoning behind this dick-waving contest up to you. Either way, it beats the God’s Not Dead series any day of the week.
#7: La Grande Illusion (France, 1937)
Another discovery from film school, La Grande Illusion is the type of war film that stands the test of time. The film takes place during World War I while simultaneously existing during the escalation towards World War II. Just like Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game, Renoir comments on class issues, and whether class will continue to matter to the rapidly changing world.
La Grande Illusion is just perfection on celluloid. It’s funny, serious, thoughtful, and ethereal. In the film, French officers are held captive by a German force. Even though they are POWs, the German officer and aristocrat von Rauffenstein (played by fake aristocrat Erich von Stroheim) treats the upperclass Captain de Boeldieu as an equal, as they are relics of a dying European aristocracy. Working-class born Lieutenant Maréchal represents both the French Revolution of the past, but also the future beyond the Great War.
At the film’s climax, de Boeldieu sacrifices himself to so that Maréchal and newly-minted French citizen (and Jew) Rosenthal can escape the prison. De Boeldieu’s sacrifice mirrors how the aristocratic class will eventually end to make way for a more egalitarian society.
#8: Eve’s Bayou (USA, 1997)
Eve’s Bayou just speaks to me. It’s a black female-directed film with a female protagonist growing up in the same part of the US I’m from. Eve Batiste’s family history even reminds me of my own family history. Growing up in a region where every family has a ghost in their house, it’s a familiar setting to me with familiar themes. Except I didn’t kill my dad, actually or figuratively.
The film is a coming-of-age about a young girl who discovers that her father has “extracurricular activities.” Also, her aunt is considered a cursed black widow. The hints of mysticism surrounding the aunt and later the voodoo priestess is played in a similar vein to how a child growing up in Bayou Country may view the world around them. It’s not heavy-handed, but has just enough ambiguity to wonder if it was all in Eve’s head or just superstition or is real influence from the spirit world. Did Aunt Mozelle have special insight into the spirit world, or was it just family lore?
#9: The Apartment (USA, 1960)
There are two people who show up on this list twice: Billy Wilder and Shirley MacLaine. MacLane broke into the mainstream as a love interest to Jack Lemmon in The Apartment. If you like Mad Men, you’ll love The Apartment. They both take place in 1960 and push the suave playboy style of that era up to 11.
C. C. Baxter is your typical, everyman office drone, but he has his own apartment, which his bosses take their mistresses for an evening of “fun.” In return for overlooking the fact his bosses are dirtying up his mattress and furniture, Lemmon receives bonuses and promotions. Lemmon also falls for the elevator girl in his building, even though she’s already seeing his boss. While not as existentially-heavy hitting as my other entries, it’s a solid comedy from my favorite screenwriter-director.
#10: The Lost Weekend (USA, 1945)
The Lost Weekend is an ocean apart from the lightheartedness of The Apartment. Instead of office shenanigans, it’s about addiction and depression. Billy Wilder introduces us to a struggling writer, Don Birnam, who is using alcohol to mask his problems. It’s a unique film noir in which the main antagonist his the writer’s own demons. His brother and girlfriend attempt to help him face and overcome his addiction.
In an era in which every adult had a cigarette and a highball, this film is brutally honest about alcohol dependence. In one gut-punching scene, Don decides to sell his typewriter in order to feed his addiction. This scene demonstrates how his addiction has gotten so bad, that he rather trade his identity as a writer for one more drink.
Combined with an excellent score and a surreal visualization of alcoholic delirium, The Lost Weekend is fabulous and terrifying at the same time.
And that’s it folks! Ten films that inspired my own career. While there are honorable mentions like Network, Menace II Society, and Akira, these ten are the ones that define my own approach to filmmaking.