day 01 – your favorite song
day 02 – your least favorite song
day 03 – a song that makes you happy
day 04 – a song that makes you sad
day 05 – a song that reminds you of someone
day 06 – a song that reminds of you of somewhere
day 07 – a song that reminds you of a certain event
day 08 – a song that you know all the words to
day 09 – a song that you can dance to
day 10 – a song that makes you fall asleep
day 11 – a song from your favorite band
day 12 – a song from a band you hate
day 13 – a song that is a guilty pleasure
day 14 – a song that no one would expect you to love
day 15 – a song that describes you
day 16 – a song that you used to love but now hate
day 17 – a song that you hear often on the radio
day 18 – a song that you wish you heard on the radio
day 19 – a song from your favorite album
day 20 – a song that you listen to when you’re angry
day 21 – a song that you listen to when you’re happy
day 22 – a song that you listen to when you’re sad
day 23 – a song that you want to play at your wedding
day 24 – a song that you want to play at your funeral
day 25 – a song that makes you laugh
day 26 – a song that you can play on an instrument
day 27 – a song that you wish you could play
day 28 – a song that makes you feel guilty
day 29 – a song from your childhood
day 30 – your favorite song at this time last year

I think Mr Gillen is on the right track taking these out of order, and also linking to them as he does them. We’ll bloody see, won’t we?

The following people have also done lists, which you can find by clicking their names:
Rol Hirst, Andy Cheverton, Kelvin Green, Tony McGee, Lee and Samurai Frog

My list, with trailers where possible and explanations/runners up, is in these three places:
1973 – 1983, 1984 – 1994 and 1995 – 2008.

If you can’t be arsed with all that, here’s the list at it’s most basic:

1973 – Live And Let Die
1974 – The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three
1975 – Jaws
1976 – Bugsy Malone
1977 – Close Encounters Of The Third Kind
1978 – Superman – The Movie
1979 – Alien
1980 – Fame!
1981 – Time Bandits
1982 – The Thing
1983 – The Dead Zone
1984 – Gremlins
1985 – Back To The Future
1986 – Stand By Me
1987 – Predator
1988 – My Neighbour Totoro
1989 – Do The Right Thing
1990 – Edward Scissorhands
1991 – The Last Boy Scout
1992 – Sneakers
1993 – Naked
1994 – The Hudsucker Proxy 
1995 – Clueless
1996 – Fargo
1997 – Con Air
1998 – Blade
1999 – Ghost Dog: Way Of The Samurai
2000 – High Fidelity
2001 – Josie And The Pussycats
2002 – Bubba Ho-Tep
2003 – American Splendor
2004 – Team America: World Police
2005 – Sideways
2006 – Pan’s Labyrinth
2007 – 300
2008 – In Bruges

I also failed to mention “Jacob’s Ladder” in 1990. I am a cinematic idiot.

Anyway, the rest…

1995 – Clueless

This was close. What with the classic moments of modern noir of “Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead” and “Se7en”, and the blackened and twisted celluloid of ”Twelve Monkeys” and “The Usual Suspects”, I had to go with the movies that sustain repeat viewing by dint of not being so heavy.

It was either “Mallrats” or this one. “Clueless” wins out – I only ever saw it by accident, years after release, because it happened to be on, and I hadn’t realised what it was. It was clear, from the trailers, that it was going to be the shittest film ever made, so I dodged it.

So imagine my surprise when it turns out to be one of the funniest, smartest and most redeeming piece of cinema fluff ever made. Alicia Silverstone never does as good a job again, Brittany Murphy is adorable in a way that it’s now difficult to believe she was ever capable of, Donald Faison and Breckin Meyer deliver typically charming daft performances, and Paul Rudd is as likeable as you’d expect. A “feel good without feeling stupid” movie, one of not many, down through the years.

1996 – Fargo

There was never any other contender for this year – I already knew that when I got to the year “Fargo” was released, it was going to be my favourite. Because basically, it’s probably my favourite movie of all time.

The Coen brothers do this sort of film so well – possibly even better then they do the screwball delivery of a “Big Lebowski”, a “Raising Arizona” or an “O Brother Where Art Thou”, if that’s possible. There are no jokes, but it’s funny. The criminals are bickering and bungling, but still ultimately terribly dangerous, and believably scary. William H Macy is brilliant, and Frances McDormand’s understated lead presents possibly the most likeable and solid of heroes in cinema history.

I’d have liked “The Frighteners” to get a year to itself, but it wasn’t to be. And “The Craft”, a monumentally shite film, should still get a mention for a soundtrack that is nifty, and still casts a shadow over youth oriented TV and film today.

1997 – Con Air

The very definition of high-octane, this film fits Rol’s newly defined genre of claustrophobiaction perfectly. The script cracks along at a decent pace, with more laughs then melodrama, Cage’s hero works well enough as a laconic hard-man with a heart, but it is really the impressive supporting cast and the action sequences that are staged to ramp up the “Awesome” to painful levels that really take this year’s ribbon for this film. 

This was also the year that the world remembered about John Cusack, with two winning performances, in this movie and in the great “Grosse Point Blank”.

Other favourites from ’97 were “Cube”, which does exactly what it wants to do, and does it well, and then gets the hell out, and “Starship Troopers”, which still delivers on the action front, even after all this time, and would have been my favourite if it wasn’t for the awkward “is it or isn’t it” social commentary – which seems to be saying “militaristic fascism is both cool and awful” all at once.

1998 – Blade

Because I go back and watch it all the time. Just a slim time before “The Matrix” came out, and confused the adolescent boys of a generation, “Blade” did it all better. The characters here aren’t deep, the performances workmanlike, but Stephen Dorff enjoys the hell out of the villain role, the fight coreography and action are perfect, as are the blending of soundtrack and visuals. There are some nice risky moments with the horror. For years, I firmly believed that the reason that this film was so good was that no-one at Marvel really gave a shit about the property, and so didn’t interfere, but recent successes maybe invalidate that opinion. I love this film to it’s guts.

Special mentions go to “Babe: Pig In The City” and “What Dreams May Come”, for visual wonderment – the former doesn’t get talked about much, but the art of the thing is incredible – the latter is only let down by sporadic injections of schmaltz, but even now, looks amazing. ”The Big Lebowski” was certainly the smartest film this year, and “Can’t Hardly Wait” the cutest.

1999 – Ghost Dog: Way Of The Samurai

You don’t always know what you’re going to get with a Jim Jarmusch movie, but “Ghost Dog” delivers. Not what you’d expect from a gangster movie, nor a samurai flick, nor a hitman story – in fact, not what you’d expect at all. There’s a lot of atmosphere scenes that don’t seem to serve much purpose, but that’s okay, because this is a tone-poem on film. Laying out the plot wouldn’t help you get a feel of proceedings – the definitive moments have nothing to do with it. “Ghost Dog” is a meditation on many themes, and rewards repeat viewing. The soundtrack is superb -music weaves through the film, rather then over the top of it.

Honorable mentions for: “The Iron Giant”, with beautiful animation, solid voice-acting, and a message that seems trite if you speak it out loud, but works well on screen – and “Sleepy Hollow”, in spite of, or maybe because of, Johnny Depp’s Swiss Tone impression in the final act.

2000 – High Fidelity

Would this movie have taken the year, if it hadn’t been based on my top book of my all time top five books? Probably. John Cusack et al did such a fine job of adapting the book that sometimes it feels like you’re watching the novel, and other times it feels like a whole new, perfect thing. Jack Black doesn’t overwhelm, which is nice, and the rest of the cast perfectly complement Cusack. 

In the same year, “The Emperor’s New Groove” became probably my favourite western animated movie ever, “Final Destination” was one of the best examples of it’s genre, and also did a bit of playful smashing of the genre at the same time, “Memento” was the cleverest and niftiest film. The Coens made George Clooney something new in “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and Vin Diesel made his only good film ever in the spunky little sci-fi horror “Pitch Black”, all well worth another look.

2001 – Josie And The Pussycats

This was the year of brilliant, visually ground-breaking and deep foreign language films, with both “Amélie” and “The Devil’s Backbone” making it onto my “must watch again” lists. The former is too overwhelming, and the latter too morbid and sad, to take the year for me, though – which is where Josie came in.

Like “Clueless”, Josie was let down badly by it’s advertising campaign, but then, it’s not really fair to complain on that score – how are marketers and trailer editors supposed to deal with something that plays so mischeviously with genre and format as much as this film did?

Superficially a great piece of teen fluff, but also sharp, and savvy, and cynical. There’s a winning anarchy to the presentation, great performances throughout, really good sound editing, and a pitch perfect power-pop soundtrack. I am totally onside with the Josie kool-aid drinkage.

2002 – Bubba Ho-Tep

If “28 Days Later” had lived up to the promise of it’s first act, or “The Bourne Identity” hadn’t been watered down by subsequent, still great, but not as good, installments, or “Blade 2″ had been slimmed down so that it’s wonderful visuals hadn’t been diluted – if I’d had the chance to watch “City Of God” or “Adaptation” more then once, or knew “Road To Perdition” a bit better – who knows what might have happened with this year?

As it is, though, there’s only one film that I can put in this slot unreservedly, and that’s “Bubba Ho-Tep”. This is the point at which Bruce Campbell really justifies all the fan adoration that he’s accumulated over the years. The premise is ridiculous, but it is perfectly delivered, and Campbell and Ossie Davis bring the whole thing more bathos, pathos and sensitivity then you would expect.

2003 – American Splendor

I’ve never been a massive Harvey Pekar fan, but this film, from its key performance by Paul Giamatti, to the playing around with form, and the mixing up of interviews with scripted scenes, transcends it’s subject matter, and engages me every time I watch it.

Other highlights of the year include the disaster that kicks off “Final Destination 2″, pretty much all of “The Hulk” except the last ten or fifteen minutes, the first half of “Kill Bill”, and most of “X-Men 2″.

2004 – Team America: World Police

On my death bed, I suspect my greatest regret in life will be that I couldn’t share enjoyment of this masterpiece with Girl One. She just really didn’t buy it.

It was a good year: “Closer” broke my heart, “Collateral” justified Tom Cruise’s existence, “Dawn Of The Dead” saw lots of excellent decapitations, which is funny because “Harold & Kumar” quite surprisingly made me laugh my head off (would “split my sides” have been a better link to run with? Does anyone say “laugh my head off” any more?). “Man On Fire” continued a trend which has J believing that Tony Scott and Ridley Scott have swapped names, “Danny The Dog” was the weirdest film I’ve seen in ages, but strangely likeable throughout, and “Phantom Of The Opera” wasn’t as good as the musical, but was still better then one could have hoped.

2005 – Sideways

Trailer at IMDB.

Warm, real, and funny, it had to be “Sideways” for 2005. It’s a perfect movie, and it’s also the reason that I now have a thing about Pinot Grigio. Sorry I couldn’t find you an embedded trailer, but the one at IMDB is fine.

This was a year of pretty good tie-in movies. “Batman Begins” was brilliant, “Constantine” was better then it should have been, what with the liberties it took with it’s source material, “Doom” was substantially better then the last few games have been, and “War Of The Worlds” was fucking epic, full of spectacle, with a nicely played, and realistically flawed, everyman from the increasingly less average Tom Cruise. The only thing stopping it being great was some of the irritating Hollywood nonsense that crept it’s way in in the second half. “Serenity”, also, was a tight and decent cinema outing for the brilliant tv series, but it didn’t feel like it made enough of a leap in scale for the increased aspect ratio. Maybe it was just too good on the small-screen.

As far as original movies go, the only things really giving “Sideways” any competition was the very smart actioner, “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang”.

2006 – Pan’s Labyrinth

I don’t know why, but Guillermo Del Toro really does bring it when he makes Spanish language movies. His English language stuff always has visual and atmospheric flair, but somehow the pacing is seldom exactly right.

I didn’t like “Pan’s Labyrinth” as much as “Devil’s Backbone”, but that says more about that film then this one. Horrifying, suspenseful, imaginative and evocative, just talking about it makes me want to crack the DVD case open right now.

Other stand outs this year:
“Crank” boiled the action movie down to it’s finest points, and delivered high-concept nonsense with style. ”The Illusionist” and “The Prestige” tackled similar subject matter, but the talent involved, and the differences in approach, make both outstanding films. The former nudges forward in my memory, for the gorgeous cinematography.
“Casino Royale” is a solid movie – I won’t say that it is a return to form for Bond, because frankly, I think it surpasses pretty much every other film in the series, if not the franchise itself. It misses out on points, because of a brave and plot-vital final act which unfortunately ends up skewing the pacing of the film totally.
I have to mention “A Scanner Darkly”, because I suspect that some years down the line, it’s going to be a favourite – beautiful to watch, and with a delirium that is hypnotic, but I just don’t know it that well yet. And “Tenacious D: The Pick Of Destiny” gets a mention for having a truly awesome soundtrack, which is not only funny, but also rocking, full of hooky songs and catchy lyrics.

2007 – 300

We watched and loved a lot of films in 2007.

“300″ is here because it is the one that I have watched the most. Having said that, that something is easy to park your ass in front of doesn’t necessarily mean it has longevity. I will say that, inconsistencies aside, I think it’s a pretty good, self-aware action movie.

Films that I suspect will become favourites:
“Superbad”, and “Juno”, for comedy and that feel-good flair.
“Zodiac”,”Eastern Promises”, “No Country For Old Men” and “The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford”, because they are all just so damn good that I wish I wrote them.
“28 Weeks Later”, “The Mist” and “30 Days Of Night”, for not letting their high-concept high-profile horror roots stop them from being genuinely horrifying.

2008 – In Bruges

So far, “In Bruges” is hands down the best film that’s come out of 2008. “Cloverfield” gets points for scale and production, choosing between “Iron Man” and “The Incredible Hulk” for sheer entertainment would be hard, and “Dark Knight” had so much good stuff going on in it that it’s strange that I’m still feeling a little restraint on the subject.

But “In Bruges” was just perfect – a nuanced script, fine relationships between the characters, and well-rounded performances from everyone, especially Colin Farrell (who, in this movie, was a revelation), and Brendan Gleeson. I’m a big fan of stories about hitmen – this is possibly the most unusual and layered one I’ve seen since “Ghost Dog”, and easily the most human.

So that’s it, then. I daresay I spent too much time on the list. I also reckon that on any given day, I’d have made different choices, too, and I’m sure I’ll change my mind down the line, n’all. But for now, there we are… 35 years worth of favourite films… all of them awesome, and dialled up to eleven. It’s been fun going back over them, and realising how much my mind has changed over the years… hope it’s as much fun to read!

1984 – Gremlins

This was close. I actually started writing up “This Is Spinal Tap” before realising that this was the year Gremlins came out.

There were a lot of crowd-pleasers in ’84, as well as a couple of less-seen classics – I was so tempted to put forward “Company Of Wolves”, for example. But really, Gremlins is the one that I remember the best, and most fondly. And the fact that they relied more on excellent puppetry then on lifelike puppets really works in the film’s favour.

1985 – Back To The Future

Another great year, and it feels weird, considering how much I’ve watched “The Goonies”, “The Breakfast Club” and “Brazil”, but really, when Michael J Fox was good, he was awesome, and any Christopher Lloyd appearance is worth it’s weight in gold.

1986 – Stand By Me

1986 was pretty much the year of sexually formative movies for me, between Jennifer Connelly in Labyrinth, and the sex scene in “Highlander”. Either one of those movies makes it into my top ten of all time, depending on the criteria, as do “Little Shop Of Horrors”, and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. Also, “The Fly”.

But we watched Stand By Me recently, and it hasn’t aged a bit. The young cast showed incredible potential, which in most cases sadly never got realised, and the whole thing is beautifully framed by Richard Dreyfuss. Girl One loved it, watching for the first time, and I love it too. Funny, heartbreaking and thrilling. So it has to be this movie.

1987 – Predator

Jeez, I don’t remember the eighties being all this good. In Wikipedia’s list of films for 87, there are five films that I’d class as personal favourites, including Predator, and a further six that I’d be happy to sit down and watch right now. You may try and guess the identity of those ten other films, if you wish. You know, for fun!

Predator gets the nod, though, because seeing it on a big screen for the first time around 2000, I realised quite how beautifully shot it is. And because Stan Winston died not so long ago, so we won’t ever get another one of his creature effects. Easily Arnie’s best.

1988 – My Neighbour Totoro

On any other day of any other week, I’d have expected myself to put “Die Hard” here. Because, well, let’s not be daft, it’s fucking John Mclane. And then I’d be shocked to find myself typing “Biloxi Blues”, because the combination of an incredibly witty Broderick performance with Christopher Walken’s often overlooked, and probably most scary role, and Neil Simon’s sing-song voice, actually gets me every time.

But sometimes you want whimsy, and Totoro is easily one of the most re-watchable and warm films ever made.

(“They Live” gets an honorary mention, because I think it’s a lot smarter then it gets credit for…)

1989 – Do The Right Thing

Probably Spike Lee’s only repeat viewer, this one distinguishes itself by effectively delivering a feeling of tragic inevitability to the events that unfold.
Although Lee used to get criticised a lot for making racist films, I always remembered this movie as being quite even-handed.
Later Lee films would tend towards the African American view, but with this movie, each group is shown to be flawed and responsible for the state of play.
Danny Aiello, as always, is awesome.
Of course, if Jack Nicholson’s performance hadn’t started to wind me up, down through the years, “Batman” would have nailed this. Also, Michael Keaton makes an ideal Bruce Wayne, but a slightly clunky Batman.

1990 – Edward Scissorhands

This was a tough one for me. Goodfellas is undeniably a cooler film, and “Miller’s Crossing” an awful lot better. But Burton’s fable came along at the right time for me, and I must have seen it about four or five times, by myself, at the little cinema round the corner when I lived in Sleaford. It was also the first real sign that if Burton thought it in that odd head of his, he could put it on the screen.
Oh dear, did I have a boy-crush on Johnny Depp. Of course, it’s all gone now…

1991 – The Last Boy Scout

This was a tough year. Two often overlooked Bruce Willis classics, the best of all Trek movies, a great Gilliam, two great Oliver Stones, the great “Boyz N The Hood” and “Ricochet”, a perfect, tight little action-thriller, with overclocked performances from Denzel Washington and John Lithgow.
“The Last Boy Scout” takes it, though, for being the best Die Hard movie, despite it not being a Die Hard movie at all, and for having my all time favourite car-bomb in it. Solid script, great action.

1992 – Sneakers

It could have been “Batman Returns”, which I preferred to it’s predecessor. It could have easily been “Deep Cover”, if it hadn’t been years since I saw it, or “Hard Boiled” or “The Player”.
It probably wasn’t going to be “The Mighty Ducks” or “Stop Or My Mom Will Shoot”.
“Sneakers” wins because even if it wasn’t a peculiar yet successful mix of espionage and funny high-jinks – even if it didn’t have an incredible cast giving fizzy performances, and a brilliant script – even if it wasn’t for those things, the final scene always brings out a soft part inside me, and gets a big old smile.

1993 – Naked

I agree with Rol about “True Romance”, and it could have been my ’93 film. As could “Benny And Joon”, a film that could have been cheesy, or could have been too quirky and cute, but for it’s unwillingness to flinch from letting Mary Stuart Masterson’s performance as Joon be as real and harrowing as it is, and it’s refusal to do a Hollywood number on Depp’s Benny – he is never more then a whimsically blank fellow, with no explanation or motivation ever asked for or given for his behaviour.

But Thewlis’ ferocity in Naked scared me, at the same time as I found myself agreeing with him when Leigh wanted me to, and identifying with him in his failings when Leigh wanted me to, and that is masterful film right there. Leigh has been pulled up on the perceived exploitation of the common man in his other, milder films, but this film doesn’t pretend to be anything other then harsh and cruel, and it works.

Is Thewlis still with Anna Friel? If he is, the film gets points for that, too…

1994 – The Hudsucker Proxy

A tough year for me, regardless of Rol’s insistence that it was a cinematic anus horribilis. It actually pains me to leave “The Shawshank Redemption”, “Leon”, “The Paper” and “Ed Wood” off the top spot. Any other year, “The Crow” would have got a look in, as Proyas showed us for the first time what it should look like, seeing a superhuman figure running across rooftops.
But the Coen brothers did such a good job of making “Hudsucker” both sardonic and whimsical, with such a charming cast, that it has to go in here.
It’s a beautiful looking film, too.

Righto. That’s your ten [edit - actually, no, it's not. There's your eleven]. At this point, I’m, what, 21 years old? Ah, heady days. No longer a virgin. First proper heartbreak – the ones where you didn’t sleep with them don’t count, I have decided, so Jess of the Sixth Form, you don’t count. It’s better that way. The year of slacking off, and living with crusties. Whatever next, for our young hero?

I am not good at assigning values to things, because I have a bad memory, and can never remember the things I have liked or disliked for longer then… that long. That period of time that just passed then.

Also, as a general-purpose geek, I fail badly, because I struggle to tie items or events to dates. I can tell you what happened in the background on a throwaway scene in an episode of Buffy that I watched once, or identify Predator 2 from a five second clip of a tertiary character doing something pointless with the sound down, but I couldn’t tell you when either film was made, or what year I saw them in.

This meme allows me to appear capable rather then handicapable in both of these areas, while reminding me of old favourites, so it can only be awesome. It requires simply this:

The meme is this: Look up the movie releases for each year of your life, and for each year, pick your favourite. Not the one that you think might have been the best, the one that sticks in your head the most, or you can watch again and again. Prepare for a few guilty pleasures, is what I’m saying.

(This post quickly became far too damn long, so I’m going to split it up. This is the first ten years. The others will be posted sooner rather then later, I promise!)

1973 – Live And Let Die

If Clint had caught me earlier in life, this would have been “High Plains Drifter“. The same goes for Bruce and “Enter The Dragon“. I saw both films in my twenties, and for only seeing each a couple of times, they each made a big impression. The red town and the oft-copied island-tournament, and mirror-fight are ideas which catch in your head.
But despite the quality of those movies, “Live And Let Die” has to take the birthday slot, because I still find myself a little nervy of the memory of all that voodoo, and that awesome theme song is never far from the back of my mind. Possibly the best thing Paul McCartney has done since The Beatles.

1974 – The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three

Of the movies that Wikipedia threw up that I could have picked for 1974, I know this film the least. 74 was the year of both “Blazing Saddles” and “Young Frankenstein“, after all, as well as “Dark Star” (which would have made it onto the anarchic teenage Nick’s list) and “The Godfather Part 2“.

I’ve only seen “The Taking Of Pelham” once, and need to seek it out again. In memory, everything about it is pitched perfectly – it comes from a time when a crime movie didn’t require an explanation of motivation for every damn character, and as such it was a precursor of all of the best examples of the genre, and a perfect illustration of “less is more” in film-making.

I gather that at the time, it would also have been a bit of a crowd-pleaser, too. Certainly, it’s exciting enough, with enough spectacle and solid characterisation. I recall Walter Matthau standing out in particular, at a time when I had only known him as a miserable old bastard in naff comedies.

1975 – Jaws

In common with Rol, I kind of think this goes without saying. My three other possible choices were “boil in the bag perversion”, a comedy staple that has been ruined for me by bad quoting and worse fandom, and a film that I am almost certain my father only showed me at a very young age to scare the shit out of me. So this was an easy choice.

1976 – Bugsy Malone

This was a tough call for me, because it was apparently a year for films that meant more to me then they probably should. If I could make a choice based entirely on full-frontal Jenny Agutter nudity in “Logan’s Run“, or a girl’s locker-room shower scene in “Carrie“, at an age when I really hadn’t seen anything like it before, the choice might have been different. Factor in the fact that “Rocky” is a movie that I have grown to like more as time goes on, from an active dislike of it as a kid, and it’s made harder.

But what can I say, there’s something infectious about an Alan Parker musical. And Bugsy always looked like it was so much fun. Growing up, this was the VHS cassette that my sisters played over and over, and I pretended to hate, but I can probably recite far too much of it, even now. And the songs are mostly great.

1977 – Close Encounters Of The Third Kind

Although between the ages of about 10 and 15, “Star Wars” dominated my imaginary landscape, my memory of what I liked so much about that movie has been diluted by the sequels, the remasters and the prequels.

“Close Encounters” is a different animal altogether. I probably didn’t really get it when I first saw it, but visually it was still so appealing. As time went on, I’ve come to really love the recurrence of images and themes, and the examination of the different ways of communicating that the aliens find. The moment where the humans are trying to reach the spaceship with the musical tones, and the spaceship responds with those two bass notes, blowing out all of the windows, is one of those moments in cinema that kind of whooshes through me.

Richard Dreyfuss, again. I clearly love the man. Which is only right and proper, because at this point he was simply a wonderful actor.

1978 – Superman – The Movie

1978 wasn’t a bad year for movies, but in terms of the impact it had on me, and accessibility for reviewing, there really wasn’t anything else that came close. I don’t think I really appreciated Christopher Reeves’ performance at the time, because I thought it was pretty hammy, but cheese or no cheese, the audience sees Clark Kent and Superman as two distinct characters throughout these movies, and that is an impressive feat. I choose to ignore the deus ex machina that ruins the payoff to the movie a little, otherwise I’d end up totally agreeing with Rol here.

1979 – Alien

There were a few possibilities for this year. But when it came down to it, Alien is the only one that I can sit down without the stars having to be in a certain alignment, or my moods to be in a particular phase.

It’s also the point at which I learnt to love both Ian Holm and Harry Dean Stanton, and both those affections have stood me in good stead down through the years.

1980 – Fame!

I know I’m going out on a limb here, but if I’m being honest, it has to be this movie. I’ve already mentioned my weakness for Alan Parker musicals, and this film was, in contrast to the TV series which followed it, a fairly solid and adult piece of work.

If memory serves, the musical numbers are all diegetic, which makes it a little unusual, and the performances are strong throughout, if a little melodramatic for my current tastes. But the film got its hooks in me young, I guess.

I should point out that I never wanted to go into the performing arts. But I couldn’t say the same for my desires for the movie Doris.

“The Empire Strikes Back” should get a mention, for being my favourite Star Wars movie. Also, “Airplane“, because I don’t think anyone is going to pick it out, and they really should. It would be my second choice, actually – a comedy that actually aims all-out for funny, and hits more then it misses, is more of a rarity then it should be.

1981 – Time Bandits

I was kind of shocked to see how many of my favourite films came out in 81. I could go for the obvious “Raiders Of The Lost Ark“, and I’m pretty surprised to find that I’m not. Jenny Agutter almost swung it for me again in “An American Werewolf In London“, but I think the reason I’m going with “Time Bandits” is that, unlike those two awesome films, I haven’t watched it hundreds of times already. It gets bonus points because I might still be surprised by it.

In common with Raiders and Werewolf, it features effects that no-one had ever seen the like of before – but it had Terry Gilliam at the helm, which of course means that no-one has seen the like of those sequences since, either.

Also, I’ve never seen this trailer before – my dad sprung the film on me on a trip to the cinema when I really wanted to see something else. This trailer is hilarious. Perfect for the film.

1982 – The Thing

No contest at all. “Blade Runner” and “Pink Floyd: The Wall” have both had their way with me more then once, especially as a teen, but “The Thing” repeatedly makes it into my Top 5. Which means I can remember it when people ask me for a Top 5. Which tells you something.

Utterly claustrophobic, totally horrific, and with special effects that still stand up to scrutiny today. This is probably the point at which I realised that I would always give John Carpenter the time of day, but I think this is probably his best.

Also, this is the first time I became aware of Keith David. That dude refuses to age. I love him.

1983 – The Dead Zone

My libido desperately wanted me to say “Flashdance” here, but no, it has to be The Dead Zone. Cronenberg delivers a note perfect adaptation, and Christopher Walken is both strangely sympathetic and utterly creepy as Johnny Smith. The right choice for all the reasons that Rol gives, and more.

That’s that, for now. I will post the next ten years soon, I promise!