Showing posts with label Classic Movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Classic Movies. Show all posts

Sunday, March 24, 2013

...these films are;
          A) In your DVD collection
          B) ...considered, by you, to be the best films EVER

        The movies are not in any particular order... except for number one... number one is number one I'm afraid!


21) SpaceBalls [1987]
You get every reference and find yourself having to explain them to your guests.


20) Fight Club [1999]
You still talk about the ‘twist’ in the movie and regularly compare with acquaintances at what point you ‘clicked’ – or maybe, you’re one of those geeks who say ‘Oh... but the book was far superior’?


19) Seven Samurai [1954]
Oh yes... you love world cinema and regularly say (with a flourish of course) ‘Akira Kurosawa’s film, Seven Samurai, is really not only his greatest film, but... also his most widely known movie on our side of the planet... har-har!’


18) The Cabin in the Woods [2011]
You make everyone you know watch this at least once and watch for their expressions... you then check at the end of the film to see if they ‘got it’.


17) Highlander [1986]
Yes, it’s awful... you agree, but you love it. You love it because it’s about Scotsmen, swords, revenge and the modern world (oh and Sean Connery). You can’t help it... I get it.


16) Zombieland [2009]
I’m afraid if this is on your shelf, there’s no hope for you now.


15) 2001: A Space Odyssey [1968]
You sit with bated breath during the five minute overture at the opening, not allowing anybody to talk or even blow their noses (or like me you stare at the ‘iPad-like’ devices they have in the space ship and pause it to tell everybody about it).


14) Metropolis [1927]
Conversations with you about this film are painful – as you’re convinced you’re the one who discovered it.


13) Shaun of the Dead [2004]
You guffaw at all the right places like a Brit; whilst saying ‘there really is nothing quite like British humour’. You also point out all the foreshadowing in the film to the annoyance of other people.


12) Battle Royale [2000]
Does the following sound familiar... ‘Ha, you liked The Hunger Games? You do know that she totally ripped it off from Battle Royale... a Japanese film from like the 2000s, which was also a manga!’


11) Gattacca [1997]
‘The themes in Gattacca are totally relevant to our very near future’ says you, whilst shaking your fist, convinced that future super-stars will be having their children genetically engineered in the womb etc etc


10) Batman [1989 onward]
All of them.


11) Serenity [2005]
Argh... stop telling me that it used to be a TV Show (Firefly) and all the actors are pretty much up to start the show again and blah blah...


10) 12 Monkeys [1995]
Post-Apoc is a genre that gets your juices flowing. This is required watching.


9) Idiocracy [2006]
When you sit to watch it, you have to be alone... otherwise, your constant spouting of how people have already reached the level of stupidity in this movie distracts those watching with you.


8) Alien Series [1979 onward]
Oh my. To initiate other people to your geekdom you force them to watch this... and the rest for good measure!


7) The Fifth Element [1997]
Another Bruce Willis – you use the fact that he is in this movie, and 12 Monkeys to prove that Willis is just so flexible and one of the best actors of our age.


6) Back to the Future [1985]
This is so geek it’s close to becoming main-stream... but your inner-geek can’t resist, even if you resent it a little.


5) Planet of the Apes [1968 onwards]
The whole damn franchise


4) Dune [1984]
This is another one of those films where you push up your glasses and tut at all the inconsistencies the film has with the novel.


3) Star Wars [1977 onwards]
‘The old ones please, none of those fandangled-fancy ones’, says you, gritting your teeth.


2) Stargate [1994]
You not only love this, but own it... and the whole series too!


...and the number one place goes to...


1) Star Trek [1979 onward]
There is nothing left to be said


Have I missed something? Do you disagree? Has your inner-geek just raged against this list? Let me know! You can message me below or on Twitter @OrisiB

Am I not geek enough?

Saturday, November 17, 2012


In all honesty I have a slight weakness for 'inspirational teacher' movies. I watched this a few weeks ago and haven't really been able to put it out of my mind. I've ruminated on the reasons why this movie is haunting me and I think I've highlighted a few points but even then they do not seem to encapsulate how I feel about this film.

Dead Poets Society (1989) has a simple premise. Robbin Williams plays the new English teacher at a very traditional boys-only boarding school, John Keating. Keating attended the school as a boy, and wants to breathe in not only new life but to try and bring hope in to a system that demands conformity. As a young man, Keating and his friends had created an underground club called the Dead Poets Society where they would 'suck the marrow out of life'. Inadvertently he inspires members of his class to set up their own Dead Poets Society society - which leads to devastating consequences.


Movies like Dangerous Minds (1995), Freedom Writers (2007), and Coach Carter (2005) all seem as if they should fall in to the same genre as Dead Poets Society, but they don't. Although I enjoyed the others in varying degrees, but there is something more refined about the repression and oppression that we see in Dead Poets Society.

Part of the refinement, in my opinion, is the dignity that Robbin Williams gives to his character. I am a big fan of Williams in more dramatic roles rather than comedic roles, and I loved the range of emotion and depth he was afforded to really emote his character. 

The movie is slow, and at times can be cumbersome, it can even give the impression that it doesn't really know which direction it is going in, but it does, and I guess that is what is most trying and shocking to the audience.

It's the crushing of hope and freedom by conformity and traditions that creates an atmosphere of claustrophobia; this coupled with the scarcity of colour (most of the film features lots of browns, black, whites, and muted natural colours), it's no wonder that the boys and the audience just want to break free. 

The film is haunting because of the hopelessness of the conclusion. Although there is a ray of light in the famous last scene (with the boys standing on the tables), there really is nothing after that, and I honestly felt left out cold, furious at the injustice of it all.

As haunting as this film is (after all, even after a few week I still think of it) I do really love it - and it does what a film is supposed to do and make you remember it.
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