Ryan Night’s Top 100 Movies: 80-71
Continuing the countdown of my top 100 movies, we move on to the third set.
For 100-91, click here.
For 90-81, click here.
For 70-61, click here.
For 60-51, click here.
For 50-41, click here.
For 40-31, click here.
For 30-21, click here.
For 20-11, click here.
For 10-1, click here.
80. Dragonheart
This is not a very good movie, but I saw it when I was a kid and I really liked it. Please don’t ever make me watch it again as an adult and ruin that. Sean Connery plays a… retired dragon hunter? And there’s supposed to be no dragons left? And there’s an evil king or prince or something who wants to kill the last dragon. I believe there is also a kid who becomes friends with the last dragon. Anyway, this movie has a special place in my heart because to me it represents some sort of romantic notion of childhood magic, wonder and fantasy that withers and dies in adults.
79. The Green Mile
Who could forget this Stephen King adaptation starring Tom Hanks, wherein a death row inmate played by Michael Clarke Duncan is actually not only totally innocent, but is some kind of angelically blessed healer? It’s a powerful movie that challenges our assumptions of justice and order and is also a prime example of crisp, clean, well-executed storytelling.
78. Highlander
Not only a really cool movie, but an awesome IP overall from the 80s that just sort of died. It had a very successful film trilogy, a spin-off cartoon, a popular live action TV show, and then it just randomly fully died, ceased to be, and seemingly everyone totally forgot about it. This thing was like The Matrix in the 80s, there are a ton of parallels. It was a cultural phenomenon, then the 3rd movie went totally off the rails, and it killed the whole IP. Anyway, it’s about a secret society of immortals who kill each other to absorb their knowledge, and it’s sort of loosely Scottish-Irish themed, which, being that, I thought was cool.
77. Snowpiercer
A high concept, high style sci-fi think piece about class in a dystopian future where all of humanity is stuffed into train cars. The train cars are, of course, an allegory for human class hierarchies. It’s a thought-provoking movie with a ton of interesting set pieces. Weirdly enough, I think this movie could have benefited from being a Netflix miniseries, because I would have liked to have seen more of the various “cars” and spent a little more time in the world, and, additionally, I think some things could have been better explained; specifically, why did that girl have psychic powers?
76. City of God
Coming in at 76 on the top 100 movies list is City of God, or Cidade de Deus, which is about a kid who grows up in the slums of Rio de Janeiro and grows up to become a crime lord. It’s a poignant look at how an environment can ruin people’s lives, and how ‘success’ isn’t always a good thing. Finally, it’s an interesting look into the culture and city of Rio. If you haven’t seen this movie, I highly recommend it.
75. Looper
Before Rian Johnson became infamous for making a, uh, let’s say controversial Star Wars movie, he was making some really cool artistic movies like Brick and, what I’m listing here, Looper. Looper was a pretty awesome movie, I thought, with a cool conceit for a plot, neat characters and some interesting directorial decisions. Who can forget the moment when the camera pulls out to a wide shot to make a cool action scene look comedic and somewhat pathetic?
74. Prometheus
Everyone hated this movie. I think most people who saw this movie liked Alien and wanted another Alien, and this movie is kind of a slow, cerebral, philosophical movie full of the stupidest characters to ever exist on screen. It is certainly not the same kind of movie as Alien. I really liked this movie on two levels. I liked the cerebral, philosophical sort of 2001-esque side of it, and also how mind-bogglingly stupid each and every character was. Hey, a giant ship is rolling slowly toward you — you could move 2 inches to the side, or run directly forward in a straight line and get crushed. What do you do? Oh, of course, crushed. Hey man, a member of your crew has all of his bones broken and is growling while slowly backwards crab-walking toward your ship with his head totally spun around. What do you do? Oh, naturally, welcome him back with open arms as if nothing is wrong. Hey, look, it’s a mysterious and super-creepy looking space worm. Let’s pet it. Excellent decisions, everyone. So I fully enjoyed this movie on two levels.
73. Con Air
Nicholas Cage, who got buff for just this one movie in his entire career and then somehow immediately lost all those gains, is on a quest to bring his daughter a bunny. He’s the only good guy on a plane filled with some of the most dangerous convicts in the world, and he ends up being the inside man for law enforcement when the plane gets hijacked. This is a great movie, and an absolute classic. It is the perfect combination of hilariously campy and legitimately good. Absolutely deserves to be on a top 100 movies list.
72. Star Wars
I’m not talking about the overall Star Wars IP/franchise that encompasses 12+ film, dozens of offshoot TV series, hundreds of books, comics, toys and is essentially a consumerist religion, I am talking specifically about the movie Star Wars, that came out in 1977, starring Mark Hamill as a bored kid living on a backwater planet, longing for something more. It’s a really good movie. It still holds up today. Having seen it again somewhat recently on a plane, what I find fascinating is how marginally better it is than other big sci-fi movies from the time period (like Logan’s Run), and yet how it, maybe 2% better, has a lasting legacy and a multi-billion dollar empire, whereas all those other 70s sci-fi movies faded into obscurity. Like, you have to remember, it was a sci-fi movie that came out during a boom of sci-fi movies, and it is the only one anyone remembers.
71. Life is Beautiful
Last on this section of the top 100 movies list is Life is Beautiful. It’s a very powerful movie about a man held captive with his son during the holocaust, where he protects his son from the horrors surrounding them by convincing him that it’s all a game. Happy, sad, dark, bright, beautiful, ugly; this movie is embedded with every emotion. If you ever wanted to feel something, this is the movie to watch. It has all the feelings.
That does it for installment 3 of my top 100 movies. This was 80-71.
For 100-91, click here.
For 90-81, click here.
For 70-61, click here.
For 60-51, click here.
For 50-41, click here.
For 40-31, click here.
For 30-21, click here.
For 20-11, click here.
For 10-1, click here.