The 10 Movies That Impacted You Most Growing Up

[Jack the Stripper]

Day 5

Mad Max 2

A totally engrossing awe-inspiring post-apocalyptic action film with bad ass characters and bad ass cars. The stunts and chase scenes are incredible and all real with no CGI or special effects. Mad Max 2 is as good as action films get, directed by the absolute master of the craft in George Miller and stunningly shot by another master in Dean Semler with a stirring soundtrack by Brian May.



I saw it at the movies when it came out and it instantly became my favourite movie and have been obsessed with it ever since...So much so, I collect everything I can find on this movie, original movie posters, program, soundtrack, auto-art model cars and figurines. I even bought a similar model of car as Max’s V8 interceptor for my first car.

Love, love, love this movie...

 

... and our common list goes on Jack !THE action movie.
Max driving his Interceptor, his short-barreled gun, his dog, his outfits, the autogire guy ... and the mighty Vernon Wells as Wes !!  those crazy cars chases. Outstanding movie.
My first "Metal" movie, without knowing it at the time.

Yep it was as metal as you could get, so is Fury Road with the Doof Warrior and all.

Pity about Beyond Thunderdome though...Was such a disappointment!

[Zzzptm]

Day 5 for me...



Pretty sure this is NOT one the rest of the gang here is familiar with, but it's very near and dear to my heart. When I had returned to teaching in 2002, I had just seen a news piece on Bollywood and I asked offhand about where I'd be able to see one of these films. A very enthusiastic student of mine came forward and asked if I was serious. I said yes, and the next day she brought 5 films for me to see!

She told me to start with this one, though. If I liked it, I'd be ready for Bollywood, full bore and both barrels. If I didn't like it, well, best to stop there.

I was hooked from the start. The ending had me hitting the kleenex like I'd never done before in a film - and it was a *happy* ending! I learned early and powerfully that Bollywood is not afraid to send your emotions in every direction, one right after the other. The music numbers push those emotions in ways that Western cinema rarely achieves, and they do it masterfully and nearly every time from certain production houses. Yash Raj films made this one, and everything from their catalog is practically an instant classic.

I fell so hard in love with Bollywood that I started to show it in my classroom during lunch every school day for the next 11 years, and that's how I wound up learning Hindi and Urdu. Yes, the falsetto soprano voices take some getting used to, but I found them easier to take than King Diamond, so I'm good with that. 

Every one of the leads in this film is a superstar and correctly so. The old guy in the middle, Amitabh Bachchan, is a fantastic actor, with a gravitas like few can muster. I would not mind one bit if I woke up one day and was him, not one bit at all.

I'm a little rusty now, not having done Bollywood every day for about 7 years, but I can still sing along with all the songs, once I get warmed up. This one has a great soundtrack, one of the best - although I think Devdas has *the* best music, but that's for another discussion.

[Jack the Stripper]

Day 6

Escape From New York

John Carpenters dystopian crime action thriller complete with a killer concept, iconic characters and superb musical score composed and performed by the great man himself. There was a time in my childhood when I wanted to be Snake Plissken. 

One of the most original and classic movies to come out of the 80’s.

[Tyr66]

Day 6

Escape From New York

John Carpenters dystopian crime action thriller complete with a killer concept, iconic characters and superb musical score composed and performed by the great man himself. There was a time in my childhood when I wanted to be Snake Plissken. 

One of the most original and classic movies to come out of the 80’s.

Ah my friend, i decided to choose a single carpenter film, so I named The Thing a few days ago but obviously Escape from New-York is of course the second Carpenter film I enjoyed the most.
Many many years ago, a friend told me about this movie . He had described to me the character Snake Plissken: his blindfold, his outfit, his implanted mini-bombs ... I had been captivated. A whole era.
I was talking about characters from the Metal culture: Snake is definitely one of the first heroes.

[Tyr66]

Here we enter the Pantheon of science-fiction and anticipation cinema. Utopia or dystopia?
Of course the score of Vangelis Papathanassiou is a character in its own right (this saxophone ..) The city of Los Angeles by night under a pouring rain, the Chinese quarter and its noodle restaurants in the street as well.
Harrison Ford has never played such a sad character. Rutger Hauer as the replicant Roy Batty is unforgettable. The last scene on the roof, his last words and the dove that finally flies away. What a moment . The theory on the true "nature" of Deckard is very interesting and the clues (the unicorn ...) which leads there throw even more the disorder on the direction of the very last final sequence.
They don't know how to make movies like this anymore.

[KiloDeltaCharlie]

#5




The MCU up until this release (2012) were really good, then they just stepped up to another level when this came out! This set the standard and sadly the DC universe is still trying to catch up.

[Jack the Stripper]

Day 7

Scarface

Often emulated but never equaled, Brian DePalma’s cocaine fuelled violent gangster drama Scarface is as iconic a cult film as there is and is by far my most beloved movie and performance from my favourite actor Al Pacino.
I became obsessed with this movie from the first time I saw it and have probably watched it more times than Tony Montana says  “fuck” in it and has the most quotable lines of any movie. It’s also another movie I love to collect things on, ranging from original movie posters, signed Pacino memorabilia and soundtracks, to books and figurines. I even named my daughter Montana...

[KiloDeltaCharlie]

#6

A bit of a cheat as with The Lord of the Rings trilogy earlier, but I'm including both The Raid and The Raid 2 this time.

Martial arts, non-stop action, limited dialogue, fights which have been expertly choreogrpahed by director Gareth Edwards. Set in Indonesia, starring Iko Uwais as a cop taking down badies!

[Tyr66]

Sci-fi 2.0 year zero.
Truly unseen when it hit theaters. Although the third part is clearly not as good as the previous two, the characters have become cult.
The chase on the highway in Reloaded (Matrix 2) is probably my favorite sequence. Trinity riding a motorcycle in the opposite direction between the cars with this electro-indus soundtrack: a whole symbol.

[Charger]

Avengers probably would have been on my list as well....but I'll stick with the superhero theme and go with the "original" classic Batman. This was one of the first (if not even the first) superhero movie...not counting that camp humor 60s batman obviously. But even as a kid the 60s Batman was bit too...well...campy. I do remember watching them though but there was no real "Oh this is some great stuff" vibe going on like lets say Star Trek TOS had...not at all...

But then came Tim Burton and his Batman...the darker, more sinister looking one that had great actors and great action and still great humor as well. And to this day this has remained THE BEST adaptation of Batman ever and Jack Nicholson is still the best Joker and Michael Keaton is THE Batman!

[Zzzptm]

My Day 6, and it's another from India:



SHOLAY! 

Action! Buddies! Romance! Singing! Dancing! Comedy! Drama! Guys getting the ever-loving crap beat out of them! More Singing and Dancing!

Some real top-shelf acting and plot make this perhaps *the* iconic Bollywood film of all time. And I absolutely love the hell out of it. If I had seen this when I was a kid, it would have likely imprinted me as deeply as Star Wars, if not more so. I so want to be 9 years old watching this and then running out to play with my buddies and insist on getting to be Jai, the cool guy of the buddy pair.

It's similar in overall description to The Seven Samurai - farmers need some help getting rid of the bandits - but that's where the fork in the road happens. When a movie goes through India, it gets some unique treatment, and have I mentioned that I'm just wild about that?

And it's got THE best ever road trip song, "Yeh Dosti". ANYONE who has ever seen the movie will sing along with it and then start talking about stuff and things with you like you both go way way back or something. It's phenomenal how fans of the film bond with each other. If you can talk straight about this film, you're a bona fide friend of the family to anyone else who loves it. Whenever I'm on the phone with guys from India, I sneak in a comment about Sholay and sing a few bars of "Yeh Dosti" and we're fast friends and they're doing favors for me and I'm helping them cut red tape and we're all working together so much more smoothly. It's a party.

So, yeah, I totally love me some Sholay. It's *always* the right time to watch Sholay!

[Charger]

You got a very eclectic movie taste my friend!

Haven't even heard of most of your picks!

[Zzzptm]

You got a very eclectic movie taste my friend!

Haven't even heard of most of your picks!

Hehehe... foreign movies have always had an appeal for me. And getting hooked on Bollywood definitely skews my influences southward. But my next one will likely be one you're familiar with.

[Jack the Stripper]

Day 8

Re-Animator

One of my favourite times of growing up in the 80’s was sitting around smoking dope with my mates and watching endless movies on VHS. We’d watch everything from famous classic movies to really bizarre movies like Videodrome and Liquid Sky as well as lots of B horror movies. One particular movie that really stuck with me though was the H.P Lovecraft inspired horror movie Re-Animator. 
A perfect blend of suspenseful horror, extreme gore and black humour masterfully navigated from director Stuart Gordon and perfectly played out by actor Jeffery Combs as the determined medical student Herbert West who’s come up with a serum that reanimates dead bodies.

Re-Animator is one of my all time favourite movies and a must watch for any slightly twisted horror fan.

[Thelemech]

My day 1



This was the first movie that I remember being very important to me. It started a life long love affair with Rock N Roll.
Though the movie has some inaccuracies it still told an excellent story on the beginnings of Rock.
Buddy Holly is still one of my favorite artists.