20 (25 really) Films that Impacted Me in Chronological not Meaningful Order (mostly) of Impact.

For me, a fool for films, my journey is winding with many different paths often intersecting and overlapping, difficult to trace or explain. And it's challenging to think of films that impacted me without relying on favorites. Often films that have an impact on me ARE favorites. But not always. As I create this list I am forced to think about what it means to "impact" a viewer. To learn something new? To challenge one's firmly held prejudices and ideas? To fill one's heart with beauty or joy or sorrow? To introduce a new genre of film, essentially a new world? To remind someone they are not alone in this world--that there exists a kindred spirit in a character--and that if someone can write that, that spirit does exist?

1. I first watched Neptune's Daughter on a Sunday afternoon on TCM. It was beautiful. Colorful. Romantic. Old. I think this film was one of the first "old movies" I watched. It opened my eyes to films from a different era. Suddenly I was interested in movies with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, Rita Hayworth and Marilyn Monroe. The clothing, the mannerisms, the sets, the lives of these men and women were like candy to me and I just couldn't get enough. Of course, growing up without cable TV and having limited movie rental options (VHS was just making an appearance in my life and we rented our films at the grocery store).

2. Somewhere in Time is a movie cited in an diary entry dated Monday June 18, 1984:
Dear Diary,
... I'm feeling kind of sick at heart. Because of the most wonderful show on television was just on. It was called "Somewhere in Time." I must see that show again. I must. It had the saddest ending. The main character was played by Christopher Reeve, "Superman."
Love, C

I am guessing this one was one of the first films to really make me cry.

3. On that note, though I am not sure which I'd have seen first Terms of Endearment was a film that sent me over the edge in empathy and floods of tears. While Somewhere in Time was perfect for my 6th grade imagination and sensibilities. Terms of Endearment endures and it can elicit the same reaction time and again.

4. I have never really liked scary movies. I remember Children of the Corn as my first terror inspired movie moment. We watched it at Heather Kramer's at a sleepover and then for what ridiculous reason, I am not sure we had set up TENTS in the pasture behind their house. Following the film, we traipsed out across the wooded area behind the house, under barbed-wire fences heavy laden with snacks and blankets and so forth, only to discover that something or someone had collapsed our tents and slashed them to ribbons. Truly a moment to remember. It turns out that their horses had trampled the tents and actually peed on everything too. Nice. This is a vivid memory inspired by a frightening movie.

But the scariest damn movie of my life was The Shining. I've actually seen this one more than once. One of the first times was in Brian Tupa's basement with a group of kids in 8th grade. Later, in 1997 I watched it on TV while babysitting. I lived alone at the time and when I got home I was so frightened I called my mom and she had to calm me down. I was considering driving over to her apartment to spend the night. I do NOT do scary movies. Children of the Corn was a silly sleepover thing and I dismissed it as much. The Shining is a film I actually WATCHED and allowed in.

5. Sophie's Choice is often mentioned in sociology 101 classes for its great and difficult choice Meryl Streep's character is forced to make. This is a film that appealed to my young melodramatic self. I read the book too. When I was young I think sometimes I had the greatest satisfaction out of tragedy and in a way THAT was a form of "self-mutilation." I hope I've outgrown that. But this film definitely was a big one for me.

6. I am so over this film now, but at one point I probably could have recited the lines to The Princess Bride.

"Stop rhyming, I mean it."
"Anybody got a peanut?"

The delightfulness of the film remains, I don't dispute that. I've just managed to see it a few too many times. A bit like eating ramen noodles repeatedly in college. This film is filled with surprising moments and memorable scenes. The book is fantastic as well.

7. Home for the Holidays is a film for me and Lori, my sister. It's a film that celebrates the way people's families can be completely fucked up and still be a family. I think that explains it well enough, actually.

8. At some point in the 1990s I watched Out of Africa for the first time and from it I took away ideas about love and relationship and daring and stories and women's role in the world. Here's a quote I have not forgotten:"It's an odd feeling, farewell...there is some envy in it. Men go off to war, to be tested for courage. And if we're tested at all it's for patience, for doing without...for how well we can endure loneliness. But I'd always known that. It didn't require a war."

9. While Neptune's Daughter made the introduction, it wasn't until I watched Pillow Talk for the first time in the late 1990s that I truly plunged headfirst into the romantic comedies and more of Doris Day, Rock Hudson, Katharine Hepburn, Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant among others. I adore this film and it was so relevant to me in the midst of my Meg Ryan love fest that I was tickled to discover the same sorts of stories have been written for years. God Bless you Nora Ephron, for reminding me to look back and for writing movies that resonated so well with the good stuff from the 40s, 50s and 60s.

10. The Life of David Gale isn't a favorite film. But until I saw it I never really knew WHY I was opposed to capital punishment. I felt like it was wrong. That God couldn't be pleased with the concept. This film helped me understand what I already knew in my heart.

11. I'm now a fan of the documentary. Yet, only ten years ago I might not have been able to cite a single one I'd seen. I have the Academy Awards to thank for much of my initial exposure. One that impacted me was Born into Brothels, about children of the red light district in Calcutta. It's about photography and art and education and hope. It opened my eyes to a different world and inspired me. It also pushed me to seek out other documentaries. I am fairly certain some of the first documentaries I rented were Michael Moore ones and they had their own impact,sure, but Born into Brothels may well be the first to REALLY get me thinking.

12. Amelie was the first foreign film I watched that really made me love it. It also was a film that I could identify with on the quirky level. It's just the sort of thing I might have written if I were a bit more clever. Completely and utterly my style of film. Run Lola Run was freakin' brilliant in its chronology and plot device, but Amelie is the stuff of adoration.

13. The Thin Man is the first in a series of films featuring Myrna Loy and William Powell. This film ushered in a new phase of film and literature for me... that of the hard-boiled detective. The wit and wisdom of these films is what I love most. The dialogue is brilliant. Loy's fashion, divine. Powell's drinking, incessant. And this film managed to draw me into more movies of the 1930s.

14. Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels is a film that showed me how much I love a good heist film... comedy of errors in the action genre. There are dozens of fantastic films that followed for me, but this was the gateway. Special thanks to my brother who knows what I'll like sometimes more than I do.

15. On a similar note, Jackie Brown -- full of swearing and violence and sex was, for me, like the film that inspired me to watch it (Get Shorty) a twisty, turny, unpredictable look at criminal activity. But what Jackie Brown had in spades was STYLE. Man, oh man. I love the look of this film. The opening credits is a favorite. Music by the Delfonics. Max Cherry. What a great name.

16-17. Two films, though there may be others, that really challenged my thinking are The Secretary and Kinsey. I liked them both. I was really impressed with the efforts and contribution of Kinsey to the American Public's understanding of human sexuality. The Secretary just opened my eyes to something I'd never really encountered or pondered.

18. Little Children did a couple things to me. One it made me terrified of cheating on my husband. I could relate so much to Winslet's character that I suddenly realized that for all my self-righteousness in denouncing cheaters and homewreckers, but for the grace of God, go I. And perhaps the grace of God is simply keeping me from marriage in the first place so as to avoid the heartbreak altogether. I felt a self-doubt creep in as I watched this film. Next it revealed the complexity of things that people like to keep simple even to a fault. The film is also about a pedophile. When he is released from prison and moves home with his mother, the world is determined that he never have a chance. It all makes me sad and sorry and fearful of what folks are capable of in the name of "justice" or what they believe is right. Films that look at the other side, the underdog, what everyone perceives as "wrong" tend to challenge me. They force me to slow down and think about things that rarely cross my mind. Paradise Now, an Oscar nominated Palestinian film, is another one of those.

19. Grey Gardens is a documentary from 1976 but I only discovered it recently. It's absolutely brilliant, but as I learned after loaning it out, it's not everyone's cup of tea. This is a different sort of documentary and it allows Big Edie and Little Edie to tell their own stories by simply living on screen for a few weeks. And the honesty and the glimpses into their eccentric world are truly wonderful. How did this impact me? It made me want to see other documentaries like this. It is a film that has that spark. The Amelie spark. The bit of electricity that says... if you like this and I like this, perhaps we are connected in some spiritual way. Belonging to some elusive club that GETS it.

20. The Royal Tenenbaums is another film like that. The day I went to it, I was at Walmart in line buying some snacks to smuggle in, when I overheard a couple saying they'd just seen it and HATED it. Thought it was the STUPIDEST film ever. Just what you want to hear moments before shelling out the big bucks to see the film. Even after watching the film as I sat, stunned, watching the credits, I could hear folks behind me say... "What the heck? That was terrible." I, on the other hand, count that as one of my favorite films of all time. Wes Anderson has an eye for wonderful details, which means when one adds it all up, it's stunning. I loved the story, the sets, the costumes, the music, the gritty old feel, the dalmatian mice, the cab company, the game closet, Margot's plays. My pulse races as I talk about this one. I get why others don't like it. But it's like Wes Anderson looked into my heart and spilled the contents out on the page and this screenplay is the result. Recently I had a similar response to the film Me and You and Everyone We Know. It wasn't quite as profound as The Royal Tenenbaums, but it was similar with its quirk and wonder.


P.S. I just realized I forgot Mary Poppins. Darn.

--Kate