Favourite Movies

In setting up my blog profile yesterday, I was asked to identify my favourite movies. That's tough. I have seen so many movies over the years - and since I enjoy the experience of seeing a movie so much, I tend to give the film the benefit of the doubt and like it (especially when I was younger, less discerning, and seeing movies in theatres more often). So when you ask me about favourite movies, the ones that float to the top of my list do so possibly because they were good films, but certainly because of the context in which I saw them (my age, where I was in my life, where I saw it, with whom I saw it, ...) That's really the only way I can name a few favourites.

(I expect the same is true for just about everybody if they are completely honest about "favourites" in anything. The Leafs are my favourite sports team, and they're far from being good - but I've got so much emotion invested in them... My favourite meal of all time was a hand-ripped turkey, swiss, and tomato sandwich - eaten with my two older daughters in wet suits on a surf board we had just pulled up onto the sand on a chilly Vancouver Island beach in the late summer with the sun peeking out from the clouds for the first time that day. In this latter context, if I had watched "The Master of Disguise" on that surfboard I expect I'd be identifying it as a favourite movie. Maybe not.)

So with all that said, and in case you still care, here are some favourites. I'd be interested in yours, but more interested in the context that made them your favourites:

• Heaven Can Wait. I first saw it when I was in the throes of my first childhood crush.
• Shrek. Loved it for all the right reasons AND it was cemented as a favourite when I saw it for the second time on a projected screen in Italy with my wife and (then little) two older daughters.
• Toy Story 3. Saw it around the time my older daughter was just packing up for her first year of University. Loved it and hated it. Toy Story 2 was my "birthday movie" with my wife and daughters during a really memorable stay in downtown Toronto that included an indoor/outdoor winter swim at the Sheraton. Any one of the three movies makes me very sentimental.
• Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Don't exactly remember the context, so I'll just chalk it up to Gene Wilder (if you pressed me to name my #1 all time favourite actor, it would have to be him, mainly for his performance in this film).
• Love Actually. I love good (and I emphasize good) romantic comedies - Keeping the Faith, Serendipity, Say Anything. This one stands out because of Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman.
• The Usual Suspects. No explanation required. Context irrelevant.
• Silence of the Lambs. Best book adaptation ever, and I loved the book.
• Lord of the Rings. Best book adaptation ever, and I loved the book.
• Rat Race. Saw it in the theatre with my parents as an adult. I have never seen any person laugh as uncontrollably as my Dad did during that movie. Actually, that's not true. On a red-eye to England, my Dad and I were both watching "Just for Laughs, Gags". We were both exhausted and giddy. The cabin was (otherwise) silent. And my Dad put on the greatest display of uncontrollable laughter ever. But we're talking about movies, not tv.
• 2001, A Space Odyssey. In the early Seventies I was in a hippie-designed and run "open concept" school. Students had a fully equipped tv studio at their disposal. We produced some sort of tv show about 2001. I never understood the movie, but my Dad always promised to explain it to me when I was older. I'm pretty sure he didn't get it either.
• Titanic. I think going back to childhood, the story of the Titanic (and that song) was probably my first introduction to death and tragedy. The movie was everything my childhood imagination had conjoured up.
• Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Having written my final exam in my final year of University, I sat alone in my (then empty) rental house and had a really good cry. Anything by Frank Capra would have done that to me that night.
• Starman. First movie-date with my then future wife.

Jurassic Park, Rocky, Close Encounters, Back to the Future, Ferris Bueller, Forbidden Planet ... and a whole bunch of others I've forgotten... all belong somewhere in my longer list. But that's enough. You get the picture. What are your favourites? Why?