five stars
I have a pretty boring diet. With rare exceptions, I have the same thing for breakfast (yogurt) and lunch (PBJ) every day. Dinner varies, but not by much. G-Vo and I eat out on weekends, but we still only choose from a small group of favorite restaurants. And that's fine; I eat these things because I like them.
But every once in a while, I'll eat something so amazing that makes me realize how everything else I usually eat is just empty calories, quickly consumed and then forgotten. One of the best meals I've ever had was filet mignon and basmati rice, with key lime cheesecake for dessert. It was one of those meals where I sat back full and happy and knew that I'd remember it for a long time. It didn't just nourish my body; it nourished my soul.
These are the movie and TV equivalents, culled from my five star ratings on Netflix. I thought I'd share them in case anyone is looking for something worthwhile to watch over the summer. Your mileage, of course, may vary. I've added comments or clarifications where needed. Also, there's a very real possibility that I forgot to rate something that I thought was worth five stars, so I may update it at some point in the future, but this is a good starting point.
In alphabetical order:
- Aladdin
- American Beauty
- Avatar: The Last Airbender (the TV show, NOT the movie!)
- The Avengers
- Borat
- Breaking Bad: We haven't actually finished this, so I reserve the right to go back and change this rating. But the writing and acting so far deserve a five.
- Bridesmaids
- Clerks
- The Dark Knight
- E.T.
- The Fall: The movie, not the unrelated TV miniseries (which is also excellent). I pulled this DVD off the shelf at the library, thought I'd watch about 15 minutes and toss it aside, and wound up watching it twice in 24 hours. It is so beautiful and heartbreaking and has made me a Lee Pace fangirl for life.
- Ferris Bueller's Day Off
- Forgetting Sarah Marshall
- Game of Thrones: I want to say it's my favorite TV show of all time, but I hesitate to do so until it's actually over. It's got a damn good shot, though, assuming it doesn't pull a Lost or a Dexter on us in the final season.
- The Green Mile: Based on one of my ten favorite books of all time.
- Harry Potter: The Deathly Hallows Part 2: Mainly for sentimental reasons.
- Hedwig and the Angry Inch
- Her
- The Hunchback of Notre Dame: The Disney version. No exaggeration, I was howling in the theater. And I don't mean laughter, I mean tears. People were actually turning around to look at me.
- The Incredibles
- Kick-Ass
- Kill Bill: The first one only; I was really disappointed in the second.
- King Kong: Peter Jackson's version.
- Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers: Probably my favorite movie of all time.
- Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King: Yes, I went out of alphabetical order there because I felt weird going out of sequential order for a trilogy. (nerd)
- Me and You and Everyone We Know
- Memento
- Mulholland Drive
- Mysterious Skin
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
- Paranoia Agent
- Perfect Blue
- Pinocchio
- Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
- The Protector: Also known as Tom Yum Goong.
- Pulp Fiction
- Running Scared: The 2006 movie, not the Billy Crystal/Gregory Hines one. One of the most exciting and audacious movies I've ever seen. A scene of Paul Walker (RIP) going down on Vera Farmiga most certainly did not hurt its rating.
- Shortbus
- Sideways
- The Silence of the Lambs
- Sita Sings the Blues
- Sixteen Candles
- The Sopranos: As of this writing, my favorite TV show of all time, though (as mentioned above) Game of Thrones is not just nipping at its heels; it has an actual foot in its mouth.
- Titanic
- Toy Story 3
- Up
- Welcome to the Dollhouse
- Zodiac
UPDATE 6/15: I couldn't easily add these without messing up my list above, so please mentally add Freaks and Geeks, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Shaun of the Dead, Star Wars, and The Empire Strikes Back to the above list.
posted by ~C @ 12:01 PM
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