Sanity saving movies?

[SeaCat]

Let me set the scene. My wife and I got home from a hellaciose day in work. It was about 85°F out. we changed and decided to work in our courtyard. Carlos Santana was playing low. I was wearing a pair of Cargo Shorts and my wife was wearing a thong bikini. A neighboring couple came over, we'll call them Jim and Deb. (Jim is the kind of person who makes a half watt lightbuld look bright. He was recently arrested for firing his rifle at a Posum, {and missing} in his courtyard at night. His defense? He was protecting his wife from the dangerouse animal. Jeff Foxworthy could write novels about this guy.) They came into our courtyard un-announced. Deb, (who stands about five feet tall and weighs about 180 pounds, in comparison to my wife who stands five foot six and weighs 125, and has a slight belly,) was wearing a pair of Booty Shorts and a tight tank top. (For those Euros in our midst, Booty Shorts are super short, super tight shorts.) Deb became upset at my wife for wearing the bikini and proceeded to read her the riot act. Jim, who was wearing Jeans hanging half way down his ass and a T-Shirt, when he wasn't busy drooling over my wife, gave me a hard time over the way I was dressed, claiming I was trying to pick up his wife. By the time they finally left my wife and I were stressed out. I decided we needed some down time and headed out to our local vido store where I rented two of the strangest movies I know in an attempt to rebalance us.

My wife and watched, in order, "Clockwork Orange" and "Rocky Horror Picture Show" quickly followed by "Blue Collar Comedy Tour". My insanity was quickly restored, as was my sense of humor.

My question is: What other good movies do you use to restore you balance?

Cat

 

[poohlive]

Forrest Gump, and the evil dead movies...
And if it's a really bad day, I'll pick the nearest Saturday off, and just watch the Back to the Future trilogy straight through.

Although, I do commend you on your choices. That has got to be the weirdest combination of videos I've ever seen. Did the clerk at the store give you a funny look?

 

[Belegon]

depends on so many things but among them are:

1) Chasing Amy

2) Before Sunrise

3) Blazing Saddles

4) The Princess Bride

5) Bull Durham

6) any LOTR

7) any Star Wars

 

[yui]

Hi Seacat,

I love:

1. "Dry Wood, Fierce Fire" is a Miriam Yeung and Louis Koo movie and it is a super fluffy romantic comedy. I love it. For whatever reason, I can sit and watch it over and over and still laugh at all the goofy parts.

2. "Metade Fumaca" stars Nicholas Tse and Eric Tsang and might just be the perfect mix of drama/comedy and exceptional style and cinematography. What makes it really wonderful is that it is full of so many little joys, from a wonderful soundtrack to excellent performances. I can watch it over and over and over…and truth be told, I have.

And I am with Belegon, "The Princess Bride" rocks, too.

Yui ^_^

 

[LadyJeanne]

Dirty Dancing - sheer silly fluff, I know, but hey,

"Nobody puts Baby in a corner!"

 

[shereads]

Let me set the scene. My wife and I got home from a hellaciose day in work. It was about 85°F out. we changed and decided to work in our courtyard. Carlos Santana was playing low. I was wearing a pair of Cargo Shorts and my wife was wearing a thong bikini. A neighboring couple came over, we'll call them Jim and Deb...

You're making this up. You porn writers never give up on the ol' "Jim and Deb" story, do you?

My wife and watched, in order, "Clockwork Orange" and "Rocky Horror Picture Show" quickly followed by "Blue Collar Comedy Tour".

Clockwork Orange for sanity restoration? That one makes me nervous.

Three off-the-top-of-my-head favorites:

I never cease to plug "American Beauty," which is remarkable in a different way to everyone who loves it.

"Being John Malcovich" makes me laugh until my stomach hurts. (Hasn't every working person known how it feels to pry open that elevator each morning on the 7 1/2th floor of the Merton-Flemmerer Building?)

For pure feel-good moviedom, you can't beat "To Kill A Mockingbird"...Atticus, where are you when we need you so much?

 

[Virtual_Burlesque]

The following movies have only two things in common,
I find them strange but entertaining. (Strangely entertaining?)
They were all recommended to me by my favorite video store clerk.

They do reset my weird-o-meter.


Seconds (1966)
– directed by John Frankenheimer
– Rock Hudson & Salome Jens

Rhinoceros (1974)
– directed by Tom O'Horgan
– Zero Mostel & Gene Wilder

Brazil (1985)
– directed by Terry Gilliam
– starring Jonathan Pryce & Robert De Niro

Strictly Ballroom (1992) [Australian Production]
– directed by Baz Luhrmann
– Paul Mercurio & Tara Morice

To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995)
– directed by Beeban Kidron
– Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze, & John Leguizamo

 

[sincerely_helene]

Hmmm... Well, if you consider those movies 'sanity restoring,' you might well enjoy Caligula (it stars the Clockwork Orange guy and is about thrice as twisted.)

What to expect:
A plethora of former penthouse babes
Malcolm McDowell's penis (that Clockwork guy)
Peter O'Toole's naked arse
Helen Mirran's naked everything (best known for roles in Shakesperian plays)
Mild Beastiality
Golden Showers
Rape (hetro and homo)
A woman giving birth on stage
Castration
Dog eating castrated testicles
Lesbians doing the nasty
Voyeurism
Incest
Orgies
and (if memory serves) a necrophilia scene

The list kinda goes on from there, but I don't want to spoil all the suprises.

 

[AngeloMichael]

What you call sanity saving, I call comfort movies and I have a list of movies that when they come on, even though I've seen them a hundred times before, I can watch again. I can just sit back and get that warm and fuzzy feeling while all my stress evaporates.

My list of comfort movies:

Office Space: There's no movie funnier than this one. The scene where they "kill" the fax machine...it's priceless.

The Goonies: The line, "Dead things Mikey, DEAD THINGS!" never fails to crack me up.

Back to the Future trilogy

The Princess Bride

Caddyshack

Stand By Me

Airplane!

Eddie and the Cruisers

As Good As It Gets

Boogie Nights

Brewster's Millions

any "Vacation" movie

Animal House

The Blues Brothers

Fast Times at Ridgemont High

The Wedding Singer

Dutch

Uncle Buck

Major League

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

Let It Ride

Radio Days

The Breakfast Club

 

[R. Richard]

The Monster That Devoured Cleveland!

 

[ABSTRUSE]

Moonstruck is my movie of choice for putting me in a better mood. I love the opera, the transformation of the characters, the food and Olympia Dukakis.

then of course any silly or ridiculous movie gets me going too...

Tommy boy
Kung Pow
Uncle Buck
Steele Magnolias
the American Pie series
the Harry Potter movies

and for a knee slapping good time, Jurassic Park, what can be better than a t-rex eating a lawyer on the toilet?

 

[Goldie Munro]

Any Baz Lurhmann movie does it for me -

Strictly Ballroom, Romeo and Juliet and Moulin Rouge

others -

Singing in The Rain

Shawshank Redemption

Toy Stories 1 and 2

Spirited Away

Sense and Sensability

The Piano

I could go on and on...

 

[millennium_bard]

When I need to get my mood elevated again, I watch movies like:

Down Periscope

Operation Petticoat

Hot Shots 1 & 2

Smokey & the Bandit

Maverick

The Fifth Element

Any of the Bond movies.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

The Shawshank Redemption
Moulin Rouge (I'm a totaly sucker for that movie, but don't tell anyone, it'd ruin my rep).

 

[Virtual_Burlesque]

When I’ve been weirded-out by reality, watching one of these movies allows me to return to reality and find it strangely comforting.

Seconds is a strange sci-fi movie.

Rhinoceros is the film version of an absurdist play.

Brazil everybody knows.

Strictly Ballroom is Dirty Dancing for the non conformist.

And Wong Foo is simply a hoot!

I didn’t think SeaCat was asking about comfort movies. That would be a completely different list.


sincerely_helene,

I like much of Gore Vidal’s work, but his work doesn’t always fare well in the movies:
Of the five that I have seen, and remember seeing, two have been absolute dogs.(*)
One has been an intelligent drama.(**)
One a funny social satire. (***)
One a screeenplay based upon a very weird play. (****)

Caligola (1979)(Screenplay) (*)
Myra Breckinridge (1970)(Novel) (*)
The Best Man (1964)(Screenplay & Play)(**)
Visit to a Small Planet (1960)(Play)(***)
Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)(Screenplay frm Tennessee Williams play)(****)


R. Richard

I do believe you are cheating.
The Monster That Devoured Cleveland was a movie that only existed in the mind of Maynard G. Krebs, later to become Dobie Gillis. (Trivia favorite.)

 

[fogbank]

Rushmore: The adolescent life I wished I had. Damn, when Herman goes to Max's school and trashes his bike... everything just snaps into perspective for me.

American Splendor: One of the best soliloquoys of any movie, when Harvey Pekar ponders the other Harvey Pekars that appear in the phone book.

Prime of Miss Jean Brodie: Maggie Stewart at her finest. What a cougar she was.

Spirited Away: Absolutely love the radish spirit.

Winged Migration: Just a gorgeous documentary on bird migration, with almost no dialog, just long scenes of birds in flight, and beautiful choral music.


Depending on my mood, some combination of these films will always balance out my world.

 

[SeaCat]

Notice i said these were movies to retain my insanity. These are not very good movies, but they do show me there are stranger people out there than I am. However they do have their good points.

Lui, I have not seen any of those movies but I will be looking for them in the near future.

Caligula, what can be said of this movie? It has parts every warped and twisted mind would like, but I never did find a story line in it.

Dirty Dancing, have you seen the newest one? Havana Nights? Good movie.

As for my all time favorite movies, hmmmmmm. Apocolypse Now, Titanic, Pearl harbor, The Meaning of Life, Amadeus, Ben Hur, and of all things Timone and Pumba in Lion King One.

Now if we were to talk about Horror I would have to mention House on Haunted Hill, both the original and the remake. Ghost Ship, the original Dracula, and the Hell Raiser series. (Although I did see a remake of an American movie about the haunting of a house by a poltergeist when I was in Germany. The American verson was okay, but the European version was much better. Too bad I can't remember the title.)

For good special effects I would have to recomend "The Cell". and for a great soundtrack I would have to recomend the remake of RollerBall. (RollerBall 2000 I think but I could be wrong. Talk about some driving music.)

Oh and let's not forget porn movies. I don't have a favorite, although "The Devil in Miss Jones" does get played in our place every now and then.

Cat

 

[shereads]

Office Space: There's no movie funnier than this one.

I believe you have my stapler.

 

[SeaCat]

Oops,

I forgot one, "The Gods must be crazy". You have to love that one.

Cat

 

[BlackShanglan]

When I'm in the "Clockwork Orange" depressive/pissed off/digging it mood, I tend to also go to "The Wall" or "Trainspotting." But then, I'm a wallower when it comes to depression.

RHPS is always in season, as is "The Princess Bride." The mere pronunciation of the word "mawwidge" can get me to crack a smile in the worst of moments.

When I just need cheering up, I usually can't focus on a whole movie. I watch Red Dwarf or South Park or something light and semi-twisted.

Shanglan

 

[Guest]

Sanity Savers:

Any Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton or Marx Brothers, and often the old screwball comedies.

Perdita

 

[sincerely_helene]

Caligula, what can be said of this movie? It has parts every warped and twisted mind would like, but I never did find a story line in it.

Dirty Dancing, have you seen the newest one? Havana Nights? Good movie.

Yeah. Your right. Plot much heavier in Dirty Dancing and Rocky Horror.

Great. Now I have "Sweet Transvestite" stuck in my head.

Virtual Burlesque: I am not familiar with any of Vidal's other attempts. In fact, never even heard of him outside of Caligula. I didn't realize he was such a popular name.

 

[CharleyH]

When in search of sanity, I generally play particularly violent computer games - nothing like getting out your agression on a bunch of aliens.

When needing to get out emotional blockades due to PMS, "City Of Angels" send me into a much needed fountain of tears. On the other hand, so does any tv commercial with sappy music.

 

[yui]

This is Spinal Tap Funny, funny, funny! More quotable dialogue than any other movie I have ever seen...

 

[cloudy]

This is Spinal Tap Funny, funny, funny! More quotable dialogue than any other movie I have ever seen...

But, does it go to eleven?

Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail is a sanity saver for me, along with Life of Brian.

The Southpark Movie, Animal House, and Old School!