My top 5 favorite movies

Well, considering that I was the one who suggested this shared topic, I suppose I need to write about it, don't I? A while ago, I wrote a post about my to 25 favorite songs of all time, and I enjoyed writing it so much that I suggested on Blog Azeroth that other bloggers try writing similar posts. As such, I would like to write a follow-up post to that last one, in which I detail my top 5 favorite movies of all time. I know I said in my to 25 favorite songs post that my tastes in movies aren't diverse enough for me to write a post like this, but I have decided to write it anyways. Before we begin, I just want to say that this is not a list of what I think are the greatest movies of all time; this is a list of the movies that I enjoy the most. As such, there will likely be a movie or two on here that will make you say, "Ugh, why did he put that one on here?" Also, as a relatively young person without much experience with "classic" films, most of these movies will be relatively recent releases; that's just the way the cookie crumbles. So, with that out of the way, let's begin.

5. Dogma
Kevin Smith can make some truly great films, and this is one of them. The plot revolves around two angels who have been banished from heaven but managed to find a loophole to allow themselves back in; however, in doing so, they will destroy existence, because existence is founded on the fact that God's will is absolute. Because of this, an abortion clinic worker (seriously) is tasked with stopping them. In addition to the typical comedic mainstays, the film also takes quite a few jabs at people who take religion in the wrong direction and use it in the wrong ways, while still being respectful of religion in general. As someone who is an atheist but is still respectful of believers and thinks there is no reason that believers and non-believers can't get along, I love the film for this reason. It's a real shame that Kevin Smith will probably not make a sequel to this film, because if any of his films deserve a sequel, it's this one.

4. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Do I really need to explain this film? Either the plot, or why I like it? Now, I'm sure there are some of you out there who can't stand this film because it is over-quoted, over-referenced, etc., etc., but it is still, in my opinion, one of the funniest movies out there. If you really don't know the plot, it's Monty Python's take on the classic tale of King Arthur. If you don't know who Monty Python are, they are a British comedy troupe that had a long-running TV show (Monty Python's Flying Circus), as well as three movies, and Holy Grail is frequently considered to be the best of them, for good reason. It is, quite simply, a classic; the jokes are hilarious, the writing is superb, it is simply the Pythons in full form.

3. the Saw series
Yes, the Saw series (the sixth film is probably my favorite, but I like them all too much to just put that one up here). I have gotten a lot of flack from my friends for liking these films, but I will always stand by my like of them. For those who don't know, the Saw films are about a serial killer called the Jigsaw Killer who puts people in "traps," mechanisms in which they must hurt themselves in some way or else be killed in an even more gruesome way. The traps are usually designed to in some way reflect what Jigsaw perceives as the victim's crimes or flaws. For example, one trap in the first film featured a man who had cut his wrists for attention. He was trapped behind a maze of razor wire, which he was given two hours to find his way through before being trapped in the room he was in. According to Jigsaw, the irony was that if he wanted to die, all he had to do stay where he was (for he would eventually die of starvation), but if he wanted to live, he had to find his way through the maze and "cut himself again." Yep, they're pretty gory (though the first film was surprisingly tame by horror standards), and as you may expect, very psychological.

Now that you know that, you may ask what possible redeeming qualities these films could have that would make me like them. For one thing, I have a penchant for poetic justice, and the traps of the Saw films are based around poetic justice. There's also an unexpectedly good plot behind all of this torture porn (as the genre has been come to be called). I especially appreciate how five sequels later (soon to be six), the series still takes itself seriously. It keeps a cohesive plot and doesn't just hand-wave events of the past films away to allow the plots of the new movies to happen, and it doesn't resort to cheap gimmicks to keep the films interesting (unless you count gore as a cheap gimmick). The movies also use flashbacks liberally, allowing important characters to continue to be a part of the plot without using cheap plot devices to bring them back. I could go on, but I doubt I'll manage to sway those of you who have already rejected the series as potentially being good, so I'll just say that I shamelessly love these movies will continue to do so.

2. Fight Club
There's a reason Chuck Palahniuk (author of the novel version of Fight Club) has said that he considers the film version an improvement. Between the great performances of the actors, the great dialog and quotes (many of which are taken verbatim from the novel), the excellent editing, the issues it address, and the great plot, there's plenty to love about this movie. I especially like how faithfully it is adapted from the novel; sure it takes some liberties with the plot and changes the ending, but so much is unchanged that reading the novel is like seeing an alternate cut of the film, and seeing the film is like reading an alternate draft of the novel. Fight Club follows an unnamed narrator who is generally dissatisfied with his life of consumerism and working as he fights his insomnia and his general dissatisfaction with life. His life changes when he meets a man named Tyler Durden, who helps him take his life in a new direction. I'd explain more, but this is such a great movie that I don't want to give anything else away. Trust me, just see it some time if you haven't already.

1. V for Vendetta
To be honest, the second time I saw this film, I actually thought to myself, "I want to watch this film until I am sick of it." Luckily I didn't, and V for Vendetta remains my favorite film of all time (thus far). The film, like Fight Club, shines because it is so well done. The dialog is well written (with the exchange between Evey and the fingermen in the beginning of the film remaining one of my favorite conversations in all of film), the shots are well choreographed, the music matches the scenes perfectly, etc., etc. The film follows the lives of a woman named Evey, who lives in a dystopial vision of England, and a freedom fighter named V, who fights to change that dystopia. To be honest, this film is a little bit of a guilty pleasure for me because most of the things that make me like it are the kind of devices that directors put in movies to make people like them more without needing to improve the substance of the movie, but hey, they work. To me, V for Vendetta is a lot like Casablanca; there's nothing particularly noteworthy about it that makes it remarkable, but everything about it just works, and it works so well that it is my favorite movie of all time.

There you have it. I know this list is a good deal shorter than my list of my favorite songs, but writing that list was made easier by the fact that I keep a playlist of my favorite songs in iTunes, so all I had to do was copy the list and put the songs in order. I didn't have the same convenience here, and because I didn't have the time to watch each of these movies before writing this list (as opposed to how I was able to listen to each song before writing my previous list), I had to write from memory, so I was only able to write about the movies I really like. But, regardless, I hope you enjoyed reading this.