Please tell me which movie(s) provoked an existential crisis in you.
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Maybe, Drowning by Numbers. A link on the chain to pay attention to what's on the screen. Deeper root, An American Werewolf in London.
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Cry Freedom - I was just a kid when I saw it and it opened my eyes to the harshness of the world outside my cosy middle class UK bubble
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And, of course, "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish".
My shrink had to listen to me going on and on for one hour about that movie and the eight lives lost. Can't listen to the theme song without sweating from the eyes.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6Z_...
Fearless Hero
YouTube video by Release - Topic
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Antonioni's Blow-Up was so shocking I had to watch it more than three times. (Also, because of the scene where the Yardbirds play with Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page.)
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Not just “it made me think” but “it made me rethink my life”
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They call Earthlings "the vegan maker." I'd hoped it would help me, then vegetarian, to go vegan. It did. Probably more accurate to say the movie resolved an existential crisis, since it caused me to abandon at least some bad faith in my relationship with other animals. Movies can be life-changing.
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The Great Hack. I loved the idea of IoT in my early twenties.
The Great Hack | Official Trailer | Netflix
YouTube video by Netflix
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Lolita. (I know, weird choice, but knowing how close I was to becoming another Dolores Haze... it's a creepy-eye-opening story)
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Bambi
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1947: Earth
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Donnie Darko hit me at a weird moment of adolescence.
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Arrival.
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Office Space, and it still does
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Weirdly, the Carmilla webseries circa ~2015ish? My best friend pointed me at that with the suspicion that it might be a bit of a gender moment. It did.
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Andy Warhol’s Empire…but perhaps not “existential” in the manner you intended. I didn’t want to exist, at least not in the time/place in which I found myself, unsure of whether I was part of some kind of experiment and weighing my least bad options.
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First Reformed
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Network (1976). The existential crisis is that it's quite possibly the bleakest Torment Nexus film because the one it predicted was foundational for the ability of so many others to be built by robbing people of access to real information. I watched it built in my lifetime and then saw the film.
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Faces of death. My older brother was having a sleepover and my dad took us to VideoWaves, the local rental place.
High school rumors of “real death on tape” fueled their choice and I’ve never been okay since watching it.
Mostly it was accidental deaths caught on camera. Sicko shit.
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Weirdly, my pick is Soldier (1998). I don't know if it triggered an existential crisis when I first saw it or only much later.
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I am not your negro Giving me the insight I will never ever view the world from the perspective of a black American or any perspective of people who are discriminated against for that matter. How much I try ...
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Pee-wee's Big Adventure.
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Choose a life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television. Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers... Choose DSY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning.
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Jesus of Montreal (I used to be a Christian)
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Do the right thing by Spike Lee was the moment when I finally “got” how seemingly random acts of violence are expressive and political. Similarly the Wind that Shakes the Barley made me understand what occupation does to occupied & occupiers. In both cases, it’s 50% the movie & 50% me/ the moment.
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Sleepy Hollow I should not have watched that at my young age lol i still remember the bloody tree scene vividly. Im okay with it now but I say okay lightly!
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Between Trainspotting at 16, Pi at 18, Matrix and Fight Club at 19 I never had a chance.
More impactful to my life today, Primer and The Fountain really changed me.
(All in theaters)
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Ana Lily Amanpour's The Bad Batch (2016). First saw it when my life was falling apart circa covid. It's about bizarre & grisly ways outcasts survive exile from a cruel society. Great music & atmosphere w psychedelic elements.
There are other films/shows of same name. Rarely see this one discussed.
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not exactly an "entertainment" kind of movie, but...
Earth 2100 - Wikipedia
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Inside Llewyn Davis
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I stopped eating pork after watching Babe.
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My Life Without Me and Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. More recently, The Wild Robot.
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Legit? "Death Becomes Her" (probably cause i saw it at age 10)
I was terrified of death as a kid, but this movie made me realize that immortality was not so great, and that death (rest) after a long, fulfilling, satisfying life was definitely preferable
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Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
The Wackness
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
Into Great Silence
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American Dream (1990)
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Following.
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Memento
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The Road
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princess mononokee, but it wasn't a immediate change, more like a slow build.
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Kids. Watched at release at the theatre in my prairie town library when I was 17.
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The Green Mile, I saw it in theaters when I was 15.
American Beauty, I was also a teenager when this came out.
Fight Club, same period!
More recently, the brutal Lilja 4-Ever, and the even more brutal The Look of Silence/The Act of Killing, related documentaries about war crimes in Indonesia
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Akira Kurosawas Ikiru.
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Z, directed by Costa-Gavras.
Just as relevant and shocking today, I guess...
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www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXbb... And the book before it, obviously:
Tuck Everlasting (2002) Official Trailer # 1 - Alexis Bledel HD
YouTube video by Rotten Tomatoes Classic Trailers
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Brother Sun Sister Moon
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Do docos count? We Are Many, about the 2003 global protests against the Iraq war. It made me believe that individual actions add up, it is always worth doing the right thing, there is always hope, and the world is full of good people.
We Are Many - A documentary film about the Iraq war protests in 2003
On February 15th 2003, 30 million people protested against the USA and UK’s plans to invade Iraq. The Iraq war protests spread across 789 cities, in 72 countries, covering every continent. This fearle...
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Prometheus
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Yentl
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An Inconvenient Truth
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Silver Linings Playbook because of the adultery scene.
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📌
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Beautiful Things
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Breaker Morant. Australian movie about soldiers in the Boer War who are convicted by a military tribunal for something they didn't do. It didn't matter what happened, they were going to be convicted for political reasons.Incredible story arc of the wills and estate lawyer assigned to represent them.
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Everything Everywhere All at Once
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The Sound of Metal. I saw it at a time when I was noticing hearing loss, when I was learning about disability justice, and when I was having trouble being by myself without distractions. It was a movie that seemed to find me.
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The Deer Hunter. The Killing Fields.
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Koyaanisqatsi (1982) for sure.
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No Country for Old Men, just bleak and tense and beautiful
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Welcome to Sarajevo, The Pillow Book, Babe, Everything Everywhere All at Once.
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Harold and Maude (1971), The Battle of Algiers (1966), Habit (1997), Adieu, Lacan (2022), Funeral Parade of Roses (1969)
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Stalker and Longlegs come to mind.
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Leaving Las Vegas
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The Vanishing? The Seventh Continent? Schindler's List (but I was 14, so).
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Embarrassing but I’ll own it… The Matrix.
I was 13 or 14 and deeply into computers & the internet (still am). I had never been exposed to any of the thought experiments it was leaning on and it blew my little noodle.
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Welcome to Sarajevo (1997) ⭐ 6.7 | Drama, War
1h 43m | R
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Aniara. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aniara_...
Aniara (film) - Wikipedia
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The Coen's "A Serious Man"
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F--king Amal made me realise I'd absorbed a lot of ambient homophobia and I'd better do something to change that.
