Shlomi Fish’s Films’ Recommendations [possible satire]
Shlomi Fish’s Films’ Recommendations
This is a list of films I have watched and can recommend. The source used to generate this page can be rendered using the XML-Grammar-ProductsSyndication CPAN module.
My Favourite Films
This is a list of my favourite films.
The Princess Bride
Rob Reiner
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is my favourite movie, and the favourite of a lot of others from my generation. It has an excellent dialogue, with many power sentences. The acting is excellent, and the film is very enjoyable.
The Princess Bride has the format of a classic fairy tale, but with a few interesting and non-ordinary twists. It is funny, engaging and highly recommended.
Spaceballs
Mel Brooks
IMDB
Wikipedia
Spaceballs is one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. Essentially a parody of Star Wars and other Science-Fiction films, this films features Druish Princesses, mercenaries who “don’t do it for money”, but rather for “a shitload of money”, and an old small alien guru who claims that you should “never underestimate the power of the Schwartz”.
I’ve seen this movie several times, and also watched or linked to many meme-scenes on YouTube.
Last Action Hero
John McTiernan
IMDB
Wikipedia
Last Action Hero is a film where a young boy is transferred into an absurd world where his imaginary hero, Jack Slater (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger ), is real whereas many truisms that we take for granted in "the real world" do not hold.
Last Action Hero theme of self-reference, strange loops, and real vs. imaginary has provided inspiration for my own works and inspired many elements and plot devices in them. See the navigation block.
Comedies
I always like a good laugh. This is a list of comedies that I enjoyed.
Mary Poppins
Robert Stevenson
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is one of my favourite live-actors Disney movies. It’s funny, fun, with a lot of great songs and other music, with many jokes and anecdotes, and with a great plot.
I’ve seen it several times and always enjoyed it. I’ve also read the first two books in the series, and they are very nice, but very different from the film.
A wonderful French bittersweet comedy that takes place in early-2000 France. Amélie is a young woman who was raised in solitude, and is starting to familiarise herself with the outside world. She tries to do good deeds to her loved ones, and avenge a man she hates.
Funny, exciting, and engaging - Amélie is a wonderful movie.
High Spirits
Neil Jordan
IMDB
Wikipedia
I saw this movie several times on television, and liked what I saw. An Irishman decides to popularise his Bed and Breakfast hotel by pretending it is a ghost castle and inviting several American guests to stay there. But much to everyone’s surprise, real actual ghosts appear and start haunting the living.
My favourite quote from the movie is:
Oh my God, What have I done? Oh my God! What have I done? Oh my God! What a woman!
The Naked Guns
The Naked Guns are among the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. I’ve watched them many times on T.V. (and watched the third one originally in the cinema), and enjoy them almost every time I watch them.
Leslie Nielsen portrays a tactless, clumsy, and naïve (but lovable) policeman, who manages to save the day despite everything, with the help of his friends. The movies have a lot of jokes, from slapstic, to funny dialogues, to punch lines, to absurd situations.
Eight Days a Week
Michael Davis
IMDB
Wikipedia
A high school graduate is in love with his female neighbour (played by Keri Russell) and taking advice from his grandfather, decides to stay at her lawn until he wins her heart. In the mean-time there are some funny incidents from both families and from the neighbours.
Here’s my review of the movie upon first seeing it.
What about Bob?
Frank Oz
IMDB
Wikipedia
I originally saw this comedy on Video, and really liked it. It is one of the only movies with both Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfus, who are two of my favourite actors and comedians, and they are both wonderful in this movie.
It tells the story of a lovable, but multi-phobic psychiatric patient, who at his mature age has already accumulated a lot of psychiatric pseudo-knowledge. He follows his recent successful psychiatrist on his vacation, and slowly drives him mad. This setting enables many jokes, gags, and positively great humour.
Bring it On
Peyton Reed
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is a sports comedy about an award-winning San-Diego-based cheerleading squad that discovers that its departing Captain stole their moves from a different squad from a run-down part of Los Angeles. As the Toros struggle to get their act together, there’s a lot of fun to be seen.
It’s hard for me to know what I exactly like about this movie, but there are probably many things to like. Kirsten Dunst acts great as usual and I always adore her facial expressions. Eliza Dushku and Gabrielle Union are also good. It’s a fun movie, which I enjoyed watching several times, and it’s still fun.
Back to the Future
Back to the Future (I)
Robert Zemeckis
IMDB
WikipediaBack to the Future Part II
Robert Zemeckis
IMDB
WikipediaBack to the Future Part III
Robert Zemeckis
IMDB
IMDB
This series of movies takes on the decades-old fascination of science-fiction writers with time travel, and combines it with a lot of zany humour, high-paced action, a great plot, wonderful acting, and a superb setting.
Michael J. Fox plays Marty McFly, a hip kid who is friends with Dr. Emmett Brown (the excellent Christopher Lloyd), a Mad Scientist who invents a time machine that causes a mess-up in Marty’s past, future, and present, and a wacky attempt to restore it.
The two first parts of the trilogy are really fun, with the second being more wacky and high-paced. The third part is not as good, but still worth the watch, if only for closure.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones
IMDB
Wikipedia
Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a hilarious and very memorable comedy. King Arthur and his brave knights of the round table are commanded out by God to seek out the holy grail, with a lot of fun along the way.
This film has many memorable quotes and sketches, and has provided a lot of fodder for popular culture and geek culture.
Lt. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N.
Byron Paul
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is a Walt Disney parody/tribute to the classic Robinson Crusoe novel. A U.S. Navy pilot by the name of Robin Crusoe (played by Dick Van Dyke), finds himself stranded on a deserted island in the Pacific Ocean, where he finds an abandoned Japanese submarine, an astronaut Chimpanze, and finally, a female native which he calls Wednesday. He is trying to survive the perils of the island until being rescued.
The film is funny, entertaining, and highly recommended.
Robin Hood - Men in Tights
Mel Brooks
IMDB
Wikipedia
A Mel Brooks parody of the Robin Hood films and especially Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, this film is very fun and funny, despite not being one of Mel Brooks’ best films.
Robin Hood (played by Cary Elwes) escapes from his imprisonment during the third crusade, and swims back to England, only to discover that his castle was confiscated, and that Nottinghamshire and England in general are under threat from the ruthless rule of the evil King John, the Sheriff of Nottingham, and the king's witch.
One can witness a fight to the death with sticks that keep getting segmented into two halves, between Robin Hood, and Little John, for crossing a small stream, a Robin Hood, that unlike some Robin Hoods can speak in an English accent, and an attempt to romance Lady Marianne of Bagel.
Lots of fun is due.
As Good as It Gets
James L. Brooks
IMDB
Wikipedia
A touching comedy-drama film. A memorable dialogue from there is:
Melvin Udall: Now, I got a real great compliment for you, and it's true.
Carol Connelly: I'm so afraid you're about to say something awful.
Melvin Udall: Don't be pessimistic, it's not your style. Okay. Here I go. Clearly a mistake.
[shifts in his seat uncomfortably]
Melvin Udall: I've got this, what, ailment? My doctor, a shrink that I used to go to all the time, he says that in fifty or sixty percent of the cases, a pill really helps. I hate pills. Very dangerous thing, pills. Hate. I'm using the word "hate" here, about pills. Hate. My compliment is, that night when you came over and told me that you would never... all right, well, you were there, you know what you said. Well, my compliment to you is, the next morning, I started taking the pills.
Carol Connelly: I don't quite get how that's a compliment for me.
Melvin Udall: You make me want to be a better man.
[pause]
Carol Connelly: [stunned] That's maybe the best compliment of my life.
Melvin Udall: Well, maybe I overshot a little, because I was aiming at just enough to keep you from walking out.
Science Fiction
Star Wars IV-VI (The Original Series)
Star Wars IV: A New Hope
George Lucas
IMDB
WikipediaStar Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back
Irvin Kershner
IMDB
WikipediaStar Wars VI: The Return of the Jedi
Richard Marquand
IMDB
Wikipedia
I guess you’ve already heard of Star Wars. I watched these movies on video as a child, and recall liking them a lot. Star Wars is a mixture of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Adventure, with a lot of vivid imagination, wonderful special effects (especially for its time) and an engaging plot.
Enemy Mine
Wolfgang Petersen
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is a relatively obscure, but a positively beautiful and touching, science fiction film. A human pilot ends up stranded on a strange planet, beside a reptilian humanoid-like alien, who belongs to a race, which the humans are at war with. While initially being enemies, they learn to cooperate with each other, speak each other’s language, and eventually even love and care for each other.
There are some twists to the plot after that, and the movie kept me captivated. Unfortunately, the movie budget’s had gone out of proportion, in part due to a change of director, and it was not successful commercially. But watching it on the Television proved to be an engaging experience for me when I was younger.
Fantasy
The Neverending Story
Wolfgang Petersen
IMDB
Wikipedia
An adaptation to film of the first part of the Novel The Neverending Story by Michael Ende (which I’ve read later and can also recommend). The film is aesthetically pleasing, with wonderful special effects, exotic fantastical creatures, great acting, and wonderful and atmospheric music.
This is one of the finest fantasy movies I’ve ever seen, and I highly recommend it.
A fantasy film based on a story by George Lucas. An evil queen-sorceress is told that a newborn baby-girl will end up killing her, and orders her to be killed. The girl’s mother puts her cradle on the river, where it ends up being found by Willow, a member of a village of a Hobbit-like race of men.
In order to save the village, Willow must travel along with the baby, and find the destiny of the baby, himself, and Madmartigen (Val Kilmer), a gifted but non-trustworthy warrior.
I really enjoyed this film.
Animated Films
The Lion King
Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is my favourite of the new crop of Disney animated films. Inspired by African legends, the Lion King tells the story of a lion cub, who learns about the place of his kind in Nature.
A few people told me that they heard people claim this movie was pro-Fascist, but there are some obvious anti-Fascist elements in it, and I didn’t find it so.
This film has great visual side, very nice songs and music, great dialogues, a lot of funny bits, and an engaging plot. Highly recommended.
The Emperor’s New Groove
Mark Dindal
IMDB
Wikipedia
This is probably the funniest Disney animated picture. An emperor of a pseudo-South American empire (voiced by David Spade) is being conspired by his advisor, and is turned into a Llama. Now he’s trying to become a human again, with lots of fun for the viewers in the process.
(Also see Yzma's Plans)
Dramas
Jerry Maguire
Cameron Crowe
IMDB
Wikipedia
A positively touching, funny and beautiful film about a sports agent who decides to change the way he and his peers treat their clients. Wonderful camera-work, great acting, and some very memorable quotes make for a movie I could not forget.
Action Films
The Quick and the Dead
Sam Raimi
IMDB
Wikipedia
A modern Western movie (sort-of), this film is half-action, and half-drama. It features several good actors, breathtaking camera work, and an engaging plot.
Sharon Stone plays a gun-woman, who is trying to avenge the death of her father by challenging the responsible villain (Gene Hackman), who is hosting an elimination tournament in a town he rules in the wild west.
We meet the people who take part in the contest, and learn on what they are trying to prove by it.
Highly engaging, spiritually involving, and otherwise lots of fun, this is a movie I still fondly remember.