I’ve seen various posts on social media that talk about people who will watch the same five movies religiously, and I am definitely one of them. I go back to these same five movies for different reasons, whether it’s because of how much I relate to the characters or how the plot progresses, I will never get sick of watching these films.
- The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
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`The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1967) is my all time favorite movie. The movie is a French musical centered around Genevieve, a girl who is in love with a man named Guy, who gets drafted to war, so she ends up being forced to marry a rich man in the time that Guy is away. This movie is tragic, but it depicts love so beautifully through its musicality and bright coloration. I adore this movie so much because I can relate to the heartbreak that the characters experience, and the way that this film expresses the feeling of moving on.
- The Virgin Suicides
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The Virgin Suicides (1999) is a film adaptation of the book written by Jeffery Euginides. The movie depicts the lives of the Lisbon girls, five sisters who live in a deeply religious household, told from the point of view of teenage boys. All these girls want is to experience normal teenage girlhood and romance, yet they are always punished and shamed for it. This ultimately leads to the sister’s suicides. This movie is so compelling to me because of the way the Lisbon sisters had such a profound impact on the lives of the people around them. I absolutely love the way that this movie depicts teenage girlhood, and that is what makes me continue to come back to this film.
- The Handmaiden
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The Handmaiden (2016) is a Korean movie that is set in the early 1900’s, during the Japanese colonization of Korea. Sookee is hired as a handmaiden to a wealthy Japanese heiress named Hideko. Sookee is originally assigned by a swindler to help him seduce Hideko and take her fortune, but Sookee and Hideko end up developing a romance. What makes this film so intriguing to me is the way the movie is told from different perspectives, and how shocking this makes the turn of events in the film seem. I will never get tired of watching Sookee and Hideko’s relationship develop, and how it progresses.
- Brokeback Mountain
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Brokeback Mountain (2005) is about two cowboys, Ennis and Jack, who end up developing a romance during their time herding sheep over the summer on Brokeback Mountain. I find myself always going back to this movie because I love how it modernizes westerns. I really appreciate how the film depicts the complexities of Ennis and Jack’s lives and how this impacts their relationship. These complexities make the film feel so human, and I love that feeling.
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
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Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) is about a woman named Clementine who erases all of her memories of her relationship with Joel. Joel decides to undergo the same memory erasing procedure. During this procedure, he realizes that he does not want to forget Clementine, and he relives his relationship with her. I find myself rewatching this movie a lot because of the unique way this film goes about heartbreak and not wanting to lose the person you love the most. I love the idea of being able to do it all again with someone who isn’t in your life anymore, it’s a comforting thought for me, and I love seeing this play out every time I rewatch this film.
These are five movies that I will watch religiously. I love how much I can relate to the characters in these films and their experiences. That’s one of the things I love most about film: how human it makes me feel.