Must watch movies?

I wouldn't class them as before you die movies, but some of my faves (in no particular order) are Long Good Friday, Blade Runner, Local Hero, Mad Max (the undubbed version), This is Spinal Tap, Withnail and I, Alien, Grosse Pointe Blank, The Castle, Goodfellas. I do not have highbrow tastes.

ETA: And Brazil.

The Godfather Trilogy
The Color Purple
The Notebook
Lady Sings the Blues

... Just a couple of my all-time favorites - They're very different genres, but hey, I lurved 'em.

I'll ad "The Usual Suspects".

Not necessarily classics, but some faves/pick-me-ups/things-that-really-left-a-major-impression, in no order and not all-inclusive (a.k.a. random):

The original Star Wars trilogy (New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi)

Avatar (big screen, 3D if possible)

Clue

The Lion King

How to Train Your Dragon (1 and 2, though the first has the more impressive soundtrack)

Indiana Jones 1 and 3

Jurassic Park

The Iron Giant

The Sound of Music

Kubo and the Two Strings

Labyrinth

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Some of my favourite black and white classics: To Kill A Mockingbird, Goodbye Mr Chips, Some Like It Hot, Inherit The Wind, 12 Angry Men, The Apartment, Born Yesterday, To Sir With Love, and anything with Cary Grant .

So many it's too many, but... one I watched again last night, Heat of the Night is one for me. Others off the top of my head, Godfathers I and II, but not three, sorry, Laverne. On the Waterfront. Ajay mentioned Cary Grant, None but the Lonely Heart, I also really like Born Yesterday, but the original with Broderick Crawford, and not Sean Penn. But Sean Penn is great, Mystic River! Bogie: Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Petrified Forest. Cagney: Angels with Dirty Faces and The Roaring 20s.

I won't call them must-watch because that's in the eye of the beholder, but there are movies I encouraged my kids to watch (when age appropriate), by which I meant I really thought they were worth watching, and they were glad they did: The Truman Show, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Pulp Fiction, The Godfather, and almost every Cohn Brothers movie, especially Fargo and O Brother Where Art Thou. I'll also add Wall-e, Up, and Dodgeball.

Ha, I misspoke re Born Yesterday. There's been no remake to my knowledge. I was thinking of All the King's Men, the original, which also starred Broderick Crawford. They remade that movie with Sean Penn in Crawford's role, also Jude Law. Had it's moments, but for me, nothing like the original. Sorry about that.

Ha, wrong again. Forget I said anything, OP.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Born_Yesterday_(1993_film)

Godfather (Only the first one for me.)
Tokyo Tribe
Dreams
V/H/S and V/H/S 2
Ju-On saga
Kairo
Tag

More will come soon.

My favourite classic movies: Most films by Hitchcock (especially Psycho), Citizen Kane, and Modern Times.
My favourite non-classic movies: Scott Pilgrim, You've Got Mail

Ah, so many! (Artistic merit or faithfulness to the books be damned! I liked these flicks)

Star Wars, Close Encounters, Grease, The Best Days of our Lives (a very, very underrated 1946 classic), Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Kitchen Stories (Norweigan but subtitled in English), Rocky (all of them, except maybe III, IV and V), Good Will Hunting, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Dogma, LA Confidential, Frankenstein (plus Bride of and Son of), Wings (1927), Independence Day, Men in Black, Man in the Iron Mask, Pirates of the Caribbean series, Love Actually, Sixth Sense, Blair Witch Project, The Exorcist, Cheech and Chong's Next Movie, The Bourne movies (except Legacy).

I know I'm leaving out dozens that I would watch again.

How has no one yet mentioned Groundhog Day or Galaxy Quest??

I'll second the Grosse Pointe Blank suggestion, as well as 12 Angry Men.

And for something completely left field, Buster Keaton's The General. Amazing stunts and the humour still holds up.

Oh, and if you're not averse to musicals, Singin' in the Rain. See above re: stunts and humour.

Shaun of the Dead. Watch it three times: first for the entertainment, then for the direction, and finally for the dialogue.

Also Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Great fun and it's quite an exercise to unpick the strands to see how the story works.

ETA: Being John Malkovich -- also for story structure and what fun a writer can have when they're in control of their material.

Hmm. In no particular order:

Blade Runner, Brazil, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, This is Spinal Tap, Spirited Away, Alien 2 (I have to stop after that one, as the others are real downers), District 9, Persepolis, The Color Purple, Citizen Kane, Inside Out, Sixth Sense, Star Trek II and IV, Pink Floyd The Wall.

My tastes are all over the place. Not many classics on this list, but eh, most people already know about those and have opinions about them.

be frank said:

How has no one yet mentioned Groundhog Day or Galaxy Quest??

I'll second the Grosse Pointe Blank suggestion, as well as 12 Angry Men.

And for something completely left field, Buster Keaton's The General. Amazing stunts and the humour still holds up.

Oh, and if you're not averse to musicals, Singin' in the Rain. See above re: stunts and humour.

Click to expand...

Seconding Groundhog Day and The General, and GQ (though that may be funniest to SF fans.) (Also Spirited Away and Wall-E, which others have mentioned.)

And, to my earlier post, I'll add Man With Two Brains, Blazing Saddles, and Young Frankenstein. (Mel Brooks's High Anxiety and Silent Movie are also classic comedies worth seeing.)

I could, of course, list a lot of movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark, which are certainly worth watching, but pretty much everybody has already watched them. So I'll go for some not everybody will have seen"\:

Chinatown
Slingblade
The Man Who Would Be King
Being There
Blood Simple (an early Cohen Bros. flick with a diabolically brilliant plot)
Top Secret (an early Zuckerman Bros. flick, completely silly, and hilariously so)
Nebraska
Posse (a 1960ish Western starring Kirk Douglas in a very unexpected anti-hero role)
There Was a Crooked Man (another Western about which the same thing can be said, plus it has Henry Fonda in it)
A Boy and His Dog
The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith
Breaker Morant
The Milagro Beanfield War
What's Eating Gilbert Grape?


caw

Time Bandits and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (love me some Terry Gilliam); The Thief and the Cobbler (the animation blows Disney's Aladdin away, even with Robin Williams), Apollo 13; High Noon; The Philadelphia Story; Bringing Up Baby (amazing acting from the supporting cast); Much Ado About Nothing (Kenneth Branagh's version), Harvey, Arsenic and Old Lace, Bladerunner

Nice to see a couple of Aussie movies make the list blac I'll add The Castle.

Oh, and the Canadian film C.R.A.Z.Y.

The Sting and All The Presidents Men.

It's sorta hard to stop isn't it.

Time Bandits - definitely

Hanger 18
Bill and Teds Excellent Adventure
Morons from Outer Space
Dark Star
Back to the Future trilogy

Eta: This Quiet Earth

Children of Men
Hero
Primer
Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind
Upstream Color
Apocalypse Now
Ex Machina
Inception
Let the Right One In
The Man Who Planted Trees
Arrival

Speaking of Australian movies, I really liked Red Dog. I'm biased, because the kelpie they used for the title role looks a bit like my Wiley, but I think they did a good job of bringing this American viewer into the setting and into the mindset of the characters.

A few more:

Stand By Me

Pacific Rim (one of the ultimate, kick-the-brain-aside-and-watch-giant-robots-punch-alien-monsters experiences)

The Incredibles

The Breakfast Club (encapsulates an age and an era)

Harry Potter (about 1 - 3; after that, the condensation from the longer books really shows bad)

Metropolis (I have a weakness for the 1980's-soundtrack one, but the movie itself is very iconic, ahead of its time, and definitely a must-see... though be sure to get an official restored version. Some of the DVDs out there are just terrible.)

South Park (brilliantly subversive movie)