This post was inspired by Stevee at Cinematic Paradox, who in turn was inspired by the dream of having a trivia page on IMDb. I agree, those pages are awesome and often don’t contain anywhere near enough information about a filmmaker or actor. So I decided to list 50 film-related facts about me (a measly list compared to Stevee’s mammoth 100-fact list), but still a list nonetheless. Let me know what you think in the comments, and feel free to list some of your own ‘film facts’.
1: The first movie I can remember seeing in a theater was Jurassic Park. It scared the shit out of me.
2: The first really hardcore horror movie I ever saw was The Evil Dead when I was ten years old.
3: My two favorite countries for their cinematic output are France and Sweden.
4: Three Krzysztof Kieslowski films have brought me to tears or close to tears: The Decalogue episodes one and five, and Three Colours: Red.
5: I think that the scene where the couples hold each other as they dance in Bela Tarr’s Damnation is the saddest movie scene I’ve ever viewed.
6: Seeing the smoke wisping from the charcoal heap in Le Quattro Volte gives me the shivers.
7: I have seen David Lynch’s Inland Empire 23 times.
8: Zbigniew Preisner’s score to Three Colours: Blue is, in my opinion, the greatest music ever composed for a film.
9: The opening scene of Grin Without a Cat, for me, exemplifies great editing and makes me envious of the documentarian and filmmaker behind it, Chris Marker, every time I see it.
10: I think the screenplay for Glengarry Glen Ross is the best screenplay ever written for a film.
11: Weirdest film text message I’ve ever received, regarding the movie Celine and Julie Go Boating: “So it’s like a French New Wave episode of Scooby Doo?”
12: The episode of Scenes from a Marriage entitled The Illiterates is one of the most savage things I’ve ever seen on film.
13: I think Vincent Gallo’s The Brown Bunny is a great film and I’ll defend it forever.
14: My favorite “indie” movie is and probably always will be Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger than Paradise.
15: There has never been a monolog in film history as powerful as Jason Robards’, two hours into Magnolia.
16: I think the candle sequence in Nostalghia is the best thing Andrei Tarkovsky filmed in his entire, fantastic career.
17: If I was forced to name one filmmaker I admire the most, it’d be Luis Buñuel. The dude is 100% pure awesomeness.
18: “I’m killing myself because you didn’t love me, and our ties were broken and I had to tighten them” is the best and most heartbreaking suicide note in movie history.
19: Many of my nightmares play out in the same fashion as Last Year at Marienbad.
20: The Help is the worst experience I’ve ever had with a film. Twice.
21: I didn’t sleep the first time I saw Waking Life. My head was too full of ideas.
22: My favorite vignette in Songs from the Second Floor is this one:
23: Edith Massey’s performance in Pink Flamingos as an egg-loving invalid always makes me laugh, even though the movie is utterly reprehensible shite.
24: Though I can’t quite nail the accent, “I DEMAND TO HAVE SOME BOOZE!” from Withnail & I is a line I love to say randomly.
25: I could stare at Monica Vitti in L’Avventura, L’Eclisse and Red Desert all day.
26: The slow-motion murder scene in Woyzeck is my favorite movie murder scene.
27: The last ten minutes of Stroszek is my favorite movie ending.
28: I had constant shivers and goosebumps running down my body at 1am in the morning during my first ever viewing of Ingmar Bergman’s Winter Light.
29: Dr. Strangelove is the funniest movie I’ve ever seen.
30: Aleksandr Sokurov’s Mother and Son is the most beautiful movie I’ve ever seen.
31: I’ve sat through the entirety of Bela Tarr’s Satantango in one seven hour sitting with no breaks.
32: Reservoir Dogs is my favorite Tarantino movie and nothing will ever make me change my mind.
33: The Five Obstructions is the movie that made me want to make movies.
34: Speaking of von Trier, I think The Idiots and The Boss of It All are very, very, very underrated.
35: Once Upon a Time in the West is my favorite western and the haters can fuck off. Seriously, this movie is indescribably good.
36: I think the ending of No Country for Old Men is perfect and I don’t understand why others don’t like it.
37: I love Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin but Jacques Tati’s trilogy of Mr Hulot’s Holiday, Mon Oncle and Play Time beat the entire careers of both men.
38: The only teen sex comedy I’ve ever really enjoyed is Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
39: There are a lot of directors I love, but none are as humanistic and down-to-Earth as Yasujiro Ozu. Rest in peace, Ozu-san.
40: One of my most proud achievements is that I’ve seen one of the longest narrative movies ever made, Berlin Alexanderplatz, and that I saw it over the course of only a handful of days.
41: I actually applauded Luis Buñuel the first time I saw L’Age D’Or. I don’t understand why it’s not more controversial. It implies that Jesus is a rapist, for God’s sake, how much more controversial can you get?
42: I have currently seen 33 Ingmar Bergman movies (more to come) and I’m proud of it.
43: Evil Dead II is my favorite horror movie.
44: I think Michael Haneke’s Code Unknown is the most important movie ever made.
45: I listen to this piece of music by Mihaly Vig from my favorite movie every day, usually more than once, and try to restrain from crying:
46: Oh, and this too, by the same musician from the same movie:
47: I think Werner Herzog’s documentaries are the best.
48: If I could live inside one movie, it’d be Fanny and Alexander. The five-hour version.
49: Abel Gance’s Napoleon is my favorite film from the first half of the twentieth century.
50: I love Bela Tarr’s Werckmeister Harmonies so much that it will always be my favorite movie of all time and I will watch it at least once a month until I die to remind me how amazing the movies can be.