On Easter, a reader of this Substack asked me in person, “What are your desert-island movies?”
You might be like me when faced with such questions.
If I’m put on the spot, it’s hard to think clearly about it, an introvert’s natural reaction.
Also, when you’ve seen thousands of movies, unless you are a database with instant recall of all of them, you aren’t going to recall the movies you want to bring up.
(“Um, The Godfather Part 2,” you say, and then you recoil because you think that’s a dumb answer since everybody says that, and then you start thinking about how the person will react to whatever your answer is.
In retrospect, after the conversation, you end up thinking of what your best answer was. It probably wasn’t the best answer, but you will think so, an introvert’s natural reaction.)
I am going to play along with this fun gimmick and answer this reader’s question in part.
“What movies would you take with you if you were stranded on a desert-island for the rest of your life?”
So take this post as a movie-recommendation list, if nothing else.
Also, regarding the desert-island question, I am going to eschew the annoying response that I want to give, which is that it depends on which island, the weather, who is with me, and any other context question.
This list will just be pure fantasy.
There is also zero pretentiousness, as I do not care what anybody thinks about this list, or whether or not it meets some kind of social-status approval test.
And it will only be ten movies long. I’ll probably add to it in the future.
(I already covered my ten choices for the British Film Institute list, which you can see here. Those choices are almost completely different from this list, because it’s a different kind of list.)
Aliens
I have enjoyed this movie for almost thirty years. It’s always exciting on every watch. About every three months, I think about rewatching it.
That’s it. There’s nothing else to say.
I realize that those are the absolutely least insightful statements that any critic can make about any artwork.
Oh well: it’s a desert-island list.
And those qualifications — do I like it? would I rewatch it a lot and still like it? — are the key factors.
Bringing Up Baby
I’m moving toward the position that comedies are crucial to our mental health and the future of civilization.
The promotion of sadder dramas as “the best” or the most award-worthy movies seems to me to be an unhealthy sign for society itself. (I have no scientific proof of this; it’s just an intuitive hunch based on reading around.)
Therefore, this completely manic screwball comedy is the needed pep that can get me building huts and fishing crabs on my desert island in no time!
I might even end up making friends with the local leopards.
If you join me on this island, even on our thirtieth viewing, we’ll be discovering new sparkling lines of wit that we had never noticed before.
Metropolis
For this list, I considered darker fare: Batman material, Gothic stuff, noirs, urban dramas, horror movies, monster movies . . . before settling on the great grandaddy of almost all of them.
You have to give me the entire, rediscovered version, though.
And an accompanying score that I like.
Ratatouille
It’s either this or Toy Story 2.
That latter Pixar movie is my go-to enjoyable animated-adventure movie, with several stunning scenes, such as the race through the toy store.
But I will go with the movie that has always inspired and impressed me since the day it came out in the theaters.
Probably it will inspire me to mix coconuts with the local vegetation and game.
Mmmm … cockroach-coconut-seaweed surprise! What flavor!
Knight of Cups
I’m picking movies here, not artists, and yet I had to take a Terence Malick movie with me.
The movie from him I have always loved is The Thin Red Line. But I’ve seen it at least ten times, and it is literally a desert-island movie. Probably it will be too depressing, or unrealistic, on my island.
With “Knight of Cups,” I’ll be awed by Malick’s construction of a pilgrim’s journey, his visual and sonic choices, and also in trying to figure out what in the world the voiceover narrators are actually saying. That could take decades!
Of all the movies on this list, this one I am the least sure about, by far. However, since I’m lost on a desert island, this movie about a lost man of the world ought to inspire me.
The White Diamond
Again, I’m picking a director here, Werner Herzog.
It’s a requirement that he goes along with me to an island. If he knew about my ridiculous adventure, he’d likely make a movie of me.
This is my favorite Herzog movie because it’s his rare joyful film. It has all the Herzogian elements — human delusions; the sublime and its alien qualities; whether God exists or not as seen by observing nature, etc.
Few people have seen this one, so I suspect this is the choice that will get your attention. I hope you can find it out there somewhere.
(Herzog is not pictured below, but this image of a man appearing to sit on a waterfall is completely Herzogian.)
One Week and Sherlock Jr.
Allow me to cheat. These two Buster Keaton films add up to a feature-length movie.
Both are hilarious. Sherlock Jr. is profound. I’m going to need both to survive.
The Dekalog
Now I’m really cheating.
Yes, it’s ten short films by the Polish master Kieslowski. It still adds up to one whole thing, though.
Now we’re dealing with fare that has many of the puzzles of the universe: how do people relate to natural law? Or is there even natural law? And if there is, can you break one law by obeying another?
And the whole thing will have me pondering whether I’m on this island because of fate, choice, chance, or some combination of them.
Or whether all of them are an illusion.
Winter Sleep
This one will be like my island adventure, yet also its opposite, with the film’s wintry, mountainous, remote Turkish setting.
On previous viewings, I have detected that this film might have perfect composition and cutting. In the long dialogue scenes, which can be twenty minutes long, the cuts seem to achieve an ideal that never happens.
I need to bring something that I can analyze to death. This one fits that qualification.
Ed Wood
Exactly the same comment as Aliens at the top of this list.
This movie always makes me laugh, a lot. I am always thinking about when I’m going to rewatch it.
That’s all that matters for the desert island.