Ten Movies I Love, and a Few I Couldn’t Leave Behind

It was tough to decide, but I picked my 10 favorite movies and added a few I just couldn’t leave out.

My favorite movies all share something in common with this blog: themes like nature, beauty, memory, personal freedom, and the search for meaning. I think most of us can relate. The list covers more than 20 years, and I’ve listed the films in release order along with their main actors.

1. Fried Green Tomatoes (1991) Kathy Bates, Jessica Tandy, Mary Stuart Masterson, Mary-Louise Parker

2. A River Runs Through It (1992) Brad Pitt, Craig Sheffer, Tom Skerritt, Emily Lloyd

3. Interview with the Vampire (1994) Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Kirsten Dunst, Antonio Banderas

4. Legends of the Fall (1994) Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Aidan Quinn, Julia Ormond

5. Seven Years in Tibet (1997) Brad Pitt, David Thewlis, B.D. Wong

6. American Beauty (1999) Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Thora Birch, Wes Bentley, Mena Suvari

7. Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) Zhang Ziyi, Ken Watanabe, Michelle Yeoh, Gong Li

8. Into the Wild (2007) Emile Hirsch, Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt, Jena Malone, Catherine Keener, Hal Holbrook

9. Life of Pi (2012) Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan, Tabu, Adil Hussain, Rafe Spall

10. Bonus choices: Little Miss Sunshine (1995), The Time Traveler’s Wife (2009), and The Help (2011)

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I want to share a few interesting things about my list.

I actually have four Brad Pitt movies on my list!

• A River Runs Through It‍ ‍ #1 Favorite movie!

• Interview with the Vampire

• Legends of the Fall

• Seven Years in Tibet

Brad Pitt takes on very different roles in these movies, but they all have a sense of beauty, independence, intensity, and a longing for something more than everyday life. Yes, he’s also a good-looking actor, but that’s not why I chose these movies for my list. I chose the four movies because he is a gifted actor who stands out in any kind of role he is in.

A lot of these movies focus on quests, escape, or a deep connection to nature:

• A River Runs Through It → family, nature, memory ‍ ‍ Did I mention #1 Favorite movie?

• Legends of the Fall → wilderness, love, family, loss

• Seven Years in Tibet → mountains, transformation, spirituality

• Into the Wild → freedom, nature, searching for meaning

• Life of Pi → survival, faith, imagination, nature

Some of the movies also highlight themes like women’s lives, friendship, identity, and relationships:

• Fried Green Tomatoes

• Little Miss Sunshine

• Memoirs of a Geisha

• American Beauty in a much darker, more complicated way

Because I’m drawn to visuals, I usually prefer movies that are especially beautiful.

A lot of my favorite movies have won awards for their cinematography or production design. For example, A River Runs Through It, Legends of the Fall, Interview with the Vampire, Memoirs of a Geisha, and Life of Pi have all been recognized for their visuals. My top choice of all Top 10, A River Runs Through It, even won the Oscar for cinematography. (Oscars)

Life of Pi was especially successful, getting eleven Oscar nominations and winning four, including Best Director for Ang Lee and Best Cinematography. (Oscars)

American Beauty won more awards than any other movie on my list, taking home five Oscars, including Best Picture. (IMDb)

Fried Green Tomatoes received the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Film. (Wikipedia)

Memoirs of a Geisha won three Oscars and many other awards for cinematography, costumes, production design, music, and visual effects. (Wikipedia)

Into the Wild (2007), starring Emile Hirsch, earned Hal Holbrook an Oscar nomination and won several other awards, like the Gotham Award for Best Feature and the National Board of Review award for Hirsch. (Wikipedia)

Interview with the Vampire was a big success, winning BAFTAs for cinematography and production design, and Saturn Awards for Best Horror Film and for Kirsten Dunst’s performance. (IMDb)

This list of movies actually says a lot more about me than you might think at first.

The way I see it, my "One World. Many Stories" approach shows up in my choices. These movies often feature people going beyond their normal lives, nature shown in an almost spiritual way, a mix of beauty and sadness, and characters trying to figure out who they are and what really matters.