logan ryan smith tagged me for a top 10 movie meme. shit, just 10? i could go nuts with sub-catagories such as my top 10 italian cannibal movies. or my favorite giallos. or my favorite post-apocalyptic tales. or comedies. or musicals. you get my drift. so i'll concentrate right now on a few of the several of the films that have mattered the most to me in my life. these are a few of the films i return to again and again. like logan i'm hardly one for art-house preciousness. most of these films are base and popular. but tell me, are there any other kind.

star wars [seeing darth vader enter the frame as a 10-year-old was a spiritual awakening]

blade runner [so far this is the best adaptation of dick's work, ever; a masterpiece]

day of the dead [this 3rd installment in romero's zombie splatter is the most bleak, and thus for me the most exhilarating]

mad max [george miller's 2nd max film the road warrior is the most accomplished, but this 1st outing was hell on wheels. i saw this one with my bros at a matinee movie theater. we came in a few minutes late. max's chasing the toecutter thru the australian wastes was like mainlining adrenline]

jaws [saw this one at the drive-in (where i watched most movies as a kid) which suited its summer hype. spielberg is a talented, but sentimental director, however this is him at his best]

saturday night fever [this movie was meant to be a cheap rip-off of the disco fad of the late 1970s. instead it is a beautiful bildungsroman. admit it, not only is travolta gorgeous, but you still can't help but dance to the bee gees]

enter the dragon [the 1st bruce lee flick i saw was the chinese connection at the long-dead drive-in mather auto movies. but this u.s. production is lee at his most acrobatic and charismatic]

the big brawl [this movie is jackie chan's 2nd u.s. production. unfortunately, it tanked at the box office and it would take chan another 12 years or so to kick up a little u.s. gold. but i dragged my bros to see it every weekend for a good month and half while it played at the crest theater, at the time a local grindhouse]

the hitcher [saw this one on videotape. i became obsessed with it, and parsed it like a graduate student writing a thesis. one of rutger hauer's most enigmatic performances]

grease [the 2nd travolta vehicle on this list. i wore out the lp when i was a pup. travolta and newton-john are magic together]

the warriors [i still get a frisson of excitement when i watch the opening credits. this is one of director walter hill's best films, an action movie par excellence]

well, that's it for now. i know there are 11 movies on this list, but it is constantly rotating. ask me next week and you'll get a different list of perhaps even more films.

those with blogs i tag gina myers, steve caratzas, alex gildzen, jean vengua, jill jones, derek motion, jim mccrary and tom beckett.

and to keith at reelfanatic.

those without blogs [hint! hint!] i tag jill stengel, jonathan hayes and randy prunty.

and whomever wants to play, or not.

soon i'll get back to writing about my favorite movies from the 1980s.