Excessive Variance

For the most part I’m not really uptight about anything.  My friends ask me where I want to go eat or what I want to go do, and I usually let them pick and just go with whatever.  However when it comes to pop culture stuff like movies and music I get a bit anal about labeling everything.  I didn’t even realize it until it was pointed out to me a couple weeks ago when I said something about some song being my 3rd favorite on a CD while driving.  So for the last couple weeks I’ve been watching myself to see how often I do that, and yea… it’s like a habit.

Anyway another one of my friends tells me today that she updated her blog with her 100 favorite movies and suggested I do the same thing.  “It’s fun” she says, so whatever I go along with it.  I took her list, removed all the stuff I don’t like, and rebuilt it to make it better stronger and faster.

I ran into a few problems though.  First I realized it’s hard to pinpoint a favorite movie because on any given day I’d consider any one of the movies that made my top ten my current favorite depending on what I’m in the mood for.  So while the top ten are in fact my top ten, they are completely interchangeable.    Another thing I had a problem with was how to judge films against each other.  Since it’s my list and I get to call all the shots, I decided I’d go with entertainment value as based on quality of the film plus replayability.  So while a movie like American History X is a really well done movie, the subject matter keeps me from rewatching it regularly and dropping it way down on my list.  On the flip side a movie like 8 Mile which was reasonably good, but not spectacular from a film making/story standpoint, moves way up my list because the entertainment I get from repeated viewings.  Also I discovered that after number 40 or so it was getting harder to decide what I liked better between two films, so everything from 40+ is nearly interchangeable.

I also listed the Trilogy’s as one entry in most cases.  Sure we all know Empire Strikes Back is better than Jedi, but I wanted to leave room for other films.  Also note the Matrix is not listed as a trilogy and I shouldn’t have to explain why.

If I left something off I’m gonna be pissed at myself…