Yet More Movies I Like

It’s all Jerry Coyne’s fault. He put together a list of his 20 favorite movies and invited everyone to join in. I have not forgotten I only got half way through, so here are the third group of five that are favorites of mine.

Performance

This movie altered my view of reality and gender. It starts as a gritty British gangster movie and then, after a homoeroticly charged fight and killing, veers off into a exploration identity, gender and performance. James Fox is the gangster on the run who finds shelter with Mick Jagger and Anita Pallenberg. Jagger is a musician looking for his lost demon/muse who pulls Fox into a radical self-examination of who he is.

If... (Criterion Collection)


The movie that introduced us to Malcolm McDowell in a look at the British private school as a microcosm of the brutally conformist society at large with McDowell as a anarchic rebel. Like Performance this movie blurs the line between fantasy and reality and never gives you a definitive answer to which is which.

Blow Up

A look at swinging London in the 60’s and a murder mystery or is it? David Hemmings stars, as a fashion photographer who may, or may not, photographed a murder. A deceptively leisurely paced but totally sucks you into it’s world.

Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy

OK this one is pure fantasy. A very fun and quintessentially ‘60s fantasy of space ace Barbarella played by Jane Fonda. You have drugs, sex and angels, what’s not to like?

Vanishing Point

The perfect nihilist road movie. A super charged Dodge Challenger, a handful of speed, and fifteen hours to get to L.A. The hero, played by Barry Newman, is doomed from the start and there is no real reason but amphetamine fuelled monomania for the chase. For a veteran street racer like myself it’s the perfect movie.