Paul's Favourites
The 7th Arts's highest level of achievement can be judged alongside great literature, great music, and great painting, with many filmmakers creating enduring masterpieces.
The list of film titles below may not all be enduring masterpieces, but I have however, fond lingering memories of all of them. They all fit the criteria of what I feel films can or should do, to not only be well crafted, but also to entertain, inform, enlighten and more often than not, take the viewer down roads less travelled...
Can only hope you also will discover or rediscover some viewing pleasures among my all-time favourites' listed below.
Blue Velvet (1986)
7.8/10
Director: David Lynch
Starring: Laura Dern, Dennis Hopper, Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dean Stockwell
The most talked about film of the '80s, David Lynch's controversial, surreal mystery is set amid the manicured lawns of small town America where a wor... Read more
Betty Blue (Blu-ray) (1986)
7.4/10
Director: Jean-Jacques Beineix
Starring: Beatrice Dalle, Gerard Darmon, Jean-Hugues Anglade
Jean-Jacques Beineix has restored 62 minutes to his romantic masterpiece ('Version Integrale') expanding the adventures of Betty and Zorg. There are s... Read more
Betty Blue (1986)
7.4/10
Director: Jean-Jacques Beineix
Starring: Beatrice Dalle, Gerard Darmon, Jean-Hugues Anglade
Jean-Jacques Beineix has restored 62 minutes to his romantic masterpiece ('Version Integrale') expanding the adventures of Betty and Zorg. There are s... Read more
The Mosquito Coast (1986)
6.6/10
Director: Peter Weir
Starring: Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, River Phoenix, Conrad Roberts, Andre Gregory, Marth...
Director Peter Weir ('Witness') re-teams with Harrison Ford as they tackle Paul Theroux`s novel of an obsessive American inventor who transplants his... Read more
Jean de Florette (1986)
8.1/10
Director: Claude Berri
Starring: Yves Montand, Gerard Depardieu, Daniel Auteuil
A marvelous tale of greed and intolerance from the novel by Marcel Pagnol about a city hunchback who inherits a valuable piece of property in rural Fr... Read more
The Fly (1986)
7.5/10
Director: David Cronenberg
Starring: Jeff Goldblum, Geena Davis, John Getz
Cronenberg's 'The Fly' is less a remake of the original film than a remake of the original short story about a brilliant scientist who develops a syst... Read more
Re-Animator (1985)
7.2/10
Director: Stuart Gordon
Starring: Bruce Abbott, Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, David Gale, Robert Sampson
This stylishly grotesque and gory filming of H.P. Lovecraft's 'Herbert West, Re-Animator' hits the mark, as we follow a brilliant young medical studen... Read more
Come and See (1985)
8.2/10
Director: Elem Klimov
Starring: Alexei Kravchenko, Olga Mironova, Vladas Bagdonas
The thoroughly mesmerising chronicle of the initiation of a young teen (impressively played by Alexei Kravchenko) into the horror and insanity of war,... Read more
Brazil (1985)
8/10
Director: Terry Gilliam
Starring: Jonathan Pryce, Robert De Niro, Kim Greist, Katherine Helmond, Ian Holm, Bob Hos...
Terry Gilliam's acclaimed, surrealistic nightmare vision of a 'perfect' future where technology reigns supreme. Spectacular set design, this wildly vi... Read more
Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985)
7/10
Director: Tim Burton
Starring: Paul Reubens, Elizabeth Daily, Mark Holton
You want some fresh air? Here it is! Pee-wee Herman goes on an adventure to recover his most important possession - a bicycle stolen by some nasties.... Read more