I’ve been in a bit of a sour mood of late and I’ve been thinking about “celebrating” it by having an “I hate my job/life” film festival. So far the only movies that I can think of are:
Office Space
Fight Club
American Beauty
9 To 5
Anybody know of any others?
Clockwatchers
Better off Dead
Falling Down
I think High Fidelity fits here. While Rob (John Cuzack) loves music and records, he is cynical and pessimistic about his long-term career prospects.
Oh, yeah – another one – Take This Job and Shove It!
Clerks
Brazil
The first part of Joe vs the Volcano
My favorite, “Withnail & I”.
The Conversation (Gene Hackman’s depressed wiretapper)
Serpico
The Sweet Smell of Success
Klute (hell, any movie about the sex industry – Showgirls, Hardcore, etc.)
The Deer Hunter
Dead Ringers – Cronenberg’s ick-fest about drug-addicted twin gynecologists unhappy in love & in their profession.
Ikiru – dying bureaucrat tries to salvage a shred of meaning at the end.
Ran – another of Kurosawa’s; “King Lear” with great battle scenes. Lots of pointless misery all around.
Dark Star – John Carpenter’s student/first flick. Hilarious, spotty zero-budget sci-fi about some guys cooped up together in a spaceship with a beachball alien. The classic “guys spending too much time together & getting sick of each other” flick. Especially after they accidentally jettison their supply of toilet paper… And the metaphysics argument with the sentient nuclear bomb that won’t follow orders? Classic.
Das Boot – Peterson’s German U-boat men, similarly miserable.
Angels & Insects – class & sexual humiliation, both.
the original “Bedazzled” – see above.
Just about any pro-union, working-class story.
'Night, Mother – Sissy Spacek tidies house and explains to her mother why she’s going to kill herself that night – and then she does it. One of the most depressing movies ever.
Carrington; The Bell Jar – more female suicide/attempt stories, both based on true stories, but without the class angle you may be looking for.
The Rapture – alienated, nympho telemarketer becomes religious fanatic; sacrifices daughter, sees The Apocalypse. [moral of Michael Tolken’s tale: don’t take up telemarketing?]
And a few by that maestro of misery, that Alpha-male of anhedonia, Woody Allen:
Interiors (almost everyone’s discontented & one commits suicide)
Stardust Memories (self-loathing Fellini-esque director)
Bananas (Fielding Mellish escapes corporate hell by joining a Latin American rebellion)
Manhattan (W. Allen quits his lucrative job in TV)
Anybody remember the name of that Jean Reno film where he’s a depressed assassin?
The Professional?
Trainspotting and Sid and Nancy for insight into the lives of heroin addcits.
What’s Eating Gilbert Grape is a sort of sucks-to-be-me story, but it’s ultimately hopeful.
Yep, that’s it. Thanks!
A few more (hey, misery loves company!)
Brief Encounter – bored, unloved housewife meets wonderful man, loses him to a job transfer to New Zealand.
The Paper Chase – law school is hell
The Graduate – what to do after Princeton? Plastics? Nothing!
The Hospital – George C. Scott as a beleaguered doctor/administrator in an urban hospital in the socio-economic crosshairs. Squaring off against Rommel in “Patton” was considerably easier than this.
A Shock to the System – middle-aged executive (Michael Caine) is primed to get the shaft, so he decides to fight back, committing a few felonies along the way… A low-key black comedy of sorts.
Repo Man – being an unemployed L.A. punk kid sucks. So does working as a repo man. Transcendence is an Eldorado with a dead alien in the trunk…
The Handmaid’s Tale – post-Apocalyptic coerced servitude as a surrogate mother – yecch!
Seconds – Cassavettes’ sci-fi noir of a man who pays a fortune for a new identity (and body), then learns that self-improvement doesn’t come as easily as that.
Midnight Express – Just say no. Especially when in Turkey.
Johnny Got His Gun – soldier suffers the worst fate imaginable.
Working Girl (you know with Melanie Griffith as the beleagured secretary and Sigourney Weaver as the Evil Boss).
Here’s an old suggestion:
It’s a Gift (1934) - W.C. Fields is a hapless grocery store owner who’s constantly besieged by his family, annoying customers, insurance salesmen, and destructive toddlers.
For more recent choices, I pick Swimming with Sharks and Glengarry Glen Ross: Sartre’s concept of Hell being other people in the workplace.
Blue Collar - underappreciated tale of auto workers
Teachers - not great but it has its moments
North Dallas Forty - cynical pro football reality
Wages Of Fear/Sorcerer - men willing to do anything to get out
Big Deal On Madonna Street/Crackers - ne’er-do-wells try to become thieves
Busting - cops hate their jobs/lives
Vanishing Point - nihilism on the road
Fat City - lowlife wannabe boxers
The Horse’s Mouth - an aging artist tries to show he still has something to say
The Scrivener, didn’t John Frankenheimer direct Seconds, not Cassavettes? But it is still a great film.
Eegad, you’re right, Widdershins.
How about a Jack Lemmon triple feature: The Apartment, Save the Tiger and the already-mentioned Glengarry Glen Ross?
Also, Taxi Driver, Silkwood and Matewan.