Your most inspiring movies

Cafe Society
1

This might not be an original thread but a fresh thread is easier to read. :smiley: My short list:

The Right Stuff
Rocky IV
Chaplin
Dead Poets Society
Chariots of Fire
The Agony and the Ecstasy
My Fair Lady
Man for all Seasons
Cyrano De Bergerac
The Fountainhead

I wish they’s make a movie about:

Henry Ford
George Washington
Harold Geneen
Captain Gilbert Hoover
Tameichi Hara
Hiroo Onoda
Tamerlane
Belisarius
The Graff Spee

They blew it:

Joseph Kennedy Jr.
Howard Hughes (The Aviator)
Abe Lincoln
The Babe
Genghis Khan
Cobb

2

Rocky IV? Not so much. Rocky I and II felt real, not Hollywood, and I found them inspiring; they weren’t just about boxing big, badass enemies, they were about Rocky struggling against his own insecurities and trying to find a balance between being a professional prizefighter and a devoted, considerate husband.

3

That certainly is a list.

4

Would the movie accurately depict him as a rabid antisemite who published The Protocols in the papers he owned? Would it show how much he despised unions?

My List

Mystery Men

A bunch of second string superheroes find themselves called on to save the day.

Lucas

An ubernerd struggles with acceptance in high school.

5

too late to edit

Re Cyrano

I regard him as a coward and a fool. He’s very brave when it comes to swords and guns. But when it comes to the one thing that really matters- telling his feelings to the woman he loves- fear makes him hold back. He also assumes that she could never love him based solely on his own fears.

6

A Man for All Seasons became considerably less inspiring to me when I found out that Thomas More sent plenty of people to the stake for seeing this God business differently than he did.

7

Modern Times, Charlie Chaplin’s masterpiece.

The definitive movie about poor people struggling to maintain their dignity against abusive government and industry. If it’s not inspiring, nothing is.

Funny, too. If you haven’t watched it, you should.

8

Just had to pop in here and second this nomination. Kinda like a Rocky IV moment for SPQR (or Rocky IX or Rocky XXIV or, never mind…)

9

Inherit the Wind
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Fountainhead
Mr. Holland’s Opus
The Corn Is Green
Les Misérables
Cyrano de Bergerac
Dead Poets Society
How Green Was My Valley
A Beautiful Mind

10

Rocky IV???

[head explodes]

11

2001: A Space Odyssey.
Day of the Jackal.
Citizen Kane.
Casablanca.
Last of the Mohicans.
Gettysburg.

A good movie…but strangely uninspiring. He could easily have saved himself all the trouble by kissing the King’s ass like everyone else has to do. God doesn’t demand martyrdom. And, yeah, what you said: More wasn’t much better than the King.

12

I agree . . . but otherwise, the story would be very short and boring. Still, I consider him a flawed hero, rather than a coward. And anyone who goes through life with an obvious deformity would realistically assume that no beautiful woman would ever love him.

13

A Night at the Opera
Patton
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
To Kill a Mockingbird

14

Rudy

Braveheart

Atlas Shrugged

15

The Karate Kid (1984) - everything about this movie is great.

16

Fargo. The goodness of Marge Gunderson, in the face of so much greed and cruelty, always makes me feel optimistic. You betcha.

17

I never understood what’s so inspiring about that movie- it’s ultimately the story of a loser, who through dogged pathetic-ness, gets thrown a bone in garbage time at the end of a blowout.

He didn’t make the team, he didn’t actually work his way into playing or anything of the sort- they basically felt sorry for him like they do the special-needs kids who they let score touchdowns at the end of the game in some horrid blowout.

Except that Rudy wasn’t a special needs person, which makes him all the more pathetic.

I prefer movies where the protagonist actually accomplishes something through grit and persistence, not ones where the gritty and persistent guy fails miserably and just gets thrown a sympathy down.

18

I always liked The Verdict, in which a down-on-his-luck ambulance chaser pulls himself together and wins the impossible case.

Also liked The Best of Times, which is similar.

I wish they’d make a movie about Lord Horatio Nelson, but his life was so over-the-top that I wonder if anyone would believe it.

19

“Notre Dame is for rich kids. Smart kids.” An old timer telling that to a college hopeful. What could be more brutal?

20

His only failure was with his son. He disliked Jews remotely; borne of the usual media stereotype. In reality, he got along well with every Jew he knew.