100 Must See Movies For Men
For whatever reason (most likely the fact that viewing is easier than reading), films don’t seem to garner the same kind of cultural respect as books do. Which is a shame because excellent movies can be just as entertaining, mind-expanding, and life-changing as good books. Scenes, characters, and quotes from the greatest movies stay with us long after we view them.
And for better and for worse, film has had a huge impact on masculinity in the 20th century. Movies have produced archetypes of manliness that many men judge themselves against today. To view how male characters of cinema have been portrayed over the decades, is to see clearly the ways in which our perception of masculinity has changed and continues to change. Thus it seemed only proper that the I take a stab at creating a list of essential movies every man should see.
I didn’t want to make a bro-y list, in which the movies were selected based on their amount of titillating sex and explosive violence. Nor did I want to create a high-brow list consisting solely of independent avant-garde movies that, while culturally or cinematically significant, aren’t very entertaining. I wanted to create a well-rounded list of films that have something to say about manliness. Some of the movies speak poignantly about what it means to be a man. Others give examples of true manliness in action (like the best war movies). Some are lessons in how not to be a man. And others are simply entertaining movies that are just plain virile. But the common thread that runs through all of them is that they’re great movies that have stood the test of time.
And for better and for worse, film has had a huge impact on masculinity in the 20th century. Movies have produced archetypes of manliness that many men judge themselves against today. To view how male characters of cinema have been portrayed over the decades, is to see clearly the ways in which our perception of masculinity has changed and continues to change. Thus it seemed only proper that the I take a stab at creating a list of essential movies every man should see.
I didn’t want to make a bro-y list, in which the movies were selected based on their amount of titillating sex and explosive violence. Nor did I want to create a high-brow list consisting solely of independent avant-garde movies that, while culturally or cinematically significant, aren’t very entertaining. I wanted to create a well-rounded list of films that have something to say about manliness. Some of the movies speak poignantly about what it means to be a man. Others give examples of true manliness in action (like the best war movies). Some are lessons in how not to be a man. And others are simply entertaining movies that are just plain virile. But the common thread that runs through all of them is that they’re great movies that have stood the test of time.
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- DirectorJohn SturgesStarsSteve McQueenJames GarnerRichard AttenboroughAllied prisoners of war plan for several hundred of their number to escape from a German camp during World War II.This group of Allied POWS fought the enemy the best way they could – by bustin’ out of prison. Based on a true story, the film has been hailed as one the greatest escape movies of all time. Despite its length (172 minutes), the movie maintains interest through the engaging relationships of the prisoners. Each individual contributes their skills and personality to the effort, even the self-interested American (played by Steve McQueen). I guess his skill would be making killer motorcycle chase scenes.
Best line: “I’m going . . . out.” - DirectorGeorge Roy HillStarsPaul NewmanRobert RedfordKatharine RossIn 1890s Wyoming, Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid lead a band of outlaws. When a train robbery goes wrong, they find themselves on the run with a posse hard on their heels. After considering their options, they escape to South America.Based loosely on the real lives of Western outlaws Robert Leroy Parker (aka Butch Cassidy) and Harry Longabaugh (aka the Sundance Kid), Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid is a classic movie about two buddies trying to make it in a changing world. What’s funny about Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is that you forget that these guys were hardened criminals who robbed banks and trains for a living. The easy going charm Robert Redford and Paul Newman bring to their roles makes you like the characters despite their choice of profession. Their clever hijinks and humor make the movie an enjoyable ride.
- DirectorBruce BrownStarsRobert AugustMichael HynsonLord James BlearsThe crown jewel to ten years of Bruce Brown surfing documentaries. Brown follows two young surfers around the world in search of the perfect wave, and ends up finding quite a few in addition to some colorful local characters.Working 60 hours a week sucks. I mean, it really sucks. The idea of travelling around the world to exotic spots with the simple objective of surfing every chance you get is about the most enticing thing on the planet. In step Mike Hynson and Robert August. Famed documentary director Bruce Brown follows the pair around the world as they chase the summer and whatever waves they can ride. If you can’t surf, or you can’t take the time off work to surf — live vicariously through this movie.
- DirectorRon SheltonStarsKevin CostnerSusan SarandonTim RobbinsA fan who has an affair with one minor-league baseball player each season meets an up-and-coming pitcher and the experienced catcher assigned to him.This movie is great for many reasons — of which, I cite two: 1) Kevin Costner can actually play baseball, instead of looking like a moron as do many other actors trying to swing a bat. 2) Tim Robbins character wears lingerie when he pitches — which is completely classic. Besides these, there are many other elements that make the movie relevant: the mentor/mentee, the old vs. the young, fighting for the woman, baseball. But ultimately it’s about a bunch of guys trying to make their mark on life — which we can all certainly relate to.
Best line: “Charlie, here comes the deuce. And when you speak of me, speak well.” - DirectorDon SiegelClint EastwoodStarsClint EastwoodAndrew RobinsonHarry GuardinoWhen a man calling himself "the Scorpio Killer" menaces San Francisco, tough-as-nails Police Inspector "Dirty" Harry Callahan is assigned to track down the crazed psychopath.Cops that won’t let anything — even the law — stand in their way of catching the bad guy may have become a Hollywood cliché, but when Dirty Harry first pulled out his .44 magnum it was a brand new story. Harry Callahan stops at nothing as he hunts down the Scorpio, a serial killer that picks people off with a sniper rifle. The plot is okay, but it’s Clint Eastwood that drives the entire picture. His rebel good- guy cop set a high mark for others to try and follow.
Best line: “You’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya, punk?” - DirectorPaul Thomas AndersonStarsDaniel Day-LewisPaul DanoCiarán HindsA story of family, religion, hatred, oil and madness, focusing on a turn-of-the-century prospector in the early days of the business.There Will Be Blood is a character study in what happens to a man who becomes ruthlessly consumed with besting his fellow man, with winning at all costs. Daniel Day-Lewis, in what may be his best performance, at first garners the audience’s sympathy and admiration, only to invite their repugnance as he loses his humanity in the pursuit of ambition. The movie’s ending is grim and grisly, and the shock blast the film creates around the themes of greed, religion, and family will embed thought-provoking, long-lasting shrapnel in your brain.
Best line: “I’ve got a competition in me.” - DirectorDon SiegelStarsJohn WayneLauren BacallRon HowardA dying gunfighter spends his last days looking for a way to die with a minimum of pain and a maximum of dignity.Nobody wants to die alone. Especially gunslingers. In a haunting portrayal that foreshadowed his own fate, John Wayne plays J.B. Brooks, an aging gunfighter dying of cancer who resigns himself to live out his days in private. But skeletons from his past prevent him from fading away, so he decides to go down the only way he knows — with his six gun blazing.
Best line: “I won’t be wronged. I won’t be insulted. I won’t be laid a-hand on. I don’t do these things to other people, and I require the same from them.” - DirectorDavid AnspaughStarsGene HackmanBarbara HersheyDennis HopperA coach with a checkered past and a local drunk train a small-town high school basketball team to become a top contender for the state championship in 1950s Indiana.At its core, Hoosiers is about redemption — basketball is just the vehicle. The story revolves around a basketball coach that has fallen from grace and finds himself at a small rural town in Indiana. He ruffles feathers and fights to earn the respect of his players, the town, and a doubtful teacher. The team chases glory, while others in the town remember what it is like to win. Not only is it one of the most inspiring movies of all time, it has one of the most hardcore stoics in all of sport movie history. Jimmy = Clutch.
Best line: “You know, most people would kill . . . to be treated like a god, just for a few moments.” - DirectorMichael MannStarsDaniel Day-LewisMadeleine StoweRussell MeansThree trappers protect the daughters of a British Colonel in the midst of the French and Indian War.This movie set the standard for war epics of the modern era. Few are its equal. A Mohican father and his son, along with their adopted son, attempt to maintain their neutrality amidst the French-Indian War in colonial America. The men are pulled into the fray after rescuing two daughters of a British Officer during a skirmish and escorting them to their father’s fort. As the impending battle builds around them, the men remain devoted to the daughters, going to great lengths to preserve them. From the opening sequence of Uncas and Hawkeye sprinting through the dense forest, to the final scene on the promontory, the movie is gripping and powerful.
Best line: “Someday I think you and I are going to have a serious disagreement.” - DirectorVittorio De SicaStarsLamberto MaggioraniEnzo StaiolaLianella CarellIn post-war Italy, a working-class man's bicycle is stolen, endangering his efforts to find work. He and his son set out to find it.An Italian Neo-Realist classic, The Bicycle Thief tells the bleak story of a man in impoverished post-war Italy whose bicycle, which he needs to work, is stolen. Father and son hunt all over Rome to find the bike, with no one to help them and ultimately no success. And thus the father is faced with a classic philosophical problem: is it okay to steal to feed your family? Realistic and honest, this movie provides one of the best glimpses into the nature of the father/son relationship.
Best line: “Why should I kill myself worrying when I’ll end up just as dead?” - DirectorAlfred HitchcockStarsCary GrantEva Marie SaintJames MasonA New York City advertising executive goes on the run after being mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and falls for a woman whose loyalties he begins to doubt.Starring dapper dude Cary Grant, North by Northwest is classic Alfred Hitchcock. Grant plays a hapless New York advertising executive mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and is pursued across the country while he looks for a way to survive. The problem is the government thinks he’s a spy, too, and they’re on the chase as well. Talk about a bad day.
- DirectorPhil Alden RobinsonStarsKevin CostnerJames Earl JonesRay LiottaIowa farmer Ray Kinsella is inspired by a voice he can't ignore to pursue a dream he can hardly believe. Supported by his wife, Ray begins the quest by turning his ordinary cornfield into a place where dreams can come true.To what lengths would a person go for a chance at reconciliation? If it is for your (dead) father, most of us would do anything. Field of Dreams is Ray Kinsellas’s journey of reparation with his father. Ray, an Iowa farmer, erects a baseball field in his cornfield after a voice tells him, “If you build it, he will come.” The voice continues, and after a series of mysterious and supernatural events, he is able to make amends. It is quite possible that a game of catch can heal most wounds between a father and son — even death, I suppose.
Best line: “If you build it, he will come.” - DirectorFrancis Ford CoppolaStarsC. Thomas HowellMatt DillonRalph MacchioIn a small Oklahoma town in 1964, the rivalry between two gangs, the poor Greasers and the rich Socs, heats up when one gang member accidentally kills a member of the other.The film adaption of SE Hinton’s famous novel perfectly captures the tumultuous nature of teenage angst. The well-to-do Socs and blue collar Greasers hate each other’s guts, and when Johnny the Greaser kills a Soc, a series of dramatic and tragic events are set in motion, including an old fashioned rumble. The film is a star-studded affair, filled with the likes of Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Matt Dillon, Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Ralph Macchio, and Diane Lane, many before they were household names. And best of all, it was shot on location in my home city of Tulsa.
Best line: “Stay gold, Ponyboy, stay gold.” - DirectorJohn FrankenheimerStarsFrank SinatraLaurence HarveyJanet LeighAn American POW in the Korean War is brainwashed as an unwitting assassin for an international Communist conspiracy.A Cold War classic starring Frank Sinatra in probably his best movie performance. The film was so controversial that it was banned from further release after JFK’s assassination. The Manchurian Candidate focuses on the way in which propaganda and the manufacture of political views can influence one’s perception and behavior in the most provocative of ways. The story follows several former Korean War soldiers who have been brainwashed by the military. Follow them as they try to unravel the source of the reoccurring nightmares. A real thriller.
Best line: “There are two kinds of people in this world: Those that enter a room and turn the television set on, and those that enter a room and turn the television set off.” - DirectorTed KotcheffStarsSylvester StalloneBrian DennehyRichard CrennaA veteran Green Beret is forced by a cruel Sheriff and his deputies to flee into the mountains and wage an escalating one-man war against his pursuers.The more weighty issues in First Blood are usually overshadowed by the gratuitous action. Understandably so, but the movie is built on Rambo’s struggle to return to society after the Vietnam War. A Medal of Honor recipient, Rambo is kicked out of a small town and then arrested for vagrancy. The sheriff and his deputies go overboard with torture and Rambo reverts back to what he does best. Nothing good can come from pissing off a guy named Rambo.
Best line: “They drew first blood, not me.” - DirectorNorman JewisonStarsSidney PoitierRod SteigerWarren OatesA black Philadelphia police detective is mistakenly suspected of a local murder while passing through a racially hostile Mississippi town, and after being cleared is reluctantly asked by the police chief to investigate the case.Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier), a respected detective from up north, is thrown into a murder investigation in the small town of Sparta, Mississippi. While he initially doesn’t want any part of the case, Tibbs exemplifies manly resolve as he sticks around, staring down bigot after bigot while searching for the murderer. The film is famous for a scene in which Tibbs, after being slapped by a white man, slaps him right back. The screenplay originally called for Poitier to simply take it, but the actor found this passive response degrading and insisted he be allowed to hit back. That my friends, is being a man. You slap me in the face, I’ll slap you right back, Sucka.
Best line: “They call me MISTER Tibbs!” - DirectorGeorge StevensStarsAlan LaddJean ArthurVan HeflinAn ex-gunfighter defends homesteaders in 1889 Wyoming.A quiet gunslinger who is trying to escape his past befriends a pioneer family that has settled out west. He attempts to settle down and become a hired hand to the family, but the ranchers who want to drive cattle through the homesteaders’ property are attempting to drive them out. Shane tries to stay out of the disputes, but keeps being drawn in and is finally compelled to put his six shooter back on to protect his adoptive family. Perhaps the most touching part of the movie is the relationship Shane develops with the farmer’s son.
- DirectorBilly WilderStarsFred MacMurrayBarbara StanwyckEdward G. RobinsonA Los Angeles insurance representative lets an alluring housewife seduce him into a scheme of insurance fraud and murder that arouses the suspicion of his colleague, an insurance investigator.Perhaps the greatest American contribution to the noir style, Double Indemnity is dark rumination on greed, manipulation, and betrayal. Barbara Stanwyck plays a classic femme fatale who uses her womanly wiles to lure insurance salesman Walter Neff into a plan to kill her husband for the “double indemnity” payout. But Neff is not a guileless victim after all. Palatable tension, suspense, and snappy dialogue make this film a true classic.
Best line: “How could I have known that murder could sometimes smell like honeysuckle?” - DirectorAlejandro AmenábarStarsJavier BardemBelén RuedaLola DueñasThe factual story of Spaniard Ramon Sampedro, who fought a 28-year campaign in favor of euthanasia and his own right to die.Politics of euthanasia aside, living is so much more than just breathing. Based on the life of Ramón Sampedro, the movie examines the fight to end his own life after 30 years of being paralyzed from the neck down. Despite his desire to end his life, through his courage and self awareness, he inspired others to embrace their own.
- DirectorJohn HustonStarsHumphrey BogartMary AstorGladys GeorgeSan Francisco private detective Sam Spade takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals, a gorgeous liar and their quest for a priceless statuette, with the stakes rising after his partner is murdered.The Maltese Falcon is filled with ambiguities in morality. Sam Spade, played by Humphrey Bogart, is a hardened and cynical man. But underneath his rough exterior is a man with a sense of idealism. Spade lives by a code of honor that doesn’t let him take the corrupt and easy solution to life’s problems. The Maltese Falcon forces us to answer a simple question: when push comes to shove, will we stick to our own code of honor or will we sell out?
Best line: “[It’s the] stuff that dreams are made of.” - DirectorWolfgang PetersenStarsJürgen ProchnowHerbert GrönemeyerKlaus WennemannA German U-boat stalks the frigid waters of the North Atlantic as its young crew experience the sheer terror and claustrophobic life of a submariner in World War II.Das Boot puts you inside a stranded and submered German U-Boat and explores the physical and emotional tensions of the situation with a vivid, terrifying realism. Holding it all together, under harrowing conditions, is a single man. The captain is a scruffy, mildly cynical, bastion of strength. He deals calmly with almost any situation, drawing on a seemingly unlimited store of courage.
Best line: “You have to have good men. Good men, all of them.” - DirectorGeorge LucasStarsMark HamillHarrison FordCarrie FisherLuke Skywalker joins forces with a Jedi Knight, a cocky pilot, a Wookiee and two droids to save the galaxy from the Empire's world-destroying battle station, while also attempting to rescue Princess Leia from the mysterious Darth Vader.Star Wars-The Original Trilogy. The reason Star Wars became a cultural phenomenon wasn’t because of the special effects. It was the story. Star Wars simply put a futuristic spin on the archetypal story of heroic good vs. evil that men have been telling around fires for millennia. Stick with the original trilogy. They’re still the best. Mainly because manly man Han Solo is in it. If CGI effects was all it took to make a good movie, then we would have all loved Jar Jar Binks.
Best line: “I am your father.” - DirectorDavid AnspaughStarsSean AstinJon FavreauNed BeattyRudy has always been told that he was too small to play college football. But he is determined to overcome the odds and fulfill his dream of playing for Notre Dame.Rudy, a scrappy blue collar kid, has a dream of playing football with the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. While Rudy wasn’t blessed with the talent or the body to be a star athlete, he’s a got a lot of heart and determination. When you’re feeling like the underdog in life, just plop down and watch Rudy. You’ll be ready to “Play Like a Champion” afterwards.
- DirectorFred ZinnemannStarsGary CooperGrace KellyThomas MitchellA town Marshal, despite the disagreements of his newlywed bride and the townspeople around him, must face a gang of deadly killers alone at "high noon" when the gang leader, an outlaw he "sent up" years ago, arrives on the noon train.High Noon is film about being torn between duty, love and standing up for what you believe in, even when everyone else abandons you. Gary Cooper plays Will Kane, a town marshal from New Mexico, who settles down with his pacifist Quaker wife (played by Grace Kelly, one of your grandpa’s babes). Kane plans to retire to a peaceful life are interrupted after he gets word that a former gunslinger is coming in on the noon train to settle an old score with him. His wife pleads with him to leave town, but Kane knows he can’t. He has a duty to defend the town and his honor. Will finds himself alone in the battle as everyone in town, including his deputy sheriff, have turned away from him. The tension builds, leading up to the final gun battle.
Best line: “Don’t shove me Harv. I’m tired of being shoved.” - DirectorRichard AttenboroughStarsBen KingsleyJohn GielgudRohini HattangadiThe life of the lawyer who became the famed leader of the Indian revolts against the British rule through his philosophy of nonviolent protest.It is impossible to capture the life of any man in one film, much less the life of a man who saw and did as much as Mahatma Gandhi. Thus the filmmakers who tried to capture his life on the silver screen sought not to give a blow by blow account of Gandhi’s life, but instead to capture his spirit in what they did show. The film begins with Gandhi’s assassination and then starts the retrospective of his life, beginning with his being thrown off a train for being Indian, and through his non-violent efforts to win Indians their rights and then their independence. One man truly can free an entire nation, if not change the entire world.
Best line: “They may torture my body, break my bones, even kill me, then they will have my dead body. NOT MY OBEDIENCE!”