My Desert Island DVDs

Fandango Groovers Movie Blog put out the call - send me your weak, your tired, your Desert Island DVDs. Eight of them to be exact. I am heeding that call. Additionally, he's asked me to include this link, so I done did that, too. Here's the setup, followed by my picks:

"The idea is a variation on the radio program Desert Island Discs: For those who don’t know the show has been running on the BBC for nearly 70 years. Guests are invited to imagine themselves cast away on a desert island with only eight pieces of music to listen to. Being a movie blog obviously we are having a twist on the idea. Simply pick the eight DVDs that if you were stranded on a desert island (don’t ask how you would play them) you could happily watch over and over again. For some people this will be their favourite movies for others it will be subtly different."

Ok. I'm on a desert island. I can take eight DVDs. For starters, I'm going with known quantities; sure, it might be noble to take a "classic" that I've never seen along for the journey - a chance to broaden my horizons, learn something, all that jazz. No way. It I hate it, or even vaguely dislike it, I'll be regretting said decision for my own personal eternity. So I've seen everything here, and in most cases, more than a few times. More than anything, these choices will make me eternally happy, and that's more important than anything else.

So I'm taking one of my all-time favorites; a film that, depending on the date and time, fills one of the top three spots in my list. The other two are Pulp Fiction and Fight Club, but a) I've seen them enough times that I can recall them at will, and b) they aren't tremendously deep. Well, Fight Club might be, but I've read the book as well, so I've gleaned as much of the meaning as I'm probably going to. Instead, I'm taking Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I know, original choice. It'll likely be on at least half of the participants' lists. I care not. I've purposefully limited my viewing of it in the six years since its release so as not to tire of it and retain some of the joy that's renewed upon each viewing. As a bonus, it's lengthy (sure to be a recurring theme for this list; given the choice of an 85-minute movie I love and a 140-minute one, I'm taking the latter).

Being on this island with not much to do besides swim, run around, build shelters, and whatnot, I'm sure I'll be in good shape bodily in no time. But what of the mind? This next section is intended just for that. I'll take along 2001: A Space Odyssey for its beauty, its length, its brain-altering content, its "How'd they do that?" special effects - the whole shebang. Additionally, I'm bringing two true mind-benders; Chris Nolan's breakout hit Memento, whose DVD houses not only a great movie but enough material on the menus to keep me busy for some time (double bonus: I can watch the movie in chronological order, which will make it seem as though I'm watching a different flick), and Shane Carruth's 2004 time travel thriller Primer, which I've seen just once, but already know I need to see about 100 more times before I fully comprehend it (and even that might not do the trick).

Of course, I will need to laugh while stranded, sans friends or family, on this island. I'll be stuck in a place with no entertainment to speak of, no one to talk to, basically nothing of interest to do (aside from movie watching, of course). In other words, my existence will be rote and monotonous for the most part. How meta of me, then, to choose Groundhog Day. I'm sure I'll take intense pleasure at watching someone else live the same 24 hours over and over again, though I suppose in this case, the end will now be a tad depressing, since Phil Conners will escape his prison and I won't be so lucky. Still, all I have to do is re-start it and he's back in jail with me. Who else could go for some flapjacks?

I'm cheating a little with my next pick, though not as bad as I had originally planned on. I'm taking a TV show. I was going to say that I would take the entire first season of Arrested Development with me (only chosen over the latter seasons due to more episodes), but that was going too far, since the package is comprised of three discs. No fair. Instead, I'll make myself a custom DVD, jamming on as many 22-minute episodes as I can onto a single DVD. If I'm going to be miserable at all on this island, at the very least I know I'll be better off than the Bluths, and no piece of comedy has made me consistently laugh more.

Two left, and they're both wild cards of sorts.

The first is Paul Thomas Anderson's masterpiece Boogie Nights. Why? Why the hell not? It's got it all - drama, comedy, soft-core porn, one of the best casts ever assembled, enough cheeseball (and otherwise) hits from the 70s and 80s to fill at least three CDs, Burt Reynolds - I mean, what more could you want from a movie?

Finally, a movie that I can guarantee will make no one else's list. No, it's not The Room, though that's a tempting option. Instead, it's the critically loathed and commercially ignored Southland Tales. Why on earth am I taking it, you might be asking? That's a very good question, and I'm not even totally sure that I know the answer. I know it intrigues me. I know that it, too, combines elements of action, comedy, and drama - even some sci-fi, too. I know that, of all the things it can be - poorly acted, byzanitinely written, overwrought with not ready for prime-time players - the one thing it never is is boring.

And the last thing I want to be on this desert island is bored.