I thought I’d give this here Substack Live feature a try. I’ve been subscribing to Max’s newsletter for a while now, and always find his writing fun to read and full of new ideas, not to mention good movie recommendations. I’d never had the chance to actually meet him, and this seemed like as good an occasion as any.
He just wrote a post about the recent New York Times Top 100 Movies of the 21st Century, which is an amalgamation of various renowned people’s top 10 lists. To be frank, Max knows way more movies than I do. Like I had only seen one of the movies on his top ten (Spike Lee’s Inside Man). But he acknowledged that his list was leaning way into his film snobbery, and doing it on purpose because honestly lists like that are less obvious and more interesting. His post then prescribed an approach to making a less “annoying” list that more properly balances the predictable consensus with subjective affection by dividing it into three categories: Obvious Choices, Outside Chances, and Personal Favorites. Inspired, I made a top ten list of my own as he suggested.
Talking about these movies led us to talking about all kinds of things from tech to politics to history to parenthood. Here’s my list:
Obvious Choices
The Martian
Pan’s Labyrinth
Outside Chances
Lincoln
Wall-E
The Wind Rises
Fruitvale Station
Personal Favorites
Sinners
Encanto
The Ladykillers
The Social Dilemma
Thanks to Max. Thanks to the people who listened to us live. And I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did. 🔴
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