#10: Starship Poopers
Treehouse of Horror IX
October 25, 1998

When Maggie loses her baby legs and sprouts a crop of writhing tentacles, it’s revealed that Homer isn’t her father at all. The secret truth is that Marge had been abducted and inseminated by Kang, a drooling space octopus.

Marge: I can’t believe it. Jerry Springer didn’t solve our conflict.
Lisa: And now he’s dead.

Hilarious.

#9: Dial “Z” for Zombies
Treehouse of Horror III
October 29, 1992

Bart and Lisa, as have so many children before them, inadvertently raise the dead and unleash a horde of brain-starved zombies on Springfield. Once the undead masses threaten to overtake the town, it’s up to the kids to cast the spell that will send them back to their graves–but not before Homer has a courageous showdown at the book depository.

Aside from being a great Simpsons episode, it’s a lot better than George Romero’s last two Dead movies, too.

#8: Nightmare on Evergreen Terrace
Treehouse of Horror VI
October 29, 1995

It’s a parody of Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street, with Groundskeeper Willie taking the place of Freddy Krueger and killing children in their dreams. Like Krueger, he’s taking revenge on the children of the people who burned him to death; unlike Krueger, he was burned not because he was a child murderer but because nobody really cared when he got set on fire.

It also has the following excellent line from Principal Skinner: “Children, I couldn’t help monitoring your conversation. There’s no mystery about Willie. Why, he simply disappeared. Now, let’s have no more curiosity about this bizarre cover-up.”

#7: The Devil and Homer Simpson
Treehouse of Horror IV
October 28, 1993

#6: Time and Punishment
Treehouse of Horror V
October 30, 1994

This sequence is inspired by Ray Bradbury’s famous short story “A Sound of Thunder.” You know the one; it’s the story that taught us all that if you travel back in time and so much as bend a blade of grass, you will fuck everything up for sure. So don’t do it!

Unfortunately, Homer Simpson is the one traveling through time in this case—an ability he develops after accidentally jamming his hand in a toaster—so, in terms of preserving the timeline as we’ve known it, the outlook is none too good. With each trip into the past, he inadvertently does some measure of damage that changes everything about the world he comes from. At one point he finds himself in a world where Ned Flanders is the unquestioned lord and master of the universe; another time he is an ant-sized Homer plagued by a gargantuan Bart and Lisa.

Each time he finds his reality destroyed, he again travels to the prehistoric past in attempt to set things right. In typical Homer fashion, he fails each time. Once he squashes a bug, once he kills some dinosaurs, and on one particularly memorable occasion he sits down on a fish, squeezing the life out of it and prompting him to deliver one of the greatest lines in the whole history of The Simpsons: “Oh, I wish I wish I hadn’t killed that fish.”

 #5: The Homega Man
Treehouse of Horror VIII
October 26, 1997

Thanks to those cheese eating surrender monkeys the French, a neutron bomb detonates on Springfield, leaving Homer apparently the last man alive. After surveying the corpse-filled town, he proceeds to do many of the things you and I would do if we knew we could behave however we liked without fear of consequences: he sees movies, dances naked in a church, etc.

#4: Terror at 5 1/2 Feet
Treehouse of Horror IV
October 28, 1993

In a parody of what is arguably the most famous episode of The Twilight Zone, Bart sees a monster on the side of his school bus, tearing it apart.

#3: Citizen Kang
Treehouse of Horror VII
October 27, 1996

Though more dated than any other single thing on The Simpsons, tied in as it is to a specific moment in time, “Citizen Kang” is so hilarious that it is every bit as worth watching now as it was when it was timely.

The 1996 Presidential election is only a few days away, and space aliens Kang and Kodos put into motion a sinister plot to take over the world: they abduct candidates Bill Clinton and Bob Dole and assume their identities through bio-duplication!

Personal favorite line, from Kang: “We have reached the limits of what rectal probing can teach us.”

#2: Bart Simpson’s Dracula
Treehouse of Horror IV
October 28, 1993

Mr. Burns is a vampire! Maybe he will bite you and turn you into a vampire! And he has a Super Fun Happy Slide in his house! Watch out for that!

#1: The Shinning
Treehouse of Horror V
October 30, 1994

Oh, holy cow is this one great. As the title would lead you to guess, this segment is a parody of Stanley Kubrick’s classic film version of The Shining. The most impressive thing about this little cartoon is that it manages to hit every pertinent point of the two hour film, distilling it down to its very essence in just seven minutes. But even if you’ve never seen the movie from which this draws its inspiration, there is plenty here for you to enjoy.

The story in a nutshell: Homer is hired on as the winter caretaker for a hotel Mr. Burns owns, and he brings his family with him. The hotel is full of spooks and haints, and they do all they can to make Homer go crazy and kill his family. Adding to the ghosts’ influence is the fact that the hotel is completely devoid of all beer and cable TV, and it’s this more than anything else that pushes Homer over the edge.

And when he goes over the edge, he does so in absolutely marvelous form. Homer’s freakouts are some of the most comical things mankind has yet unleashed upon the world. Homer screams and jibbers while contorting his face and body into positions so bizarre they make me get down on my knees and give thanks to the heavens for the fact that animation exists. He goes from one comical pose to the next, each more hilariously improbable than the last, leaving the viewer laughing so hard he wets not just his pants but the pants of several people nearby.

To be fair, I haven’t loved all of his books. It would be pointless fanboy gushing to say that I did, so I’ll admit that I could do without Cujo and Gerald’s Game and a couple of others. But even when I haven’t loved one of King’s books, I’ve at least found it interesting, and I’ve found all of them to be worth reading at least once.

Movies based on his stuff are another matter entirely. They range from the superb and brilliant to the embarrassingly dreadful (for example, Children of the Corn, which was so awful that it spawned six sequels and is, of course, being remade), with most of the movies falling somewhere in between in the land of the mediocre. Let’s take a look at some of the films that rise above the pack.

#10: The Shawshank Redemption

We’ve all seen The Shawshank Redemption thirty million times thanks to that period of about five years in the 90s when TNT ran the movie every single day. Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins are in prison, Tim Robbins was wrongly convicted, he dreams of escaping and becoming an obvious, hamfisted metaphor for the human spirit, etc.

It’s a good movie, certainly, thanks largely to the performances not just from the two leads but the supporting cast as well. But I’m going to come out and say that it’s not quite so good as everybody thinks it is. That’s right, I said it. It’s overlong and it whacks you over the head so hard with its messages and symbolism that your skull caves in.

If the movie were really only that long, it would have been way higher on the list.

 #9: Creepshow

Creepshow is an anthology picture, telling five stories in the style of the E.C. horror comics of old. Not all the pieces are of equal quality—one segment, “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill,” only features one character, played by King himself, a man of limited acting range—but taken together they average out to be an enjoyable watch. It’s also directed by George A. Romero (who also directed the much less good King adaptation The Dark Half) and features a hell of a cast, including Ed Harris, Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau, Leslie Nielsen, E.G. Marshall and Ted Danson.

#8: The Mist

Frankly, nobody was more surprised than I when The Mist, adapted from a novella-length story in the collection Skeleton Crew, turned out to be so awesome. The story had never been among my favorites, though in the interest of full disclosure I should tell you that virtually every other Stephen King fan with whom I share that tells me I am an idiot. It’s a story of an increasingly panicky group of people trapped in a grocery store and menaced by some distinctly Lovecraftian monsters, which may explain why I didn’t love the story; though this may cost me my credibility as a horror fan, I confess that I have never enjoyed H.P. Lovecraft no matter how hard I’ve tried.

In director Frank Darabont’s hands, the movie not only overcame my reservations but totally annihilated them. It’s a thrilling picture with many moments that are genuinely scary, and is so engaging that it never feels as long as it is (125 minutes). The zombie movie style combination of monsters outside and increasing paranoia and dissent among the people inside makes for one compelling watch.

And just because you’ve read the story, don’t think you know what’s gonna happen.

#7: The Dead Zone

That’s right, long before there was some TV show I couldn’t be bothered to watch, there was actually a movie. Johnny Smith wakes from a coma with the ability to see into the future and a feeling that he’d better use his knowledge to make sure upcoming events go down in a positive way. Part of that means trying to prevent a crazy dickhole from becoming President, and you just know that in a movie like this he’s not going to stop him through grassroots political activism.

Allow me to drop some names on you. Director: David Cronenberg (Scanners, Videodrome, The Fly). Writer: Jeffery Boam (Lethal Weapon 2 and 3, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade). Cast members: Christopher Walken, Tom Skerritt, Martin Sheen. Oh yeah.

#6: The Green Mile

Hmm, a Frank Darabont prison movie, based on a Stephen King story, about a dude who’s been wrongly convicted of a brutal murder. Sounds like this is basically just The Shawshank Redemption again.

And, well, it kind of is. It has a much different plot, and features elements of the supernatural where Shawshank did not, but it suffers from many of the same problems as that earlier film.  Once again it’s metaphors are obvious and hamfisted, once again it’s overlong and it whacks you over the head so hard with its messages and symbolism that your skull caves in. Fortunately, it also has an unimpeachable cast and—perhaps for no better reason than merely my own personal preference—it just plays better.

#5: Stand By Me

Based on King’s novella The Body (found in the Different Seasons collection), Stand By Me is the story of four kids going out to look at a dead dude. But of course that’s just the plot and, as is so often the case when a group of kids get together in a movie to have an adventure, this is really a coming-of-age story, worthy of standing shoulder to shoulder with the best of them. Also, it has a part where a leech gets on a dude’s nutsack, so you’ll want to be sure to tune in for that.

Although the cast is made up of people you’d rather not watch in a movie—you know, people like Corey Feldman, River Phoenix and Wil Wheaton—as the film unfolds you’re drawn into their lives so completely that you start to forget that you hate them (Corey Feldman) or you hate other roles they’ve played (Wil Wheaton) and just believe in these characters. Which I guess means they’re actually very good actors; I only wish they’d brought this level of skill to the table more often.

#4: The Stand

This is the best of all the TV miniseries adaptations of Stephen King books, and it beats the rest by a country mile. It’s got a huge cast and they’re all great, including the stupid guy from Coach, the dad from ALF, the chick from Just Shoot Me, Uncle Martin from My Favorite Martian, Max Headroom from Max Headroom, and Rob Lowe from that sex tape. Plus, you know, Gary Sinise and Molly Ringwald and Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis and Miguel Ferrer and goddamn that’s great.

Shall we run down the plot? Okay: A PLAGUE kills practically everybody, including KAREEM ABDUL-JABBAR. The people left alive are either REGULAR DUDES AND DUDETTES or TOTALLY EVIL. They DREAM accordingly, either of a NICE LADY or a TOTALLY EVIL DUDE. They gather together in two camps and schedule an APOCALYPTIC SHOWDOWN. Plus, at least two characters make passing reference to their DISORDERS OF THE BOWEL.

If you don’t have the time to devote to the four-part miniseries, here’s a video that tells you everything that happens in under three minutes:

#3: Carrie

I’ve reviewed Carrie before, you can find out all there is to know by reading that. Here’s an interesting fact about the movie, though: When they show it on TV, they bleep out the word “shit”, but they show unblurred the graffiti on the wall that reads “Carrie White Eats Shit.” Is written shit less of a problem with the douchebags at the FCC than verbal shit? Another interesting fact is that this is probably Brian De Palma’s best movie, with the other top contender being The Untouchables. I only bring this up because I feel it is my duty to point out, at every opportunity, that people who love Scarface so much are stupid.

Here’s a trailer that pretty much spoils the climax of the movie for you:

#2: Misery

Hey, I’ve reviewed Misery before, too! This is getting easy! A brief recap would be: This is a near-perfect movie from director Rob Reiner, wherein Kathy Bates plays a crazy lady who keeps her favorite author, played by James Caan, prisoner in her house. It’s creepy as hell and even has a scene that makes a hardened horror movie veteran like me turn away from the screen. Bates and Caan carry basically the entire movie by themselves, and neither of them misses a trick. Just awesome.

#1: The Shining

Yes, I know, Stephen King was never happy with Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of his novel, he felt it didn’t deal with the themes that were important to the book. Well, that’s as may be, but this movie still rocks the house down.

Story: A family is snowed in at a spooky haunted hotel, the son is psychic, the mother has horrible teeth, and the father is going more and more crazy with each passing day. The father in question is none other than Jack Nicholson. He’s a man well known for being batshit crazy, and in this movie he’s even crazier than that. Even before he goes crazy you wouldn’t be surprised if he leaned over and whispered in your ear “I shot three archbishops with a nail gun today.” And it’s that kind of insanity that makes a movie pretty grand.

I’m sure some of you will carp about the absence of “Godfellas” on this list, or be puzzled at the inclusion of “The Farnsworth Parabox” instead of one of many other hilarious episodes, but this is my list; as someone who’s devoted a lot of time to watching Futurama instead of graduating from college or making friends, I feel I’m qualified to make these judgments.

#10: The Farnsworth Parabox

The Professor invents a cardboard box containing an entire parallel—and possibly evil—universe. Virtually every line uttered by every character is hilarious.
GREATEST MOMENT
PROFESSOR: You people and your slight differences disgust me!

#9: The Luck of the Fryrish

In this surprisingly touching episode, Fry learns a thing or two about lucky seven-leaf clovers, his brother, and grave robbing.
GREATEST MOMENT
The Planet Express crew is watching a Behind the Music style show.
WHISKEY AND CIGARETTES BRITISH GUY: Phil came in, right? Strummed out this tune, yeah? And I said, “That’s a number one record.”

#8: Fry and the Slurm Factory

Fry wins a contest and gets to take a tour of the Slurm soda factory, along with the rest of the Planet Express crew. If you suspect that it will be a wondrous, magical factory along the lines of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, you are so right.
GREATEST MOMENT
PROFESSOR: Who are those horrible orange creatures over there.
GLURMO: Why those are the Grunka-Lunkas. They work here in the Slurm factory.
PROFESSOR: Tell them I hate them!

#7: Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?

Dr. Zoidberg starts totally flipping out for no apparent reason, and as any sci-fi viewer worth his salt knows, when an alien starts doing that it means it’s time for him to return to his home planet to mate. Which is just what he does. And as any sci-fi viewer worth his salt further knows, a fight to the death is very likely to ensue. Which it does.
GREATEST MOMENT
The people of Dr. Zoidberg’s home planet are told to rise for their national anthem, which is then revealed to be the famous Star Trek fight music, which debuted in “Amok Time,” the episode that this masterfully lampoons.

#6: Anthology of Interest II

Three stories for the price of one! Bender becomes human and barfs a lot. Earth is threatened by the space invaders from Space Invaders. Leela finds herself transported to the land of Oz. All in all, a full, rich day.
GREATEST MOMENT
FRY: All right. It’s Saturday night, I have no date, a two-liter bottle of Shasta, and my all Rush mix tape. Let’s rock.

#5: Time Keeps on Slipping

Thanks to the Professor’s experimentation, the universe is experiencing time skips, where everything suddenly jumps forward at an unpredictable rate. It’s up to the Planet Express crew—with a little help from the Harlem Globetrotters—to put everything right.
GREATEST MOMENT
MARV ALBERT: Ladies and gentlemen, something very strange has just happened in this basketball game between space clowns and atomic monsters.

#4: Roswell That Ends Well

Through a confluence of improbable circumstances, the Planet Express crew is thrown backward in time and, wouldn’t you know it, it turns out they’re the aliens that crash landed at Roswell in 1947. Meanwhile, Fry does the nasty in the pasty, knocking boots with his own grandma which is either gross or hot, depending on your preference.
GREATEST MOMENT
PROFESSOR: Yes, we tore the universe a new space-hole, all right. But it’s clenching shut fast.

#3: The Devil’s Hands Are Idle Playthings

Fry makes a deal with the devil so he’ll gain the skills necessary to win over Leela with his holophonor playing. The episode culminates with the entire cast taking part in an operatic extravaganza. Incredible.
GREATEST MOMENT:
HEDONISMBOT: A man writing an opera about a woman? Oh, Sirrah, how deliciously absurd.

#2: Where No Fan Has Gone Before

Oh, man. It’s like you’ve died and gone to nerd heaven. This episode features guest appearances by almost the entire cast of the original Star Trek, playing themselves. The Trek references come at an average of more than two a minute (yes, I counted).
GREATEST MOMENT
BENDER: Can people who hate Star Trek leave?
WALTER KOENIG: Good question.

#1: Jurassic Bark

If you can watch this episode without crying your eyes out then, mister, you’re as dead inside as that aquarium I never clean out. Through stories told in two separate times, we’re introduced to Fry’s loyal dog Seymour, a pup that can sing “Walkin’ on Sunshine” and swim in a vat of tomato sauce with ease and aplomb.
GREATEST MOMENT
The heartbreaking montage that closes the episode, showing the passage of time and making the viewer lose all emotional control.

#10: Army of Darkness

Initially I didn’t want to include any movies that were third in a series, wanting to deal expressly with initial movies and their immediate sequels. But first of all, that became difficult. Secondly, I would have been forced to overlook Army of Darkness, and overlooking Army of Darkness is the biggest mistake mortal man can make.

CLICK THESE WORDS TO SEE AN AWESOME COLLECTION OF ARMY OF DARKNESS MOMENTS.

I don’t mean to say that the first two movies in the series, The Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2 are in any way lacking, but holy cow is Army of Darkness a thing to see. It’s the story of Ash (Bruce Campbell), a regular guy like you and me who has a chainsaw for a hand and wields a shotgun and gets sucked back in time to fight skeletons. You heard me. While the first two Evil Dead movies were excellent and had already built a strong following, it was this one that cemented Bruce Campbell as the absolute king of cult superstars. His portrayal of Ash makes the character perhaps the most badass wisecracking hero of all time, which is really saying something when you consider our next movie is…

#9: Goldfinger

Again, it’s the third in a series (a decades-long series, in this case), but how could I not include the James Bond movie. Dr. No and From Russia With Love had been great rides, but it was Goldfinger that shouted to the masses: “Guess what, motherscratchers, James Bond gonna rock your world!” This movie laid out everything we now think of as necessary elements of a Bond movie—a megalomaniac villain, girls with double entendre for names (well, in this case, Pussy Galore is more of a single entendre), superpowered cars, humorous asides made in the face of death, ridiculous henchmen, lasers aimed at genitals, chest hair. Most of the other movies in the series have used Goldfinger as their model, and if for some unfathomable reason you can only see one, this is the one to see.

#8: Bride of Frankenstein

Film folks may be surprised not to see this one closer to the top of the list, but in fact I wasn’t even sure if I should include it at all. Not because it isn’t great, it is. Rather, my hesitance came about because I constantly go back and forth on whether I prefer Bride of Frankenstein or the original Frankenstein that preceded it. Both, it must be said, are classics that will endure long after any of us are dead. If you need any evidence, look no further than this scene.

If you managed to avoid thinking about Gene Hackman and Peter Boyle, your probably noticed something: that’s the most moving thing you’ve ever seen and now you’re having a hard time reading this thanks to the tears welling up in your eyes. It’s that kind of emotion that makes a movie great, and it’s something most modern horror has sadly lost. Fortunately, we’ll always have James Whale’s two Frankenstein pictures to remind us that the horror genre has the power to be as wonderful as any other.

#7: Dawn of the Dead

It’s fair to say that Dawn of the Dead isn’t technically a sequel to Night of the Living Dead—writer/director George Romero says so himself, in fact—but it’s also fair to say shut up, of course it’s a sequel. And brother, what a sequel it is.

While Night of the Living Dead could be fairly criticized as being boring or even, if you’re particularly curmudgeonly, not very good at all, Dawn of the Dead cannot be called anything but balls-to-the-wall righteous. With its abundance of exploding heads, chomped flesh and screwdrivers in ears, Dawn of the Dead is a movie that truly has it all. From the first moment to the last, there’s nothing on screen that doesn’t make you say “What I am watching is so incredible I may have to change my jodhpurs.” In the words of the character Roger, this movie is “Perfect, baby. Perfect.”

#6: The Dark Knight

This may not be a very popular sentiment, but I felt that Batman Begins was only pretty okay. The Dark Knight, however, is a different beast altogether. By which I mean it is great.

Comic book movies as a whole are fighting an uphill battle. I’m not some kind of snob who thinks they can’t be great or are a lesser form of movie, far from it. But they definitely require that the viewer accept a higher level of inherent ridiculousness than any other genre, and so they have to work that much harder. Too often they don’t bother, but on The Dark Knight they did the work and it paid off.

And while the title refers to Batman, we know this is really the Joker’s movie. Every moment he’s on screen, you’re captivated; every moment he’s not on screen, you’re saying to yourself “When are they gonna get back to the Joker?” Sorry, Hannibal Lecter, but the next generation of filmgoers has a new mesmerizing-yet-dangerously-insane villain. Heath Ledger’s performance as the Joker is so spellbinding that it all but erases from memory the Joker from 1989’s Batman, and as you may recall, in that movie the character was played by Jack Freaking Nicholson. I can’t think of higher praise for Ledger than that.

#5: Aliens

I love me some Alien. I’ve called it one of my top ten scary movies, and I stand by that. Yet by not trying to compete with or emulate Ridley Scott’s first movie, James Cameron managed to make Aliens the kind of sequel we wish every sequel would be.

Whereas Alien is essentially a haunted house movie in space, Aliens is a “monsters are attacking from every which way, let’s blow them up as much as we can holy shit action plus there is Paul Reiser” kind of movie. Shifting the focus from scares and suspense to full throttle action made Aliens one of the most enjoyable movies of all time. Once it starts going, you never get a chance to catch your breath.

After you watch it, be sure to then not watch the very beginning of Alien 3, because you will say: “What a bunch of bullshit! Was it all for nothing?”

#4: Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Back before they made a movie that was okay but kinda stupid and a movie that was completely stupid, the Terminator franchise was just the original movie and this badass sequel. Remember that part where Arnold is flipping the shotgun around while he rides the motorcycle?  Or that part where they blow up Cyberdyne? Or that part where Linda Hamilton looks totally terrifying but also hot (the whole movie)? Or that part with the kid from Salute Your Shorts? I LOVE THIS MOVIE!!

#3: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

Star Trek: The Motion Picture was a movie of powerful boredom. For this sequel they went back to doing things the way that had made the original series so successful, even going so far as to revisit a character from one of the very best episodes. There’s action, there’s comedy, and the end of the movie will reduce you to a non-fuctional ball of sadness. Plus, there’s this:

I think once you’ve said that you’ve said it all.

#2: The Empire Strikes Back

Was there any doubt that this, the best film in the Star Wars trilogy, was going to show up on this list? You got Yoda, you got Han and Leia’s sexual tension, you got Billy Dee Williams.

Lando demonstrates his little maneuver

#1: The Godfather Part II

As great as The Godfather is, this first sequel is even better. In fact, I’d say it’s my favorite movie that features two men kissing each other full on the lips.

Where to even start when talking about this movie? Well, there’s the cast. Most of the actors from the first movie are back, with Robert De Niro joining them as the young Vito Corleone. This is the only chance you have to see Pacino and De Niro in the same movie before they both transformed into caricatures of themselves. Then of course we could talk about…oh, what’s the point. Just look at the list of Oscars in that trailer up there—everything about this movie is mindblowing. An absolute all-time classic.

#10: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Snow White goes down in history as the one that started it all, so its place on lists like these is all but secured. But even if this had just been one somewhere in the middle, it would stand out as a worthy entry in the canon. I’ve no objective way to judge this, but with its catchy songs, charming characters and moments of genuine emotion, I’d bet Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs dazzles today every bit as much as it did when first released.

#9: Alice in Wonderland

It’s only fitting that one of the greatest children’s books of all time should have led to one of the greatest children’s movies of all time. That’s Disney standby Sterling Holloway (best known, arguably, as Winnie the Pooh) as the Cheshire Cat!

#8: Peter Pan

I have a special affinity for the Peter Pan story in all its manifestations. I’ve devoted virtually my entire life to the avoidance of adulthood at all costs. That’s why I complain about things on a website instead of paying back my student loans. So, Peter Pan.

#7: Cinderella

The much beloved Cinderella is the movie that saved Disney animation. Just as they had done with Snow White, the studio essentially banked everything on this one feature. Luckily for them, and for animation fans the world over, the gamble payed off big time. Even today, Cinderella remains many people’s favorite Disney animated feature. You’ll hear a lot of love for Gus the mouse, but for my money you can’t beat Lucifer the cat.

#6: Dumbo

A flying elephant? Definitely great. A drunk elephant? Definitely greater. A running time of only 64 minutes? Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner!

#5: Sleeping Beauty

Holy nut, look at those backgrounds! Sleeping Beauty is the Citizen Kane of Disney movies, in the sense that all the backgrounds have crazy depth, plus there’s that scene in Citizen Kane where Joseph Cotten fights a dragon. Nice work, background designer Eyvind Earle! Also, I love Tchaikovsky more than just about any other composer, so the film’s using the music from his Sleeping Beauty ballet suits me just fine.

#4: The Little Mermaid

I’ve mentioned before that The Little Mermaid has moments so powerfully moving that even I am helpless to resist weeping. This could be because the movie is great, or it could be because I am a blubbering crybaby who starts bawling no matter what he watches, including soup commercials. I’d prefer to think it’s the former. (It’s both.) And dig that Academy Award winning music, courtesy of Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. Wonderful stuff.

#3: Pinocchio

The initial, classic period of Disney animation didn’t get much better than this (foreshadowing: it only got better than this one time!). Aside from everything just being gorgeous, there are moments of fun, of pathos, of fright, of everything. The phrase “this movie has it all” couldn’t be more applicable. The fact that “When You Wish Upon a Star” has become a standard, beyond the children and Disney enthusiasts who might be expected to remember the words, ought to tell you something, too.

#2: Beauty and the Beast

This “tale as old as time” became the only animated feature to be nominated for Best Picture, and though the movie it lost to, The Silence of the Lambs, is a great one, I think Beauty and the Beast should have taken the statue. Words can’t begin to describe how fabulous this movie is. It’s got a strong heroine, imaginative characters at every turn, a stellar voice cast (I loves me some Angela Lansbury), music from the Menken/Ashman team and the most beautiful animation since Sleeping Beauty more than thirty years before. Sure, it has the same problem inherent in any version of the Beauty and the Beast story—just keep staying with the violent, psychologically abusive, controlling partner and one day he will turn by magic into your Prince Charming—but it’s magical enough to make you not give a shit about that at all. Anyone stuck on that when watching this movie has SERIOUS GROUCHY PROBLEMS.

#1: Fantasia

Was there any doubt? I’m on record about forty billion times as saying that Fantasia is my favorite Disney movie and that, in addition, it is just about the greatest thing mankind has ever achieved with the possible exception of Reddi-Whip. Breathtaking animation. Music culled from the best ever composed. The introduction of the Mickey Mouse design we know today. Those hopping mushrooms. Hippopotamuses in tutus. A guy named Deems! What more could you possibly want in a movie?

#10: Batman Returns

Now, I don’t love this movie, but I do like it. It definitely deserves better than the reputation it has and despite the above trailer making it actually look pretty terrible, I’m ever willing to defend it.

My colleague Mark is on record saying: “I don’t really enjoy watching Batman Returns at all.” Well, you know what I don’t enjoy, Mark? I don’t enjoy that time in middle school gym class that you turned up all the doors on the lockers so they were stuck open and then wouldn’t confess for a while and everybody in the class almost had to run a bunch of extra laps. That’s what I don’t enjoy at all, buddy!

#9: BASEketball

This is the only movie I can think of that gives you the chance to hear Robert Stack, in full Unsolved Mysteries mode, drop an f-bomb. What I’m saying is, it has a lot of funny parts, though several not-so-funny parts are featured in the trailer as part of the universe’s ongoing attempt to make me look like an idiot.

#8: Blues Brothers 2000

Here it comes. Hold onto your hats because I am about to rock your world: I think Blues Brothers 2000 is better than the first one. Yes, it’s sad that there could be no John Belushi, but in terms of what happens in the movies, the first one and the second one are basically exactly the same movie. But the second one moves along a lot faster, making it an easier, more enjoyable watch. There I said it.

#7: The X-Files: I Want to Believe

I don’t know that it’s really nobody likes this movie, though it did get a lot of negative reviews, as much as nobody even saw it. I’m the only person I know who saw this flick, opening as it did a week after a little movie you may have heard of called The Dark Knight. The timing sort of doomed this movie to being overlooked at the box office, but it’s a worthy addition to the X-Files canon. It asks thought-provoking questions about life and morality, and though the supernatural side of the story is sometimes a little lacking, the stuff about the characters of Mulder and Scully is well done and just what a fan of the TV series would want to see after all these years.

#6: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III

All my turtle-loving friends my age, they turn into real Negative Nancys when it comes to this movie. Here’s my theory on that phenomenon. This movie is no worse than Turtles 2, which these same people all love. But what happened was by the time Turtles III came out, kids in my age group were old enough to think the toys and movies they liked a few years before were stupid and for babies, and it wouldn’t be another ten or so years before they came back around and started loving everything they loved as kids again. So they all just assumed this movie was dumb. Fortunately, since I never grew up at all and never stopped liking the same things I liked when I was four years old, I have always been a big supporter of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III. And while I’m on the subject…

#5: TMNT

Are you people with your bad attitudes liars, assholes, crazy, or what? This movie was great!

#4: The Master of Disguise

Mike Nelson of MST3K, a guy whose opinion on movies I respect more than almost any other, calls this the third worst comedy of all time, better only than Junior and Little Nicky. He couldn’t be more wrong. This movie is funny and I’ll scream that until the day I die.

I remember the day I and a large group of my friends saw it in the theater. Most of them wanted to see something else—M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs, if you can believe anyone wanting to see an M. Night Shyamalan movie—and I and one other brave soul campaigned so hard for The Master of Disguise that we finally broke them down and convinced them to go. They all hated it, because they are idiots. I loved it.

#3: Battle for the Planet of the Apes

PEOPLE: The Planet of the Apes movies just got worse and worse as they went on.
ME: No, you just get worse and worse as you go on, buttmunch.

#2: Psycho II

Critical consensus on this movie basically amounts to “Oh, it’s okay, but not really very good and certainly nothing compared to the original, blah blah.” Roger Ebert says “It’s too heavy on plot and too willing to cheat about its plot to be really successful” and ” I don’t think it deserves a place on a double bill with the original Psycho” and calls it “a movie full of half-sketched characters and half-explained developments.” What is wrong with that guy? This movie is probably the greatest horror sequel of all time and would fit on a double bill with the original movie very comfortably indeed. I think Hitchcock would have been proud of this picture.

#1: Rock-a-Doodle

That’s right, Rock-a-Doodle. The movie that nobody liked and that basically ruined Don Bluth financially is, in fact, the greatest movie of all time. It’s the story of a boy who turns into a cat and follows around an Elvis-style rockabilly rooster voiced by Glen Campbell. There are some villainous owls voiced by Christopher Plummer and Charles Nelson Reilly. THIS MOVIE HAS EVERYTHING!

True story: On my sixth birthday, I got a cassette of the Rock-a-Doodle soundtrack and proceeded to listen to it about five times a day for the rest of my life until the day I die. I freakin’ love this movie and can’t believe there is anybody out there who doesn’t. What’s not to like? That rooster is singing like Elvis! Are you even seeing this? THE ROOSTER IS SINGING LIKE ELVIS!

You can surely tell that this song dates from 1985, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Sure, nobody remembers Duran Duran now, but way back then this song went all the way to number one, making it one of the most successful of the Bond songs. Dance into the fire. Do it!

#9: “All Time High” by Rita Coolidge, 1983

The movie was called Octopussy, but that’s a tough title to make a love song out of, so you’ll forgive them for going in another direction. The track didn’t have the success that “A View to a Kill” would, but it did reach number one on the Adult Contemporary char—but try not to hold that against it. It also contains a line that nicely sums up what the Bond movies are: “a sweet distraction for an hour or two.”

#8: “Tomorrow Never Dies” by Sheryl Crow, 1997

When a song mentions “martinis, girls and guns,” you know it has the best interests of James Bond at heart.

#7: “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” by John Barry Orchestra, 1969

Poor On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Everybody’s always bagging on the flick because it’s the one with George Lazenby in it. But the fact is, this is one of the best Bond movies. Everything about the movie is great except Lazenby’s performance, including this instrumental title song. Check out that Moog synthesizer!

#6: “Diamonds Are Forever” by Shirley Bassey, 1971

Bond songstress extraordinaire Shirley Bassey records her second title song with “Diamonds Are Forever” (she’d earlier done “Goldfinger” and would go on to record “Moonraker”). I really like this one. It’s got a “bum-bum-bum” thing in the bass that makes me very happy, indeed. P.S. Guys, she is kind of singing about a penis.

#5: “Goldfinger” by Shirley Bassey, 1964

Gollllld-fin-ger! Wah WAH wah! Just as Goldfinger is the standard by which all other Bond movies are judged, Shirley Bassey’s recording of the title tune is the ultimate example of a Bond song, putting everything about them in one neat little package. The song made it to the top five, but more importantly it made its way into the brains and hearts of moviegoers all over the world for decades.

#4: “You Only Live Twice” by Nancy Sinatra, 1967

Nancy Sinatra = totally hot. That’s enough for me, I’ll admit it.

#3: “Live and Let Die” by Paul McCartney and Wings, 1973

Paul McCartney comes in and gets the job done nice and quick. Granted, there’s the little matter of the insanely redundant lyrics (”this ever changing world in which we live in”), but as a counter to that I present this evidence: also there are xylophones!

#2: “James Bond Theme” by John Barry Orchestra, 1962

With this one piece, composer Monty Norman guaranteed himself immortality. Has there ever been a more iconic theme, a piece of music more instantly evocative of a character and his way of life? There sure hasn’t. The music is used throughout all the Bond films, but it actually does play over the opening titles of his first big-screen adventure, Dr. No. The movie world was never the same.

#1: “Nobody Does it Better” by Carly Simon, 1977

The AFI (American Film Institute or, more accurately, Absolutely Fucked-up Idiots) put this theme from The Spy Who Loved Me as the 67th greatest movie song, behind Whitney Houston’s terrible, over the top version of “I Will Always Love You” and even, if you can believe it, “My Heart Will Go On.” Is that the most insane thing you’ve ever heard or what? This song is absolutely fantastic, reaching number 2 on the charts and getting an Academy Award nomination. “Baby, you’re the best” is right!