9 Movies That Defined My College Years

I attended Marymount University from August 1995 until I graduated in May 1999.  I was not a model student or athlete, though I was both.  And there was a time when I am 100% positive that the school had discussions about giving me their version of a pink-slip.  So, as you can infer, I had a great time in college, and some of those great times were watching movies with my buddies.  This list of movies doesn’t necessarily define me as a major event would define a presidency, or a battle campaign would a general.  And the movies aren’t reflections of the things I was going through.  Simply, they are movies that we watched over and over, or quoted way too many times, or have a significant event attached to them.  I’ll let you know if any of them even fall into my Top 10 list, but I make no guarantees.  I hope you enjoy and I also hope to hear from my college buddies to see if these movies hold any special meaning to them as they do with me.  

9.  Sensational Janine.  This is an adult film.  It is also the first adult film I can remember watching.  The only reason it is on my list is because college is filled with sex and perversion and adult films are saturated with both from reel to reel.  That’s all I’m saying about this movie. 

8.  The Big Lebowski.  This slacker movie from the Coen brothers came out in 1998 and was at first if nothing short of a head scratcher for me.  Subsequent viewings peeled back genius in the film, the characters, and showed me that sometimes it’s ok to just be oblivious.  This movie is a gem which I am glad I discovered in college.   

7.  Liar Liar, Private Parts, and yes, The Empire Strikes Back.  Ok, how do these very different movies get lumped together?  Elementary my dear reader.  In March of 1997 George Lucas re-released his second leg of the Star Wars trilogy, The Empire Strikes Back as a special edition (see: Lucas wanted to ring more cash from the movie-going public and set the Nation up for a promotional tease preceding the arrival of the first Star Wars prequel in 1999).  Of course I wanted to see it.  I was 3 years old when the movie was originally released and I was a huge fan of Star Wars, but Empire especially (everyone knows it is the best film in the canon).  However I also wanted to see this new Jim Carrey movie, Liar Liar, about a lawyer who can’t lie.  And it just so happened that Howard Stern was at his popular height and was releasing a movie based on his autobiography.  It was an adolescent tour de force and I was very busy, so my friend James, I mean Jim, and I went to one movie, but stayed for all three.  It was economical, illegal, and one of the most rewarding Saturday movie experiences of my life, let alone my college years.  It also coincided with hooking up with the girl I was seeing for the very first time the night before.  It’s a weekend I won’t forget.  

6.  Lock, Stock, & Two Smoking Barrels, The Exorcist, and Rush Hour.  Great, he’s heaping them together again.  In the Fall of 1998 my best friend, Keegin, and I were lucky enough to study abroad (or many broads, sorry) in London for a semester.  After all, I was encouraged to get out of the country when my soccer coach informed me he would not be needing my services for my Senior year because I was a huge asshole during my Junior season.  So across the Pond we went.  Among the myriad cultural activities in which we participated, we found time to get to the movies often.  Lock Stock was the first film from Guy Ritchie (who many of you may know as the former Mr. Madonna) and is about east London hustlers and gangsters.  It is a gritty story-telling with temporal cuts and slashes akin to Pulp Fiction, and a hellova lotta fun.  This was also the same season in which The Exorcist was re-released and would be shown for the first time in England.  Billed as the scariest movie of all time, and known principally for spinning heads and priests who tumble down stairs, at 21 years old I found the movie comical and out of date.  And finally, the much anticipated (for college guys anyway) buddy comedy, Rush Hour, starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker.  The movie, in the vein of 48 Hours and Twins, placed two complete opposites together to solve crimes whilst cracking jokes.  It worked on all levels, but the one drawback was it ultimately led to Rush Hour 3.  Yuck. 

5.  Deep Impact.  The only reason this is on my list is because this movie ended up making me the butt of many jokes in my best friend’s house.  And I deserved them all.  A few buddies and I were set to see this early summer blockbuster and I had invited my ex-girlfriend to meet up with us.  I had even gone early to buy tickets for everyone.  When movie time came, my buddies showed up, paid me, and made their way inside the theater while I waited outside for my ex.  She never showed, but after 20 minutes I would not go into the movie.  I had missed the previews, my favorite part, and didn’t feel like watching the movie.  Instead, I waited out on the mall bench feeling stupid and playing out possible insults from my friends inside my mind.  I would not be disappointed.  It was if they had been practicing the barbs in the theater because they were relentless.  And when we got back to Keegin’s house his dad took his turn and he didn’t pull any punches.  We were all laughing so hard that it made being stood up so worthwhile.  The next morning I dropped by the school on the way to the airport and I got my money from her for the tickets I never used, her's and mine.  That’s why Deep Impact is on this list.    

4.  The Usual Suspects.  Easily one of my favorite films of all times.  Unfortunately I didn’t go with my dad to the world premiere in Miami when it came out because I thought it would be stupid.  But later in college, with Keegin in his bed and me in mine, we watched the curious tale of thieves thatched together for a heist involving a mysterious war lord and we were gripped.  Not even when my friend Omar came in, and tried to ruin the surprise ending halfway through the film, did we become disengaged with this movie.  The movie has a terrific cast, great quotes, and won Kevin Spacey an Oscar for best supporting actor.  I could watch this movie over and over because there is always something else to discover.  

3.  Caddyshack, Tommy Boy, and The Saint.  Two of these movies came out when we were in school.  One, a classic, did not.  All three were watched over and over and quoted as frequently, if not more, than anything we needed for school.  To this day we still trade quotes from these movies.  In Tommy Boy, Chris Farley and David Spade have their best team-up for a road-trip about a daddy’s boy trying to save the family company despite being a complete f&%k-up.  The Saint was a movie based on the Roger Moore television series of the same name, starring Val Kilmer as a chameleon thief.  It is a ludicrous movie with an even stupider plot, but I really loved Kilmer’s acting in the movie and for me, it has some great lines.  And Caddyshack, like Animal House and Stripes, a must for any red-blooded American male, is the movie that remains to this day comedy gold.  It is the movie I wish I could write.  It throws the rich vs the not, the hammered –shit working class against the Nair-do-wells.  And it just works on every level.  Whether you love Bill Murray’s Carl, or Chevy Chase’s Ty, or the impromptu caddy synchronized swimming, it’s all magic.  I’d bet that there isn’t a conversation, any category, all over this country on a daily basis that isn’t peppered with the nuggets from this movie.  I own it.  I love it.  And I have that going for me, which is nice. 

2.  Dazed and Confused.  This was another highly quotable movie that we watched over and over.  But the reason I put it on the list is because we watched it so many times that it resonated with us to the point that we assigned each other characters from the movie.  If you haven’t seen this movie here’s what it’s about.  The movie takes place in the suburbs of Houston (I think) on the last day of high school in 1976.  It’s about the future high schoolers getting the crap kicked out of them by the upper classman.  It’s about sex and drugs.  It’s about teenage angst.  And it’s about rock and roll.  The movie has one of the best soundtracks of the past 30 years, with everything from Foghat to Kiss and War.  Music that literally defines that decade helps tell the story of these kids as they search out for a party to kick off the summer while they reflect on past and future alike.  Dazed was also a launching pad for future movie stars like Ben Affleck and Matthew McConaughey.  It’s one of those coming of age movies that never come across as preachy, which is why it remains a cult classic. 

1.  The Godfather I & II.  I knew of the Godfather films before college.  You’d have to have been from Mars or stuck “in” Uranus not to have known these films.  But I owe it to my buddy Omar for really getting me into Pacino and company while we were in college.  He’d watch them over and over to the point that every time I went in his room he had one of them cued up.  So I got curious and decided to invest my time in discovering the magic of Francis Ford Coppola.  I started watching the movies and fell in love with the story telling, the fraternity of the Italian mafia, the characters, the moral and ethical dilemmas, and the ensemble cast.  Everything weaves together in the first film to paint a gloomy picture of the organized turf-war in New York during the 40’s and 50’s.  You all know the plot, the star-making role for a young Al Pacino, the iconic role of Godfather played (and often imitated, but never duplicated) by Marlon Brando, and the excellent hot-headedness of Sonny, played by James Caan (when Jews play Italians, everybody wins!).  The Godfather taught us to keep our friends close and our enemies closer, that sometimes no offer is too good to refuse, and that blood runs thicker than water.  But as good as The Godfather is, The Godfather II is my favorite of the trilogy (I won’t even mention the terrible conclusion to the series, pure dreck).  Godfather II is at once both sequel and prequel, which takes the story of Godfather I while reaching back in extended flashback scenes that chronicle the early life of Vito Corleone (Brando’s Godfather played by a young Robert De Niro).  It is a film that sees the Corleone family extend beyond the relative safety of Long Island into the unknown of the gaming and casino business.  Younger brother Fredo crosses the family, which anyone can tell you should never happen lest you want to go fishing in the moonlight.  And shows the strain of running legitimate and illegitimate businesses and how that strain affects the entire family.  The Godfather II is a must for any movie fan, and I surmised that I watched both films about 20 times from 1996-1999.