Favorite Movies

So, I've never been able to reply immediately what my favorite color, book, dessert, food, movie or song was. It's situational. But I watched a movie last night, The Station Agent, that made me start thinking about which movies would be my favorites and why. These are in no order, because, as I said, it's situational.

1. The Longest Day - a WWII movie with a cast of characters to die for.
2. A Bridge Too Far - another WWII movie I love. and will stop what I'm doing to watch even though I own a copy.
3. The Way We Were - I loved this and now can't sit still to watch it now since I know the ending.
4. The Godfather - Luca Brazi sleeps with the fishes
5. Cinema Paradiso - subtitles but full of wonder
6. The Hunt for Red October - because of Sean Connery's brogue and despite Alex Baldwin
7. To Kill a Mockingbird - Gregory Peck, a very young Robert Duvall and my favorite book
8. Pretty Woman - underdog meets happily ever after
9. Steel Magnolias - small towns, girlfriends, sacrifice and pursuit of good hair
10. O Brother Where Art Thou? - In the 70s there were still men dressed like that in rural Alabama
11. The Jungle Book
12. Live and Let Die
13. Raiders of the Lost Ark - well, the first 3, I haven't seen the new one
14. The Net - plausible fear
15. An Affair to Remember & You've Got Mail
16. The Quiet Man - John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara. "Hallooo, woman o' tha house" and the best cross country fight on film
17. The Client - you had to love that kid and it had a short run as a tv series that I liked too
18. Desk Set - Spencer and Tracy, real intelligence bests artificial intelligence
19. A Wonderful Life
20. The Sound of Music

I'm quitting now. But see what I mean? Too many for there to be a favorite. The closest would be To Kill a Mockingbird.

Then there are the movies I watched one time. Old Yeller, Dances With Wolves, Bambi and Dumbo come to mind as some that I can't watch anymore because the animals face unhappiness or death. The Way We Were is another non-animal example. And Boys Don't Cry. What a downer. I think there was just enough in me to get through that story once, and never again.

And I love Gettysburg, but can't watch the inevitable, sure doom of Pickett's Charge anymore, even as I marvel at the willingness of the Confederates to follow him up that hill all those years ago.

I am always surprised to have that avoidance reaction and not quite sure where it comes from.

Okay, let's hear it. What are your favorites? And the not favorites?