Top 10 Most Memorable Movie Experiences Of My Life

Hello once again, dear reader!

Today's list is a bit on the biographical side - I recently decided to make a list of my all-time favorite movie experiences, which was meant to include the double screening of A Quiet Place (2018) and A Quiet Place: Part 2 (2020) in my local cinema, which I had planned to see last week. Due to a certain virus you might've heard of, the screening got delayed, but I was pretty far into making this list so I decided to release it this week anyways. The experiences range from the movie theater to various couch potato marathons, with the common denominator that they have all been magical and memorable in some way. No matter how good a movie is, this list won't include any films just for the sake of how good they were when watched the first time - to qualify for this list, the experience must have some real-life element that made watching said movies especially important.

Here are my honorable mentions: Ironically watching Jason X with my girlfriend; Marathoning all 3 Monty Python films; Seeing Gravity in 3D in the cinema; Watching 7 great movies in 7 days with my dad; Watching Shoplifters from a huge screen in a movie picnic event.

10. Halloween on Halloween

The first time I saw my second favorite horror movie of all time was with my father on the most appropriate day to watch it: October 31st. The overall creepiness of the movie was made much better by the overall creepiness of the day, and the film's imagery of jack-o'-lanterns and ominous weather coincided with how our surroundings looked (Halloween isn't that big in Finland, but our household always does a jack-o'-lantern and scary weather is quite default for Finnish autumn). Watching Halloween (1978) on the actual day was a truly memorable experience, and one that I recommend to all fans of horror cinema.

9. The Room / The Disaster Artist double feature

This was just a stroke of genius from me and two of my friends. For those not familiar with these films, The Room (2003) is a cult classic known as the Citizen Kane of bad movies; it's terrible on pretty much all fronts, yet beloved and iconic for being terrible in such an entertaining way. It also has a remarkable story behind it, as the eccentric and mysterious Tommy Wiseau wrote, directed and starred in the film with a vision to make a great movie, only to fail spectacularly. The Disaster Artist (2017) is a very good film that tells the true story behind The Room, where James Franco plays Tommy Wiseau and the process of making the bad movie is followed in depth. Watching these two films consecutively made for a marvelous experience, as all the scenes from The Room were freshly in memory as we saw the stories behind them in The Disaster Artist, and seeing such a good movie after such a bad one (while the subject matter stayed the same) felt very rewarding.

8. Ferris Bueller teaches me a lesson

If I had watched Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986) for the first time at any other time in my life, I'm sure I would've laughed a lot and thoroughly enjoyed the film well enough. But I happened to watch it at the best possible time: when I needed it the most. It was a period of unforeseen school stress for me, with new challenges and multiple deadlines really messing with my head and causing more stress than any studying should. And in the midst of all that, I decided one evening to watch this classic comedy film that I hadn't seen before - and oh boy, did it hit hard. In that state of mind, Ferris Bueller's Day Off served as a reminder for some of my core values that I had momentarily forgotten - school isn't everything, stuff like that shouldn't be taken too seriously, there's much more to life, et cetera. It's crazy how a comedy film from the 80's is one of the things that helped turned that situation for the better, but that's a perfect example of how big of an impact a movie can have on one's life.

7. Star Wars marathon

This one was just a blast! In the weeks before Star Wars: Episode VII: The Force Awakens came out in 2015, me and my good friend marathoned all six Star Wars movies that had been made at that time. To add to the overall epicness, we watched them in an unconventional order that I had heard of: not the chronological 1-6 order but also not the 4-6, 1-3 order in which they were made, but one that made for a cool dramatic arch: 4, 5, 1, 2, 3, 6. That way it starts out strong with the original movies, but after the cliffhanger of The Empire Strikes Back (1980) the prequels are shown as a lengthy backstory, and then it all comes together in Return Of The Jedi (1983). It was cool to see these films in rapid succession, and made the hype for The Force Awakens more real. Speaking of hype...

6. Avengers: Endgame after all that hype

I can safely say that I have never been as hyped for seeing a new movie than I was with Avengers: Endgame (2019). My love for the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been well-documented throughout this blog of mine, and this was where it all culminated. I had watched all the 20 films that came before Endgame, and had been very invested in the larger and smaller continuous storylines that had built up towards this film. Most of the MCU movies, especially in more recent years, I had seen in the cinema with a certain group of friends, and seeing Endgame with them made the experience all the more fitting. I loved the film and deemed it a perfect conclusion to the Avengers story, and seeing such a wonderful work in the theaters after looking forward to it for years felt amazing.

5. 2001 from a big screen on my birthday

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) is an unmatched masterpiece - if I ever post a list of my all-time favorite films, I think it's safe to say that it would be in my top 5. While my first and second times watching it were incredible experiences, the one that made it to this list is actually the third time I saw it. At the time, I was in this program where civil servants are trained, and it was my 19th birthday. After discussing ideas how to celebrate with my fellow civil servants, our brainstorming started to collide with another idea we had talked about: watching 2001 together, as many of us hadn't seen it while many wanted to see it again. And so we went to one of the lecture spaces in the evening and hooked the film up to be shown from a big screen, and it was just perfect. Watching a movie I love so much on my birthday from that screen in that atmosphere was immensely satisfying, and a memory I'll always cherish.

4. Friday The 13th in the best possible setting

There was a time last year when morbid curiosity lead to me watching all of the Halloween, Nightmare On Elm Street and Friday The 13th films in a period of a few months. While this lead to many memorable experiences (I also watched one of the films in this franchise on the actual Friday the 13th!), my favorite was definitely this one. I was at my family's summer cabin when I realized that the next film on my itinerary was Friday The 13th: Part 4 (1984), which many consider to be the best of the franchise - if you're not aware, this franchise takes place in a series of cabins near a lake. And there I was, in a cabin near a lake.

There are so many little things that made this experience absolutely perfect. I was sleeping alone in an old attic room with creaky floorboards and all that - it's a beautiful place, really, but also pitch perfect for a horror movie setting if one uses their imagination. The room has a window with a view that at night looks like it's straight out the Friday the 13th franchise: another cabin, rustling trees, the lake in the background...watching the film there made the experience so much more real. Walking in the dark to the outhouse after the film was over felt like quite the feat of courage, but being slightly creeped out by these surroundings for a night was a small price to pay for such a cool movie experience.

3. Dead Poets Society before a big exam

Look, I'm not saying that my perfect score on the essay portion of the Finnish matriculation examination is thanks to watching an inspiring movie the night before - I'm just saying that I'd like to believe that it played a part in it, as did many other factors. In Finnish high schools, senior students take a series of matriculation exams, and I had made a tradition to watch a movie related to the subject on the night before each exam - Margin Call (2011) before social studies, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989) before history, et cetera. That way I wouldn't rack my brain with last-minute studying but rather cool out before the actual test, while still keeping the subject matter in my mind on some level.

For Finnish, I decided that instead of watching a Finnish movie I'd watch something that had to do with literature - after all the subject is actually called "Finnish & literature", and it's quite similar to English classes in the USA but just with our own language. And so I stumbled upon Dead Poets Society (1989), which I had not seen before, and it immediately became one of my all-time favorite movies. The timing was perfect, too: I had known that it's supposed to be a good film, but I had no idea it would be that inspiring. I kept the feeling of inspiration from it in my mind on the next morning and during the exam, and maybe, just maybe, that was the extra push I needed to write the best essay of my high school career.

2. The Hobbit's midnight premiere

My brother and I are big fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit books, as well as Peter Jackson's film adaptations. This culminated with the midnight premiere of the final film of the franchise, The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies, in 2014. First of all, I know that the movie got a negative reception in general, but I really liked it and especially saw it as an extremely fitting ending despite having some flaws in it. Second of all, the experience. At the time, I didn't very often see movies at their premieres, let alone a special midnight premiere like this one. Seeing the final film of such a magnificent franchise in that setting with my brother was a truly memorable and unique experience, yet somehow it isn't even the best experience we've had with those movies! You see...

1. Middle Earth Marathon

If you know me as a person or just have read this blog, you may probably guess that I like making lists quite a lot. And the mother of all lists is my personal bucket list: a list of 11 important things I want to get done in my life, ranging from visiting places around the world to items of personal growth and whatnot. The only movie-related item on my bucket list was accomplished on 1.8.2015: marathoning all The Hobbit and The Lord Of The Rings movies (the extended editions, no less).

My brother and I woke up around 5 o'clock a.m. in the morning. We started with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012), making our way through all six films in chronological order, culminating with The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King (2003). The extended edition of the final film runs at over 4 hours, and it came to an end around 2 o'clock at night. Our abundance of snacks, the epicness of the movies and the overall atmosphere of being so immersed in Tolkien's world for the whole day made for a magical and unforgettable experience.


Thank you for reading! Any and all e-mail subscriptions will be most appreciated. Tune in next week for my ranking of the eight TV shows in the Star Trek franchise!