One of the most dramatic shifts in our post-mormon lives is often the movies we watch. The pre-me was Disney Disney and anything that could possibly pass for Disney. The real-me, the me I found after leaving LDSinc, found these ten movies:

The Eternal Sunshine Of A Spotless Mind

https://youtu.be/0zFywiAh7N0

Her

https://youtu.be/dJTU48_yghs

Beasts Of The Southern Wild

https://youtu.be/pvqZzSMIZa0

Melancholia

https://youtu.be/RHMy6abqq04

Lola Versus

https://youtu.be/Ktxy1fDR8HM

Inside Llewyn Davis

https://youtu.be/LFphYRyH7wc

Carnage

https://youtu.be/ZPX6-4Bo7XU

Take Shelter

https://youtu.be/hUraDx3oFVg

Francis Ha

https://youtu.be/y9YKHRQkf7k


And what has become one of my favourite movies of all time, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou:

https://youtu.be/aZVxCNwBqXI


I could have just as easily named ten other films. This isn't a top ten list or anything like it, it's an example of a sensibility totally beyond me while mormon.

No matter what new sensibility one finds, the point is that it was probably always there but hidden under the restrictions of mormon culture. Those newly out, try something new. Experiment. Don't be afraid to fail. Just do different things than what you were once use to doing as a mormon. New music, new films, new TV, new rhythms, new friends, new clothes, and maybe even a new city or country. The world is yours. Expand. Take a chance and you'll probably run into a new self along the way, a self that was always you but buried deep under the restrictive, guilt and shame ridden life you lived as a mormon.

Shed the shame, rid yourself of the guilt, and expand into the you that was always there.

Human

Only seen Life Aquatic but one of my top ten is this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=6&v=9-cIUVgacaY

It was somewhat life changing/enhancing for me.

That book was life changing for me, in a delayed way.

At 18 I found myself in a bookstore looking for enlightenment. Pondering the choices on the shelves, I realized I had no idea how to do this, pick a book that I really needed. And I really needed enlightenment.

Randomly, a girl I scarcely knew, a girl of nodding and maybe smiling acquaintance only, saw my perplexity and came over and began chatting with me. She chose "The Razor's Edge" for me. She did it, and she has no idea how life-altering that was for me.

The book planted a seed. Seven or so years later it began to sprout. Today I enjoy the mellow fruit of that moment, that girl, that book.

Thank you... I don't even remember her name.

Human

(And Elder Berry, thank you for reminding me about all this.)

Murray was roundly trashed/ condemned by the critics for The Razor's Edge. They could not stand Murray doing anything besides comedy and they totally rejected him in any genuinely contemplative / introspective dramatic role. For me , I had never seen humanity laid so bare before me in a movie, as it was in The Razor's Edge. I thought that it was one of the greatest films ever, my absolute favorite until What Dreams May Come came out. I thought Murray was superb, regardless of how much of a surprise it was to see him in this different acting mode.

Murray was able to make The Razor's Edge - where his heart was really at, as a contractual concession for his agreeing to be in Ghost Busters, something that Murray insisted on and gave up a lot of money to be able to get done. For anyone willing to pay attention, and to give the film its due recognition as veritable cinema, the motion picture was deeply moving and a HUGE revelation about how much stunning depth really existed in some one who had only been previous seen as a comedy skit player.

As a spiritually broken return missionary so ravaged by the soul raping agenda and hollow promises of LD$ Inc's MORmON church criminal enterprise, Murray's film deeply moved me. It was like a gift from him to me, and there was no way that the dead wood MORmON god MORmON Jesus could take any credit for it. Murray had turned out to be much more compassionate, poignant, and emotionally supple than the corporate empire building consumed (super @$$HOLE) MORmON Jesus that I was trying to cope with and reconcile in my own mind at the time.

I went to see the movie several times while it was in the theater. I was spell bound every time. My older than me good member TBM MORmON room mate (who was NOT an RM) and I quibbled / argued about the film. He challenged me on it: "I don't know what you think is so great about that movie!"

I threw the challenge back on him: "What about it do feel is not very good ?"

He said: " all of that build up and it never really said anything profound or meaningful at all "

I could have said: "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST! are you kidding me ???" but instead I asked him to further explain.

He said: "Just like when he is on top of that mountain, and he got really cold and he started burning that book that he was supposed to be reading, and then he just came down from the mountain, I thought he was going to learn something really important, some big secret of life, one that they were going to tell us, and he never did and the movie never told us any important secrets of life, it was really disappointing ".

Once again, I could have said: "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST (-you know the MORmON version Jesus who loves to see teenage girls get raped by his prophet in his name)!!!! Are you kidding me????"

With out even thinking about it, out of the blue ...... and out of two years of agonizing full time MORmON missionary service I said: "what were you expecting to happen? what kind of message were you expecting? -something like THE Joseph Smith's first vision????"

That fairly well shut him up. It also got me to thinking about the situation even more. Looking back on the situation, I can see that my response was actually a pretty good indication of some one who was on a outbound path to exist the FUCKING MORmON cult. It took long enough, but I finally learned that great lesson / secret of life ( -that secret handshakes really do NOT mean much to who ever is running the universe and in turn that MORmONISM is utter BULL SHIT) and I made "THE" transition OUT of "THE" FUCKING MORmON church CULT.

( Now all that I need is a movie where Steven Seagal ..... or Wesley Snipes beats the holy shit out of some body who bears a striking resemblance to Mark E. Petersen or Bruce R. McDonkie.
I wonder if THE plot and / or THE message in that movie would go over my old room mate's MORmON head)

I still see my old room mate periodically. We are friendly.
He feels that he is stronger in THE church than ever -due to the lessons that life has taught him, and he just can't understand why anyone would ever leave THE all important (MORmON) church, as I have. ....... Oh, and he feels like a total and complete loser that has never been able to come close to living up to the ideals of the MORmON religion, which in his MORmON mind means he needs to cling to THE Church tighter than ever. .......As for me, I'd much rather kill myself than go back to that soul sucking MORmON style tail chasing routine, and I feel far more grateful to Bill Murray than I do to that (FUCKING @$$HOLE) MORmON Jesus.

Melancholia's music is from Wagner's Ring Cycle of operas.
Interesting! The Ring Cycle has a plot like Lord of the Rings somewhat. The magic ring is in the Rhine River in the Ring Cycle.
Yes these are the operas with the big boobed women wearing steel (I guess it must have been invented at this time) helmets and blond braids.... Brunhilde is the main woman warrior called the Valkyries. The Valkyries theme is very popular and everyone has heard it in cartoons....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRU1AJsXN1g

Oh yes, Wagner.

I think of this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuschwanstein_Castle

But have to have seen.

I like your taste in movies. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of my absolute favorites. I also really liked Her and Francis Ha. The others I haven't seen but plan on putting them on my list.

I also agree with what you said. In my opinion, Mormons who only allow themselves to see certain types of movies, like Disney, are missing out on so much. Even when I was a believing member, I still watched R rated movies. I've always had a love and appreciation for great films that bend and stretch our ways of thinking and perceiving the world, allowing us to broaden and expand our horizons. It's one of the greatest things in life in my humble opinion. Some others I'd recommend to you that have had this effect on me are:

"The One I Love"
"Garden State"
"American Beauty"
"Tiny Furniture"
"American History X"
"Little Miss Sunshine"
"Sling Blade"
"The Station Agent"
"Revolutionary Road"
"Fruitvale Station"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2015 02:51PM by fakeempire.

fakeempire Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> I've always had a
> love and appreciation for great films that bend
> and stretch our ways of thinking and perceiving
> the world, allowing us to broaden and expand our
> horizons. It's one of the greatest things in life
> in my humble opinion.

Exactly, and couldn't agree more.

Retirement bucket list: build the perfect home theatre, with the best of the best, in every way; stocked full of the very best wines, beers and all manner of spirits; and make my way through the Criterion Collection, with whomever happens to be around at the moment. I love film.

Definitely checking out The Station Agent and Fruitvale Station. Holding off on Tiny Furniture for the right mood. The rest I've seen and enjoyed very much.

Good stuff.

Human

Sorry, Inside Llewyn Davis wouldn't make my Top 10 list of anything other than the straight-man performance by Justin Timberlake. He could be a full-time actor.

One other comment on your list. "Her" was very clever and I'm a big fan of Joaquin Phoenix, but not a top ten lister!

Here's my Top 15 (Which spans the wide spectrum of movie going tastes):

- Amélie
- The Hurt Locker
- The Shawshank Redemption
- Inglorious Bastards (The first scene of this movie might be the best piece of film ever made)
- Populaire
- Birdman
- Duets (I can watch scenes of this movie over and over and over)
- Chef
- The Intouchables
- L.A. Confidential
- No Country for Old Men
- Midnight in Paris
- Mystic River
- The Pianist
- Sucker Punch
- 500 Days of Summer (BONUS)

Watch these and blow your ex-Mormon mind!

Great list!

Just to repeat, my list is nothing like a top ten. For example, there are other Coens' that are top ten, and Spike Jonzes, too.

Newbie ex-mos, Doubting Thomas here has a mind-blowing list. Indulge!

Human

Best ex-Mormon movie? 1995's Get Shorty. Every other word is an f-bomb.

Didn't see it; but agree, f-bombs are the bomb for the ex-mo soul!

I always wondered why this movie resonated with me.

You want F-Bombs? The movie for you is THE WOLF OF WALL STREET. The F word is said once every 3 times EVERY MINUTE for a total of 506 times.

Kind of takes the fun out of it...

On the other hand as a nevermo raised in Poland I never had any movies forced on me, no Disney no cartoons. My dad was agnostic my mom not too religious and they let me watch whatever I wanted. So at the age of 10-12 it was Twin Peaks, and around the same time X Files. I was scarred as shit watching it but enjoyed it a lot. Plus reading lots of horror books. I remember my cousin an adult person giving me pornographic fanny Hill. As it was a novel no one considered it a porn (it was). I was around 13 at that time and thanks god my cousin is a women so it is not sexual molestation although in US it would probably be considered so.

I also remember that when i was 14 all my peers and me, we had to read for school so called camp literature (no not gay - camp as in death or concentration camp). Borowski about Auschwitz and Herling Grudzinski about Gulag. I still remember the stories about people put to ovens. My favorite story was one about gulag when experienced criminals planning escape would convince one non criminal to run away with them. They would call him sausage in their secret conversations. This was because when they run out of food they would kill him, quarter his body, put his parts to a bucket and feed on that. When you read such kind of stories when you are 14-15 it messes up your mind.

Mormons are interesting for me partly because they watch disney. I mean I often thought that hadn't I watched so many crazy stuff as a kid and read about Auschwitz maybe I wouldn't be so messed up. But than Disney movies and all this polished world without swearing and sex and incest and raping your pet (just kidding) is so boring and untrue.

It is so funny for me when I read your stories that when you where mormons you thought only you were masturbating. Well as teenager i pretty much had the feeling that everyone was doing this, maybe except for girls. I even remember a girl telling us that she wouldn't shake our hands because in her opinion boys didn't wash them after jerking off. Well it was not true in my case, at least not every time :).

My favorite movies are all cruel and full of violence but not like rambo in which death is so sterile and good alwayes wins but more like City of God https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioUE_5wpg_E or elite squad https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eodyqcxtL4M which show death in details and look at evil with much more undarstanding than any american movie will ever do.


European and especially catholic culutre is more accepting of human weaknes and maybe that is why it is much more appealing to me. I for example love therese dreaming painting http://www.wikiart.org/en/balthus/th%C3%A9r%C3%A8se-dreaming-1938#supersized-artistPaintings-244812 which shown not only to mormons but also to many politically correct and full of hipocrisy americans would scare shit out of them, although it is only a painting of innocent girl.

I adore Wes Anderson and Quentin Tarantino films. I think a film (and/or the book) every ex-mo should take a look at is The Virgin Suicides- What happens when an overbearing patriarch puts down the iron fist over his daughters and his wife's inability to protect them.

My favourite film of all time is and probably be Last Supper which is both funny and dark, a combination that's classic. I also enjoy Kubrick's and the Coen brothers' films.

Yes, Virgin Suicides! Ever on my list. Gotta get to it.

Favourite all-time film, besides It's A Wonderful Life, is probably Babette's Feast.

Well a painting is never "only" anything.

Like your post. Excellent. And could never be reduced to an "only".

Mormonism, however, loves "only". This is and that are *only* part&parcel with evil, like R rated movies. If it's rated R, it's evil and can *only* be that.

Good stuff, kolonko.

And by the way, I love Disney. Still do. Always will. But lovely to see other things.

As for masturbation, you gotta hand it to God, really, in the end. How any of us endured believing that not only were we the only ones doing it but that we were doing it perpetually to an audience of dead relatives, is a miracle. How in heaven's name did we reach climax under those circumstances? I would literally say sorry to my past uncle and grandfather, at least, each and every time. Was way too ashamed to even think of apologizing to Jesus.

Human

Most European film I had seen before twenty, and quite by accident:

https://youtu.be/VxzO8Qx96O4

It reflects on what you think and feel and the society and culture in which you're raised or identify.

I can see why some people would get upset, because maybe they think it's sexualizing a young girl. These are probably the same people who missed the point of Nabokov's "Lolita" (also a Kubrick film, one I haven't watched yet, but will get to it.) I don't agree with that interpretation, because it simply looks like a girl laying back without all the pressures and rules of "being a woman."

Yes. We place in so much when we look at art. Too often, what we place in is that which we wish to hide. Thus the *utility* of art.

But why must we know what's in the shadows? Why must we look at art?

Human

Casio over Goodfellas, nice!

And oh Jesus, Stepbrothers almost killed me. C. Reilley is unbelievably versatile. The best of Chicago. The guy's amazing.

And then I saw Everything Must Go with Will Ferrell, and my goodness was he good in that; a role set-up by knowing everything else he had done.

(My childhood favourites like The Cowboys and the ones with Fonda and Stewart also, were never the same after seeing The Good The Bad And The Ugly. Saving the Peckinpahs for old age.)

Human

Reply meant for Whiskeytango below

Love movie threads! So many eclectic tastes by so many people! I never let my LDS-ness influence my movie watching, which may be why I could never hold intelligent discussions with church members around Oscar time as they never had seen the movies. Here's my top 10 semi-recent movies in no particular order. Most are mainstream - I don't get a chance to see all the indie movies I'd like to:

Doubt (wow, just wow)
Winter's Bone (poverty so real you could feel it)
Silver Linings Playbook (better than the book - excellent portrayal of mental illness)
Little Miss Sunshine (great family dynamics)
No Country for Old Men (Coen brothers best movie)
Gangs of New York (How didn't Daniel Day-Lewis win an Oscar)
Hope Springs (any married middle-age couple can relate)
American Beauty (excellent depiction of gay repression)
Wolf of Wall Street (language that would make a drill sergeant blush)

and to top it off - Hot Tub Time Machine (just because it's funny).

I also don't understand the fascination with Disney in the LDS world. The animated movies are without peer, but there's so much more out there than PG and G. Art imitates life, not the other way around, no matter how bad we want it to. Life is gritty, dirty, vulgar, fun, disrespectful, and wonderful. To limit your movies, tv shows, and art to only "family-friendly" you are really limiting yourself from seeing the whole world. Not everyone lives in France next to Belle and her father.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2015 04:51PM by tiredoflies.

Hot Tub Time Machine was hilarious!

I left off the really popular stuff because everyone knows about them. Sometimes I could die in a theatre, literally, I mean it, suffocate to death, from laughing so hard.

The Hangover

The Jumpstreets

Most things Will Farrell is in,
or sometimes Seth Rogan

They just kill me, on the floor laughing; pounding the floor, sometimes; I mean, I get hysterical at all kinds of stuff. Just plain TV; Modern Family just kills me...

I love the funny stuff.

Not a fan of big-budget comic books or action stuff, though. Usually leaves me bored.


And your list, all so excellent (gotta admit, though, not a fan of Silver Linings or his later stuff. So rip-offie, derivative, and an oddness that just doesn't work for me. Others love it. My daughter, a film-fan, loves his work. But I'm stunned how I don't like his later stuff, at all, because I love I Heart Huckabees and Three Kings). And f-bomb lovers gotta love Wolf Of Wall Street.


I'm hoping Modern Mormon Families learn to watch Disney with the kids but allow themselves to be adults when the kids are placed in bed. That's the key. No need to be a kid when the kids are away. Be an adult, cast your eyes wide along the world's horizon, and don't be afraid to see what's really there, including what's in yourself.

Human

I'm a huge Will Ferrell fan too. The funny thing is that he used to bug me, then I saw Elf and he instantly won me over. Now I think he can do no wrong. He is so insanely hilarious, I can't hardly stand it. You mentioned Stepbrothers, have you by chance seen Old School? Some of the best Will Ferrell moments in a movie EVER...streaking, tranquilizer gun, etc. I seriously die when I watch it. He's also great in more serious roles like Everything Must Go, and Stranger Than Fiction. If you haven't seen that, you must!

"Taking Chance" with Kevin Bacon
"Winters Bone" incredible movie
"No Country for Old Men"
"The Cowboys" John Wayne
"The Godfather"
"Casino"
"The Outlaw, Josey Wales"
"Saving Private Ryan"
"Stalag 17"
"The Last of the Mohicans" Daniel Day Lewis
"In the Name of the Father" more Daniel Day Lewis

and "Stepbrothers".

Reservoir Dogs
Midnight Cowboy
A Clockwork Orange
Menace II Society
Rocky Horror Picture Show
Little Miss Sunshine
Fargo
Manhattan
The Godfather
La Cages Au Folles

donbagley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Reservoir Dogs
> Midnight Cowboy
> A Clockwork Orange
> Menace II Society
> Rocky Horror Picture Show
> Little Miss Sunshine
> Fargo
> Manhattan
> The Godfather
> La Cages Au Folles


Easily a Top Ten List.

A perfect mix of oddities making a fascinating whole.

(Seen every one except Menace II Society. After seeing the trailer, I'm in. On my list.)

Human

Fargo was fantastic....Need to see Midnight Cowboy.

I'm documentary fan. I have never seen ANY movie that has elicited so many different emotions in me than Dear Zachary. Here is the trailer for a sneak peek -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtyY0CXdiNo

Here is the full length movie -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpkqfZ95jtw

Don't google or research it beforehand. Just watch it and stick with it to the end. An amazing story about a guy, and his even more amazing parents. WARNING - - This movie will put you through the wringer.

Undertaking Betty!!! Best British humor ever!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47qFqUn0xSA

I love threads like this. My absolute favorite movie is "The Last of the Mohican's" but I've loved it since I was TBM and 14...

A movie I wouldn't have seen (but would've wanted to) while a TBM would have been "Cake." Amazing film.

I watch a ton of documentaries dealing with 'uncomfortable' issues. It's so great to be able to choose what I watch or read. One small perk on this side of apostasy.

A few to add to the mix:

Harold and Maude
Citizen Kane
2001: A Space Odyssey
All About Eve

good grief ! I must not get out much.
I've never heard of ANY of those !