Megan Judge's Favourite Movies

Masculinity & Femininity

Men becoming men or taking control of their stoic masculinity, things like Fight Club, American Beauty, Revolver, etc, show men reclaiming their masculinity/mind/life as adults. Then the younger versions, like Scott Pilgrim, Superbad, Cruel Intentions, Grease 2, etc where Men finding their way in the world. Softens my heart, I like to watch men evolve - become themselves. When Michael learns the skills to build the motorbike in Grease 2, Lester starts smoking pot and working out in American Beauty, Jack quits his job in Fight Club, shit like this. They take a hold of the direction their life is going and start to make their own choices. I don't care what the choices are, I just like watching people solve the ultimate problem, the Self.

There is also some themes within femininity of creating friction. The Big Sleep has the power play of how a femme fatale deals with masculinity, The Beverly Hillbillies shows the differing ways a variety of men react to female strength and feminisation, Malena shows how beauty is often is treated by the world and how it can change a woman into her choosing 'hiding herself', Dogville shows - at the end its a play on the discussion with God, I felt I've had that good part of me try to be destroyed by humanity also - but its the lifting of the veil of femininity to show that it chooses to normally make covert (why femininity at root is ugra and maya creating). When the feminine interacts and controls the environment and then has experiential side affects of people disliking that and trying to destroy them, how you must defend your beauty and your side of the wheel in yin/yang.

They say women's intrasexual bullying became subtle, evolutionarily, so men couldn't see it and so most women suffer in silence because men tell them they are crazy for noticing queues. Evolutionarily its hypothesised to have evolved so physical altercations wouldnt take place between a man defending a woman against another woman and accidently killing her arguably - so female bullying even though incredibly hostile can be done right in front of a man and him be totally unaware his woman's status is being undermined and she is about to be ostracised from a social environment because its covert. So women suffer without the help of men quite often. For example, Malena and Dogville are meant to show female intrasexual competition - the ending of how the women treat her is meant to be a lesson in demurity as the men threw her around and the women didn't help her because she threatened their own status in a wing of the female power heirarchy.

Society vs. the Self

The other main theme is society vs the Self. The collective taking over and trying to destroy the Self through things like removing one's freedom (Spirit, Silver Brumby, V for Vendetta, The Truman Show, 1984, Yellowbeard, etc) or actually fighting the state/authority (Life of Brian, Nice Dreams, etc). Or it falls into fighting in the beyond the Self (the "greater you", usually) to reclaim the Self (Limitless, Inception, Tenet, The Illusionist, Everything Everywhere All at Once, Nine Days, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Matrix Reloaded, etc) - all these films circulate around the mind conquering reality. The dream, creativity, metaphysical, paranormal breakdown of what is "real" and what is "actionable" even though statistically improbable. Like changing your brain waves to not need physical drugs (limitless), bending the dream REM state into reality (producing more DMT naturally when you are awake), etc etc etc. Encompassing the overall, "what is the Self," and where you fit into the world (Being John Malkovich (what is you), Blade Runner (what is a human), Idiocracy (maybe a new world changes how you see you), Lord of War (being the world's bad guy), Requiem for a Dream (does reality defeat you or not), Enter the Void (do you exist past life?), Oppenheimer (what do you give to the world?), Secret Window (would you know you were slipping), etc). The Lord of War, Fight Club, Oppenheimer, Revolver, Yellowbeard, V for Vendetta, 1984, Spirit, Idiocracy, etc themes of... well even The Truman Show in the end, of learning to be the bad guy to harness one's own power would be the subtle theme. "What is bad" in regards to growth beyond a system being considered a plague on the system.