Once upon a time, fresh from high school, I arrived at Stanford with plans to double major in film and communication. Before college, most of my money used to vanish, albeit with my consent, at the box office at least once every two weeks. Movie nights with friends had been Friday staples. So, freshman year sans car, the inaccessibility of the theater was one of the first grave things I felt. Over time, my tap on the movie scene diminished; the balance of movies I’ve seen against movies I want to see tipped more precariously toward the latter.

 

Most of us realize there was a thing we didn’t pack with us in the move to Stanford. Yet I haven’t quit saying that I love watching movies — sitting still in one place and getting lost in a visual story. I love how favorite movies become campaigns we make to convert our friends into fans. I love how we can debate whether a movie was realistic or not. I love how we can sit right next to each other watching the same movie and notice entirely different details on the screen before us.

 

With that, ladies and gentlemen, I now transform this little newspaper section into a strategic soapbox about the following three movies, among those I keep watching over and over again. (And in so doing, possibly subject myself to the familiar criticism: “You like that movie?”) My unabashed objective here, of course, is to persuade you to see them all. Here goes…

 

“Ocean’s Twelve”: Because it’s enchanting to watch people with chemistry. My little brother and I watched this movie maybe a dozen times one summer, repeatedly enjoying what felt like a two-hour long inside joke. I hadn’t noticed at first, but “Twelve” constantly references “Eleven” (and I loved “Eleven”); Rusty (Brad Pitt) is talking with a full mouth in almost every one of his scenes and snarky double entendre dominates the script. There’s a scene in which Rusty and Isabel (Catherine Zeta-Jones) first meet in Italy — it’s a second of eye contact as she sits alone at a cafe and he grins at her while sprinting away from the local policemen chasing him. Later:

 

“I think I saw you yesterday,” she says.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah, you were being chased by the police.”

“Chasing me? No. I don’t think so,” he says.

“I’m quite sure it was you.”

“Doesn’t say much for the police.”

 

That’s how the love-affair-of-the-movie starts. It’s a microcosm of the entire movie: hints of an idea, mysterious nods to a past event, characters that totally click and forget that technically they’re in complete disagreement. Don’t we love when that happens in real life?

 

“The Royal Tenenbaums”: Because in the process of doing what we think is best, we often foil others trying to do the same exact thing. Royal (Gene Hackman) is an estranged husband and father who attempts to reconnect his splintered family by pretending he’s dying of cancer after getting kicked out of the hotel he was living in for years. Now-grown children, grandchildren, an adopted child, unique coping mechanisms and hidden love interests all end up under the same roof like in the olden days, except less willingly. In their re-acquaintances, they surprise each other as they learn how much they had all attempted to escape each other.

 

“Looks like you and Dad are back together again, huh?” Chas (Ben Stiller) says.

“He’s your dad, too, Chas,” Richie (Luke Wilson) says.

“No, he’s not.”

“Yes, he is.”

“You really hate me, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t. I love you.”

 

“The Science of Sleep”: Because we know how great our minds are at making complicated situations out of tiny facts. Stephane (Gael Garcia Bernal) falls in love with his neighbor Stephanie (Charlotte Gainsbourg). But our protagonist is not simply an artist by occupation — he is an overactive dreamer whose imagination starts confusing him as to which events have happened and which he has only dreamt. He seems childish to us at times; really, though, he puts pictures to the ideas that can haunt anyone with an unshakable crush. The way he sees it:

 

“It’s not fair. She changed exactly the second I started to like her. It’s like a big bang. You know, the first instant, it’s very small and then the next nanosecond, huge — infinite. I wish I could travel back to the time when I didn’t find her attractive.”

 

So there you have it — my first list-style column! And, yes — I’ll admit that this column was spurred on by my viewing, finally, of “Hugo” this past weekend.

 

Convinced?? Not quite? That’s okay! — we can talk about this. Email Nina at ninamc “at” stanford “dot” edu.