Variety Asks Hollywood: What’s Your Go-To Movie?
Forget the critics’ best of lists — what are the movies that the people who starred in and created those awards season favorites consider their personal faves? Variety’s Marc Malkin asked: “What’s the one movie you can watch over and over again?”
Jennifer Lopez
“West Side Story”
“It was the first musical that my mom made me watch and I so identified with it because it has Puerto Ricans in it. And even though they were gang members, they were still dancing around and they were cute and they were funny and it was great. It was a whitewash version of it, but it was a musical and I fell in love with musicals. That’s what really made me want to sing and dance and act. Not just be an actress or not just be an actor, a singer or just a dancer. I knew that there was a lot out there because of that movie.”
Charlize Theron
“Forgetting Sarah Marshall”
“Whenever it comes on, it makes me happy. And I don’t necessarily know why. I just love that it still makes me feel that way. And I don’t know. The jokes never get old. ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall’ is a warm blanket. It’s a warm blanket with a chocolate mousse and a cheesecake.”
Awkwafina
Popular on Variety
“Drop Dead Gorgeous”
“I love it. I did a movie with Allison Janney and Ellen Barkin, who play best friends in that movie, and they were sitting across from me at dinner, just the two of them and I remember thinking, ‘Oh, my God — this is so cool.’”
Greta Gerwig
“Singin’ in the Rain”
“I’ve seen that movie literally hundreds of times. It was one of the first movies I ever saw. Gene Kelly is my first love and I wanted to be Gene Kelly. It was a combination. And it was tap dancing. It’s a movie about artists. It’s the most joyful movie.”
Lulu Wang
“Secretary”
“It’s the film that made me want to make films, actually… Maggie [Gyllenhaal] is so spectacular in that. Even though she’s in the position of being dominated, I would say it’s still very much her story about her actually gaining and finding her power within that dynamic. I just hadn’t seen films like that before, that really explored female desire, female sexuality, and it was hot. It wasn’t hot because of the objectification. It wasn’t the male gaze. It was hot because she was in power ultimately. It was about a woman who gains control and power.”
Taylor Russell
“Rosemary’s Baby”
“It’s kind of bleak, I suppose. But I love an undertone of sinister nature. I love cult-y worshipping things. I like a pack mentality. I am fascinated by cults. Seeing that and how it unfolds, I love that stuff.”
Antonio Banderas
“Singin’ in the Rain”
“There is an energy in the movie that is very special. That is very romantic in a way. It tells us a story about old Hollywood and a time in the history of this town that was very hopeful and colorful, and we had a lot of hope for a life that was beautiful. Maybe we had lost that innocence and that’s what I like about that movie, the innocence inside it.”
Beanie Feldstein
“Bridesmaids”
“I saw it when I was 17 the week before I graduated high school in the theater at midnight with Ben [Platt] and our other best friends and it was the most impactful theatergoing experience I’ve ever had. To see that many women, that funny in different ways and allowed to just completely take up every space in any way they wanted to, was so impactful on me.”
Lorene Scafaria
“Clueless”
“I miss the ’90s. It’s also a story where you’re talking about a character that maybe people wouldn’t understand or would judge also right out of the gate. You know, a stuck-up, Beverly Hills woman of privilege. But there’s so much heart there and I love her father. I love her relationship with the friends and it just brings me joy.”
Jodie Turner-Smith
“Romeo and Juliet”
“I love that movie. I’ve watched it so many times. It was perfect. Love is the deepest and most universal human subject. We all want community, we want understanding, we want love and to have this undying love for someone who against all circumstances you must be with but also because it leaves you wanting because these two people senselessly die and it’s just so well done.”
Matt Bomer
“Sunset Boulevard”
“I just think it’s a perfect movie”
Taron Egerton
“Shaun of the Dead”
“It’s made in such a way that it’s very, very layered, so you can watch it time and time again and see different things in it. And I just think the performances are lovely in it, and it’s very, very funny. I also have a real soft spot for zombie movies as a genre.”
Ron Howard
“One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”
“That blend of comedy, those ideas, the unbelievable impeccable performances, top to bottom. Haskell Wexler’s photography, the direction, the staging, everything about it just rivets me, because it’s full-on entertainment fueled by ideas and this really artful execution that is just … I really admire that movie.”
Sterling K. Brown
“Out of Sight”
“It has one of the sexiest sex scenes in the history of cinema and you don’t see a stitch of skin. Like you see [George] Clooney with his shirt on and you see [Jennifer Lopez] in a bra and panties, but the seduction — between the top of that rooftop bar and him flirting with her — and then cutting back and forth to the hotel room where they’re just slowly undressing, it’s like, perfect.”
Noah Baumbach
“ET: The Extra-Terrestrial”
“It had such an emotional impact on me, but it was like in that ‘hurts so good’ way that I kept going back to get that catharsis of that thing. I mean, saying goodbye has always been a source of heartbreak for me in movies, like ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ when she says goodbye to the scarecrow. So saying goodbye to ET, that ending always just got me.”
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