Curious version of the topic -- films are probably (with the exception of television) easily the most influential broadly on the whole population, but I wonder how many people would say that a film changes your life the way a book does -- interesting to see what people say. There is a difference between impact and influence, I think. I can think of few films that have changed my way of being or doing, except for the 10 minutes after the film is over (slouching like Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca -- one of Woody Allan's smartest images). They seem to wear off.

I remember leaving Old Yeller at the age of 6 and lying in a snowbank crying for an hour. That counts I guess.

When I was in London in the 70's, I became fascinated with Greta Garbo, and as luck would have it, a movie house did a series of retrospectives, one of which was of her early films. The one I most remember was "Die Freudlose Gasse" (1924) -- her first international film (she had done a couple in Sweden, this one was in German). Marlene Dietrich has a part in it too, though if you blink you miss her. Garbo plays a secretary who becomes the mistress of her boss, and the striking thing about the movie is that everyone else in the film seems as if they are from about 30 years earlier. Or, to put it another way, they all seem to be in black and white, while she is in colour. Her teeth are a mess, and she completely overacts, but is something new, like a space alien. Watching her films was a great solace to me, and very influential.

I remember wandering into a theatre one day for the hell of it, and watching "Bonnie and Clyde"-- the scene in the escaping car where they have been wounded and are screaming in pain, completely wrecked the conventions of every previous Hollywood film -- the chase scene, the bank robbery, the shootout, you name it -- and made one wonder what else one had taken as truth that was convention.

"The Piano" is probably the film that had the greatest impact on me. I saw it one day in an empty movie theatre and was completely swept away by everything about it. The final scenes are still amazing, awe-inspiring, unbelievable.


yours,

Peter T.