I haven't really distinguished these two categories. Everyone is partial to their personal favorites, and films good and bad speak to us on different levels. As I'm sure is the case with you, many films transport us to a different place, not just the film itself, but within ourselves. Big Trouble in Little China conjures up all kinds of memories. Planet of the Apes reminds me of my summer of '96 when I had no cable but had all the Apes movies and proceeded to watch the cycle on an average of every other day. Great music does much the same for me as well, and some albums and bands that might not seem great to some people hold a special place for me based on my associations with it. Yesterday I heard Van Halen's "Can't Stop Loving You" on the radio and was a little stunned to think the song is 12 years old. I remembered when the song came out, when the video premiered, where I was at, and what particular girl seemed like my eternal love at the time. Some movies can do this as well, and I've already found myself growing nostalgic for films that I've even recently seen.

Lately I have gotten a chance to re-visit some of those classic films from my childhood, including Big Trouble and Major League. I found that these films may reveal different nuances to me, I still find them immensely enjoyable even if neither film is regarded as anything close to a classic (outside of major league baseball players). I'm not sure how your perspective of film has changed, but last quarter in class a professor made a point that I agreed with. He said that he and I have a different eye when watching film. We watch films not just to be taken in by the spectacle, but we're consciously aware of what the director is communicating to us, and more specifically we watch every film wondering how they shot certain scenes. Perhaps a curse of knowing too much about film. A film rarely seems just a "film" to me anymore, and everything is a personal vision expressed, a moral or political agenda trying to be conveyed, and a constant advancement.

As far as my film lists, and something I've tried avoiding lately, is to resist my film snobbery. Shortly after getting into "real" movies I found myself condemning all my old favorites, but today I can watch these films and realize that Dawn of the Dead, I'm Gonna Git You Sucka, and even Predator are really damn good movies. I can't wait until our generation are the head writers for film magazines and newspapers. The corpus collossum of film cannons needs to change, and it will eventually.