Jeremy Mathai's Favorite Movies Of All Time

Hey everyone, Jeremy Mathai here! By this point, you may or may not be familiar with seeing my byline at the top of /Film articles, both as an occasional contributor over the last year or so and, in recent weeks, as a staff writer. For those who have no moral objections to my strong opinions and sarcastic demeanor, I'm humbled and beyond thrilled to be here! For those who do experience a negative Pavlovian response to my very existence, well, I'm still glad to be here. We'll get through this disappointment together, folks.

The true disappointment here is that us newcomers have been tasked with limiting our all-time favorite movies to just a paltry sum of 15. I don't have enough of an ego (I promise!) to assume that anyone's going to be waiting on pins and needles for my deeply personal, intensely subjective, and somewhat arbitrary list. That said, I do think that movie rankings — whether Marvel, Star Wars, or a veritable buffet of all things cinema — have a way of revealing just what makes a person tick like nothing else can. If that interests you, kindly join me on this journey into the depths of what makes me, me!

I've only had the heart to watch Alfonso Cuarón's 2001 masterpiece just once, which is why I can't in good faith rank Y Tu Mamá También any higher. But what an unforgettable watch. The story of Luisa Cortés (Maribel Verdú, who pops up again further down this list!) accompanying two best friends Julio Zapata (Gael García Bernal) and Tenoch Iturbide (Diego Luna) on their road trip to a Mexican beach is a visually sumptuous feast for the eyes, one far better experienced than described. Rarely has the slow, sharp ache of time been captured so effectively, with the bond between the three companions ebbing and flowing before our eyes until arriving at its bittersweet, if inevitable conclusion. None of them are the same after that journey, and neither was I.

I may have a weakness for filmmaker debuts. Rian Johnson first introduced himself with this distinctive and unabashed film noir centered on high schoolers. I always point to Brick as an example of some of my favorite things filmmakers can do: committing wholeheartedly to a genre despite the silliness of a premise, making the absolute most out of a shoestring budget, and relying on sharp writing and a deep well of film history to build atop what came before while adding something new. I'd sometimes waver between this and The Brothers Bloom as my favorite Johnson movie, but I never tire of how Brick taps into something deep and true and bittersweet.

Somehow, we still take Lana and Lilly Wachowski for granted. We're getting a Matrix 4 soon and I can't wait to join the critical revisiting of the entire trilogy. But as underrated and necessary as the sequels are, they merely build off what the original established. It's a perfect hero's journey that takes a highly specific contemporary fear and turns it into fuel for a new universal myth. Superman first made audiences believe a man could fly, but The Matrix made me think he could accomplish even more.

This Peter Weir historical epic is the Dad Movie of all Dad Movies, an episodic and sometimes meandering cat-and-mouse game between opposing naval commanders in the Napoleonic Wars. The action is so gritty and tactile that you can almost taste the gunpowder in the air after a volley of cannon fire. Led by Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany, the characters feel just as lived-in as the ship itself. Fans have been begging for a Master and Commander sequel ever since 2003, but one gets the distinct impression that the story continues to live on regardless after the credits roll.

How many movies so keenly have one foot firmly in adulthood and the other planted in the innocence of youth? In pure Guillermo del Toro fashion, Pan's Labyrinth is simultaneously a fairy tale and a splash of cold water in the face of childish fancies; both an escape from reality and an angry call to arms against genuine evil in this world. Nobody does fantasy like del Toro does, and not even del Toro has done better than the gut-punch of an ending here.

I constantly seek emotional truth and honesty in movies. I'm not sure I've ever seen that put to screen as frankly and with as much nuance as Joel and Ethan Coen do in Inside Llewyn Davis. From the washed-out colors to Oscar Isaac's performance to the largely plot-less story, I could practically live in the pervasive melancholy of this film. I've rarely felt more sympathy for an unlikable character as I do for Llewyn Davis, trapped in a never-ending cycle of grief.

Is it possible to fall in love with a movie within its first 8 minutes? That's exactly what happened here, as the Peter Jackson fantasy film swept me off my feet before I even knew what hit me. Later years have given me an appreciation for its greatness as a near-flawless adaptation as well, while many deep-dives into the behind-the-scenes DVD features gave me my first crash course in Film 101. No other Middle-earth entry understands the feeling of reading J.R.R. Tolkien quite like The Fellowship of the Ring. Just make sure it's the Extended Edition.