Just watched it. Fantastic movie. Brilliant cast. Incredible soundtrack that contains not just one, but two songs from the Vince Guaraldi Trio’s “A Charlie Brown Christmas” album and Paul Simon’s “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard.” I loved it. Cross another one off the list.
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I’m going to comment on some of your movies on your list:
Royal T’s: Great movie, which I own. I also love the Charlie Brown Christmas album, and I had it playing in my car constantly around Christmas. Nick Roosa is a big fan of the movie, if you’re looking for someone to discuss it with.
Happy Feet: Nice, wholesome movie – until the last 45 minutes, when it was taken over by hippies that made it into a giant piece of vomit-inducing environmentalist propoganda.
Mean Girls: This is going to be the only time in my life I ever admit this – I really liked Mean Girls.
The Shawshank Redemtion: Can’t believe you never saw this.
Phantom: Good, not great, in my opinion. I’ll take the actual show.
Mr. Holland’s Opus: One of my mom’s favorite movies/soundtracks.
Brokeback Mountain: Right up your alley
Billy Madison: Honestly, who hasn’t seen this movie at some point in their life??
Your list, I imagine, is by no means complete. If I could offer some suggestions (I’ll stick to less popular/older movies), which I will, they’d be (assuming you haven’t seen them): The Last Picture Show; The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly; Once Upon A Time in America; Run Lola Run; Princess Mononoke, and mostly any other miyazaki; Yojimbo; Seven Samurai; Jules and Jim; The Bicycle Thief; The 400 Blows; The French Connection.
@Kevin – The Charlie Brown Christmas album is my favorite Christmas album, hands down. Sometimes I listen to it during the year. Next time I’m on a run with Roosa, I’ll have to bring up Royal Tenenbaums. In regards to not seeing the Shawhank Redemption, there are a lot of movies that I’ve missed during my life. I’m trying to catch up without becoming an antisocial loser. P.S. The only reason that Brokeback Mountain is on there is because of Chris Nolan’s “Broketrack Mountain” parody.
@Anonymous – No list of “Movies to Watch” could ever be complete. There are books such as this which could keep you occupied for thousands of hours. As you picked up on, I have not watched many older movies. I consider it an especially weak part of my film experience. I haven’t seen any of the ones you mentioned, so I’ll be sure to keep them in mind the next time I’m looking for a movie to watch.