Sometimes a movie is just to wind down with friends and watch something mindless. Sometimes it is so much more. If you are looking for a cinematic experience, here are some good places to start. The first three per genre will have links attached to them to their IMDB page, the rest, are listed alphabetically by genre.

 

Comedy

• The Darjeeling Limited (Wes Anderson)
• The Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson)
• Fargo (The Coen Brothers)
• Funny People (Judd Apatow)
• Gigantic (Matt Aselton)
• It’s Kind Of A Funny Story (Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck)
• The Life of Brian(Terry Gilliam)
• O Brother Where Art Thou (The Coen Brothers)
• The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson)
• Rushmore (Wes Anderson)
• Zombieland (Ruben Fleischer)

 

Off Beat

• Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky)
• Burn After Reading (The Coen Brothers)
• Donnie Darko (Richard Kelley)
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry)
• Garden State (Zach Braff)
• Grave of the Fireflies (Isao Takahata)
• Ikiru (Akira Kurosawa)
• Pans Labyrinth (Benicio Del Toro)
• Requiem for a Dream (Darren Aronofsky)
• The Seventh Seal (Ingmar Bergman)
• Stalker (Andre Tarkovsky)
• Sunshine (Danny Boyle)
• Valhalla Rising (Nicholas Winding Refn)

 

Classics

• 25th Hour (Spike Lee)
• Bad Sleep Well (Akira Kurosawa)
• Casablanca (Michael Curtiz)
• Clockers (Spike Lee)
• Do The Right Thing (Spike Lee)
• The Departed (Martin Scorsese)
• The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola)
• Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese)
• Fight Club (David Fincher)
• Mean Streets (Martin Scorsese)
• No Country For Old Men (The Coen Brothers)
• Ran (Akira Kurosawa)
• Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa)
• The Social Network (David Fincher)
• Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese)

 

Dark/Gritty/Realistic

 

• The Lower Depths (Akira Kurosawa)
• To Live (Yimou Zhang)
• True Grit (The Coen Brothers)

 

Documentaries

c

 

 

This list is extremely limited (I didn’t even touch on my deep love of Zombie films!) But this should get you started. Feel free to message or comment with suggestions and/or additions.