My Disaster-Wise blog is now ten years old, with a few hundred posts and about a third of a million views along the way. I never really introduced myself, so how about this: a list of movies I'd recommend to a friend. This isn't a list of movies that all smart people are supposed to love, like Citizen Kane: these are ones that resonated with me over the years.

I'm sure there are lots of great movies that I haven't seen yet, so the adventure continues. Also, I included one Outer Limits episode at the end. Comments?

Sorcerer  (1977) - a remake of The Wages of Fear (1953, also very good). Amazing, gripping movie. Once past the improbable premise (that an urgent delivery of dynamite to an oil-well fire would go by truck over bad roads rather than by aircraft) the movie never falters. The effects are stunning. The depiction of nitroglycerin is pretty accurate, such as its tendency to sweat out of the clay filling of aging dynamite sticks. 

The Dam Busters (1955) - Very hard to find now but worth chasing. The story of the RAF squadron ordered to destroy three dams on the Ruhr River drainage, using unconventional weapons. Quite accurate to the after-action reports, and it doesn't hold back from the terrible cost of such missions. It was one of George Lucas's inspirations when crafting Star Wars. 

The rest of my picks, in no particular order:

Terminator 2  (1991) 

Das Boot (1981)

Flight of the Phoenix (1965; the original)

The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

Groundhog Day (1993)

Metropolis (1927)

Blade Runner (1982)

Signs (2002)

Empire of the Sun (1987)

My Neighbor Totoro (1988)

The Abyss (1989)

Steamboat Bill Jr (1928)

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

The Searchers (1956)

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)

To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

No Highway in the Sky (1951)

Outer Limits episode - "Demon with a Glass Hand" (1964)