Happy Birthday to... Me
Monday, June 6, 2022 at 3:24PM 
me chillin' with the boyfriends cat. my #1 favourite relaxation technique
Hello dearest readers. Today is my birthday (I want no gifts for myself other than donations -- here's our fundraiser since we'd love to go to Venice again and keep active through the fall film season. Or if you'd like to subscribe you can see that in the sidebar and choose a small monthly donation amount).
Let's have fun with lists, shall we? Obviously movies aren't made with any one person in mind -- that would be insane -- but have you ever felt like a movie was made just for you or was just what you needed or found yourself unable to not obsess? Because nostaglia has struck me, herewith are the (mostly) movies from each year from 1989 forward that felt (at the time) like personal gifts to me...
For fun I've also included a "soundtrack" of that year though I am not really a music person, drifting in and out of awareness in that showbiz field. You can see I drift most to pop, folk, and showtunes
DISLCAIMER: These aren't necessarily the entertainments I'd call the best of that given year but just the ones that were most personally meaningful to me at that very moment OR that I have the most in-the-moment memories connected to for lots of different reasons. This is a very chaotic umbrella description, I'm aware. Would love to hear which entertainments fit this description for YOU in the comments.
1989 The Fabulous Baker Boys / Madonna's "Like a Prayer"
1990 Postcards from the Edge / George Michael's "Listen Without Prejudice Vol 1"
1991 Truth or Dare / Lucy Simon & Marsha Norman's "The Secret Garden"
1992 Bram Stokers Dracula / Batman Returns / Annie Lennox's "Diva"
1993 Addams Family Values / Björk's "Debut"
1994 Reality Bites / Hole's "Live Through This"
1995 Priest / Alanis Morissette's "Jagged Little Pill"
1996 Evita / Tori Amos "Boys for Pele"
1997 Boogie Nights / Indigo Girls "Shaming of the Sun"
1998 Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Off Broadway) / Madonna's "Ray of Light" / Lauryn Hill's "The Emancipation of Lauryn Hill
1999 Run Lola Run / Missy Elliott's "Da Real World"
2000 Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV) / Magnetic Field's "69 Love Songs"
2001 Moulin Rouge! / Rufus Wainwright's "Poses"
2002 Far From Heaven* / Jason Robert Brown's "The Last Five Years"
2003 Angels in America (TV) / Madonna's "American Life"
2004 I Heart Huckabees / Patty Griffin's "Impossible Dream" / Scissor Sister's "Scissor Sisters"
2005 Brokeback Mountain / Antony & the Johnson's "I Am a Bird Now" / Adam Guettel's "The Light in the Piazza"
2006 Shortbus / Madonna's "Confessions on a Dancefloor"
2007 Once / Björk's "Volta"
2008 Rachel Getting Married / Pink's "Funhouse"
2009 Precious / Mad Men (TV) / Lady Gaga's "The Fame Monster"
2010 Mad Men (TV) / Robyn's "Body Talk"
2011 Bridesmaids / Lady Gaga's "Born This Way"
2012 Magic Mike / Madonna's "MDNA"
2013 Short Term 12 / Frances Ha / music???
2014 Pride / Captain America Winter Soldier / Sia's "1000 Forms of Fear"
2015 Carol / Mad Max Fury Road / Carly Rae Jepsen's "Emotion"
2016 The Witch / Lin-Manuel Miranda's "Hamilton"
2017 Lady Bird / Miley Cyrus "Younger Now"
2018 A Star is Born / Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper's "A Star is Born"
2019 Parasite / music ???
2020 Normal People (TV) / Taylor Swift's "Folklore/Evermore"
2021 The Power of the Dog / Adele's "30"
2022 (thus far) Everything Everywhere All At Once / Kacey Musgraves "Star-Crossed"
Randomness. Share your own in the comments. any set of years!
Birthdays, List-Mania, The Film Experience
Reader Comments (21)
I think this is what you mean
1998 springs to mind first my 21st trip and only to this day to the USA,I loved it and Madonna's Ray of Light/Titanic.
1986 Madonna's True Blue/Anything Molly Ringwald
2007 Atonement/Kylie's X
Reality Bites, Short Cuts and Y tu mama tambien have always felt that way for me.
Sometimes you find those things long after they came out - I was just a kid when Something Wild came out, but of that movie's not for me, I don't know who it's for.
(Oh, and happy birthday!)
Mr Ripley -- 1997/1998 was SUCH. a memorable year. love hearing your choices
Mike --- it's true. i find that with particularly music sometimes i get into it years later. happens less with movies since i see so many of them.
Happy birthday, Nathaniel!!
I for sure thought your '97 would include Titanic in some capacity. Can't argue with Boogie Nights though!
There are movies that are important to me but feel like private joys: Cukor's HOLIDAY, CHILDREN OF PARADISE, SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY, ROXANNE, SHOOT THE MOON, THE GREEN RAY, WEEKEND, SYNDROMES AND A CENTUrY, BROOKLYN. (I could go on.)
Since Spotify, I do tracks, not albums. A song that has made me swoon since I first heard it a few years ago is "Without the One You Love" by Aretha, which I could listen to every day.
Sucker that I am, on TV I'm currently reliving the teenage years I never had with HEARTSTOPPER. And bravo EVERYTHING.
Happy birthday!
Nothing has ever felt more personal to me than Chasing Amy. I am a former comic collector from New Jersey. In high school I identified as a lesbian and then began dating a man. (It took me years of dating men before I identified as a bisexual; they all seemed like flukes.)
Happy birthday, Nathaniel! No Jurassic World for 2022 :)?
Hope you have a great birthday! Love this list, and I match so many of them.
Here are a few that hit that way for me not on your list: The Opposite of Sex (which maybe doesn't age well, but was what I needed back then), American Beauty (same), The Hours (still adore it), Saved! (which really was my life growing up), Milk, Won't You Be My Neighbor and I will always be a little irked Moonlight and La La Land were pitted against each other, because both are vivid movie memory moments for me.
Music: Taking the Long Way by The Chicks, Communion by Years & Years, Dirty Computer by Janelle Monae and everything from Kacey Musgraves, though Golden Hour edges out her debut as my favorite. Seconding all the Madonna and Lauryn Hill's album is probably my all time favorite. Alanis too!
Happy birthday!
This is a great question. The movies that have felt most personal to me are Lady Bird, Lost in Translation, and The Royal Tenenbaums. I would agree with Mad Men as well. The albums are When the Pawn.../The Idler Wheel... by Fiona Apple, Folklore/Evermore by Taylor Swift, The Suburbs by Arcade Fire, and High Violet by The National.
my heart LEAPT when i saw TORI AMOS - BOYS FOR PELE. I absolutely adore Tori (she is my god) and i also play piano, so i'm so glad i discovered her. I truly believe she has helped me get this far in life, and will continue to help me get thru. Happy Birthday Nathaniel!!!!
Thank you for the shout out for Madonna's American Life, one of her most unfairly maligned and misunderstood albums. X-static Process is so beautiful - my favorite song of hers. And the two songs preceding it - Nothing Fails and Intervention - are almost as fine. Happy Birthday sir!
Happy birthday, Nathaniel. I hope your day was relaxing and peaceful. Congrats on making it to another year! May your next year bring about many more blessings and much health, wealth, and love into your life. :)
Happy Birthday
1965 The Sound of Music / Help!
1966 Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? / The Supremes A Go Go
1967 Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner / I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You
1968 Romeo & Juliet / Aretha Now
1969 Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid / Blood, Sweat & Tears
1970 Five Easy Pieces / Bridge Over Troubled Water
1971 The French Connection / Tapestry
1972 The Godfather / Cabaret soundtrack
1973 The Way We Were / The Way We Were
1974 The Godfather Part II / Fulfillingness’ First Finale
1975 Dog Day Afternoon / That’s the Way of the World
1976 Taxi Driver / Frampton Comes Alive
1977 Annie Hall / Rumours
1978 La Cage Aux Folles / Saturday Night Fever
1979 Apocalypse Now / Bad Girls
1980 Ordinary People / The Game
1981 Reds / Tattoo You
1982 Victor Victoria / Beauty and the Beat
1983 Fanny and Alexander / Thriller
1984 The Killing Field / Purple Rain
1985 The Purple Rose of Cairo / Like a Virgin
1986 Hannah and Her Sisters / Whitney Houston
1987 Moonstruck / Whitney
1988 Die Hard / Dirty Dancing
1989 sex, lies and videotape / Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814
Happy Belated Birthday, Nathaniel! As another June baby, I like to look backwards and forwards and sideways, and as always, very eclectic.
1975 - Sound of Music, first time I was allowed to go to the movies without adults; it was the 10th anniversary special, showing in theaters all over the country, saw it three more times
1979 - Hair / Blondie, One Way or Another
1982 - Fanny and Alexander, first foreign film / The Cars, Let's Go
1983 - Silkwood, became a Meryl Streep fan / Willie Nelson
1988 - TNT launched and started showing classic movies, never turned the channel / big band also Cinema Paradiso / movie soundtracks
1989 - visit to the Museum of the Moving Image in London (it has since closed), and fell head over heels in love with movie montages (see also the end of Cinema Paradiso above)
1990 - In the Mood for Love / Sinéad O'Connor, Nothing Compares to U
1995 - Toy Story
2014 - Happy Valley, became a Sarah Lancashire fan
2022 - Julia (HBO) and Borgen: Power & Glory (Netflix) / Eleri Ward's folk album of Sondheim tunes, called A Perfect Little Death
happy happy birthday!
Happy belated birthday!
I'll go with the first year that came to mind:
- 2016, the year of Moonlight & Beyonce's "Lemonade"
It’s great finding out that you’re also a Tori Amos fan! I just saw her last month for the tenth time. I loved Boys For Pele. Caught a Lite Sneeze, Marianne, Putting the Damage On, Not The Red Baron are all classics.
For more chaotic than your description could it be, makes perfect sense to me.
As a good list-obsessive that I am, I have an archive with lists of films and music, and the "criteria" that I use to order it (after time to decide how to do it) is not to put "the best" on the top but the art I feel more connected to.
Here are my choices:
1986 Hombre Mirando al Sudeste (Man Facing Southeast) / "Soy Una Arveja" El Cuarteto de Nos
1987 La Vida Alegre / "De Sol a Sol" Presuntos Implicados
1988 Neco Z Alenky (Alice) / "Circle In The Forest" Asturias
1989 Amanece, Que No es Poco / "Vital Signs 1" Vital Signs
1990 La Luna en el Espejo (The Moon in the Mirror) / "The Brand New Heavies" The Brand New Heavies
1991 Delicatessen / "Cuentame Un Cuento" Celtas Cortos
1992 Death Becomes Her / "Virulencia Modulada" Virulo
1993 La Gente de la Universal (The People at Universal) / "Combat Folk" Modena City Ramblers
1994 Bienvenido-Welcome / "Ad Perpetuam Rei Memorian" Ataraxia
1995 Underground / "La Vaquita de Martin" Los Hermanos Rincón
1996 Tesis (Thesis) / "Babel" Santa Sabina
1997 Cube / "Proud Like A God" Guano Apes
1998 Crna Macka, Beli Macor (Black Cat, White Cat) / "Cowboy Bebop" The Seatbelts
1999 South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut / "De Flora Y Fauna" Gallina Negra
2000 Requiem for a Dream / "Juan Manuel" Plastilina Mosh
2001 Baran / "Chico Trujillo y la Señora Imaginación" Chico Trujillo
2002 Russkiy Kovcheg (Russian Ark) / "Radaid" Radaid
2003 Te Doy Mis Ojos (Take My Eyes) / "Da Capo OST 1 - Amoroso"
2004 Temporada de Patos (Duck Season) / "Welcome to the North" The Music
2005 Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit / "Ratoncitos" 31 Minutos
2006 Madeinusa / "Show Your Bones" Yeah Yeah Yeahs
2007 La Zona (The Zone) / "As I Am" Alicia Keys
2008 Yo Soy Otro (Others) / "Musica Para Bombardear" Silverio
2009 Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh (No One Knows About Persian Cats) / "El Tren de la Alegria" Paté de Fuá
2010 Prometeo Deportado / "Triciclo Circus Band" Triciclo Circus Band
2011 Jodaeiye Nader az Simin (A Separation) / "Cripta y Vida" Pedropiedra
2012 Holy Motors / "The Willing Parte 1" Radaid
Happy belated birthday, Nathaniel!
Here is my list:
1989 - Batman ... Madonna--Like a Prayer / Janet Jackson--Rhythm Nation 1814
1990 - The Grifters ... Sinead O'Connor--I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got
1991 - The Silence of the Lambs / Thelma and Louise ... U2--Achtung Baby
1992 - Batman Returns ... Madonna--Erotica / REM--Automatic for the People / Tori Amos--Little Earthquakes / Sophie B. Hawkins--Tongues and Tails / Annie Lennox--Diva
1993 - The Piano ... Liz Phair--Exile in Guyville / Janet Jackson--janet. / Sheryl Crow--Tuesday Night Music Club
1994 - The Last Seduction ... Jeff Buckley--Grace / Hole--Live Through This
1995 - Safe / To Die For / Seven... Bjork--Post / Radiohead--The Bends / PJ Harvey--To Bring You My Love
1996 - Fargo / Scream ... Tori Amos--Boys for Pele / Sheryl Crow--Sheryl Crow
1997 - Boogie Nights ... Radiohead--OK Computer / Elliott Smith--Either/Or / Janet Jackson--The Velvet Rope
1998 - The Dreamlife of Angels ... Garbage--Version 2.0 / Tori Amos--From the Choirgirl Hotel / Madonna--Ray of Light / Lucinda Williams--Car Wheels on a Gravel Road / Elliott Smith--XO / Sheryl Crow--The Globe Sessions
1999 - All About My Mother ... Fiona Apple--...When the Pawn
2000 - You Can Count on Me ... Radiohead--Kid A / Madonna--Music / Erykah Badu--Mama's Gun / Aimee Mann--Bachelor No. 2 / PJ Harvey--Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea
2001 - Moulin Rouge! / Spirited Away / Mulholland Drive ... Bjork--Vespertine
2002 - The Hours / Far From Heaven ... Neko Case--Blacklisted
2003 - Rufus Wainwright--Want One
2004 - Franz Ferdinand--Franz Ferdinand
2005 - Me and You and Everyone We Know ... Antony and the Johnsons--I am a Bird Now / Feist--Let It Die / Martha Wainwright--self-titled / The New Pornographers--Twin Cinema
2006 - Pan's Labyrinth ... Neko Case--Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
2007 - No Country for Old Men ... Feist--The Reminder
2008 - Wendy and Lucy ... Fleet Foxes--Fleet Foxes
2009 - Julia ... Maxwell--BLACKsummers'night
2010 - Black Swan ... Beach House--Teen Dream / Robyn--Body Talk
2011 - Martha Marcy May Marlene / Young Adult ... St. Vincent--Strange Mercy
2012 - Rust and Bone ... Anais Mitchell--Young Man in America
2013 - Her ... Jason Isbell--Southeastern
2014 - Stranger by the Lake ... D'Angelo--Black Messiah
2015 - Mad Max ... Sufjan Stevens--Carrie & Lowell
2016 - Moonlight / Arrival ... Beyonce--Lemonade / David Bowie--Blackstar
2017 - Wonder Woman ... Moses Sumney--Aromanticism
2018 - The Favorite / Burning ... Kacey Musgraves--Golden Hour
2019 - Us ... Lana Del Rey--Norman Fucking Rockwell!
2020 - Nomadland ... Fiona Apple--Fetch the Bolt Cutters / Taylor Swift--Folklore
2021 - The Worst Person in the World ... Lady Blackbird--Black Acid Soul
Angelo -- ooh, love so many of these choices. I really need to listen to Fiona's "fetch the bolt cutters" i wasn't in the right mood for it at the time but i love her.