Variety, long the chronicler of all things showbiz, recently put out a book called, “The Movie That Changed My Life” in which 120 celebrities talk about their key moment of cinematic inspiration.
For “Sex and the City” scribe Candace Bushnell, it was Woody Allen’s 1977 lovelorn ode to New York and neuroses, “Annie Hall.”
Seeing Marlon Brando in 1954’s “On the Waterfront” hooked Jack Nicholson on acting. And will anyone be surprised to learn that “Interview With the Vampire” author Anne Rice cited 1936’s “Dracula's Daughter?”
"I saw it as a child, and it established the myth of the vampire for me," she reports.
Movies, like other art forms, can inspire for better or worse. At it’s best, there’s something about the big screen that can take us out of ourselves, uplift the spirit and make us see possibilities we hadn’t considered before. Or, as actor Javier Bardem told Variety about his life-altering flick, “E.T.”: “You feel like a better person after watching that film.”
Then again, there are many more movies that only inspire us to demand our money back from the box office.
The celebrities weighed in – now it’s your turn. Use the comments section below to tell us what movie changed your life and why.
Hester is founding director of the award-winning, multi-media NYCity News Service at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism. He is the former City Editor of the New York Daily News, where he started as a reporter in 1992.
