So wrong, but Clueless. I had to watch it for a class, and once you think about it it’s really the best version of Emma ever made. I appreciated it when I saw it in that context.
I was really mad and confused after i saw Blue Velvet, but even a few weeks after i saw it i couldn’t stop thinking about it. So i went on to see some of Lynch’s other films and then i revisited it and i found that i actually liked it a lot better. And since then i’ve seen it a few more times and it just keeps growing on me.
Days of Heaven confused me at first, but it has now come to be one of my favorite films.
The first time I saw it, I found Citizen Kane to be a boring, moderately entertaining film with a twist ending and a repository for lots of parodied/iconic moments.
When I first saw Casablanca I thought it was a so-so movie, but I’ve seen it many times since then and it’s become one of my favorites.
Svankmajer’s FAUST. Now I’m sold.
Ralph Baksih’s WIZARDS. Now I’m addicted.
I’m kind of perversely worried that someday I’ll be like that with DOMINO. Like if I develop cinematic Stokholm’s syndrome and can only come to peace with the trauma of having ever witnessed DOMINO by watching the movie over and over and over and over and over…
This happens a lot more to me with albums than movies. Anyone else?
Jules et Jim. It was just to bohemian for me to sympathize with the characters, I guess I got over it though, it hits me harder every time I see it.
Last Tango in Paris. Thought it was BORING, now one of my favorites……
The Third Man. I’d like to go back and smack my younger self for ever uttering a disparaging word against Reed’s masterpiece. What an ignorant dolt!
Terry Gilliam’s Brazil. I’m not sure why I didn’t like it the first time I saw it, maybe I was just in a bad mood; not it’s one of my favorite films of Gilliam’s catalog. I also hated Cronenberg’s Crash for some reason, now I love it.
Don’t throw anything at me for saying this. But I really had to give Almodovar films a few chances before I realized what an amazing genius he was. I think the problem was the choices I was being exposed to tended to be films that some of his more ‘die-hard’ fans tended to love and weren’t the larger crowd-pleasing films (if that can be said about his stuff). When I saw All About My Mother I saw him in a different light. A week later, I had that 8 disc box set and was working my way through them and yeah…he’s a genius.
I was too young when I first saw Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, so it really freaked me out. OK, I was 16, but still, that movie is intense. Over the next year so, I found myself responding to the question “Did you like A Clockwork Orange?” with a more positive answer every time. Eventually, I saw it again (multiple times) and it very well may be my favorite movie now.
Also, I didn’t really get Terry Gilliam’s Time Bandits the first time around. I guess I thought it was too ridiculous. Subsequent viewings fixed that.
I did not care at all about THE SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE at first, but after a second viewing it became one of may favorite films. Something similar happened with SEX, LIES AND VIDEOTAPE.
One curious case is Tran Anh Hung’s CYCLO, which I started out despising and ended up loving… all of which happened while it played on the screen. I consider it a flawed masterpiece.
Mulholland Drive. I thought it was confusing for confusion’s sake. After seeing Blue Velvet and Elephant Man I came to understand that Lynch can construct a very involving narrative without drawing so far out of the structural boundaries, and so he must have been doing it for a reason. Watching it with an eye for intent as opposed to pretension really woke me up to the beauty of the film.
Les Bonnes Femmes was like that for me. The ending really started to haunt on me for months afterwards. Same thing with Into the Wild too.
Svankmajer’s FAUST. Now I crave it.
B JUDGE: good call on BRAZIL. Finally watched the whole thing after a few aborted attempts. It is magnificent.
Finally, DEAD RINGERS. Watched when I first got really excited by Cronenberg, but particularly his effects-heavy films. DEAD RINGERS struck me as much less interesting and much less focused than many of Cronenberg’s films that I loved…a waste of the world’s best film idea! But I just watched it more on its own terms last week. I was wrong. It’s amazing.
Alejandro Jodorowsky’s EL TOPO.
First I was all like, “What?”
And then I was all like, “Ohhhhh.”
I hated, hated, HATED Eternal Sunshine the first time I saw it. 45 minutes through I wanted to walk out. Now I think it might be one of the best films of the decade.
There Will Be Blood.
at first I was like “wtf? what happened?” but then at the same night, I give it a second try and I love it.
RoboCop- I first saw the TV cut and turned it off after twenty minutes. A few years later, I finally saw it uncut and loved it.
Die Hard- same as above
The Truman Show- the first time around, I didn’t get it. About six years later, I saw it in a class and realized it really wasn’t that bad.
Mulholland Dr. It was my first Lynch film, and I frankly didn’t get it. Then I re-watched it, read up on Lynch and his thought process. Read some interpretations, then I loved it. I mean, absolutely loved it.
I don’t know about HATE, but I responded to Punch-Drunk Love with a resounding “meh” the first time I saw it. I now think it’s Paul Thomas Anderson’s best film, right above There Will Be Blood.
I must have been in the wrong mood the first time I watched “The Apartment”, because I thought it was a little stupid. Sometimes when I react negatively to a movie widely considered to be great, I assume that maybe I missed something, and usually give it at least one more try. Well, a couple years later I caught “The Apartment” at an open air screening in Grant Park in Chicago, and was blown away.
“Magnolia” didn’t do much for me the first time either. I now advise that a person see it once just to get the hang of all the characters and situations, and then another time to relax in the knowledge gained from the first viewing.
I’ve tried to think of other films, but I’m coming up short. If I truly hate a movie the first time through, subsequent viewings may help me to appreciate it, but they rarely draw me to a 180 degree change in opinion.
There are dozens of movies that I’ve felt indifferent about at first, but later come to love: “Chinatown”, “Zodiac”, “Nashville”, “The Searchers”, “Mouchette”, “Jackie Brown”, “Meet Me in St. Louis”, “Bicycle Thieves”, and even “Notorious”. These movies wouldn’t impress me on a gut level the first time through, but embedded themselves into my brain so that I would think over them much more than I had expected to.
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. First time through I couldn’t get wait to get out, although the last half hour still hit me like a beautiful brick in the face. Made myself sit down and watch it after revisiting other old Westerns I’d previously shown no affection for (McCabe and Mrs Miller doesn’t get any better it seems, still boring Altman crap) and fell in love with it. A perfect synthesis of old genre filmmaking with a contemporary feel and twist on the old Western mythology too.
I felt exactly the same way about A History of Violence and Citizen Kane as previous posters did. Still don’t really connect with Kane on a gut level, but can appreciate it for what it is.
Withnail & I. I can’t believe I used to hate it.
I’m in the same boat with Chinatown, The Searchers and A History of Violence. I can’t believe I didn’t take to Chinatown right away. I must have been possessed by demons or something. I now really like all three of those movies. My hurdle now is There Will Be Blood because I really didn’t care for it on first viewing. I know I’ll take some hits for not liking it. Yes, I know it is a very well made film and beautiful to look at, but it didn’t click with me for some reason. I’ll give it some time and watch it again. It was years before I saw Chinatown for the second time so who knows?
Luc Besson’s Subway. May be his best.
I didn’t take to Chinatown much on my first viewing either. Second viewing I thought it was a masterpiece. The movie is almost made to be better on a second viewing. You start seeing all the ins and outs of everything.
mulholland drive. basically didnt really understand anything before the “switch”. after i finished the film i understood it better though and watched it again after reading some theories.
Alonso Díaz de la Vega
When I first saw A History of Violence I didn’t get it and disliked it very much, I even thought Cronenberg was a terrible director. Ironically enough, I’m now a huge Cronenberg fan and enjoy the film very much because I started seeing other of his films and liking them and after reading and learning more, I ended up thinking AHoV is a pretty good one in his career. Ever happened to anyone?