The Best Movies From Each State: Alaska
The results from the second installment of my totally normal and not insane 51 week study of the top three movies from each state are IN. Remember everyone got three votes, so the percentages reflect how many times they appeared on every individual vote. For the last frontier, here is what y’all chose for the top three:
3. The Grey (24%)
Just barely edging out ‘The Proposal’, I love this pick from you guys. It was one of those out-of-nowhere movies for me in that I wasn’t expecting much, but came away extremely surprised by how how well made it was. Liam Neeson is still a badass, but instead of a shoot-em-up killer he’s more of a survivalist looking for meaning à la Jeremy Renner in ‘Wind River’. Some people criticized the ending, but personally I loved it. I’d say its a must-watch for anyone who likes survival movies, or if you recently saw ‘The Mountain Between Us’ and want something to refresh the palate.
2. Mystery, Alaska (34%)
A classic David vs. Goliath matchup, this might be a sneaky top 10ish hockey movie ever. Burt Reynolds coaching a team of scrappy guys, Russell Crowe with killer lettuce, Hank Azaria, Colm Meaney, Mike Myers and also some real life Hockey commentators and journalists. Thats a winning combo in my book. Biebe’s speech here is also phenomenal, “ANYBODY FUCKIN TIRED?!?”. Kind of wild that Crowe went from this directly from this to 1999’s ‘The Insider’, where he got a best actor nom for in the 72nd Academy Awards, then he was in the same year’s ‘Gladiator’ which won him the award in the 73rd Academy Awards. What a swing!
1. Into The Wild (43%)
The story of real life hitchhiker Chris McCandless and Sean Penn’s finest directing job in my opinion, this movie is super sad but also very aesthetically appealing. I agree with you guys in that it is definitely the one movie that makes me automatically think of Alaska, and it’s also just one of my more favorite survival movies in general. The scene where the old man tries to adopt him is particularly heartbreaking. I find Emile Hirsch’s style of acting to be very genuine, and hope to see him in some more projects. There was also a very solid supporting cast in Marcia Gay Harden, William Hurt, Catherine Keener, Kristen Stewart, Vince Vaughn and Zach Galifianakis.
I love your guy’s picks, and you had some solid write in answers, none of which gathered a single percent so I didn’t add them to the final tally. Examples include ‘Out Cold’, ‘The Fourth Kind’ and ‘Grizzly Man’. As a note on the last, I wasn’t planning on including documentaries in these votes. Here is the full breakdown of your voting:
Now on to week 3! We have the Grand Canyon state up next, Arizona. Google automated some great choices for the state, and I expect this to be a pretty close vote after first place. If you can’t use the embedded form, click here.
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