The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)

Growing up without a dad, I got a lot of my fatherly advice from the prototypes I saw on the silver screen. It’s these characters and films that, not only gave me a glimpse into a dynamic I had never known or understood, but also made me realize that I was in fact missing out. So for those who feel the same or just want to watch a movie with their dad, here are my top 10 paternal films.

Juan and Chiron’s relationship in the first chapter we see of his life is absolutely beautiful. A big-time drug dealer, as muscular and powerful as he is, Juan helps this little boy who is being picked on for being gay and is neglected by his mother. He feeds him, talks to him, and teaches him how to swim in one of the most beautifully composed cinematic scenes I have ever watched. Juan rejects many of the assumptions people would make about a drug dealer. He has so much love and care for this child. I would put him higher on the list if he didn’t do that thing he did (watch the movie to find out :) 

There is no such thing as watching too many movies. I know that since my family and I have enacted social distancing, the amount of movies we’ve watched has skyrocketed. And if there can be a silver lining in the messiness and ugliness of the situation we’re all in right now, it’s that we have an opportunity to watch a lot of the movies that we’ve been meaning to watch and re-watch a lot of the movies that we’ve been meaning to re-watch. I know the other day I was looking through my Blu-ray collection and picked out the 1933 King Kong, a movie I’ve owned for about a year but never watched. It’s one of those movies I always said to myself, “Not now, I’ll watch it another time.” But because we’re stuck indoors with nothing to do, I finally said, “Screw it, it’s time to watch King Kong!” And I loved it!

With the popularity of my previous list (you can check it out here), I wanted to recommend another 19 movies for people to check out across Netflix, Amazon Prime, HBO Max, and Hulu. So here you are; go watch some movies! You can’t really go wrong with any of them.

1 | Apocalypse Now (1979) | Amazon Prime

Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola