Liam Neeson names his four favourite movies of all time
Most film fans would be hard-pressed to pick their four favourite movies. How could you possibly narrow down a lifetime of viewing and more than a century of filmmaking into just four titles? It must be doubly challenging for actors like Liam Neeson who are masters of their craft and have been in the industry for so long.
Throughout his career, Neeson has explored a broad range of roles and taken a rather surprising trajectory. The Irish actor began acting in theatre before transitioning to critically acclaimed films in the 1980s and ‘90s, such as Excalibur, Husbands and Wives, Michael Collins, and, of course, Schindler’s List, for which he earned an Academy Award nomination. Then something strange happened – he got into action movies. Following his role in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, he scored a surprise hit with the low-budget revenge thriller Taken in 2008.
That was pretty much the end of that. As early as 2016, Neeson has been threatening to stop doing action movies, but eight years later and well into his seventies, he’s still going strong.
Given his background, Neeson’s taste in movies is harder to predict than the average critically-acclaimed thespian or action star. During a conversation with Letterboxd, he revealed his four favourite titles and was even kind enough to elaborate on why several of them made the list, as well as the one thing he thinks politicians could do to make the world a better place. “Maybe not in order of preference,” he said, “But [John Ford’s] The Quiet Man – John Wayne, Maureen O’Hara, Victor McLaglen – love that film. The original Seven Samurai, [Akira] Kurosawa’s film,” he continued.
“The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, yeah – Lee Marvin, Jimmy Stewart – All of John Ford’s films, actually. It’s hard to single one out. He tells exciting stories and he tells them in like 90, 95 minutes. There’s no two-and-a-half hours, there’s no three hours 20 minutes. I just…That turns me off a film, it really does.
“Michael Collins, I suppose,” he continued. “There were generations of – certainly my father’s generation – you know, men were supposed to be very stoic and not to show emotions and certainly not to tear up or cry, you know? Totally against that, you know? […] I think if every politician in the world over the past 50 years, before a serious meeting – confrontational meeting – give each other a hug and it had to be a minimum of 10 seconds. I think the world could be a different place, I really believe that.”
Neeson’s love of fellow Irishman John Ford is hardly surprising. The director transformed the Western from a collection of B movie tropes into a way of exploring morality, individualism, landscape, and American mythology. His movie The Quiet Man was one of the many he made with John Wayne, but unlike most of their collaborations, it takes place in the green pastures of Ireland.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, released in 1962, is a spare, unromantic view of the western, a great master interrogating his previous work and the idealisation of the American West. Focusing on the transition between the Wild West and the looming spectre of big government, cities, and the rule of law, it is more relevant today than ever. The Seven Samurai needs no introduction. Kurosawa’s masterpiece has influenced countless filmmakers, including George Lucas’s Star Wars, which Neeson joined.
The fact that Neeson singled out one of his own films is not as surprising as it might seem. Centred on the Irish revolutionary leader of the title, Michael Collins was a passion project for the actor who has called the protagonist his hero and said that the role was his all-time favourite. The movie received criticism for the liberties it took with history, but it focuses on the tragedy of Collins’s death and explores what might have been had his vision of Ireland been carried out. Whether a hug would have solved everything is not quite as clear.
