Miloš Forman’s 10 favourite movies
The film director Miloš Forman held both Czech and American citizenship, having initially risen to fame in his native Czechoslovakia before moving to the United States in 1968. A number of Forman’s works are widely admired, including his classic feature The Fireman’s Ball, first released in 1967.
Yet Forman is likely best known for his excellent 1975 effort One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, starring Jack Nicholson, adapted from Ken Kesey’s 1962 novel of the same name. While Forman’s works garner profound respect from critics and fellow filmmakers alike, how about the films he admires? Fortunately, to answer this question, we can consult a list of his favourite films, as per Combustible Celluloid.
Like several cinema lovers, Forman holds a deep respect for one of the widely-considered greatest films of all time (if not the single greatest), Orson Welles’ 1941 classic Citizen Kane. The plot told of a fictional media tycoon’s rise to power, which was played by Welles himself, and frequently topped the most exemplary cinematic works lists.
Evidently, Forman is also a big fan of the works of Robert De Niro, as he includes two of his greatest performances on a list of favourites. First is Michael Cimino’s The Deer Hunter, which was first released back in 1978. It tells the story of the difficulty a Vietnam War veteran has in returning to normal civilian life. Also included is Raging Bull, directed by De Niro’s frequent collaborator Martin Scorsese. With that, another of Scorsese’s close work partners, Paul Schrader, co-wrote the screenplay, having adapted it from Jake LaMotta’s 1970 memoir of the same name. The film followed the career and domestic tragedy of middleweight boxer LaMotta in one of De Niro’s finest performances.
De Niro also appeared in the second part of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather, and although that does not appear on the list, the first part of the trilogy does. The Godfather is another classic cinematic work that often appears on the list of greatest films of all time, showing that Forman certainly admires the best the big screen has to offer.
Elsewhere, we find wondrous work from the likes of Italian director Federico Fellini Amarcord, an early work of Star Wars creator George Lucas in American Graffiti and even a film from as far back as 1931 with Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights. Check out the complete list of Forman’s must-watch films below.
Miloš Forman’s 10 favourite movies:
- Amarcord (Federico Fellini, 1974)
- American Graffiti (George Lucas, 1973)
- Children of Paradise (Marcel Carne, 1945)
- Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)
- City Lights (Charles Chaplin, 1931)
- The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978)
- Giant (George Stevens, 1956)
- The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
- Miracle in Milan (Vittorio De Sica, 1950)
- Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980)
