Roland Emmerich names his five favourite movies of all time
Celebrated for his science fiction and disaster movies, German film director Roland Emmerich has earned himself the nickname ‘The Master of Disaster’. Despite his European origins, Emmerich is known for his English-language big-budget Hollywood films, which have grossed over $3billion worldwide.
Amongst Emmerich’s film credits boast the likes of Stargate, Independence Day, 1998’s Godzilla, The Day After Tomorrow and 2012, so pretty much all his movies appear to be centred around the ‘world coming to an end’ theme. Emmerich is something of a sci-fi nut, but he also looks to enjoy a drama or two as well, as per the list of his favourite films given to the Academy Award website A-Frame.
Emmerich’s unequivocal “favourite movie” is Steven Spielberg’s 1977 classic science fiction drama Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and he thinks it holds striking similarities with his own films. “When you look at all my movies, it’s always normal, regular people in extraordinary circumstances,” he said. “And they always triumph.”
“Because these are very big stories, and I think if they don’t triumph at the end, you have not made the right movie,” Emmerich added. “Somebody like Richard Dreyfuss, who plays this electrician, if he doesn’t walk into the spaceship at the end, you haven’t done your job.”
Next for Emmerich is another science fiction classic, George Lucas’ original Star Wars film, also initially released in 1977. “It is just an incredible, fun movie,” he said. “And it’s not so much ‘my’ kind of movie, but I was just blown away by the visual effects and everything. To have this onslaught of imagination—it’s really amazing from that perspective.”
The list sways slightly from there as Emmerich picks out the 1988 Italian coming-of-age drama Cinema Paradiso, directed by Giuseppe Tornatore. It tells of a young boy who develops a friendship with an old projectionist who works at the local cinema in a small Sicilian town.
Emmerich said of Tornatore’s film, “Cinema Paradiso is something I watch every year because it shows you how much you have to be in love with film. Every time he opens the box, and there are all the kisses put together, and that rolls, and you see only people kissing… Every time, I start crying. It shows you what movies have to be.”
Roland Emmerich’s favourite movies:
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Steven Spielberg, 1977)
- Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (George Lucas, 1977)
- Cinema Paradiso (Giuseppe Tornatore, 1988)
- The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
- Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979)
The German director rounds off his list with two Francis Ford Coppola classics, both of which are often considered some of the greatest films ever made. The first is his universally-admired 1972 mob drama The Godfather, and the other is his reimagining of Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness in a Vietnam War setting, Apocalypse Now, released in 1979.
