#21 ‘Chinatown’

Misogyny, Murder, and the Myth of the Male Martyr

Chinatown (1974) is Roman Polanski’s sun-scorched noir nightmare about corruption, incest, and water rights—because nothing says hard-boiled like municipal infrastructure. It’s hailed as a cinematic masterpiece: moody, masterful, and mature. But let’s not confuse complexity with moral clarity. This is a film that cynically lays bare the rotted heart of power—and then carves its initials into the body of a brutalized woman, just to make sure you feel something on the way out.

Jack Nicholson plays Jake Gittes, a private eye with a fedora full of cynicism and a libido he can’t keep holstered. He swaggers through 1930s Los Angeles, a city oozing sun, secrets, and systemic rot. He gets hired under false pretenses, uncovers a conspiracy involving land fraud, drought manipulation, and incest, and slowly realizes—gasp!—he’s in way over his smug, jaded head.

But while the film sells itself as Jake’s moral awakening, the real story, the only story with real stakes, is that of Evelyn Mulwray. Faye Dunaway gives a devastating performance as a woman trapped in a web of male violence, sexual abuse, and generational trauma. She’s fragile and fierce, desperate and dignified, and still the film treats her as a puzzle to be solved, a cipher for Jake to crack.

And crack her, he does—literally and figuratively. Jake slaps her repeatedly in the infamous scene, demanding “She’s my sister! She’s my daughter!” like a twisted refrain. And what’s the emotional payoff? Nothing. No comfort, no reckoning—just more violence, more silence, more trauma draped in moody brass and chiaroscuro shadows.

John Huston plays Noah Cross, Evelyn’s father and the film’s villain—an unrepentant symbol of patriarchal rot who buys land, politicians, and access to his own daughter’s body with the same sick ease. He’s a monster without fangs, smiling through his sins like he’s hosting a dinner party. And the film’s final act? He wins. Evelyn dies. The system closes ranks. And Jake stares blankly while some guy utters the most infuriating line in cinema history: “Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.”

What does that mean, exactly? That systemic abuse is inevitable? That the city’s corruption is just part of the landscape, like palm trees and smog? The line has been quoted endlessly as a shrug-shaped monument to nihilism—but it’s not profound. It’s cowardice masquerading as depth. It’s what happens when a story dismembers its women, then asks us to reflect on the male detective’s feelings about it.

Yes, the film is exquisitely crafted. Yes, it’s one of the great American noirs. But underneath the brilliance is a festering rot—of women used as metaphors, of trauma turned into aesthetic, of justice sacrificed at the altar of fatalism.

3 out of 5 oranges
(One for Dunaway. One for the cinematography. One for the unflinching bleakness, even if it hides behind poetry. The rest was washed away with Evelyn’s blood and any hope that noir could be anything more than tragedy dressed up in trench coats and lipstick-stained glasses.)

#20 ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’

Gaslight, Gatekeep, Guardian Angel

It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) is America’s favorite Yuletide narcotic—an aggressively sentimental fable in which one man’s unpaid labor, stifled dreams, and crushing mental health crisis are spun into a heartwarming morality tale about staying put, shutting up, and being grateful you didn’t drown yourself in the snow. Frank Capra’s beloved holiday classic wants you to believe that self-sacrifice is noble, community is salvation, and that being a broke, broken man with four kids and a mortgage is the highest calling life has to offer.

Let’s start with George Bailey. Jimmy Stewart, the only man in history who could whine charmingly, plays a man who spends the entire movie getting sucker-punched by life. Every time he tries to chase his dreams—college, travel, doing literally anything else—someone needs him to save the family business, fix a crisis, or act as the moral backbone of a town full of helpless adults. And George, of course, obliges. Because he’s a good man—which in this universe means emotionally repressed, exhausted, and financially overextended.

The film’s entire premise hinges on George’s breakdown: on Christmas Eve, overwhelmed by decades of deferred dreams and a missing $8,000 (not his fault), he decides to end his life. Enter Clarence, an angel-in-training with the wingspan of a toddler and the wisdom of a TED Talk, who shows George what the world would look like if he’d never been born. Spoiler: it’s a hellscape. His absence causes everything to collapse—his brother dies, the town becomes a capitalist wasteland, and worst of all, his wife becomes a librarian.

Yes, that’s right. Mary, played by the luminous Donna Reed, is reduced to the most terrifying vision the film can imagine: a single woman with a job and glasses. Capra doesn’t show her mourning George or becoming a pillar of strength. No, she’s timid, bookish, and—gasp!—unmarried. Because in this vision of America, a woman without a man is a tragedy worse than death. Forget that she’s the one who redeems George’s life by rallying the town to support him. In his absence, she’s a ghost of a person, because without him, she’s nothing.

And that’s the core of It’s a Wonderful Life: a deeply gendered, quietly suffocating fantasy about duty, conformity, and community as salvation only if you never, ever step outside your assigned role. George is sainted for sacrificing everything, and the film ends not with him reclaiming any dreams, but with him surrounded by people paying off the latest crisis—cheerfully, in a pile of cash—so he can keep being their moral mule.

The message? Don’t ask for more. Don’t want more. Be glad you’re loved—even if it costs you everything.

3 out of 5 bells ringing
(One for Stewart’s performance. One for the haunting “what if” sequence. One for the existential horror buried under the tinsel. The rest flew off with Clarence, who, unlike George, at least gets promoted for his trouble.)

#19 ‘On the Waterfront’

I Coulda Been a Contender, But I Settled for a Snitch

On the Waterfront (1954) is Elia Kazan’s gritty, brooding tale of dockside corruption, moral conflict, and men in dirty coats mumbling their way through redemption. It’s often hailed as a masterpiece of American realism, and let’s be fair: it is well-acted, well-written, and soaked in moral ambiguity like whiskey in a Catholic confession booth. But strip away the grit, and what you really have is Kazan’s self-justifying fever dream about why selling out your comrades makes you a hero—as long as you cry while doing it.

Marlon Brando plays Terry Malloy, an ex-prizefighter turned longshoreman with a conscience slowly awakening beneath his hangdog pout. Brando famously mumbles through the film with the tortured charisma of a man trying to remember if he left the stove on. His performance is raw, vulnerable, and yes, iconic. But it’s also so thoroughly centered on his internal turmoil that the bodies piling up around him feel like atmospheric noise—collateral damage for his emotional arc.

The film revolves around Terry’s decision to testify against corrupt union boss Johnny Friendly (the least subtle name in cinema), who controls the docks with the iron grip of a 1950s studio executive. Along the way, Terry falls for Edie Doyle (Eva Marie Saint), the sister of a murdered dockworker, whose purpose in the story is to forgive, inspire, and gently coax him toward virtue by looking pretty in soft lighting.

Edie is given just enough fire to seem modern, but not enough agency to matter once Terry’s crisis kicks into full gear. Like most women in postwar male morality plays, she exists to reflect his growth—not to undergo any of her own. There’s also a priest, because of course there is, delivering righteous monologues in dingy churches about standing up to evil. As always, organized religion gets to swoop in as moral compass while women are left to hold the coats.

But let’s not forget the real elephant on the dock: this is Elia Kazan’s apology letter to himself. Made two years after Kazan infamously named names before the House Un-American Activities Committee, On the Waterfront paints whistleblowing as the noblest of causes. Never mind the political context. Never mind the ruined lives. Kazan wants you to know that informing isn’t cowardice—it’s courage, baby. And if you disagree, well, you're just not brave enough to carry the burden of righteousness.

The film frames union solidarity as morally suspect and individual conscience as heroic—as long as that individual is a man writhing in guilt and pain. It’s a beautifully shot middle finger to collective resistance, made palatable with noir aesthetics and Brando’s tortured masculinity.

3 out of 5 pigeons
(One for Brando’s performance. One for the cinematography. One for the haunting score. The rest got tossed off the dock by Kazan himself—right after he gave your name to the committee.)

#18 ‘The General’

Trains, Stunts, and Confederate Nostalgia Dressed as Comedy

The General (1926)—that silent-era darling in which Buster Keaton, the stone-faced prince of slapstick, risks life, limb, and logic to recover a stolen train and the woman who clearly deserves better. Hailed as a technical marvel and a masterclass in physical comedy, it’s also, let's not mince words, a Confederate fantasy where the South is plucky, charming, and only fighting to get their locomotive back.

Yes. That South.

Keaton plays Johnny Gray, a hapless train engineer rejected from Confederate army enlistment (because he's “more valuable” operating trains, eyeroll) and dismissed by his sweetheart for not being man enough to die for a cause built on slavery. When Union spies steal his beloved train—and her, because why not?—he embarks on a high-speed rescue mission that involves stunts so impressive they almost distract you from the film's ugly moral vacuum.

Let’s be clear: this is a comedy in which the Confederate hero chases down Union soldiers, defeats them, and is rewarded with a military commission and a kiss. But don't worry, it’s funny, so the historical context doesn't count! Except it does. Because this isn't just Civil War as slapstick—it's a gleeful reframing of the Confederacy as underdog heroism. Keaton isn't playing a man fighting for white supremacy; he’s playing an earnest, bumbling boy chasing his train. That’s the sleight of hand. It’s not Lost Cause propaganda—it’s Lost Cause charm.

And of course, Annabelle Lee, the romantic lead, has all the depth of a paper doily. She scolds, swoons, and eventually cooks in a train firebox. (Yes, really.) Her function? To validate Johnny’s masculinity once he’s proven himself via machinery and explosives. She is the reward, not a character. It’s a love story between a man, his train, and the woman who is conveniently trapped inside it.

Technically, yes, The General is brilliant. Keaton’s timing, choreography, and death-defying stunts are still jaw-dropping nearly a century later. The cinematography is fluid and ambitious. The editing is crisp. The comedic set pieces are tight. But let’s not pretend it’s apolitical. You don’t set your madcap comedy in the Civil War and root for the South without making a statement—whether you admit it or not.

In the end, The General is both a cinematic landmark and a deeply uncomfortable relic. A film that wants to be remembered for its genius, but politely hopes you’ll ignore the Confederate flag fluttering in the background. Watching it today is like admiring a beautifully restored plantation house while trying not to think about what paid for the porch.

2.5 out of 5 locomotives
(One for Keaton’s physical comedy. One for the filmmaking craft. Half a star for Annabelle’s miraculous patience. The rest derailed somewhere between nostalgia and historical denial.)

#17 ‘The Graduate’

Mommy Issues, Misogyny, and the Myth of the Blank Slate Boy

The Graduate (1967) is often praised as the voice of a generation—a sharp, stylish satire of suburban malaise and post-college drift. But really, it’s a mopey, masturbatory fantasy about a blank-faced boy who fumbles through sex, boredom, and entitlement while the women around him are reduced to either cougars or virgins, depending on how well they tolerate his self-pity.

Dustin Hoffman plays Benjamin Braddock, a recent college grad with no direction, no personality, and yet an unshakable belief that the universe owes him something more profound than his parents’ swimming pool. He floats through life like a damp piece of white bread, sulking into a scuba mask and somehow attracting the attentions of not one, but two women who, bafflingly, exist solely to reflect his existential ennui back at him.

Let’s begin with Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft, far too good for this). She’s intelligent, bitter, bored, and unapologetically sexual—so of course, she’s vilified. The film frames her as a predator, a warning, a smirking emblem of adult corruption. She seduces Benjamin, sure—but only after he dithers like a confused boy scout and still ends up feeling victimized. Her complexity is flattened under the weight of his narrative: she’s not a person, she’s a cautionary tale in a slip.

Then we have Elaine, her daughter, played with wide-eyed bewilderment and zero interiority. Benjamin stalks her, gaslights her, and quite literally kidnaps her from her own wedding—and somehow, this is portrayed as romantic. The infamous final scene on the bus, with both of them staring into the void like confused toddlers, is treated as profound. But what it really says is: he has no plan, and she has no choice.

Elaine is not a love interest. She’s a trophy. A symbol of innocence and redemption, handed to Benjamin because he’s tired of being disillusioned by women with thoughts, histories, and motives. The film wants to say something about rebellion, but what it really says is: when boys get bored, women pay the price.

And let’s not ignore the age-old Oedipal undertones, simmering under every line. Benjamin doesn’t love Elaine—he wants to erase the shame he feels for sleeping with her mother. His pursuit of Elaine isn’t romantic, it’s therapeutic. He’s trying to absolve himself by rebranding his creepy decisions as love. Spoiler: it’s not love. It’s projection with a car chase.

Yes, the Simon & Garfunkel soundtrack is iconic. Yes, the cinematography is inventive. But all the visual cleverness in the world can’t distract from the fact that The Graduate is a film about a privileged man-child who drags two women through his identity crisis and somehow emerges the hero.

2 out of 5 plastics
(One for Anne Bancroft’s withering stare. One for the soundtrack. The rest got left behind in the backseat of Benjamin’s borrowed Alfa Romeo, along with the myth that this is a feminist coming-of-age story. It’s not. It’s just another elegy for mediocre men who think their confusion makes them deep.)

#16 ‘Sunset Blvd.’

Fame, Fatalism, and the Femme Fatale as Roadkill

Sunset Blvd. is Billy Wilder’s 1950 noir classic about the rot beneath Hollywood’s glittering skin—a tale of broken dreams, fading fame, and men who think they’re too clever to be consumed by the very industry they exploit. It’s acidic, stylish, and cynical. So naturally, it’s also cruelly fixated on a woman’s decay as both horror and punchline.

Enter Norma Desmond: faded silent film goddess, played with operatic madness by Gloria Swanson. She’s the heart of this film, the spectacle, the tragedy—and make no mistake, the target. A woman discarded by the Hollywood machine is served up as a grotesque parody of feminine delusion: overpainted, overdramatic, and (worst of all) unyoung. In an industry that turns actresses into icons and then into cautionary tales, Norma is the final act: alone in a crumbling mansion, reciting lines no one asked for and desperate to be seen by a camera that’s long since moved on.

And floating through this gothic fever dream is Joe Gillis (William Holden), a down-on-his-luck screenwriter with the moral compass of a shrug. He narrates from beyond the grave because of course he does—no man ever suffers in Hollywood without getting the last word. Joe shacks up with Norma, uses her money, indulges her delusions, and sneers at her all the while. The film frames him as tragic—trapped, corrupted—but let’s be honest: he’s a gigolo in a three-piece suit with a typewriter and a death wish.

What makes Sunset Blvd. so insidious is how gleefully it invites the audience to laugh at Norma even as it mourns her. The film has empathy—but it’s poisoned with judgment. Her longing to be adored isn’t pathological, it’s inevitable in a culture that sells women glamour and then punishes them for believing in it. But instead of indicting the system that chewed her up, the film makes her the monster. She’s the punchline. The cautionary tale. The madwoman in the pool.

Let’s talk about age, shall we? Norma is supposed to be 50—50!—and she’s treated like a walking corpse. Meanwhile, Joe is 32 and already worn out from the weight of not getting the respect he believes he deserves. In classic Hollywood fashion, male disillusionment is profound. Female aging is a horror story.

Yes, the film is brilliantly made. Yes, it skewers the industry that birthed it with surgical precision. But what’s left in its wake is the image of a woman destroyed not by madness, but by misogyny—and then framed by a man who dies smirking about how tragic it all was.

3 out of 5 close-ups
(One for Swanson’s legendary performance. One for Wilder’s razor-sharp writing. One for the guts to expose Hollywood’s underbelly. But the rest? Lost in Norma’s eyes—still hungry, still shining, and still unforgivably female.)

#15 ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’

A Cold, Silent Bro-Mance with the Universe

Ah yes, 2001: A Space Odyssey—Stanley Kubrick’s slow, glacial love letter to silence, screensavers, and the spiritual journey of... men in suits pressing buttons. Often praised as the greatest science fiction film of all time by men who say “actually, it’s about evolution,” this 1968 cosmic lullaby is less a film and more an expensive existential screensaver with delusions of grandeur.

Let’s get this out of the way: yes, it’s visually stunning. Yes, the match cut from a bone to a spaceship is clever. And yes, the use of classical music is now permanently embedded in the cultural bloodstream. But somewhere between the apes discovering murder and the fetus floating in space, Kubrick forgot one tiny thing: a soul. Or at the very least, a woman.

This is not a film that “doesn’t have many women.” It is a film that seems utterly allergic to them. The only female characters are stewardesses with Barbie doll voices and lab technicians who appear briefly before vanishing into the void, presumably replaced by HAL’s maternal monotone. This isn’t the future. This is the corporate fantasy of 1960s white men imagining a future where women were finally, blessedly, irrelevant.

And what do we get in their place? Dave Bowman, a protagonist so devoid of personality he makes a Roomba look extroverted. We’re told he’s undergoing some kind of spiritual journey, but it’s hard to be emotionally invested when his entire character arc consists of blinking at blinking lights. HAL 9000, the murderous AI, is the most interesting and sympathetic character in the film—because, unlike the humans, he actually feels something: anxiety. Paranoia. Loneliness. You know, relatable emotions.

The final act? A drug trip through a lava lamp followed by an art deco deathbed and a giant fetus staring at Earth like it’s about to judge us all for our sins. Kubrick fans call this profound. I call it what happens when a male auteur takes a big hit of Nietzsche and thinks “you know what this movie needs? Rebirth. But make it vague.”

There are no relationships in 2001. No intimacy. No joy. Just machines, monoliths, and men slowly becoming more machine-like themselves, until one of them turns into a glowing space baby with a thousand-yard stare. It's evolution, but only if you believe the final form of humanity is a giant, floating boy fetus with perfect skin and no mother.

2.5 out of 5 malfunctioning AIs
(One for the visuals. One for HAL. Half a star for the sheer audacity. The rest got lost somewhere beyond Jupiter, along with Kubrick’s empathy and any trace of female existence.)

#14 ‘Psycho’

Mommy’s Boy Murders Woman, Audience Applauds

Let’s pull off the highway of narrative convention and check into Psycho—Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 “masterpiece” of suspense, shock, and sanctified misogyny. You know the one: shower scene, screeching violins, taxidermy. It’s been canonized as a turning point in cinema history. And sure, if your idea of innovation is brutally murdering your female lead halfway through the film and then spending the rest of the runtime psychoanalyzing her killer instead—then yes, Psycho changed the game.

Let’s start with Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), a bored secretary who dares—dares!—to steal money from a sweaty businessman and flee town for a better life with her equally boring boyfriend. For this transgression, she is stalked, moralized at by a smug cop, ogled by a pervert, and finally knifed to death in a motel shower. Naked, of course. Because if Hitchcock was going to kill a woman onscreen, you’d better believe she wasn’t getting out of it with her clothes—or dignity—intact.

And don’t be fooled: Marion’s murder isn’t a plot twist. It’s a statement. A thesis. Punish the woman who acts outside her domestic lane. Send her off alone, make her squirm with guilt, then stab her repeatedly while violins scream like the embodiment of female trauma. And what do we get in return? Forty more minutes of Norman.

Ah, Norman Bates. The twitchy man-child taxidermist with a "mother problem" so severe it could be bottled and sold as patriarchal perfume. He peeps. He gaslights. He rocks in a chair in drag. And the film lovingly lingers on every moment of his unraveling. We’re expected to find him tragic, fascinating—a victim of smothering maternal love. Please. Every woman in the world has a Norman Bates in her life, and none of them deserve a close-up.

But Psycho doesn’t care about Marion’s story. Or her desires. Or her desperate, guilty drive across the desert. It cares about his breakdown. His sadness. His inner torment. She’s just the trigger—literally—and once she’s gone, the camera forgets her completely and pans lovingly across his descent into psychosis, because what’s more riveting than a cis white man losing his mind and blaming his mother?

Let’s also talk about that final scene: a smug psychiatrist delivers a clunky monologue that sounds like it was pulled from a Reader’s Digest article on “split personalities.” It’s the cinematic equivalent of a man interrupting a woman’s funeral to explain how she was probably asking for it—psychologically speaking.

Yes, Bernard Herrmann’s score is brilliant. Yes, the shower scene changed editing forever. But let’s not confuse craft with conscience. Psycho is a gorgeously made, deeply misogynist morality tale in which a woman’s ambition gets flushed down the drain, along with her blood and any pretense of narrative equality.

2 out of 5 stuffed birds
(One for the score. One for Janet Leigh, who deserved so much more than a curtain rod and a scream. The rest is locked in the fruit cellar with Mother and a century of unresolved gender trauma.)

#13 ‘Star Wars’

Daddy Issues in Space with a Side of Incest

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away… a whiny farm boy became the chosen one, a planet full of women exploded, and somehow this became the cornerstone of modern mythology. Yes, I’m talking about Star Wars (1977), the original sci-fi opera that launched a thousand thinkpieces and gave generations of men an excuse to grow up without actually growing.

Let’s be clear: Star Wars is not a feminist space adventure. It’s a boys’ clubhouse with lasers, where the only woman allowed in is either being rescued, lectured, or ogled—and where the greatest power in the universe is having a famous dad.

Luke Skywalker, our supposed hero, is an irritating man-child with the emotional depth of a soggy cracker. He spends most of the movie either whining about power converters or blindly stumbling into heroism like a golden retriever with a lightsaber. We’re told he’s special, destined, full of potential—because nothing says “relatable” like an intergalactic nepotism fantasy.

And then there’s Princess Leia. Oh, Leia. Played with razor-sharp brilliance by Carrie Fisher, she’s smart, competent, and furious in every scene—and for good reason. She’s the only person in the film who seems to realize she’s surrounded by idiots. But instead of being celebrated for her leadership, she’s belittled, bossed around, and eventually slapped into a metal bikini by her own franchise. We’re supposed to believe she's a symbol of empowerment, but the story treats her like the nagging mom in a household of petulant sons.

Han Solo, meanwhile, is a space cowboy with the emotional range of a smirk. He gaslights, negs, and grabs his way into Leia’s affections, and it’s all framed as “charming.” Consent? Mutual respect? Not in this quadrant.

The plot? An oppressive fascist empire blows up planets, and the only people who can stop it are a bunch of robed monks with vague metaphors and daddy issues. The Rebellion is suspiciously lacking in nuance, diversity, or infrastructure, but never mind that—there’s a prophecy to fulfill, a throne to reclaim, and a whole lot of pew pew pew to distract you from the fact that this is essentially King Arthur in space, if Merlin were a cryptic ghost and Guinevere got to fire a gun exactly twice.

Darth Vader, let’s not forget, is a mass-murdering warlord who gets a redemption arc because he throws one guy down a shaft after decades of slaughtering children and coworkers alike. But he’s a dad, and dads, apparently, always deserve forgiveness in the Lucasverse.

Sure, the score is iconic. The production design is groundbreaking. The crawl at the beginning is pure cinematic adrenaline. But when you strip away the space dust and nostalgia, Star Wars is little more than a patriarchal power fantasy dipped in space glitter. The women are sidelined, the politics are simplistic, and the moral is clear: trust the force, unless you’re a girl—then you’d better trust the men who use it instead.

2.5 out of 5 death stars
(One for the music. One for the costumes. Half a star for Leia’s side-eye. The rest was lost in hyperspace somewhere between Alderaan and male fragility.)

#12 ‘The Searchers’

Cowboys, Carnage, and the White Man’s Existential Crisis

Let’s saddle up and ride into the glorious myth of American exceptionalism, shall we? The Searchers (1956) is often hailed as the crown jewel of the Western genre—a sweeping, Technicolor epic about obsession, redemption, and the majesty of Monument Valley. But strip away the stirring score and rugged landscapes and what do you have?

A deeply racist, morally queasy tale about a violent, bitter white man scouring the wilderness to reclaim his niece from the so-called savages—and possibly murder her if she’s been too assimilated.

Yes, that’s the plot. And yes, critics have spent decades calling it “complex.” Because apparently, when you make your protagonist a seething, genocidal bigot but shoot him in soft, glowing sunsets, that’s nuance.

John Wayne, in his most iconic role, plays Ethan Edwards, a Confederate veteran (red flag #1) who returns home only to have his brother’s family slaughtered by Comanche warriors. The film never misses a chance to demonize Native Americans, reducing them to little more than whooping specters of chaos—faceless, voiceless, othered to the point of abstraction. We learn nothing about their motivations, culture, or humanity. They exist purely as narrative obstacles and moral tests for the white men pursuing them.

Ethan’s quest to find Debbie, his niece (played by Natalie Wood, a white actress in bronzer—of course), becomes a years-long odyssey of hate-fueled monomania. He doesn’t just want to rescue her. He wants to eradicate the possibility that she’s become “tainted.” His repeated insistence that she’s no longer “white” enough to live would be chilling if the film didn’t keep inviting us to admire his grit and resolve.

But here’s the trick: director John Ford knows Ethan is a monster. He just doesn’t care. Or rather, he thinks that portraying a monster beautifully is the same as interrogating him. It’s not. The film gestures at moral ambiguity, but it never meaningfully condemns Ethan’s violence or racism. Instead, it wraps them in romanticism, as if bigotry is just another rugged American frontier.

And the women? Don’t worry, they’re all here: the innocent girl who needs saving, the nagging love interest whose entire arc exists to wait around for a marriage proposal, and the Native women, treated as jokes or burdens or tragic off-screen corpses. It’s a testosterone-fueled opera of conquest and trauma, but the trauma is always filtered through the white male lens—his pain, his rage, his redemption (or lack thereof).

Yes, the cinematography is stunning. Yes, the final shot is justly famous. But what good is visual poetry when it’s telling the same old violent, imperialist ballad? The Searchers wants to be a meditation on hatred. What it ends up being is a love letter to it.

2 out of 5 tumbleweeds
(One for the cinematography. One for the mythology it helped build—whether we like it or not. The rest can ride off into the sunset with Ethan and his unresolved racism.)

#11 ‘City Lights’

Mime Your Feelings, But Keep the Woman Blind

Let’s dim the lights and cue the violins for City Lights—Charlie Chaplin’s 1931 silent “romantic comedy” that’s been canonized as a cinematic masterpiece and held up as proof that love needs no words. And maybe that’s true. Especially when the female lead has no lines, no agency, and literally can’t see what’s going on.

This is the story of a tramp—a dirt-smudged, bowler-hatted man-child with good intentions and boundary issues—who falls in love with a blind flower girl. Not because she’s smart, or interesting, or even particularly curious about who keeps showing up and awkwardly stalking her. No, he loves her because she’s fragile, helpless, and—this part is key—unable to perceive his socioeconomic inadequacy.

What we get is 87 minutes of the Tramp humiliating himself to earn money for an operation that might restore her sight, while she pines after a fantasy rich man she believes he is. That’s right: the entire plot hinges on a lie. A well-meaning, supposedly noble lie, but a lie nonetheless. And the film dares to treat that deception as romantic. It’s Cinderella in reverse: he wants her to love him, but only if she never sees who he really is.

We’re told this is selfless. Touching. Even heroic. But let’s call it what it is: emotional manipulation with a top hat and cane.

When she finally regains her sight and realizes the truth, the film ends with a teary, ambiguous smile. Critics swoon over this final scene. “She sees him, and she knows,” they say. But knows what? That he’s the man who gaslit her into believing he was someone else? That the love she thought she had was founded on a fantasy and a stalker in oversized shoes?

Chaplin, of course, is a genius with timing and pathos. His physical comedy is exquisite, his facial expressions devastating, his musical scoring meticulous. But technical brilliance does not excuse narrative imbalance. The blind girl isn’t a character—she’s a prop. A symbol. A damsel in literal and metaphorical darkness, so that the male protagonist can perform self-sacrifice and bask in the glow of her gratitude.

The message is clear: women are vessels for redemption. And the best ones are the ones who can’t see you coming.

2.5 out of 5 bowler hats
(One for Chaplin’s craft. One for the score. Half a star for the emotional manipulation that, yes, almost got me too. The rest belongs to the blind girl, who deserved a story—not just a savior.)

#10 ‘The Wizard of Oz’

There’s No Place Like the Patriarchy

Let’s click our heels and chant it together: There’s no place like home... especially if “home” is a dustbowl farm where a young girl’s desires, dreams, and inner life are so thoroughly dismissed that she needs a tornado-induced hallucination just to be taken seriously for five minutes.

Yes, I’m talking about The Wizard of Oz—that 1939 Technicolor fever dream that’s been sold to generations of children as a tale of wonder, courage, and self-discovery. But scratch the sepia-toned surface and what you really get is a gaudy morality tale about staying in your place, keeping your shoes on, and trusting the nearest fraud in a hot-air balloon to tell you what’s best.

Dorothy Gale, played by the luminous Judy Garland (herself a tragic case study in the Hollywood machine’s abuse of young women), is the only person in the film who asks questions, challenges authority, and dares to dream of something more. So naturally, the narrative gaslights her at every turn. She’s told that leaving Kansas is selfish, her instincts are wrong, and her emotional turmoil can be solved with footwear and a smile. She literally goes on an interdimensional journey of growth and empowerment, only to be told at the end: You had the power to go home all along—you just didn’t know how to obey properly yet.

And let’s not ignore how The Wizard of Oz treats women in power. Glinda the Good Witch? Patronizing and passive-aggressive, floating around in a bubble of smugness while withholding vital information for “Dorothy’s own good.” The Wicked Witch of the West? A woman with boundaries, ambition, and a broomstick—so obviously she must die. This film demonizes powerful, assertive women while rewarding the ones who smile sweetly and don’t ask questions. A tale as old as patriarchy.

Meanwhile, the men Dorothy meets—Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion—each represent the classic male crisis of confidence. Their arcs are solved not through actual growth but by being told they already had what they needed. Because of course they did. They’re men. Even when they’re spineless, heartless, and terrified, they’re still complete. Dorothy? She has to risk her life, kill a witch, and get emotionally manipulated by a carnival huckster just to be told to go home and shut up.

And the Wizard himself? A lying conman hiding behind curtains and cheap effects who still gets forgiven without question. We’re supposed to find his cowardice charming. It’s not. It’s just another man bluffing his way to power and getting away with it.

Yes, the songs are iconic. Yes, the set design is groundbreaking. Yes, “Over the Rainbow” deserves every accolade it’s ever received. But don’t be fooled by the sparkle. This is a story about conformity dressed up as fantasy. A shiny, sugarcoated reminder that women should stay grounded, accept their lot, and not dream too loud—or they’ll wake up exactly where they started, with fewer illusions and no shoes of their own.

2.5 out of 5 flying monkeys
(One for Judy. One for the music. Half a star for the queer-coded camp of the Emerald City. The rest got swept up in a tornado of glitter and cultural gaslighting.)

#9 ‘Vertigo’

Misogyny in a Trench Coat, Shot Like a Dream

Let’s spiral down the staircase of male delusion and land squarely in Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo—a lush, hypnotic thriller about obsession, control, and the absolute gall of men thinking women are blank canvases for their fantasies. It’s hailed as one of the greatest films ever made, and, sure, if your definition of “great” includes gaslighting, stalking, and transforming a traumatized woman into your dead ex, then yes—this is your masterpiece.

James Stewart, in full creepy uncle mode, plays Scottie, a retired detective with a fear of heights and apparently also a fear of letting women exist outside his imagination. After being hired to follow a friend’s wife, Madeleine (Kim Novak), he spirals into a voyeuristic romance that quickly turns necrophilic in tone, if not technically in act. When Madeleine dies—more accurately, when the first version of her dies—Scottie promptly falls apart, loses his mind, and then finds a new woman to mold into his lost fantasy like she’s a department store mannequin with a pulse.

And here’s the real horror: he succeeds.

This is a film that treats female identity as not just malleable, but utterly disposable. Judy, the woman Scottie meets after Madeleine’s “death,” is actually the same woman—an actress hired for a con—but Scottie doesn’t care who she really is. He wants her to be her again. He drags her to salons. He tells her how to wear her hair. He dresses her, criticizes her, literally shapes her body into his idealized corpse-bride. And when the transformation is complete? The movie acts like his pain is what matters.

Kim Novak delivers a quietly devastating performance, trapped between desire, guilt, and the crushing weight of male fantasy. But she’s not allowed to be a real character. She’s a mirror. A ghost. A vessel. And Hitchcock, bless his camera, seems entirely complicit. He shoots her with such fetishistic detachment you’d think she were made of glass. Vertigo isn’t just about male obsession—it is dripping with it, behind and in front of the lens.

Stewart’s Scottie isn’t a tragic hero. He’s a predator who can’t distinguish love from possession. And yet the film invites us to sympathize with his brokenness, his yearning, his vertigo. Judy’s terror? Her autonomy? Her literal death at the end? Just footnotes in his tortured narrative.

Visually, of course, it’s stunning. Bernard Herrmann’s score is an erotic dirge. The editing, the color design, the dizzying dolly zoom—they’re all technically brilliant. But let’s not mistake Vertigo’s dream logic for depth. This isn’t a profound exploration of love and loss—it’s a cautionary tale of what happens when men mistake desire for entitlement and call it tragedy.

3 out of 5 spirals
(One for the cinematography. One for Novak. One for the sheer audacity. The other two fell off the tower with what was left of Judy’s identity.)

#8 ‘Schindler’s List’

Holocaust Through the Eyes of a Capitalist with a Conscience

Let’s talk about Schindler’s List, Steven Spielberg’s harrowing, impeccably crafted, and morally loaded three-hour journey through the Holocaust—viewed, of course, not primarily through the eyes of the six million victims, but through the redemption arc of one wealthy, philandering industrialist who finally grows a soul.

Because if history teaches us anything, it’s that even genocide can be reframed as a tale of one good man’s awakening.

Liam Neeson plays Oskar Schindler, a Nazi Party member and war profiteer who realizes—somewhere between boozy banquets and counting his ill-gotten gains—that maybe using Jewish slave labor isn’t such a great look. What follows is a slow-burning, emotionally manipulative metamorphosis: he goes from self-interested scoundrel to tearful savior, purchasing Jewish lives like luxury goods, racked with guilt only after the slaughter has reached an unbearable crescendo.

And yes, Spielberg renders it all with his signature mix of sentimentality and virtuosity. The black-and-white cinematography is stark and lyrical. The violence is unsparing. The famous girl in the red coat—subtle as a brick, but undeniably effective—remains lodged in the cultural consciousness like a collective wound. But let’s not confuse powerful filmmaking with flawless storytelling.

Because for all its importance, Schindler’s List is still, fundamentally, a film about a white man learning. Learning that genocide is bad. Learning that human lives are worth more than their labor. Learning that you can’t bribe your way out of the end of the world. Meanwhile, the Jewish characters—those actually enduring the camps, the ghettos, the selections—are often flattened into symbol or spectacle. They suffer, endure, and die heroically, but rarely do they speak. The camera loves their pain. It rarely gives them agency.

Ben Kingsley’s Itzhak Stern is the dutiful conscience figure, a walking moral compass there to quietly nudge Schindler toward righteousness. Embeth Davidtz plays Helen Hirsch, the abused maid of Amon Göth, rendered with tragic dignity but used mostly as a vessel to show us how monstrous Ralph Fiennes’ Göth is. (Spoiler: very. The man is a walking, shooting id.) The women, the children, the elderly—they exist largely to be imperiled, so that Schindler can be haunted.

And that’s the central problem. Spielberg, for all his skill, can’t resist framing the Holocaust as a story about hope. About one good man. About how even inside the machinery of fascism, capitalism can be bent toward morality. Which is convenient. And comforting. And deeply misleading.

The Holocaust wasn’t a stage for individual heroism. It was the systematic, industrialized annihilation of an entire people. Schindler saved 1,200. That’s extraordinary, yes. But placing the spotlight solely on him risks reducing the horror to one man’s redemption narrative—a feel-bad-then-feel-good story that allows viewers to leave the theater sobbing, but absolved.

Yes, this is an essential film. Yes, it is art. But it is also a lesson in narrative framing: even the greatest atrocities will be filtered through the lens of a powerful man in a suit, having a crisis of conscience.

3.5 out of 5 gold rings
(One for the filmmaking. One for the cast. One for the gravity of the subject. Half a star for the attempt to honor the victims. The missing 1.5? For the silences, the erasures, and the sheen of redemptive capitalism.)

#7 ‘Lawrence of Arabia’

White Savior on a Camel, with Extra Sand

There are desert mirages, and then there is Lawrence of Arabia—a four-hour cinematic hallucination where British imperialism rides shirtless into the Middle East and somehow comes out the hero. David Lean’s 1962 epic is widely hailed as a masterpiece, and to be fair, if you’ve got a fetish for sweeping landscapes and tortured white men staring nobly into the middle distance, it absolutely delivers. But once you brush aside the dunes and dramatic sunsets, you’re left with the same colonialist delusion dressed up in prestige.

Peter O’Toole stars as T.E. Lawrence, a real-life British army officer turned mythic white messiah who, according to this film, single-handedly wrangled the fractured Arab tribes into a freedom-fighting force with nothing more than a sharp jawline and unearned self-assurance. The Arabs, of course, are portrayed as noble savages—mystical, volatile, exotic, and utterly dependent on this pale Englishman with a death wish to teach them the meaning of nationhood.

How convenient.

The film stretches across continents and ideologies but somehow forgets to include any meaningful Arab perspectives. Omar Sharif, the only notable Middle Eastern actor in the cast, is given just enough screen time to prop up Lawrence’s existential crisis. The rest of the locals are reduced to background chants, facial hair, and the occasional betrayal—because no colonial epic is complete without some moral ambiguity that conveniently doesn’t apply to the central white protagonist.

Lawrence himself is a martyr in a linen robe, tormented by violence, power, and his own inflated myth. The camera loves him—lingers on him—invites us to admire his suffering as something profound, even poetic. But what it never asks is: what the hell was he doing there? The film romanticizes occupation, manipulates revolution into a personal identity crisis, and then wipes its hands of accountability by blaming Lawrence’s descent on “the system.” Not empire. Not Britain. The system.

And don’t even bother asking where the women are. This is a film where testosterone and colonial arrogance are the only love story worth telling. There isn’t a single speaking female role. Not one. You could air this in a monk’s monastery without needing a content warning.

Yes, the cinematography is breathtaking. Yes, Maurice Jarre’s score makes your spine vibrate. Yes, O’Toole glows like an oil painting lit by the sun itself. But all this beauty is in service of a hollow tale—one where imperialism is rebranded as personal tragedy, and conquest becomes character development.

In the end, Lawrence of Arabia isn’t really about Arabia. It’s about a man who went to the desert, stirred the pot, and came back broken—and we’re supposed to feel sorry for him. Never mind the people whose land was used as his existential playground.

2.5 out of 5 camels
(One for the cinematography, one for the music, half a star for Omar Sharif trying to dignify this white-savior fever dream. The rest belongs in a sandstorm.)

#6 ‘Gone With The Wind’

Four Hours of Confederate Cosplay and Toxic Romance

Ah yes, Gone With the Wind—the cinematic plantation fantasy that refuses to die, like a corseted ghost of white supremacy draped in velvet curtains. Released in 1939, it’s still bizarrely hailed as a “classic,” which is a nice way of saying “a breathtakingly long and problematic ode to the lost cause of the American South, held together by racism, melodrama, and the sheer willpower of Vivien Leigh’s clenched jaw.”

Let’s begin with the obvious: this film is a steaming, Technicolor fever dream of historical revisionism. It portrays the Confederacy not as a treasonous, slavery-defending regime, but as a noble, gallant society tragically disrupted by—gasp—progress. The enslaved characters are background furniture at best, comic relief at worst, and we're meant to believe that everyone on the plantation was just one big happy family, sipping sweet tea under the benevolent eye of their enslavers.

If you feel your blood pressure rising, good. That means you’re awake.

Scarlett O’Hara, our supposed heroine, is a shrill, selfish, manipulative narcissist who somehow becomes an icon of strength simply by outlasting everyone around her. “Tomorrow is another day,” she sighs famously—yes, and tomorrow she’ll still be insufferable. Vivien Leigh acts her petticoats off, but no amount of hair-flipping can disguise the fact that Scarlett is a petty tyrant who builds an empire on the backs of others and calls it pluck.

Then there’s Rhett Butler, played by Clark Gable with a mustache full of misogyny. He’s a smug opportunist with a penchant for manipulation and a deeply unsettling “romantic” streak that involves mocking, gaslighting, and—oh yes—marital rape. But hey, it’s okay because he smolders while doing it. Chivalry!

Their relationship is less a romance than a case study in codependency and emotional abuse, but it’s dressed up in sweeping music and epic camera angles to make it feel like destiny. If you ever need a reminder of how Hollywood used to define love, just watch Rhett manhandle Scarlett while she swoons into unconsciousness. Love, apparently, means never having to say you respect her autonomy.

And let’s not forget the glorification of the antebellum South, painted here not as a brutal slave economy but as a bygone paradise of manners and magnolias. It is plantation porn, plain and simple, with the Civil War treated as a mere inconvenience to Scarlett’s social climbing. The war is a backdrop, the enslaved are scenery, and moral reckoning is nowhere in sight.

Yes, the film is visually sumptuous. Yes, the performances are iconic. But no amount of Oscar gold can gild the rotten heart at its center. Gone With the Wind is a romanticized lie—beautifully shot, yes, but built on a foundation of racial nostalgia and gendered power plays. If this is what we're supposed to “not make ‘em like anymore,” then good.

1.5 out of 5 hoop skirts
(One star for Hattie McDaniel, who made history while being treated like garbage by the Academy. The half-star is for the set decorators who at least made the collapse of civilization look fabulous.)

#5 ‘Singin’ In The Rain’

Tap-Dancing Through Misogyny With a Smile

Let’s be honest: Singin’ in the Rain is the cinematic equivalent of being handed a cupcake by a man who’s just kicked your chair out from under you. It’s colorful, charming, and choreographed within an inch of its life—but underneath all that jazzy razzle-dazzle lies the same old smug celebration of men doing whatever the hell they want, while the women giggle, trip over themselves, or, ideally, shut up and sing pretty.

Set during the painful puberty years of Hollywood—when the silent film industry was gasping its last and “talkies” were stealing the show—the film pretends to be about artistic transition and technological innovation. But really? It’s just an excuse to let Gene Kelly smirk his way through musical numbers while the women fight for screen time, dignity, and basic respect.

Kelly plays Don Lockwood, a vainglorious silent film star who’s spent his career lying to the public about his humble origins and pretending to tolerate his screeching co-star Lina Lamont. Enter Kathy Selden, played by Debbie Reynolds, a young woman with talent, grace, and a spine made of gelatin. She’s introduced with promise—she critiques Hollywood bombast, stands her ground, and makes Don flinch.

And then… poof. Instant romantic interest. Within 15 minutes, she’s reduced from witty adversary to human doormat, forced to play second fiddle to his ego, his ambitions, and yes, his redemption arc. She literally dubs over another woman’s voice and doesn’t even get credit for it. Meanwhile, Don gets to be the hero and the romantic lead, and all Kathy gets is a patronizing kiss and the implication she should be grateful.

Let’s talk about poor Lina Lamont for a second. Sure, she’s painted as the villain—vain, deluded, and possessing a voice like a cat trapped in a gramophone—but she’s the only one telling the truth. She wants credit. She wants control. She’s sick of being used as a pretty puppet. In another universe, she’s the feminist antihero we never knew we needed. Instead, the film dunks on her repeatedly, mocking her accent, her ambition, her appearance—while the men backstage plot to erase her from her own film.

Meanwhile, the men are rewarded for their schemes, their swagger, and their ability to pirouette around accountability. Cosmo Brown (Donald O’Connor) is essentially a slapstick misogynist court jester, making his friend look good by comparison. He gets to dance on furniture and insult women and somehow we’re supposed to find him lovable.

Yes, the dance numbers are iconic. Yes, the colors pop like candy on celluloid. But when you look past the Technicolor gloss, Singin’ in the Rain is yet another old Hollywood self-congratulation ceremony—one that chuckles indulgently at female ambition and sells male arrogance as charm.

3 out of 5 umbrellas
(One for the choreography, one for the set design, one for Debbie Reynolds’ stamina after being treated like set dressing in tap shoes. The rest is all wet.)

#4 ‘Raging Bull’

A Testosterone-Soaked Opera of Misery

Oh joy, another entry in the ever-swelling canon of cinema celebrating the tortured genius of the violent, emotionally stunted man-child. Raging Bull, Martin Scorsese’s 1980 black-and-white tribute to the boxing brute Jake LaMotta, is less a film and more a 129-minute apology note from American cinema to the patriarchy.

Let’s be clear: Raging Bull is technically a masterpiece. The cinematography is lyrical, the editing precise, the sound design visceral. It is a triumph of form. And like many triumphs of form, it has all the moral clarity of a drunk uncle at Thanksgiving dinner who wants to “just play devil’s advocate” about women in sports.

Robert De Niro throws himself (and his rapidly inflating waistline) into the role of LaMotta, a man so emotionally constipated he weaponizes his jealousy, inadequacy, and infantile rage against every woman who dares breathe in his presence. He hits his wife. He accuses her of cheating. He smashes a door in because she complimented another boxer’s looks. And what does the camera do? It caresses him. It sympathizes. It lionizes.

This isn’t just a character study—it’s a shrine to male agony. There is no reckoning. No feminist lens. No actual critique. Just the slow, mournful descent of yet another man who couldn't be bothered to go to therapy, so he terrorized everyone around him instead. And we’re expected to call it art.

The women, of course, are cardboard cutouts with eyes. Cathy Moriarty plays Vickie, Jake’s teenage bride (yes, teenage, because what better way to say “America” than grown men marrying barely-legal girls). She mostly stands still, speaks softly, and serves as a punching bag for Jake’s grotesque insecurities. Her greatest crime? Looking. At. Someone. Else. For this, she earns beatings and accusations—while we’re meant to empathize with the guy giving them.

And what does the film teach us? That the man who destroys himself and everyone around him still deserves our tears. That the boxer in the ring is noble because he bleeds, even if he’s the reason everyone else is bleeding at home. That masculinity is tragic, not toxic. That violence, when aestheticized properly, is poignant.

I watched Raging Bull with the same expression I reserve for discovering a used Band-Aid in a public pool: disgust, with a tinge of morbid fascination.

To those who insist the film is not celebrating LaMotta, merely portraying him, I say: when every frame is drenched in operatic grandeur, when the violence is rendered in slow-motion ballet, when the abuser gets the final word—what, exactly, are we meant to take away?

Watch it, if you must. But don’t mistake it for a story about redemption. It’s a cinematic shrine to male misery—a misery entirely self-inflicted, yet endlessly mourned. And if you find yourself sympathizing with Jake LaMotta, might I suggest a long, hard look in the mirror—and maybe a call to your ex.

1.5 out of 5 brass knuckles
(That extra half-star is for Thelma Schoonmaker, because God knows a woman had to clean this mess up in the edit suite.)

#3 ‘Casablance’

War, Whiskey, and White Men’s Wistful Regret

Let’s dim the lights, cue the piano, and watch yet another emotionally unavailable man drink through his feelings while the world burns around him. Casablanca, the 1942 sacred cow of Golden Age Hollywood, is one of those films people insist is romantic—the kind of romantic that only makes sense if you think passive aggression, moral superiority, and sacrificing women for the greater good is the apex of love.

Here we have Rick Blaine, played by Humphrey Bogart, the original Sad Suit With a Scotch. Rick owns a nightclub in Vichy-controlled Morocco—a fascist pitstop full of spies, cynics, and men who only know how to express emotion by lighting cigarettes. He’s brooding, bitter, and probably hasn’t slept since 1939. We’re told he “sticks his neck out for nobody,” which in male-coded cinema means he’s a hero. In real life, we’d call him emotionally stunted and in desperate need of therapy.

Enter Ilsa Lund, played by Ingrid Bergman with the kind of luminous restraint reserved for female characters whose job is to look radiant while being railroaded by male decisions. She’s Rick’s old flame who vanished in Paris and now reappears with a resistance hero in tow. And what does Rick do? Does he talk about his feelings? No. He emotionally stonewalls her, takes petty swipes, and then finally decides that the best way to show his love is to shove her onto a plane like excess baggage and whisper something noble about “the problems of three little people.”

Translation: I love you, but not enough to give up my moral vanity project.

We’re supposed to believe Rick’s sacrifice is brave, selfless, iconic. But it’s not love. It’s martyrdom wrapped in trench coat chic. Rick doesn’t grow—he chooses to remain the world-weary martyr, forever haunted by what might’ve been, because that way he never has to do anything emotionally difficult, like forgive. Or stay. Or choose love over war games.

Let’s not forget that this entire narrative hinges on the idea that two men (Rick and Victor Laszlo) are the true arbiters of Ilsa’s future, trading her between them like she’s a symbol of moral clarity. The resistance leader needs her to humanize him. Rick needs her to hurt him. Nowhere in the film does anyone stop to ask what Ilsa actually wants. She’s just the emotional shuttle between two men’s ideological wrestling match.

Yes, the dialogue crackles. Yes, the lighting is sumptuous. Yes, Dooley Wilson’s “As Time Goes By” will melt even the hardest shell. But let’s not pretend Casablanca is a great romance. It’s a shrine to male ego dressed up as sacrifice. A story where love is less about connection and more about control, withholding, and the holy act of letting go… without ever asking.

2 out of 5 fog machines
(One for the piano. One for Claude Rains, the only character who seems to know he’s in a melodramatic fever dream. The rest? Round up the usual male self-pity.)

#2 ‘The Godfather’

A Love Letter to the Men Who Ruin Everything

Ah, The Godfather. The sacred text of cinema bros, mafia fetishists, and every man who’s ever quoted "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse" while ignoring the withering stares of every woman within earshot. Francis Ford Coppola’s 1972 masterpiece is revered, exalted, practically canonized in the Church of Masculinity. And for what? A glorified family drama about emotionally constipated men solving their problems with murder, lies, and some very good tailoring.

Let’s not pretend this is a film about power and legacy. It’s a film about male entitlement—served with a side of pasta, a gun in the toilet tank, and the unquestioned assumption that violence is noble if it’s done in the name of “family.”

Marlon Brando mumbles his way through the role of Don Vito Corleone, a mafia patriarch who seems gentle because he prefers veiled threats and passive-aggressive cheek kissing over bloodbaths—until, of course, bloodbaths are required. Then there’s Michael, the golden boy turned sociopath, whose transformation is hailed as Shakespearean by men who mistake moral decay for character development.

Michael’s journey is framed as tragic, as if the audience is supposed to weep over the fact that the American Dream turned him into a remorseless killer. But let’s be honest: Michael was never innocent. He just hadn't yet found the justification to turn his superiority complex into a body count.

And the women? Don’t blink or you’ll miss them. They are either silent, sobbing, or dead. Apollonia, Michael’s Sicilian wife, is fridged before she’s even properly characterized. Kay (Diane Keaton, trapped in WASP purgatory) exists only to stare blankly as her husband morphs into a mafia kingpin, and when she finally asserts herself by asking about his business? He lies, shuts a door in her face, and that’s the END of her arc. A literal closing door is considered one of cinema’s greatest endings. Symbolic, sure. Also: emotionally bankrupt.

The film revels in the aesthetics of power—dimly lit rooms, whispered orders, long tables full of men pretending their violence is righteous. It wants us to believe these men are complicated. That murder, betrayal, and corruption are just the cost of loyalty. What it really shows is how male-dominated institutions—be they criminal empires or capitalist dynasties—destroy everything they touch and call it tradition.

Yes, the cinematography is sumptuous. The score? Iconic. But if you strip away the sepia tone and slow-motion murder montages, what are you left with? A bunch of men defending their fragile egos with bullets while their wives pray and suffer off-screen.

The Godfather is the cinematic equivalent of watching a cigar smoke itself into extinction while someone reads you the minutes of a toxic family meeting. A beautifully crafted, morally hollow opera of manhood in decline.

2.5 out of 5 cannoli
(The half-star is for the cannoli. Leave the gun. Take the patriarchy out back and bury it.)