What Movies Have You Seen The Most?

[Leo656]

Another thread got me curious. If this has been done before, I halfheartedly apologize, you pedantic Slapnuts, don't @ me. Anyways.

So anyways, some of us like to watch our favorite movies over and over again. For many of us, this thoroughly enhances our enjoyment of the film and gives us something new to appreciate every time. In truth, it's the ability of a film to still capture your attention and emotions after numerous viewings that reinforces its value; after all, anything can be good Once. But something that retains or even increases its enjoyment factor over time is what usually elevates a movie from being one of many, to a beloved favorite.

So I'm curious what some people's most viewed films are. I'm guessing we'll see a lot of the familiar ones like Star Wars and whatnot, but I expect there will be a few "odd duck" choices, as well, and that's what stands to make it interesting.
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I don't keep track of how many times I've seen any movie, but there are a few that I'm positive I've seen at least 100 times and some probably way more than that. Part of that came from growing up semi-poor with only a few VHS tapes handy and cable TV only sporadically, but part of that is just because I really, really like the movies. This list is just off the top of my head and I'll probably think of more later. Aside from "Young Guns" being the clear "winner" as far as the ones I've seen the most, this list is in no real order, I'm just listing movies as I think of them.

- Young Guns I and II. I generally only ever watch them as one long movie, the way they should be seen, but sometimes only the first one is on cable. I own like three or four copies of the first one across various formats, and for my wife and I it's mandatory viewing if ever we catch it on, no matter what else happens to be on at that moment, or if it's already in progress, or what. If I've seen them less than 200 times each, I'd be shocked. But I stopped keeping track somewhere around 1992.

- Superman: The Movie, Superman II, and Superman IV: The Quest For Peace. The first one was generally more of an "event" movie when I was a kid, something that would come on TV once a year and they'd market the hell out of it, like "The Wizard of Oz", but I still managed to see it a lot, and II and IV were on HBO, ABC and WPIX constantly up through 1994 or so. Oddly enough, despite being a huge Superman fan, I never owned any of the VHS tapes as a kid, settling for versions I'd taped off the TV since they were "free". Superman III, for some reason, was almost never on TV, so I didn't even see it until 1993. Maybe because it ain't good. :lol:

I've cooled off significantly on the Reeve Superman films in more recent years, partly because I've seen all of them to the point that it's mind-numbing but also because as I've gotten older I can't overlook their many flaws the way many others can. I hardly ever look at them now but I've still seen them more over a lifetime than most people have.

- Back to the Future Trilogy. I spent many weekends as a kid renting all three of them on one'a those "3 Movies for 3 Days for $3" deals the mom and pop video stores used to run. I still put 'em on if I see them while I'm surfing channels. My brother-in-law and I used to kill time at work by doing Random Quotes and Trivia since we'd both seen the movies so many times we could recite the entire thing by heart, chapter and verse.

- Karate Kid Trilogy. I managed to tape II and III off TV and the first one was on TV a lot even though I somehow never recorded it, so I pretty much grew up watching these movies, most recently getting a good buddy of mine from high school to watch them for the first time in his life (after I jabbed him with a cattle prod for being 30-whatever years old and never watching any of the goddamn "Karate Kid" movies). Point of fact, Karate Kid Part II was definitely one of the very first movies I'd ever seen in a theater, if not the first one. I barely remember it but I remember seeing Kreese punch out those windows and my life changing forever in that moment.

- Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure / Bogus Journey. Another common weekend rental. Me and my good buddy essentially WERE Bill and Ted (or Wayne and Garth, six of one :trazz:) back in those days, so we'd rent and watch those movies whenever we could.

- Wayne's World. See above.

- Who Framed Roger Rabbit? The first VHS tape I owned when my Dad brought home our first VCR. I played that tape to death.

- Masters of the Universe. Another very early theatrical experience. My Dad got just as big a kick out of it as I did, but then he always did think He-Man was awesome. This is another "I will watch this movie no matter what else is on" flick, for me.

- Ghostbusters I and II. My best friend and I were absolutely steadfast in our conviction as little kids that we were going to grow up, prove that ghosts were real, and become millionaires by essentially applying the movies to Real Life. :lol: So we watched those movies a ton because we were planning for our future, y'see. Another couple of flicks I've seen at least 200 times if I've seen them once. Whenever we got together for a Birthday or Christmas or New Year's or whatever, we would always, always watch Ghostbusters, and then both films back to back after the second one came out. To this day, whenever we see each other, Ghostbusters is inevitably a topic of conversation. It became one of the thickest roots of our entire lifelong friendship, it's pretty cool.

- Batman '89. Another one I saw in theaters, and then watched to death because I taped it off the TV. The FIRST movie I ever taped off TV, if I recall correctly. The first ever blank tape I owned, I recorded Batman, Ghostbusters II, and Karate Kid Part III, and that was my default "I'm bored, I'll put this tape on in the background while I play with my action figures" tape for a good few years.

- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Possibly the second "real" VHS of a movie I owned, I can't quite remember. I remember that after being enthralled watching it in the theater I watched it every day on video for I don't know how long.

- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. McDonald's ran a promotion one Christmas season where you could buy VHS copies of the Indiana Jones movies with your meal; for whatever reason my Dad brought home Last Crusade first so that's the one I saw the first and have since seen the most times. Again, when you only had less than a dozen movies on video and you could only afford cable like half of the year at best, you kinda made due with what you had a lot of the time. I never complained, though.

- Rocky I-V. True story, I initially didn't care much about Rocky and only rented III because Hulk Hogan was in it. That's obviously the best scene in the entire saga, BUT, I genuinely fell in love with the movie, then went back and rented the others to get caught up. I will never skip them if I know they're on, and they're on A LOT so I've seen them a ton by now. I wish I could include "Rocky Balboa" but it's almost never on TV by comparison to the others, and most marathons don't include it, so it's like for every time I've seen that one, I've seen each of the others like 50. So it's never gonna make the list even though it's terrific.

- Dick Tracy. This is one of the coolest goddamn movies ever made and I could write a book about everything great about it. Another one I taped off TV and wore the tape out.

- Star Wars Trilogy (Special Edition). I didn't see these "properly" until the late-90s theatrical re-release, but I do remember seeing the first one in its entirety once on HBO or Showtime some time around 1989, and snippets of "Empire" and "Jedi" when they'd sporadically air on network TV. But I got pretty heavy into Star Wars after 1997 until right after Episode III so I watched my tapes a bunch. I've seen them all a lot but not even close to the "fanatic" numbers some people brag about. Like I said, my "Star Wars" is "Young Guns". :lol: I don't watch them much unless they're on TV anymore, though, on account of the series sucks now and the "good" movies don't even matter anymore, so it's a little less fun to watch them than it used to be.
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That's a good chunk off the top of my head. Again, a lot of these movies benefit from having been on TV a lot, and are movies I just refuse to skip if I know that they're on, even though I own all of them and can watch them anytime I want. Just about any movie on this list, if it's on I will make it a point to watch, so some of them I've easily, easily seen over 100 times and others probably twice as many. There's definitely more that could and deserve to go on this list but I'm tired and this is already pretty long.

In about 10 years both "Man of Steel" and "BvS: Dawn of Justice" will be somewhere in the middle of the pack, along with "Superman Returns", "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight"; they're all recent entries compared to most of that list but quickly gaining ground, and I'd rather watch them than about 3/4 of the ones listed above, maybe more.

So yeah, I don't expect too many people to have similar "I've seen that movie 500 times" stories but I'm curious at which movies keep you coming back over and over again. I'm especially interested in the "Dark Horse" type of stuff, the non-blockbuster stuff. That's much more interesting to me than the standard "I've seen Star Wars 1000 times" stuff, although if that's the case then it's the case, I'm simply more intrigued by the more "quirky" and personal favorites than the predictable stuff.

[Coola Yagami]

Wow, that's a good question.

When it comes to theaters I actually went to see Man of Steel, both Infinity movies, Black Panther, It (just the first part) and Joker twice.

When it comes to home viewing, I probably seen the first 2 TMNT movie a few times, and wow, IDK. I guess I'm not much of a repeat movie watcher.

I do remember 2 instances though, when we first rented Who Framed Roger Rabbit, we literally watched it like 3 or 4 times before we had to return it later. Like literally rewind the tape and watch it again just as soon as it ended the first time.

Also back in Mexico there was a channel that would constantly repeat the same set of movies over and over and OVER again until like half a year later they'd add new ones. Like yeah there would be new movies here and there but I mean they'd still play the same 3-4 movies among the new additions and whatnot. Anyways, the point is when they kept showing Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, I remember we'd drop whatever we were doing and watch it every time we happened to run into it.

I guess the real winner is a Christmas Story. Every year I watch it at the very least twice, and boy after a rough 2020 I am sooooo looking forward to seeing that movie again.

[Cure]

Jurassic Park and Ninja Turtles, probably. I love reptiles, I guess.

[CyberCubed]

The original TMNT movie trilogy and the original Star Wars trilogy by far. They're likely the only trilogies I've probably watched 50+ times or more.

But keep in mind this is since I was a kid. They would also air on TV from time to time and I'd catch them there. Obviously as an adult I don't watch movies over and over anymore even if I really liked them.

Besides that probably the Batman nolan movies, Total Recall, and some other Arnold Schwarzeneggar movies.

[IMJ]

Given my viewing habits going back to VHS, it has to be Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first TMNT flick or The Crow.

After that would have to be A New Hope or Empire, but those two are a distant, distant cousin when compared to how many times I sat through the first three in the theaters and then on VHS.

[Andrew NDB]

In semi-regular rotation?

Eh. The Rocky movies. The Rambo movies. The Star Trek movies. Brazil. Scarface. The Godfather trilogy. Not too much else.

[ZariusTwo]

Original Star Wars, the Prequels for ironic enjoyment, Last Jedi for the re-editing, Pound Puppies: The Movie (legit underrated), Transformers: The Movie, TMNT I and II, Godfather I, Superman II (both cuts, and Lesters' was the first comic book movie I ever saw)

Batman '89 and Batman Forever, Pokemon 2000 (the legit series finale as far as I'm concerned), Ghostbusters I and II, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm,Total Recall, Robocop I and II, Silence of the Lambs

[newfan]

Well thinking back to when I was a kid with VHS and a lot less choice I re-watched a lot of stuff.

Most of all would be when I was in a phase of one of the following:
Star Trek, some movies more than others
Star Wars
Robocop

Movies I watched a lot when I was young
The Goonies
The Karate Kid
Watched the Gremlins and The Never Ending Story a number of times too.

Edit: I watched The Burbs a lot with one of my sisters and my friend one summer, that and The Little Mermaid.

There are a number of movies I have watched a few times but those I mentioned already fall under most watched. I have watched a number movies over with my children too but that's not quite the same thing. I will mention Coraline though as I have enjoyed watching that.

[Wesley]

I wasn?t much of a repeat movie watcher when I was younger (I never really got into movies until nearly a decade ago), but the ones I?ve seen the most are:

Off the top of my head:
Red Eye (2005)
Batman 1989
Batman Returns
TMNT 1990
Phone Booth
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

This includes anytime I watch bits of them if they?re on tv.

[Wildcat]

Common:

Ghostbusters 1 and 2, first 4 Chucky movies, first Jurassic Park, first MIB, any Terminator (have not seen Dark Fate yet), TMNT 2 (just liked it more as a kid), Christmas Vacation (for the holidays), Mrs. Doutfire, Dumb and Dumber.

Uncommon I guess or more personal choices:

HOUSE 1986 (thats the year not part of the title, one of my absolute favorites, have the Arrow Special Edition Blu Ray), First 2 Tremors (giant worms), The Wizard (me and my sister have always loved this, not just because of Super Mario either, I know it recently got a Special Edition).

I should clarify the specific numbers for these. Except for House (the first is the best imo, sequels are ok but theyre not really connected, one of those weird things) Im not ignoring the rest of those particular series those are just the parts Ive seen the most.

For example I dont have any of the Terminators. Theyve rerun them a lot over the years though, even Genisys so I usually watch them if nothing else is on.

This topic does lead me to something Ive thought of recently. Part of the reason people consider these older movies or previous eras better than modern ones might be because of this exact thing...we watched these movies to the extreme. Not to mention the nostalgia factor

I mean as kids you just wanna rewatch your favorites over and over because “ its cool “ . As adults I dont think we rewatch movies to this level because theres other things going on. I personally space out my viewings of reruns now so it does not become monotonous but as kids its never enough.

Probably happens with todays kids and movies too.

[Spike Spiegel]

The first six Star Trek Movies
Ghostbusters
The Back to the Future trilogy
TMNT I-III
Predator 2
Alien and Aliens
Batman (1989)
Superman (1978 ) and Superman II (1980)
The Matrix
Star Wars I-VI
The Thing (1982)
Most of the DC Animated Universe DTV spin offs from the 90s and early 2000s
Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island

[Slade]

Besides a ton of Disney movies..
Scarface
Man of Steel
Tmnt 1
8 Mile
Multiplicity
Batman 89
TDK
TDKR
Infinity War
Power Rangers the Movie

[Icebot]

I never really kept track of how many times I watched a movie but I would guess:

The Wizard of Oz
Forrest Gump
The Little Mermaid 1989
Turtles Forever (not sure if that counts as a movie?)

[Galactus]

Okay reverse my man points here but when I was a kid I watched Mary Poppins a lot. My mother would sit me down with her next door neighbors daughter to watch it almost every day. She and I got the penguin dance down almost exactly at the time. I'll always still catch it when it is on TV which seems to be every holiday here in the UK.

Sticking with Disney I watched Aladdin a lot simply to imitate Robin Williams Genie and The Lion King too.

TMNT 1990 obviously and Batman 1989 - still a good movie and a good Batman movie (sorry not sorry)

Planet of the Apes 1968. As a teenager I became a little oddly obsessed with this and the original Apes series. I knew of it sure as it is one of the more referenced and parodied things in pop culture but never actually watched them until I saw a making of documentary and thought this actually sounds much cooler than I thought and bought the whole series on VHS. That and Conquest are probably the most watched movies in the series for me.

[newfan]

Okay reverse my man points here but when I was a kid I watched Mary Poppins a lot.

I was thinking about Mary Poppins when I made my list, not wanting to fess up :), but if we are including what we watched a lot as young kids then this would have to go on my list too, along with Chitty Bang Bang and The Wizard of Oz.

[neatoman]

When I was like two to three years old I watched Disney's Jungle Book every single day (if my mother is to be believed). So probably that one.

If we're talking movies I watched since reaching a more cognizant age, that's hard to tell. My best guesses are:

Alien
Terminator
Star Wars Episode IV
The Shining
Spider-Man
Bladerunner
Life of Brian
X-Men

[Leo656]

Lots of interesting stuff here, nice.

To clarify, Yes, stuff we watched to death as kids for any and all reason absolutely counts, otherwise everyone's just gonna say Star Wars and TMNT and Marvel stuff, and that would be a very boring exercise. :trazz:

A couple more I know I watched a lot, especially as a kid, but not sure where they'd "rank" among the other stuff I mentioned are Terminator 2, The Lion King, and the Police Academy series, predominantly 2, 4, and 6.

Wildcat said something interesting that I feel deserves its own reply. But anyways, good lists, keep 'em coming.

[Leo656]

This topic does lead me to something Ive thought of recently. Part of the reason people consider these older movies or previous eras better than modern ones might be because of this exact thing...we watched these movies to the extreme. Not to mention the nostalgia factor

I mean as kids you just wanna rewatch your favorites over and over because ? its cool ? . As adults I dont think we rewatch movies to this level because theres other things going on. I personally space out my viewings of reruns now so it does not become monotonous but as kids its never enough.

Probably happens with todays kids and movies too.

It's a fair point but a few things I take issue with. Firstly, yeah, it's only natural that one's definition of "a lot" with regard to how many times they watch a movie is going to shift as they get older; even me, when I say I watch Young Guns "a lot", now that might be 3-4 times a year, where as a kid it would be a couple of times per month at least for whatever reason. So yeah, it's a sliding scale.

But as a kid, while I knew intuitively which movies "speak" to me and I would gravitate towards those movies, there's also tons of movies from Back Then and before which I didn't pay much attention to and am only getting around to now. The variety of films I'm exposed to now is far wider than it was when I was a kid. And being fully objective as always - and also keeping in mind that there's a bit of a cyclical nature to the way films are made - there's ample evidence that "They really DON'T make 'em like they used to."

Films in more recent years have become more sensational to look at BUT have suffered greatly in other ways, particularly writing, acting, and sound/music. Now, not that there wasn't a lot of junk in those categories Back In The Day and not that there aren't people doing good to great work now. But there's a generic quality, a "same-ness" to tons of popular modern films that just wasn't as prevalent back a few decades ago. Around the time CGI became more prevalent, that became the new go-to thing for all movies, and all of a sudden, you didn't need "plot" anymore, or memorable characters, you could sell a picture JUST on spectacle alone, and in more recent years we've seen that the films that rise to the top - regardless of how they fare critically - tend to be these bloated, extravagant, set piece movies.

Compare TMNT 1990 to either of the PD movies. TMNT 1990 was a STORY first and a spectacle second; with the first PD film, some of the people working on it admitted that they more or less came up with the idea of the snow mountain scene, because it would be a big spectacle, and built the rest of the movie backwards from there, with little regard to where it would go or whether it was appropriate for the characters or the story being told or anything. That's just awful, you can't do things like that. And they did it again in the second one. And those are objectively two of the very worst movies ever made by anyone, a blight on the entire idea of "film" as a medium. So, so far removed from where they started back in the day. It's Night and Day. People are going to be talking in a positive light about TMNT 1990 forever; nobody even talks about the newer ones NOW except as a How-To of "What Not To Do."

In fact, any long-running series is a pretty good example of what I mean. Terminator is another example of what I mean. T1 and T2 had great, great stories and compelling characters. No objective person, or anyone who wasn't simply a fanboy for the series, could EVER say with a straight face that the rest of the Terminator movies are as well-written and well-thought out as the first two, they simply are not. T3 and "Salvation" have their own unique problems and "Genysis" and "Dark Fate" are simply awful, but in all four of them it's the WRITING that holds them back from ever achieving the lofty heights of the two originals; T2 shouldn't even work, given how it goes so totally away from what the original established, but they took great care in making it work, to the point where for most people, it works better than the first. But with T3 onwards, you can tell that Story and Plot were not their motivating factors in continuing the series, but rather, to continually increase the spectacle and have ever more impressive set pieces. And they've done that; there's no denying that the visuals in the newer Terminator films are generally impressive, but they feel empty. They're not anywhere near as well-written, the characters are more one-dimensional... it's all just popcorn movie stuff, now. T1 and T2, again, timeless classics that people are going to be favorable towards forever, and they'll still be regarded as "classics" 100 years from now. The rest of the films in the series simply are NOT going to be remembered fondly, nor do they deserve to be. No historian is ever going to cite those films as anything but an example of, "So this is what happens when you milk the cow until it's bleeding", nothing more.

I could go on. But in general, yeah there's always a nostalgic factor, but it's inarguable that there was more craftsmanship in films when everyone wasn't chasing the (then-impossible to even dream about) Billion Dollar Checkmark and making sure everything was nice and inoffensive for the Chinese market overseas. It's an entirely different world, now, and while movies are more shiny and fun to look at and more bombastic in general, it's hard to say that they've gotten "better". If you prefer Stories over Spectacle, then movies as a whole simply haven't gotten better as time goes on, and in fact it could be argued that they've only gotten worse and continue to do so. "Back in my day", there wouldn't be like six "Transformers" or "Pirates" movies, they'd have stopped after the second or third one once it became patently obvious that they were completely out of ideas and just recycling stuff from the first two to milk the cow. Back then, more movies of a greater variety came out in general, so people's patience for "the same old thing" being recycled ad nauseum was more limited to things like horror movies and lowbrow comedy, but it was generally understood back then that if you saw "Part 6" in a movie's title, that it was not a great movie.

So yeah, fair point that things do shift as we get older, and that we have stronger affection for things which we can view through a sentimental lens. BUT. It's also a different world and movies are made for different reasons, nowadays, and on the whole, the number of "classic" films that are going to be looked back on with great fondness in another two decades is at a nadir right now. What's this decade's "Godfather" series, or its "Apocalypse Now", or even its Rocky Saga? What's the equivalent? What "classics" of Right Now are going to be pored over and discussed by future generations? It's long been said that you can tell everything you need to know about a society, at any point in history, by how it entertains itself, so in 50 years, what "classic" films of Right Now are we going to be judged by? The MCU saga? "Joker"? C'mon. I know people are having fun, and that's fine, but the state of movies as a whole right now as "Art" is Not Good compared to where it used to be, even if the SFX are better and there's a lot more money floating around. That's just the facts, jack.

Whenever I watch those AFI shows where they talk about films across the decades and how they left an indelible mark on culture and changed the way movies were made, up through the 1990s there's always such incredible variety and films were treated as an art form. Now it's all fast food, not art. The inevitable AFI series on "Great Films of the 2010s" is gonna be a bunch of CGI schlock with a bunch of people shouting at giant holes in the sky while people spout witty rejoinders at each other during the climax. You won't even be able to pick out what scene came from what movie. You can't even do that now, it's all so generic. And they don't even pretend that they care about telling stories, anymore, the entire business of movies is purely profit-driven, now. Obviously people were always trying to make money but there was also a lot more creative freedom and variety, and you still had movies that were "just" stories, and they could get theatrical release and still do alright even without being a giant fireworks show. Now, if you can't sell tickets in China your movie simply doesn't get made. It's a dark time to be a fan of movies, despite the fact that they're making so much money. We're absolutely regressing insofar as what movies mean to us and how we interact with them.

So yeah, sure, we hold more affection for things which we have the benefit of looking at with nostalgia. True enough. What's ALSO true though is that movies were, on the whole, better-written and crafted with more care, Back Then, and now they're all mostly just various shades of "Meh" and "Slightly Less Meh". Anyone who can't see the drop-off in "actual" quality of movies that runs parallel to the rise of SFX Blockbusters is simply not capable of looking at movies past the superficial or emotional level.

I mean, I know not everyone feels that movies should make you actually think or feel Real Emotions or anything, but... they should. And right now they don't. But they used to. Like, all the time. And I don't think too many of Today's Hits are gonna have the staying power to make the All-Time Greats list. That's just the way it is, and it has nothing to do with age or nostalgia.

[Wesley]

I agree that movies should make us feel real emotions. One of the reasons I like the ones I?ve listed is because they have good messages in them. They?re not just entertainment.

[Leo656]

I feel you, brother, and am definitely not at all adverse to hearing about the "Why" in some of these if anybody feels like getting into it.

Any movie that a person would watch repeatedly obviously has some level of personal investment way beyond "I just like it". And to me that's a huge part of the whole thing. And what makes it more interesting is that it's going to be a little bit different with everyone because the meanings are so unique and personal.

Like with me the Young Guns thing throws people off a little until they get to know me as a person, because most people don't have such a strong personal connection with those films, but there's a million reasons why it's always resonated with me as a human being more than any other movie has. But to people who know me well it's like "Oh, well, yeah, it couldn't really be any other movie."

Everybody, I think, has one like that in their catalog and it's neat because you can learn more about a person as A Person by what they take away from certain things, or how they feel represented in certain things.

[Vicky82]

Die Hard with a vengeance, because BBC 1 are always airing this movie
Gremlins, because ITV are always airing this movie
All 3 original TMNT movies and 2007 movie
Ghostbusters
Snatch and Lock Stock and 2 smoking barrels
The Lion King (1994)
The Goonies
The original 3 Indiana Jones Movies because BBC 1 are always airing these movies
Who Framed Rodger Rabbit
Con Air
Twister
Gone in 60 seconds
Volcano
Jaws
Independence Day

[Leo656]

I swear that "Temple of Doom" is on somewhere every day. :lol: It was on again last night. I don't especially care for it - to me it's easily the worst in the series, so people's scorn for Crystal Skull kind of puzzles me, shoddy CGI aside - but it's on in the background while I'm not paying attention and doing other things, quite often. So that's a movie that I've seen a lot despite not really liking it much, simply because it's a functional "Eh, there's nothing else on" kinda movie. And it's ALWAYS on. :lol:

[Whatswiththeheadbands?]

I've surprisingly only seen 3 movies more than maybe 10 times.


Buzz Lightyear of Star Command. I loved this film when I was really young.

Toy Story 2 was another one I watched a lot. I've seen it probably 10 times more than the original film. That opening Buzz Lightyear Video game level blew my mind when I was younger (still the best Pixar opening ever)

Iron Giant was yet another one I played to death. Watched it again last year after so long and loved it just as much


My other most watched films I've only seen maybe less than ten times each


Rocky. I love all of them, but Rocky is the one I've watched the most. It's also the film I've seen on most formats (VHS, DVD and Blu Ray).

Batman 1989. My introduction to Batman and still my favourite live action superhero film

Batman: Mask of the phantasm. My favourite superhero film full stop

5 centimetres per second. At only an hour in total running length, this is super easy to rewatch a lot

[MikeandRaph87]

The movie I have seen the most is TMNT II: Secret of The Ooze. It was my favorite TMNT film as a kid and it still is. The movie I have seen second most is the first film. Aside from the first two TMNT films I have seen...

Home Alone I I have seen a dozen times by now and probably my third most watched film. For a while it was the go to Black Friday film and while the premise makes it dated it is quite fun and while taken from a 2nd grader's perspective adults can appreciate it too.

The Original Trilogy of Star Wars half a dozen times each. It will not be equaled and has memories of two to three generations it has in awe. Nothing more can be said.

Back to The Future trilogy...can't say the same for Back to the Future Part III, but I have seen Part I and Part II at least half a dozen times if not more.


A Christmas Story, so many memorable scenes in one film. I have seen it half dozen times and probably a few parts x times more due to the round the clock airings in December, but for good reason.

I do not have a number of how many times I have seen Rocky I-IV. The nobody rising to the top and continuously defying the odds as characters drop dead around him and a killer soundtrack.

The Sam Raimi Spider-Man films. The best film never made is Spider-Man 4. If allowed to breathe it has a little of everything and the characters actually look taken directly off the page. Its fun, epic, quotable, and has a few jaw dropping moments. I realize since we now have twice as many Spider-Man films these films especially the second one will never be surpassed in quality.

National Treasure I is a film that has a little of everything. I use it in the workplace and is a well thought out film with an intriguing premise. I have seen it atleast half a dozen times.

Another likely unique film from me is Batman Forever. It is my favorite Batman film. It has my favorite hero (Dick Grayson) and my favorite DC villain (Riddler). Sure I do not like Carey's costume and hate the neon aesthetic , want more psychoanalysis shown, but it is a fun film that I always enjoyed.

[Leo656]

Y'know, it's always been hip to kinda diminish Back to the Future Part III, and it's inarguable that I and II are probably better movies on the whole, but III might be my sentimental favorite.

For one thing, I'm a sucker for a happy ending and that's one of the all-time best trilogy-closers in the history of movies. "Your future hasn't been written yet, so make it a good one." I feel like if every single human being had that etched into their bathroom mirror so they were forced to see it every day when they woke up, the entire world would be a better place.

The first one is the best overall and has a tight story, impeccably executed. The second one is more of a grand spectacle, and I LOVE the extent they went to recreate and run parallel to the scenes from the first movie, because that was incredibly hard to pull off and I give them all the credit in the world for it. But Part III is nothing to sleep on. It has a certain heart, a poignancy, and a sincerity that the first two simply did not have. It's a much slower burn than the first two, by design, but you go on a much broader emotional journey. Marty and Doc get more character development and grow more as people in that one film than the previous two movies combined, which is no easy feat but it all feels completely organic and earned.

Then superficially, there's the simple fact that I love a good Western. I thought it was great fun how they played with the tropes and such.

So yeah, III is most people's bottom-feeder and I'll never say it's better than I or II but I think a strong case can be made for it, and personally I might enjoy watching it the most of all three.

I prefer not to only watch one or two of them ever, though. For me, you NEED all three and no one piece can be removed without ruining the grander Whole. They're each individually great movies, and while III arguably doesn't work as well as a stand-alone compared to its predecessors, that trilogy is a perfect example of three really awesome individual parts that combined to make up an even more spectacular completed piece. I sincerely think those three films are among mankind's greatest achievements in film, ever. And it's likely going to stay that way.

[Spike Spiegel]

Y'know, it's always been hip to kinda diminish Back to the Future Part III, and it's inarguable that I and II are probably better movies on the whole, but III might be my sentimental favorite.

For one thing, I'm a sucker for a happy ending and that's one of the all-time best trilogy-closers in the history of movies. "Your future hasn't been written yet, so make it a good one." I feel like if every single human being had that etched into their bathroom mirror so they were forced to see it every day when they woke up, the entire world would be a better place.


I prefer not to only watch one or two of them ever, though. For me, you NEED all three and no one piece can be removed without ruining the grander Whole. They're each individually great movies, and while III arguably doesn't work as well as a stand-alone compared to its predecessors, that trilogy is a perfect example of three really awesome individual parts that combined to make up an even more spectacular completed piece. I sincerely think those three films are among mankind's greatest achievements in film, ever. And it's likely going to stay that way.

"Run fer FUN? What the hell kinda fun ya call that?"

I used to have those movies practically memorized. Those of you who were around this forum in 2006-2008 or so might recall my original screen name here was Marty McFly.

I think the train sequence from III is almost as good as the clock tower sequence. And Marty/Doc's arcs worked so well from start to finish.

8ktMe0xclxA

I know they didn't plan for any sequels initially, but I'm glad Gale and Zemeckis stuck to their guns in terms of the narrative choices, casting, execution, and style. There's nothing about the films of the trilogy that makes any of them wildly different from or incongruent with the others, and the story isn't written in a way where you can tell there was some kind of trend-chasing or executive meddling.

[Leo656]

When I was little I had no idea whatsoever that it wasn't initially planned to be a trilogy. I saw Part II before Part I as it was, and when I first watched all three in a row, it was all so seamless that it seemed completely impossible to me that it wasn't all planned that way from the start. It's so absolutely seamless from start to finish that you can really believe that every single thing went according to some grand design, rather than late-game decisions.

The train sequence isn't as iconic, for whatever reason, but I do believe it's altogether grander than the Clock Tower sequence. I have theories for why the latter resonates more strongly with people as a whole, but the sense of danger and risk of failure was much higher in Part III. I think there are a lot of little reasons why one sticks out more than the other; for one thing, objects in motion are harder to film in an "iconic" manner than stationary objects, so a train picking up steam as it heads towards a dead-end track isn't quite as vivid a memory as this giant, foreboding Clock Tower getting struck by lightning. Secondly, a lightning strike is a more clean and, once again, "iconic" visual than flames erupting from a locomotive. Thirdly, there's the fact that even though the entire framework is different, there's still a sense of We've Seen This Already by the time we get to the climax of Part III. It's all by design that the two climaxes run perfectly parallel to each other, but when you've already done something once it's just not going to be as memorable the second time.

That said, the stakes in Part III are much higher and there's a much higher element of danger, absolutely. But all the moving parts maybe prevent it from being quite as memorable as the climax of the original.

[Wildcat]

Leo656,

Thanks for the reply but thought it was too long to quote. I think you understood what I was trying to say but I want to clarify a little more in general because it seems to come off as just nostalgia.

What I meant was that our opinions might have been impacted by the fact we gave these movies so much attention to begin with. As adults we do not let ourselves get caught up in our modern favorites which lessens the impact because we changed our viewing habits.

Although increasing our viewings now might not have the same effect either since we are adults. As kids were naturally more impressed and like I said just want more.

Anyway like Ive said I do not agree that todays movies are made with less care. Im against this notion because its saying that studios/filmmakers stopped caring (or decided to care less) at some point between now and whatever the cutoff year is supposed to be.

Movies have been around so long. To say this is specifically when they stopped caring does not make sense. Theres no real examples of this. Just our bias towards certain eras. Its such an intangible thing.

Its not about CGI vs Practical Effects. The same argument could have been made then by older people too. That the 80s/90s relied too much on flashy scenes and monster effects. Its the same difference.

In Terminators case they really have no where to go but bigger. Some might not want that but its true. In this storyline the threat can only grow. As much as I enjoy T2 its very much a redoing of the original imo. Except now the humans have a good robot for a bodyguard to keep it fair.

Also technology was going to advance (its still going). So including more spectacle was bound to happen. Whether it was Amazing CGI or Super Practical Effects.

I DO agree there seemed to be more variety and stuff being tried out back then. Maybe because practical effects were at their peak. That might have been a big reason the 80s/90s made such an impact. Not that movies were necessarily better. Its just something that era became known for.

As for modern day equivalents or classics I dont know. I think thats kind of decided by each generation. Im sure kids today will consider stuff like the MCU and others Classic.

Those tv specials that look back on old movies and pop culture look back decades after and reflect those times. Todays movies cannot break the same ground over again.

[Andrew NDB]

Come to think of it, I do dust off the Dirty Harry and Death Wish movies every couple of years or so.

[Original TMNT Cartoon Fan]

I didn't care much for movies as a child. Playing with toys, reading, drawing and playing video games were funnier. When it came to television, it was usually the action cartoons that faschinated me.

But I recall liking Spaceballs (before I'd seen Star Wars) and Hot Shots, and watching them a few times.

[Leo656]

Wildcat:

I get what you're saying, but you're also over-simplifying a lot.

For one thing, there's always a shift in filmmaking every generation or so.
Long ago it was all about making Westerns, then nobody wanted 'em. Even within a genre like horror, sensibilities change: mid-70s, you had more "traumatic horror" stuff like "The Hills Have Eyes" and "Last House on the Left" and "Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer", where a "horror movie" was legit something that would make a viewer feel like they needed a shower and to go see their therapist or something. Then came the rise of 80s "Slasher Movies" which were more popcorn and "quippy", and thus the whole "Root for the Bad Guy" motif of the Freddy and Jason style of "horror". And then in the 90s you had "Scream" and all the "self-aware horror movies" where they kept winking at the audience and poking fun at the tropes, which thankfully didn't last long. And then in the early-2000s came "Hostel" and "Saw" and the "torture porn" style of horror. Late-2000s saw the "Modern Reboot" trend of horror, where everything from "Friday the 13th" to "The Hills Have Eyes" got a mediocre remake within three-year span. And so on. That's ONE genre of films but I think you get my point.

Fact is, the priorities of filmmakers has always shifted every decade or generation, due to a variety of factors such as "What's popular with the audience Right Now", "How much can we afford to spend Right Now", and so on. But there is never a "Cutoff Year" as you put it for when these things change, it's a gradual shift in priority. Sometimes it happens more abruptly than others but it's always a wave.

You actually CAN easily point out to where there was a Big Huge Break in priority, and it's when "Jaws" and "Star Wars" first came out, as those were the first "blockbuster" movies that 1. "Everyone" had to see and the movie was now An Event, 2. They cost a lot to make, and 3. Thus needed to make HUGE earnings in order to justify the cost in making them. THEN they became some of the first films to be aggressively sequelized - sequels had existed long before them, but in the past it was implicitly understood by most people that sequels were bad movies; NOW with stuff like Jaws 2 and "Empire Strikes Back" we were being told, "No, you HAVE to see this, it's BETTER than the first one!" which really was never the case before. BUT, it was all still purely profit-driven; movies pre-Jaws, pre-Planet of the Apes, pre-Star Wars, were always "just" movies. People worked hard to make the best movie they could within their budget, and if it made a lot of money that's great, but it was simply "impossible" for a movie to make Star Wars money before Star Wars was a thing, so nobody ever went into a movie hoping or expecting it to be a "blockbuster". The term didn't even exist; "Nobody is ever going to make $100 million back on a movie because there's never going to be a movie that popular" was the general thinking of filmmakers, up through the '70s. "I hope we make money, but we probably won't" was how most films were made before that. Losses were expected. Billion-dollar profits weren't even within the realm of imagination.

BUT, everything changed, post-Star Wars. If you just look at movies released year-by-year by major studios, all the way up through the mid-70s you had a much broader range of films, everything from drama to romance to "art house" stuff to horror to sci-fi and there was no overwhelming "genre" of movies; everything just sort of came out, and some stuff was more popular than others, but the range of studio releases was very, very broad. Not so much after the rise of the "blockbuster"; once they all saw you COULD make $100 million - to say NOTHING of a billion - that's all anyone wanted to do. EVERYTHING became about chasing profits, and nobody just made movies "for art" anymore. Independent cinema and "grindhouse" and "exploitation" movies ALL quickly died a death when blockbusters and franchises like "Friday the 13th" became standard, and if you didn't have a plan to get your character on a T-shirt and make six more movies and franchise your work, then you didn't get your movie made at all.

It's STILL like that, although "independent" cinema has seen a resurgence somewhat thanks to YouTube and NetFlix and such. But insofar as Hollywood goes, it's STILL all about chasing money and not telling stories. And no, it was NOT always like that. It used to be "Let's tell a great story, I hope we make money with it." Post-1975 or so to today, it's "Let's make some money. We don't need a story, people who buy tickets are idiots anyway." Some movies have good or even great stories but it's not a PRIORITY and has not been for a very, very long time. You say "you can't point to a cutoff", but you can. In fact, I'm not the one who came up with this little thesis of mine; I'm merely echoing what directors, screenwriters and actors who were around back then have been saying for years: That at one point, writers and directors were "artists", and now they're just hired guns for a studio that's chasing a pot of gold, and if you can't make a billion dollars you're easily replaced.

It was NOT always like that, not even close. And it DOES hurt the industry. Movies ARE worse now than they used to be. They're just prettier to look at, that's all. I know some people don't care about anything but escapism and having a fun little two hours in the air conditioning. But they SHOULD care. Movies SHOULD be Art, not a paint-by-numbers exercise in chasing an endless river of cash. I'm not saying blockbusters have no place in cinema but not EVERY film should HAVE to be a blockbuster just to have a right to exist. But that's exactly where we are Right Now. "If we can't make a billion dollars and eight sequels, why would we even back this project?" That's terrible, but it's the state we live in. And it's bad for everyone.

A lot of it IS about CGI vs. Practical Effects. When you had to actually spend a year building sets, costumes, props, and puppets, you had to be a LOT more careful with what you were doing because you had to justify every dollar that went on screen and filmmakers had to be a lot more creative. Now, you can push a few buttons and in a couple hours, there's your Death Star or whatever. And that's very freeing for the VFX artists but 1. CGI always looks like sh*t, and the editors don't care because "Well, the audience knows we're using CGI so it's okay if it looks like sh*t, they expect it", and 2. It makes people careless when they can just go into "Edit", press a button, and completely redesign everything. It makes them sloppy. When you actually had to build things with your hands, there was craftsmanship. When you push buttons, standards drop. You get stuff like Cavill's upper lip in "Justice League", or those horrible Transformers designs. Ugly, ugly sh*t. So no, it's not ALL about CGI but the prevalence of CGI is absolutely a factor. People care less about "mistakes" when you can "fix" it by pushing a button or swiping a light pen. It leads to a general lack of care across the board.

In wrestling - which is basically just "making movies in real time without a net" - we have a term called "training your audience". It's a fact that tastes and things can shift, but it's also true that an audience will "pop" for whatever they're repeatedly told is important. Right now, the movie audience is "told" that Only Billion-Dollar Blockbusters Matter, so they buy into it, and so it's all anyone pays to see and thus it's all anyone wants to make. You hear it all the time from people: "Movie X didn't make any money, so it has to be terrible. If it was good it would've made a billion!" But that's such a flawed way of thinking; lots of great films are ignored and lots of blockbusters are awful. BUT, we've been "trained" to pop for "spectacle". BUT, if anyone were inclined, movies COULD be "just" about telling stories again. They'd just have to start telling the audience that stories and plot and acting all matters, and not how much the movie cost to make.

Obviously, when they're spending $300 mil on every movie coming out, they're not gonna do that. It's a vicious cycle that's choking the industry to death, even if you choose not to see it.

Art shouldn't be about "technology", and the fact that they have computers now and insist that they have to use them to tell stories is asinine, it's just them masturbating. They put $200 million on the screen for each of those PD TMNT movies, and they couldn't draw flies to sh*t because the movies themselves were fundamentally terrible no matter how pretty they were. It was nice to see them fail, because it proves that sometimes it's NOT about spending a fortune on shiny toys, and if your story sucks people reject it. That was heartwarming. It sucks that TMNT had to be the Sacrificial Lamb in that experiment, but I wish it happened more often.

The current trend of "Spend More to Earn more" and "People Only Want Blockbusters" is not sustainable, and it never should have even gotten this far. Fewer movies get made altogether, VFX houses shut down because these "blockbusters" that make billions don't have to share that money with the SFX artists due to shady contracts, and there's a distinct lack of variety. "Bigger, Better, More" isn't how this sh*t should work. And it can't last forever.

This isn't "Old Man Yells At Clouds" stuff. This is all proven, and provable, Objective Truth. Movies as an art form have been on a downward slide for decades. They're just prettier and more expensive now. That's all. Things aren't "better", they're only "better" if you ONLY like blockbusters, because that's all anyone gets now. And when someone like Scorsese says that it's not sustainable, and we're all going to collectively come to regret our obsession with this popcorn stuff, he's 100 correct.

[DarkFell]

TMNT 1990.
Terminator 1 & 2.
Jurassic Park.
The first Land Before Time movie.
The Wizard of Oz.
The Goonies.

Honorable mentions are:
The Shadow.
Batman '89. (I plan on eventually getting the DVD.)
Mrs. Doubtfire.
Most Disney 2-D movies. (I know, I'm cheating - it's hard to pick a favorite.)
Predator 1 & 2.
Secret Of The Ooze.
Rock & Rule.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Infinity War.
Iron Man 1.
Spiderman 2002.

[ranger_scout]

I watch The Wizard of Oz on my birthday every year. So, that could be the movie I has seen the most times. However, I could be wrong.

Other movies include The Chipmunk Adventure, Home Alone, Mrs. Doubtfire, The Sandlot as well the original Peter Pan, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King.

[Wildcat]

Leo656,

I understand about the shifts but based on that description the cutoff would have been way before suggesting the 80s/90s the era where things declined. Its when a lot of franchises came to be.

Anyway to say filmmakers outright stopped caring still does not make sense to me. I see how Blockbusters became dominant but saying this caused a wave of less care is more of an assumption to me.

I can see it being true in some part but thats a big assumption to use on the entire industry. The belief is that filmmakers cared more before some specific time frame. Not what trend became mainstream. I think thats a different topic.

I know its not just you making these claims. Ive seen this kind of stuff said before. I do agree some bigger budgets are not necessary but a lot of stuff has become more expensive over time. Thats not unique to the movie business.

We will just have to agree to disagree on the CGI thing. To label it as inferior and self indulgent is such a disservice to the technology and people who have worked to keep improving it imo.

Sometimes its over used or seems off. Not all cgi is treated the same. I saw CRAWL recently though. The alligators were completely cgi and they looked great to me. I checked because I thought they used a mix of real animals.

Always thought the Transformers looked good too. The designs at least. Im also happy Sonic was not made in the 90s. I am curious how they would have done it but I think he would have looked out of place. It was worth waiting.

Might seem like I prefer cgi over practical effects but I honestly like both the same. I never thought one should replace the other. CGI gets such a bad wrap though.

[Whatswiththeheadbands?]

It's strange in many ways how the general audience's views have changed. Back when CGI was introduced, people were blown away with what could be done.

But now, I find a lot of people are now being blown away when a shot isn't CGI, and is in fact practical effects.

It's strange

[DarkFell]

It's strange in many ways how the general audience's views have changed. Back when CGI was introduced, people were blown away with what could be done.

But now, I find a lot of people are now being blown away when a shot isn't CGI, and is in fact practical effects.

It's strange.
I think that a lot of folks are just burned out from the excessive CGI in most of today's movies.

[Leo656]

Yeah, I always gravitate towards sets and props more, that's never gonna change.

Did I say "Ernest Goes To Camp"? Because I've definitely seen that movie way more times than is necessary. :lol: When I was in like first grade it was on cable twice a day every day for several weeks so I got a huge head start with that one.

I think it's one of the few Ernest movies that is not completely terrible upon re-watching with adult eyes. It's heavy-handed and of course unrelentingly silly but there's a few moments that have genuine sincerity. I hate "kids movies" as a rule and can't stand most of the ones I even watched as a kid, or at least a lot of them, but I do think that one's a perfectly reasonable "kids movie".

[ABrown]

I don't really have to give this a whole lot of thought. The movie that I have seen the most times in my life is the original Transformers movie from 1986. I watched it about a billion times as a child. And then in 1999 when Kid Rhino re-released the movie, I purchased it and watched it dozens of times. And then in 2006 when the 20th anniversary DVD came out, I purchased that and have watch it many times over the last 10+ years.

[PizzaPower1985]

I've been unemployed for the majority of my life so I have seen A LOT of films and read a LOT of comics/books.

I'm 34 and up until about 6 years ago I watched 2 films a day everyday for 2 decades, be they old favorites or new releases.

My all time favorites that I have watched more than any other are:

Batman '89 I've seen it 80 times since I was 4 (my first movie theater film)

John Carpenter's Halloween and it's sequel (watched it at least 50 times)

TMNT 1990 (probably seen it 40 times in my life)

Superman: The Movie (watched it on TV as a kid and seen it about 30 times since)

Back to the Future Trilogy - Not sure of a number but a lot

Warriors (1979 - street gang movie) - watched it about 20 times

Suburbia (1983) - punk rock movie - was obsessed with this... 25 or so. weird flick.


Tourist Trap (1979 a creepy little proto-slasher that I recommend) - watched it about 15 times

King Kong (30's, 70's and 2006 versions) each version seen about 10 times

A Nightmare on Elm Street (all of them) - too many times to count

The Breakfast Club - This movie I watched nearly every week in high school so, about 100+ times

Indiana Jones films (the first 3) - at least 30 times each

Ghostbusters and II - at least 20 times each

RoboCop - seen it about 20 times

The Texas Chainsaw Masscare - seen it about 15 times.

First Blood (Rambo) - about 15 times

Jaws (1975) - about 20 times

Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho - about 30 times, at least

Total Recall (1990) - about 15 times

Pulp Fiction - probably at least 30 times
The Alien trilogy - at least 20 times a piece... Alien 3 at least 30 times.