I feel that the real mark of a good movie is the desire to watch it again. I've seen a lot of critically acclaimed movies that never want to see again. I would rather gnaw my own arm off then see Wong Kar Wai's "Happy Together" (Chun gwong cha sit) or sit through another showing "L'Atalante." Of course I appreciated how artistic they were, the caliber of the performances, and whatever stunning technical assets the movie may have had. But that made them works of art, not entertainment.

My personal philosophy is that a good movie should have a bit of both. When you have artistic merit is something to be appreciated. If you want to make movies that are purely artistic then you should go for shorter length experimental films. Because having a very ideologically challenging movie is all well and good but if it has messed up pacing, irritating visuals, truckloads of pretension, or is depressing beyond belief I don't want to sit through more then an hour of it let alone see it again. You can still have a lot or art and meaning packed into something that doesn't make you want to kill yourself.

For me the mark of an excellent movie is when you still cry or laugh despite the fact that you have seen it before. If a movie can still get you emotionally, or comically after a few views that's when you know you've really got something great.

I must have seen each of the "Lord of The Rings" movies 10 times by now. Today I saw that TNT was running a marathon, and despite having more important things to do I couldn't pull myself away from the tv. This was just another reminder of how much I really love LOTR. I kind of hate to admit it, but I still cry every time when Eowyn says "I am no man." I don't know why that makes me cry every time, but it does so without fail.

"Lord of The Rings" is one of my favorite movies of all times. I consider Fellowship, Two Towers, and Return of the King to all be the same really long movie. After all, Tolkien himself wanted to publish Lord of the Rings as one giant book, the publishing company made him break it up into three parts. It takes a very long time to watch LOTR, and I mean really long because if you want to do it right you have to see the extended edition.

If you have never done so and have an entire day to waste I highly recommend doing a Lord of The Rings marathon. Don't be afraid unleash your inner nerd.

Do any of you have favorite movies that you can watch over and over but still get emotional about, or still laugh at the punchlines? Let me know what your favorite movies are.