September 3, 2025 • 34 mins
What movies light the creative fire inside you? This week, Christopher shares five films that don’t just entertain, but have shaped his imagination, fueled his storytelling, and continue to inspire his creativity. From sparking big ideas to conjuring pure movie magic, these are the films that remind him why he loves to create.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
They're coming to get you, Barbara. They're coming for you, Barbra.
That comes one of them. Now, welcome to the latest
episode of the Movie Breakdown. Welcome to September and for
(00:36):
some of you enjoy your time back to school. I
am your host, Christopher Spicer, and as has been the
rule for the last year or so with a few
episodes that we have posted, it's just me here talking
to you about movies. And of course this show is
(00:58):
brought to you from Beyond the Balcony, our website where
it's been since way back at twenty thirteen when this
show started, and as well from our hosting site spreaker Prime,
the place where if you get over a thousand downloads
one thousand listeners on like a wee weekly basis, you
(01:21):
can have them as your host site. Some of the
top podcasts and crime, entertainment, maybe gardening or whatever people
podcast about you can find it there at spreaker Prime.
They've got a wide selection there. So what am I
talking about this week? Well, I still have not reviewed
(01:41):
any twenty twenty five movies. That's now the running gig.
Let's see if I even get one movie in before
the year is done. But I am going to talk
about something where it's September. Now it's back to school,
but not just back to school. This is the time
of year when a lot of programs start up again,
(02:06):
and this is sort of the September a lot of
ways is more of a fresh start than January is,
because my kids are going to start doing tap, singing,
lessons are starting up again, feeders, game back in its groove,
and so usually summer sort of when you're off, and
(02:26):
then september's a lot of times where work starts buckling
down again. I actually used to have a job where
our financial year began in September because it was a
camp and so it was the end of the summer camp.
And they're starting now with like the school groups and
the guest groups that would come in, and so we
(02:48):
saw September that sort of again the kickoff to their year.
And so in a lot of ways, September is sort
of the great time to sort of I'm up with
your resolutions or your goals or your plans for the year,
because a lot of places kind of operate from September
(03:09):
to August rather than you know, January to January. And
I'm saying that because as you know, I'm a freelance writer,
and as you know, I've had some ups and downs emotionally.
I have hit a bit of a career rotted in
the last few years, and this year has been sort
(03:30):
of an opportunity for me to grow and to better
understand myself. As I've revealed on this podcast, learning that
I am autistic and I have ADHD, which then some
people call it ADDHD, So autism blended with ADHD, which
is its own fun adventure. And I'm still sort of
(03:53):
trying to piece that all together, figure out how I'm
going to go forward with that. But all that to
be say that I want to see this September is
a way to really get things back on track. So
that is this podcast, that is the website, Beyond the Balcony,
that is my freelance writing career. Be it pitching to
(04:15):
different editors wanting to write about sort of neo divergence,
write about write about pop culture movies, be it again
like more movie reviews. Start working on sort of the
books and the novels and the short stories that I've
been allowing to just fester away in my head or
bubble away in my head. It's not necessarily festering. It's
(04:37):
a pod of it's a boiling pot of magic ideas
that have been boiling there. And I want September to
sort of be the road to start that all happening.
And my career is all sort of about creativity. And
so today I want to look at five movies that
I feel inspire my creativity, five movies that get me excited,
(05:01):
that motivate me, get my creative juices going. And my
number one movie, the first one I'm gonna start with,
is not likely one that you would attach to the
idea of being about creativity or one that would motivate
one to sort of start projects and do jobs. But
(05:24):
if you have read my website, or if you know
me for any amount of time, you'll this shouldn't surprise
you too much. And that is Star Wars. Because even
though Star Wars is not in itself necessarily about creativity,
this has always been my favorite movie and I was
(05:45):
absolutely obsessed with it as a young kid, and I
wrote a piece many years ago on Beyond the bulkany
Where I credit Star Wars as the picture that really
got me into loving movies, loving storytelling, and wanting to
(06:06):
become a writer. After watching Star Wars. I remember walking
around with notebooks and constantly coming out with story ideas.
The first few stories were definitely just reworkings of the
Star Wars movie or set in the Star Wars universe.
But over time I expanded and I did more fantasy stories,
(06:26):
different sci fi, and then even stories that were more
grounded in reality. But that all the idea of wanting
to create my own world, create my own characters, to
be able to tell a story that send somebody on
an adventure and put you on an emotional rollercoaster. It
all started with me being obsessed with Star Wars, the
(06:49):
love of Star Wars, and how I remember it is essentially,
I love Star Wars, watched it many many times, and
I think again now about my new divergence. I became
obsessed and I wanted to watch all the possible documentaries,
read all the books, and learn as much as I
can about Star Wars. And that's when I sort of
(07:11):
was introduced to the idea that a movie has a
creator behind it, a movie is a story. The Star
Wars wasn't this real thing that was unfolding in front
of me. Someone had to take the time to imagine
it and create it. And so that is where I
got excited of realizing I could tell my own stories,
(07:32):
and I wanted to learn more about filmmaking and how
that came about, and learning about all the different inspirations
that George Lucas had to make Star Wars, to learn
about a Charac Sawa and hit him Fortress and Flash
Gordon and John Carter and just the numerous things, all
(07:56):
the myths and classic storytelling. I inspired them. Then deep
I dug into it. I want to learn more about mythology,
I want to learn more about classic storytelling. I want
to learn more about the hero's journey. And so Star
Wars was the door for me into becoming more interested
(08:18):
in the art of storytelling and just artistry in itself
and that idea of how you can get other people
to become obsessed with the work or to inspire them
and to just believe in the possibilities of different worlds,
different characters, different journeys, different adventures. And it all started
(08:42):
with Star Wars for me. So every time I watched
the original Star Wars with most people now know it's
a new hope, it spurs something in me. It triggers it,
it gets that creative juices flowing again. And it's all
because it sort of hit that switch in young Nero
(09:04):
divergent Christopher of I want to learn more about Star Wars.
And then when I went behind that curtain and discovered
George Lucas and his own journey and his own storytelling
and his own obsessions, it then got me now more
interested in this idea of learning about filmmaking and learning
(09:26):
about the creative process, and that is something I've always
been excited about, and there's always been something I've been
interested in, is learning about the creative process, What motivated
someone to tell the story that they did, what led
them to that idea? And there's always, in some ways
(09:47):
to me, a more fascinating story behind that, like the
idea that Star Wars exists because George Lucas couldn't get
the rights to Flash Gordon. To me, that's fast because
what would have the movie world have been like if
George Lucas made his own version of Flash Gordon and
thus Star Wars was never created. What would have that
(10:11):
done to blockbuster filmmaking? What would have that done with
the big tent poles and all the things that Star
Wars inspired would have flashed Gordon be able to do
the same thing in an alternate world. Maybe it didn't,
maybe it still did. But all that type of stuff,
just the minutia and the sort of the sausage making
(10:34):
as they say, that metaphor, that idea of how a
story's actually composed, how an epic it's actually made, how
a big mainstream story is actually launched. That stuff has
always been fascinating to me, and it all became because
of Star Wars. Star Wars is what instigated that whole
(10:57):
sort of fascination in my life. And I'm a storyteller,
I'm a movie critic, I'm a podcaster, i am an essayist,
i am a man of full of verbal diarrhea. All
I think in a lot of ways because of Star Wars,
(11:18):
and so to me, that movie is always going to
be considered. So my number one when it comes to
inspiring my creativity, My next one is A Princess Bride,
And this, once again I think inspires me because of
(11:38):
just the fascinating world the Princess Bride crates, the fascinating characters,
the visuals. I became a big I've always been more
of a fantasy person than a sci fi person. Even
though I love Star Wars. Star Wars are a lot
of ways it's more of a fantasy, and so something
(12:00):
like Princess Bride is rate out my Willhouse. William Goldman
made the book first and then adapted into a screenplay,
which that was directed by Rob Reiner. And this picture.
Part of the inspiration for my creativity is just the
fact that I do like fantasy, I do like world building,
(12:24):
I do like unique characters, and so the movie itself
just sparks a lot of interesting ideas in me. But
I just also like how the picture plays with sort
of so many tropes. It's got the revenge tail in there,
with the indigo Molntoya trying to seek the man who
(12:44):
killed his father, the man with six fingers on one hand,
It's got sort of the giant who seems evil, but
it's got a heart of gold. It's got the trying
to save the princess. It's got the rogue, the person
who considered a pirate but you realize he's actually the hero.
The sinister subplot by the king with his devious plans,
(13:08):
the the heelmaker, the magic person who could bring the
person back to life, like the evil creature in the woods.
It plays with so many of the tropes, but then
make such a memorable, unforgettable story. And I think that's
what motivates me because one of the things you know
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as a storyteller is there's no one truly original idea.
The originality, the intrigue, the magic and storytelling comes from
the storyteller himself. Someone the storyteller does it from their perspective.
It's how you take that story in a different direction.
(13:53):
You take those classic tales and then you sort of
freshen it up, you bring in those news you find
ways of messhing in different like I say, tropes or ideas.
And I think Princess Bride shows how you can take
all this classic material what looks like sort of a
(14:17):
straightforward fantasy tale that in total thousand times and you
do something fresh and unique, and you have made this
picture that is so many people's favorite movies and it's
held up as a classic. And like I said, you
can argue, well, it's not even really not original story.
(14:37):
But it's the way that William Goldman does it. It's
the way that he brings in these fresh characters, different perspectives,
and the way that he puts together and sews together
all these sort of classic moments in storytelling. It does
something that's fresh and unique. And of course then it's
got the sense of humor, it's got the wit, it's
(15:00):
it allows Robin Wright to be sort of a strong
princess that stands up for herself. It's got that personality.
I just also love the fact that when you have
the bit of essentially the grandfather who is reading the
story to the sick boy, he doesn't want to go
to school, he would rather kind of stay home and
play video games. But his grandfather played by Peter fulk
(15:25):
to his grandson played by Fred Savage. He offers him
the story, which is not interesting because you know, it's
got the kissy stuff in it, it's got the romance.
But as the boy listens to the story and lets
his grandfather read it to him, he gets attached. He
really cares about these characters. He gets enthralled into the world,
(15:48):
he gets pulled in. And that's the magic of good
storytelling is how it can connect with people and how
even on the surface you're like, I'm not interested in
the story, but when you're open to it, when you're
ready to go on this journey. Even the stories that
at first that don't seem appealing can connect to you
(16:09):
when you've got those sort of memorable characters and you
have those memorable moments. And I think that's what excites
me about Princess Bride, is that it's about the power storytelling.
I also like the gentleness that's throughout this story. That's
always a thing that sort of connects with me. The
idea that you know you have the Andrea gives character
(16:31):
uh Fessik, who redeems himself, Enigo Montoya, who at one
point again is sort of considered a villain at the beginning,
but he's truly just trying to avenge his father. Of course,
the connecting romance between Wesley and Princess Buttercup, and I
think all those moments, there's just there's this gentleness, there
(16:55):
is this bonding. There's this idea of forgiveness, this idea
of how kindness and love can overcome the greatest challenges.
And I guess I'm just a big sap for that
type of stuff that I think. To me, I love
stories that they can have a darkness, they can have
(17:16):
an edge, they can even have sadness at the end
but I feel like any great story at some point
has that glimmer of hope, that ideas of sort of
the power of true goodness, and I think Princess Bride
is able to do that. With all its sort of
humor and silliness and adventure, it is truly a story
(17:38):
about hope, and so that always really inspires my creativity.
The next one has nothing to do with well may
that's not totally true, but on the surface it's not
necessarily about storytelling, but it is about creation. And that
is A Chef, which is directed by Jon Favreau and
(18:03):
stars Jon Favreau and is written by John Favreau. It's
essentially about a head chef who gets fired from his
restaurant job, or he quits there's an issue with a critic,
and so he decides to buy a food truck, take
his strange son on this journey with him, and try
(18:24):
to bring back his creative passion. And right there is
what kind of inspires me. Is this is a great
movie that's about the creative process. It's about how it's
so important to find your passion again, to find your love,
and how that ability to create and to use your
(18:46):
imagination and to just really delve into your love and
really make something that you throw, oh your heart and
soul into can truly lift you up and make you
whole again and make you a happier person. That's what
this is about. He's just in that dingy food truck,
but he falls in love with the art of cooking again,
(19:09):
the art of making masterful and wonderful food. And I
love this movie that it really shows the creative process.
It shows you making the dishes. You can see each
piece of food. And again, my creative leanings come from
like performing and definitely from telling stories through a writing perspective,
(19:34):
but this is still he is telling a story, he
is creating art. He just does it through food. And
I love movies that show you the creative process. I
love movies that show you someone who is passionate, imaginive, creative,
and being able to just lean into that job and
truly be vulnerable, be themselves and put themselves out there.
(19:57):
And that's what this is. He's in a food treck,
he doesn't have any job security, and he is making
himself vulnerable. He's throwing his heart out there trying to
connect with an audience. In this case, obviously it's patrons,
it's people who are hungry, and it's an incredible movie.
I gave it high acclaim when we were reviewed on
(20:19):
the podcast So I came out in twenty fourteen. Both
me and Scott gave it high thumbs up, and I
believe it both made our Best of the Year list
or made it very close. It was just a movie
that we are really connected with us as people who
are creative and like and are the sort of storytellers.
And I think this is just an inspirational movie. If
(20:41):
you love food, if you love cooking, you're gonna like
this picture. But I think if you're someone who does
get inspired by movies that are about the creative process,
you will see something in it too. And Jeff really
motivates me, inspires me every time I see it. The
next pick. Sure, again is not necessarily about the creative process,
(21:03):
but it has always inspired me and has deeply connected
with me. And that is inside out. Now I understand
with inside out when you have emotions, when you have
joy and sadness and anger and disgust and fear that
this is supposed to be about it is like a
(21:24):
neotypical girl. It's trying to show you how it's like
a very fantasy way of sort of how the brain works.
And I think that a lot of people recognize it
as a fantasy can relate to sort of different things
with having like your imaginery friend and your imagination and
(21:46):
just different emotions that sometimes can drive you and how
they conflict. But how in the end, in order to
see happiness you do need sadness. And I think there
is that universality to it. But someone who's narrowed di
Vergin and I mean when I saw this movie, I
didn't know that I was autistic or that I had ADHD,
but I always felt a little bit different. I think
(22:09):
I connected to this movie a lot. And that idea
of I always feel like there is a war going
in my brain. I always feel like there's more than
one voice, and now I know why that is. But
this idea of the emotions kind of rubbing against each other,
are these emotions actually having discussions and meetings. It made
(22:34):
a lot of sense to me because I feel like
I'm always trying to manage my emotions and my sensitivities
and sometimes feeling so dramatic and other times feeling so down.
And I know a lot of that and I was
tied to my Neil divergence, and like I said, I
realized inside out, not necessarily talking about Neil divergence. But
I think I was able to connect this movie even
(22:56):
more than other people because I do feel my emotions
and my thoughts are constantly at war, and there's so
many of them, and they're constantly speaking and going all
these adventures in their head. And so I connected to
the movie because of the creativity. I love stories that
are not afraid to use sort of fantasy and imagination
(23:21):
to explore real issues. I mean, this movie's sort of
looking at a young girl right before puberty. It's looking
at a girl who's having to deal with the fact
that she had to move across the country and she
doesn't have friends, and she's not really She's trying to
figure out how do I go forward in life now
(23:44):
that I'm stuck in California and this seems like a
whole new world all those and even parents are trying
to they're losing touch with their daughter and they're trying
to reconnect with her. Those are the real world, and
they use kind of the fantasy elements of a fantasy
version of the brain to deal with real family issues.
(24:08):
And I'm always drawn to that, the idea of using
imagination creativity but grounding it with ideas of family and
parenting or be it depression or mental health or social issues,
if you can do it in a way that where
it doesn't feel didactic, where people of different backgrounds can
(24:33):
each get something out of it, I feel Inside Out
is universal because no matter your background, no matter the
way of how your brain works or is something you
can grab from this movie. And so this movie inspires
me because it's the type of storytelling I want, but
also I can deeply connect with sort of that chaos
(24:57):
of the brain and that chaos of emotions and how
they're constantly messing about. And I think it gives a
lot of meaning to me. And so as a creative person,
it inspires me to make sure that every piece I right.
I want to entertain, I want to engage, but I
also wanted to have meaning. I wanted to have something
(25:18):
that can personally connect with people and have have it
be about something that you can attach to and not
every single person, Like I said, I'm opposed to be
overly didactic, but so not every person necessary is going
to connect with a work in the same way, and
especially as a personal work. It's going to mean something
(25:38):
to me when I tell that story. But if you
do it with sort of like I said, enough creativity
and enough sort of that hardened soul, I think you
can create something that is going to mean something differently
to each person, but they'll still connect to it. And
(25:59):
that is what Inside is to me. And I hope
those ramblies made some kind of sense to you, because
it does make sense to me. A few years ago
on the podcast I Think, I talked about how I
can never really connect with anime, and that has massively
changed because my son deeply loves anime, and because of
(26:22):
his love, I've now gone to an anime convention and
I see I watch One Piece on a weekly basis
with him as we're trying to go through that whole series,
and I enjoy it quite a bit. But also because
of him, I've gone through most of the Studio Ghibli movies.
And not only have I watched most of the Studio
Ghibli movies with him, but I love most of the
(26:43):
Studio Ghibli movies. I think there are works of art.
I think they are masterful, and so my last one
here on this list is another supernatural fantasy, but one
that I think really does inspire me creatively, and that's
Spirited Away. Spirit Away is considered one of hyl Mayazaki's masterpieces.
(27:05):
It's one of Studio Gibili's most acclaimed pictures. I think
it's an absolute classic and sort of the story is
about sort of a girl who I believe her family
is moving and she is very frustrated with her parents
(27:27):
at the moment, and then their car I believe, breaks down,
and so they go to this abandoned sort of fair
and their parents see all this freshly cooked food, they
gobble it up and they get turned into pigs. And
so this girl is trying to figure out a way
to turn her parents back to humans, and all of
(27:49):
a sudden she discovers that this fair is this alternate world,
this world ruled by sort of a witch, and there's
these different spirits and these different creatures. And one of
the ways that it inspires me is once again just
incredible world building and the massive imagination, the colorful characters
(28:13):
and the different creatures. It's just the very vivid and
elaborate world it creates. I just love the buildings and
it just feels like such a lived in, magical world
with all the different homes and the streets and just
the different characters and the life that it brings. It's
one of those movies. I've talked about this before. I
(28:35):
was on the podcast where I just want to hang
out in for a while, where I could just watch
this movie just to enjoy the background and the visuals
and the different characters and just sort of it's just
as interesting world as a kid I would love to
be swept to. And so there's that aspect where it
inspires my creativity. It's just the amazing imagination there and
(28:57):
the just incredible beauty, full animation. If you feel the
studio that anime is just too weird for you, I
do want to at least encourage you to try a
few studio GBLI movies because their works of art. Even
if the story's a little too bizarre for you, the
animation is just incredible. It's just gorgeous, and like I said,
(29:23):
I've said a thousand times here, but just it's full
of just imagination and I just love the artistry and
the meticulous work that's put into this world. So that
alone inspires me. But I love a journey. I love
a quest. I love those just epic pictures features where
(29:48):
the character has to go on this journey, meet new characters,
overcome a big problem. But on that journey they learn
more about themselves, they grow a great question. Journey is
truly about In the end, there is that internal aspect
where someone learns more about themselves, they come out of
(30:09):
it a better person. And this ten year old girl
on her journey, she does grow and she does become
a better person, and all that type of stuff is
what I love about storytelling. Is this idea of sort
of that transformation and what we can get out of animals,
characters we attached to, and those ideas of what would
(30:29):
have I done in this situation in this world. And
I feel that spirital way captures all that. But it's
also just there is that aspect of storytelling and that
idea of again sort of trying to be a better
person and trying to leave that positive impact, and just
(30:53):
the different people and how they want to control this world,
and there is sort of the selfishness, but there is
also the people who have that idea of trying to
help others and leave a greater impact and all that stuff,
I feel is great material of driving storytelling. Art is
(31:17):
about wanting to make an impact in the world. Art
is about trying to connect with people. Art is about
wanting to try to make a difference. I feel that's
what great storytelling is. I feel that's what a great
movie is. And so watching Spirit Away does all that.
It motivates me, it changes me, it transforms me, and
it really wants me to tell great and amazing stories
(31:40):
that can connect and make a difference. And so those
are by five movies that I think are great for
inspiring my creativity. But there are also just five movies
that are worth watching, and that's Star Wars, Princess Bride, Chef,
Inside Out, and Spirit Away. And if you want to
(32:00):
tell me, what is the movies that inspire you, make
you want to create, or inspire you to go out
and whittle some wood. To let me know at the
Movie Breakdown at gmail dot com. You can also follow
us on Twitter at Movie Breakdown one, and we also
have a Facebook page at the Movie Breakdown. And a
(32:23):
great way that you can help us is to subscribe
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can really help out the podcast is listen to it
(32:44):
on the speaker app so that would be fantastic, and
share us on social media if you liked this episode,
pass the word. Another way you can help me out
is check out the website Beyond the Balcony. I recently
wrote about how I enjoy watching Phineas and Verb in
(33:05):
one Piece with my kids. I've written a bit more
about sort of my neo divergence and that challenges, along
with some of my big plans for the website and
the podcast for the fall, I also talk about seven
life lessons I learned from play Mayor Shint in The
Music Man. So lots of stuff you can check out
(33:28):
over on Beyond the Balcony and I'll be back with
you next week. And I should be reviewing a twenty
twenty five movie, maybe even the long talk about Watson
Grammet Vengeance Most Foul. So please come back next week.
Thank you so much for listening to me this week.
I'm Christopher Spicer, and have a great week at the movies.
They're coming to get you, Barbara. They're coming for you, Barbra.
That comes one of them. Now, welcome to the latest
episode of the Movie Breakdown. Welcome to September and for
(00:36):
some of you enjoy your time back to school. I
am your host, Christopher Spicer, and as has been the
rule for the last year or so with a few
episodes that we have posted, it's just me here talking
to you about movies. And of course this show is
(00:58):
brought to you from Beyond the Balcony, our website where
it's been since way back at twenty thirteen when this
show started, and as well from our hosting site spreaker Prime,
the place where if you get over a thousand downloads
one thousand listeners on like a wee weekly basis, you
(01:21):
can have them as your host site. Some of the
top podcasts and crime, entertainment, maybe gardening or whatever people
podcast about you can find it there at spreaker Prime.
They've got a wide selection there. So what am I
talking about this week? Well, I still have not reviewed
(01:41):
any twenty twenty five movies. That's now the running gig.
Let's see if I even get one movie in before
the year is done. But I am going to talk
about something where it's September. Now it's back to school,
but not just back to school. This is the time
of year when a lot of programs start up again,
(02:06):
and this is sort of the September a lot of
ways is more of a fresh start than January is,
because my kids are going to start doing tap, singing,
lessons are starting up again, feeders, game back in its groove,
and so usually summer sort of when you're off, and
(02:26):
then september's a lot of times where work starts buckling
down again. I actually used to have a job where
our financial year began in September because it was a
camp and so it was the end of the summer camp.
And they're starting now with like the school groups and
the guest groups that would come in, and so we
(02:48):
saw September that sort of again the kickoff to their year.
And so in a lot of ways, September is sort
of the great time to sort of I'm up with
your resolutions or your goals or your plans for the year,
because a lot of places kind of operate from September
(03:09):
to August rather than you know, January to January. And
I'm saying that because as you know, I'm a freelance writer,
and as you know, I've had some ups and downs emotionally.
I have hit a bit of a career rotted in
the last few years, and this year has been sort
(03:30):
of an opportunity for me to grow and to better
understand myself. As I've revealed on this podcast, learning that
I am autistic and I have ADHD, which then some
people call it ADDHD, So autism blended with ADHD, which
is its own fun adventure. And I'm still sort of
(03:53):
trying to piece that all together, figure out how I'm
going to go forward with that. But all that to
be say that I want to see this September is
a way to really get things back on track. So
that is this podcast, that is the website, Beyond the Balcony,
that is my freelance writing career. Be it pitching to
(04:15):
different editors wanting to write about sort of neo divergence,
write about write about pop culture movies, be it again
like more movie reviews. Start working on sort of the
books and the novels and the short stories that I've
been allowing to just fester away in my head or
bubble away in my head. It's not necessarily festering. It's
(04:37):
a pod of it's a boiling pot of magic ideas
that have been boiling there. And I want September to
sort of be the road to start that all happening.
And my career is all sort of about creativity. And
so today I want to look at five movies that
I feel inspire my creativity, five movies that get me excited,
(05:01):
that motivate me, get my creative juices going. And my
number one movie, the first one I'm gonna start with,
is not likely one that you would attach to the
idea of being about creativity or one that would motivate
one to sort of start projects and do jobs. But
(05:24):
if you have read my website, or if you know
me for any amount of time, you'll this shouldn't surprise
you too much. And that is Star Wars. Because even
though Star Wars is not in itself necessarily about creativity,
this has always been my favorite movie and I was
(05:45):
absolutely obsessed with it as a young kid, and I
wrote a piece many years ago on Beyond the bulkany
Where I credit Star Wars as the picture that really
got me into loving movies, loving storytelling, and wanting to
(06:06):
become a writer. After watching Star Wars. I remember walking
around with notebooks and constantly coming out with story ideas.
The first few stories were definitely just reworkings of the
Star Wars movie or set in the Star Wars universe.
But over time I expanded and I did more fantasy stories,
(06:26):
different sci fi, and then even stories that were more
grounded in reality. But that all the idea of wanting
to create my own world, create my own characters, to
be able to tell a story that send somebody on
an adventure and put you on an emotional rollercoaster. It
all started with me being obsessed with Star Wars, the
(06:49):
love of Star Wars, and how I remember it is essentially,
I love Star Wars, watched it many many times, and
I think again now about my new divergence. I became
obsessed and I wanted to watch all the possible documentaries,
read all the books, and learn as much as I
can about Star Wars. And that's when I sort of
(07:11):
was introduced to the idea that a movie has a
creator behind it, a movie is a story. The Star
Wars wasn't this real thing that was unfolding in front
of me. Someone had to take the time to imagine
it and create it. And so that is where I
got excited of realizing I could tell my own stories,
(07:32):
and I wanted to learn more about filmmaking and how
that came about, and learning about all the different inspirations
that George Lucas had to make Star Wars, to learn
about a Charac Sawa and hit him Fortress and Flash
Gordon and John Carter and just the numerous things, all
(07:56):
the myths and classic storytelling. I inspired them. Then deep
I dug into it. I want to learn more about mythology,
I want to learn more about classic storytelling. I want
to learn more about the hero's journey. And so Star
Wars was the door for me into becoming more interested
(08:18):
in the art of storytelling and just artistry in itself
and that idea of how you can get other people
to become obsessed with the work or to inspire them
and to just believe in the possibilities of different worlds,
different characters, different journeys, different adventures. And it all started
(08:42):
with Star Wars for me. So every time I watched
the original Star Wars with most people now know it's
a new hope, it spurs something in me. It triggers it,
it gets that creative juices flowing again. And it's all
because it sort of hit that switch in young Nero
(09:04):
divergent Christopher of I want to learn more about Star Wars.
And then when I went behind that curtain and discovered
George Lucas and his own journey and his own storytelling
and his own obsessions, it then got me now more
interested in this idea of learning about filmmaking and learning
(09:26):
about the creative process, and that is something I've always
been excited about, and there's always been something I've been
interested in, is learning about the creative process, What motivated
someone to tell the story that they did, what led
them to that idea? And there's always, in some ways
(09:47):
to me, a more fascinating story behind that, like the
idea that Star Wars exists because George Lucas couldn't get
the rights to Flash Gordon. To me, that's fast because
what would have the movie world have been like if
George Lucas made his own version of Flash Gordon and
thus Star Wars was never created. What would have that
(10:11):
done to blockbuster filmmaking? What would have that done with
the big tent poles and all the things that Star
Wars inspired would have flashed Gordon be able to do
the same thing in an alternate world. Maybe it didn't,
maybe it still did. But all that type of stuff,
just the minutia and the sort of the sausage making
(10:34):
as they say, that metaphor, that idea of how a
story's actually composed, how an epic it's actually made, how
a big mainstream story is actually launched. That stuff has
always been fascinating to me, and it all became because
of Star Wars. Star Wars is what instigated that whole
(10:57):
sort of fascination in my life. And I'm a storyteller,
I'm a movie critic, I'm a podcaster, i am an essayist,
i am a man of full of verbal diarrhea. All
I think in a lot of ways because of Star Wars,
(11:18):
and so to me, that movie is always going to
be considered. So my number one when it comes to
inspiring my creativity, My next one is A Princess Bride,
And this, once again I think inspires me because of
(11:38):
just the fascinating world the Princess Bride crates, the fascinating characters,
the visuals. I became a big I've always been more
of a fantasy person than a sci fi person. Even
though I love Star Wars. Star Wars are a lot
of ways it's more of a fantasy, and so something
(12:00):
like Princess Bride is rate out my Willhouse. William Goldman
made the book first and then adapted into a screenplay,
which that was directed by Rob Reiner. And this picture.
Part of the inspiration for my creativity is just the
fact that I do like fantasy, I do like world building,
(12:24):
I do like unique characters, and so the movie itself
just sparks a lot of interesting ideas in me. But
I just also like how the picture plays with sort
of so many tropes. It's got the revenge tail in there,
with the indigo Molntoya trying to seek the man who
(12:44):
killed his father, the man with six fingers on one hand,
It's got sort of the giant who seems evil, but
it's got a heart of gold. It's got the trying
to save the princess. It's got the rogue, the person
who considered a pirate but you realize he's actually the hero.
The sinister subplot by the king with his devious plans,
(13:08):
the the heelmaker, the magic person who could bring the
person back to life, like the evil creature in the woods.
It plays with so many of the tropes, but then
make such a memorable, unforgettable story. And I think that's
what motivates me because one of the things you know
(13:31):
as a storyteller is there's no one truly original idea.
The originality, the intrigue, the magic and storytelling comes from
the storyteller himself. Someone the storyteller does it from their perspective.
It's how you take that story in a different direction.
(13:53):
You take those classic tales and then you sort of
freshen it up, you bring in those news you find
ways of messhing in different like I say, tropes or ideas.
And I think Princess Bride shows how you can take
all this classic material what looks like sort of a
(14:17):
straightforward fantasy tale that in total thousand times and you
do something fresh and unique, and you have made this
picture that is so many people's favorite movies and it's
held up as a classic. And like I said, you
can argue, well, it's not even really not original story.
(14:37):
But it's the way that William Goldman does it. It's
the way that he brings in these fresh characters, different perspectives,
and the way that he puts together and sews together
all these sort of classic moments in storytelling. It does
something that's fresh and unique. And of course then it's
got the sense of humor, it's got the wit, it's
(15:00):
it allows Robin Wright to be sort of a strong
princess that stands up for herself. It's got that personality.
I just also love the fact that when you have
the bit of essentially the grandfather who is reading the
story to the sick boy, he doesn't want to go
to school, he would rather kind of stay home and
play video games. But his grandfather played by Peter fulk
(15:25):
to his grandson played by Fred Savage. He offers him
the story, which is not interesting because you know, it's
got the kissy stuff in it, it's got the romance.
But as the boy listens to the story and lets
his grandfather read it to him, he gets attached. He
really cares about these characters. He gets enthralled into the world,
(15:48):
he gets pulled in. And that's the magic of good
storytelling is how it can connect with people and how
even on the surface you're like, I'm not interested in
the story, but when you're open to it, when you're
ready to go on this journey. Even the stories that
at first that don't seem appealing can connect to you
(16:09):
when you've got those sort of memorable characters and you
have those memorable moments. And I think that's what excites
me about Princess Bride, is that it's about the power storytelling.
I also like the gentleness that's throughout this story. That's
always a thing that sort of connects with me. The
idea that you know you have the Andrea gives character
(16:31):
uh Fessik, who redeems himself, Enigo Montoya, who at one
point again is sort of considered a villain at the beginning,
but he's truly just trying to avenge his father. Of course,
the connecting romance between Wesley and Princess Buttercup, and I
think all those moments, there's just there's this gentleness, there
(16:55):
is this bonding. There's this idea of forgiveness, this idea
of how kindness and love can overcome the greatest challenges.
And I guess I'm just a big sap for that
type of stuff that I think. To me, I love
stories that they can have a darkness, they can have
(17:16):
an edge, they can even have sadness at the end
but I feel like any great story at some point
has that glimmer of hope, that ideas of sort of
the power of true goodness, and I think Princess Bride
is able to do that. With all its sort of
humor and silliness and adventure, it is truly a story
(17:38):
about hope, and so that always really inspires my creativity.
The next one has nothing to do with well may
that's not totally true, but on the surface it's not
necessarily about storytelling, but it is about creation. And that
is A Chef, which is directed by Jon Favreau and
(18:03):
stars Jon Favreau and is written by John Favreau. It's
essentially about a head chef who gets fired from his
restaurant job, or he quits there's an issue with a critic,
and so he decides to buy a food truck, take
his strange son on this journey with him, and try
(18:24):
to bring back his creative passion. And right there is
what kind of inspires me. Is this is a great
movie that's about the creative process. It's about how it's
so important to find your passion again, to find your love,
and how that ability to create and to use your
(18:46):
imagination and to just really delve into your love and
really make something that you throw, oh your heart and
soul into can truly lift you up and make you
whole again and make you a happier person. That's what
this is about. He's just in that dingy food truck,
but he falls in love with the art of cooking again,
(19:09):
the art of making masterful and wonderful food. And I
love this movie that it really shows the creative process.
It shows you making the dishes. You can see each
piece of food. And again, my creative leanings come from
like performing and definitely from telling stories through a writing perspective,
(19:34):
but this is still he is telling a story, he
is creating art. He just does it through food. And
I love movies that show you the creative process. I
love movies that show you someone who is passionate, imaginive, creative,
and being able to just lean into that job and
truly be vulnerable, be themselves and put themselves out there.
(19:57):
And that's what this is. He's in a food treck,
he doesn't have any job security, and he is making
himself vulnerable. He's throwing his heart out there trying to
connect with an audience. In this case, obviously it's patrons,
it's people who are hungry, and it's an incredible movie.
I gave it high acclaim when we were reviewed on
(20:19):
the podcast So I came out in twenty fourteen. Both
me and Scott gave it high thumbs up, and I
believe it both made our Best of the Year list
or made it very close. It was just a movie
that we are really connected with us as people who
are creative and like and are the sort of storytellers.
And I think this is just an inspirational movie. If
(20:41):
you love food, if you love cooking, you're gonna like
this picture. But I think if you're someone who does
get inspired by movies that are about the creative process,
you will see something in it too. And Jeff really
motivates me, inspires me every time I see it. The
next pick. Sure, again is not necessarily about the creative process,
(21:03):
but it has always inspired me and has deeply connected
with me. And that is inside out. Now I understand
with inside out when you have emotions, when you have
joy and sadness and anger and disgust and fear that
this is supposed to be about it is like a
(21:24):
neotypical girl. It's trying to show you how it's like
a very fantasy way of sort of how the brain works.
And I think that a lot of people recognize it
as a fantasy can relate to sort of different things
with having like your imaginery friend and your imagination and
(21:46):
just different emotions that sometimes can drive you and how
they conflict. But how in the end, in order to
see happiness you do need sadness. And I think there
is that universality to it. But someone who's narrowed di
Vergin and I mean when I saw this movie, I
didn't know that I was autistic or that I had ADHD,
but I always felt a little bit different. I think
(22:09):
I connected to this movie a lot. And that idea
of I always feel like there is a war going
in my brain. I always feel like there's more than
one voice, and now I know why that is. But
this idea of the emotions kind of rubbing against each other,
are these emotions actually having discussions and meetings. It made
(22:34):
a lot of sense to me because I feel like
I'm always trying to manage my emotions and my sensitivities
and sometimes feeling so dramatic and other times feeling so down.
And I know a lot of that and I was
tied to my Neil divergence, and like I said, I
realized inside out, not necessarily talking about Neil divergence. But
I think I was able to connect this movie even
(22:56):
more than other people because I do feel my emotions
and my thoughts are constantly at war, and there's so
many of them, and they're constantly speaking and going all
these adventures in their head. And so I connected to
the movie because of the creativity. I love stories that
are not afraid to use sort of fantasy and imagination
(23:21):
to explore real issues. I mean, this movie's sort of
looking at a young girl right before puberty. It's looking
at a girl who's having to deal with the fact
that she had to move across the country and she
doesn't have friends, and she's not really She's trying to
figure out how do I go forward in life now
(23:44):
that I'm stuck in California and this seems like a
whole new world all those and even parents are trying
to they're losing touch with their daughter and they're trying
to reconnect with her. Those are the real world, and
they use kind of the fantasy elements of a fantasy
version of the brain to deal with real family issues.
(24:08):
And I'm always drawn to that, the idea of using
imagination creativity but grounding it with ideas of family and
parenting or be it depression or mental health or social issues,
if you can do it in a way that where
it doesn't feel didactic, where people of different backgrounds can
(24:33):
each get something out of it, I feel Inside Out
is universal because no matter your background, no matter the
way of how your brain works or is something you
can grab from this movie. And so this movie inspires
me because it's the type of storytelling I want, but
also I can deeply connect with sort of that chaos
(24:57):
of the brain and that chaos of emotions and how
they're constantly messing about. And I think it gives a
lot of meaning to me. And so as a creative person,
it inspires me to make sure that every piece I right.
I want to entertain, I want to engage, but I
also wanted to have meaning. I wanted to have something
(25:18):
that can personally connect with people and have have it
be about something that you can attach to and not
every single person, Like I said, I'm opposed to be
overly didactic, but so not every person necessary is going
to connect with a work in the same way, and
especially as a personal work. It's going to mean something
(25:38):
to me when I tell that story. But if you
do it with sort of like I said, enough creativity
and enough sort of that hardened soul, I think you
can create something that is going to mean something differently
to each person, but they'll still connect to it. And
(25:59):
that is what Inside is to me. And I hope
those ramblies made some kind of sense to you, because
it does make sense to me. A few years ago
on the podcast I Think, I talked about how I
can never really connect with anime, and that has massively
changed because my son deeply loves anime, and because of
(26:22):
his love, I've now gone to an anime convention and
I see I watch One Piece on a weekly basis
with him as we're trying to go through that whole series,
and I enjoy it quite a bit. But also because
of him, I've gone through most of the Studio Ghibli movies.
And not only have I watched most of the Studio
Ghibli movies with him, but I love most of the
(26:43):
Studio Ghibli movies. I think there are works of art.
I think they are masterful, and so my last one
here on this list is another supernatural fantasy, but one
that I think really does inspire me creatively, and that's
Spirited Away. Spirit Away is considered one of hyl Mayazaki's masterpieces.
(27:05):
It's one of Studio Gibili's most acclaimed pictures. I think
it's an absolute classic and sort of the story is
about sort of a girl who I believe her family
is moving and she is very frustrated with her parents
(27:27):
at the moment, and then their car I believe, breaks down,
and so they go to this abandoned sort of fair
and their parents see all this freshly cooked food, they
gobble it up and they get turned into pigs. And
so this girl is trying to figure out a way
to turn her parents back to humans, and all of
(27:49):
a sudden she discovers that this fair is this alternate world,
this world ruled by sort of a witch, and there's
these different spirits and these different creatures. And one of
the ways that it inspires me is once again just
incredible world building and the massive imagination, the colorful characters
(28:13):
and the different creatures. It's just the very vivid and
elaborate world it creates. I just love the buildings and
it just feels like such a lived in, magical world
with all the different homes and the streets and just
the different characters and the life that it brings. It's
one of those movies. I've talked about this before. I
(28:35):
was on the podcast where I just want to hang
out in for a while, where I could just watch
this movie just to enjoy the background and the visuals
and the different characters and just sort of it's just
as interesting world as a kid I would love to
be swept to. And so there's that aspect where it
inspires my creativity. It's just the amazing imagination there and
(28:57):
the just incredible beauty, full animation. If you feel the
studio that anime is just too weird for you, I
do want to at least encourage you to try a
few studio GBLI movies because their works of art. Even
if the story's a little too bizarre for you, the
animation is just incredible. It's just gorgeous, and like I said,
(29:23):
I've said a thousand times here, but just it's full
of just imagination and I just love the artistry and
the meticulous work that's put into this world. So that
alone inspires me. But I love a journey. I love
a quest. I love those just epic pictures features where
(29:48):
the character has to go on this journey, meet new characters,
overcome a big problem. But on that journey they learn
more about themselves, they grow a great question. Journey is
truly about In the end, there is that internal aspect
where someone learns more about themselves, they come out of
(30:09):
it a better person. And this ten year old girl
on her journey, she does grow and she does become
a better person, and all that type of stuff is
what I love about storytelling. Is this idea of sort
of that transformation and what we can get out of animals,
characters we attached to, and those ideas of what would
(30:29):
have I done in this situation in this world. And
I feel that spirital way captures all that. But it's
also just there is that aspect of storytelling and that
idea of again sort of trying to be a better
person and trying to leave that positive impact, and just
(30:53):
the different people and how they want to control this world,
and there is sort of the selfishness, but there is
also the people who have that idea of trying to
help others and leave a greater impact and all that stuff,
I feel is great material of driving storytelling. Art is
(31:17):
about wanting to make an impact in the world. Art
is about trying to connect with people. Art is about
wanting to try to make a difference. I feel that's
what great storytelling is. I feel that's what a great
movie is. And so watching Spirit Away does all that.
It motivates me, it changes me, it transforms me, and
it really wants me to tell great and amazing stories
(31:40):
that can connect and make a difference. And so those
are by five movies that I think are great for
inspiring my creativity. But there are also just five movies
that are worth watching, and that's Star Wars, Princess Bride, Chef,
Inside Out, and Spirit Away. And if you want to
(32:00):
tell me, what is the movies that inspire you, make
you want to create, or inspire you to go out
and whittle some wood. To let me know at the
Movie Breakdown at gmail dot com. You can also follow
us on Twitter at Movie Breakdown one, and we also
have a Facebook page at the Movie Breakdown. And a
(32:23):
great way that you can help us is to subscribe
and rate us on Spreak, your Prime, Spotify, cast Box, app,
Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, or wherever you love to listen
to your podcast. We're almost everywhere. And another way you
can really help out the podcast is listen to it
(32:44):
on the speaker app so that would be fantastic, and
share us on social media if you liked this episode,
pass the word. Another way you can help me out
is check out the website Beyond the Balcony. I recently
wrote about how I enjoy watching Phineas and Verb in
(33:05):
one Piece with my kids. I've written a bit more
about sort of my neo divergence and that challenges, along
with some of my big plans for the website and
the podcast for the fall, I also talk about seven
life lessons I learned from play Mayor Shint in The
Music Man. So lots of stuff you can check out
(33:28):
over on Beyond the Balcony and I'll be back with
you next week. And I should be reviewing a twenty
twenty five movie, maybe even the long talk about Watson
Grammet Vengeance Most Foul. So please come back next week.
Thank you so much for listening to me this week.
I'm Christopher Spicer, and have a great week at the movies.
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