Top 5 Fluffy Films

The following "Top 5" list was posted on cinekklesia on June 22, 2005.

In my review of The Terminal, I lamented the film's lack of fully formed fluffiness. It essentially was a fluffy film, but it tried to make itself into something more with "paeans to overworked themes and trite heroes." Rather than happily (and securely) accepting its lot as "just" entertainment, The Terminal tried to "say something," and in the process became contrived, annoying, and not at all fluffy.

What, you ask, is a fluffy movie? Simply put, it is one that has no discernible theme, message, or lesson; it is a movie that seeks solely to entertain, a movie that is comfortable in its shallow pandering to the basic (though not necessarily base) levels of our aesthetic lives. Whatever themes exist are mere projections of the viewer's repressed anguish and desires.

While many, if not most, fluffy films are "bad" to "mediocre," we can find a few diamonds in the rough, a few steer that rise above the herd. I humbly suggest the following for your consideration.

5. The Bourne Identity (2002) - Dir. Doug Liman

Normally, good fluffy films fall within the comedic range, but occasionally, an action movie can make the cut. In The Bourne Identity, Matt Damon plays a super secret agent who wakes up with amnesia...and therefore doesn't remember that he's a super secret agent. Nevertheless, other agents want him dead, so he's got to start putting the pieces together quick. His supporter/confidant throughout the film, Marie Helena Kreutz, is played by the very cool Franka Potente, star of the brilliant (and not at all fluffy) Run Lola Run and The Princess and the Warrior.

4. The Thin Man (1934) - Dir. W.S. Van Dyke

Who says that accidental discoveries only happen in the science lab? I stumbled across this jewel while intending to rent The Third Man. The Thin Man follows a wise-cracking husband-and-wife detective team, played by William Powell and Myrna Loy. The dialogue is racy, both in speed and content—okay, it's racy by 1930s standards, but the script has plenty of the ol' nudge-nudge, wink-wink to go around—and the movie is perfect for the serious student of fluffy cinema, one willing to dig deep within the archives.

3. The Blues Brothers (1980) - Dir. John Landis

I was living in the Philippines when I first saw this tribute to a great American musical genre. A mere lad of five or six years, I managed to impress upon my brain a memory of one of the most famous scenes from this film: the nighttime car chase inside a shopping mall. The other famous car chase, of course, is an early morning race on the streets of Chicago, involving the two protagonists (Jake and Elwood, played by John Belushi and Dan Akroyd, respectively), dozens of police cars, and what seems to be the entire Illinois National Guard.



Oh, the plot: Jake and Elwood are two blues musicians who have to reunite their band for a charitable concert to benefit their old orphanage. This movie has all that you need for a fun, fluffy evening: funny lines; great musical cameos from the likes of Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, John Lee Hooker, and others; and, of course, lots of mangled vehicles.

2. Ocean's Eleven (2001) - Dir. Steven Soderbergh

After developing a reputation as a "thinking" director, Steven Soderbergh decided to relax a bit with a remake of a Rat Pack classic. Apparently, the original was pretty awful, but Soderbergh's version is witty, funky, and intriguing. George Clooney plays Danny Ocean, a con man fresh out of prison with the proverbial "last heist" on the brain: namely, breaking into the high-tech vault of a Vegas casino and making off with millions. Clooney heads an ensemble of (mostly) Hollywood heavyweights that will leave you feeling very entertained (without have been intellectually edified one bit!). The sequel, unfortunately, is not nearly as good.

1. Clerks (1994) - Dir. Kevin Smith

Knowing that it has been over ten years since I first saw this film makes me feel old. Nevertheless, Kevin Smith's take on the minimum wage employees who serve behind the counter of your favorite convenience store is as fresh today as when I was in college. Bawdy, obnoxious, holding no sense of decorum (and not for the faint of heart), this film embodied the apathy, cynicism, and self-absorption that stereotypically defined the '90s. In a way, Seinfeld was the calmer, cleaner sibling of the riotous, long-haired Clerks. Not that Kevin Smith had any social message to impart; before he got all sentimental, he was just having a good time.