- Rolling Thunder/No Country for Old Men – nihilism
- Taxi Driver/Nightcrawler
- Attack the Block/The World’s End (brit alien invasion)
- No Country for Old Men/Sicario (Cartel)
- PCU/Old School (How dross becomes the man)
- Audition/Gone Girl (consequences of fucking with the wrong woman)
- Tell No One/Gone Girl (best in class novel to movie adaptations)
- Pineapple Express/The End
- Magnolia/Snow Angels
- Magic Mike/Spring Breakers/No Pain no Gain (Floridian late capitalism)
- Goodfellas/Boogie Nights (non-schlocky derivative)
- Rushmore/American Splendor (Sic Transit Gloria)
- Sleepaway Camp/Wet Hot American Summer (watching Sleepaway Camp first, you’ll expect WHAS to be a slasher flick and then it isn’t)
- Finding Nemo/Leviathan
- The Big Sleep/The Long Goodbye/The Big Lebowksi/Inherent Vice/Under the Silver Lake
- Inception/Last Year at Marienbad/Certified Copy
- You’re Next/Ready or Not
- Uncut Gems/Enter the Void
- Conan the Barbarian/Endless Summer 2
- Sea Fever/You’re Next
- Roma/Parasite
- The gambler/uncut gems – idiotic desperation, middle-aged, white people problems
- Out of Sight/Jackie Brown – Elmore Leonard Cinematic Universe
- Burn After Reading/In the Loop – govt incompetency
- Midsommar/Bacurau – don’t fuck with forces you can’t understand
- Bad lieutenant port of call new Orleans/wrath of man
- Say Anything/Grosse Pointe Blank + obvious
- Da 5 Bloods/Triple Frontier – ashes of the American empire
- Dr. Strange love/In the Loop – governmental spin and incompetence
- Metropolitan/Salt burn – petit bourgeoisie genx v genz
- The Long Goodbye/Fletch/Confess Fletch
- Edge of tomorrow/sicario/the counselor