By: Ellie Simmers- Assistant News Editor
Sitting in his office, surrounded by various superhero memorabilia, Dr. Robinson, known as Dr. Mike to everyone on campus, struggled to choose only four favorite movies.
“I really hate to pick favorites because I’m like a little kid, like, everything’s exciting to me, you know, every ride in the amusement park is great, every movie’s fantastic,” said Robinson as he compared choosing a favorite movie to say which child you love the most.
Despite his reluctance to give a definite four all-time favorites, these are Dr. Mike’s Top Four Favorite Films, plus some honorable mentions.
“I love love love Jaws, I have probably watched Jaws 60 times. I love it, it’s one of those movies where I can drop into it now and I can watch it, and even though I know everything that is going to happen, I still love it. I just get so excited by it, it’s just such a well-put-together movie, and it’s got so much clever character work,” Robinson raves as he begins to tell a behind-the-scenes story from the film.
“When they were filming Jaws, the shark didn’t work. They had built these robot sharks, and everything was fine, but when they threw them in salt water, salt water just hates machinery, so they kept breaking down and kept having troubles, so all the actors were just hanging around all the time and they just started talking about the characters and figuring out what they could do and what their characters were about and it just makes it such a strong movie, like even some of the mid-level minor characters in Jaws are a lot of fun,” Robinson explains as he gives some examples of minor characters that remain memorable because of their character work.
Jaws follows an unlikely group of men whose small community off Long Island has begun to be terrorized by a great white shark, and their efforts to stop it.
Jaws
Image Credit: Fire Station Creative
“I am absolutely crazy about Star Wars, but I probably love Empire Strikes Back more,” Robinson said, going on to explain not only the parts of the movie that he loves, but also the emotional connection he has with it.
“My father was in the hospital; he was having knee surgery, and we went to see him. At lunch, we went over to the mall, and I said, ‘Mom, Empire Strikes Back is in the mall.’ My mom, who loves Star Wars too, said, ‘We can’t. We have to go back and see your father.’ But, he was in a lot of pain and just not happy and had decided to take a nap. Mom was like, ‘Oh, well, let’s just go ahead and go home.’ It was a long drive and as we started driving back, I was like, ‘Hey, Mom, I don’t think you’re going the right way.’” Robinson shares, as his mother had driven them back to the mall with the movie theater so they could watch The Empire Strikes Back together.
“It was so much fun. We had such a good time. I remember everyone in the theater saying, ‘Oh, my god, Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father.’”
The Empire Strikes Back is the second film in the original Star Wars trilogy, following Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Princess Leia as they are on the run from the Galactic Empire and more specifically, Darth Vader.
The Empire Strikes Back
Image Credits: Rio Theatre
“I love Raiders of the Lost Ark. I love it. It’s so much fun,” Robinson says before admitting that he wasn’t always this excited about this film.
“That’s always embarrassing to me because I didn’t actually rush out to see that. For whatever reason, the trailer did not excite me. I waited. I had to go see it in a second-round theater,” Robinson said before continuing his praise of the movie.
“I absolutely fell in love with it. That is a great, great movie. A lot of fun. A lot of action. A lot of things are moving. That’s another one where I’ve probably seen it a million times.”
Set in 1936, Raiders of the Lost Ark follows Indiana Jones, an archeologist, who is on the hunt for the Ark of the Covenant, all while trying to retrieve the artifact before the Nazis do. It is the first of the five Indiana Jones films.
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Image credits: The Kennedy Center
“I love North by Northwest. The old Hitchcock movie. Suspense film. Oh, it’s a lot of fun. That was in my film class when I was in undergrad,” Robinson noted as he is currently teaching a film class this semester.
“I had never heard of it. I had never seen it. And I fell absolutely in love with it,” he said, noting the stars of the movie, Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint, and how their chemistry made this movie special.
North by Northwest follows an advertising executive named Roger Thornhill, who has been mistaken for a government agent and is chased across the United States by foreign adversaries.
North By Northwest
Image credits: The Daily Runner
- Dr. Mike’s Honorable Mentions
Even after giving his four films, Dr. Mike continued to list off some of his favorites which included movies such as Captain America: Civil War, Alien, Aliens, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956 version), and Mad Max: Fury Road.
Dr. Mike does not have his own LetterBoxd account, but he does have a way he shares the movies he loves and the ones that he deems “just ok,” which is with his family.
“The whole family is sort of really on the same wavelength. So it’s a lot of fun to share that with them. And we can see movies that are okay or, you know, all right. But as long as you’re with them and you’re having fun, it’s good stuff.”
For more about Dr. Mike, check out his column in the Critograph, “Nerd Factor.”For more movie recommendations, follow my Letterboxd account.
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