If it doesn’t matter when it came out then it would be Yi Yi by Edward Yang. It’s a Taiwanese film from 2000 that is so beautiful I cried while watching it twice in the cinema recently during its 4K restoration and 25th anniversary run. Everything about it is pretty much perfect in my opinion (with maybe the murder twist being a bit odd).

It tells the story of three different family members - the father, the daughter, and the son, as they just… deal with life to be honest. Old loves reappear, new ones are formed, things go well, thing go bad. It’s beautifully simple, just a film about people, but the way it’s presented - from the cinematography, to the writing, music, and acting - is done so well that I personally can’t help but feel it’s a must-watch for every human being.

For some fun extras that I won’t opine much also:

• pretty much anything by Wim Wenders (Alice in the Cities; Kings of The Road; Paris, Texas; Perfect Days)
• The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (It’s lesbian 12 Angry Men)
• The Connection (it’s jazzy and drug addicted 12 Angry Men)
• The Battle of Algiers
• 8 1/2
• Tokyo Fist
• Strike (yes, from 1925)
• Girlfriends (1978)
• from more recent movies I really loved the comedies Better Off Dead (the Indonesian film) and The Last Viking. Die My Love, The Drama, and Marty Supreme were also excellent.