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Edgar Wright Reveals His Most-Watched Movies, What Inspired Him To Become A Filmmaker

The Evil Dead Renaissance Pictures
By Max Evry

Director Edgar Wright's new film "Last Night in Soho" sadly underperformed at the box office this weekend despite solid reviews (read our own positive take here), but that does not mean the film is altogether doomed. Eleven years ago he came out with "Scott Pilgrim vs the World" which has slowly evolved into a cult favorite still getting play in theaters. The point is, whether his movies make or lose money, we are always there for a Wright joint, and the cinema-crazy filmmaker recently did a Reddit AMA where he discussed what made him want to make movies in the first place as well as his most-viewed movies of all-time.

"I was always interested in films and being apart of that world but the lightbulb moment was seeing a TV documentary when I was 14 called 'The Incredibly Strange Film Show' which had an episode about Sam Raimi and the fact that he directed 'Evil Dead' at the age of 18 after having made Super 8 shorts with his school friends. I pretty much leapt up and said 'that's what I'm going to do."

This comes as no surprise given how big an influence Raimi's self-consciously stylish imprint has transferred over to Wright's movies. The "Doctor Strange 2" helmer even reached out to Wright at one point to direct "Drag Me to Hell" before Wright convinced Raimi he should go back to his horror roots and do the job himself. And for those looking for inspiration themselves, you can find some old episodes of host Jonathan Ross' "The Incredibly Strange Film Show" on YouTube and other parts of the web and it's well worth a look with its profiles of cult filmmakers the likes of Herschell Gordon Lewis ("Blood Feast") and Ray Dennis Steckler, whose 1964 film "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies" inspired the program's name and eventually became an MST3K favorite.

No Surprises Here

Carrie United Artists

In another question during the Reddit AMA someone asked Wright what the most watched film in his collection are. Here is what he said: 

I'm not sure what movie I've watched the most in my life, but it would probably be one of the following:

2001: A Space Odyssey

Airplane!

An American Werewolf in London

This is Spinal Tap!

Phantom of the Paradise

or Carrie (Two De Palmas!)

In another interview with Radio 1's "Movies That Made Me," Wright mentioned the aforementioned titles as his most-watched films, while adding a couple more to the collection: "Evil Dead II" and "Raising Arizona."

Again, if you've followed Edgar Wright's career or past interviews at all you'll find no surprises here. "American Werewolf" in particular had a huge impact on the "when it's scary it's scary/when it's funny it's funny" tone of "Shaun of the Dead." The pastiche style of De Palma was also formative, as both he and Wright are of the mindset of being consciously informed by other movies. The zany Mad Magazine comedy of "Airplane!" mixed with the more improvised parody of "Spinal Tap" shows Wright's eclectic comedic sensibilities. "2001" is a bit harder to place in Wright's own filmography, but the power of the imagery and Kubrick's mastery of the form are catnip to any storyteller. 

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