Ask HN: Films that made you see the world differently?

* Leviathan (Russia, 2014) - It's a minor miracle this film was made and saw the light of day, depicting as it does the banality of corruption and impunity in provincial Russia. Not especially obscure, it won a slew of awards including a Golden Globe but it's not nearly as well-known as it should be. This film isn't didactic and there really are no "good guys" - it's at least as much a tale of love and loss. I certainly understood local corruption at an intellectual level - I saw plenty of it growing up in the American "Deep South," but as a middle-class white boy it was never really aimed at me. This film helped me feel the weight of it at a visceral level in a way I hadn't before.

* Nobody Knows (Japan, 2004) - Sometimes what shapes us is only visible in retrospect. Most parents, in my experience, will acknowledge the profound shift in mindset and empathy that occurs when you have a kid. Half a decade before my first, I can trace the first experience of those feels to this film. Surely this has something to do with my (20s) age when I saw it, but it's a rare film that triggers such a re-programming of the psyche. I feel duty-bound to warn this isn't a comedy.

* Leningrad Cowboys Go America (1989, Finland and America) - This IS a comedy. A band from (fictional) northern Russia unable to hit it big in the terminal-stage USSR (this film was released 8 months before the fall of the Berlin Wall) comes to America to seek fame. By Finland's (arguably) greatest director Aki Kaurismäki, the heart of the film is a journey through the forgotten routes and dives of the American South. The places are real. The extras are local. As a cinematographic document, it's the best road movie since Easy Rider. The band (by virtue of being visible outsiders) obliviously crosses all kinds of social boundaries, playing in redneck bars and juke joints alike. This film gave me an outsiders frame of reference to a part of the country where I grew up, and was an inspiration to me to get out and see the world. Inconsistently available, I've bought it on multiple physical formats over the years. For folks in the US, I guess HBO Max has a lot of Criterion-distributed films now so they might have it? But I can't tell because that service isn't available in the country where I now live.

Little Big Man (1970) and Dance with wolves (1990) . I saw them many times when I was a kid. It made me understand early that the adult world would be tough. I was also amazed with the landscapes. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065988/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099348/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Un Prophète (2009 by J. Audiard). A weird gangster movie that makes you realize that even in the worst situation, even if you reached the bottom, there is a path to get out... https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1235166/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Ghost Dog (1999). I was obsessed for months by the music and by the scene when Withaker steals the car... https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0165798/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

It shows whatever your stance on abortion that making it illegal doesn't stop it and is risky for women

The film also shows the hypocrisy of the well off woman who can still get an abortion. While the poor can't access this

Finally when the film was released it struggled in America as people expected Vera drake to get off, but she ends up in jail. As the director says this is how it works in real life