20 movies that changed real life

After his loss in the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore reinvented himself as a climate change activist, devoting significant attention to drawing attention to this existential crisis. He is at the center of An Inconvenient Truth, which aims to show the world just how much of a threat climate change poses to Earth and its inhabitants. It ultimately had a significant real-world impact, drawing attention to the issue and contributing to the exacerbation of a political divide that persists to this day.

It’s not every film that can claim to have changed the way people think about wine, but there’s every reason to think that Sideways is one of those films. Notably, the film has a significant impact on Pinot Noir and Merlot. While the former experienced a spike in sales in the aftermath of the film’s release, the latter experienced a decrease, which is attributed to the moment in the film in which the character Miles praises Pinot but has nothing but contempt for Merlot. 

The death penalty is a subject that always arouses many feelings, particularly when it’s explored with the sort of bracing and haunting clarity of a film like A Short Film About Killing. Even though it is a drama, it has the sort of power that one often associates with documentaries, particularly how it forced Polish audiences to think about their support of capital punishment. In fact, A Short Film About Killing made a major contribution to the eventual abolishment of the death penalty in Poland.

Top Gun, along with Risky Business, helped to catapult Tom Cruise to the top ranks of box office stars in 1980s Hollywood. Its popularity helped rehabilitate the Navy's reputation and led to a surge in interest in enlisting. Though the number of people who actually did enlist has been a subject of some dispute, there’s no question that the Navy itself was quite willing to take advantage of the film’s popularity to draw more people into an interest in being a pilot.

Oliver Stone has long had an interest in history and how it’s told, and JFK remains one of his most harrowing films, and it remains a key part of the conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The film was enormously influential, and it even led to the passage of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992, or the JFK Records Act. This is one of those films that quite literally changed the law, and Stone deserves some credit for being willing to take such a risk.

The 1961 British film Victim was one of the first films to show a gay person in a positive light. Though its story is harrowing — its protagonist, Dirk Bogarde’s Mel Farr, takes on a group blackmailing gay men — it is remarkably sympathetic to its gay characters. This was quite revolutionary for the time, particularly in the UK. In fact, the film is often seen as key to the change in British attitudes toward homosexuality throughout the 1960s and subsequent decades, which, in turn, led to a loosening of various anti-sodomy laws then on the books.

The live-action version of 101 Dalmatians  was undoubtedly a success, thanks in no small part to Glenn Close’s brilliant performance as Cruella de Vil. However, while the film has more than its fair share of the old Disney magic, it had a less-than-sanguine impact on the real world. All too many people ran out and bought Dalmatians of their own, without really thinking about how difficult it would be to raise a remarkably temperamental breed of dog. As such, the film serves as a warning about the dangers of buying a dog solely because the breed stars in a popular movie.

Anyone who has seen Disney’s Bambi can attest to the film’s emotional power, and the scene in which Bambi’s mother gets shot by a hunter has scarred generations of children. At a broader level, it also raised awareness of hunting, and it’s believed that the film caused a backlash against deer hunting more broadly. To this day, many people’s perception of hunting and its morality (or lack thereof) remains influenced by this film, demonstrating the enormous impact that Disney movies tend to have on popular consciousness.  

V for Vendetta is one of those dystopian films from the early 2000s that becomes increasingly prescient and relevant with every passing year. In addition to being quite popular in its own right, the Guy Fawkes mask, which plays a key role in the film (being the disguise used by the character V), became associated with many activist groups. Among the most notable of these is the group Anonymous, which, much like V, concerns itself with attacking governments and other oppressive entities. 

Steven Spielberg created one of the most beloved films of the 1980s with E.T. In addition to being hugely popular in its own right, it also boosted sales of Reese’s Pieces, which, of course, are a part of the plot. The irony of it is that M&Ms were originally supposed to be used, but Mars, Incorporated didn't want them to be associated with what they thought was going to be a scary movie. As a result, Hershey’s managed to reap the benefits of being associated with a blockbuster movie. 

What The Cove lacks in documentary objectivity, it more than makes up for in the intensity of its message. Its focus on Japanese dolphin hunts was always going to arouse a great deal of emotion, and this was certainly the case upon the film’s release. As a result of the film, many protesters have flocked to Japan to agitate against the dolphin hunts depicted in the film. While this particular practice may be ongoing, there’s no doubt that The Cove raised awareness of it and changed how many people outside of Japan view it. 

Fight Club is notable for many things, not the least of which is its ability to tap into the sense of alienation and anguish felt by many men at the end of the 20th century. In the decades since its release, it has continued to exert a powerful influence on many viewers. In fact, it has become something of a guiding text for many men’s rights activists, who ignore the movie’s obvious criticism of brutal masculinity and instead focus on its cool factor and its seeming valorization of violence. 

Anatole Litvak’s The Snake Pit is a bracing and wrenching portrayal of a mental institution, featuring a truly remarkable performance from the late Olivia de Havilland. She portrays Virginia Stuart Cunningham, a woman who spends much of the film in a mental hospital. The film would go on to become quite influential, and it appears that it even inspired many states to change their regulation and reform the mental institutions within their jurisdictions. As is surprisingly often the case in Hollywood, drama has the power to change the real world.

Few modern horror movies have been quite as influential as Scream.  The first film was a genuine success for Wes Craven, and it gave birth to a franchise that is still ongoing. The first installment also had a rather unexpected real-world impact, in that its opening scene, in which Drew Barrymore is terrorized and ultimately slain, inspired many people to invest in caller ID. When it comes right down to it, it’s always better to be safe than sorry when the person on the other end of the line might be a murdering maniac.

The 2013 documentary Blackfish sent shockwaves through American culture thanks to its focus on the ethics of keeping captive orcas. SeaWorld, in particular, suffered a drop in attendance and revenue, thanks in no small part to the film. The amusement park chain would ultimately decide that it was no longer going to have orca performances and would cease breeding them. In addition, the company underwent significant changes in its leadership, further evidence of the film’s impact.

Steven Spielberg’s Jaws was undoubtedly a success on its release in 1975, and it helped to inaugurate a new era of blockbuster filmmaking. Its story of a killer great white shark tapped into some potent fears among the audience. For this reason, it continues to exert an impact on how the general public perceives sharks, and in both the immediate aftermath and beyond, it has made more than a few people afraid to go into the ocean out of fear that they might meet the same grisly fate as those in the film. 

Not every influential film has a positive impact on society. D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation, for example, is infamous not just for its racist depiction of African Americans but also for its broader impact on American society. In addition to helping to contribute to the pernicious practice of segregation, it also inspired the rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan, in large part because the film valorizes the original Klan. For all that Griffith was a visionary filmmaker, his legacy remains defined by this film and its toxic legacy.

Errol Morris is one of those documentarians who has a keen eye for crafting a film that is formally sophisticated and narratively jarring. The Thin Blue Line, for example, uses elements such as reenactments to critique the trial and conviction of Randall Dale Adams for the shooting of a police officer. The film’s impact was such that Adams’ conviction was ultimately overturned, and since the DA declined to retry him, he was ultimately freed. This is the power of truly great documentary filmmaking. 

Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me was like a lightning rod when it was released in 2004. Like the most influential documentaries, it shaped public debate and concern over America’s food habits and the fast food industry. Although McDonald’s, one of the key subjects in the film, claims that its discontinuation of the supersize option was a coincidence, it certainly seems as if Spurlock’s film had an impact, if for no other reason than that it reminded audiences of how much their eating habits were ruining their health.

It’s not every film that can boast of having created a sports team, but that’s just what happened with the hockey film The Mighty Ducks. Disney, never one to miss an opportunity for branding, formed the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in 1993, a name they retained until the early 2000s. After the sale of the team, they came to be known as the Anaheim Ducks, but given the enduring popularity of the original film, one could be forgiven for continuing to refer to them by their old name.