Diva

Diva is a movie that seems just as stunning and unique to me today as it did when I first saw it 20 years ago. One of those movies that you will remember forever.

On the surface, it's an exercise in pure style, combining exciting, "hip" visuals with great music (opera as well as some great atmospheric incidental music). But there are hundreds of movies like that. What makes Diva so memorable to me is the way it combines this stylish cinematic eye candy with a suspenseful plot, good acting, a touch of romance and sex, and even a smattering of philosophy (as the title character explains her reasons for not allowing her voice to be recorded, not to mention the immortal bread-buttering scene).

It sounds like a recipe for a boring, highly stylized "European" movie, but this is a film where the excitement never flags for a minute. One of the true gems of 80s cinema. As a friend said "If you wanted to be hip in the 80s, you had to have seen 'Liquid Sky', 'Repo Man' and 'Diva'". But even today, you should see it just because it's a great movie.