OUR TOP 10 LISTS

10. The Sandlot

The best thing about sports movies is that they all are in some way about a character's coming of age. What that says about how we depict athletes, I'm not sure (all of them are immature babies?), but inevitably the change that overcomes people who are really into sports is often the most satisfying to watch.

One of the greatest things to keep in mind when thinking about The Sandlot is that this movie is about a bunch of kids who are afraid of a dog. I know, that is simplifying. But, really, at the heart of it, it's true.

Below the surface, when we really search this all-American classic, we are able to find several layers of coming of age that, like Now and Then, bud into lifelong friendships. And I know I'm not alone in saying this, but Benny Rodriguez was a babe, am I right? Like, a total babe?

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

9. The Squid and the Whale

What do you do when your dad is boning his very hot, much younger student, and your brother is ejaculating all over his school? You tell everyone you wrote "Hey You" by Pink Floyd and hope you get away with it.

The Squid and the Whale is a film about several characters growing and learning something new about adulthood, but none more so than fresh-faced but perpetually scowling Jesse Eisenberg.

As his parents' marriage dissolves, he feels obliged to choose a side, but his big realization is that sometimes things aren't that simple and maybe he is neglecting a larger emotion. A particularly twee version of entering adulthood, not everyone's experience will look as much like a brownstone, but it may share some similar painful feelings.

Though I hope your younger siblings are able to keep themselves in check much easier.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

8. Igby Goes Down

Though J.D. Salinger pretty much nailed the coming-of-age story when he wrote "Catcher in the Rye," there is definitely a second-best found in Kieran Culkin's role as Igby in Igby Goes Down. When your parents are as effed up as his, and when your love life consists of a girl name Sookie who says "That's funny" instead of laughing, things may seem pretty dismal. The only way out is through, as they say, so Igby has to try everything to keep from going down. Living the life of a Manhattan bohemian, we see him change and grow in the typical snarky way of a cosmopolitan teenager. When Igby realizes that it's the adults that are insane and that he might just be the normal one, that's when he is free to grow up and abandon home for LA. Los Angeles, where all coming-of-age movie stars go to be grownups.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

7. Dead Poets Society

No matter what background you are from or whether you attended public school, prep school, or no school, we all had a teacher like Mr. Keating. Despite how hard we try to get out of high school without having learned anything, there is always one teacher who is trying to shape us into better men and women from the young children we once were.

Or, at least that's the romantic ideal that Dead Poets Society tries to sell us. The movie poster alone, with all Mr. Keating's students carrying him on their shoulders, is as idyllic as a Whitman poem itself.

But it's okay—even if our experiences aren't as truly inspirational as those of DPS, we can go through our coming of ages by watching this movie and lamenting the fact that Robin Williams was never our teacher. What a dream that would have been.

Oh captain, my captain, indeed.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

6. Superbad

This is another classic in the way of everything happens in one day for the perfect duo of Michael Cera's Evan and Jonah Hill's Seth. They go through an entire day and night and ever-so-precious morning together when they realize that, above all, friendship reigns.

Is it overly sweet to imagine Seth Rogen and his best friend writing the screenplay together? Absolutely. Do we think they were courted by girls as hot as Emma Stone? Not likely.

But the changes we see happen to Evan and Seth over the course of their wild night are things we can all identify with. Period stains on pants and all.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

5. Now and Then

If you were an adolescent girl in the 90s, then this was your go-to movie when you were trying to sort out all your problems.

Every girl dreamed of having relationships like the adults and children in the movie, particularly because we all secretly wanted to be besties with Christina Ricci in that era.

Watching her tape her boobs to reduce their size was a heroic and hilarious act that showed young girls how hard it would be when that kind of nonsense started happening to us. The moral, though?

That one day, no matter how awful it was then, we'd blossom into fun women with sassy friends that we'd known our whole lives. Oh, womanhood!

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

4. Almost Famous

Though life lessons abound in this film, I think the key message Almost Famous is trying to deliver is that Billy Crudup should always have a mustache.

And that fringe will always look cool. About third on the list of messages is that you can really grow up if you choose to spend time around a bunch of psychotic drug-abusing rock stars, so you should probably go ahead and do that if you're looking to speed up the maturing process.

Young high schooler William Miller gets the opportunity of a lifetime to see the downward spiral of made-up band Clearwater, and to pick up the pieces of leathered and tasseled Penny Lane, who—shh—isn't as old as she says she is, either.

This movie is full of adults acting like children and children acting like adults, and it's probably secretly your favorite movie. Who doesn't love a good coming-of-age film about writing, drugs, and rock 'n roll? Even if Phillip Seymour Hoffman were its only star, I'd still watch.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

3. Wet Hot American Summer

Is there something about movies that take place over the course of one day that make for great coming-of-age stories? In a way, the implied meta message of Wet Hot American Summer is that most movies attempt to have it seem normal for so much character development to occur over such a short period of time, which rarely happens in real life.

It does make for an outrageously funny film, however. How could anyone forget when the counselors go to town with their boss, Beth ("Would you wear, you know, pants?"), where they smoke cigarettes, rob an old lady, and develop an addiction to heroin all before returning back to camp an hour later?

Or that little Aaron, and Gail, the art teacher, end up engaged and moving in together by the next morning? Maybe the comment is that things happen too fast in films. Or maybe it goes to show that a lot CAN happen over the course of the last day at summer camp. A gay wedding, an innocent love confession, a life-threatening piece of Skylab crashing to earth.

No matter how you've changed, just make sure to meet us back here in 10 years, say 9/9:30?

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

2. Dazed and Confused

The brilliant tag line for this 70s high school epic is "It was the last day of school in 1976, a time they'd never forget...if only they could remember." As it goes without saying for the whole scope of this movie, not much makes a lot of sense (Ben Affleck, what's that hair cut deal?

Matthew McConaghy, there is no way you are under 35) but it's truly a classic tale of not just one but many teenagers learning to become adults...or something somewhat like it. Mitch Kramer, everyone's favorite Tim Lincecum look-a-like, is the hero of his incoming freshman class, while newly minted senior Randall "Pink" Floyd and his gang of blazey-blazed friends attempt to show the newbies who is in charge.

And who wants to stop it all? Friggin' adults, that's who! No one is going to interfere with their one chance to really party. In the end, Mitch ends up hooking up with a sophomore girl and learning a little bit about how to take charge of his newfound adulthood. And on that babyface of his, growing up has never looked sweeter.

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans

1. A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints

Based on the memoir by Dito Montiel, this film is a beautiful representation of a group of teenagers in Astoria, Queens during the 80s. It stars an often shirtless Channing Tatum and a typically speech-impedimented Shia LaBeouf as the teenager who we see change, bend, and grow under the Warriors-esque backdrop of a turbulent New York.

As can be seen in most coming-of-age films, tragedy befalls the boys a number of times and we see how Dito (LaBeouf) is able to escape the madness around him and make success for himself as a writer in LA through frequent, shaky flashbacks. But he grows to realize that home is where he needs to be in order to make amends with all that has happened since his departure.

This movie is tragic and gorgeous and nostalgic all at once. Watch it if for any reason but to see Shia LaBeouf's "serious face."

Need more angsty cult classics in your life? Don't miss FREAKS AND GEEKS, Weeknights 7p

Author: Dayna Evans