Top Five Movies of Kerry Washington

I love to think about why I like things. Why do I find certain women attractive? Why do I love ?Dumb and Dumber? and find ?The Hangover? idiotic? Why do I find ?Best in Show? hilarious and ?Waiting for Guffman? cruel? Why don?t I even try to watch certain TV shows like Kerry Washington?s starring series ?Scandal??

On one hand, it has Kerry and that is a good reason to start to watch a show. (The reason I started to originally watch ?Buffy the Vampire Slayer? probably had at least as much to do with the presence of Sarah Michelle Gellar than the fact that I kind of liked the original theatrical movie and really liked the idea of it.) On the other, when I read descriptions of it, I hear the words ?soap opera? and I?ve been trained since an elementary school student playing hooky to avoid those shows like the plague. Heck, school was often a better option than those shows. However, besides shows that air used to air between 10 am and 4 pm on networks everyday and were sponsored by soap companies, I don?t know what it means to be a ?soap opera.? Sure I can point to ?Dallas? and say, ?That?s one,? but what is it that makes it a ?soap opera?? How is it different from crazy bits of ?The Sopranos? or the Jack, Sawyer, Kate triangle in ?Lost,? or shows that I really like in other words? Does any one-hour dramatic show owe its roots to ?One Life to Live? and other shows like that? I don?t know, and I?ll keep thinking about it and when my brain gets tired, I?ll just watch Kerry in one of her movies below, because I still don?t trust ?soap operas? unless I do.

5. Lakeview Terrace/Miracle at St. Anna

Yes, number five is two movies, technically making this a top six list, but I couldn?t decide which one to put on my list for the same reasons. Both star Kerry, of course. Both have cool directors, Spike Lee and Neil LaBute. Both have cool ideas, four soldiers trapped in a WWII village and a cop forcing a bi-racial couple out of a neighborhood. Finally, both have great casts, Samuel L. Jackson and Patrick Wilson in one, and John Turturro and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the other.

4. The Details

This one, on the other hand, is all about the rest of the cast to go with Kerry. On the guy side, there?s Dennis Haysbert and Tobey Maguire and on the gals side, there?s Laura Linney and Elizabeth Banks. Well, and the first seven words from the IMDB description got me right away, ?When a family of raccoons discover worms??

3. Mr. and Mrs. Smith

The movie that created the idea of ?Brangelina? because of the obvious chemistry of the two leads. It?s a decent action film that doesn?t treat you like a complete moron, and that?s all you can ask from most action films.

2. Ray

Trying to sum up a person?s life, any person, in a film two and a half hours in length has to be impossible. But, in the right hands and choosing the right moments, though it is incomplete, the story of a life?s highlights can be interesting. The writers and directors made the right choices here and add in Jamie Foxx?s Academy Award winning mimicry, and you have a darn good film.

1. The Last King of Scotland

Not only is there Kerry, but there?s also Forest Whitaker (who won an Academy Award) and James McAvoy (who stars in one of my favorite TV shows about journalism, ?State of Play?) in an incredibly interesting story. Trust me, it?s worth seeking out.

Agree? Disagree? Which movies would make your Kerry Washington top five?