John Carpenter Reveals His Two All-Time Favourite Films
John Carpenter names the two films that shaped his creative vision, explaining why these classics stand above the rest in his eyes.
With the rise of Letterboxd, everyone seems to have a list of their top films ready to go. The app’s team has made a habit of hitting red carpets, asking celebs to rattle off their top four picks. Most stars have their answers sorted, and some even give the app a nod—Kristen Stewart once quipped, “You can tell a lot about a person from seeing them in Letterboxd.” It’s clear we’re all a bit obsessed with what our mates reckon about films. So, when someone who’s actually shaped the industry shares their favourites, it’s worth paying attention.
John Carpenter, known for his work as a director, writer, composer, and actor, isn’t on Letterboxd himself, but he’s been open about the two films that have left the biggest mark on him. In 1949, Carol Reed’s The Third Man hit the screens, and it’s right at the top of Carpenter’s list. As he wrote for Criterion,
“Oh, come on! You can’t get better than this movie.”
The film, a gripping international crime thriller with a noir edge, has a plot that Carpenter describes as “deceptively simple”:
“There’s an accident, a man is killed, and the third man turns out to be the bad guy, played by Orson Welles.”
Looking at Carpenter’s own work, it’s easy to see why this one resonates. The film’s bleak, post-war mood is almost chilling, and Carpenter points out,
“The chase scenes in the sewers of Vienna are astonishing, and the use of shadows is brilliant and inspiring. It’s just an incredible movie.”
Howard Hawks’ Influence and a Standout Classic
About ten years before The Third Man, Howard Hawks released Only Angels Have Wings, a romantic adventure set at a South American airmail outpost. Carpenter has called Hawks a major influence, saying,
“Howard Hawks has always been a big influence on me and my work, and Only Angels Have Wings is my favourite movie of all time.”
He’s not shy about his admiration, admitting he can’t pick just one thing he loves about it.
“If you sit down and watch it and you don’t love it, then you can just forget Howard Hawks. Everything about him as a filmmaker is here: the relationships between men and women, the adventure, the mystery, the pleasure.”
Carpenter reckons this film stands out among Hawks’ work because it blends two of his favourite storylines. Some of Hawks’ films are all about “daring men doing various adventurous things,” while others are comedies where the hero—often Cary Grant—gets taken down a peg or shows his silly side. But Only Angels Have Wings is, as Carpenter puts it,
“unique… it’s a movie in which men, in this case, pilots, risk their lives every day, with every flight, while darkness is all around them… they have their own codes and their own ideas of bravery.”
World-Building and Enduring Inspiration
Building a believable world in any creative project is no easy feat. It takes a fair bit of innovation and a knack for drawing punters in. Carpenter seems to have picked up this skill from Hawks, whose films are known for their immersive settings and strong sense of place. The way Hawks crafts his stories—full of adventure, tension, and complex relationships—has clearly left a lasting impression on Carpenter’s own approach to filmmaking.
Both The Third Man and Only Angels Have Wings have set the bar high for what cinema can achieve, at least in Carpenter’s eyes. Their influence can be seen in the mood, style, and storytelling choices that define his own body of work.