If you’ve ever been called a film bro, it was probably as an insult. Movies typically thought of as being linked to film bros can be good, but they’re sometimes misinterpreted by people who get called film bros, which is a big reason why the term is derogatory. Film bro movies often have violent/dark stories, above-average levels of intensity, and in-your-face visual stylistic choices.
And they’re often about men, directed by male directors, which is probably where the “bro” part of “film bro” comes in. But film bro movies can be good, and it’s silly to dismiss them all just because you might feel they’re particularly popular among younger and/or somewhat immature film fans. The following films will hopefully show that, since they all fit within the realms of film bro cinema (justifiably or otherwise), but are all genuinely good, regardless of how many people enjoy them for questionable – or outright wrong – reasons.
10
‘Scarface’ (1983)
Scarface is a movie about how it doesn’t pay to be a criminal, because it very obviously tells a rise-and-fall story in line with the sorts common to the earliest era of gangster movies, but at the same time, being a criminal looks like a blast. At least some of the time. Scarface goes all out with style and bombast in depicting a very heightened 1980s back when the decade was still very much ongoing, and that’s part of where the fun of it all comes from.
Tony Montana is sometimes glorified, or seen as cool, even if Scarface is funnier if you treat it like a cocaine-fuelled spin on a classical/Shakespearean tragedy, with all the melodrama dialed up not to 11, but somehow beyond it. The shootout and some of the stuff that happens before the big ending are equal parts cool and kitschy, sure, but Tony Montana himself stops feeling cool, at a certain age, a little like how The Sopranos feels like more of a comedy (and many of its main characters feel continually sillier) the older you get. Same for Walter White in Breaking Bad, truth be told. The Sopranos and Breaking Bad might be catnip for TV bros, if that’s a possible term.
9
‘The Dark Knight’ (2008)
2019’s Joker might be more of a film bro movie than The Dark Knight, but The Dark Knight is the better movie, and it’s also pretty film bro-ish, so putting it here instead of Joker feels right. Though Joker is still interesting to think and talk about, in a post-Folie à Deux world, since that sequel felt like it was made specifically to annoy people who found some kind of catharsis or coolness in Joker. And it worked, since nobody really liked it or recommended it enough for the film to be profitable.
Anyway, The Dark Knight has so many fans, and it’s a pretty easy movie to fall head over heels for, with some of those fans potentially liking the Joker here a little too much. But also, if you’ve got a villain some people feel is in the right, or had a point (even if it’s hard to know, sometimes, how sincere those people are being), then maybe there’s an argument to be made that you’ve written that villain quite well (see also Thanos, for better or worse, in Avengers: Infinity War).
8
‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ (2013)
You’re going to see Martin Scorsese pop up a few times here, even if his films do tend to be more nuanced than some other typical film bro movies. Also, you can see continual maturing as a director, on Scorsese’s part, because few people are going to mistake the likes of Silence, The Irishman, and Killers of the Flower Moon for being edgy or running the risk of glamorizing/simplifying crime.
But the film he made before those, The Wolf of Wall Street, does get misinterpreted by some. It’s a movie that wants you to see the allure of a debaucherous lifestyle before outlining the downsides of such a life, and then flipping the script once more to condemn society at large for not properly punishing white-collar criminals. Yet you get some people who focus on the chaotic/fun partying and the sense of getting away with things, and find all that pretty cool, which does feel like missing the point (not to say you can’t have fun at certain points of The Wolf of Wall Street… it’s just not supposed to be exclusively mindless fun).
7
‘American Psycho’ (2000)
It’s fascinating to look back on American Psycho and how it’s been viewed and reinterpreted over the years, with some people understanding it better than those back in 2000, and some people not getting it, seemingly, more than anyone didn’t get it back then, too. It’s a satirical look at a bored, listless, and remarkably lucky (or, sorry to use this word, privileged) young man working on Wall Street who’s also a serial killer. Seemingly. Or possibly.
Christian Bale is amazing in the lead role here, and Patrick Bateman is an undeniably fascinating character, but with people idolizing him, even ironically… well, that puts things into potential film bro territory. It’s a tricky one, though. There’s a lot that’s funny here intentionally, and a lot that has become funny largely because of memes made years after the film’s release, and it’s not always easy to discern whether the meme-makers “get” American Psycho or not. Still, it’s a great movie, and a thought-provoking one. Some people probably overthink it and some people seem to underthink it, so if you can find a happy middle ground, then you’re gold and probably even staying it, like Ponyboy Curtis.
6
‘Drive’ (2011)
Potentially the most film bro of all the film bro movies ranked here, Drive has a stoic and very masculine character at its center, it’s got style for days, it’s very violent when it wants to be, and there is an undeniable (and exceedingly loved) sense of cool here. Unlike a lot of the movies here, there isn’t a great deal to misinterpret or understand. It’s a heist movie, but it’s a bit more arthouse than it is post-2009 Fast and Furious.
The film bro status here might just be from people being particularly obsessed with Drive and some of the visuals/music choices, all of which have been heavily memed to an undeniably ironic extent in certain corners of the internet. That irony might make Drive post-film bro cinema, while the next movie (that doesn’t have a dissimilar title) is about to be described as proto-film bro cinema. Are you confused yet? Someone gets paid for writing this nonsense, it’s crazy. Maybe even undeserved, like the previously mentioned Patrick Bateman.
5
‘Taxi Driver’ (1976)
Jumping from Drive to a driver of taxis, here’s Taxi Driver, which is sort of proto-film bro cinema (try saying that maybe six, seven times, really fast). It’s got the same sort of thing that Joker does, but does it better, with the whole thing being a character study about a lonely and alienated man who lashes out against society, seeing it as rotten, but to some extent, he’s probably projecting.
Travis Bickle is a hell of a character, and there’s admittedly an elasticity that comes with deciding when he crosses a line, morally speaking.
It’s one of the better character study-heavy movies out there, because Travis Bickle is a hell of a character, and there’s admittedly an elasticity that comes with deciding when he crosses a line, morally speaking. You do sort of have to accept he goes too far at a point, though, and anyone feeling like he doesn’t (or views the ending as some kind of triumph, rather than a possible hallucination or something cynical and maybe even sort of satirical) is probably Taxi Driver-ing the wrong way. Sorry to be talkin’ to you and callin’ you out, if that’s you.
4
‘Goodfellas’ (1990)
Goodfellas is the third and final Martin Scorsese movie worth discussing, and it’s understandably the most famous not just of his gangster films, but possibly of everything he’s directed to date. It’s a little like Scarface in that much of it’s fast-paced, energetic, and stylish, which makes it all exciting, but then it’s a bit like The Wolf of Wall Street in that there’s a very deliberate comedown from it all.
Okay, that sense of there being a comedown was also felt in Scarface, albeit explosively. The Wolf of Wall Street has a comedown that’s not much of a setback. Goodfellas has an ending that’s somewhere in between, having a more direct final moral statement than The Wolf of Wall Street (which is a little more nuanced/morally complex) without being as cathartic or grand as the fall in Scarface. Still, you’ll find some people getting a little too swept up in Goodfellas, as it’s simple in some ways, but then there is a bit more nuance in other regards, plus that Sopranos-like sense of characters seeming cooler and less ridiculous when you watch the film as a teenager (or a possibly burgeoning film bro) versus watching it as an adult. There are characters/things to laugh with, and laugh at, in Goodfellas, in other words. Or, from another point of view, it’s funny how? No, really, what’s so funny about it? Scorsese’s a clown? He’s here to amuse you?
3
‘The Godfather’ (1972)
While it’s not as relentless or fast-paced as Goodfellas, The Godfather plays with fire a little more, to some extent, when it comes to running the risk of being misinterpreted. It’s got a degree of tragedy to the story, without a doubt, and things don’t really end well for many sympathetic (or initially sympathetic) characters, but the mafia lifestyle is shown as at least partially glamorous, and some of the people wrapped up in such a life have a certain level of class and even morality/honor.
That dissipates in the much more bitter The Godfather Part II, which finds a clever way to still have the more honorable Vito being honorable, by criminal standards (thanks to flashbacks), with those scenes making it further tragic how much his son, Michael, falls morally. That film is slower-paced and a little more complex thematically, feeling less film bro in the process, while The Godfather, for as great as it is, can be misread a little easier. Love or hate 2023’s Barbie, one of the best moments in that movie presents a pretty good argument for The Godfather being an essential film bro flick.
2
‘Pulp Fiction’ (1994)
You could’ve put most Quentin Tarantino movies that aren’t Jackie Brown in this ranking and they would’ve fit in quite nicely, but it’s Pulp Fiction that has the most ties to the film bro phenomenon. If you went into a college film student’s dorm room and looked around at the posters on their wall, there’d be a high chance you’d see Pulp Fiction. Honestly, that’s a good test for finding what is a film bro movie and what’s not. Goodfellas and Scarface posters, for instance, are also likely to be glimpsed.
Again, though, the movies here are all great, and sometimes, the film bros get it right, even if they’re getting parts of the movies they love wrong. Pulp Fiction is a bit like The Dark Knight in the sense that so many different people love it for so many different reasons so, mathematically speaking, there’s just going to be a good chance you’ll eventually have a fair few people liking it for questionable reasons. That doesn’t mean you can’t like it, though. That was mentioned earlier, but it’s being stressed again. Cinema and the way it’s consumed/discussed is complicated and layered.
1
‘Fight Club’ (1999)
As far as the most intensely film bro movies go, Fight Club is right up there with Drive and American Psycho. So, it scores points there, and maybe that’s a reason why it’s got the #1 spot here. Yeah, this has a bit to do with what movies are best, but it’s also got something to do with which ones are the most film bro-ish, and even has a little to do with which ones get misinterpreted the most.
So, here’s Fight Club. It’s a movie that wasn’t necessarily loved critically upon release, and then it became a cult classic, and then it grew beyond cult classic status, and now you might well find people who are exhausted when it comes to everything Fight Club, just because the fanbase that’s sprung up about Fight Club is so intense. There’s a lot that’s blunt, obvious, and intense here, and then also, somehow, a lot that’s been viewed differently and debated. It’s a bit messy but also pretty great at the same time, and it’s also the kind of movie you’re not supposed to talk about, so nothing all that coherent was said about it here. The rules have been followed.
