In 1911, a Broadway playwright wrote a snarky letter about a teenage actor who had recently train-tripped from New York to Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe poor kid is actually thinking of taking up moving pictures seriously,\u201d William C. deMille scribbled to his theater colleague, David Belasco. \u201cSo I suppose we\u2019ll have to say goodbye to little Mary Pickford. She\u2019ll never be heard of again.\u201d<\/p>\n
That gossip set the tone for the story of Hollywood: adventure, pathos, arrogance, comedy and a dramatic twist ending. Mary Pickford became the most famous face in the world and William and his family quickly followed her west where, in 1914, his little brother Cecil directed the town\u2019s first full-length movie, \u201cThe Squaw Man.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since then, Los Angeles has produced who knows how many films. No one seems to have counted them. The most reasonable guesses I can find estimate the tally to be around 30,000 features, a number that sounds small for the psychological real estate that Hollywood occupies in the mind of its global audience. Back-of-the-envelope math calculates you could watch all of them in a little over five years \u2014 assuming you never slept.<\/p>\n
Read more: The 101 best Los Angeles movies<\/a><\/p>\n From their ranks, we\u2019ve chosen the 101 L.A.-set movies<\/a> that best represent this city and its inhabitants: actors, scamps, cops, crooks, singers, strivers, slackers and even cyborgs.<\/p>\n In a fitting irony, \u201cThe Squaw Man\u201d itself doesn\u2019t count because Cecil imagined it took place on the plains. But the barn he used as a studio still stands on Highland Avenue \u2014 it\u2019s now the Hollywood Heritage Museum<\/a>. If you\u2019ve been here at all, you\u2019ve certainly driven past it on your way from Mulholland Drive to Sunset Boulevard and Chinatown, a tour that references three titles that stand tall on our list, even if the plots themselves don\u2019t make us look pretty.<\/p>\n Part of what defines a Los Angeles movie is our city\u2019s willingness to turn the camera on itself, to prioritize a riveting tale over our own reputation. We\u2019re eager to share our saga with the world. Our glamorous and gruesome history is all there in a close-up of “Chinatown\u2019s” Jack Nicholson: a movie star with a mutilated nose.<\/p>\n Intriguingly for a town that popularized the Hollywood happy ending, many of the movies we most identify with end on a downbeat note, roughly half of them. Sunshine aside, this isn\u2019t an easy place to live and it\u2019s getting harder. My friends and I joke that Hollywood makes movies like \u201cFalling Down\u201d and \u201cDeath Becomes Her,\u201d in which traffic jams and narcissism lead directly to death, to keep more New Yorkers from flooding the place, like a Chihuahua owner posting a sign on their door that says: Beware of dog.<\/p>\n I arrived right after college, an Oklahoma transplant whose expectations of L.A. were, naturally, shaped by the movies. The Sunset Strip hair metal bands immortalized by Penelope Spheeris in \u201cThe Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years\u201d were long since extinct and the \u201cSwingers\u201d bros who ascended afterward were themselves aging out of the scene. To put an exact time stamp on it, I signed the lease of my first apartment in Little Armenia because the bowling alley from \u201cThe Big Lebowski\u201d was only two blocks away. A month later, it closed. (Luckily, I did get to go once.)<\/p>\n Read more: Tell us: What are the best Los Angeles movies?<\/a><\/p>\n Driving west, I\u2019d steeled myself for two classic L.A. clich\u00e9s: seismic earthquakes and shallow people. Instead, I was thrilled to discover a city full of fascinating characters<\/a> and so many yet-to-be-explored corners that it will never run out of material.<\/p>\n Fifteen directors made our list at least twice, an eclectic group whose ranks include Amy Heckerling, David Lynch, Charles Burnett, Kathryn Bigelow, Michael Mann and Billy Wilder \u2014 the latter of whom has two films in the top 10. Each filmmaker revealed fresh layers in this soil and, upon it, built their own legacies. (Three other directors you may be able to guess earned even more than two spots.)<\/p>\n Storytellers \u2014 the best ones, at least \u2014 are curious by nature and in this town, no matter where they point a camera, there\u2019s something worth seeing, from the hangout vibes of \u201cFriday\u201d to the erotic humidity of \u201cSpa Night.\u201d Sean Baker\u2019s hyperactive \u201cTangerine,\u201d shot on an iPhone at a doughnut shop on Santa Monica Boulevard, not only makes that point with gusto, it encourages you to get out and roam.<\/p>\n These movies are a permanent reminder that Los Angeles is a place where fiction and reality are fused. Right now, you could go get a cold soda at Bob\u2019s Market in Angelino Heights \u2014 an ordinary joint with laundry detergent and fresh lemons on the shelves \u2014 and toast it for cameoing in three movies on our list: \u201cL.A. Confidential,\u201d \u201cNightcrawler\u201d and, most iconically, Vin Diesel\u2019s gasoline-powered 2001 crowdpleaser \u201cThe Fast and the Furious.\u201d<\/p>\n To quote a needle drop from a title on this list, I love L.A. That Randy Newman anthem blares at the end of \u201cVolcano\u201d after Tommy Lee Jones and Anne Heche successfully divert a lava flow into the Pacific Ocean and the newly formed Mt. Wilshire exhales a sigh of relief. (Mick Jackson, who directed that disasterpiece, also helmed the aptly named Steve Martin rom-com \u201cL.A. Story.\u201d)<\/p>\n Read more: This little-known L.A. museum has preserved the birthplace of the American film industry<\/a><\/p>\n One summer shortly after I planted my own stake here, a science club hosted an outdoor screening of \u201cVolcano\u201d on site at the La Brea Tar Pits, nestled among the palm trees it took such pleasure in destroying. One local geologist wore a black bed sheet with orange and red foam noodles sticking out of her head \u2014 yes, she was costumed as a volcano. As the credits rolled next to the park\u2019s mastodon sculptures, I couldn\u2019t have agreed with Randy more.<\/p>\n