Super Pop!: Pop Culture Recommendations for Every Occasion

Pop Culture Inspirations for Your New Year's Resolutions

Inspiration has become a kind of dirty word. Not in the sense that you would tell someone at a stoplight to “GO INSPIRATION YOURSELF, YOU INSPIRATIONAL INSPIRATION-WAD!!!” (No, because that would be confusing for everyone.) But rather in the sense that, if you describe something as “inspirational,” you might as well be saying it’s “interesting” or “weird.” It’s a word that we use when we don’t know how else to say nothing at all. But that’s too bad, because “inspirational” is not an easy thing to be. After all, it’s hard to find inspiration in an unlikely success story if we hate the hero and don’t care about who wins a given game. We’re only really inspired by the things that stir us up—and formulaic entertainment is decidedly un-excellent at stirring human souls. So this list takes a different approach to inspiration: The items here exist as entertainment, first and foremost. They’re lovable because they’re great. And even though they weren’t made to make us better people, that doesn’t mean they can’t serve that purpose as well.

10. “MAN ON FIRE”
 (2012), PERFORMED BY EDWARD SHARPE AND THE MAGNETIC ZEROES, MUSIC VIDEO DIRECTED BY BRADY CORBET 

For those who want to keep their resolution to: Take more risks and have more fun.

The hippie movement has faded a bit since the Summer of Love, but Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes have kept the fire burning. They make music that is joyous and all-embracing; and despite the fact that the world has since moved on (to a more cynical, less optimistic way of being), there’s no denying the sheer joy that’s present in these songs. “Man on Fire” is about the instinctive urge to dance. The lead singer insists that he’s a “man on fire” in the same tones that Johnny Cash used to sing about annihilation and salvation, and the song’s rhythms are just as firm and straightforward as Johnny Cash appeared to be. BUT. In the video, those straightforward rhythms and lyrics are augmented (and disrupted) by the most thrilling assortment of dancers and dance instructors that you could ever hope to see.

The video begins at the Brownsville Rec Center (where Josh Cooper, a young tumbler, tumbles magnificently) and then, after a rapid-fire tour through cheer leagues, double-dutch competitions, and dance studios, ends with the New York City Ballet company engaging in an impromptu hoe-down in an anonymous New York City alley. You hear the music and you see the dancing and that’s the entire video. But before you know it, your body will move you. And once you start, there’s no reason to stop. This music video will make you want to dance forever no matter how bad a dancer you may be. So just do it. Just dance.

9. Z (1969), DIRECTED BY COSTA-GRAVAS

For those who want to keep their resolution to: Save the world (despite the world’s essential un-save-ability). 

The easiest way to deal with a hopeless situation is to not deal with it at all. But if we all ran away from everything then we would live in a world of blameless scapegoats—and that is just not tenable. At all! First of all, what is a scapegoat and what does it eat? Shall we feed it scape-oats? (I hope so, but fear that scape-oats may be a myth.) And second of all, a scapegoat isn’t a scapegoat if it can’t be blamed. So let’s take a moment to put politics (and the hatred of politics) aside and just appreciate the fact that some people really do work hard to get beyond the confusing issue of scapegoats, and seek to right injustices, confront hypocrisy, and make the world a better place. To the point . . .

Greece in the late 1960s was ripe for apathy. The military ran the government, the government had its fingers in every piece of every pie, and everything was a mess. If you weren’t in power, you were helpless, and most of the power was collected around a very few people. Grigoris Lambrakis was a Greek politician who advocated for pacifism and nuclear disarmament despite the fact that this was not a view shared by those in power at the time. He was assassinated in front of many witnesses, and the conspiracy behind his murder went all the way to the top. This hyper-realistic, semi-documentarian film begins with his death and ends with our disappointment (when we realize that almost all of the villains have found a way to escape any real form of punishment), but if you’re looking for a reason to believe in change, then this is a good place to start. It’s also one of the most thrilling stories you’ll ever see on film.