Media Circus (cont.)

CLICK HERE FOR PART I OF RICHARD DEITSCH'S MEDIA CIRCUS

Anyway, here's this Generation Xers amended Top 5:

1. Old School: The Citizen Kane of the genre.

2. Animal House: Fat, drunk and stupid continues to be a major on college campuses. Which is why we pay homage to the film that started at all by ranking it over the bloated and overrated PCU.

3. Breaking Away: The best coming-of-age sports film. Ever. And a love letter to Indiana University

4. Real Genius: Kilmer in pre- Jim Morrison mode as a genius who just wants to party. Unquestionably, the best film ever made about college geniuses.

5. The Graduate: More of a post-college angst film but watching Dustin Hoffman chase down Katherine Ross made me want to attend Berkeley. Unfortunately, the school didn't agree.

Last week I had a chance to interview actor Michael Madsen. The 46-year-old actor said that he grew up in Chicago as a gearhead and dreamed of being Richard Petty. "I built a couple of cars -- I had a Road Runner and a Dodge Charger and a good friend of mine in high school had a Super Bee," he said. "We were the Dodge Boys. We would build these cars and race them. I was a big quarter mile track guy and I used to think my destiny was going to be a NASCAR driver. I once got to drive the Citgo Dirt Devil. I did four laps with it at the Phoenix International Raceway when I was making a movie called The Getaway and, oh, man, that was like a lot more exciting than filming."

Interesting, but here's my favorite answer from the devilish Madsen

SI: Any current athlete you think would make a credible tough guy actor?