There are few bands who can lay claim to as many needle drops in movies as The Rolling Stones. The filmography of Martin Scorsese and his legions of imitators alone put them in the number one spot. Some filmmakers don't stop there, though, and also opt to name entire movies after Stones songs. Here are some of them.
Note: This list does not include Stones concert movie named after their music (Gimme Shelter, Shine a Light, Some Girls, Let's Spend the Night Together) for obvious reasons.
1. Jumpin' Jack Flash (1986, dir. Penny Marshall)
Penny Marshall's directorial debut is one of the first starring vehicles for comedian and actress Whoopi Goldberg, casting her as a computer programmer who is embroiled in spy hijinks. This is one of the few Stones-titled films in which the song actually plays a major role (Goldberg is contacted by a mysterious person using the handle "Jumpin' Jack Flash") and plays in the movie twice, first as the Stones' version and then as a cover by Aretha Franklin. The movie is just ok -- Marshall's TV background is apparent and Goldberg is still finding her voice as an actor -- but at least it acknowledges that the characters are Stones fans and doesn't just crib the song title for name recognition.
2. Sweet Virginia (2017, dir. James M. Dagg)
A little-seen indie thriller featuring some great actors (Jon Bernthal, Rosemarie DeWitt, Christopher Abbott, and Imogen Poots) that takes its title from a country-tinged track on Exile on Main Street. Bernthal plays a former bull rider-turned-small-town sheriff trying to stop a killer (Abbott) who has come to his town. I saw this at a festival years ago and haven't seen it since; I remember liking its One False Move energy and I'm clearly due for a revisit. As far as I can remember, the song doesn't play in the film, though it does appear in both Casino and Knives Out. Go figure.
3. Moonlight Mile (2002, dir. Brad Silberling)
Writer/director Brad Silberling's wonderful drama about a family coping with a sudden loss was originally named for a couple of Beatles' songs (first Baby's in Black and then Goodbye Hello, both lesser titles than what was settled upon) before pivoting to this Stones' ballad that closes out Sticky Fingers, their greatest album. This one actually plays in the movie, too, during a lovely slow dance scene between mourning Joe (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Bertie (Ellen Pompeo), the postal worker with whom he has struck up a friendship and possibly more. This is my favorite song on Sticky Fingers and one of my favorite movies of 2002.
4. Satisfaction (1988, dir. Joan Freeman)
Justine Bateman's lone attempt at movie stardom during her Family Ties success casts her as the lead singer of a garage band that also includes Trini Alvarado, Britta Phillips of the band Luna, Scott Coffey, and a then-unknown actor named Julia Roberts on bass. This movie is a mess and Bateman doesn't quite have the vocal chops to pull of what is asked of her, but I give her a ton of credit for doing her own singing. Oh, also I love this movie. It's ridiculous and stupid but everyone commits -- no one more than Bateman -- and I'm a sucker for a "summer that changed me" movie. The girls' band Mystery plays the Stones cover on a soundstage during the credits, either because they were going to try and make it into a music video or because they forgot to include it sooner. In both cases it feels like an afterthought. This one was such a box office dud that NBC retitled it Girls of Summer for its network broadcast airing. Why no Blu-ray, Fox?
5. Sympathy for the Devil (2023, dir. Yuval Adler)
Given just how many songs have used the Stones' "Sympathy for the Devil" on their soundtracks, it's incredible to me that it took until this 2023 indie for a movie to use it as its title. My favorite actor Nicolas Cage plays a man only referred to as The Passenger and gets into Joel Kinnaman's car to hold him at gunpoint for reasons that become clear only as the movie progresses. The movie was shot on a virtual soundstage and feels like it; the premise is thin and the screenplay repetitive. Only Cage gets away unscathed, going for broke in bravura fashion as only he can. I'm sad to say the movie is worth of the song that inspired it.
6. Monkey Man (2024, dir. Dev Patel)
I still haven't seen Dev Patel's directorial debut about a man who becomes an underground fighter to avenge his mother's death (I think), but I know that its title is derived both from the monkey mask that the character wears and from the Stones song off of Let it Bleed, which was already used so memorably during the helicopter/make the sauce/cocaine sequence of Goodfellas, because Scorsese is the king of the Stones needle drop. Do I need to see this one? It seems like the moment has come and gone.
7. Brown Sugar (2002, dir. Rick Famuyiwa)
A sweet, understated romantic comedy starring Sanaa Lathan and Taye Diggs as lifelong friends who originally connected over a shared love of hip-hop and are now trying to navigate the possibility that they could be in love with one another. I can't say for sure that the movie's name comes from Sticky Fingers' opening track, but I like the idea that co-writer and director Rick Famuyiwa (The Wood) repurposed a pretty racist song into a lovely film centered on Black characters. I miss when romances like this were the stuff of movies theaters and not relegated straight to streaming, just like I miss theatrical movies starring Taye Diggs and Sanaa Lathan. Bring all of it back.
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