My Favorite Movies
For the last week or so I’ve been binge-watching my favorite all-time movies. I doubt there’s a theme, just that these are memorable. I found when watching them that re-watching was very enjoyable, because I discovered nuances and sub-plots my younger self missed.
The Last Picture Show.
This captivated me as the best chronicle of ennui and decline in rural America.
In Harm’s Way was a tour de force for a long list of great actors including
John Wayne
Lloyd Bridges
Patricia Neal
Henry Fonda
Carroll O’Connor
Burgess Meredith
Dana Andrews
Brandon de Wilde
Slim Pickens
Larry Hagman
And countless others
https://123movies.net/watch/RGbo24dY-in-harm-s-way.html
Dances with Wolves
The quintessential depiction of the clash between the nuanced and sophisticated Native American Tribes and the gauche bigoted whites of all persuasions.
My Fair Lady
The only thing that detracted was the failure to cast Julie Andrews as the lead.
Gone With the Wind
Despite its failure to stay true to the book, it clearly caught the story of the civil war from the politically incorrect view of the South. I’ve come to have a very different view of the South since moving to Nashville. I rented a room temporarily from a gay redneck Republican whose living room was the poster picture for diversity most days. We live in a condominium where, at 73, I’ve finally graduated from the youth group. Our neighbors are all colors, our Home Owner’s Association President is gay, and nobody cares.
Animal House
Absolute mayhem, completely politically incorrect, and a laugh a minute.
Schindler’s List
This sweeping tale of charity in the middle of the Holocaust is compelling. It isn’t easy to watch, and its horror is instructive. I would not hesitate to show this to a fourteen-year-old, but much younger than that would be dicey.
South Pacific
The plot is predictable, the acting leaves a lot to be desired. The scenery is hokey. The reason for its inclusion is obvious.
Finally, Jurassic Park
The book was great. Michael Crichton may be my favorite author. Nearly every one of his books, movies and television shows has been about complex systems. They are all cautionary tales: one must approach complex systems with humility. Instead, the world must learn repeatedly that approaching complex systems with arrogance is doomed.
The movie passed by the crucial scene and was the poorer for it. In the book, the computer whiz counts the dinosaurs in the park, and always gets the same number: 60. There can’t possibly be more, because that’s all that were created, and the dinosaurs’ DNA made them all sterile. The visiting philosopher asks if the computer code contains instructions to stop counting when it reaches 60. On learning that the instructions are indeed to cease counting, he asks the computer whiz to bypass the line of code and run the count again. We watch the count reach sixty and continue going.
Good to find that you're still kicking, Doc.
I've been catching some good movies on TCM lately. First time ever, viewing these classics:
the original Nightmare Alley
Bogart and Bacall in To Have And Have Not- which is perhaps an even better film than Casablanca (more or less the same story), because Lauren Bacall so clearly hits it off with Bogart in a way that Ingrid Bergman never quite managed. That's some all-time chemistry.
Animal House is the first R rated movie that my friends and I were able to sneak into. For that reason it holds a special place in my heart. Running into an old loved movie is like coming across an old friend. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane is one of my favourite classics.