Classic Films
Related: About this forumStaph
(6,245 posts)It's hard to pick a movie to discuss when we're spread over so many time zones and when classic movies are not so easy to find on television, in theaters or on sale. So we end up talking about what's on Turner Classic Movies. (If you'll notice in my postings on TCM's schedule, I try to include information on Oscar nominations and wins, as well as other movie trivia. Other posters include photographs and snippets of scenes and trailers. These personal additions to simple schedule postings sometimes start discussions.)
Help us out! What are your favorite classic movies? What have you seen lately? What are your favorite genres, directors, actors?
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)Most original posts draw eyeballs but few if any written responses, and that seems to be the nature of most of the groups I subscribe to.
And in fact on DU in general I've found it's an uphill battle to generate responses to a thread. A DUer (I can no longer recall who it was) observed that introducing a subject for discussion risks drawing nothing more than the chirping of crickets, but "What color is your dog?" can attract dozens of responses.
So I think this is a case of A) be the change you want to see and B) don't take it personally if responses are sparse or nonexistent.
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)...was your DU moniker inspired by a certain Glenn Ford film?
DearHeart
(692 posts)I have way too many favorites to list them all. Dear Heart is one of my favorites, Since You Went Away, the Petrified Forest (Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart), the Enchanted Cottage, Bringing Up Baby, Butterfield 8 and many, many more. I like pretty much everything. Getting into Noir a little more lately, but I still don't like the old westerns. What are some of your favorites? Any particular genre that you prefer?
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)It's been a while since I've seen Dear Heart, though frankly I can't read your DU name without the movie's theme running through my mind. But it's a good type of earworm.
I have way too many favorites to list them all. Dear Heart is one of my favorites, Since You Went Away, the Petrified Forest (Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart), the Enchanted Cottage, Bringing Up Baby, Butterfield 8 and many, many more. I like pretty much everything. Getting into Noir a little more lately, but I still don't like the old westerns. What are some of your favorites? Any particular genre that you prefer?
Hm. Maybe I should start a "Your Must See-List" thread.
Anyway, here are a few of my favorite classics, in no particular order. They're the kind of things I'll make any excuse to see when they're on TV:
Casablanca
Bringing Up Baby
The Philadelphia Story
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Ball of Fire
Christmas in Connecticut
The Shop Around the Corner
It's a Wonderful Life
Arsenic and Old Lace
Between Two Worlds
The Ox-Bow Incident
Key Largo
To Have and Have Not
The 39 Steps
The Talk of the Town
The Lady Eve
The More the Merrier
Stagecoach
To Kill a Mockingbird
Holiday
But that's just the list in glorious black and white, and frankly there are some things missing even from that.
Westerns are not my genre, frankly, but you'll notice both The Ox-Bow Incident and Stagecoach (1939) are right in there. Neither is to be missed.
The Ox-Bow Incident
DearHeart
(692 posts)I've seen everything on your list except for Stagecoach and The 39 Steps. I'm going to keep an eye out for the 39 steps-sounds really interesting; love spy thrillers too! Holiday is also one of my all-time favorites, especially the scene up in the playroom at midnight on New Years-fabulous!
I have seen the Ox-Bow Incident and did enjoy it-I tend to stay away from the older westerns, but I do like the more modern westerns such as Open Range, Tombstone, and the Unforgiven. I've just recently gotten into Humphrey Bogart movies-saw Casablanca in the theaters last month for the first time and loved it; I also like Treasure of Sierra Madre. He was also in the Petrified Forest with Bette Davis-I think that movie started his typecasting as a "thug".
I also can't believe that you listed Between Two Worlds-wonderful movie, but then again anything with John Garfield will do for me!
I also really love "Nobody Lives Forever" with Geraldine Fitzgerald.
Another small list:
Dark Victory
Rebecca
Waterloo Bridge
Mildred Pierce
So Proudly We Hail
Mortal Storm
I do prefer the classic movies, but I really just love movies in general.
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)This list is totally arbitrary, but it's all movies in color, things I'd watch again and again.
The Music Man
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Gigi
On the Town
Singin' in the Rain
Meet Me in St. Louis
Henry V (1989)
A Room with a View
Howards End
Enchanted April (1992)
Shall We Dance? (the original Japanese version, of course)
When Harry Met Sally
The Goodbye Girl
Sense and Sensibility
Amelie
Babette's Feast
Cold Comfort Farm
Persuasion
Cinema Paradiso
DearHeart
(692 posts)Murder By Death
Open Range
Shooter
Sense & Sensibility-one of my favorites!
De-Lovely
Young Frankenstein
Meet Me in St. Louis
You've Got Mail
When Harry Met Sally
Thirteen Days
Kiss Me Goodbye
Towering Inferno
(For some reason, I love disaster movies! )
Airplane!
Matilda
(6,384 posts)You really don't want to know about the fifties remake with Kenneth More. It's rubbish.
DearHeart
(692 posts)I don't know that many people who actually watch the classic movies, which is why I was hoping that more people would be discussing the movies. I completely understand the problems with time zones and the lack of availability of titles. I've never really posted before because I never saw any discussions going on. It seems like any time I post, I never get a response. If I were a paranoid personality, I'd be really freaking out about that!
I do appreciate the TCM updates-they're very helpful! Thanks!
Matilda
(6,384 posts)and I guess we don't want to bore each other by saying the same thing over and over.
But every now and then something comes along that hasn't been discussed, and sometimes that discussion can lead to talk about all sorts of other films.
aint_no_life_nowhere
(21,925 posts)I'd visit this forum more often because I love old movies. I'm not putting down what usually goes on here but I check the TCM schedule nearly every day on my own.
Here's a question: Has anyone ever seen Il Sorpasso, a 1962 French/Italian film with Vittorio Gassman, Catherine Spaak, and Jean-Louis Trintignant? Gassman, a very fine Italian actor gives the performance of his life in that movie. It's a very interesting buddy-type story between a guy who is repressed and shy (Trintignant) and a guy who actually could tone it down several notches, as he's so very outrageously outgoing (Gassman) and who imposes himself on others everywhere he goes and makes himself at home anywhere he likes. You may have seen this film with subtitles under the title The Easy Life. It's where just as the kind shy guy seems to be coming out of his shell, their Lancia gets into an accident and he goes over a cliff, whereas the loud-mouthed asshole manages to survive. I'm surprised that Hollywood never tried to adapt this and update it, as they have done with so many foreign films. I last saw this film on TV in San Francisco in 1969 and have not seen it on TV since. Fortunately, I bought my own copy.
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)That's a harrowing sequence, with a major ratcheting up of the suspense and an ending that left me drained.
aint_no_life_nowhere
(21,925 posts)Here's a typical review:
"...This is simply one of the greatest films of all time. Yes, up there with "Modern Times" and "Los Olvidados," but for entirely different reasons. It is a convincing celebration of life that I have never experienced in any other movie. Gassman will move you to tears and laughter in a beautiful performance. The plot? An attempt to introduce a nerd to the world of chromatic living and accelerated emotion. Do the consequences matter? Yes? No? You'll love it anyway. If you can't get an English version, it doesn't matter. Listen to the original Italian and marvel at the significance of the depth and the architecture that penetrates the screen. ..."
The reviews are almost universal in heaping enormous praise on this film. I think it's one of the best films of the 60s. It supposedly was the inspiration for Easy Rider. And the film is fucking hilarious, thanks to the overly flamboyant role of Gassman.
Angelshare1
(18 posts)Stop spamming the board with non TMC stuff.
Auggie
(31,067 posts)The horse Olivia de Havilland rides in 1938's "The Adventures of Robin Hood" is none other than ... (drum roll)
Roy Roger's Trigger.
My dad is 84. He repeats a lot of things.
CBHagman
(16,968 posts)...I could live with that. I wouldn't mind hearing some of my relatives' memories of the classic films, if they were here to tell me.