« The Ambassadors III:1 | Main | The Ambassadors III:2 »
April 05, 2005
Movies You Must See
Over at La Coquette, people are confessing to not having seen Annie Hall. Here is a baker's dozen of movies, all made before 1980, that you must see, pronto.
1. Casablanca
2. The Palm Beach Story
3. Vertigo
4. The Awful Truth
5. Laura
6. The Philadelphia Story
7. What's Up, Doc?
8. All About Eve
9. Top Hat
10. The Third Man
11. Some Like It Hot (What was I thinking, giving Billy Wilder's spot to Auntie Mame?)
12. Murder on the Orient Express
13. Annie Hall
If it weren't for the cutoff date, I'd add Unforgiven, but as a rule I don't do war or Westerns, or for the matter of that, pictures without girls.
Posted by pourover at April 5, 2005 09:35 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.portifex.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/285
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Movies You Must See:
» carrier mail vehicle from carrier mail vehicle
[Read More]
Tracked on December 5, 2006 05:16 AM
Comments
To your list, I would add To Catch a Thief, The Women, and The Man Who Came to Dinner. And then there are the Thin Man films... The spouse wants to know why you didn't include Cool Hand Luke? What (other than The Unforgiven) would be on your baker's dozen of 'must see' post-1980 films?
Posted by: jkm at April 6, 2005 08:59 PM
I've only seen FIVE of them. I'm so not worthy...
Posted by: Coquette at April 6, 2005 09:13 PM
JKM: I tried to limit my selections to one per film maker. I seriously considered The Women, but decided that it's too much an acquired taste, and too plainly unappealing to most men, for a list such as this. The Man Who Came to Dinner is far better as a play, and ought to be revived more often. As for Cool Hand Luke, you've got me - one that I haven't seen all the way through in one sitting. Something to add to my list! Many thanks!
Coquette, thanks for inspiring this list. I find that the must-see canon is much vaguer now than it used to be, but of course when I was young it was the only branch of "pop culture" that got intellectual respect. (Speaking of which, an entirely separate list of non-Hollywood movies is forthcoming.) In any case, you, simply by virtue of being La Coquette, are worthy in every situation. But feel free to see the eight remaining.
Posted by: R J Keefe at April 6, 2005 09:52 PM
PS to Coquette: Which five?
Posted by: R J Keefe at April 6, 2005 09:53 PM
Personally, I don't much care for Cool Hand Luke, but then the spouse also refuses to watch The Women after I persuaded him, during a 1986 trip to London, to see an extremely mediocre stage production at the Old Vic (the alternative was to see Breaking the Code with Derek Jacobi and I must agree that, in this particular case, I didn't choose wisely). Still, Cool Hand Luke does have at least one great line: 'What we have here is a failure to communicate' (spoken, if memory serves, by Strother Martin). Another film that I love (and continue to watch on my ever-disintegrating videotape) is Two For the Road; one of these days, I hope, it will be released on DVD.
Posted by: jkm at April 6, 2005 10:41 PM
I always place The Third Man on the top of my list, invariably.
What about The Apartment ? That would seem very much in place on this list.
Posted by: Max at April 11, 2005 11:01 AM
Thanks, Max, for reminding me of Billy Wilder. When I review the list, I believe that I'll have to replace Auntie Mame with Some Like It Hot. Hey, nobody's perfect.
Posted by: R J Keefe at April 11, 2005 01:14 PM
What about "North by Northwest?" And can we make a post-1980 list? To which I will add "Moonstruck," a film I could probably perform from start to finish.
Posted by: Ms. NOLA at April 21, 2005 08:22 PM