My Essential Movies

Just bury at least one Blu-ray copy of each of these films in my casket, okay?

Duck Soup (1933)

Friday, July 1st, 2011

Remember, you’re fighting for this woman’s honour, which is probably more than she ever did.

I would offer up Duck Soup as the spiritual great-grandfather of movies like Blazing Saddles and Airplane!. Its plot seems to exist as an afterthought, unnecessary baggage that gets in the way of the movie’s true purpose: “four Jews trying to get a laugh,” as Groucho Marx would later confess.

Duck Soup

It’s possible to view Duck Soup as a brilliant political farce, lacerating the bloated self-importance of world leaders, or you can just look to it for 68 minutes of pure post-Vaudevillian anarchy. It works both ways. This may not be the Marx Brothers at their most coherent, but it’s easily them at their funniest.

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Director:  | Released:  | 68 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

The African Queen (1951)

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

I may be a born fool, but you got ten absurd ideas to my one.

John Huston’s classic film had the unusual distinction of being the last film from the American Film Institute’s 100 Years, 100 Movies list to appear on DVD in the United States, not bowing on that format until March of 2010, well into the Blu-ray/Netflix streaming era. You could find it overseas, but only if you had a “region-free” player, and those copies were made from prints that were, to be polite, pieces of mule dung. Yeah, you should have heard the less polite version of that sentence.

The African Queen

Having seen Paramount’s new release, on Blu-ray of course, I have to say it was worth waiting for the studio to sort out who had the rights to The African Queen, find a half-way decent copy, and then take the time to restore the film to something quite near its original glory.

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Director:  | Released:  | 105 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

Tuesday, June 14th, 2011

When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.

While John Ford would go on to direct several more pictures after this one, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance represents a sort of exclamation point of one of most celebrated directorial careers in American film. His previous high-water mark, The Searchers, was a film torn between the conventions of a previous era and emerging modern sensibilities. Liberty Valance is thoroughly modern by 1962 standards and virtually timeless by any other.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

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Director:  | Released:  | 123 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

Raging Bull (1980)

Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

I’m your brother and you ask me that?

Raging Bull is an unforgettable portrait of man who seemed to lack the capacity and imagination to ever be happy. It’s not a film you watch to be uplifted or reassured about the human condition. The most pleasant thought you can take away from the story of Jake La Motta (Robert DeNiro) is how fortunate you were not to be one of his friends. Or him.

Raging Bull

Stacked next to La Motta, DeNiro’s other great role for director Martin Scorcese, Travis Bickle, is a poster child for well-adjusted contentment. (more…)

Director:  | Released:  | 129 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

Dr. Strangelove (1964)

Thursday, May 5th, 2011

Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here! This is the War Room!

Stanley Kubrick’s acid-soaked absurdist farce about the end of the world has to stand alone among the genre of cold war films in the same way that 2001: A Space Odyssey stands alone among science-fiction films. (more…)

Director:  | Released:  | 95 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

Do not speak to me of rules. This is war! This is not a game of cricket!

Even before its classic final scene, the subject of madness runs under this particular bridge, as all three of the main characters have their sanity questioned at some point and the chief questioner, played by William Holden, jokingly questions his own mental state. For all its vast scale, The Bridge on the River Kwai remains an indelible and intimate portrait of fanaticism fatally clashing with fanaticism.

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Director:  | Released:  | 161 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

The Searchers (1956)

Friday, January 16th, 2009

You speak good American for a Comanch. Somebody teach ya?

John Ford’s The Searchers is a movie in desperate search for an identity. For every aspect that is excellent, two more make you want to cringe. The film seems to have feet in two eras. Its ambivalent attitude toward the stereotypical treatment of Native Americans seems slightly ahead of its time, although Hollywood would do much better later. Balancing against this are characters and storylines that would have seemed dated when Ford and John Wayne were first working together back in the thirties.

The Duke

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Director:  | Released:  | 119 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

No End in Sight (2007)

Wednesday, December 12th, 2007

Are you telling me that’s the best America can do?

I have a feeling that a lot of trouble could have been avoided if our current president had just asked his father one simple question. “Dad,” he could have asked, “exactly why did you leave a brutal dictator like Saddam Hussein in power after the 1991 Gulf War?” Bush 41 could have gone on to explain how they foresaw that power vacuum in Iraq could leave the country in a state of sectarian chaos and Iran as the sole regional power.

No End in Sight

We wouldn’t want that to happen, would we?

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Director:  | Released:  | 102 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

From Here to Eternity (1953)

Friday, November 30th, 2007

Nobody ever lies about being lonely.

In lesser hands, this movie would have been one long soap opera, but this adaptation of James Jonesrather bawdy novel manages to wring real human drama out of its characters instead. The real miracle is that the filmmakers managed to tame the rather explicit novel enough to appease the censors and still stay true to the spirit of the story. If all you remember or know about this movie is Burt Lancaster’s famous clinch on the beach with Deborah Kerr, then you owe yourself a viewing of this movie, which has a lot more to offer.

From Here to Eternity

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Director:  | Released:  | 118 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

Theatrical and director’s cut:
1980 Special Edition:

They can fly rings around the moon, but we’re years ahead of ’em on the highway.

What was it in the water in 1977 that directors of classic sci-fi movies couldn’t leave well enough alone? Long before George Lucas had turned the words “Han Shot First” into a fanboy battle cry, Steven Spielberg had already done a major facelift on his landmark UFO film. When Close Encounters was in production, Spielberg was aiming for a summer, 1978, release. Columbia Pictures, on the verge of bankruptcy, forced him to finish the movie for the fall of 1977, leaving unfilmed several of what he thought were key scenes.

I envy you.

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Director:  | Released:  | 135 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

Paths of Glory (1957)

Sunday, November 4th, 2007

There are few things more fundamentally encouraging and stimulating than seeing someone else die.

Paths of Glory

Legendary French director François Truffaut famously said that it was impossible to make a truly anti-war film, because film inherently glamorizes everything it depicts. That quote is hard to reconcile, however, with the evidence of Stanley Kubrick’s first truly great movie. (more…)

Director:  | Released:  | 88 min. | Rated:  | Genres: 

The Jazz Singer (1927)

Sunday, October 21st, 2007

You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.

Economists have a term known as creative destruction. That’s when a new innovation appears on the market and the established order of an industry has the proverbial rug pulled out from under its feet. The introduction of synchronized sound, especially dialog, had that sort of effect on the film industry.

Something

Not only were careers ended for performers who couldn’t adapt to the new demands, but silent films already in production were either shelved or reshot with sound. Within a couple of years, silent films had gone from being state of the art to yesterday’s relics. They were the 1920’s equivalent of last year’s iPod.

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Director:  | Released:  | 88 min. | Rated:  | Genres: