20+ year old movies. Recommendations?

[mhuiraich]

I'd like some recommendations on pre-1984 flicks in all shapes and colors. Any ideas?

[Vitriola]

I never got to sit through the whole thing, but if it's half as funny as the book, 'Anatomy of a Murder' is comedy gold.

Just don't let Lysander get on some MST3K kick. And avoid anything in the 70s drama category.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Along the same lines, has anyone seen the 1944 movie "Double Indemity"? I heard it was a classic, but never seen it myself.

[chris]

I'd like some recommendations on pre-1984 flicks in all shapes and colors. Any ideas?

Let's see...some of the movies I like (by decade are):

80-84: "Raiders of the Lost Ark", "ET", or "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" (the Phoebe Cates pool scene is the greatest scene in movie history EVARRRR). Oh yeah, you GOTTA watch "The Blues Brothers".

70s: Era of disaster movies. "The Towering Inferno" and "The Poseidon Adventure" are good flicks. Any of the early Dirty Harry movies too (Dirty Harry, The Enforcer, or Magnum Force). "Dirty Harry" is the best of the lot.

60s: "Lawrence of Arabia" immediately comes to mind. Clint Eastwood's spaghetti westerns too ("The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly", "A Fistful of Dollars", or "For A Few Dollars More").

50s: Can't think of any good one off the top of my head. Maybe "The Caine Mutiny" or "Operation Petticoat".

30s-40s. Anything with Humphrey Bogart or Edward G. Robinson in them is gold. "The Maltese Falcon" and "Key Largo" are GREAT films. The two of them did a movie together called "Bullets or Ballots" that I caught late one night that I thought was really good...there's one scene in it that made me laugh my ass off, and I never thought a 30s film could make me do that. If you watch it, you'll know which scene I mean. The original "All Quiet on the Western Front" is really good as well.

[Knuckles the CLown]

Brewster's Millons and The Boys From Brazil. Richard Pryor(BrewMill) and Gregory Peck(BoyFromBraz) in their comedy primes.

[Vitriola]

The Boys From Brazil is a comedy? What, like how Platoon and Coma are comedies? In that sort of 'they're not' kind of way? Now Brazil, that's a comedy.

EDIT: Needs more Itgirl.

[gsdgsd]

A French fellow named Jean-Pierre Melville created some of the best crime films ever in the '50s-'70s -- "Le Samourai", "Bob Le Flambeur", "Le Cercle Rouge", and "Un Flic" are all great. LS possibly the most so, and natch, the hardest to find.

Two Cary Grant flicks from the '30s-'40s, "The Philadelphia Story" and "The Awful Truth", are among the funniest films ever made. As are the "Thin Man" films.

And of course, from the 1970s: "Slap Shot."

[AArdvark]

Let us not forget the 'Topper' movies.
Billie Burke at her ditziest.

Laughed my ass off. Then I put it back on cause I needed it.

THE
HEY, I USE THAT THING
AARDVARK

[pinback]

"Network".

The most prophetic, ahead-of-its-time movie ever made. Everything put forth nearly 30 years ago as satire and as a cautionary warning has already come to pass, and moreso.

Also, the greatest monologue in film history, by Ned Beatty.

And besides that, eminently quotable from start to finish, and that's not even counting "I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore."

"We got a big, fat, big-titted hit!!" - Robert Duvall

[itgirl]

EDIT: Needs more Itgirl.

Here I come to save the day.....

I never got to sit through the whole thing, but if it's half as funny as the book, 'Anatomy of a Murder' is comedy gold.

I swore you watched the entire thing at Dad's house with me once when we rented it. James Stewart....ahhh...

As V can tell you, I am the Certified Queen of film history. This was the dumbest fucking question anyone has ever asked. The majority of the oeuvre of films in any genre were made pre-1984. Perhaps a bit more focus on what movies you do like that were made after 1984. Do you like mystery, sci-fi, fantasy, what?

Jonesy, Double Indemnity is excellent. It is a classic film noir flick. I highly recommend it.

Someone else recommended The Philadelphia Story and The Awful Truth. Both also excellent and comedies. Throw His Girl Friday in there, a male/female retelling of The Front Page (a play and a 1960s movie with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau).

Hitchcock...many are great, a few are divine, some are dreadful. See Shadow of a Doubt, Rear Window, North by Northwest, To Catch a Thief. In Hitchcockian mode, see Charade (recently remade as The Trouble with Charlie) and Mirage.

Political: All the President's Men will keep you on the edge of your seat. Reds. Dr. Strangelove or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.

Sci-fi: Alien. 2001: A Space Odyssey. A Clockwork Orange. Too obvious to name. Anything in the 1950s "The Russians are coming / we are terrified of the bomb" genres (Them! and Earth vs. the Flying Saucers are excellent). Conversely, drop everything and see The Day the Earth Stood Still.

Western: The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. True Grit. The Ox-Bow Incident. High Noon.

Legal: Inherit the Wind.

Musical: Singin' in the Rain. The Wizard of Oz. An American in Paris.

Silent: The Sheik. Pandora's Box. The Canary Murder Mystery. It (my username comes from this movie). Ben-Hur (better than that 1959 claptrap).

Romance: Casablanca. It Happened One Night. Ninotchka.

Want more?

[mhuiraich]

Ok, maybe I could refine the question as I didn't expect quite so many suggestions. Any idea on these:

1. Short films -- the kind they showed as a header at the drive-in. Shorts. I'm clueless here.
2. Films known for unusual composition, color or general aesthetic (ie, Cabinet of Dr. Kalagari(sp),) etc.

[Jethro Q. Walrustitty]

Jesus, you people have no sense of movie history whatsoever. Especially when it comes to something other than Hollywood churn.

Referring here to "everyone else", not the topic-starter.

Short films: You are interested in the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable. My friend, can your heart stand the shocking facts about La Jetee, the French short which is merely a series of still photos with voiceover, and was remade by Gilliam as "Twelve Monkeys"?

If you want something in a lighter vein, the Buster Keaton silent two-reelers from the '20s (avoid anything after 1930) are astoundingly funny and extremely significant from a technical perspective, especially "The Playhouse" and "Sherlock Jr" (the latter being longer - perhaps four reels.)

Unusual aesthetic - well, that could be anything, but start off with some Werner Herzog, especially the Kinski collaborations. Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo are my personal favorites.

If you can handle it, try early John Waters, like Pink Flamingoes. I saw that with ICJ in the theater for its 25th Anniversary and I swear that's why he moved away from Rochester.

The '70s were a boom time for angry American films - Taxi Driver being one of the obvious ones. You can also throw in countless others, like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and even Paul Simon's One Trick Pony. Watch "A Decade Under the Influence" on IFC if you want to see more suggestions.

For color, the obvious answer would be Suspiria, probably the last movie ever done in three-strip Technicolor. Many other Dario Argento movies are similarly colorful but none quite as vibrant.

Unusual composition... Well, that could be anything. You mention Caligari, so I'll assume that you're already familar with Murnau's Nosferatu - and Herzog's 1979 remake is worthwhile, as well.

If you can handle B&W, make sure to see some other classics from the '50s and '60s, like The Seventh Seal, Seven Samurai, Hidden Fortress, Throne of Blood, etc. The first being a Bergman (Swedish), the latter three being Kurosawa (Japanese.)

And - duh - see Citizen Kane, for God's sake.

[bruce]

And - duh - see Citizen Kane, for God's sake.

SPOILER for CK.
































Kane dies alone.

So how does anyone *know* what his last word is?

Bruce

[Vitriola]

For color, the obvious answer would be Suspiria, probably the last movie ever done in three-strip Technicolor. Many other Dario Argento movies are similarly colorful but none quite as vibrant.

I saw Opera. Except for the very visceral bondage/murder scenes, I thought it was quite badly done. How do the others compare?

[Jethro Q. Walrustitty]

Opera was exceptionally brutal.

Argento's movies are sort of an acquired taste. He's got the gore of a Lucio Fulci movie but the artistic sensibilities of... well, he's got artistic sensibilities.

Deep Red is probably his best all-around movie, and is fairly accessible. Suspiria is very good but a little confusing. Phenomena is fun, especially since it stars Donald Pleasance and a very young Jennifer Connelly. I liked Opera, but man, it was mean. Inferno was very difficult to follow - like a fever-dream nightmare. Tenebrae is pretty good and a very tradition giallo.

If you don't know what a giallo movie is, you will probably be somewhat confused or disappointed by his (and many Italian horror director's) movies. I don't mean that in a snobbish way, but in a "you're probably not familiar with the genre conventions" kind of way. It's pretty standard for the movies to feature killers wearing black leather gloves who are unmasked (usually not literally, but sometimes) at the end.

Oh, and Argento's later work is generally regarded to be not very good. Opera is at the tail end of his best work.

I'm surprised to see that I hadn't actually posted reviews of his movies on my site. While we're talking Italian horror flicks, I'll point out that "Dellamorte Dellamore" is absolutely brilliant, even with it starring Rupert Eerrett. One of the best Italian horror flicks yet. But it's from '94, so it's a little new for this topic.

[itgirl]

Ok, maybe I could refine the question as I didn't expect quite so many suggestions. Any idea on these:

1. Short films -- the kind they showed as a header at the drive-in. Shorts. I'm clueless here.
2. Films known for unusual composition, color or general aesthetic (ie, Cabinet of Dr. Kalagari(sp),) etc.

1. See anything from Rick Prelinger. He has an archive of ephemeral films. Aside from the fact that he's a really nice guy and we got wasted on single malt one night in Atlanta in 1996, and I almost went to work for him in my other life as a moving image archivist, he is smart, witty, and to my knowledge the only person who collects these. He is the person who supplied these types pf films to the MST3K folks for their use (according to him in a Borders in Ann Arbor while we were looking at a MST3K book one night, I doubt he'd have a reason to lie). He also has CD-ROMs and other such ilk out with collections of his films on them.

2. Have you tried Eisenstein (Oktober, The Battleship Potemkin)? Russian silent films. Also Francois Truffaut's Les Quatre Cents Coups (The 400 Blows), Tirez Sur le Pianiste (Shoot the Piano Player), Jules et Jim (Jules and Jim), L'enfant Sauvage (Wild Child), Fahrenheit 451, La Nuit Americaine (Day for Night). Jean Luc Godard's A Bout de Souffle (Breathless), Vittorio de Sica's Ladri di Biciclette (The Bicycle Thief), Marcel Camus' Orfeu Negro (Black Orpheus), Jean Renoir's Grand Illusion or La Regle du Jeu (The Rules of the Game).

Bruce, I always wondered the same thing.

Edited to add: Rick Prelinger's films can be mostly see for free on the Internet Moving Image Archive.

[Jethro Q. Walrustitty]

Just thought I'd pop in and mention that on October 30th, IFC will be showing the documentary Dario Argento: An Eye For Horror, as well as the films Suspiria, Inferno, and Deep Red.

Suspiria is a masterpiece but far better on a big screen with surround sound - otherwise you lose much of the impact, as it's extremely visual.

Inferno is sort of fever-dreamish, and not one of my favorites of his.

Deep Red - fantastic, his best.

Argento has been the victim of the most brutal cuts to his films over the years, but IFC will probably be showing more or less complete versions. One obvious tip-off is if you see the scene in Suspiria where the exposed, beating heart of a victim is stabbed in closeup.

Check them out.

On the 31st itself, they'll be showing Mario Bava stuff - I'll be checking that out, as I'm well aware of him but somehow have actually seen very little of his work. Being shown will be Mario Bava: Maestro of the Macabre (documentary), Black Sunday, Bay of Blood, and Baron Blood. The only one I've seen is Bay of Blood, on DVD by its alternate title, "Twitch of the Death Nerve" (I love that title.) The DVD has horrible audio, unfortunately, but good video. Friday the 13th is practically a remake of it - many of the deaths are identical.

[nessman]

I'd like some recommendations on pre-1984 flicks in all shapes and colors. Any ideas?

Anything with Ernest Borgnine, but nothing beats a movie with both him and George Kennedy in it together.