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GIANT (1956)
Directed by George Stevens, who received an Oscar for direction.
Stars: Rock Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor, James Dean, Sal Mineo, Rod Taylor
Highly recommended
GIANT is a great sprawling tale of the lives of texas cattle ranchers and their families.
Rock Hudson, in the best role I have every seen him in, lumbers about like a giant, literally head and shoulders over the rest of the cast. He plays a tough Texan with a soft heart for his family. We see how his rigid iflexibility and prejudice becomes tempered in the course of the movie, largely due to the influence of his wife, played by Elizabeth Taylor, also playing a great role. She grows from a spunky impetuous kid into a thoughtful caring wife and mother, but still tough enough to stand up to her husband. James Dean plays a brash young kid, with a typical lopsided grin and talking in his characteristic mumbling drawl. His character is doomed to despair because of unrequited love for Taylor. Everything about the movie is big: the stars, scenery, storyline, drama, laughs, fights, cattle, oil gushing... Take, for example the really big canvas that hangs in the living room. It displays a vast prairie scene filled with cattle and must be (I would guess) atleast 30ft wide and 6ft high. There are some famous scenes in the movie: Dean's drunken speech to an empty convention room; Hudson knocking the huge wine racks over so that they cascade down like falling dominos, the wild fist fight in the diner between Hudson and a counterman, probably the only other comparably sized character in the movie. And the movie makes a big point about prejudice against Mexicans and Americans of Mexican descent.
THE SAND PEBBLES (1966)
Robert Wise, director
Eight academy award nominations
Highly recommended
Stars: Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, Candice Bergen, Richard Crenna.
Set in China on the Yangte River in 1926, the USS San Pablos, called "Sand Pebbles" by the crew is a rivoting story of war, diplomacy, and the people caught up in it trying to love and stay alive. When the movie begins we see McQueen as Jake Holman, an independent minded engineer boarding the ship and finding a crew that depends largely on Chinese people to run just about everything on the ship. He learns that even the simple chore of shaving in the morning is done by a Chinese servant. "It's his rice bowl," Jake is repremanded by crew members. Attenborough plays a crew member and Jake's close friend while Candice Bergen is Jake's love interest. Both Attenborough and Bergen are terrific in their roles, although at times Attenborough's British accent disconcertingly slips through. (I think he is supposed to be from Indiana? if I remember correctly). The rampant prejudice against the Chinese by foreigners is abundantly and chillingly evident. The Chinese are contemptuously referred to as "slopeheads". However, we gradually see Jake's attidude begin to change in the course of the movie as he gets to know a Chinese helper and befriends him. I suspect that the big fight scene between Jake's Chinese friend and a big blustering loudmouthed bully of an American crewmember is meant to be somewhat blantantly symbolic of the relations between China and America at the time. Soon, we see that the political climate is changing in China as China is struggling to find itself and rid itself of foreigners.Themes of the movie are honor, duty, and self realization. The movie's beautiful score is by Jerry Goldsmith. The cinematography is wonderful.. The movie is based on the Richard McKenna novel.
MR. DEEDS GOES TO TOWN (1936)
Directed by Frank Capra, who won an Oscar for direction.
Gary Cooper, Jean Arthur, Lionel Stander
Entertaining movie
Maybe I have seen this movie too many times or have gotten too old and cynical. "Mr Deeds goes to Town" is a highly entertaining movie with wonderful characterizations. I especially like Lionel Stander's brassy voice and tough guy character, see? Gary Cooper, of course, is his perfect laconic self, yep. Jean Arthur is ok in spite of that whinny voice. The movie is typical Capra schmatlz, laid on thick with plenty of moralizing about good, honest, simple plain-talking small town folks vs the villainous hypocritical big city rich snobs. Perfect for the depression era. Cooper is Mr. Deeds, a small town good guy and tuba player who suddenly inherits 20 million dollars, which doesn't phase him at all. He is confronted by all kinds of big city rascals who want to relieve him of the money or at least take advantage of his naivety. Among these is Arthur, playing a "bottom-line" newspaper reporter out for the big story. Well, you guessed it, what happens when Arhur and Cooper get together. Mr. Deeds deals with the big city snobs the way any small town honet individual would, he punches them out. Mr. Deeds is definitely pixillated, quite pixillated, indeed!
MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962)
John Frankenheimer
Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh, Angela Landsbury
political thriller
Korean war hearo Mccarthy like husband Richard Condon story, Queen of Diamonds humor
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Terry Gillian
John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin
second feature, medieval crusade, very funny!
Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
William Dieterle
Charles Laughton, sir Cedric Hardwicke, Maureen OHara
medieval paris, a classic. Laughton is brilliant.
Indiscreet (1958)
Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman
Stanley Donen
Worth seeing just for Cary Grant's silly dance routine.
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir ((1947)
Joseph L Mankiewicz
Gene Tierney, Rex Harrison, Natialie Wood
music by Bernard Herrmann
The Inn of the Sixth Happiness (1958)
Mark Robson
Ingrid Bergman, Curt Jurgens, Robert Donat
Based on a book by Alan Brugess, "The Small Woman", about an English lady who's driving desire is to go to China as a missionary. Rejected by the missionaries in England, she nonetheless manages to raise enough funds to go to China and pursue her dream. Brilliant acting, particularly by Bergman, who plays the English lady who endures and triumphs over many ordeals.As Foot Inspector, she must confront villagers who bind traditionally bind the feet of young girls. She must deal with a prison riot, and rescue children from the invading Japanses. The movie was beautifully filmed on a mountain in Wales where a Chinese village was recreated. So the story goes, to populate the village, as many London Chinese people as possible were recruited and were told not to speak during filming because of their cockney accents. Beaautiful score by Malcolm Arnold.
papillon (1973)
Franklin J. Schaffner
Steve McQueen, Dustin Hoffman
Devil's IslandJerry Goldsmith
How the West Was Won (1962)
John Ford, Henry Hathaway, George Marshall
Henry Fonda, Gregory Peck, George Peppard, Robert Preston, Debbie Reynolds, James Stewart, John Wayne
narrated by Spencer Tracy, three generations of western pioneers, alfred Newman scoreOscar for story and screenplay and editing
Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)
Blake Edwards
Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom
fifth movie, boss goes crazy destroy world with ray gun
Star Trek Generations (1994)
David Carson
Patrick Steward, William Shatner, Malcolm McDowell, Jonathan
Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Michael Dorn, Gates McFadden, Marina sirtis, James Doohan, Walter Koenig
Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991)
Nocholas Meyer
William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, Nichelle Nichols, George Takei, Christopher Plummer, Mark Lenard, Michael Dorn
Robnson Crusoe on Mars (1964)
Byron Haskin
Paul Mantee, Vic Lundin, Adam West
beautiful music, great effects, imaginative storyline, and scenery.I think it is one of the best science fiction films made.
CAPTAIN BLOOD (1935)
Michael Curtiz, Director
Starring Errol Flynn, Olivia deHavilland, Basil Rathbone
Adventure
A great swashbuckler. Flynn plays Peter Blood, an Irish physician who becomes a pirate. Beautiful music, as usual, by Eric Korngold.
LOST HORIZON (1937)
Frank Capra, director
Starring Ronald Colman, Jane Wyatt
adventure
Colman is a world famous diplomat who is kidnapped along with some other interesting passengers to a secret Tibetan paradise, hidden away and sheltered all around by snow-covered mountains. This is Shangila, where people live long, contented and happy lives in a beautiful warm paradise filled with everything a person could desire, and peace and gentlenss reign. Eventually, Colman meets the High Lama who presides over the land with the simple rule, "Be Kind." Nonetheless, there is trouble in paradise and also romance. This is a beautifully filmed movie, with superb acting.
JURASSIC PARK (1993)
Steven Spielberg, director
Starring Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, and Richard Attenborough.
Science Fiction
Oscars for visual effects, sound and sound effects, editing. John Williams composed the beautiful score. Read the book, too.
BACK TO THE FUTURE, PART III
Robert Zemeckis, director
Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Mary Steenburgen, Lea Thompson
Science fiction fantasy
A wonderful fantasy, the third in a three part series of movies, in which Marty (Fox) must go back in time to the Old West using Doc Brown's (Lloyd) time traveling Delorian to rescue Doc Brown, who accidently ended up there in the second movie. So, Marty must convince Doc Brown (of the present) to help him rescue Doc Brown (of the future) who has gone back to the past...get it? Neat special effects and music, a clever storyline, and great acting by Lloyd, who is perfect as the wild-haired scientist. This movie is great fun.
AUNTIE MAME (1958)
Morton DaCosta, director
Rosalind Russell, Forest Tucker, Peggy Cass
comedy
A brilliant hilarious movie with wonderful performances by Russell as Auntie Mame, Tucker as B Jackson Pickett Burnside, wealthy Texas oilman, amd Cass as Mrs. Gooch, meek secretary from Speedo, and Auntie Mame's personal "spoonge". Originally a broadway play and later a musical.
SUNSET BLVD (1950)
Billy Wilder, Director
Glovia Swanson, William Holden
Drama
A strange and unique movie experience! Swanson is a faded movie star who has delusions of grandeur while Holden is a writer who also narrates the film. Surprise ending.Well worth seeing. This movie won three oscars including Best Screen Play.
LOST IN SPACE (1998)
PG-13 (fantasy violence, mild sexual
references and some coarse expressions)
Stephen Hopkins, director
William Hurt, Mimi Rogers, Gary Oldman, Matt Le Blanc, Heather Graham, Lacey Chalbert.
Tons of very impressive special effects, lots of story action.good solid characters and dialog. I liked the alien spiders. recommended for good fun clean escapism.
A CIVIL ACTION (1998)
Steven Zaillian, director
PG-13 for a couple of needless offensive words
John Travolta, Robert Duval, John Lithgow
Excellent film adaptation of the book with a great low-key and thoughtful performance by Travolta. Read the book by Jonathan Harr since the movie can not possibly cover all aspects of the complex legal machinations that are involved in bringing suit against companies for illegal dumping of toxic wastes and then tying that to leukemia incidence in children. Younger kids will be bored out of their minds by this movie since the drama comes from the dialog rather than from action sequences or special effects.
Dan's Review
TAXI DRIVER" (1976)
rated R for violence, language
Martin Scorsese, director.
"Paul Schrader's tale of a misfit Vietnam vet who works as a cabbie in NYC. A masterful study in alienation, and one of the 1970's greatest films. Also stars Cybill Shepherd as his would be love-interest, and Jodie Foster as a thirteen year old prostitute he befriends. Highly recommended."
You talking to me? Too violent and depressing for me. Definitely not my 'cup of tea'.(dshostatkovich)
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