West Side Story

Feels like I am finally getting to movies people have actually heard of. And this one is still pretty popular. West Side Story was the first of 4 musicals to win Best Picture in the 60’s and won a total of 10 awards making it the most honored musical in Oscar history. Another interesting fact I did not know was that originally the play was going to be called East Side Story and be about a Jewish girl and a Catholic boy. Either way it still is a good movie.

The movie is a modern take on Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. It is about two gangs the Sharks and the Jets. The Sharks are a Puerto Rican gang that the Jets feel are taking over their territory. At the same time Tony (Richard Beymer) a member of The Jets falls in love with Maria (Natalie Wood) the sister The Sharks leader. Both gangs are not happy about this new found love and they do what they can to try to break it up. All around Tony and Maria people are fighting and there is mistrust and they think they can find a way to make everything better. Yet all their optimism can’t stop the tragedy that is coming.

This movie still feels fresh today. It is hard to believe that it is 50 years old. The music by Leonard Bernstein lyrics by Stephen Sondheim still hold up. The dancing does feel a little silly and corny but that might have to do with the fact that it has been often imitated and spoofed. Still it does seem odd that there will be that many spinning pirouettes in a movie about fighting gangs. The movie started with two directors, Jerome Robbins who directed and choreographed the Broadway production and Robert Wise who had directed some horror movies. These two directors seemed to come from different worlds but Robbins was hired to direct all the musical parts and Wise was to direct the dramatic elements. Robbins who wanted everything to be perfect took so long directing his parts that the film ran over budget and the actors were exhausted and injured from all the dancing. He was eventually fired and yet the two became the first team to win the best directing Oscar. The only other duo to win is the Coen Brothers for No Country for Old Men in 2007. The movie also won best supporting actor and actress for George Chakiris as the leader of the Sharks and Rita Moreno as his girlfriend Anita. They beat out favorites in two great movies Judgment at Nuremberg and The Hustler. While neither of the two lead got nominated for this film Natalie Wood was nominated for Splendor in the Grass.
It was ranked 41 on AFI’s Top 100 in 1997 and 51 in 2007.

The night after I saw the movie I was watching the Colbert Report and Stephen Sondheim who wrote the famous lyrics for the movie was on. So, I included the link if you would like to see the fun interview.
Colbert Report-Stephen Sondheim Interview

Rating System

Recently there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the rating of Blue Valentine which opens this week. The controversy is that it was originally rated NC-17 for one sex scene. On appeal it was re-rated R without having to make any changes. This is not the first time the rating of a movie has caused controversy; one of the most notorious is Midnight Cowboy which was rated X in 1969 and went on to win best picture. The questions raises are what is the point of the ratings and what does it mean to get one rating over the other?

First lets look at the history of the ratings. The ratings are issued by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). The MPAA was started in 1922 by the major motion picture studios as a way of self regulation to avoid government censorship. The first head of the MPAA was former Postmaster General Will Hays. He developed what is called the Hay’s Code which had a list of things that could not be in a movie if it was going to be released in the United States. According to the Hays code there could be no immoral behavior in the movie or the movie would not get released. Then in the late 60’s filmmakers started pushing the envelope with what they were showing. This led new head of the MPAA Jack Valenti to try and come up with a different way of reviewing movies without making the filmmaker edit the movie to be released. So with the National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) he developed the modern ratings system.

The new rating system was started on November 1, 1968. Originally the ratings for a movie were G, M, R, and X. M was changed to PG in 1972, and in the 1980’s they added PG-13 to kind of bridge the gap between PG and R. This was mostly due to parents uproar over the violence in the Indiana Jones movies and Gremlins. This led Steven Spielberg to suggest another rating would be useful. In 1990 the X rating was changed to NC-17 to get away from the notion that an X rating made it a pornographic film. Basically G is General Admittance, PG is Parental Guidance, PG-13 is Parental Guidance for those under 13. The difference between R and NC-17 is one that many people get confused. An R rating means that 17 and under need to be accompanied by and adult and a NC-17 rating means no one 17 and under can see the movie even if with a parent.

So why are filmmakers upset over the ratings? In theory it seems to make sense. Give parents a guide so they can make informed decisions about what their kids watch. I am all for that. There are certain movies should not be allowed to see and it is up to the parents to decide what is appropriate. But there are a number of problems with the system.

One of the biggest problems is the MPAA close association with NATO. National theatre chains are all members of NATO and there is an agreement between NATO and MPAA that any movie rated NC-17 will not be shown in their theatres. Therefore any movie that gets an NC-17 rating will not make any money even if it is good because no one will be able to see it. Also, it makes it harder to advertise since most TV and print media wont show advertisements for NC-17 movies. That is not as much a problem any more with the Internet and low profile movies can still generate a lot of buzz and you can see “red band” trailers online. “Red Band” trailers are trailers for rated R or NC-17 movies that were not approved by the MPAA as suitable for all ages. Also, movie retail stores like Blockbuster and Walmart will not sell or rent any movie with an NC-17 rating. Blockbuster will also not rent any movie that is not rated by the MPAA. So, while the stated purpose of the MPAA ratings is to avoid censorship and while it does not directly censor if a movies gets the dreaded NC-17 rating it sets it up to lose a lot of money. An example is what happened earlier this year with Hatchet 2. A horror movie that came out around Halloween got a NC-17 rating. Every theatre refused to release it unedited. There was one AMC theatre that said they would show it. After showing it on one screen for two days they pulled it off the screen. Their story was that it wasn’t doing well but it appeared to be due to pressure from other theatre chains for showing it.

The other problem with the system is that I feel the ratings are too vague and there is not clear distinction when a movie crosses the line from PG-13 to R to NC-17. Unlike the Hays Code there is no specific criterion for what each rating means. The biggest difference in NC-17 and R is usually sex. Very rarely does a movie get a NC-17 rating strictly for violence or language. Exceptions are as noted above Hatchet 2 for violence and Clerks originally had NC-17 for language. According to the movie This Film is Not Yet Rated the MPAA’s own website says that 4 times as many films receive NC-17 ratings for sex then for violence. So while a movie like Hostel can get an R rating even though it has graphic violence a movie like Blue Valentine gets an NC-17 for one scene of sex. And that sex scene is between a married couple in love. It is not gratuitous in anyway it is just a very raw and passionate scene. Also they do not have to tell the filmmakers why the movie is rated what it is. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. The MPAA appears to favor studio movies over independent movies. A perfect example of that was in 1999 when American Pie and But I’m a Cheerleader came out. Both movies had a masturbation and a sex scene but American Pie got an R rating and But I’m a Cheerleader got an NC-17 rating.

There is an appeals process for movies. And it usually takes a famous star, director, or major studio to get a rating overturned. In the past you were not able to cite precedent. Therefore if you feel that you were not given an appropriate rating you could not reference any other movies to show how your film compares to a scene in that movie. They now allow you to mention other movies but the appeals board can ignore it.

This Film Not Yet Rated is a great movie that really shows a lot of the hypocrisy in the ratings system as it stands today. The movie is sort a tale about censorship and a spy drama. Because the identities of the people on the board are kept private no one knows anything about the members. So to try and find out who are these people giving the ratings Kirby Dick the director of  hires a private investigator to find out who they are and hold them accountable. The board is supposed to be made of parents of kids aged 5-17 but during his investigation he found out that is not true of all of them. Also he found out that during the appeals process there is always clergy present. It is not real clear why that is. The best quote form the movie is by Darren Aronofsky. “It seems backwards that to show human sexuality in pretty much any form is getting to R territory while you can shoot as many bodies as long as there is no blood and its PG-13…It should be flipped where if there is violence without blood its fantasy and should be for adults… but if you show violence with blood it should be PG-13 because you can see the consequences.”

Not a parent I am just curious how others choose what movies to let their kids see. I think that the current ratings system is helpful to a point. I think it helps parents to see which movies might be age appropriate but I don’t think it really helps parents see what kind of content is in a movie. R ratings can be for any number of things and for some reason things that can be R in one movie will be NC-17 in another or PG-13 in a different one. I am glad they don’t try to censor the movie’s but all the financial implications from a NC-17 rating is a form of censorship. The website I find very helpful and recommend to my friends that are parents is Kids in Mind . They rate movies based on 3 different categories violence, sexuality and language. So a movie that has 1-1-6 you know has very little violence, very little sex but some cursing. That website also goes into very detailed descriptions of why each movie is rated what it is (Almost too detailed for me as it can give away some spoilers). But if I had kids I think that is the kind of rating system I would like. I would love to hear any parent’s thoughts on this topic.

The Apartment

This small movie seems a little misplaced between epics and big extravagant movies like Ben-Hur, West Side Story, and Lawrence of Arabia. At just over 2 hours it is the shortest  but its the writing and Jack Lemmon's performance that elevates the movie to greatness.The movie zips along and doesn't feel that long at all. Its one of those rare movies that can combine comedy and tragedy to capture the everyday life of an ordinary man. Jack Lemmon portrays the everyman as only he could do. With a sense of humor and a sense of sadness.

The Apartment is about this guy Bud played by Jack Lemmon who is trying to move up in the corporate world. So, he decided to lend out his apartment to the executives so they can have flings with their mistresses. He falls in love with this women Fran(Shirley Maclaine) who unbeknownst to Bud is one of the girls his boss Jeff Sheldrake(Fred MacMurray) is having an affair with. One night after Fran and Jeff have a fight in the apartment she attempts suicide and Bud comes home to find her passed out from an overdose. After getting the doctor from next door to help her Bud realized that she might not be as sweet and innocent as he thought. But he doesn't want to do anything to make the executives mad because he just got a big promotion.

All the actors are amazing. Jack Lemmon really makes this movie work. He pulls off the goofiness of the character but also the sadness when he realizes the girl of his dreams isn't what she appears to be. Shirley Maclaine starts off the movie as a perky girl who has a reputation as a good girl, but ends up just being as lost as everyone else. Billy Wilder wrote and directed another great movie. He wrote this one after Some Like it Hot which was named funniest movie of all time by AFI. Here he combines humor with some ugly situations. It is not very often you find a suicide in the middle of a comedy, but he some how makes it all work. It has the feel of everyday life both funny and tragic. The movie was kind of a sign of the times. Moving from more modest films of the 50's to the more sexual provocative movies of the 60's,  where adultery and divorce are treated as the norm and no consequence's are shown.

How this movie didn't win any Oscars for the main actors is beyond me. Billy Wilder did win Best Director, Best Writing, and as a producer got an award for Best Picture making him one of the only men to win all three awards in the same year. The one movie in my opinion that came out in 1960 that got overlooked by the academy was Psycho. It was was nominated for 4 awards including Best Director for Hitchcock, and lost all. But it was not nominated for Best Picture, or Best Actor for Anthony Perkins great performance as Norman Bates or the now famous score.  A few other things about the 1960 awards. Shirley Jones best known for playing the mother on the Partridge Family won the Best Actress award for Elmer Gantry, and The Apartment was the last all black and white movie to win best picture(Schindler's List which was mostly black and white won in 1993 had a few shots in color).

By the Numbers
Number 93 on AFI's 100 Greatest Movies in 1997 and number 80 in 2007
Number 20 on AFI's 100 Greatest Comedies and Number 62 on AFI's 100 Greatest Passions
Currently number 91 on IMDB Top 250

Off Screen Behavior

I recently read an article  Do the Politics and Behavior of Actors Affect How You See Them on Screen? and that thought came to mind again after watching Ben-Hur because growing up all I knew about Charlton Heston was his pro gun activism with the NRA. I know a few people who refuse to watch movies if certain actors are in it. For example one of my friends is very conservative and if Sean Penn or Tim Robbins are in a movie they won’t watch it (sad for them they won’t see Mystic River because it is a great movie and they both give amazing performances in them). On the other hand I understand not watching a movie that has an agenda. Movies like Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 turn me off because of its propaganda style.

While politics is one thing what if an actor does something illegal? For example should we support people who are accused of abusing women (Mel Gibson) or rape (Roman Polanski)? Mel Gibson has been in the spotlight lately due to his being cut from a cameo appearance in The Hangover 2. While the exact reasons for him being cut from the movie aren't real clear it is speculated to be because Zach Galifianakis objected to Mel on a moral grounds. It would be interesting to know if an audience would feel the same way. Would people not see the movie because Mel Gibson was in it for a few minutes? I actually think it would have been funny to see. As some have pointed out it is odd that Mel has caused a big ruckus for the cast of The Hangover 2 but no one seemed to complain about Mike Tyson in the first movie, and he was convicted of rape. That movie went on to gross a huge amount of money and I never heard anyone say they wouldn't see it because a convicted rapist was in it.

The fact that Mike Tyson was convicted brings up an interesting point. Does it make him less evil of a person since he went to jail and served his debt to society?  Are people more willing to forgive him then Mel Gibson because Mel has not been convicted of anything? I had a conversation similar to this with a co-worker of mine not about a movie star but about an athlete. We were talking about Michael Vick and how he is having a great comeback this year. She said she could not forgive him for abusing animals.  She feels that Vick did not get the amount of punishment he deserved and should not be playing football.  Personally the only person I have a moral issue watching their movies is Roman Polanski. Here is a guy charged with raping an underage girl and before he could be arrested he fled the country and is living as a free man. While it appears that Hollywood has already forgave him (they awarded him Best Director for the Pianist in 2002) I can not do it so quick. He committed a crime and has not had any punishment for it.  Should we reward him for getting away with it by watching his movies and making him richer? I don’t think so. And while his last movie The Ghost Writer got a lot of critical praise I could not bring myself to watching it. Maybe one day I will but I am torn about it.

Now everybody likes a good comeback story especially in Hollywood. The big question is when will the public forgive them and let them move on from their past. Take for instance Drew Barrymore and Robert Downey Jr. Both have overcome substance abuse and scandal to become headliners again. But to me that is different. They overcame personal demons and the only people they were hurting were themselves. Unlike Mel Gibson, Mike Tyson, Michael Vick and especially Roman Polanski who purposefully hurt others. I think that this should warrant a second look at them and maybe we should not support their careers especially if they appear unremorseful.

Another thought occurred to me while I was watching a gossip morning show while at the gym. They were talking about Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie. It got me thinking if people care so much about the politics of stars do they care about their personal beliefs? The answer to this question is obviously no. Hollywood gossip has been around as long as Hollywood. The gossip columns only make stars even bigger. But why is that? Should we not watch an Angelina Jolie movie because she is an adulteress and stole Brad Pitt away from Jennifer Aniston? It hasn't hurt any of their careers. In fact it might have helped Jennifer Aniston's because now everyone feels sorry for her. Stars can do what many people consider immoral behavior and no one seems to care and in fact they get celebrated for it. It makes me wonder if people care so much about what they say politically why they don’t care what they do in their personal life. Should we only support movie stars that live by a strict moral code? It’s an interesting question for my conservative pals who feel they can't watch a movie with a liberal in it but no problem with someone who has a shady personal life.

I agree sometimes actors off screen behavior takes away from their movies. I do have trouble watching a Tom Cruise movie since he went crazy and was jumping on Oprah's coach. I don't think it is fair to boycott movies just because their actors are outspoken on an issue or issues. I think a movie should be judged on the merit of its content not the off screen antics of its stars, as long as those antics doesn't hurt anybody. The line starts to get a little blurry when it goes from talking about issues to criminal acts.  I know this is not something I have thought a lot about in the past. I have always just judged the movie based on its creative and entertainment value. But all this talk recently has given me pause and got me thinking and maybe I will be more carful who I give my money too in the future. It will be interesting to see how people greet the return of Mel Gibson in the upcoming movie The Beaver. I am still not sure if I will be seeing the movie.
What are your thoughts? Leave a comment would love to know what others think.

Ben-Hur 1959

Wasn't sure if I was going to be able to find 4 hours to sit down and watch this movie. But then is snowed any my plans changed and I had a whole night to watch it. At almost 3 and half hours it is the 4th longest movie to win best picture. But I will never understand why a movie that is long to begin with needs to have entrance music, and exit music. It starts with a long musical introduction then goes into a musical opening sequence. I can understand having an intermission but maybe if it didn't have such long musical introduction it wouldn't need the intermission.

Ben-Hur is about a prominent Jew in Judea in the time of Christ named Judah Ben-Hur played by Charlton Heston. He is falsely accused then betrayed by his friend and sentenced to a life of slavery in the Roman navy. He vows revenge for himself and family and manages to stay alive and win the the affection of a Roman commander and finally wins his freedom. When he returns home he seeks to find out what has happened to his family and the guy that betrayed him. Along the way he crosses path with Biblical characters including Jesus.

What is amazing about this movie is how well it stands up over time. The story of betrayal and revenge is not an original story but Charlton Heston really shows many levels of pain. As a peace loving man by nature the hate that he feels after being betrayed brings lots of inner conflict and you can see this in Heston's performance. Probably one of Heston's greatest performances. For a man who to me growing up was just the head of the NRA and active in politics it is kind of cool to see he was a great actor. I also like the integration of Biblical figures into the movie. Its an interesting perspective to see how people went about their normal lives around the time of Jesus. Its something that we don't think about much.  Along with the acting and story the movie also has some cool action scenes. The chariot race scene is probably the most known and before I had seen the movie for the first time that is all I knew about it. At 11 minutes long it is one of the coolest action scenes and doesn't feel old. I always figured that it would just be one of those scenes that was cool for its time but it does hold up and really keeps the suspense during the scene. The other action scene is a big sea battle which is also pretty cool.

The movie won 11 Oscars the most of all time. It still holds the record but is now tied with two other movies Titanic and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. The only Oscar it lost was Best Screenplay which was won by Room at the Top. It also had a surprise win for  Best Supporting Actor for Hugh Griffith for his role as Sheik Ilderim one of the more colorful supporting characters. The favorites to win were one of the supporting actors from Anatomy of a Murder either George C. Scott or Arthur O'Connell.  William Wyler won his third Oscar for his record 11th Best Director Nomination(he would go on and be nominated one more time for a record total of 12 nominations). He beat one of the other great directors of the time Billy Wilder who had a total of 8 Best Director nominations and only two wins. Wilder directed another classic movie Some Like it Hot which topped  AFI's List of 100 Greatest Comedies. Another classic movie that didn't get nominated for any of the top Oscars is one of my favorite Hitchcock movies North by Northwest.

Ben-Hur by the Numbers
At 3 hours and 20 minutes it is the 4th longest movie to win.
With 11 Academy Award wins tied for the most wins.
Ranked #72 on AFI list of Greatest Movies of All Time in 1997 and #100 in 2007
Currently ranked #156 on IMDB Greatest 250 Movies.
A remake of Ben-Hur from 1925 makes it is the only remake to win Best Picture.

Gigi

This is one of those years when you wish a movie from the previous year cam out this year. Apparently 1958 was not a good year for movies. After 1957 when so many good movies were nominated that lost like "12 Angry Men" this year there were not very many great movies nominated. Besides for "Cat on the Hot Tin Roof" and "The Defiant Ones" I have not heard of the other movies nominated for Best Picture and I have not seen any of them. I would think one of them would be better then Gigi.

Gigi is a musical about a girl growing up in Paris in the early 1900's.  Her Grandmother and Aunt are raising her to be a mistress to a wealthy man figuring that's all she could hope for coming from a poor background. Meanwhile this rich man Gaston who hangs out at the poor family's home to be with some regular folk and get away from the banal lifestyle of his upper class existence takes a liking to little Gigi. Gigi's grandmother and aunt try to work out a deal where Gigi would become Gaston's lover and she will have a lovely existence but that is not what Gigi wants. She realizes that she is in love with Gaston and wants to be his wife not just his mistress.

One of the problems I have with the movie is not just the bad acting, the bad songs, the silly dancing it is the disturbing nature of the plot. From the first songs "Thank Heaven for Little Girls" the movie seem like a pedophiles dream. Here is this girl that they are grooming to be someones sex partner. They never say how old Gigi is but she is still in school and not yet old enough for boys. I guess my biggest issue is who they make it seem like everything is ok like it's fine for old men like Gaston's uncle to go around lusting after young girls and singing songs about it. Just a little disturbing to me. I am not sure how this movie won so many awards. I won all 9 of the awards it was nominated for. Making it at the time the most any movie had won(it would lose that record the following year when Ben-Hur would win 11) and also only the third movie at the time to win every award it was nominated for(Grand Hotel and It Happened One Night were the two previous films to get a clean sweep The Last Emperor and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King are the only two that has done it since Gigi). Also Gigi has the honor of the shortest title to ever win best picture.

The Bridge on the River Kwai

I watched this right after I watched Around the World in 80 Days. TCM was nice of enough to show them both on TV and I got to DVR them both. It made for a long day since Around the World in 80 Days is 3 hours and The Bridge on the River Kwai is 2 hours and 45 minutes. It also showed the contrast between a great movie and an ok movie. While Around the World in 80 Days is considered one of the least deserving movies to win The Bridge on the River Kwai is one of the best.

The movie is about British soldiers in a Japanese POW camp on a jungle island during WWII.  It starts out as a battle of wills between the British and Japanese Colonels. The British Colonel Nicholson played by Alec Guinness is brought to the camp with his men and instantly clashes with Colonel Saito the commander of the POW camp. Nicholson is very strong minded and by the book. He clashes with Saito over the Saito's plan to have his entire troops build a bridge. Nicholson refuses to have himself and his officers help in the manual labor saying it is against the Geneva Convention(he actually hands Saito his copy of the convention rules.) This leads Nicholson to be put in isolation for a while. When Saito realizes he can not finish the bridge on schedule he gives in to Nicholson and lets Nicholson take control over the bridge construction.  Nicholson sets out to prove how superior English workmanship is and plans to build the best bridge they can.  This becomes an obsession for Nicholson and he makes sure every little detail is perfect in his words "
One day the war will be over. And I hope that the people that use this bridge in years to come will remember how it was built and who built it. Not a gang of slaves, but soldiers, British soldiers" But unbeknownst to him the allied have a plot to blow up the bridge with the help of an American who escaped the camp.

All the acting in this movie is great. The battle of wills in the beginning of the movie is some of my favorite parts. I love to see two great actors just play off each other like that. Its great watching each men slowly go mad, especially Alec Guinness' Nicholson. Slowly watching him become more and more obsessed with this bridge and how it will be a lasting testament to the British men and himself.  William Holden as the American who escapes is also great in the movie and brings some of the comic relief to the movie. Overall it is a great movie. David Lean directed his first of many great epic movies.

The movie won 7 Academy Awards, besides best picture it won Best Actor for Alec Guinness, Best Director for David Lean, Best Music, and Best Editing. The Best Screenplay Oscar had gone through some changes over time. For a while there were three categories Best Original Story, Best Screenplay Adapted, and Best Original Screenplay. In 1957 it merged into the modern day categories of just Best Original Screenplay and Best Adapted Screenplay. The Bridge on the River Kwai won Best Adapted Screenplay that year but not without some controversy. While Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson helped Pierre Boulle write the screenplay only Pierre Boulle was given on screen credit and therefore the only one that got the award. This was due to Carl Foreman and Michael Wislon being black-listed for appearing in front of the House of Un-American Committee. Foreman and Wilson were both posthumously given the award in 1984. 

Losing to the The Bridge on the River Kwai was another great movie 12 Angry Men. Which if it had been nominated any other year hopefully would have won. Also not nominated but one of the only Stanley Kubrick movie I like was Paths of Glory.  Another good movie that was nominated for Best Picture was Witness for the Prosecution a twisty murder mystery.

Around the World in 80 Days 1956

Around the World in 80 Days is one of the movies that is considered one of the least deserving movies to win best picture. It is not a bad movie and not really the worst movie to to ever win best picture but definitely not a great movie. Arguments could be made for other movies that year that should have won.

The movie is an adaption of the great Jules Verne novel. I read the novel when I was in 5th grade and loved it. Needless to say I don't remember much from the book now but remember it was a fun action story.  It is about Phileas Fogg played by David Niven who makes a wager that he can go around the world in 80 days. Along with his man servant Passepartout they take off and travel by balloon, train, ship, elephant and whatever else they find to make the deadline. Along the way the encounter numerous obstacles including a detective that thinks Fogg is a bank thief and a rescue of a princess in India.
The movie sounds like great fun and the book was, but the problem the movie has is it's 3 hour run time. There are sequences in the movie that just seem to drag on. One sequence in particular is the bull fighting sequence. In which Passepartout has to fight a bull in order for them to use a yacht. The sequence goes on and on and gets really boring after a while. Also kind of annoying was the first 10 minutes of the movie which is some guy explaining the importance of the Jules Verne novel and giving a short history lesson on Verne. Entirely unnecessary. When you have a 3 hour movie it is best not to add extra stuff that is not needed. Not sure why they felt the need to explain that at the time Verne wrote the novel that it was unimaginable to go around the world that fast. Another part that just felt ridiculous was the Indian attack when they were traveling on the transcontinental railroad in the United States. People are getting hit with arrows but when Passepartout goes out on the train all the arrows just bounce right off of him. The scene is laughable and takes away from whatever cool action scene it could have been.

The movie wasn't all bad. A few things it had going for it was it use of scenery from exotic locations. When they are traveling you see long scenes of the location(possible lingering too long at some spots). While most of the movie was shot in sound stages it was nice to see some footage of the actual locations. Also, it had at least a dozen cameos from famous actors. Including Buster Keaton, Frank Sinatra, Cesar Romero and Peter Lorre. In fact it was this movie that made popular the term cameo. Other interesting facts about the movie is it had one of the largest number of extras of any movie and also the largest number of animals of any movie at that time. It also had the largest number of costumes used of any movie. That all made the movie one of the biggest movie productions of all time.

Having one of the largest productions off all time is probably why the movie won best picture.  It highlights one of the Academy's biggest issues do you reward movies that are ambitious and big or movies that may be smaller but better quality. This if a problem that they still have today, do you give it to movies like Titanic or Avatar(which surprisingly lost) which are large and make alot of money or smaller budget movies that are better and tell a great story. In my opinion this also the same reason that The Greatest Show on Earth won. When you look at the 50's and the advent of television the film industry thought they were going to lose alot of money. So to compete with television they highlighted these huge dramatic big budget movies. With the exception of Marty which was based on a television show alot of the movies in the 50's was trying to showcase bigger and better. So, a movie shot in widescreen in color  with exotic locations had what people couldn't see on television. 1956 was the first year that all the Best Picture nominees were in color. The 50's were a very interesting time for movies.

Other movies that were nominated for best picture that year were The Ten Commandments, The King and I, and Giant. Also released that year was the John Ford's  The Searchers considered one of the best Westerns but did not get any nominations. 1956 was also the year that the first competitive Foreign Language category. Up till then they had just been a special award given to the Best Foreign Language movie but this year there were 5 nominees and  La Strada became the first winner. Also that year James Dean got nominated for his second posthumous nominations for Giant(he was nominated the previous year for East of Eden). 

Marty 1955

Marty is a short sweet movie. It is one of those movies you dont hear about much anymore but still holds up over time. I bought the DVD at an outlet store for $5 about a year ago. I wasn't sure what to expect. I thought I had seen it before but couldn't remember what it was about.  The movie wasn't too bad. I very down to earth love story about two misfits who find each other.

The movie is about Marty played by Ernest Borgnine. Marty is a 34 year old single guy who still lives with his Italian mother. Everyone keeps asking him when he will get married like all of his siblings. When he finally meets a girl he likes everyone around him see her as a threat to what they have been use too. Marty's best friend feels like he is losing a friend, and after years of badgering him to find a girl when he finally does his mother fears what will happen to her when her last child leaves the house and she will be alone.

What I like about this movie is it takes place over one weekend and shows how a chance encounter can change someones life. The relationship between Marty and Clara feels real and not overly melodramatic. The supporting characters also feel very real and not one dimentional. Esther Minciotti as Marty's mom gives a good performance. In the begining we see her as she wants her son to find a wife but when she talks to her sister and begins to think about what life would be like alone she realizes she doesn't want Marty to get married.  The whole movie is very real and you can feel the pain, disapointment, joy, and despiration of all the characters.

Interesting fact about this movie is that it is the only movie to win best picute that was based on a TV program.
Also at 90 minutes it is the shortest movie ever to win Best Picture.

On the Waterfront 1954

Interesting that this is the movie for this week. The Elia Kazan Collection an 18 disc box set with 15 movies was just released. Included in the collection is On the Waterfront and The 1947 Best Picture winner A Gentleman's Agreement. Also included are other Elia Kazan classics like A Streetcar Named Desire, Splendor in the Grass, and East of Eden.

On the Waterfront is about a corrupt union of longshoresmen and a guy who is caught between his conscience and loyalty to the union. Marlon Brando ins an ex-boxer Terry who is now  a longshoresman and his brother is one of the union bosses.  His brother and the union boss use him as a mindless thug. He is a guy who just does as he is told, doesn't think to hard, and doesn't really care about anyone besides himself. But over time he learns that people are taking advantage of him and he slowly becomes aware of the needs of those around him. A big part of his change comes from Edie(Eva Marie Saint), who is looking for the murderer of her brother. This puts a big strain on Terry because he was used to help lure her brother to his death. For along time he plays the part of just a deaf and dumb (D and D) member. Going along with what his brother and the union bosses tell him to do. But he begins to see that neither one of them have been looking out for his best interests. This leads to one of the most famous scenes and lines  in the movie where he confronts his brother and tells him " I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am, let's face it." He then goes in front of a jury and tells all of what he knows about the corruption and brings the people responsible for the murder to justice.

This is a great movie. Besides best picture the movie won 7 other awards. Both Marlon Brando and Eva Marie Saint won acting awards. They both gave amazing performances. It was pretty cool seeing a Marlon Brando in his prime. It is hard to believe he is the same guy in the Godfather 20 years later. The movie also won best writing for Budd Schulberg and best directing for Elia Kazan. Although it didn't win best music score I thought the music was great. It is the only non musical score written by Leonard Bernstein.

The interesting thing I found out about this movie is some of the meaning behind the movie.  Both Budd Schulberg and Elia Kazan were called to testify in front of the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) in 1952.  There they both named people who they were associated with during their time in the communist party. They both were able to keep their jobs in the movie industry because they cooperated but lost a lot of friends who felt they had done the wrong thing by ratting out their friends. One of the people that felt they were wrong was Arthur Miller who was once friends with Kazan. When Miller wrote the play "The Crucible" which compared the HUAC hearings to the the witch hunt in Salem, Ma. Kazan took it as an attack on him for speaking out. His response to "The Crucible" was On the Waterfront where the hero is the person that speaks out against injustice. The testimony that Kazan gave to HUAC caused him great pain. He did not want to lose his film career nor did he want to testify. He is quoted as saying "I hate the Communists and have for many years, and don’t feel right about giving up my career to defend them. I will give up my film career if it is in the interests of defending something I believe in, but not this".  All of the people Kazan had named were already known and he did not out anyone.  But he was still considered a rat and even when he won a lifetime achievement Oscar in 1999 there were still some who would not applaud him. 

The movie is considered one of the best movies. It was voted number 9 by AFI in 1997 and 19 in 2007. The quote "I coulda been a contender" was on AFI's list of best quotes at number 3. It is on the IMDB TOP 250 movies, and it still stands up over time. No matter what the reasons for the making of the movie was the transformation of the character from bum to leader is classic and timeless.

From Here To Eternity 1953

The first time I saw From Here to Eternity I remember thinking it was a good movie. This time when I watched it I was a little underwhelmed. It is not a bad movie just didn’t do much for me this time. Could be just the frame of mind I was in when I watched it. I hadn’t been sleeping well and just wasn’t feeling all that good. Anyway, it is considered a great movie. It did make the American Film Institutes Greatest Movies of All Time at number 57 and AFI’s Greatest Love Stories of All Time at number 20.

From Here to Eternity is about an Army base during pre-WWII Hawaii . It stars Burt Lancaster as Sergeant Warden and Montgomery Clift as Private Prewitt. Prewitt is an ex boxer who is transferred into the company by the captain for his boxing skills. The captain wants him to box so he can have a winning team. Prewitt gave up boxing after an incident and refuses to join the team. The captain then allows for him to be hazed by the other members of the boxing team. Warden is a strict but fair Sergeant who keeps the company running while the Captain is off womanizing and tries to protect Prewitt as much as possible from the hazing. They both struggle with being in the Army and following all the proper procedures and protocols and living their own private lives. They both fall in love and begin ill fated relationships. Warden begins to have an affair with the Captains wife played by Deborah Kerr while Prewitt starts a relationship with a prostitute played by Donna Reed. Also in the movie is Frank Sinatra as a fun loving and heavy drinking soldier. He is Prewitt’s only friend on the base and brings a lot of the humor to the movie. While the movie is not completely a war movie it does end with the attack on Pearl Harbor .

The movie is based on a controversial book by James Jones of the same name. The movie pretty much sanitizes whatever controversy was in the book. Out of fear that the movie would make the US Army look bad they took a lot out they thought would be embarrassing, including changing the brothel and prostitutes from the book into a “private club” with “hostesses”. There is one scene that is considered provocative for its time and is probably the most memorable scene from the movie. The scene is where Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr kiss in the sand with the waves crashing over them. They made Deborah Kerr wear a skirt with her bathing suit because otherwise it would have seemed too risqué. The beach where they filmed that scene in Hawaii is still a tourist attraction and most tours around Oahu stop at what they call the “From Here to Eternity” beach, and when you go there it is amazing how small that beach really is. I think the movie would have been much better if they didn’t take out some of the controversial stuff from the book. And, while the acting is good (nominated for 6 acting awards and won 2) I think it is the whole love story that I had trouble with. This seems to be a recurring issue with me and movies from the 50’s. I don’t know if I am too jaded or the movies were written too blandly to not offend anyone but I find it hard to believe the love story and I had the same problem with An American in Paris and The Greatest Show on Earth.

There is an Interesting story in the casting of Frank Sinatra in the movie. He was considered a has-been by 1953 and his acting career was not going very well. The producers did not think he would be a good fit for the movie and did not want to cast him in it. Rumor has it that Sinatra’s connections to the mafia got him the role, and the mafia made the producers an “offer they couldn’t refuse”. That theory was later used in the famous scene from The Godfather. Sinatra not only ended up getting the role but winning the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. In other casting news, Joan Crawford was originally going to be cast in the Deborah Kerr role but when she found out she wouldn’t be wearing and designer dresses she turned down the role. Also in a small role is George Reeve’s from the TV show Superman who role was supposedly trimmed because people laughed when they saw him in a serious role.

Another interesting fact from the 1953 Academy Awards is that Walt Disney won 4 awards. The most for a single person at any Oscar ceremony. He won for Best Animated Short, Best Documentary Short, Best Short Film, Best Documentary Feature film.

The "From Here to Eternity Beach" on Oahu

The Greatest Show on Earth

Well I just wrote my whole blog and when I hit post it deleted it all. So now i have to start again and think I am just going to make it a short one since I don't feel like retyping all that I had before. And since I don't think anyone actually reads this it doesn't make a difference.
The Greatest Show on Earth is considered to be one of the biggest upsets in Oscar History. It beat what was the clear favorite High Noon. This is rumored to be because High Noon was written by Carl Foreman who had just been black listed by Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee. High Noon was considered to be a statement against blacklisting and some including John Wayne considered it an un-American movie. So the movie about a circus won.
Cecil B. Demille is considered to be the first feature length Hollywood director. He directed 1914's 72 minute movie The Squaw Man and went on to become a great director of several big epic movies including both the 1923 and 1956 versions of The Ten Commandments. The Greatest Show on Earth is by not his best movie. It is inconsistent and has a really bad love story. The train wreck scene which amazed audience's at the time by today's standards is pretty lame. Charlton Heston was one of the best parts about the movie in one of his first movies. Also, Jimmy Stewart in a bizarre role as Buttons the clown with a dark secret did a great job too. The other actors were kind of boring and some were just annoying.
Besides The Greatest Show on Earth and High Noon the other movie from 1952 that many people consider should have won but wasn't even nominated was Singin' in the Rain.
Other Notes
First televised Oscar ceremony
The theme song for High Noon won Best Original Song and was the first song from a non-musical movie to win.

An American in Paris

Not sure how this won best picture. Definitely one of the biggest upsets for best picture. No one expected it to win.  My biggest problem with the movie is that the last 20 minutes of the film have no dialogue and is mostly dancing. I don't have anything against musicals but I like it when the music moves the movie along. There are a bunch of parts where there are musical interludes that have nothing to do with the movie. If you cut out the miscellaneous musical parts the actual story part of the movie will probably be less then one hour. And if it wasn't for my cat and dog fighting I probably would have fell asleep during the last 20 minutes like the first time I watched the movie.

The movie is about An American (Gene Kelly) an artist living in Paris. He is a poor artist living in a small studio when he meets a wealthy lady who becomes his benefactor but then he falls in love with a younger girl who he doesn't know is engaged to someone else. Gene Kelly's dancing is amazing and is one of the best parts about the movie, but his acting is not that great and the story itself just isn't enough to keep it interesting. The technical aspects of the movie is pretty good for the time. Really made great use of color and music. It probably was one of the best technical movies of the year and maybe that's how it won.

Other movies from 1951 that in my opinion are better then An American in Paris.
Strangers on the Train
The African Queen
A Streetcar Named Desire
A Place in the Sun also won six awards but not best picture the second most wins for a movie that didn't win best picture(Tied with Star Wars which also got six). Cabaret holds the record with 8 wins but lost Best Picture to The Godfather,

Other Facts
Second color movie to win best picture Gone With the Wind was the first in 1939. That's 12 years between them.
Humphrey Bogart won his first and only Academy Award for the African Queen
Rashamon won the special award for Best Foreign Language Film (and was better then An American in Paris).
A Streetcar Named Desire was the first movie to win three awards for acting(even with Marlon Brando's loss to Humphrey Bogart)

By The Numbers
Ranked number 68 on AFI Best Movies of all time in 1998 and didn't make the list in 2008
A Streetcar Named Desire ranked number 45 in 1998 and 47 in  2008
A Place in the Sun ranked number 92 in 1998 and didn't make the list in 2008
The African Queen ranked 17 in 1998 and 65 in 2008



And if you want to see some good movies from 1951
These would have been my picks for the 5 Best Picture nominations.
.

All About Eve

This is one of those movies that took me by surprise. When I saw it for the first time a few years ago it just blew me away. I figured it would be another one of those old boring movies. It kind of starts out that way but changes quickly. It has some of the snappiest dialogue and Bette Davis is amazing in it. 1950 was a year of great movies with All About Eve, Sunset Blvd., and Harvey but I definitely think this deserved best picture.

All About Eve is pretty much what it says it is, a movie about Eve. Its about her rise from lowly poor girl to award winning theatre actress. The path she takes to get there is one of manipulation, black mail, and back stabbing. She uses everyone she meets to her own advantage and seeks out anyone that can help her make it to the top. The person who can get her to the top fastest is the aging actress Margo Channing played by Bette Davis. Eve (played by Ann Baxter) connives her way into Margo's life and while pretending to be a modest assistant does everything possible to become a star herself. One of the movies many themes is the place for aging actresses in theatre. This is interesting because this is still a topic discusses in Hollywood. Seems like at least a couple of times a year there is at least one magazine that has an article about roles for older actresses. Entertainment Weekly constantly talks about this. Another timeless theme in the movie is the lure of fame and success. Eve is a person willing to do anything for fame. And the movie ends with her heading to Hollywood to pursue a film career. If this movie was made today there would have been a sequel already about her exploits in film. Actually I am surprised that they never did make a sequel.

The movie had 14 Oscar nominations and won 6. The only other film to have 14 nominations was Titanic in 1997. It had 4 nominations for its actresses the most of any movie. Two for Best Actress(Ann Baxter and Bette Davis) and two for Best Supporting Actress(Celeste Holm and Thelma Ritter) and didn't win any. How Bette Davis didn't win Best Actress is beyond me she gave an amazing performance, and I think Thelma Ritter had some of the best lines and should have won supporting actress. It did win best screenplay and best director for Joseph L. Mankiewicz his second year in a row winning both categories and becoming the only person ever to win back to back directing and writing awards(he won both awards the previous year for A Letter to Three Wives).
Ranks up there as one of my favorite movies to win best picture.

Other facts
Voted number 16 Best Movie of All Time by AFI in 1998 and dropped to number 28 in 2008
Voted number 21 Best Movie of All Time by Entertainment Weekly
"Fasten your seat belts it's going to be a bumpy night" (one of my favorite quotes from the movie) voted number 9 best quotes of all time by AFI
Bette Davis performance was voted number 5 of all time by premiere magazine.
Marilyn Monroe has a small part in one of her first roles on screen.
 

All The King's Men 1949

Again a little late as I usually try to post on Thursday's but had a Wedding to go to out of town and didn't get this written on time. But I did get to watch it before I left.
All the King's Men is a political drama about power and corruption. It fits with the late 40's theme of socially conscience Best Picture winners. It follows the political career of Willie Stark from small town backwoods man to Governor of the state. It is based on the book by Robert Penn Warren which is loosely based on the life of Louisiana politician Senator Huey Long. Willie starts out as a man who is fighting the injustice he sees in his home town. Unable to do anything about it he attends law school and becomes a powerful lawyer prosecuting large companies for taking advantage of the people. He eventually catches the eye of some big politicians who think they can use him for their own advantage. During the process Willie learns the tricks of getting elected and getting things done. He becomes very corrupt very fast. He gets a lot done for the state but all of it is done using black mail and payoffs. But because of all he does he becomes very popular with the common people.  Eventually he corruption starts to unravel and he begins to feel the pressure of all he has done and leads to his downfall.

The rise and fall of Willie Stark is a great story. It is amazing to see how people can change and how power goes to some people head even when they start out with the best of intentions. We see the humble beginnings of Willie dedicated husband, good father, looking out for the little people. Then he turns into a political machine only thinking about himself, cheating with multiple women, and making sure anything his son does makes him look good. While the story is good and interesting the movie it's self is kind of clunky. I don't know what it is about how the movie was edited or what but I feel it kind of leaves a lot off. They skip from one phase in Willies life to the next without giving much detail about what happens in between. He loses one election then the movie jumps to 4 years later and all of sudden he is the most corrupt politician. If it wasn't for the great story and the great acting the movie would just fall apart. The movie earned two deserving acting awards one for Broderick Crawford as Willie Stark and one for Mercedes McCambridge(who later in life became the voice of  possessed Linda Blair in the Exorcist) for Best Supporting Actress as Wilie's political aide, secretary, and mistress.  The movie lost best Director and Best Screenplay to Joseph Mankiewicz for A Letter to Three Wives. Mankiewicz would win the same to awards the following year for All About Eve. Making him the second director to repeat winning.  There was a remake of the movie in 2006 starring Sean Penn as Willie Start. I never saw that version but am going to check it out to see how it compares to the original because if done right it could be even better. But seeing as it didn't get that many good reviews I am guessing it wasn't done right.

What I most got out of the movie is that nothing really changes. This movie is from 1949 and talking about political corruption. How has things changed? Power still corrupts, politicians still look for the easy way to get elected, and they will always tell the people what they want to hear. Makes me wonder when the good old days were that all these people talk about today. It seems to me that things have always been this way and there really is no way to change it. It reminds me of the Billy Joel song lyric "The good old days weren't always good and tomorrow ain't as bad as it seems".

Hamlet 1948

What can you say about Hamlet. It is just a film version of the Shakespeare play with very few changes. Although it is the only film version that eliminated Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Laurence Olivier's version from 1948 is considered one of the best versions of Hamlet on film which is saying a lot because there have been many versions. But as far as I am concerned it is one big snooze fest. If you have insomnia and need something to watch to fall asleep this would be my suggestion. Maybe I am just not into Shakespeare but I find it very boring. It doesn't bring anything new to the story, I feel like once you have seen one version there is no need to see another. Took me like five restarts to finally finish the movie because it kept putting me to sleep. I don't know how this movie beat The Treasure of the Sierra Madre for best picture. That was a great movie.

Other Facts
Laurence Olivier was the first person to Direct themselves to a Best Acting Academy Award. Roberto Benigni is the only other person to do that for Life is Beautiful in 1997. They both lost the best directing Oscar.

Eileen Herlie was 28 when she played Hamlets mother Laurence Olivier was 41.

Dentist Movies

Well I found this blog about the 5 movies not to watch before going to the dentist. And while I agree with most of it I really think that the scene from Castaway where he removes his tooth with an ice skate should be on that list. Five Flicks to Avoid Before Dental Work

Since they already had the scary movies I tried to come up with the 5 funniest movies with dentists.
Here is what I came up with.

Little Shop of Horrors-While it is on the list of movies not to watch the Dentist song is hilarious.


Bill Cosby Himself. -Some of the funniest stand up about Dentists.


The Whole Nine Yards-Fun to watch the dentists go crazy.


The Hangover- He is such a good dentist he can pull his own tooth out.

Gentleman's Agreement

I have been trying to get these out every Thursday but this one didn’t quite make it. The 20th movie to win Best Picture and the third in a series of socially aware movies Gentleman's Agreement is about a writer’s investigation into anti-Semitism in post WWII America. It took me a few tries to watch the whole movie because it's a little boring and I kept falling asleep. Gregory Peck plays a magazine writer who moves to New York from a rural town. His first assignment at the magazine is to write a piece on anti-Semitism. He tries to come up with a new angle and decides the only way he can write something different is to experience it himself and he pretends to be Jewish for six months. During the six months he experiences different types of prejudice even some from other Jews, and the whole experiment puts a strain on his relationship he just started with a young woman and also his family and friends.

The movie seems kind of dated as anti-Semitism is not a prevalent nowadays or at least not as obvious. Or maybe I am just being naïve in thinking that. Either way the movie just doesn’t resonate with me and just felt preachy. Gregory Peck gives another amazing performance as he usually does. Elia Kazan was considered one of the Best Directors of the time he had 5 nominations and 2 wins for best director. He did win best director for this movie, but I read that he did not like the movie. He felt that if lacked passion and that the romance was too forced. I agree with that. The romance in the movie was kind of forced. He meets this girl and the next day they are engaged. It appears that another girl likes him but nothing happens and it just seems like it was an after thought. The studio execs at the time did not want this movie made. Most of them were Jewish and they thought that making this movie would just stir up a hornet’s nest, but producer Darryl F. Zanuck thought it was a good topic to talk about after the revelations of what happened in German Concentration Camps. While the movie did cause some problems wjen it was released for the most part it was widely accepted and was one of the highest grossing movies of the year. It appears to me that it was a bad year for film and there were not many good movies released that year and this might have been the best movie of the year. The only other movie I saw that was released in 1947 was Song of the South and while that is notable for other reasons I would not consider it a great movie. I never did see Miracle on 34th Street even though it is played every year at Christmas time I am not much into Christmas movies.

Other Facts
Beat Miracle on 34th Street for best picture.
The first special award for foreign film was given to Shoeshine, although it was not made an official competitive category till 1956.
James Baskett received an Honorary Award for playing Uncle Remus in Song of the South making him the first African American male win an academy award, (the first African American Male to win a competitive award would be Sidney Poitier for The Defiant Ones in 1958). Song of the South also won best song for “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” and oddly enough Song of the South was never released on DVD in the United States because of what is seen as racial stereotyping of African Americans.

The Best Years of our Lives

This was an amazing movie about returning veterans from WWII. When I first got it in the mail from Netflix, I saw that it was 2 hours and 45 minutes, I was thinking another long movie. But once you start watching it sucks you in. Its about 3 WWII veterans who return home, each to a different family situation. One is married for 20years with two kids, one just got married right before he left for the war, and one had his hand badly burned that they had to be amputated and replaced with hooks. He is returning home to his girlfriend. Each men have different issues to deal with and need to readjust to home life. What is amazing about this film is how well it holds up over time. Maybe its because no matter what war it is the soldiers always have to come home and adjust. Doesn't matter if it is WWII, Vietnam, or the Iraq war, there is a period of adjustment when soldiers come back. Their are plenty of other movies that deal with returning veterans from the other wars, but what I found eye opening about this movie is that you always hear about the heroic welcome that soldiers got at the end of WWII, and how they are the greatest generation, but you don't hear about the struggles they had when they got back. The struggles to find work, to get a loan, to realize that your kids are different people now, or how to deal with feeling like a monster with hooks for hands. It shows that now matter what the war these will always be issues that are faced.

The Director William Wyler is the most nominated director of all time. He has 13 Best Directing nominations and 3 wins. Like Billy Wilder the year before he is one of the best directors of the time. Personally I think this is one of his best movies. Really captures the humanness of the soldiers and makes the story feel very real, even when it starts to get a little melodramatic at the end. Also, what makes the story feel real is Harold Russell who is a real life returning vet who lost his hand in the war. His character Homer Parish is one of the most memorable of the film. Maybe because he had lived it but for a non actor he brought such a presence to the screen and out shined some of the other actors. For that he won the Best Supporting Actor award for one of his only acting roles. He also won an honorary award "for bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans through his appearance in The Best Years of Our Lives." This honorary award was probably given to him because the Academy did not think he would win the competitive Best Supporting Actor award, thus becoming the only actor win two Oscars the same year for the same role.

Other Facts
Second in a series of best picture winner that had a socially responsible message
Beat Its a Wonderful Life for best picture.
Was ranked at number 37 on AFI Greatest Films of all time.
One of the quotes I found most prophetic in the movie was when Fredric March's character comes home and his son asks him about the war.

Rob: Say, you were at Hiroshima, weren't you Dad?..Well, did you happen to notice any
of the effects of radioactivity on the people who survived the blast?
Al: No, I didn't. Should I have?
Rob: We've been having lectures in atomic energy at school, and Mr. McLaughlin,
he's our physics teacher, he says that we've reached a point where the whole
human race has either got to find a way to live together, or else uhm...
Al: Or else...?
Rob: That's right. Or else. Because when you combine atomic energy with jet
propulsion and radar and guided missiles, just think of the...

The Lost Weekend

After watching the previous years feel good best picture winner Going My Way 1945's The Lost Weekend is a complete 180. Instead of being feel good it's a depressing story about an alcoholic. Basically the Lost Weekend is about an alcoholic who despite the best efforts of his brother and his girlfriend manages to steal some money and go on an alcoholic binge(its amazing how drunk $10 could get you in the 40's). We get to see his slow descent into despair and desperation. It just starts with one drink, then he is having a good time spouting some drunk philosophy. Talking about how he met his girlfriend and his aspirations to become a famous writer. Then with each drink he moves closer to desperation. He finally ends up in a hospital full of drunks where he begins to hallucinate and slowly goes mad.

This is a great movie. In my opinion one of the most underrated movies to win best picture. It's one you never hear about but has such an emotional impact. What I like about the movie is it gets right into it. There is hardly any back story, just starts with him hiding a bottle of liqueur from his brother then moves from there. Each minute going further down the abyss. The two things I didn't like about the movie was the end and the music. I thought the end could have been a little darker. Not as feel good. And the music just didn't fit the mood of the movie. The score sounded like something out of a 50's sci-fi movie not a serious dark movie. But overall it was a great movie.

Billy Wilder who wrote and directed the movie is one of the most nominated directors and screenwriters. He has a total of 8 directing nominations with 2 wins and 12 screenwriting nominations with three wins. What is amazing about Billy Wilder is the scope of his movies. You have dark movies like this one then you have flat out comedies like Some Like it Hot(AFI ranked it #1 funniest movie of all time) and film noir movies like Sunset Boulevard. Almost everything the guy did turned out great. Only two of his movies won best picture(The Apartment in 1960 is the other one) but most are considered classics.

Other Oscar Facts
The Bells of St. Marys a sequel to the previous years winner Going My Way became the first sequel to be nominated for Best Picture and Bing Crosby became the first Actor to be nominated twice for playing the same character in different films.
Joan Crawford won her only Oscar for Mildred Pierce. Accepting it at her home because she was too "sick" to attend the ceremonies.
Set a precedent for socially-responsible movies to win best picture in the late 40's

Going My Way

Going My Way won Best Picture in 1944. It was the only comedy nominated that year against two darker movies(Double Indemnity, Gaslight), a patriotic film(Since you Went Away) and a biopic (Wilson). The movie is about a young Priest Father O'Malley(Bing Crosby) who helps and older Priest Father Fitzgibbon(Barry Fitzgerald) bring some life back into an old Church. Along the way Father O'Malley starts a boys choir, writes songs, and is very generous to those in need. Of course staring Bing Crosby there is lots of singing. He helps the boys get off the street and find something better to do then cause trouble, then he writes a song that he sells to a record company to make enough money to get the church out of financial trouble. He also helps the poor and the misguided. He is kind of like an Angel that comes and solves everyone's troubles then leaves everything better then he found it. It is a very uplifting story.

Similar to You Can't Take it With You, I feel you have to look at the mood of the country to see why this movie was so popular. In 1944 FDR got re-elected for his unprecedented fourth term. FDR signs the GI bill to help returning veterans financially. But the biggest story of 1944 was the continued fighting in WWII. On D-Day June 6Th 1944 the Allies invaded Normandy, France. This battle would change the course of the war. There was also the Battle of the Bulge in December of 1944.(Also in 1944 an important event for me personally. My dad was born).

You can see that with all the war news and battles going on, people were just trying to look for an escape. So, along comes this very inspiring movie that is not about war but about people looking out for other people. I don't know if its because I watched it after I didn't sleep well the night before or just because it's a different time we live in, but it really didn't do much for me. It does have it's funny parts and it does have the inspiration factor but I just wasn't feeling it. It is interesting how you are feeling when you watch a movie affects how you respond to it. Who knows if I watch it again on a different day I might like it better. For me I would have enjoyed the darker movies. Double Indemnity is considered one of the first and one of the best film noir movies. I would have enjoyed watching that again. But there is nothing wrong with Going My Way it is a good movie and it inspired a sequel(The Bell's of St. Marys) and a TV show and was well like at the time.

Interesting Oscar Facts
This was the first year that they standardized the Best Picture list to 5 at least until 2010.
For the first and only time the same person was nominated for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor for the same role. Barry Fitzgerald was so well liked as Father Fitzgibbons they nominated him twice because they couldn't decide if he was a lead or supporting actor. He ended up winning supporting actor then the next year the Academy changed their rules so it could not happen again.
Bing Crosby won his only Oscar for his Father O'Malley part. He was also nominated the following year for the same part in The Bells of St. Mary's.
Leo McCarey was the first person to receive three Oscar Awards for the same picture (as producer, director, and writer) It has only been done four other times. (Billy Wilder for The Apartment (1960), Francis Ford Coppola for The Godfather, Part II (1974), James L. Brooks for Terms of Endearment (1983), and James Cameron for Titanic (1997).]

Fall Movies

Labor Day is almost here which means its the official end of the Summer movie season. I finally got around to reading the Entertainment Weekly that has the Fall Movie Preview in it(it came in while I was on vacation). Entertainment Weekly considers the Fall Movie Season from Labor Day Weekend to New Years. I think that is a little too far to still consider fall, especially when they will have another issue out around Thanksgiving for the Holiday Movie Preview. So, I consider the fall movie season from Labor day to Thanksgiving. The fall movie season is usually one of the worst movie seasons(spring is usually the worst movie season). Its the time when the studios usually dump all the movies they decided wouldn't make money over the summer or the movies that are probably not good enough for the Oscars. Oscar winning movies usually get released in November and December with a few exceptions. My Birthday falls around Labor Day weekend and it is usually the really bad movies that are released that weekend. The number one movie over labor day weekend is usually a summer movie that everyone is just catching up on.
This year I hope it will be different. So, here are the 5 movies I am most excited to see this Fall.

MACHETE
One of the best parts of Grindhouse was Robert Rodriguez's fake trailer for Machete. It was so popular that now he made a movie based on the fake trailer. Interesting that character of Machete first appeared in the kids movie Spy Kids. But this is no kids movie. Check out the Red Band trailer. If you don't know what that means Red Band trailers are trailers that are rated R and have not been approved for children of all ages, so don't watch it if you are faint of heart. They arent kidding when they say "gut wrenching". The movie looks like its going to kick some ass and finally a movie that looks good that is coming out on my birthday weekend.

Red Band Trailer for Machete at Listal

THE SOCIAL NETWORK
A movie about the founding of Facebook. As you can guess the founder of facebook is upset with the movie as it has taken some liberties with the story. It is directed by David Fincher(Fight Club, Seven) and written by Aaron Sorkin(West Wing, Charlie Wilson's War). Aaron Sorkin has a way of writing that I love. It is usually quick snappy dialogue and I love most David Fincher movies. There is usually something dark and sinister to his movies. It will be interesting to see how this one is. Based on the trailer it looks awesome and is getting some early Oscar buzz, but like I said earlier movies that come out in the Fall don't usually get nominated. I love the tag line though. You don't get to 500 Million friends without making a few enemies, and love the song in the preview. Also Justin Timberlake has been getting great reviews for his acting. Is there nothing that this guy cant do?

WAITING FOR "SUPERMAN"
Now I already saw this movie at Sundance, but I am excited that it is getting released and hope more people see it and would love to hear what some of my teacher friends think about it. It is a documentary about the Public Education system in America. It is kind of sad but not surprising. Everyone should take a look. It is directed by the guy who directed An Inconvenient Truth but it is much better then that movie and I think it will be less controversial also but we will see.



WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS
A sequel to the 1987 movie from Oliver Stone. After so long why make a sequel? Well it seems like an appropriate time to revisit the guy that told us "Greed is Good" and see where that got us. While might not be the best movie it will be fun to see Michael Douglas in the same role that won him an Oscar. I love the scene in the trailer where they give Michael Douglas his mobile phone back as he is leaving prison.

BURIED
Can't have a fall movie preview without including one horror movie. This was also at Sundance this year and generated alot of buzz. Basically its Ryan Reynolds in a box. Pretty sure that's the whole movie. I heard it was pretty twisted and looks like a fun psychological thriller.

So those are my fall movies I am most looking forward too. A gory action movie, a semi-factual drama, a documentary, a sequal, and a psychological thriller. Should be a fun fall at the movies.