A Fish Called Wanda

Laughs (#21)

There is dishonor among thieves.  Four people pull off a bank heist and then spend the rest of the movie trying to cheat each other out of the loot.

It's funny, with a good cast,  but not really my kind of movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUusX1Js6R0

The Bridge on the River Kwai

Top 100 (#13/36); Thrills (#58); Stars - William Holden (#25); Cheers (#14)

Total guy movie.  Japanese soldiers force Allied POWs to build a bridge.  Yep, that's what it's about.  Alec Guinness played an arrogant, racist British officer who helped me understand why my father always said, "Don't call me sir!  I work for a living."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vL4kXJ6857k

Anna Karenina

Stars - Greta Garbo (#5); Passions (#42)

Okay, Didder - you already had points for reading Anna, but now I'll double those points because the movie was so tedious I figure the book must have been extra boring.  So props to you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwYS7BYIIag

The Best Years of Our Lives

Top 100 (#37/37); Cheers (#11)

Long movie, but a good glimpse of the trials veterans face when they come home from war.  I'm sure the issues aren't a whole lot different now than they were then.  It felt like a radio production, which it wasn't originally, but the actors did perform it for radio later.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8tqGAsOkPs

Sounder

Cheers (#61)

Good movie, based on a really good book.  But it seems a bit out of place on this list because AFI didn't recognize very many feel-good family films.  Did it deserve its spot?  Yes.  I'm just surprised AFI thought so, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBlitTE9kLk

There's Something About Mary

Laughs (#27); Stars - Matt Dillon (Current)

Here's what happens when you take a potentially sweet plot outline, some fairly decent characters, and give them to a bunch of sophomoric men.  I really think if this had been written and directed by women it could have been a likeable romantic comedy.  Instead, it was, sadly, a waste.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTSBUUpoqRQ

Seabiscuit

Cheers (#50)

I like (not love) horse movies.  The Man From Snowy River is definitely the best.  But truth be told, if you've seen one, you've seen them all.  There's not a whole lot of variance of plot.

And so my review is that Seabiscuit is just like every other horse movie.  If you like them, you'll like this movie.  If you don't, you won't.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7OHUndHCLg

The Night of the Hunter

Thrills (#34); Stars - Lillian Gish (#17), Robert Mitchum (#23); Villains - Reverend Harry Powell (#29)

Robert Mitchum is so scary!  He's a master of the calm, calculating, almost bemused look. 

Here he plays a "preacher" - a con man - who discovers that two children know the whereabouts of the money from a bank heist.  And he's out to get that money whatever the cost.  Throughout the movie he sings "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms" in a haunting, predatory style.

But then, finally, he's encountered by the amazing Lillian Gish.  Kick butt, Miss Gish!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNmtkxw4b58&feature=related

Manhattan

Laughs (#46); Passions (#66)

Things I don't understand:
1) Why this is considered a comedy
2) Why this is considered passionate
3) Why this made the AFI lists
4) Why Diane Keaton and Meryl Streep, both of whom I would think would maybe have some sense, would do this movie
5) Why Mariel Hemingway's 17-year-old character was portrayed more like she was 12
6) Why anybody would watch this, let alone pay to watch it
7) What on earth is Woody Allen's appeal

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQgfgB-vgT0

Cape Fear

Thrills (#61); Stars - Gregory Peck (#12), Robert Mitchum (#23); Villains - Max Cady (#28)

Holy scary bad guys!  Ex-con Mitchum has it in for Peck, who testified against him years earlier.  And so, in devilish bad guy style, he goes after Peck's wife and daughter. 

I thought Mitchum was scary in Night of the Hunter.  Max Cady far out-scaries that bad guy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73lZPln-A2I

Being There

Laughs (#26); Stars - Shirley MacLaine (Current - Not Rated)

This was a very different kind of movie, and very different for Peter Sellers (although he petitioned the author for the part).  Simple-minded Chance the gardener lives his entire life inside the house or in the walled garden of his employer.  When the man dies, Chance is left on his own with no place to go.  He ventures out into the world, where his name is misheard as Chauncey Gardiner, and people assume he is the sum of all wisdom.

Good, but different.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcPQ9gww_qc&feature=related

Hotel Rwanda

Cheers (#90)

The thing I like most about this project is stumbling across a really good movie that I probably would not have seen otherwise.  This is one such movie.

It's a shame that it ranks so low on the Cheers list.  It really deserved a higher spot.  Don Cheadle was excellent.

There is no clip for today, because I couldn't find the one I wanted.  The clip I was hoping to post was this, because it hit me hard and I'm hoping I don't forget it (or worse, remember it and go on eating my dinner):

Jack:  [after Paul thanks him for shooting footage of the genocide] I think if people see this footage, they'll say Oh, my God, that's horrible. And then they'll go on eating their dinners.

The Matrix

Thrills (#66)

See - I told you we're Sims characters!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORfUz9JiDMk

The Sandpiper

Stars - Elizabeth Taylor (#7); Songs - The Shadow of Your Smile (#77)

How stupid.  Hippie single mom Taylor beds married private school principal Burton. 

The Big Sur scenery was nice though.  And I've been waiting anxiously to review this movie so I could share this Oscar-winning song with you:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OLaNFHO6Q8