Daily Entertainment.

[muji]

Hello all!

Does anyone here like old movies? No, I don't mean from the nineties. I mean like "Johnny-Weissmueller-was-my-first-celebrity-crush" old movies. Which ones do you like/not like? Why?

Or just hate/love on It's a Wonderful Life. Either/or.

Comments

[alchemistseraph]

I have a huge thing for the Swiss Family Robinson, and Captain Blood, and rather unsurprisingly the old version--I mean 1934--of The Count of Monte Cristo. I've always sort of liked the films that really stuck to the idea that movies weren't so much supposed to reflect current life as much as take people away from it for a couple hours.

And Errol Flynn was my first celebrity crush. >> I mean. Uh.

[muji]

ERROL FLYNN ROBIN HOOD RULES MY LIFE.

[ceitfianna]

Yes, me too! That's my favorite Robin Hood.

[sardonicynic]

I cannot even begin to articulate how much love I have for Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch.

[muji]

He's a classic for sure. I am actually not all that enamoured of Mockingbird as a favorite of mine for Peck movies? That goes to The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit.

[alchemistseraph]

He was just about the only thing in that movie I halfway liked.

[cupenny.livejournal.com]

.... I have a tag on my LJ dedicated to my love for Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch. (In fact, he was my first ever char here at Milliways. <3)

[sdelmonte]

I love old movies.

Where to begin? Casablanca. Possibly the greatest example of a Hollywood film ever made. The greatest movie ever? No, it's a product of its time, and it's very much a capsule of pure Hollywood hokum with only the slightest resemblance to the real world. But it's such a wonderful film nonetheless, with that amazing cast, with Bogey at his best, with Ingrid Bergman as radiant as ever. (And I cast my vote for her as the most beautiful actress ever.) I can watch this film over and over. It never grows old. It never stops being witty. Or fun. Or moving. Or stirring.

Other favorites include Bridge on the River Kwai, The Philadelphia Story, Harvey, High Noon, and Bad Day at Black Rock. I am sure there are a lot of others I am forgetting. I used to watch old films a lot growing up, and my mother still watches Turner Classic Movies more than most other channels. (She prefers the original True Grit to the new one.)

I can't think of any I hate, though I feel that The Thin Man and The African Queen are overrated. As for It's a Wonderful Life, people don't give it enough credit for playing around with alternate timelines, but it's really quite hokey.

[muji]

See, I grew up unable to escape The Thin Man, so I'm not sure I like it so much as have it burned into my subconscious.

[misslucyjane]

I love them. I was raised on a steady diet of gene Kelly and John Wayne, and I have a Thing for Cary Grant. I even own a few silents.

It's a Wonderful Life: Love.

Edited to change icons, 'cause why not.

[muji]

I wrote my thesis on silent film in France at the turn of the 20th century. Mmmmmsexytimes.

[raptorcanaria]

It's a Wonderful Life. Some Like it Hot. Singin' In The Rain.

rushin_doll has just introduced me to the Thin Man movies.

And Leslie Howard is my Pimpernel. Hands down.

[muji]

Check out Holiday Inn. :D It's fun.

[silveraspen]

*raises hand* Hi. :) Yes. Film noir is something I very much enjoy watching.

[muji]

Double Indemnity.

(The Geico commercials? Tell me that guy isn't Fred MacMurray.)

[theresnodoor]

Casablanca is my ultimate romance flick of pure love. To Kill A Mockingbird, I could pretty much take or leave, except for every.single.moment. Gregory Peck is on stage.

I love John Wayne, for reasons I do not understand. Certainly not his acting caliber.

(sorry, America)

[kd7sov]

I admit, I haven't had a lot of exposure to many old movies. I've seen Casablanca, but it didn't really hit me one way or the other. I liked the Hitchcock movies I've seen, but that's only Rear Window and North by Northwest. I do quite like It's a Wonderful Life. Rewatched it just a week or two ago, actually.

[bodldops.livejournal.com]

For a slightly-more-modern twist: Lilies of the Field.

For great awesomeness, yo.

[dynastessa]

Oh, man. I love old movies! I haven't seen very many as of late, but film class was amazing just to be opened up to such things.

Singin' in the Rain, Gone With the Wind, Citizen Kane, and Casablanca, for sure are classics for a reason.

And I also still pretty much worship Audrey Hepburn and pretty much all her films.

And I love the Laurence Olivier takes on Shakespeare. And Hitchcock's stuff.

And on top of old movies, I love foreign old movies. Like Truffaut's Jules et Jim, and Antoine et Colette, and Fellini's 8 1/2.

I also really like It's a Wonderful Life.

[sdelmonte]

I will commit an act of heresy: Citizen Kane is overrated. Groundbreaking, yes. But overstuffed. And laid on real thick at many points.

That said, Welles was a genius even when he failed. He had amazing charisma, amazing vision, and amazing nerve. But I prefer him in his Shakespeare films and the times he was being himself on film (F is for Fake).

[minkhollow]

I need to indulge my fondness for Marx Brothers and Fred Astaire movies more often. The oldest thing I own that I watch regularly is A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (at one point I even apped Erronius, but never ended up doing anything with him).
ETA: --No wait, Help! might edge it out by a couple years. I adore that movie; it's so unashamedly ridiculous.
Also, the original The Day The Earth Stood Still. IT WAS NOT BROKEN. And I highly doubt Keanu Reeves fixed it.

A couple others: Vertigo for great psychological thriller, and Bell, Book and Candle because lead characters never have my name BUT IN THAT ONE SHE DOES. \o/

[theresnodoor]

ZERO MOSTEL HIGH-FIVE!!!!!

I love Forum and the only real Producers is the original Producers. <<

[bigfluffball.livejournal.com]

Well I've certainly had to sit through a fair few...

I like the Sound of Music, that's pretty old. And the old St Trinian's films.

[ceitfianna]

I love the old Astaire and Rogers' films, anything with Danny Kaye and just so many others.

My first class was canceled, I'm so glad since I feel so wobbly today.

[dramaturgca.livejournal.com]

The Philadelphia Story! OMG One of my top 5 all time favourites. How can you beat Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart?!

Singin' in the Rain, The Great Race, The Court Jester, White Christmas, The Gay Divorcee, Beach Blanket Bingo (Shameful, but true)... I like the musicals.

[gorgonfondness]

I have great big crushes on Harpo Marx, Clark Gable (and as a result I find guys with big ears just adorable), and Marlon Brando circa A Streetcar Named Desire. Perhaps one of my all-time favorite movies is Duck Soup and it's a shame that I somehow don't own it. I do have five other Marx Brothers movies on hand as well as Gone With the Wind recorded off of TCM. Another of my favorites is Some Like It Hot, which caused much sadness when I found out last year that Tony Curtis passed away.

And though more modern, I have a soft spot for movies on VHS since I own a working VCR. A sizeable portion of those being anime. Non-anime fare includes Good Morning Vietnam, A Night at the Roxbury, both Wayne's World movies, South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut, and Chicken Run.

[austen.livejournal.com]

Oh, man, any movie with Jimmy Stewart ranks high on my list, because I adore the man, so that includes everything from It's a Wonderful Life to my favorite Hitchcock movie ever, Rear Window. :D

Also, anything with Grace Kelly, because she was perfection on the screen, so Rear Window is basically my answer to everything, I guess.

[alreadyknowhow]

Love old movies. Lovelovelove. Did my senior project in college on the Weimar-era films of Fritz Lang, founded a classic movie club at my school, and will often have TCM on in the background all day when I'm working on costumes. ^_^

Metropolis is my favorite, but I love movies of the '40s and '50s, of just about any genre--musicals, comedies, dramas, war movies, westerns, anything. And of course The Sting, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and the work of Montgomery Clift, among others.