Category: OCF

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 11

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Baseball Movies

I started out with sports movies but that’s a lot of territory.  Football, basketball, boxing, horse racing and all kinds of other stuff.  Baseball by itself is plenty for a list.

Every kid of my generation loved baseball as much for playing as for watching the pros.  We played some version of baseball on parish fields, sandlots, school yard asphalt or around the cars on our city streets.  Baseball, stickball, punchball, slapball or softball.  Wherever we could find the space and whoever was around we could always get together some kind of game.

And of course we were rabid fans.  Being from New York City we had to choose between the Yankees and the Mets.  But even though I was a die-hard Yankees fan I went to the 7th game of the 1969 World Series and dutifully ripped up a square of turf when the Mets won it all for the first time and planted it in my backyard.  A year later that chunk of grass died.  It figured.

“The Sandlot” is a cheat because it’s more of a comedy about kids but it has a few things that broaden the appeal.

“Field of Dreams” and “A League of Their Own” both have cultural aspects that annoy me but both contain enough entertainment to allow me to include them on the list with only a grimace or two.  “The Natural” is overly sentimental but I consider it the best attempt to capture the mythological aspect of baseball in the American psyche; at least as it was before America was lobotomized in our era.  “61*” is a more realistic look at the business of baseball legends.  “Eight Men Out” is another movie to look at the reality behind the legends.  It’s the story of the Black Sox Scandal.  Excellently made.

I’m sure opinions will differ.  Have at it.

  1. The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
  2. It Happens Every Spring (1949) 1
  3. Angels in the Outfield (1951) 1
  4. The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings (1976)
  5. The Natural (1984)
  6. Bull Durham (1988)
  7. Eight Men Out (1988)
  8. Field of Dreams (1989)
  9. A League of Their Own (1992)
  10. The Babe (1992) 2
  11. The Sandlot (1993)
  12. Cobb (1994)
  13. For Love of the Game (1999)
  14. 61* (2001)

1 Master Diver

2 War Pig

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 10

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Military Movies

I’m sure everyone will say I left out one of their favorites.  War movies and movies about the military seem to be very personal in their impact.  And that’s easily remedied when you list your forgotten favorite in the comments!

I left out ancient wars so Spartacus and Henry V were too far back I thought.  “Master and Commander” is close to the line but is such a good movie I couldn’t leave it out.  Although it would still show up in an action category and a list of movies about the sea.  Of course, I was restricted to movies I’ve seen and I can’t claim to have seen most war movies.

  1. Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944) 3
  2. The Story of GI Joe (1945) 3
  3. They Were Expendable (1945) 3
  4. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
  5. Fixed Bayonets! (1951) 3
  6. Captain Horatio Hornblower (1951) 3
  7. From Here to Eternity (1953)
  8. Pork Chop Hill (1956) 1
  9. The Gallant Hours (1960) 3
  10. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) 3
  11. The Longest Day (1962) 3
  12. The Great Escape (1963)
  13. Zulu (1964)
  14. Battle of the Bulge (1965) 3
  15. In Harm’s Way (1965) 3
  16. The Dirty Dozen (1967)
  17. Battle of Britain (1969) 3
  18. Patton (1970)
  19. A Bridge Too Far (1977) 3
  20. Big Red One (1980) 3
  21. Das Boot (1981)
  22. Full Metal Jacket (1987)
  23. Gettysburg (1993) 3
  24. Saving Private Ryan (1998) 2
  25. Band of Brothers (2001) 2 *
  26. Black Hawk Down (2001)
  27. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)
  28. Downfall (2004)
  29. Letters From Iwo Jima (2006) 3
  30. American Sniper (2014)
  31. Dunkirk (2017)

*(TV Series)

1 Master Diver

2 Tom D

3 War Pig

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 9

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Classic Horror Movies

Okay, the category is one of those inconsistent constructs.  Why not call them classic monster movies?  How do you define classic?  What is the allowable chronological range?  Are silent movies included?  Well, I’m fudging all of these and just selecting what I want to, no matter that logical consistency probably goes out the window.

Let’s look at my list.  Basically, it’s the Universal monster movies in their heyday along with “Nosferatu,” “Island of Lost Souls” and “House on Haunted Hill” thrown in for dubious reasons (basically because I like them).  I’ve left out a dozen Universal films that could just as easily have been included and I’ve included “The Invisible Man” and “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” which really belong in a list of early science fiction stories.  But that probably applies to the Frankenstein movies too.  So, the whole thing is incredibly subjective and personal in nature.

So, I won’t belabor the point any longer and will instead chalk this up to a labor of love.  As a little kid I thoroughly enjoyed these movies and hundreds more that provided a similar thrill.  List your favorites in the comments.  If you want my detailed reviews of most of these movies do a search on the site by title.

  1. NOSFERATU (1922)
  2. THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925)
  3. DRACULA (1931)
  4. FRANKENSTEIN (1931)
  5. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE (1931)
  6. THE MUMMY (1932)
  7. ISLAND OF LOST SOULS (1932)
  8. THE INVISIBLE MAN (1933)
  9. BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935)
  10. THE WEREWOLF OF LONDON (1935)
  11. THE WOLF MAN (1941)
  12. HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (1959)

 

UPDATE

War Pig’s picks:

Black Sabbath 1963

Black Sunday 1960

Night o/t Living Dead

Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde 1931

Psycho

The Birds

Phantom o/t Opera 1925

Last Man On Earth 1964

Incredible Shrinking Man

Curse o/t Demon

Island of Dr Moreau 1932

Murders in the Rue Morgue

The Tingler

M (also under film noir, crime, etc.)

 

 

 

Pay Back for Paying Forward

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Two thirds of July burned through.  But we got the sun and heat the calendar promised.  So, I can’t kick.

Swimming pools are an awful nuisance to the owner especially if he lives in the north.  The winter weather beats the hell out of the polymers that the liner and the filter loop are made out of.  In every practical sense they’re a bad deal.  A dead loss except for one very important aspect.  They attract grandchildren like no other power on Earth.  To paraphrase “Field of Dreams,” “If you fill it, they will come.”  Like a law of nature, a hot summer week, a swimming pool and youngsters react like iron filings to a magnet.

And that’s great.  Provide the pool, some burgers and lemonade and they’ll swim and dive and splash around until their fingers and toes become as wrinkled as prunes.  But why, you might ask, would anyone want to have a bunch of noisy, boisterous, unruly kids around when peace and quiet is so much easier?

Well, the answer is simple.  Grandchildren are the one and only, absolutely authentic, sure-fire fountain of youth that has ever been discovered by mankind.  When you steal away their children away from your children and spoil them rotten with bilious food and frivolous activities; like throwing around a baseball or letting them play a game of hide and seek in your yard, it’s as if you’ve stepped into a time machine.

When you referee their squabbles and join in their silly card games and argue with them about whether T-Rex is stronger than Spinosaurus or whether a dragon that breathes fire is more powerful than one that breathes ice or when they draw birthday cards for you with all the care and concentration that a five-year-old can muster you are transported to a different world.  A much, much better world.

Getting to spend time with your grandkids is the payoff for all the years of work and worry that goes into raising a family.  We try to spend as much time with our kids as we can but work consumes so much of our time.  And worrying about getting them launched into their adult lives steals away so much of the time you have when you’re in the prime of your life.

So having the chance to really experience the small joys of children at play in your later years is imbibing the quintessence of life.  And it makes the prospect of getting old acceptable.  Our mortality is THE fact of life.  We get a span of time on this giddy rock hurtling through space-time.  And sooner than any of us imagine, the sands start building up in the bottom of the hour-glass.  But if we see children and then grandchildren and maybe great-grandchildren; well then, we can feel as if we did our part to keep this crazy, confusing, hopelessly conflicted endeavor called the human race staggering down the road for at least another generation or two.  And if after we’re gone they think back on us and smile about something we said or did, well, that’s one kind of immortality.

And that has to be enough to make the whole thing worthwhile.  Because as far as I can tell, that’s about as good as it gets.  And that’s good enough for me.

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 8

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Super Hero Movies

I approach this category with great trepidation.  In the new millennium comic book movies have exploded into the only profitable movie type.  The billion-dollar box office totals for several of these films rival the money made by the Star Wars franchise at its height.

But the cinematic quality has varied drastically and of late social justice themes have poisoned several franchises and tanked the profits on several of these “blockbusters.”

In most cases the sequel moves (with a few important exceptions are usually weaker than an initial strong entry film.  The most notable exception is the “The Dark Knight.”  It is the middle movie of a trilogy but may be the best of the three.

Disney’s endless chapters in the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) as they term their merging of the various Marvel super hero franchises (Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow, Avengers, Doctor Strange, Guardians of the Galaxy, Spiderman, etc., etc., etc.) are fairly hit and miss.  I’ve listed the ones I thought were relatively well done and entertaining.

I’ve listed the old Superman movie from the late seventies.  It was entertaining and featured a fair amount of comedy.

Batman has had several iterations.  I’ve listed the ones I liked.  Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy is considered by some to be the best overall version by many, but who’s to say?

The last five films are stand alone stories that are notable in some way.

Warning:  Just because these are comic book movies doesn’t mean they are to be assumed safe for children.  For instance, Deadpool and Watchmen are specifically adult fare.

 

  1. SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE (1978)
  2. BATMAN (1989)
  3. BATMAN BEGINS (2005)
  4. THE DARK KNIGHT (2008)
  5. THE DARK KNIGHT RISES (2012)
  6. THE BATMAN (2022)
  7. IRON MAN (2008)
  8. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER (2011)
  9. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER (2014)
  10. MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS (2012)
  11. AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON (2015)
  12. AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (2018)
  13. AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019)
  14. SPIDER-MAN (2002)
  15. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (2014)
  16. DEADPOOL (2016)
  17. HELLBOY (2004)
  18. CONSTANTINE (2005)
  19. WATCHMEN (2009)

V FOR VENDETTA (2006)

If I left out one of your favorites or if you detest one of my listed films, feel free to speak up and make your opinions known in the comments below.

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 7

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Fantasy

This category is a shambles.  I have arbitrarily excluded superhero movies, monster movies and animated films like Disney’s Pinocchio without any rationale other than I intend to make separate lists for those.  Also, these films run the gamut from children’s movies to adult fare.  And one movie; “Big Fish,” may not even qualify as a fantasy at all.

So, I apologize in advance for the idiosyncratic and incomplete nature of the list.  I’ve emboldened my personal favorites.

  1. THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939)
  2. THE THIEF OF BAGDAD (1940)
  3. THE SEVENTH SEAL (1957)
  4. JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS (1963)
  5. MARY POPPINS (1964)
  6. WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY (1971)
  7. TIME BANDITS (1981)
  8. CLASH OF THE TITANS (1981)
  9. EXCALIBUR (1981)
  10. CONAN THE BARBARIAN (1982)
  11. THE NEVERENDING STORY (1984)
  12. HIGHLANDER (1986)
  13. THE PRINCESS BRIDE (1987)
  14. THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN (1989)
  15. SLEEPY HOLLOW (1999)
  16. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (2001)
  17. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS (2002)
  18. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING (2003)
  19. BIG FISH (2003)
  20. THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE (2005)
  21. THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: PRINCE CASPIAN (2008)
  22. THE HOBBIT: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY (2012)
  23. THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG (2013)

If I left out one of your favorites or if you detest one of my listed films, feel free to speak up and make your opinions known in the comments below.

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 6

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Film Noir (Crime)

So once again there is some chicanery going on here.  Because of my previous list I have to leave out all of Alfred Hitchcock’s movies that should be in this category.  “Strangers on a Train,” “Dial M for Murder,” “Rope” and whole bunch of his stuff is right near the top of this genre.  But consistency was never my strength.  Laziness is.

I have emboldened the movies I particularly like.  Take that as personal preference.

I’ve reviewed some of these movies separately if you want my detailed opinion on them search the site.  So here’s a list of what I think is some pretty good noir.

  1. THE MALTESE FALCON (1941)
  2. HIGH SIERRA (1941)
  3. MURDER, MY SWEET (1944)
  4. DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944)
  5. THE BIG SLEEP (1946)
  6. THE STRANGER (1946)
  7. THE BLUE DAHLIA (1946)
  8. THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE (1946)
  9. GILDA (1946)
  10. OUT OF THE PAST (1947)
  11. ODD MAN OUT (1947)
  12. DARK PASSAGE (1947)
  13. THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI (1948)
  14. KEY LARGO (1948)
  15. SORRY, WRONG NUMBER (1948)
  16. THE NAKED CITY (1948)
  17. WHITE HEAT (1949)
  18. THE THIRD MAN (1949)
  19. ALL THE KING’S MEN (1949)
  20. D.O.A. (1949)
  21. THE ASPHALT JUNGLE (1950)
  22. IN A LONELY PLACE (1950)
  23. KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952)
  24. THE BLUE GARDENIA (1953)
  25. THE BIG HEAT (1953)
  26. SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS (1957)
  27. TOUCH OF EVIL (1958)

If I left out one of your favorites or if you detest one of my listed films, feel free to speak up and make your opinions known in the comments below.

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 5

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Suspense – Alfred Hitchcock

I’m faking a lot of thinking here with this category.  Alfred Hitchcock usually can be considered as a creator of crime or specifically murder stories.  But sometimes it’s a spy story or something really crazy like birds turning against humanity.  So, suspense is probably as good a label as anything else.

For most of his career Hitchcock produced very high-quality product.  At his peak he could get the best actors and lavish budgets to make his films.  But even on a shoestring like with Psycho he could produce a memorable movie.  At the very end he did produce some awful stuff.  I assume he was beginning to fail due to old age.

I’ve reviewed most of these movies separately if you want my detailed opinion on them.  But here’s a list of what I liked in Hitchcock’s output.  I still haven’t seen all his films but there are enough to form more than a good list of his best stuff.

  1. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
  2. The 39 Steps (1935)
  3. The Lady Vanishes (1938)
  4. Suspicion (1941)
  5. Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
  6. Lifeboat (1944)
  7. Spellbound (1945)
  8. Notorious (1946)
  9. Rope (1948)
  10. Strangers on a Train (1951)
  11. Dial M for Murder (1953)
  12. Rear Window (1954)
  13. To Catch a Thief (1955)
  14. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
  15. North by Northwest (1959)
  16. Psycho (1960)
  17. The Birds (1963)

If I left out one of your favorites or if you detest one of my listed films, feel free to speak up and make your Hitchcockian opinions known in the comments below.  People are usually very decided in their feelings about his films, one way or the other.  For instance, film aficionados consider “Vertigo” Hitchcock’s greatest masterpiece and a seminal work of cinematic importance.  But being a philistine, I despise it.  So, I left it out.

Peak Summer 2024

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July 15th is peak summer; top dead center.  And this year it’s living up to the hype.  Lots of heat, lots of humidity, a pretty good amount of sunshine.  As opposed to 2023, I am satisfied with the ration of summer being provided.  I am watching countless hours of old movies and wandering the fields looking for pictures of bugs and listening to political talking heads panicking or laughing at the latest exploits of the Joe Biden Flying Circus and Freak Show Emporium.  I’ve had to stop watching anything that has James Carville on it.  The Ragin’ Cajun is so distraught that I’m afraid I’ll bust a gut laughing at his apoplexy.  I’ll be shocked if he survives.

Now I will pay for all this joy.  The karmic wheel never stops turning and eventually it will pay me back with pain.  But what the hell.  Let’s let this thing play out.  Sometime in September Trump and Biden are supposed to have their second debate.  I’m sure by then the Dems and the Media will have adjusted their depression meds and decided to stop their Biden freakout and concentrate on destroying Trump by any means necessary.  And ANY is the operative word there.  I won’t be surprised by anything but I may be dismayed anyway.  After all these are desperate and delusional people who control resources that have almost no limits.  Four years ago, they shut down the whole world’s economy for a year and a half just to get Donald Trump.  What might they consider out of bounds?

But I digress.  I read that Shelley Duvall died yesterday.  In honor of her passing I plan to watch “The Shining” this week.  There is a certain contrarian logic in watching that most wintry of horror movies at this most sultry time of the rolling year.  Watching Jack Torrance succumb to the poison that the Overlook Hotel has served up to him is a cautionary tale for every frustrated fiction writer that ever lived.  All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

And just to give equal time to a less disturbed ghost story I think I’ll watch the George C Scott version of “A Christmas Carol.”  I think Christmas in the middle of July is something that should not be left to only the Hallmark Channel.

Yesterday I got a burst of energy and took out my pruning saw, bow saw and extra heavy-duty pruning shears and went primitive on some small trees that have gotten out of control in one area of the property.  And while I was at it, I searched out some Virginia Creeper vines that had gotten completely out of hand in the woods.  Some of these vines were three inches in diameter.  The trees they were climbing on were almost overwhelmed by the parasite that had wrapped around and choked them.  Looking out at those trees I now see broad swaths of dead leaves up in the canopy where these vines have been cut off at the roots.

Camera Girl mocked me for all this effort for little tangible result.  But self-satisfaction is its own reward.  Vines, especially poison ivy aggravate me.  In August I have a plan to wreak havoc on a patch that’s growing by the road.  I’m going to soak them down with vinegar and cover them with plastic or paper to let them stew in that low pH brew.  I don’t want to use herbicides because of ground water contamination.  But acetic acid passes muster as an organic substitute.  In my book the highest good that bio-engineering could be put to would be building a virus that would drive poison ivy to extinction.  The man who did that would rise to the level of a saint in my opinion as having removed one of the great scourges in this world.

Well anyway, time to get back to peak summer.  At play in the fields of the Lord.

2024 Summer Movie Talk – Part 4

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Westerns – Modern

I’m dividing Westerns into two categories; Classic and Modern, because they really are completely different categories.  I’ll list what I think are among the best or the most popular or the most interesting modern westerns in approximately chronological order.  I’ve reviewed a number of these movies so if you want my detailed opinion, you can do a search on the site.

  1. THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960)
  2. A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS (1964)
  3. FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE (1965)
  4. THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY (1966)
  5. ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST (1969)
  6. BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID (1969)
  7. TRUE GRIT (1969)
  8. JEREMIAH JOHNSON (1972)
  9. HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER (1973)
  10. THE SHOOTIST (1976)
  11. THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES (1976)
  12. THE LONG RIDERS (1980)
  13. PALE RIDER (1985)
  14. SILVERADO (1985)
  15. UNFORGIVEN (1992)
  16. TOMBSTONE (1993)
  17. WYATT EARP (1994)
  18. OPEN RANGE (2003)
  19. 3:10 TO YUMA (2007)
  20. TRUE GRIT (2010)
  21. HELL OR HIGH WATER (2016)

Twenty-one is a long list.  Longer than I intended but I guess I have a soft spot for some of these movies.  I included both versions of “True Grit” and both Tombstone and Wyatt Earp.  And I broke my own western rule by including “Hell or High Water” because the time period is modern day.  But modern westerns are modern!

Now this is just my list.  Your list will be different.  I’ve got a lot of Clint Eastwood in this list.  Not everyone likes his stuff.  I left out Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch” and “Ride the High Country.”  I could have left out “Unforgiven” and “Silverado.”  Just how I felt at the moment.

Have at it.  Give your opinion in the comments.