My Favorite Things - Amendment #1

So here I am, ready to retract some of my thoughts from yesterday - last night, Chris and I watched The Quiet Man. Although I had seen this movie many years ago, I forgot a lot more of it than I thought. We LOVED it! We were laughing hysterically the whole time - between Ward Bond fishing in the river, the hysterical Michaleen as the chaperone and the back and forth relationship between Mary Kate and Sean, there just were no bad moments!! So although I did not care for other John Wayne / John Ford movies, I have to say that this one was nothing short of brilliant. John Wayne has NEVER looked that good, my God. What on Earth? Haha. The last half hour of this movie is right up there with some of the greatest moments in film history.

I read a great piece of trivia about The Quiet Man. At the end of the movie, you can see Sean and Mary Kate standing in their garden. Mary Kate leans over to Sean and whispers something in his ear, which generates a great response of shock from him. Apparently, John Ford told Maureen O'Hara something to whisper, and she said "no way", she could never say that to the Duke. He talked to her into it, promising her that between the three of them, no one would ever reveal what was said. To this day, the line is a mystery. :)

My Favorite Things :)

I can't tell you how excited I am to make this post - it's something I have talked about ever since I started working and stopped blogging - a list of favorites, surprises and debunked assumptions. During the course of my blog I watched just under 90 new movies - and since then I have watched dozens more as the blog really just fueled my love for movies. TCM consistently takes over our DVR and Netflix queue. What can I say...I'm in love.

So here you have it...a summation of my experience :)

Who did I watch the most?

Spencer Tracy - 7

Katharine Hepburn - 7

Jimmy Stewart - 5

....and for directors, I saw 6 of Billy Wilder's movies :)

Who surprised me the most - in a good way?

This one is easy. Spencer Tracy. Before I started the blog, I had never seen Spencer Tracy in anything - all I really knew of him was that he was in a relationship with Katharine Hepburn while married and that he was a drunk. I expected him to be cocky and brash and I was prepared to not care for him at all. Well, I was right about the relationship and about him being a drunk, but the cocky and brash - I could not have been more wrong, at least about him as an actor. Within 10 minutes of seeing him on screen (my first viewing was I believe...Adam's Rib) I was in love. I found him to be so charming and subtle - I could never picture him reading lines from a page. By the end of the blog I had seen 5 of his movies - Adam's Rib, Woman of the Year, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Pat and Mike and Captains Courageous - and since then I have added Judgement at Nuremberg and Boy's Town. I can say without a doubt that he is my favorite actor of all time - and for those of you who know me well, you know I take that very seriously :)

Another surprise to me was Billy Wilder. As a self proclaimed movie buff, I am simply ashamed to say that I had never even heard of Billy Wilder before the blog - honestly now I can't even imagine how I didn't know him. He's quite an interesting character - so interesting, in fact, that I read a book about him called "Conversations with Wilder" by Cameron Crowe...very good read. He's a great storyteller and storycrafter - I love how he puts shots together - the light and shadow, etc...I saw six of his movies during blogtime - let's see if I can remember them from memory - Some Like it Hot, Sabrina, Sunset Boulevard, Love in the Afternoon, The Apartment....and.....and .....oh yes, Stalag 17 (had to look that one up). Post blog, I watched The Lost Weekend - one of his most well known movies. I highly recommend all of them...except Love in the Afternoon, haha :)

One more...Bette Davis. When she's onscreen, I just can't take my eyes off of her. Plus her list of quotes about Joan Crawford are reason enough to love her. She just has PRESENCE.

Did anyone meet the exact expectations I had for them?

I love this question because I only wrote it so that I could talk about Jimmy Stewart and Frank Capra. One of the reasons I started this blog was because I felt that, as a movie buff, I really needed to learn more about the classic movies and actors. I would say "Well, Jimmy Stewart is my favorite actor" but let's be honest...he's everyone's favorite :) So, just like I can't say Hey Jude is my favorite Beatles song because it's too obvious, I felt like I needed a different answer. Well, I'm sorry folks, but no one in this world amuses me more onscreen than Jimmy Stewart - I just love every second of everything he does (well, minus some seconds from Harvey). You would think his on screen "aw shucks" demeanor was just a show but it wasn't - I read his biography too and no one ever refuted what a great person he was - friendly, humble. .....and Frank Capra, come on. The guy just doesn't make bad movies - It's a Wonderful Life, You Can't Take it With You, It Happened One Night, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Classics. (Julie I know you wanted me to add Arsenic and Old Lace - haha). A great pair of men.

Any other surprises?

When I started blogging, there was a whole genre of movies that I knew little about but really wanted to explore - westerns. I thought, you know, I have seen almost no old westerns, maybe I could really love them? The answer to that, in short, is no. I wanted desperately, and I mean really desperately, to love John Wayne and John Ford....and although I have a great respect for them, I just couldn't force myself to love them. I was really surprised that I couldn't - I thought for sure John Wayne would become a favorite. ....an icon, yes...a man's man, absolutely...a hollywood legend, no doubt. I also love how respected he was in Hollywood - women loved him and men wanted to be him.

Who were Hollywood's hottest leading men?
Again, an easy question - and I have three easy answers. Paul Newman. William Holden. Clark Gable. Done. There are no words.

Who were Hollywood's hottest leading women?

Ah, yes. I must give this one to Joan Crawford - talk about presence, my God, when she appears in The Women you think no wonder Norma Shearer's husband cheated on her. To me, she is the quintessential movie star.

What movies would I add to my favorite movies of all time?

The Women

Some Like it Hot - one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. Jack Lemmon. Classic.

How Green was my Valley

Sunset Boulevard - Gloria Swanson=perfection.

...and just one parting thought. Perhaps I should have put Lionel Barrymore on my list of surprises - I've only even seen two of his movies - It's a Wonderful Life and You Can't Take it With You - but he won my heart in You Can't Take it With You - just seeing him onscreen makes me smile. His speech in the jail cell at the end of You Can't Take it With You is one of my favorite moments of all the movies I've seen.

I hope I didn't forget anything :)

AFI's Top 100 Movies!

So far I have seen 69/100! Only 31 more to go...

1. "Citizen Kane," 1941
2. "Casablanca," 1942
3. "The Godfather," 1972
4. "Gone With the Wind," 1939
5. "Lawrence of Arabia," 1962
6. "The Wizard of Oz," 1939
7. "The Graduate," 1967
8. "On the Waterfront," 1954
9. "Schindler's List," 1993
10. "Singin' in the Rain," 1952
11. "It's a Wonderful Life," 1946
12. "Sunset Boulevard," 1950
13. "The Bridge on the River Kwai," 1957
14. "Some Like it Hot," 1959
15. "Star Wars," 1977
16. "All About Eve," 1950
17. "The African Queen," 1951
18. "Psycho," 1960
19. "Chinatown," 1974
20. "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest," 1975
21. "The Grapes of Wrath," 1940
22. "2001: A Space Odyssey," 1968
23. "The Maltese Falcon," 1941
24. "Raging Bull," 1980
25. "E.T. - The Extra-Terrestrial," 1982
26. "Dr. Strangelove," 1964
27. "Bonnie and Clyde," 1967
28. "Apocalypse Now," 1979
29. "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," 1939
30. "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre," 1948
31. "Annie Hall," 1977
32. "The Godfather Part II," 1974
33. "High Noon," 1952
34. "To Kill a Mockingbird," 1962
35. "It Happened One Night," 1934
36. "Midnight Cowboy," 1969
37. "The Best Years of Our Lives," 1946
38. "Double Indemnity," 1944
39. "Doctor Zhivago," 1965
40. "North by Northwest," 1959
41. "West Side Story," 1961
42. "Rear Window," 1954
43. "King Kong," 1933
44. "The Birth of a Nation," 1915
45. "A Streetcar Named Desire," 1951
46. "A Clockwork Orange," 1971
47. "Taxi Driver," 1976
48. "Jaws," 1975
49. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," 1937
50. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," 1969
51. "The Philadelphia Story," 1940
52. "From Here to Eternity," 1953
53. "Amadeus," 1984
54. "All Quiet on the Western Front," 1930
55. "The Sound of Music," 1965
56. "M*A*S*H," 1970
57. "The Third Man," 1949
58. "Fantasia," 1940
59. "Rebel Without a Cause," 1955
60. "Raiders of the Lost Ark," 1981
61. "Vertigo," 1958
62. "Tootsie," 1982
63. "Stagecoach," 1939
64. "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," 1977
65. "The Silence of the Lambs," 1991
66. "Network," 1976
67. "The Manchurian Candidate," 1962
68. "An American in Paris," 1951
69. "Shane," 1953
70. "The French Connection," 1971
71. "Forrest Gump," 1994
72. "Ben-Hur," 1959
73. "Wuthering Heights," 1939
74. "The Gold Rush," 1925
75. "Dances With Wolves," 1990
76. "City Lights," 1931
77. "American Graffiti," 1973
78. "Rocky," 1976
79. "The Deer Hunter," 1978
80. "The Wild Bunch," 1969
81. "Modern Times," 1936
82. "Giant," 1956
83. "Platoon," 1986
84. "Fargo," 1996
85. "Duck Soup," 1933
86. "Mutiny on the Bounty," 1935
87. "Frankenstein," 1931
88. "Easy Rider," 1969
89. "Patton," 1970
90. "The Jazz Singer," 1927
91. "My Fair Lady," 1964
92. "A Place in the Sun," 1951
93. "The Apartment," 1960
94. "Goodfellas," 1990
95. "Pulp Fiction," 1994
96. "The Searchers," 1956
97. "Bringing Up Baby," 1938
98. "Unforgiven," 1992
99. "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," 1967
100. "Yankee Doodle Dandy," 1942

....New Plans!

.....as you all have noticed, my movie watching has dwindled considerably. With the holidays just around the corner I have found it difficult to keep up with movies while painting and keeping Mootinis running! Crazy times but good times :) So be patient and I'll do my best - my revised goal is to make it to 100 movies total! I'm really excited because once I reach 100 movies I'm going to make a nice big juicy post about all my favorites along the way - people and movies who surprised me (Spencer Tracy)....and those that were exactly what I hoped for (Jimmy Stewart) :) It's going to be a lot of fun. Number 84 will be Arsenic and Old Lace. At that point I need to take a serious look at my list and make sure the remaining 16 movies are MUST SEES. So help me out if you have any ideas!!

Day #83 - Gigi

IMDB Link-

Yesterday I watched Gigi - going in with no expectations I came out feeling fine about it...just fine. Not crazy one way or another. The story has been told so many times it's hard to be too moved by it - basically any story of a girl who is in love with an older man but doesn't catch his attention until she is all made over. Think My Fair Lady - in Paris.

Leslie Caron plays Gigi, a young French girl who is raised by her Grandmother and her Aunt, a high-mannered and elegant woman who never married but has plenty of lessons and knowledge to impart on Gigi, namely, how to properly walk, sit, talk and eat. Gigi of course is beautiful but sloppy - she runs everywhere, plops in her seat, and tells it like it is. Louis Jordan plays Gaston, a rich bachelor whose exploits land him in the daily news pretty consistently. Finding the rich life and its women and company a bore, Gaston finds company in Gigi and her Grandmother. After spending a weekend away with Gigi - Gaston and Gigi still see each other as just friends.....but at the same time, Gigi's Grandmother and Aunt see a huge opportunity to bring them together. When the idea is presented to Gaston, he at first is appalled - after all, Gigi is just a baby! After a bit though, he realizes that he is actually in love with her....and well, the rest you can fill in.

I didn't know that Gigi was going to be a musical - and it was a strange kind of musical to me. The songs were more talking than singing. It was the first Lerner/Loewe musical since My Fair Lady, so ....I must not be a big fan of them because most of you know how I feel about My Fair Lady...Audrey or not. Maurice Chevalier narrates the piece and has the same kind of talking/singing. He's very handsome though and I love his accent. I read that he actually acted with a stronger accent than what he had in real life and that he was a real penny pincher. Anyhoo, the thing about musicals is that I don't actually like them very much. It's strange though because The Sound of Music is arguably my favorite movie of all time - but yet when I see OTHER musicals I don't like them!! This one felt very Mary Poppins'y, just in the sense of it's color and feel. Why were movies so oversaturated?? So essentially, it was a cute movie but I would recommend others is this is the feel you are going for :)

Gigi won many Academy Awards in 1958 - Best Picture, Best Writing, Best Score, Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Director, Best Film Editing and Best Song. WHEW! 9 wins overall. That surprises me a bit.

Day #82 - Harvey

IMDB Link

Harvey, I wanted to like you. I really did. ....but you know, I didn't. In fact, I was over you about an hour in. This one was hard for me - I love, love, love Jimmy Stewart so I figured as long as he was in it I was good to go. Just seeing him at the opening of the movie made me smile and laugh. What really drove me crazy, and I mean CRAZY, about this movie was Josephine Hull who played Veta, Elwood Dowd's (Jimmy Stewart's) sister. I'm sorry, but I found her to be SO annoying - her constant whining and crying and fretting about drove me mad. It certainly didn't help that she had such a big part in the movie. ....interestingly enough, she won an Academy Award for her role. Honestly, with some of these old movies I really wonder what the Academy was thinking.....harsh, I know.

Harvey is the story of Elwood P. Dowd. Elwood lives with his sister and her daughter, Myrtle May, in the house he used to share with his mother before she passed. All would be well except that Elwood has a best friend who has created a lot of problems for Veta and Myrtle - this best friend just happens to be Harvey - and Harvey happens to be a 6 foot 3 1/2 inch rabbit. Along the way we learn that Harvey came about just after Elwood's mother passed, and we as the audience should assume that this is how he dealt with the trauma of the loss. He befriends everyone he knows and spends most of his time with Harvey, drinking at the local bar. When he introduces Harvey to a group of socialites dining with his sister and niece, they are so embarassed that they decide to commit him to the local institution. When they take Elwood there, a huge mix-up occurs which ends Veta in the institution and Elwood out of it! Once they figure out the mistake, Elwood is gone and they set out to find him. The thing about Elwood is that even though he sees Harvey, he is such a good man that the doctors and nurse at the institution really start to care for him. In fact, by the end of the movie, the head doctor is convinced that he also sees Harvey. Veta stays dedicated to committing Elwood until the end, when she realizes that even though he has some issues, he is far more pleasant as is than if she were to change him through medication. Thus, a happy ending.

Harvey was based on a Pulitzer-Prize winning book and Jimmy Stewart also portrayed Elwood P. Dowd on Broadway. I believe Josephine Hull was also part of the Broadway cast, oh joy. In the film, Elwood refers to Harvey as a "pooka", which basically means that he is an apparition which usually takes the form of a large animal, in this case, a rabbit. Although the only other person to see Harvey is the doctor, I think as the audience we are not led to believe that he for sure does or does not exist....it's an interesting way to tell a story.

Word has it that Steven Spielberg is remaking this movie in 2010 - the latest rumor is that Robert Downey, Jr. will play Elwood P. Dowd. I don't think he looks or acts much like Jimmy Stewart - I think Tom Hanks would be a good choice - but I don't put anything past Robert Downey Jr.....he's extremely talented.

Day #81 - Away We Go

IMDB Link

I loved this movie!!! It was so, so cute. Chris and I honestly felt like it was written about us - a couple of times we looked at each other like. "did they really just say that? We say that all the time!" Away We Go is about Burt and Verona and their journey to find the perfect place to raise their child. Verona is six months pregnant when they find out that Burt's parents are moving to Europe - since Verona's parents passed away and they moved there to be close to Burt's parents, they decide hey, we don't have to be here anymore. So they think of a few places where they have friends or family and set out to find a city to move to. Burt and Verona really love each other and are excited to have a baby, even though they aren't married. When they spend time with their somewhat crazy friends and family, they learn a lot about how different relationships work - between husbands and wives, parents and kids....etc. They see how unfair the world can be when relationships don't work out or are troubled and it just reminds them of how much they love each other. Really the movie is a journey for them, in my opinion, to really figure out what kinds of parents and people they want to be.

I looooooved the cast in this movie - fantastic all around! I was really unsure of John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph....to me, John Krasinski is just Jim from The Office and I wasn't sure I could see past that....and Maya Rudolph seemed too old I guess. But they both did an amazing job - their dialogue was really natural and there were a few semi-emotional scenes where John Krasinski especially really surprised me. The supporting cast though really makes this movie a gem - Allison Janney might be my favorite actress ever, she just cracks me up. Some of the other friends and family were played by Catherine O'Hara, Jeff Daniels, Maggie Gyllenhall, Paul Schneider and Jim Gaffigan.

I definitely recommend this movie - it was directed by Sam Mendes and it's just really sweet!