Movies I'm Watching: The Best Movies I've Never Seen

I recently came across a reference to Leonard Maltin's 151 Best Movies You've Never Seen (Harper Studio, 2010). The title is designed to be provocative, to make you say to yourself "I bet I've seen a lot of them." And that's what I said to myself. I see a lot of movies, including fairly obscure ones, and I watch a lot of older films.

I looked the book up on Amazon and found myself humbled by the table of contents: I had seen only one of the 151 films on the list. Oh dear. I did a little searching, and found two similar books. One was Richard Crouse's The 100 Best Movies You've Never Seen (ECW Press, 2003). I have seen six of the films recommended in that book--somewhat better. The other was The 100 Best Films to Rent You've Never Heard Of (St. Martin's Griffin, 1997). I have seen 13 of the 100 recommended there--even better. Still, I have to admit that I'm surprised there are so many purportedly worthwhile films in these three books that I have yet to see--and there is very little overlap on the lists.

I feel a project coming on.

What sort of project? First, I clearly need to see some of these selections. Second, recommending obscure favorites is a game that anyone can play. I could recommend a few of my own. This is beginning to feel like a dual-layer project....

No film is on all three lists. Eight films are on two of the lists: Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Bubba Ho-Tep, The Devil's Backbone, Delicatessen, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Peeping Tom, and Two-Family House. As I have seen two of these (Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and Kind Hearts and Coronets, I think I know where to begin.

For a list of some of my personal favorites that few people seem to know, see my following post on the subject of movies.

Television: Why I love the Olympics

Since the start of the Winter Olympics--a little more than two weeks ago--I've been thinking about the meaning of the games, as one does every four years or so. I'm always mildly surprised by my own interest in the competitions, as I'm generally not a fan of sports; the Olympics are one of the few sporting events I look forward to and watch as much as I can. A fair number of people claim to hate the games, but I was heartened to see that a Google search on "Why I hate the Olympics" returns only 40,000 hits, while a search on "Why I love the Olympics" gets 139,000 hits. I decided to poll my friends and acquaintances to see why they feel the way they do about the games. I know the Vancouver Olympics are over now, but I'm still watching the portions my brother was able to tape for me (don't worry Olympic Commission, it's for private use--I have no TV service--and I plan to erase the tapes after viewing).

Talking to friends, there appears to be quite a homogeneity of opinion about both the appeal and about what turns people off. Most people who say they hate the games say they dislike the behavior of nations that attempt to breed athletes from absurdly young ages in national "medal factories." These national programs seem to arouse the same indignation as sweatshop child labor, and rightly so. The Olympics haters point to the secretive behavior of Olympic committees worldwide and the sometimes absurd protectiveness of the IOC of its trademarks and other rights. They point to the taint of money in the form of advertising and sponsorship that has attached to the games. They call the games elitist and object to investments governments make to host the games or support teams at taxpayers' expense. They point to the nationalism the Olympics can foster.

I am a fan of none of these things. In particular, I dislike the nationalism the games create. National pride is one thing, and not a bad thing necessarily, but nationalism is too often used as an excuse for the re-writing of history by people in power at the expense of people that have none. (In one of those odd little coincidences in life, I just read an excellent review in the most recent New York Review of Books that touches on this very subject--the misuses of history*.) Even some athletes profess to dislike the games--saying that World Cup events are the true test of the greatness of an athlete. In particular, they seem to resent the public's focus on a single set of competitions that happens only once every four years. (Yet, these same athletes seem to want the Olympic gold medal very much--often very, very much.)      

Most people who enjoy the games point to one thing; the hard work and dedication of individual men and women aiming to become the best a human being can be at bobsledding, or ski jumping, or javelin throwing, or just running fast. It seems a good thing to dedicate a lifetime to--or the best part of a lifetime.  Sport interests me when it is sport at its best--people at their best. And so I watch and I cheer for the winners--regardless of what country they come from.

But, there is another thing. Call me sentimental, but the very idea of the Olympic games--at least of the ancient Olympic games--still seems a noble one to me, regardless of how it has been altered over the years or tainted by this or by that. As a child, I loved learning that the whole Greek world was supposed to have laid down arms during the games. I first came across the idea reading A Child's History of the World (V.M. Hillyer, first published in 1924). I see the book is still in print. That doesn't surprise me. It was a delight to read. I remember pulling it out of the big dark wood bookcase with leaded-glass doors in our house in Dayton to start reading it, at my mother's suggestion--she had enjoyed it as a child. It was her copy that I read. I imagine it's been revised, rewritten, brought up to date. If I were to read it now, I might see the stories in an entirely different light, but I remember thinking then--I must have been about 10 or 11--that dropping everything for the games was a special idea.

Humanity having the good sense--even if occasionally, once every fours years--to set priorities in so hopeful a fashion is an idea to be celebrated, fervently to be wished for, even if halting all conflict is not achievable today or never in reality has been. By keeping a feeble flame lit under a vision of us as beings that are better than we actually are, we are given something to strive for. Imperfect as the Olypmics are, and although in modern times the games have been put off in order to fight wars--turning on its head the idea that so struck me as a child--the modern Olympics continue to suggest that we can be better if we try. For that reason and because of the phenomenal work of the athletes and the excellence of their performances, I love the games.

*"Drawing the Wrong Lesson," by Max Hastings, a review of Dangerous Games: The Uses and Abuses of History, by Margaret MacMillan. The New York Review of Books, Volume LVII, No. 4, March 11, 2010. In another coincidence, this review mentions the movie Zulu, which I have just written about elsewhere in these pages.

[The Olympic rings are a trademark of the International Olympic Committee. Their use here is solely illustrative. No affiliation exists or is claimed between this blog and the IOC or the Olympic Games. It is not the author's intention to suggest endorsement by the IOC. Use is intended simply to visually alert the reader that the subject of this post is the Olympic games. (The need to say this sort of thing is one of the things people who hate the Olympics hate most about the Olympics.)]

Miscellaneous: Super Bowl XLIV (2010)

I plan to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday. It'll be the first football game I've seen all year. I'm not sure who is playing who. I really don't care. My football allegiances, such as they are, appear to be firmly rooted in the world of 1960s football; the first team names that come to my mind are always the Jets, the Eagles, and the Green Bay Packers. They were the big teams when I was a very small boy--and that was about the last time I paid serious attention to football. There was a brief period in the late 70s (in high school) that I followed the Oakland Raiders. Ken Stabler, Cliff Branch, and Fred Biletnikoff were something to watch, but then I spent all those years in Japan and lost track altogether. I'm still surprised now and then by team names I've never heard of and franchises in cities that don't sound quite right. I do know that the Bengals almost made it this year. Would that have been a first? I remember when the Bengals were a brand new team. My Boy Scout troop trooped off to an exhibition game (in 1970, maybe?). Who is playing in the Super Bowl matters less to me than how well they play--and the more passing the better. Short-yardage pile-ups followed by long huddles, punctuated by vulgar advertising is not my idea of sports entertainment. I'm hoping for two teams with aggressive passing games. I'm looking forward to a lot of passing followed by long huddles, followed by vulgar advertising.

Pass the chips.

Miscellaneous: Cancelled my TV Service Today

Cancelled my TV service today.

Miscellaneous: Musings about Mad Men--Season Three

I've just finished watching the third episode of Mad Men this season (Season Three). Mad Men is slow as molasses. There are many untied loose ends. It's essentially a soap opera with only one hour a week to do what a 30-minute daily drama gets two-and-a-half hours to do each week. I'm beginning to wonder how long it will sustain my interest if it never rises above the soap opera level. There's only so much dallying and office politics people can take. (Maybe I'm wrong about that. Isn't The Guiding Light going off the air this month--after 72 years? And, if pressed, I'd admit that I am wondering what will come of Don's eyeing the teacher dancing round the maypole, I am wondering about the man with his hands on Betty's pregnant belly--will he appear again?) Still, I enjoy Mad Men. It's the only show on TV I make time to see each week--and that's something I haven't done in decades (in fact, since Star Trek--the original Star Trek). I'm asking myself why does Mad Men fascinate?

It's partly style. From the first episode, the creators made it clear they would attempt to faithfully reproduce the period. I was born in New York in 1960, living in Brooklyn. Although we left when I was seven, my earliest memories are of New York, from late 1963 to 1967. My New York memories are those of a small child, but I still feel that the people of Mad Men inhabit an era and a place that I know. I feel like I'm filling gaps, getting glimpses of the backdrop to the earliest period of my life that I can remember.

I take it in, but always with skepticism. Are they getting it right? I hope they are. It's hard for me to say. The people of Mad Men are not the people of my childhood. We moved in different circles. Peggy's mother and sister are most like the people I remember from our apartment in Brooklyn. The cramped living spaces of their home and Peggy's are familiar. In these scenes and others I sometimes find myself looking at objects in the room with more care than at the characters that people those rooms. There's an odd comfort in things like the foldable wooden drying rack that Peggy uses, in a container of spices wearing the package I remember from our Brooklyn kitchen.

Style, in the sense of fashion, is another aspect of the same. I love the men's suits. The women, however, seem overdressed most of the time, which feeds my skepticism, a nagging skepticism I wish I could let go of. It's a shame Mad Men is not actually a show of the era. I wish there were no room for doubt. Perhaps it's no coincidence that the only other TV show I'm vaguely passionate about is the Dick Van Dyke Show. Likewise set in an office and in the homes of its main characters and again in New York in the early 1960s. The Dick Van Dyke Show, too, is a fiction, but at least we can be certain its props are period-correct--no room for doubt. I keep wondering if Rob and Laura Petrie will appear within Mad Men. That would be a nice touch. The Dick Van Dyke Show debuted in October 1961. Don and Betty could be watching it now--but it was slow to take off and it ran five years. There's time. What year is it in the Mad Men timeline? 1963? I noticed that the marriage of Roger's daughter is set for November 23.That won't go off well. JFK will have been assassinated the day before--the first day I remember in my own life.

Perhaps my fascination with the physical details allows me to be less concerned about the authenticity of the interpersonal relationships. I question these less, but I question them nevertheless--especially the office interactions. Would these people really have been as rude to each other as they sometimes are and then, upon next meeting, have behaved as if the slights were never delivered? Would the women really have been treated with so little respect? Are we being fed nothing more than stereotypes--pictures of what we think we already know about the 1960s?

There are so many loose ends. The most bothersome is the relationship between Pete and Peggy. Is Pete so dull that he is entirely unaffected by Peggy's revelation about her baby? Has he forgotten that she told him? He behaves as if he never heard the news. It was never clear what he felt about her in the first place--I'm as confused about that as Peggy herself was (at least while she seemed to care). Roger's health is another loose end. He had two heart attacks and nearly died, but he lives his life as if it never happened--still drinking, still smoking. His lifestyle choice is not the issue. Maybe a man in his position would choose to make no concessions, but he looks far too healthy for a man that has made that choice. What happened to the character that openly announced he was gay? He has disappeared. Where did Ken Cosgrove the short story writer go? There are others loose ends.

There are details that bother me--especially the airline crew in Episode 1 this season. Having been married to a stewardess--excuse me, a flight attendant--for 18 years, I know a thing or two about the habits of airline crew. I can't imagine they would have gone to dinner in their uniforms. Surely they would have checked in to their hotel rooms, changed, and then gone out again. No? A detail, but one that continues to bother me. I'll have to ask my father. He worked for British Airways (B. O. A. C.) through the 1960s and beyond. [Update: My father says this would have been normal until a somewhat later period. As stewardesses got a reputation for looseness, airlines apparently started forbidding them from wearing their uniforms except on the job and to and from the job. Interesting.]

Still, I enjoy watching the story lines unfold. We'll see where things go. We already know there will be a Season Four. I wonder if there will be a Season Five? I think that will depend on how well the creators transition from soap opera to something of a little more substance. [Still looking for an appropriate credit for the photo above, which, fairly obviously, is not by me.]

Miscellaneous: Super Bowl XLIII (2009)

It has come to my attention that tomorrow is Super Bowl day.

As that statement should make plain, it's been a long time since I paid much attention to football on a regular basis (think back to the Oakland Raiders in the days of Ken Stabler, Cliff Branch, and Fred Biletnikoff: Even then, I wasn't a Raiders loyalist, I just appreciate a fine passing game, and those guys had one). Still, I felt really out of it when I heard a couple of days ago that the Steelers would be playing the Arizona Cardinals tomorrow. Wait a minute. Isn't that the St. Louis Cardinals? And the Cardinals are a baseball team, aren't they? Well, whoever is playing and whatever sport they choose to play, I hope they have a good passing game. I'll be watching.