Jackson Heights Life

Any B Grade horror flick is a great watch.  If you remember the show Chiller Theater you can watch the shows opening video on this link

http://www.chillertheatre.com/main.htm

The American Film Institute has created a list of America's 10 greatest films within 10 classic genres.  Below is the list of genres along with the names of the movies listed at the #1 spot:

• Animation:  Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
• Romantic Comedies:  City Lights
• Westerns:  The Searchers
• Sports:  Raging Bull
• Mystery:  Vertigo
• Fantasy:  The Wizard of Oz
• Sci-Fi:  2001: A Space Odyssey
• Gangster:  The Godfather
• Courtroom Drama:  To Kill a Mockingbird
• Epic:  Lawrence of Arabia

Check-out AFI's website to see the entire listings.

AFI's 10 Top 10

Maybe I was too young when I saw it but I thought "2001 a Space Odyssey" was a bore.

Maybe I was too young when I saw it but I thought "2001 a Space Odyssey" was a bore.

eddie, here's a review that I thought you'd like:

A film review by Chris Barsanti - Copyright © 1999 Filmcritic.com
This isn't to say that the complainers are wrong: 2001 certainly is a colossal bore, unless you're on its wavelength, in which case it's one of the greatest films of all time.

The arguments over the film's meaning or whether or not it deserves the hallowed level of critical regard wherein it currently resides are beside the point not just because they are quite impossible to prove one way or the other, but for one reason in particular: Nobody having seen 2001 has ever quite been able to forget it. Even now, some four decades on, when the optimistic buzz of the space race has drifted away and we're awash in films whose special effects dwarf the imaginations of an earlier Hollywood, and our media-saturated selves have been assaulted by more homages and parodies than one can even begin to count, there is still nothing quite like the film's opening, with the sun and crescent moon perfectly aligned and the soundtrack blasting Wagner's "Also Sprach Zarathustra."


I loved it.  Classic Kubrick.   

Thanks for posting that Eddie!  You know, I can't remember how many times I stayed up late as a kid to watch Chiller Theater.  I just noticed now that the chiller hand has 6 fingers!  Aghhh...they don't make them like they used to.  :rockon:

I never knew it had six fingers either until last year.  I was parked in NJ and I found a flyer on my windshield for a Chiller Theater expo in Paramus. I searched their web site and found the video clip.   I couldn't stop laughing when I saw it.  Everything has a cult following I guess.  I wish there was a DVD with the Chiller Theater movies.  There was also another show on either channel 9 or 11 called "Creature Features" around the same time.  You're right they don't make them like they used to.

LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL is a beautiful film.  Now that I think of it, there are a lot of Italian films that I've loved in the past.  The ones I can remember now are AMARCORD, BICYCLE THIEVES, LAST TANGO IN PARIS, CINEMA PARADISO, THE GARDEN OF THE FINZI CONTINIS, SWEPT AWAY..., SEVEN BEAUTIES and there are others but I'm getting sleepy.

Lately I’ve been discovering “new” movies that make me wonder why they’ve been hiding from me for so long.  Or at least that’s the justification I’ve been using to explain why I haven’t seen some venerable classics yet.   My latest discovery is a Billy Wilder movie called Witness for the Prosecution, starring Charles Laughton, Tyrone Power (I think this may have been his last movie performance), Marlene Dietrich, Elsa Lanchester and a few easily recognizable character actors such as Una O’Connor, the maid from the horror classic The Bride of Frankenstein.   Based on an Agatha Christie story, the movie is a courtroom drama that also offers a few laughs via the relationship of a cranky English barrister and his obsessive live-in nurse.

Charles Laughton is convincing as the curmudgeon Sir Wilfred, whom against doctor’s orders, has decided to take on one last criminal case.  He’s supposed to be convalescing from a recent hospital stay due to a heart attack.  Lanchester plays his nurse that is just as stubborn in her overbearing and comical treatment of his medical condition.  Tyrone Power is the defendant accused of murdering an older woman whom he’s been frequenting unbeknownst to his wife, played by Marlene Dietrich, the prosecution’s main witness.

This is a whodunit, comedy and suspense filled drama all rolled into one great movie.  The plot has twists and turns and the ending even has a surprise built in.  Needless to say, the acting is as noteworthy as the movie.   Suspenseful and fun to watch!