Save the Last Dance ? Really? Heh.

I did like Beautiful Girls.

Save the Last Dance ? Really? Heh.

My reaction exactly. Interracial romance and all, it was still an incredibly...um...standard bit of movieness. Though it did contain Julia Stiles giving the most earnestly white, WASPy read ever to the line, "Oh, I would never pop a cap in your ass!" Which is the first and the last time I've ever loved Julia Stiles.

Just saw Narrow Margin on TMC (they did a terrific day-long series of films set on trains) and it was amazing.

When Hec gets to work and has a moment to pop in, he'll be very happy about the Fire Walk With Me love.

I do remember Save the Last Dance being surprisingly watchable, and Sean Patrick Thomas being irresistable.

It was a good movie, yeah, but I wouldn't have considered it a "lost classic."

Oddly enough, I just read about Cockfighter yesterday.

I love this movie, but I'm all into Warren Oates.

There's some great movies on that list. I love The Swimmer, Safe, Ride Lonesome (anything by Budd Boettischer, really, but this one is one of the best), Cockfighter (natch), Wise Blood, and Two-Lane Blacktop (which is just astonishing and recommended to everyone who loves existential car race movies starring pop stars). Had no idea that anyone had made a movie of Housekeeping, a book that I love despite the troubling disconnect between Robinson's musical prose and her dull protagonist. I think y'all are right that some of those movies must be more underground across the pond, because quite a few don't seem so lost to me.

I like Save The Last Dance, but classic? Although I like Julia Stiles...she reminds me of myself if I could look elfin, that is.

erika, don't limit yourself to potatohead Stiles. Aim higher.

Interesting list. My favs on there would be:

Petulia (mod San Francisco, Julie Christie at her most radiant)
I Wanna Hold Your Hand (I bet Scrappy likes this)
Ace in the Hole (Jan Sterling has two all-time great noir lines in this movie. Billy Wilder scripted, 'natch.)
Top Secret (I desperately want the "Skeet Surfing" song. Val's unreasonably charismatic in this. His perfect trilogy is Top Secret, Real Genius and Tombstone.)
3 Women (Altman does Bergman's Persona. Shelley Duvall and Sissy Spacek are both fantastic)
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (as JZ notes I'm a fan. And as usual Frank and I share a movie brain. Sheryl Lee's performance ought to be legendary.)
A New Leaf (I love this movie and hardly anybody ever sees it. A great, quirky character driven comedy. If you love Walter Matthau you should watch this. If you don't love Walter Matthau - ptooie!)
Dreamchild (supercreepy Henson puppets. Young Peter Gallagher. Old Coral Browne. Rheumy and tortured Ian Holm. Coral Browne (Vincent Price's wife) had one of the all-time great put-downs: "Don't talk to me about writing! He couldn't write 'Fuck' on a dusty venetian blind!")
Breathless (of course, I love the original best, but this is an excellent pop art rock and roll version. It's got the Silver Surfer and X! C'mon. Tarantino is a big fan of this as well.)
Cutter's Way (Excellent 70s post-Watergate noir. It's on cable a lot. Do check it out)
Narrow Margin (Just saw this on TCM last week. Very taut cheapy thriller, with our favorite noir ballbuster, Marie Windsor.)
Wise Blood (Brad Dourif's greatest role! Perfectly cast. Doesn't quite get all the way to the book, because as Huston himself lamented, he didn't have Flannery's faith. Shot on the cheap and looks it. Awesome cast though).
Robin Hood (the Disney version is the ur-text for Furries, incidentally)

DH's interview wtih Guillermo del Toro is up! It's a really good interview, too -- he got to sit down one-on-one in person (as opposed to the usual press junket round-table situation), and Guillermo del Toro is made of so much awesome you just can't believe it. I want to live inside his head.

My favorite quote:

"People tend to think of genre as a lower form [of filmmaking] and I really don't. I believe genre movies are pure cinema, even the bad ones. In the history of film, George Méliès is more important than the Lumière Brothers and Thomas Edison to me. They made moving pictures, Méliès made films. Let me put it this way: Take all the motherfuckers that don't like genre movies, tie them to a chair for eternity and tell them, 'Do you want to watch the fucking train arriving at the station for the rest of your life or do you want to watch A Trip to the Moon?' I bet you'd find that they would pick Méliès."

What I particularly love about Beautiful Girls is that none of the actors in it were Big! Stars! at the time, although some have gone on to some level of Big! Stardom! since then (and then drifted back out). It's just such a nice little self-contained movie.

And I agree that it's still probably Natalie Portman's best performance to date.