'Safe'
A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.
This should come as a surprise to no one, but The Wild Bunch is pretty much my favorite movie and I believe that, like it or hate it, everyone should watch it once.
Also, I love On The Waterfront, despite its convoluted relationship with McCarthyism.
I hate Forrest Gump because I don't like Forrest the character. Actually the book wasn't half bad but the movie just...ugh.
My understanding (second hand) is that one of the main tidbits from the book that the movie leaves out is that Forrest has a HUUUUUUUGE cock, and that's why Jenny sleeps with him, and why she decides to stay with him at the end.
12 Angry Men is deinitely on the list
That is one of the best plays/movies ever, and should be seen by everyone. Sure, gaping legalistic holes, but amazing.
Also, seekrit message to Kathy A: ludfisk breath.
Huh. I had 12 Angry Men in my Netflix queue. Of course there are 400+ others in there too, but at least it's definitely on my list.
I've seen 72 of the 100 (including, oddly, 4 of the 5 on Hec's not-seen list -- Raging Bull being the exception). My gaps are mainly the newer ones, war, and Westerns.
I second what everyone has said about Sturges and will even say that Sullivan's Travels is not the one Sturges to have if you're having only one. Or even two. (I'd go with Palm Beach Story and Miracle of Morgan's Creek first.)
I used to love 12 Angry Men, but it doesn't hold up for me any more. It seems overly stagey.
I'd go with Palm Beach Story and Miracle of Morgan's Creek first.
I'd go Lady Eve, then PBS, then Unfaithfully Yours, then Sullivan's Travels, then Morgan's Creek.
I found 29 movies on each list that I love and would keep on my own personal list. Each list has 3/19 unique to it, so that's 32% agreement between me and the AFI. I hope someone is keeping notes.
I saw Citizen Kane as a pre-teen, and I think I rate it more boring than the Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton Cleopatra, which is nowhere on the list. Of course, I was 10 at the time.
The movie high on the list that I am unsure of is Schindler's list. I mean, it makes me cry. It moves me. I quite love how the war/Nazi occupation brings out the good in one very ordinary man and the bad in another. But I hate the girl in the read coat. Hate, hate, hate.
I saw Citizen Kane in senior year of high school and loved it. It was my first film class, and I think it just astounded me that one of them old black-and-white movies could have such an interesting narrative style.
I first saw Casablanca as a senior in high school and thought it came across as incredibly cliched. Saw it again a few years later after realizing that it was the source of a lot of the cliches as well as learning a lot more in-depth about the era. That's when I realized that it's a masterpiece of its kind.