A List Of My Favourite Movies (now with links) :
Submitted by professor on Mon, 06/30/2003 - 10:18
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A List Of My Favourite Movies (now with links):
- Jesus Of Nazareth   (Robert Powell) - simply the greatest movie ever made - in every category.
- Romeo and Juliet (1968 Franco Zeffirelli version)
- The Outsiders (Matt Dillon, Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, Patrick Swayze, C. Thomas Howell, Ralph Macchio)
- Drugstore Cowboy (Matt Dillon, Kelly Lynch, Heather Graham, William S. Burroughs)
- St. Elmo's Fire (Demi Moore, Judd Nelson, Emilio Estevez, Andrew McCarthy, Rob Lowe)
- Rebel Without A Cause (James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo)
- Magic (Anthony Hopkins, Ann-Margret, Burgess Meredith)
- Remains of the Day (Anthony Hopkins, Emma Thompson, James Fox, Christopher Reeve, Hugh Grant)
- Howard's End (Emma Thompson, Anthony Hopkins, Vanessa Redgrave, Helena Bonham-Carter)
- Legends of the Fall (Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Aidan Quinn, Julia Ormond)
- Sense & Sensibility (Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Alan Rickman, Hugh Grant)
- Emma (Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeremy Northam, Ewan McGregor, Toni Collette, Greta Scacchi)
- Aliens-II (Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, Bill Paxton)
- Up In Arms - the genius that is Danny Kaye - also ceck-out 'Wonder Man'.
- Notting Hill (Hugh Grant, Julie Roberts, Gina McKee, Tim McInnerney, Alec Baldwin, Rhys Ifans)
- Heaven Can Wait (Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, James Mason, Jack Warden)
- Groundhog Day (Bill Murray, Andie MacDowell, Harold Ramis)
- Truly Madly Deeply (Juliet Stevenson, Alan Rickman. Bill Patterson, Michael Maloney, David Ryall)
- Rebecca (Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Judith Anderson, Nigel Bruce)
- Taxi Driver (Robert De Niro, Jody Foster, Cybill Shephard, Harvey Keitel)
- Heat (Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Val Kilmer, Jon Voight, Tom Sizemore, Ashley Judd)
- Pulp Fiction (Bruce Willis, John Travolta, Uma Thurman, Samuel L. Jackson, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth)
- Straw Dogs (Susan George, Dustin Hoffman, Peter Vaughan, David Warner)
- Big Boss (Bruce Lee)
- Enter the Dragon (Bruce Lee, John Saxon, Jim Kelly)
- Highlander (Christopher Lambert, Sean Connery, Clancy Brown, Beatie Edney)
- If ... (Malcolm McDowell)
- Clockwork Orange (Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Warren Clarke, John Savident, David Prowse)
- The Medusa Touch (Richard Burton, Lee Remick, Jeremy Brett, Derek Jacobi, Gordon Jackson)
- Villain (Richard Burton)
- Cromwell (Sir Richard Harris, Sir Alec Guiness)
- The Accountant (TV Film - Alfred Molina, )
- Absence of Malice (Paul Newman, Sally Field, Wilfred Brimley, Bob Balaban, Josef Sommer)
- Shoot The Moon (Albert Finney, Diane Keaton, Peter Weller, Karen Allen, Dana Hill)
- Field of Dreams (Kevin Costner, Ray Liotta, James Earl Jones, Burt Lancaster, Amy Madigan)
- Arthur (Dudley Moore, John Gielgud, Liza Minelli)
- The Fugitive (Harrison Ford, Tommy Lee Jones, Julianne Moore, Jeroen Krabbe)
- Spellbound (Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck) A fabulous movie.
Author Comments:
. . . in no particular order.
These are my favourites, rather than what I consider are the best all-time movies.
Comments welcomed.
- -
the
professor - -
Professor, have you seen Cold Comfort Farm or the BBC Pride & Prejudice with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle? If you liked Emma and Sense & Sensibility I don't see how you can go wrong with those two
I have not seen either Cold Comfort Farm or Pride & Prejudice as yet, but both are on my radar to watch out for - many thanks. The BBC have recently (in the last three months) introduced two new TV channels (on satellite only - BBC 3 and BBC 4), and I expect them to be showing many such treats in the near future (I hope). A few other prospects are also on my radar: Middlemarch and Persuasion - have you seen either of these?
Another of my favourite BBC productions is I, Claudius (I have the video set, and the book), and another on my radar is The Borgias (I have the book).
Have you seen Remains of the Day ? Too good to describe.
(Not strictly in the same category.)
I've seen both Persuasion and Remains of the Day, but both long enough ago that I should rewatch them. I haven't seen I, Claudius or The Borgias, which I'll have to check out. Thanks!
I saw 'Bruce Almighty' at the weekend which was truly excellent - it had everyone in stitches, and I could hardly breathe through laughing at one point. Highly recommended.
It may very well make my 'favourites' list in time.
Straw Dogs was on the TV at the weekend for the first time in over twenty years, in an 'edited for TV' version, having been banned for all of that time (here in the UK). Neither has it been available in video/DVD form until now.
A Clockwork Orange was in the same category until recently (a few months), when it was shown on TV.
Big Boss was on TV tonight.
I watched Truly, Madly. Deeply on UK TV last night - perfect.
I just had to add Pulp Fiction to the list.
Nice list!
I absolutly agree with you on:
Rebel without a Cause (three excellent actors: James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo)
Rebecca
Taxi Driver
A Clockwork Orange
If you liked 'Rebel Without A Cause', I can thoroughly recommend 'The Outsiders' (or even if you don't like 'Rebel Without A Cause') - the book by S. M. Hinton is also a joy.
Another recommendation is 'Truly Madly Deeply'.
I've added 'Heat', although I thought it was already on my list - I watched it again tonight on UK satellite TV.
cool your from the uk!! me too!! :)
Great list of movies here.
hi mate, just thought i'd say i have posted a reply to your question HERE sorry for the delay :)
I watched 'The Court Jester' (Danny Kaye) again yesterday (Christmas day), but it wasn't as good as I remembered it, so I've substituted 'Up In Arms' in its place.
I've added two more to this list:
Arthur (Dudley Moore, John Gielgud, Liza Minelli). Gielgud is utterly brilliant in this.
The Fugitive (Harrison Ford, Tommy Lee Jones). I'm not usually a big fan of Tommy Lee Jones, but for me he makes the movie in this. Most often the cops in this type of movie are made a fool of by the crook(s) or they are incompetent, but in this the cops are efficient (Jones in particular) and his authority is totally credible.
Over the last few days I watched Jesus Of Nazareth   starring Robert Powell, and directed by Franco Zeffirelli.   Made in 1977, it is a TV movie of six hours spread out over four parts.
The acting from the whole cast is awesome, Robert Powell is inspired (how could he not be), and inspiring, he is just perfect. The story is the greatest ever told, the direction from Zeffirelli is superb, the music, the costumes, the visuals . . . everything is perfect.   It is brimful with iconic images you only expect to see in Italian Rennaissance art.   An incredibly moving experience.
This has to be quite simply the greatest movie ever made, in every category.   OK, the editing on the TV version which I watched was not perfect - I videotaped this in 1988 from a TV repeat and have just watched it again.   Despite being made in 1977, it's production standards haven't aged at all, and it could have been made yesterday.
Cast includes:
Robert Powell ... Jesus Christ
Michael York ... John the Baptist
Olivia Hussey ... Virgin Mary
Anne Bancroft ... Mary Magdalene
Ernest Borgnine ... The Centurion
Claudia Cardinale ... The Adulteress
James Farentino ... Simon Peter
James Earl Jones ... Balthazar
Stacy Keach ... Barabbas
James Mason ... Joseph of Arimathea
Ian McShane ... Judas Iscariot
Donald Pleasence ... Melchior
Christopher Plummer ... Herod Antipas
Anthony Quinn ... Caiaphas
Fernando Rey ... Gaspar
Rod Steiger ... Pontius Pilate
Peter Ustinov ... Herod the Great
Cyril Cusack ... Yehuda the Rabbi
Ian Holm ... Zerah
John Duttine ... John the Evangelist
Simon MacCorkindale ... Lucius
Sir Ralph Richardson ... Simeon
Sir Laurence Olivier ... Nicodemus
Another point: The script is by Anthony Burgess. He later published the novel 'Man of Nazareth' based on his screenplay.
He also scripted 'A Clockwork Orange'.
For all of those who have not yet seen 'The Outsiders', here is yet another reason to watch it:
Sofia Coppola, daughter of the film's Director Francis Ford Coppola, and herself Director of 'Lost In Translation' and 'The Virgin Suicides', is in the cast as the 'Little Girl' (made in 1983).
OK. Here's a full list of the reasons why 'The Outsiders' is one of my all-time favourites, in very approximate order:
1. The story (of course), from the (brilliant) novel by a 16/17 year old S. E. Hinton. Reminiscent of 'Rebel Without A Cause' in some respects (but not the main story), it is about a gang of kids from the wrong side of the tracks (the 'Outsiders'). Two of the younger more vulnerable gang members (C. Thomas Howell, narrator and aspiring writer, and Ralph Macchio) are set upon by a rival gang (the rich kids / the 'Socs' / socialites), and heavily beaten up, but unfortunately one of the rich kids dies. The two kids go to one of their more senior gang members who they look up to (Matt Dillon in a James Dean style role), who gives them a gun and a few dollars and sends them away to hide out upstate, where he says he will meet them in a few days. They hide out, become heroes after saving some kindergarten kids, and the ending is extememly sad and poignant. There are many interesting sub-plots to this movie, all of which add to the affect, such as Ralph Macchio (or was it Emilio Estevez?) being beaten up by his father, C. Thomas Howell being looked after by his older brothers (gang leader Patrick Swayze and Rob Lowe) because their parents are dead and they're trying to keep the family together, a possible romance with the girlfriend of a rival gang member, a climactic rumble between the gangs, and a wild Matt Dillon always in trouble with the police. S. E. Hinton also wrote the novels upon which the films 'Rumble Fish', 'That Was Then This Is Now', and 'Tex' were all based. I also highly recommend the novel.
2. The cast. Whilst the main protagonists are C. Thomas Howell ('Ponyboy'), Ralph Macchio ('Johnny Cade') and Matt Dillon ('Dally'), the supporting cast (gang members and brothers) are unbelievable, they include a very young brat pack: Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe ('Sodapop'), Emilio Estevez ('Two-Bit Matthews'), plus musician, Tom Waits, novelist S. E. Hinton in a cameo role as a nurse in the hospital, and Sofia Coppola (herself later when older to Direct 'Lost In Translation' and The Virgin Suicides' - see above) as 'the Little Girl'.
3. The cinematography. Fabulous, images reminiscent of Gone With The Wind (but 40 years later).
4. The Theme song: Stevie Wonder should certainly have got the Oscar for his song 'Stay Gold' which opens the movie and sets the atmosphere from the outset, and also closes the sad ending, it is just exceptional.
5. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
You have a good mix of movies here. I loved Pulp Fiction in the theater, then never saw it again. I bought it a couple of years ago so that I could rewatch it, but a friend borrowed it and never returned it. He gave me U.S. Marshalls instead, which is definitely not a worthy replacement.
I think that Clockwork Orange sounds very intriguing, but I'm afraid I'd be too disturbed by it to thoroughly appreciate it. One of these days I'll have to see it, though.
US Marshalls was certainly a letdown after The Fugitive.
A Clockwork Orange is a cultish movie and won't appeal to everyone.
Malcolm McDowell made a trilogy of 'interesting' 70s movies in:
A Clockwork Orange
If ... (recommended)
Caligula
Tip: Watch 'The Outsiders' - my all-time favourite. Read the reviews.
Added   Spellbound   (Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck).
A fabulous movie, with 'spellbinding' performances from both Bergman and Peck.