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A Trash talk post led me conclude you Philistines need someone to provide the touchpoints necessary for a decent understanding in motion picture entertainments. I'm handpicking 10 films per time period--I might not limit myself to decades or anything, but contiguous time periods. These are films I like. Expect it to be short on musicals, which I loathe.
This one will mostly be films from the 60's with maybe a little hint of the 50's and 70s. The Hays Code starts to fray and adult topics could be treated in an adult manner. The industry had absorbed the lessons of Capra, Cukor, Hitchcock, Ford, Welles, and Huston. The studio system dissolves. The Stanislavski System gains prominence. A lot was changing in the industry, and it shows up on the screen.
2001: A Space Odyssey -- A triumph. This is the finest film ever made. It has a vision and breadth that is lampooned more than emulated because it is so singular. The only movie even trying to come close is TREE OF LIFE or perhaps some of Herzog's work.
8½ -- The prototype "behind the scenes" pseudo bio pic. There was a comment on the pre-1960s list that I needed some Fellini. Here ya go. This movie wraps around itself in some interesting ways. You need to have seen some good films before watching this one to really get how good it is. It's meticulous and perfect.
Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb -- Kubrick hits it out of the fucking park. Sellers is triply cast and stellar throughout. A ripsnorting laugher about nuclear war. Perfectly cast.
Lawrence of Arabia -- If you can see a revival of this in the theater in 70mm--do this. Travel an hour to see it. Maybe two. It's remarkable. This movie more than others on the list loses something in the transition to home viewing. When Sherif Ali appears out of the desert you just can't fucking believe the balls of David Lean. He must have had a wheelbarrow to carry them around.
The Seventh Seal -- Art film warning! Art film warning! A crusader plays chess with Death as the plague ravages his homestead. Bergman made the best films of the late 50s and early 60s, but you can only be asked to take so much. His films have a luminescent quality even among black-and-white classics. If this is too much high school symbolism flashback for you, see THE VIRGIN SPRING.
The Graduate -- This is the first post-modern comedy. It was not sold as a comedy and folks weren't even sure if they were supposed to laugh. Still works today and Dustin Hoffman is great. Also features overlapping dialogue that became much more of thing with Robert Altman in the 1970s.
Cool Hand Luke -- I could watch this on a loop all day. Paul Newman is amazing. I can't really put my finger on why this movie is so good. I don't know how this looked on paper, but it is a masterpiece in execution.
Peeping Tom -- There are some really solid horror movies to choose from, and I am sure folks will call their favorites out below. This one is mine. Chilling movie, so well done. Shameful shameful end to Powell's career--he managed to creep himself right out of film making. The build-up and denouement are exquisite. It makes you uncomfortable as a viewer on multiple levels.
The Battle of Algiers -- Intense and real in a way that other films can't touch. You are in the thick of an insurgent war and it's tough to root for anyone. The documentary feel has been copied again and again in the modern era. Unique for the time.
The Apartment -- Billy Wilder finally gets to spread his wings a little and get away from campy cross-dressing romps into something a little more real and naughty. I think he felt really hamstrung by the Hays Code, and that you could seem to talk about infidelity only as something to kill a person for, but not something to play for laughs. As the 50's waned, Wilder waxed.
See the 1970s list here.
See the 1980s list here.
