Posted on October 3, 2009 at 8:00 am
Rotten Tomatoes salutes “Whip It” with a list of the best roller skating scenes in movies. My favorite is this one, with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers skating to “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off.”
And I also love Gene Kelly’s athletic tap dance on roller skates in “It’s Always Fair Weather.”
And also wonderful is Charlie Chaplin’s roller skating in “The Rink,” as graceful as dancing.
Posted on July 18, 2009 at 8:00 am
Another “moon” movie moment — Audrey Hepburn sings “Moon River” in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
Posted on March 14, 2009 at 8:00 am
Cinematical has a great tribute to one of my favorites, Doris Day’s “The Thrill of it All.” Day was so wholesome that it is easy to forget how talented she was, but she could do it all — sing, dance, act, and above all, she is one of the best light comediennes in Hollywood history. I love The Thrill of It All!
Day plays the wife of a successful obstetrician (James Garner) who becomes an accidental media sensation when she starts doing ads for “Happy Soap.” This creates enormous upheaval at home — it was the pre-feminist era, and the movie’s ending is so unabashedly sexist it will have you howling with either laughter or disbelief. But if that message is outdated, its commentary on the “organization man” and manipulative marketing still feels very apt. And it is always a blast to see two of Hollywood’s most gifted performers doing what they do better than just about anyone. Plus, Garner drives his car into a swimming pool. The witty screenplay was written by Larry Gelbart (“Tootsie,” the “M*A*S*H” television series) and Carl Reiner (“The Dick Van Dyke Show”), who appears in the clever trailer and the film, and the capable co-stars include Arlene Francis (who is adorable in the first scene as a wife with some very good news) and many of the top character actors and comics of the 1960’s.
Many thanks to my wonderful daughter for showing me this fabulous compilation of Day’s “mad” scenes.
Posted on February 8, 2009 at 10:00 am
On Idol Chatter, Kris Rasmussen has come up with a two-part list of haunting moments in movies that is well worth exploring and every one of the films and those added by the commenters is a worthy addition to your Netflix queue.
I like her definition of “haunting” — “cinematic points in time that bring revelation to our souls in some big or small way.”
The moments that haunt me tend to involve extraordinary kindness or devotion. Some that I would add:
1. The last moment in Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights
2. “Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father’s passin.'” In To Kill a Mockingbird
3. Helen Keller learns about language in The Miracle Worker
4. A family farewell in A Man for All Seasons
5. Erin Brockovich
Posted on January 30, 2009 at 11:12 am
Writing about the original version of “The Electric Company” reminded me of one of my all-time favorite short films by John and Faith Hubley, who later went on to work on the “Letterman” segments of that show. It is the story of two little girls playing and it is called “Windy Day.”
When the Hubleys began making films, animation was very structured and scripted. Their great innovation was the use of improvised dialogue and impressionistic images and the result was fresh, natural, innovative, and remarkably touching. In “Windy Day,” the dialogue is the private conversation of the Hubley daughters as they were playing. I first saw and loved it when I was just past the ages of those girls myself, and I thought of it often as I listened in on my own children at play.
The Hubleys created many more wonderful films, including “Everybody Rides the Carousel,” based on the work of Erik Erikson about the psychological stages of development, and “The Hat” about two border guards (played by Dudley Moore and Dizzy Gillespie) who argue over what they should do when one’s hat blows into the other’s territory.
