Favorite Films (lists up to participating site members)

[Mayerling]

The Cat And The Canary (Bob Hope) was a decent mystery.

And a funny one - Hope was good with both of his co-stars, Paulette Goddard and Willie Best, whom Hope later would say was one of the hardest working comic actors he ever appeared in a film in. I know that actors like Best and Lincoln Perry "Stepp'n Fetchit" are stereotypes, but if you watch them carefully they frequently show more common sense than the supposedly smarter "white folks".

Jeff

[Mayerling]

Hi Jeff

You could have got even by waiting till Columbo was due on, and then telling your sister "I've seen that one. I know how it begins....."

Re the shooting, as is normal with human beings if something can happen, it will happen : a Texas man called Jim Saunders was shot in the head and has had a bullet lodged in his brain for more than thirty years.

Hi Robert,

Re Columbo: Lee moved out of the apartment by the time that series was on television, so I was out of luck with that clever idea you suggested.

The sad death of Leonard Nimoy recently made me aware again of how the many guest stars on that show have passed in recent years, especially the antagonists. Falk himself died (tragically with Altzheimer's) a number of years ago. Among the guest antagonists now gone are (besides Nimoy), Anne Baxter, Ray Milland, Jackie Cooper, Patrick McGoohan (in several great episodes), Robert Culp (likewise in several episodes), Jack Cassidy (not only in several episodes, but also tragicaclly decades ago in a fire), Ricardo Montalban, Leslie Nielsen, Anne Francis, Sal Mineo (ironically, himself a murder victim in the series and in real life), Johnny Cash, Ida Lupino, Roddy MacDowell, James Gregory, Richard Kiley, Juliette Mills, Dick Sargent, Nancy Walker, Donald Pleasance, Ruth Gordon, and many others. That's one of the less pleasant aspects of viewing any old film or television series - the memento mori that crops up.

As for the matter of the man who had a bullet in his head for thirty years and lived, the question is - did the bullet improve anything?

Jeff

[Robert]

The Cat And The Canary (Bob Hope) was a decent mystery.

[Steadmund Brand]

Mayerling.. wow what a list....I was thinking what I could add to it...the only one I could think of that wasn't there is the BBC version of Rogue Male with Peter O'toole (1976)... I know it is more of a chase film.. but the story is about a man's failed attempt to shoot Hitler...fun film that suprisingly few people remember ( see.. this is a " re-make" that wasn't bad.. because it wasn't a true re-make of Man Hunt ( the Fritz Lang film from the early 40's I believe, can't remember for sure)

Oh how I love this thread!!!


Steadmund Brand

[Robert]

Hi Jeff

You could have got even by waiting till Columbo was due on, and then telling your sister "I've seen that one. I know how it begins....."

Re the shooting, as is normal with human beings if something can happen, it will happen : a Texas man called Jim Saunders was shot in the head and has had a bullet lodged in his brain for more than thirty years.

[Mayerling]

Hi Jeff

Yes, Marriott was a delight. "Next train's gone."

The film with Peck and Bergman was called Spellbound. Bergman gets a lot of lecturing from her old professor on the need for her, as a woman, to keep her emotions in check. The ending has the gun turning 180 degrees and shooting its owner (I won't say the name in case anyone reading this hasn't seen it). I don't know whether that had ever been done before, or whether it was Hitchcock's own idea.

I have a funny story about "Spellbound" (and thank you for naming that film). It has to do with exactly with your action of withholding the name of the killer. Years ago I was watching the television in my apartment when my sister and I were living with our parents. Lee wanted to see something on the set, and I was watching "Spellbound". It turned out she had seen it. Lee frequently does twisted things when she thinks of it. As she left the room, noting how intently I was watching the film, she said out loud, "Blank Blank is the killer!!" Of course it was "Blank Blank". I did not feel like saying anything polite to her for awhile.

The interesting thing about that business with the gun turning 180 degrees. It was not the performer's hand when the sequence was shot, but a model of the hand holding the gun. Hitchcock explained it to Francois Truffault in the interview book "Hitchcock/Truffault" published in the late 1960s. The hand pivots mechanically, and faces the holder who supposedly fires it to commit suicide. Then there is a momentary splash of red in the film, supposedly blood from the bullet (if you recall "Spellbound", despite the Dali artwork, was a black and white film, so the effect was to be an additional jolt. My own problem with that is that if one fires a shot into one's head, I doubt if the brain will register seeing blood. But then, since the proof is a deadly type of experiment we won't perform, who knows?

Jeff

[Robert]

Hi Jeff

Yes, Marriott was a delight. "Next train's gone."

The film with Peck and Bergman was called Spellbound. Bergman gets a lot of lecturing from her old professor on the need for her, as a woman, to keep her emotions in check. The ending has the gun turning 180 degrees and shooting its owner (I won't say the name in case anyone reading this hasn't seen it). I don't know whether that had ever been done before, or whether it was Hitchcock's own idea.

[Mayerling]

Hi Jeff

Maybe add Dial 'M' for Murder to the list.

The Ladykillers isn't really a perfect murder scheme, is it, more like a perfect robbery leading to an extremely imperfect murder.

I see you have Green For Danger on the list. Wonderful performance by Sim, and a non-Harbottle appearance by Marriott. Also a great line about laughing gas - 'the laughter is caused by the impurities' - 'rather like our modern music halls.'

Hi Robert,

I failed to recall several films, and "Dial 'M' for Murder" was one. Another Hitchcock film I can't recall the name of is with Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman about psychiatry and murder and Salvador Dali did some of the art backgrounds in it. It has a single word title, and I can't recall it. Such is memory.

The reason I did include "The Ladykillers" was that when the Professor and his gang start thinking of silencing the extremely moral Mrs. Wilberforce, Guinness says to the others, "It should look like an accident". Unfortunately the only one who could adequately get rid of her (Lom) is not all that keen on it as it turns out.

I do like many of Sim's films (and this goes far beyond his definitive Scrooge). "Green For Danger" is not his only film as a policeman or detective. Another good one, but not in the area of perfect crimes or planned crimes, is "An Inspector Calls" where he is that interesting Inspector Goole.

As for Marriott, it is interesting seeing him in a fairly straight (if brief) part in "Green For Danger", but his "Harbottle" against (it seems hardly fair to say "with") Will Hay is a marvel. There is a bit in the film "Ask A Policeman", where he is playing his own father, and Hay, trying to get some information from him, reassures him, "Don't you worry about this news from Balaclava." He is there to get the correct conclusion of a quadrain that will explain where a smuggler's lair is from centuries back. Marriott is reciting it in and "abab" rocking horse meter, and then blasts off with a final line explaining the location but it doesn't scan properly, and Hay starts forgetting his purpose and becomes a literary critic!

Jeff

[Robert]

Hi Jeff

Maybe add Dial 'M' for Murder to the list.

The Ladykillers isn't really a perfect murder scheme, is it, more like a perfect robbery leading to an extremely imperfect murder.

I see you have Green For Danger on the list. Wonderful performance by Sim, and a non-Harbottle appearance by Marriott. Also a great line about laughing gas - 'the laughter is caused by the impurities' - 'rather like our modern music halls.'

[Mayerling]

List for "Perfect Murder"/Murder Plot films

I didn't mind 12 and 13 or even the remake of 11 but just as Smiths Chips, used to say in an ad here in Aus

"The Original and the Best"

G'Day GUT,

I'm guessing "Smiths Chips" are potato chips. My question now is are they the best?

I thought of a new list, given we just crime capers: Movies about murder plots or attempts at Perfect Murders. This can include assassination schemes.

Assassination Schemes:

The Tall Target
Prince of Players
The Conspirator
Prisoner of Shark Island
We Were Strangers
Julius Caesar (1950 version)
Cleopatra (1934)
Cleopatra (1963)
JFK
Suddenly
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
Nine Hours to Rama
Gandhi
Hitler's Madman
Hangman Also Die
Guns of Zangara* [*Originally a two part television episode on "The Untouchables" but later released as a film]
The Day of the Jackel
The Three Musketeers (1948)
The Three Musketeers (1975)
Becket
Richard III (1955)
Malcolm X
Michael Collins
Beloved Enemy
The Assassination of Jesse James...By the Coward Bob Ford
Jesse James
Nicholas and Alexandra
Rasputin and the Empress
Viva Zapata
Macbeth (1949)
Macbeth (1969)
Caligula

"Perfect Murder" Schemes:

Woman of Straw
The Verdict (1948)
Man in a Cloak
The Lady From Shanghai
Experiment: Perilous
Return From the Ashes
And Then There Were None
The List of Adrian Messinger
The Naked Truth (Admittedly a comedy - but look at the plots planned against Dennis Price's blackmailer)
The Green Man
The Ladykillers (1955)
High Anxiety
The Wrong Box (Technically not a murder - but the disposal of unwanted bodies)
Weekend at Bernie's
The Trouble With Harry
Rear Window
Vertigo
Suspicion
Shadow of a Doubt
Strangers on a Train
Stage Fright
Gaslight
Mr. Denning Drives North
Love From a Stranger
Green is For Danger
Touch of Evil
The Three Cases of Murder ("Lord Mountdrago" section)
The Third Man

Jeff

[GUT]

G'Day GUT,

I think that it's because Sinatra and his pals were not taking themselves seriously through most of the picture. Clooney and his crew were - otherwise why did they bother making two sequels (and probably another is on the board somewhere).

Jeff

I didn't mind 12 and 13 or even the remake of 11 but just as Smiths Chips, used to say in an ad here in Aus

"The Original and the Best"

[Mayerling]

G'day Jeff

Funny you mention Oceans 11, I only watched the original last weekend, it was on one of the lesser TV channels.Whilst I thought the remake was OK the original was brilliant.

G'Day GUT,

I think that it's because Sinatra and his pals were not taking themselves seriously through most of the picture. Clooney and his crew were - otherwise why did they bother making two sequels (and probably another is on the board somewhere).

Jeff

[GUT]

Hi Stan,

One of my favorite caper films was the original "Ocean's Eleven" with Sinatra, Martin, Davis, Lawford, Conte, Romero, and a cameo by Shirley MacLaine. I have watched parts of the remake and sequels with Clooney and Pitt, but the original was just about perfect to me. For one thing, except for the business of Richard Conte's health, it did not take itself too seriously. Even "retired" elder Mob statesman Cesar Romero seems to be enjoying himself in his part.

Joey Bishop (as part of Sinatra's "Rat Pack") was in "Ocean's Eleven". Bishop was also in a cute comedy with Jim Hutton, Walter Brennan, Milton Berle, Jack Gilford, Bob Denver, Victor Buono, a young Jamie Farr, and I believe Dorothy Provine, called "Whose Minding the Mint" (1967) directed by Howard Morris (of "Your Show of Shows" fame). The plot dealt with Hutton, facing a possible investigation about his finances (he works for the U.S. Treasury Department's printing division), who discovers that he has accidentally caused one million dollars to be destroyed, and has to get together a band of men to print an unplanned million in currency to cover the loss. Initially he was thinking that one or two people might be sufficient, but the plan unfortunately mushrooms, and involves getting Gilford a hearing aid, using boats to transport everyone through a sewer, and using Denver to romance a young woman so she can't be at her window watching a courtyard where the gang has to enter and leave the sewer. It is not a great comedy but it is amusing.

Jeff

G'day Jeff

Funny you mention Oceans 11, I only watched the original last weekend, it was on one of the lesser TV channels.Whilst I thought the remake was OK the original was brilliant.

[Mayerling]

My favorite caper movie, if you consider it such, would be 21 about the MIT Blackjack Team that gave Vegas fits counting cards back in the 80s.

Hi Stan,

One of my favorite caper films was the original "Ocean's Eleven" with Sinatra, Martin, Davis, Lawford, Conte, Romero, and a cameo by Shirley MacLaine. I have watched parts of the remake and sequels with Clooney and Pitt, but the original was just about perfect to me. For one thing, except for the business of Richard Conte's health, it did not take itself too seriously. Even "retired" elder Mob statesman Cesar Romero seems to be enjoying himself in his part.

Joey Bishop (as part of Sinatra's "Rat Pack") was in "Ocean's Eleven". Bishop was also in a cute comedy with Jim Hutton, Walter Brennan, Milton Berle, Jack Gilford, Bob Denver, Victor Buono, a young Jamie Farr, and I believe Dorothy Provine, called "Whose Minding the Mint" (1967) directed by Howard Morris (of "Your Show of Shows" fame). The plot dealt with Hutton, facing a possible investigation about his finances (he works for the U.S. Treasury Department's printing division), who discovers that he has accidentally caused one million dollars to be destroyed, and has to get together a band of men to print an unplanned million in currency to cover the loss. Initially he was thinking that one or two people might be sufficient, but the plan unfortunately mushrooms, and involves getting Gilford a hearing aid, using boats to transport everyone through a sewer, and using Denver to romance a young woman so she can't be at her window watching a courtyard where the gang has to enter and leave the sewer. It is not a great comedy but it is amusing.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

I feel so ripped off being an American that the smaller British films never make it over here.. and my all region DVD player has died.. so ordering many of these films is impossible for me... I feel like I miss out on some amazing stuff....if only we lived in a region free dvd world

Larceny Inc... wow... I have not seen that film in so many years I almost forgot about it (ok not almost.. I did) That I will be watching again very soon!!!

Mayerling... great call on The Killers.. another film I love that few seem to remember.. oh this thread brings back so many good memories.....

I just read that there is a remake in the works for the film Going In Style (with George Burns, Art Carney and Lee Strasberg) staring Dustin Hoffman, Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine.. three actors I really like, and a film that I love.. so I ask... WHY WHY WHY.. THIS REMAKE STUFF HAS TO STOP!!!! I just can't imagine this having the same heart as the first.. but I'm sure they will throw in all kinds of witty "I'm so old " jokes to make for a good 2 minute trailer... oh well.. what else is new..


Steadmund Brand

Hi Steadmund,

The Killers is one of those multi-layered story tales where the kernel at the center is only revealed at the tail end when Edmond O'Brien finally learns why Lancaster was killed (which is like a final twist in the story the viewer is not totally prepared for). It was an excellent introduction for Lancaster on screen and had a wonderful cast (besides him and O'Brien, Ava Gardner, Albert Dekker, Sam Levine, Donald MacBride, William Conrad, Charles McGraw) and certainly kept the right down-beat mood to the end.

Frequently the Turner Classic Movie network shows it and other film noir movies (and other in general) that are not seen elsewhere. Last night they showcased Ann Southern (their star of the month) in "Nancy Goes to Rio", which I had never seen. And they have been showing a number of Disney films this month too - I finally saw "The Three Cabilleros" on Sunday night.

Jeff