Favorite Films (lists up to participating site members)

[sdreid]

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.

[Steadmund Brand]

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

[Mayerling]

Hi Robert and GUT,

It was "Ladies Who Do". A marvelous small scale comedy of big impact, that the British are so good at. The way the charwomen and Morley become a kind of investment group is wonderful, as is how they keep teaching one lesson after another to this bumptious millionaire who wants to turn them out of their flats for some building project - and manage to demolish his prized limousine.

Moody was (besides being Fagin in "Oliver") Count Mountjoy, Prime Minister of Grand Fenwick in "The Mouse on the Moon".

Jeff

[Robert]

Hi Jeff and GUT

I think that one was called "Ladies Who Do." I re-watched it a couple of years ago. Good film, and a nice touch at the end when the now successful ladies have their waste-paper bins rummaged through by their charlady.

Ron Moody is a sheer delight, whatever he's in. I remember in one of the Margaret Rutherford Miss Marple films, where he plays the leader of a bunch of struggling actors, he dismisses Rutherford as having no future in the profession. Then she mentions that she has money, and he freezes in the act of donning his hat, his hat halfway en route to his head. In his final scene in the film, where he is in hospital with a broken leg, he greets Rutherford, makes a graceful gesture towards his plastered leg and says "You will forgive me if I do not rise."

[GUT]

Hi Robert,

There is also a pair of films "Make Mine Mink" with Terry-Thomas and Peggy Mount about the denizens of a boarding house who by accident become a successful fur gang. The other one (the name of which escapes me at this time) starred Robert Morley, as a clever but poor investment strategist, who discovers a way to great wealth through a bunch of charwomen who clean out the offices of various big businessmen. I wish I could recall that film, as it was clever, and Ron Moody had an early small but important role as a police officer who the charwomen manage to keep outmaneuvering.

Jeff

I remember the Morley one, but not the name, I'll see if I can find it, pretty sure we have it on DVD or more likely VHS.

[Mayerling]

Two more old British crime comedies : Crooks Anonymous - a thief addicted to crime seeks the help of an organization which claims it can reform him. And, The Big Job - a gang of crooks hide the loot from a bank robbery inside a hollow tree. When they come out of prison they find that the area has been developed and the tree is now a few feet inside the walls of the local police station.

Hi Robert,

There is also a pair of films "Make Mine Mink" with Terry-Thomas and Peggy Mount about the denizens of a boarding house who by accident become a successful fur gang. The other one (the name of which escapes me at this time) starred Robert Morley, as a clever but poor investment strategist, who discovers a way to great wealth through a bunch of charwomen who clean out the offices of various big businessmen. I wish I could recall that film, as it was clever, and Ron Moody had an early small but important role as a police officer who the charwomen manage to keep outmaneuvering.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

The original scarface is just incredible in fact it's damn perfect. Pacino does a good job of imitating muni. I love how Oliver stone is credited with writing scarface....the vital scenes are nearly exactly the same as the original all the day did was add a ton of filler, coke and cheesy 80s colors.

Larceny inc is great the idea of stuffing suitcases full of dirt from digging To the bank next door is just too funny. If you like little Caesar check out EGR as cobra collins in this gem: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IO4bYj85OK4

I love the original "Scarface", and still have not seen the remake with Pacino and "his leetle friend".

Two moments of comic joy stand out to me from "Larceny Inc." First Robinson and Crawford have gone for a discussion at a nearby greasy spoon where the counter man is a young Jackie Gleason. To get rid of him Robinson orders a cup of coffee. He and Crawford are discussing ways of getting the money for the purchase of the luggage shop, when Gleason returns smiling, and proudly puts down the cup in front of Robinson saying, "That gents is the best cup of coffee in town!!" Robinson and Crawford look at Gleason as though he's a simpleton, and poor Jackie walks away like "the poor soul".

The other moment is after Robinson has acquired the luggage shop and has a customer (something he really does not care about too much). The man has entered the shop, and asks the brilliant question, "Do you sell luggage here?" Robinson says (while pointing at the handbags and suitcases), "No, we keep all this stuff out for laughs!"

Jeff

[Robert]

Two more old British crime comedies : Crooks Anonymous - a thief addicted to crime seeks the help of an organization which claims it can reform him. And, The Big Job - a gang of crooks hide the loot from a bank robbery inside a hollow tree. When they come out of prison they find that the area has been developed and the tree is now a few feet inside the walls of the local police station.

[RockySullivan]

I love that you put obviously next to Scarface, I take it you agree with me that the De Palma Scarface is one the most overrated films, I have no idea why people love it so much, I just think it’s a bad film….

Also, I know it’s an over played film, but The Godfather really should be on any list of gangster films.. as I said, it’s become cliché and all, but think back to the first time you saw it… it’s a fantastic film really!!

Great list, but If I may I would like to add a few

1- Black Friday 1940- Lugosi and Karloff, written by Curt Siodmak (off the Wolfman fame) and hokey “gangster” dialog delivered in a Hungarian accent, what more could you want!!
2- The Criminal Code 1931- Non Horror Karloff role, interesting little film
3- Smashing the Rackets- 1938- Chester Morris not playing Boston Blackie!!
4- Miller’s Crossing-1990- there are some good modern films 
5- Get Carter-1971- Sorry this was a great film that DID NOT NEED A REMAKE!! And oh what a remake eh…if you didn’t see it consider yourself lucky!!
6- Performance- 1970- Ok this one is hard to put on the list, I know that it is not for everyone (none of my friends that I have shown it to have liked it) but I really dig this film, so I’ll add it, but if anyone searches it out, watches it and hates it, please don’t blame me.

Steadmund Brand

The original scarface is just incredible in fact it's damn perfect. Pacino does a good job of imitating muni. I love how Oliver stone is credited with writing scarface....the vital scenes are nearly exactly the same as the original all the day did was add a ton of filler, coke and cheesy 80s colors.

Larceny inc is great the idea of stuffing suitcases full of dirt from digging To the bank next door is just too funny. If you like little Caesar check out EGR as cobra collins in this gem: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IO4bYj85OK4

[Mayerling]

Another good caper movie, that "The Killers" with Burt Lancaster frequently hides from sight, is his later film, "Criss Cross" with Yvonne DeCarlo and Dan Duryea. It also deals with a carefully plotted crime that is destroyed by inter-gang problems.

[AlanG]

the Dark Knight, Captain Phillips, Jurassic Park, The Lion King & Toy Story

[sdreid]

Absolutely on Asphalt Jungle Jeff-a gangster film, a caper movie and a film noir all rolled into one. Louis Calhern should have gotten at least a nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

[Mayerling]

Gangster films involving crime planning

01) Asphalt Jungle
02) The Killing
03) High Sierra
04) The Killers (1946)
05) White Heat
06) Rififi
07) Topkapi
08) Desire (a comedy, but it has a clever jewelry heist at the start - with Dietrich as the thief)
09) Gambit (two films in one: Michael Caine outlining the perfect theft crime to John Abbott in the first twenty minutes, and ninety minutes of Shirley McClaine and Herbert Lom screwing it up).
10) The Hot Rock (Robert Redford, George Segal, Zero Mostel, trying to steal an important jewel, again, and again, and again....).

Sorry if I became a little facetious, but in thinking of all those "perfect crime" films, I began remembering (starting with "Topkapi" all the ones that start out well but get messed up.

Honorable mentions:

1) The Lavender Hill Mob
2) The Ladykillers (Bravo Mrs. Wilberforce!!!) (1955 version, naturally)
3) Larceny, Inc. (Undeservedly forgotten Robinson comedy in which he has to purchase a luggage shop to rob a bank vault, aided (?) by Broderick Crawford).
4) The Green Man (Alistair Sim finding his plot against Raymond Huntley being derailed by George Cole with or without the assistance of Terry-Thomas).
5) Babes in Toyland (1934) (when Stan and Ollie - all too briefly - try to burglarize Barnaby's home - "Christmas, in July?!")
6) The Wrong Arm of the Law (Peter Sellers and Lionel Jeffries - with Bernard Cribbins - going after a new gang dressed as policemen)
7) Two Way Stretch (Sellers and Cribbins again, assisted by criminal mastermind Wilfred Hyde White about a robbery with a perfect alibi - and Lionel Jeffries in pursuit this time).

[Steadmund Brand]

Favorite Gangsta flix:

Scarface (1932 obviously)
Little Caesar
Public Enemy
Lady Killer
angels with dirty faces
roaring Twenties
High Sierra
G-men
Little giant
Kiss tomorrow goodbye
Black Tuesday

I love that you put obviously next to Scarface, I take it you agree with me that the De Palma Scarface is one the most overrated films, I have no idea why people love it so much, I just think it’s a bad film….

Also, I know it’s an over played film, but The Godfather really should be on any list of gangster films.. as I said, it’s become cliché and all, but think back to the first time you saw it… it’s a fantastic film really!!

Great list, but If I may I would like to add a few

1- Black Friday 1940- Lugosi and Karloff, written by Curt Siodmak (off the Wolfman fame) and hokey “gangster” dialog delivered in a Hungarian accent, what more could you want!!
2- The Criminal Code 1931- Non Horror Karloff role, interesting little film
3- Smashing the Rackets- 1938- Chester Morris not playing Boston Blackie!!
4- Miller’s Crossing-1990- there are some good modern films 
5- Get Carter-1971- Sorry this was a great film that DID NOT NEED A REMAKE!! And oh what a remake eh…if you didn’t see it consider yourself lucky!!
6- Performance- 1970- Ok this one is hard to put on the list, I know that it is not for everyone (none of my friends that I have shown it to have liked it) but I really dig this film, so I’ll add it, but if anyone searches it out, watches it and hates it, please don’t blame me.

Steadmund Brand

[RockySullivan]

Favorite Gangsta flix:

Scarface (1932 obviously)
Little Caesar
Public Enemy
Lady Killer
angels with dirty faces
roaring Twenties
High Sierra
G-men
Little giant
Kiss tomorrow goodbye
Black Tuesday