Friday, February 8, 2013

More Movies You Should Watch

The Big Sleep (1946)

One of the most classically cool films ever made. Also, one of the sexiest. The plot is so famously convoluted that at the premier, director Howard Hawks realized he wasn't certain who killed a particular character. He asked screenwriter William Faulkner, who also wasn't certain.  Confusing?  Yes.  Does it matter?  No.  The dialogue is so damned cool that you don't care that you're confused.  Equally cool are the female characters, who are as far from simpering waifs as you can get.  Man or woman, this moive could be an instruction manual for how to be a bad ass.

Wait Until Dark

Audrey Hepburn plays a recently blinded woman who slowly comes to the realization that the guests in her home, claiming to be old friends of her husband, are in fact a group of thugs she is now forced to outwit.  It's a great classic suspense film that takes place entirely in the apartment.


Why are espionage movies better when set in Europe?  Narrow winding streets make for brilliant car chases.  Ronin follows a group of mercenaries hired by the IRA to steal a mysterious case from a Russian agent.  There's car chases, backstabbing, street doctors, sneaky plans, car chases, gunfights, and car chases.  Also, the movie never talks down to the audience. It's smart, tight, and exciting.  Did I mention the car chases?  They're really good.

1 comment:

  1. I started writing a reply to this all about Bogart, but I think it's worthy of its own post, so that's all I'm going to say here.

    I've not seen Wait Until Dark. I'm a sucker for limited set films (Rear Window, Twelve Angry Men, etc), so I'll have to check that out.

    Oh and Ronin was great too. :)