30 Movies

Salon.com just came out with a list: 30 Movies to See Before You’re 30. Basically the argument is that you cannot be a functional American without having watched these movies. I’m a huge fan of old movies, and consider myself extraordinarily cinema-literate. But when my boyfriend and I started dating, he was appalled at the gaps in my movie viewing: “You’ve never seen The Godfather? Star Wars?” etc. In my defense, they are such cultural tropes that I was able to give him plot synopses, to recite lines, etc., but I’d just never bothered to sit down and watch them all the way through. Plus Hollywood just sort of ended for me in the late 60s.

I’ll turn thirty-one this Saturday. I still haven’t seen this whole list, and there’s no way I’ll have time to squeeze them in before my birthday. But here’s the list, and my run-down of what I’ve seen and not seen, with commentary. More…

1. Citizen Kane – Orson Welles, Joseph Cotton (1941). Seen it. Not a huge fan (but who is, really?) As far as Welles goes, I prefer F for Fake.
2. Casablanca – Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman (1942). Seen it a zillion times. Love it. One of those goodies that just gets better and better.
3. The Godfather – Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Robert Duval, James Caan (1972). Of course the boy sat me down with this one, as well as its sequels.
4. Some Like It Hot – Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Marilyn Monroe (1959). Seen it, mostly because it’s almost constantly running on PBS.
5. The Lady Eve – Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda (1941). Never saw it. But my favorite Stanwyck film is the brilliant screwball comedy Ball of Fire, a sort of Snow White story with Gary Cooper playing very much against type. I love seeing stars before they get typecast; Jimmy Stewart in After the Thin Man is another great example.
6. It Happened One Night – Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert (1934). Of course I’ve seen it. It’s the template for a zillion other movies. It’s also a great example of why romantic comedy and chick flicks are completely separate genres.
7. The Maltese Falcon – Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet (1941). Of course I’ve seen it. I lurve Peter Lorre.
8. Singing in the Rain – Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, Donald O’Connor (1952). Meh. Soooo overrated. If you must watch a Comden/Green musical, I recommend the highly underrated It’s Always Fair Weather. The dance numbers are about a zillion times splashier. Gene Kelley dances on roller skates, and Cyd Charisse will knock you out (literally!).
9. Duck Soup – The Marx Brothers (1933). I think I’ve seen bits of it on PBS.
10. Top Hat – Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers (1935). Cannot honestly recall.
11. The Graduate – Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft (1967). Totally seen it.
12. Gone With The Wind – Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh (1939). Yup. Plus, in seventh grade we had to read a civil war novel for English class, and I chose the 1300-page book. Nerd! One of my favorite references was in last season of Mad Men, when Sally wanted to go riding with her mom, and Birdie replied “Now, you remember what happened to that little girl in Gone With the Wind?” Hee!
13. The Searchers – John Wayne (1956). No, probably much to my dad’s chagrin (he’s a big Duke fan).
14. The Wizard of Oz – Judy Garland, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, Bert Lahr (1939). Hundreds, possibly thousands, of times. And every time I watch it, I just can’t believe how good it is. My dad’s cute story about this one is that he never ever knew, until he was dating my mom, that Oz was in color. His parents only had a black-and-white TV set growing up.
15. Psycho – Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh (1960). Yes. I can’t think of a single Hitchcock film I haven’t seen, though I wouldn’t rank this as the must-see-est of his.
16. The Philadelphia Story – Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, James Stewart (1940). Oh god yes! This is one of the greatest movies ever, another excellent example of non-chick-flick romantic comedy. I loaned my copy to my sister last year, and I think it changed her life.
17. The General – Buster Keaton (1927). No. I am woefully underexposed to Buster Keaton.
18. The Manchurian Candidate – Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh (1962). Yup; I had to watch this for a political philosophy class in college.
19. Raiders of the Lost Ark – Harrison Ford (1981). So obviously yes. Hundreds of times.
20. On the Waterfront – Marlon Brando, Rod Steiger (1954). Definitely.
21. To Kill a Mockingbird – Gregory Peck (1962). Oh, yes yes yes. I lurve Gregory Peck so much that I positively refuse to watch Boys From Brazil. And, for James: “Hey, Boo.”
22. Star Wars (aka Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope) – Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Alec Guinness (1977). Yes. I had a horrible flu over the summer, and my boyfriend spooled out the entire original trilogy. Somehow I’d managed only to see bits and pieces of each, never a sustained viewing of any single one. But I watched a couple of the made-for-TV Ewok movies as a kid. Which totally doesn’t count.
23. Raging Bull – Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty (1980). No, and I suspect this is probably on the boy’s short list of movies he’s going to make me watch as soon as he finds out I’ve never seen it.
24. City Lights – Charlie Chaplin (1931). Yes. This was another one (with Modern Times) that I watched for a college class. Although I think my favorite Chaplin film is probably The Great Dictator; what’s freaky about that one is that it’s a parody of the rise of Adolf Hitler, and a scientist in the movie exclaims that he’s invented a gas that will kill everyone—three years before construction started on the first death camps. Chaplin delayed the release of it because of WWII.
25. The Sting – Paul Newman, Robert Redford (1973). Yes. Adorable. Induces doofy can’t-stop-smiling. One of the utter best endings of any movie of all time.
26. Annie Hall – Woody Allen, Diane Keaton (1977). Yes. Ho-hum. Probably worth revisiting.
27. All About Eve – Bette Davis, Anne Baxter (1950). Yeah. I lurve Bette Davis, and this is probably one of my least favorite of her films, though. I’m more of a Now, Voyager, Baby Jane, Watcher in the Woods gal.
28. Young Frankenstein – Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, Madeline Kahn (1974). Of course. I’m a Mel Brooks fangirl, and there’s no shame in admitting that.
29. In the Heat of the Night – Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger (1967). Nope.
30. One Flew Over of the Cuckoo’s Nest – Jack Nicholson, Louise Fletcher (1975). YES! Brilliant.

So, twenty-four out of thirty. That’s about a B-. Not bad.