ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, December 21, 1996 TAG: 9612230125
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: C12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KATHERINE REED
Today, these are my favorite 10 movies ever. Tomorrow, the list would probably be slightly different. But at least five of them - the top five here - would retain their place on any day.
1. "M," directed by Fritz Lang, 1931. I saw this movie when I was about 10. I saw a restored print of it several months ago at Hollins College. There were no subtitles on the print, and I don't speak German, so I spent my time entirely with the images. This is the story of a murderer of children who is finally caught by the city's criminals and brought to justice at an underground tribunal. What still amazes me about this movie is its lighting, the long, silent chase scene and Peter Lorre's cry of agony to the assembled criminals, "You don't know what it's like!" It is still chilling, still beautiful.
2. "Jules and Jim," directed by Francois Truffaut, 1962. Starring Jeanne Moreau, this is the story of a French woman who can't decide between two men. So she doesn't. It's an intensely romantic, intensely French movie, and you can't beat the ending for holy mackerels.
3. "Some Like It Hot," directed by Billy Wilder, 1959. I love watching Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis dressed up as women fighting over Marilyn Monroe. It's so adorably perverse. And I can't resist rewinding during the scene in which they first spot Sugar (Monroe) jiggling down the train platform. "How does she DO that?" Lemmon's character asks with a new appreciation for the difficulties of walking in high heels. Curtis is dumbfounded, too. But with lust.
4. "Lawrence of Arabia," directed by David Lean, 1962. The final word in epics, as far as I'm concerned. I could listen to Peter O'Toole whisper the word "Akaba" from now until I'm 90. Plus, his blue eyes look great under a burnoose.
5. "It's A Wonderful Life," directed by Frank Capra, 1946. I know it's sentimental drivel, but I don't care. It's also an eternally entertaining movie, and I love James Stewart like nobody's business. If I didn't have this movie on my list, I'd have to substitute it with "The Philadelphia Story," also partly because of Stewart - once the movies' finest example of why a great sense of humor is sexy.
Here's where it gets more difficult the not so immovable five:
6. "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next," directed by Milos Forman, 1975. Watching Jack Nicholson, another national treasure, go to war with Nurse Ratchett (Louise Fletcher) is still cathartic. I like what this movie has to say about authority of a certain kind. And the fishing trip scene remains one of my favorites ever.
7. "Taxi Driver," directed by Martin Scorcese, 1976. My parents wouldn't let me see this movie when it came out, so I had to wait until I went away to school. They were right. It's a powerful, disturbing movie. Robert De Niro's "Are you talking to me?" bit has been parodied a million times, but it still makes me want to hide under a table.
8. "Cabaret," directed by Bob Fosse, 1972. Sometimes, a feeling for a film comes down to a single scene, and that's the case with this movie. It's the scene at the roadside biergarten (beer garden) in which a Nazi youth stands up and sings, "Tomorrow Belongs to Me," ending with a chilling salute to Der Fuhrer. (I'm also quite fond of Fosse's choreography and Liza Minnelli's performances at the Kit Kat Club.)
9. "Raising Arizona," by the Coen Brothers, 1987. "Got any balloons that make funny shapes?" "Not unless round's funny " I love the Coen boys. I loved their earlier movie, "Blood Simple" and I'm still taking apart "Barton Fink." But this is a comedy that I never get tired of. Nicolas Cage's cartoonish con, John Goodman's cornflake eating and Frances McDormand's overbite. I challenge anyone anywhere to beat this movie for laughs per minute.
10. "Burnt by the Sun," directed by Nikita Mikhalkov, 1994. This movie takes a tragedy of mythical proportions and makes it life-size and emotionally accessible in the four leading characters: a Russian revolutionary hero, his young wife, their beautiful daughter and his wife's former lover, now a member of Stalin's secret police. The ending to "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" briefly gave me the feeling that this film creates for its duration and that is of the painfully fleeting perfection of life.
So there it is. For today, at least.
You can talk to Katherine about movies online at KTR60@aol.com, or write her at The Roanoke Times, P.O. Box 2491, Roanoke, VA 24010.
LENGTH: Medium: 80 linesby CNB