Movies about food
Ratatouille
Pixar’s love-letter to French cuisine
Chef
Favreau takes break from blockbusters
The Menu
Sins revealed, punished, by chef
Next: Movies About Rural Living
Bad Day at Black Rock
Nobody wants Spencer Tracy around
In the Heat of the Night
“They call me Mister Tibbs!”
Doc Hollywood
Dr. Stone’s stuck in Grady
Next: More movies about rural living
Cars
Doc Hollywood on four wheels.
Witness
Ford, while hiding, helps Amish.
Field of Dreams
Ballpark in cornfield? They’ll come.
Next: Movies based on actual historical events
Glory
Black troops help crush slavery
Iron Jawed Angels
Suffragists struggle for voting rights
All the Way
Cranston is great as LBJ
Next:
Movies that get history wrong
Anastasia
DNA says that she isn’t.
Birth of a Nation
Historical film; terrible history lesson.
JFK
Maybe least accurate film ever.
NEXT: Fiction people think is true
The Sound of Music
Rode a train into Switzerland
Argo
Canadian embassy’s part is downplayed
Chariots of the Gods
The answer to everything: Aliens!
Next: Movies by Sofia Coppola
The Virgin Suicides
Sisters have some big problems
Lost in Translation
Lonely wife, washed-up star bond
The Beguiled
Downbeat Civil War feminist drama
Next up:
Movies costarring actors better known as a directors
Eyes Wide Shut
Sydney Pollack as Victor Ziegler
The Village
Director played a park ranger
Pulp Fiction
Tarantino’s Jimmy shelters “the dorks”
Next: Movies with large groups of children as central characters
Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
Golden Tickets reveal true character(s)
Weapons
Kids disappear; school-shooting horror parable?
Lord of the Flies
Civilization’s veneer is very thin
Next:
Movies focusing on old people
Movies focusing on old people
Driving Miss Daisy
Black chauffeur drives Jewish widow
Cocoon
Oldsters are revitalized by aliens
Grumpy Old Men
Feuding neighbors make lives miserable
Next: Movies With Unlikeable Protagonists
Payback
Coolest antihero ever, I’d say!
Best in Show
Everyone is totally annoying. Everyone.
Wall Street
Entitled douchebags, white-collar criminals abound.
Next up:
Movies about people who are pure at heart but not annoying
Mr. Smith Goes To Washington
Idealistic Senator fights government corruption
Mr. Deeds Goes To Town
Smalltown millionaire helps poor farmers
Mulan (1998)
Woman fights for family, country
Next:
Movies Starring Jimmy Stewart
Rear Window
First base with Grace Kelly
Harvey
Overly referenced in subsequent movies
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
Rare billing above John Wayne
Next: John Ford movies
The Tornado
His first (1917); now lost
Napoleon’s Barber
His first talkie, also lost
The Battle of Midway
He was wounded while filming
Next up:
More John Ford movies
Up the River
Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart debuts
How Green Was My Valley
First Oscar for Best Director
Donovan’s Reef
Ford’s last with the Duke
Next: Even more John Ford movies
My Darling Clementine
Col. Sherman Potter’s favorite film
They Were Expendable
PT boats, but no JFK
Chesty
Not about what you think!
Next up:
Alex Proyas films
Knowing
It’s better not to know
I, Robot
You, Sonny, learns to wink
Dark City
Beware the Strangers wearing trenchcoats
Next: A24 movies
Midsommar
Not the nicest cult around
Ex Machina
Beautiful robot is tough cookie
Civil War
America in, say, five years?
Next up:
Less-well-known Spencer Tracy movies
Dante’s Inferno
Bribe, suicide, trial, start over!
Fury
Loosely based on Leo Frank.
The Sea of Grass
High-grossing, but not very well-remembered.
NEXT: US films of Fritz Lang
The Big Heat
Tough cop takes on gangsters
Man Hunt
In crosshairs? Der Fuhrer himself
Contempt
Ol’ Fritz appears as himself
Next up:
More US films of Fritz Lang