# Help me curate my at-home birthday film festival **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [December 15, 2020, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113 "2020-12-15T17:31:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Nonsuch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nonsuch/32/2922_2.png) [@Nonsuch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nonsuch)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/1 "2020-12-15T17:31:32Z")
My birthday is next week, and owing to pandemic blah blah blah, I can’t really go anywhere or do anything to celebrate. So I’m having an at-home film festival. I am planning to “screen” three different titles based around a theme. Here are the ideas I have right now. Would love any random input, up to and including entirely new theme suggestions. All (but one) of these films would be new to me. If an apparently obvious title is omitted, it’s probably because I’ve seen it. (Running times noted for my own reference.) **New York in the 70s** The Panic in Needle Park (1:50) Serpico (2:10) Klute (1:54) **The Early 70s Grab Bag** Carnal Knowledge (1:38) The King of Marvin Gardens (1:43) Badlands (1:34) **Hal Ashby** Coming Home (2:07) Shampoo (1:50) The Landlord (1:50) **Robert Altman** The Long Goodbye (1:52) McCabe & Mrs. Miller (2:00) Thieves Like Us (2:03) **John Frankenheimer** Birdman of Alcatraz (2:27) Seven Days in May (1:58) The Train (2:13) **William Friedkin** To Live and Die in LA (1:56) The Boys in the Band (1:58) The French Connection (already seen, but would watch again) (1:44) **Michelangelo Antonioni** Zabriskie Point (1:53) L’Avventura (2:24) Blow-Up (1:51) **European Grab Bag** Persona (1:23) La Dolce Vita (2:54) Elevator to the Gallows (1:31) ---
**Author:** ![peedin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peedin/32/14095_2.png) [@peedin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peedin)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/2 "2020-12-15T17:33:40Z")
How about Billy Wilder? Sunset Boulevard, Some Like It Hot, Double Indemnity. Of course there is Hitchcock with a huge catalog. ---
**Author:** ![Nonsuch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nonsuch/32/2922_2.png) [@Nonsuch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nonsuch)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/3 "2020-12-15T17:34:33Z")
Hitchcock I’m pretty well versed in. For Billy Wilder I’ve seen SB and DI – what else would you recommend? ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/4 "2020-12-15T17:56:36Z")
The Apartment? ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/5 "2020-12-15T18:51:05Z")
> [@Nonsuch](#): > > Hitchcock I’m pretty well versed in. For Billy Wilder I’ve seen SB and DI – what else would you recommend? Ace in the Hole One, Two, Three Ninotchka Ball of Fire Avanti! ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/6 "2020-12-15T19:10:53Z")
For your European grab bag, Death In Venice. j ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/7 "2020-12-15T21:31:50Z")
So there needs to be a theme, then? The vast majority of your flicks are from the 70s - is that the era basically you want to work with? (some of the following are from the 60s) **Ingmar Bergman** _Cries and Whispers_ _Autmn Sonata_ _Scenes From a Marriage_ (romantic/familial dysfunction) **Roman Polanski** _Cul de Sac_ _Repulsion_ _The Tenant_ (isolation, paranoia, depravity) ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/8 "2020-12-15T21:44:54Z")
You might want to put 52-Pickup in the Frankenheimer list. I’d prefer that to Birdman of Alcatraz myself, but maybe I’ve seen it too many times. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2020, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/9 "2020-12-15T22:26:48Z")
> [@Nonsuch](#): > > **Michelangelo Antonioni** > Zabriskie Point (1:53) I’d skip that. Yeah, the photography and scenery is beautiful and the soundtrack is legendary (Floyd, Stones, Grateful Dead), but the story is just boring. As for Billy Wilder films, I second the recommendation for “The Apartment”. It’s his most perfect comedy (you can even call it a tragicomedy, given the jarring sexual politics of the time it demonstrates and subverts). ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2020, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-curate-my-at-home-birthday-film-festival/928113/10 "2020-12-17T16:13:23Z")
**Courtroom Dramas** Breaker Morant A Few Good Men Runaway Jury **Jane Austen on the Silver Screen** Pride & Prejudice (2005) Emma (1996) Sense and Sensibility (1995) **The American Civil War** Glory Cold Mountain Lincoln **The Best of Ahnuld** True Lies The Terminator Terminator 2: Judgment Day