Post-Airplane, It’s hard to remember what an influential film Airport was. It was the first disaster movie in the Grand Hotel style with lots of intersecting personal stories and major stars in even the tiniest of roles.
Genius (2106) starring Colin Firth and Jude Law.
An interesting, thoughtful movie about a writer and his editor that drew me in.
It’s hard not to notice what a 1970 right wing backlash movie Airport is. Theme: “we’re in charge, you’re not, so shut up.”
Residential neighborhoods hate low overhead flights? That’s their small-minded tough shit. Van Heflin, if he’d only listened to Maureen Stapleton and kept his big mouth shut, wouldn’t have been unemployable and had to bomb his flight for the insurance money. The slap that made every Catholic in the audience laugh (especially the ones who hated Vatican II). The smart-ass kid who thought he knew stellar navigation. No surprise left wing pseudo-intellectual Burt Lancaster hated the film and only did it for the paycheck.
I don’t know if it’s necessarily all right-wing. The happy, suburban, nuclear family sitting down to their Norman-Rockwellesque dinner table get told that their tranquility will continue to be interrrupted by the march of science and technology. Mel Bakersfeld (Burt Lancaster) turns down a more lucrative job offer to stay in the industry he loves. Someone in a position of authority, an airline captain, gets his plane stuck in the snow and it takes a lowly maintenance supervisor to drive it out. And like true Socialists, workers from other airlines chip in to help.
Maxwell Perkins and Thomas Wolfe. I found Jude Law’s accent grating, but I didn’t watch all of it.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
Somewhat recommended.
An adequate sequel, but not a great one. Yes, Michael Keaton is terrific in the Beetlejuice role, but I found some of the plot points of this one to be kind of lame.
It was fine, but not as memorable as the first movie. Would have gotten a similar review if it came out just 10 years after its original release. It’s just, “Oh, another one.”
The ending might be the only real risk they took. I’m not sure what to think of it, but part of me wants to think that:
Both movies, all of Beetlejuice 1 and 2, were dreams. Nightmare, actually.
A weird homage to The Fly II?
I have not seen that movie.
Spoiler It was just a dream in that one, too.
Over the summer, I watched My Cousin Vinnie for the first time, and was totally charmed by it. I’ve been hearing how great it was for a long time; it lived up to the hype.
So last weekend, I put it on with the family. They all loved it, too.
I’ve seen Born Yesterday (1950) recently. There is an interesting comparison with My Cousin Vinnie (1992). For both at the Oscars, someone won best actress or best supporting actress, although many people found that win surprising at the time. In both, the other four nominees were more famous and tended more to do dramatic roles, but the winner was less well known and had a comedic role.
There is enough evidence here to say:
Maybe Beetlejuice 1 and 2 are dreams of Winona Ryder’s character. It doesn’t say it clearly, but she wakes up alone at the end and you can at least speculate.
One interesting thing to note about the film, is that it is also beloved by Lawyers who consider it one of the best in terms of how courts actually operate. Legal Eagle has a whole breakdown of it:
I remember liking it when I first saw it, and every subsequent viewing as well
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Hah! I told my wife how lawyers love it for its accuracy, and then she told her online friends, and all the lawyers were like, “WE LOVE THIS MOVIE FOR ITS ACCURACY”
It was My Cousin Vinny that taught me that the prosecution has to share their case with the defense. I love that moment where Vinny says, “Man, I’d kill to have a peek at their case.”
Prosecutor just says, “I’ll have my secretary send everything we have over to you in the morning.”
It’s one of those movies I can watch over and over (not at the same time…I do need a bit of a break) and still find funny and even touching. I love how Joe Pesci performs that scene with the older lady whose eyesight isn’t what it used to be. Marisa Tomei was great, too. Actually every body was good – Fred Gwynne, Ralph Macchio, Lane Smith.
Truly ahead of its time!
I watched Fly away home (1996) last night, it was one of those “gem movies you might have missed” from Cracked website, and I concur.
A tale of a little girl who rescues Geese eggs and finds she has to teach them to migrate, so flys along with them on a microlite for migration. Really heartwarming movie.
Notably there was a early teens Anna Paquin (Sookie from True Blood) in it,
Did you watch it in 3D? I’ve recently seen the 3D version of this (and several other films – I had a 3D mini-fest a few months back). The maze itself an the architecture of the manoral house give great 3D settings, even though the movie is pretty dumb.
Which makes sense, it’s a unique court room drama. Court is boring so every other procedural speeds it up so a 5 month case is condensed into “You can’t handle the truth!” but My Cousin Vinnie is a comedy about falling down the stairs of judicial procedure. It’s the perfect slippery banana because outside of a few the audience doesn’t know the procedure either. So it’s Who’s on First but with Robert’s Rules of Order.