Anyone care to go through the list and recommend some?
Of the 28 movies it put on the first page I’ve only seen one, “The Conquest of Space” and that was dreadful. Not worth looking for all 100.
A couple methods you might search:
- For each section heading on the front page click on it (for example click on Classics and it shows 32 videos).
- Click on the Videos heading and it will show uploads. Change the sorting (on the right hand side to Most Popular). For full movies it starts with Masters of the Universe, The Devil and Miss Jones, The World of Suzie Wong, The Loved Ones, Funny About Love, King Creole…)
Sections:
Classics:
Horror:
Comedy:
Science Fiction:
Drama:
Action/Adventure:
Digital Series:
- Most Popular
The Paramount Vault - YouTube
Of the ones I’ve seen:
Come Blow Your Horn – a film of an early Neil Simon play. Frank Sinatra is completely miscast in it (his character is supposed to be much younger), and the play itself is bound to feel dated. Dean Martin has a seconds-long cameo. I recommend Simon’s play, but not this film.
Don’t Give Up the Ship – Jerry Lewis film, and not at his best
Space Children – pretty awful science fiction film with a sorta religious twist at the end. MST3K did this one, which should tell you something. Russell Johnson once again plays a scientist/technician, before assuming the role of The Professor in Gilligan’s Island. Only in this one, he’s a mean drunk.
Colossus of New York – Dying Scientist has his brain transplanted into a robot body, then begins to lose his humanity. The story doesn’t make a bit of sense, but the cyborg body looks kinda cool, with its glowing eyes.
Conquest of Space – George Pal’s follow-up to the Robert Heinlein-written Destination Moon, but without Heinlein this time. It shows. The film features the first mission to Mars. The effects were pretty impressive for the time, giving us a wagon-wheel space station and a winged craft, all in color, but would probably look amateurish to modern audiences raised on CGI effects and post-“2001: a Space Odyssey” detailing of spacecraft (One older critic called in “my generation’s 2001”) It doesn’t help that the mission commander becomes a religious fanatic at the end. Recommended as of historical interest to those who love old SF films, but it’ll probably bore anyone else.
I Married a Monster from Outer Space – pretty much what you’d think, from the title. On their wedding night, the new groom apparently runs over a figure on a woodland road, which turns out to be an alien with a face like tree rots that takes over his body, then displays awesome mental powers as it makes a bid to take over the world. Remarkably similar to another bad SF film, The Brain from Planet Arous. They featured this in It Came from Hollywood, showing clips from the trailer. "We’ll have children, says the now-admitted alien Groom to his Bride. “What kind of children?” she asks with trepidation. “Space Children!” announces the narrator on the trailer from the film of that name that the folks making ICfH cut in at that point.
The Deadly Bees – MST3K did this one, too, which tells you all you need to know (In the closing credits, they give their Props Diva as “Deadly Beez McKeever”). The problem with movies about evil swarms of bees is that, until CGI became available, the bees didn’t look scary, or even believable. Yet people kept making these movies. The bee swarm effects in this one are particularly laughable.
All of 1900! All five hours, six minutes, and nine seconds of 1900 that got released, at least. Which is a fair chunk of the year 1900.
I remember liking Casanova’s Big Night. Bob Hope is a riot and Joan Fontaine is lovely, lovely, lovely.
As I recall, Mel Gibson’s Hamlet wasn’t too bad.
I watched the The Devil And Miss Jones the other night. A fun, somewhat left-wingish comedy starring Jean Arthur. I find it interesting how employee/worker relations used to be portrayed.
Oh, I forgot
Crack in the World – relatively low-key science fiction flick with good use of natural footage for their effects shots. Industrialist wants to tap into the mantle by sending a bomb-equipped 'missile" into a hole drilled into the earth (and none of this “Mohole” nonsense – we’re going to do it on land!) and releases molten magma. unfortunately, he’s apparently opened a badly-stitched seam in the earth, and it’s unraveling. Other scientists try desperately to stop it, at one point setting off a nuclear bomb in a volcano (a la L. Ron Hubbard), but all that does is change the course of the tear. Eventually the crack goes all the way around and completes a crude circle, and a new moon breaks away (how it overcomes gravity isn’t explained. Nor how this avoids killing everybody on Earth.) Oh, yeah, the industrialist is slowly dying of cancer, as well. Scientifically ludicrous but looks great.
I’ve heard that this is actually quite good, despite everything. John Baxter spoke very well of it in his Science Fiction in the Cinema.
The gem of the collection is Preston Sturges’s brilliantly bawdy comedy The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek. Adding to the comedy is that many of the assumptions of the time are even funnier today. Trudy Kockenlocker (a name that Sturges has a lot of fun with) discovered she married a soldier while drunk, only she can’t remember his name (“Ratzkywatzky or something”). When she discovers she’s pregnant, she has to find a father – the well-meaning but dimwitted Norval Jones. William Demerest is a hoot as Officer Kockenlocker, Trudy’s father. It has some great dialog, first-class slapstick, lots of innuendo, and a general air of pure madness.
Bound was a solid thriller. It was the Wachowskis’ first movie.
Well, Baxter is entitled to his opinion, but I don’t have much use for Baxter’s book. My copy is marked up with comments where I disagree with him – and I’m a guy who hates marking up books.
I’m surprised to see the film has a rating of 86% on Rotten Tomatoes. But most review sites I checked seem to say that this is basically a “good” bad film – i.e. - an entertaining bad film, so maybe that’s it. Og knows, it ain’t good science fiction.
I Married a Monster has that iconic 50’s sci-fi/commie threat feel to it. It’s got just enough quality mixed with nostalgic hokeyness to make it popular. Good movie, not really, fun MSTK3 type movie, more so.
On first pass I thought that said “The Devil IN Miss Jones” and was wondering how they managed to get that up on youtube.
Saw that one at a drive-in *and *read the comic book adaptation.
Bound is one of the best suspense movies I’ve seen, highly recommended.
Unless the idea of graphic lustiness between Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly doesn’t appeal to you. Or graphic violence. It’s all done extremely well and fits the movie, but I’ve had people cringe or literally shriek in surprise during some bits.
In my top 100.
None of the movies on the list is available to me. It doesn’t say it is blocked by country, which is what I assume is the issue.
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers is an excellent film about a crime in the past that won’t stay there. A dream cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin and a young Kirk Douglas in his debut movie. Highly recommended.
And what’s with blocking movies or content by country?
“F U, country X, you don’t get to see movie Y.”