More Than One Lesson

dir. Stanley Kubrick

Stanley Kubrick siphoned comedy up from the depths of a serious source book (Peter George’s Red Alert), then restrained the comedy by filming, then scrapping, an over-the-top pie fight in the War Room. In between these two major tonal adjustments, resting perfectly on the pinpoint nexus of dark and funny, is where the movie lives. We know it’s serious because of what the characters are saying; we know it’s funny because of how they’re saying it: the most internationally destabilizing act possible, instigated by a gone-mad Air Force general, alongside all of the commentary on that act, by the men whose job it is to keep it from happening at all costs and then clean it up if it does, must be believed because of the dry authority behind it, but cannot be believed because the implications mean the destruction of all life on earth. There isn’t a flawed performance in the movie, and one actor in particular had three chances to fail. While Peter Sellers completely manifests three different energies within the movie, the highest-wire achievements belong to Sterling Hayden, who must somehow believe every word of his own outrageous, fluid-based self-justification, and George C. Scott, who must somehow believe every one of his pouty, hyper, arm-flapping, tumbling physical expressions. Together, the verbal and the physical are absorbed into the dark and the funny, a cook so pure that it distracts us until the very end from the ultimate dark realization: there’s little chance that scrawny humanity, with its twin passions for technology and war, will ever avoid getting its hair permanently mussed.

dir. Victor Fleming

When my wife and I showed our son The Wizard of Oz, he was barely 3 years old. He absolutely loved it. We both commented on how we could remember being nearly that young when we first saw it and had responded with just as much delight. What was even more astonishing was that when we mentioned this to our parents, they all said the exact same thing.

I don’t know if there is a precise measurement for the timelessness of a film. But if such a thing can be uncovered, it might just be buried in a yellow brick road somewhere right outside the gates of the Emerald City. For Victor Fleming’s 1939 film to still hold the same wonder, the same charm, and the same enchanted ability to bring joy to young and old alike after nearly 80 years in nothing short of a cinematic miracle.

The characters are so clearly defined and so colorfully realized that they almost transcend the confines of their story to become metaphors for longing, companionship, and the quests each of us find ourselves on for what’s missing in our lives. The troop of actors, from the American sweetheart Judy Garland to the versatile Frank Morgan (pulling at least quadruple-duty as different characters including the Wizard himself), each bring such specific creative talents to their roles that imagining anyone else in those parts automatically feels inferior.

The production design is a unique marvel as well. The colors leap from the screen in as vibrant and wondrous a collage as the rainbow of the film’s iconic theme song. Rarely, if ever, has there been a stronger narrative case for the shift from sepia to technicolor than in the journey from Kansas to Oz, which is fascinating considering certain critics at the time considered that shift to be gimmicky. The film is a visual feast of color and there’s almost never an uninteresting frame, let alone a dull moment or scene.

Then, we have the songs. The catchy and lovely little ditties that are as hummable as jingles, but strikingly rich in theme when you ponder their lyrics: from the comical “If I Only Had a Brain” and the celebratory “Ding! Dong! The Witch is Dead!” to the universally recognized anthem for dreams, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” But what strikes me as so wondrous is how their simple little reflections could be extended to touch the deeper places of our heart where we long for freedom, for fulfillment, and for home.

And lastly, I must say a few words about the ending — perhaps the only “it was all a dream (or was it)?” ending I’ve ever felt fully satisfied by. Because to me, the film is really about the pursuit of our dreams. We dream of being smarter, being braver, being more fulfilled, being validated, being in control, or being in a place where we finally belong. Perhaps this why the film resonates with such a broad age range.

It brings a tremendous amount of hope and comfort to hear a story where we discover that sometimes the dreams we’ve so longed for have been with us all the while, just waiting for us to click our heels and wake up after the cyclones of life has hurled us far, far away to discover that there really is no place like home.

Josh appears on Jim’s podcast, I Do Movies Badly, discussing filmmaker Werner Herzog.

dir. Paul Thomas Anderson

Of all of Paul Thomas Anderson’s films, Magnolia is the one that beckons to be watched over and over. It’s so rich with themes and characters that it asks you can’t help but reevaluate what its pointing to every time you see it. Is it about loneliness, or the way we treat our children, or forgiveness? It’s about all of these things and more.

One of the things that all of Anderson’s best films excel at is their editing. Magnolia cuts from one scene to another, one character to the next, so organically and it refuses to let go of our attention. The way each scene is stitched together so that they cannot be separated from the ones that precede them or the ones that follow are like the inseparable and interconnected lives of the characters. Anderson draws us in, and we’re there with them every step of the way.

dir. Joel & Ethan Coen

To many, the best and most purely Coen of all Coen Brothers movies. It’s a ransom bag full of every one of their obsessions, visually and story wise: it contains the exact right mixture of black humor and random violence; it’s predicated, like many of their movies, but this one much more so, on a crime gone horribly wrong; it’s the epitome of their typical slide-rule filmmaking, with precise, classroom-worthy moves and compositions; and it has a merciless stranglehold on place – a frigid, snow-packed landscape populated with characters so specific they’re funny for being so real. And the two stakes that hold the whole tent in place are two of the most well-crafted characters in their entire body of work. William H. Macy is Jerry Lundegaard, the world’s most pathetic man having the worst week of his life, not unlike, say, Larry Gopnik in A Serious Man, only Jerry’s Job-like circumstances are entirely, stupidly self-inflicted. His attempt to salvage a dire financial situation with the aid of dubious criminal elements teaches him the hard way that his skill set in such matters might be limited to pushing TruCoat, and we watch with cringing glee as he scrambles around for any kind of rope out of his self-made quagmire. Meanwhile, Frances McDormand, as sharp, wide-eyed, and very pregnant police chief Marge Gunderson, slowly registers for the first time the depths of depravity some men can go on such a beautiful day. It’s the first, and only one of the few, of the Coens’ movies to move so inexorably along a line of dread and inevitability, so much so that the brand it stamps on your memory is like the darkest, cruelest, and funniest of morality tales. Lesson: you can’t always get what you embezzle.

dir. Steven Spielberg

While many films on this list have noted effects on cinema history and technique, Jaws transcends the medium of film and has impacted not only popular culture but our lives. It strikes at the chord of a carnal fear that’s within all of us, and it has never let go of it. How many times have you gone to the beach or have been on a boat and have contemplated with a sense of dread at what may be under the surface? You can thank Jaws for that. While it may not have explicitly put the fear and thought into your head, it has intensified it. You can hear John Williams’ rhythmic and imposing score in your mind. You visualize a single fin protruding from the water. In the long and prolific career of Steven Spielberg, there’s a reason why his breakout film is still considered his best, and its effects on the medium and in our lives will continue to be felt for decades to come.

dir. Francis Ford Coppola

Francis Ford Coppola’s mafia opus is so effective because of the way it draws us into Michael’s descent to the dark side. As the film begins, we understand how he wants to distance himself from the family “business.” But slowly, gradually, we want in just as much as he does. Emotions are heightened, lines are blurred, and suddenly there’s no reliable moral compass. Michael is no longer concerned about what’s right and wrong, but about what he has to do. This fractured moral tale is told with haunting cinematography and explosive performances from many of the greatest American actors of the ‘70s. Suspenseful, emotional, and propulsive, The Godfather is the mob movie to end all mob movies.

dir. Frank Capra

Once upon a time, we were sold on the American Dream, a lofty, fairy tale concept that convinced anyone willing to buy into it that they could achieve anything they strived for as long as they worked hard for it. George Bailey wanted to believe in it. Americans post-World War II waned to believe in it. We all want to believe in it. That doesn’t necessarily mean that Capra and It’s a Wonderful Life believe in it. Critically and commercially ignored upon its release, It’s a Wonderful Life gained its status as a classic decades later in TV syndication around Christmas, a time of year when idealism is at its peak. That’s not to imply that there’s anything contradictory about the season with which the film has become synonymous, but rather that the hope and good cheer associated with bot the holiday and the film are destinations at which we arrive after a long, arduous journey rather than inherent constants. Like we all gradually do, George Bailey discovers that the American dream isn’t so much a dream as it is a system, and that the system asks much of its participants including pain, compromise, and sacrifice. The remarkable prescience and gravity of George’s trials remains relevant decades later because of the emerging complexities in its characters and story as well as the universal truths that find resonance in both sides of an increasingly partisan political landscape: conservatives can appreciate a small business owner who strives to provide for his family, whereas liberals can appreciate a motley community refusing to cower to the whims of the 1%. It’s a film that morphs and caters its appeal across generations and just so happens to ring most true at a time when connections across boundaries are more important than ever.

dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer

Carl Theodor Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc is perhaps the most modern film ever made. This statement is especially significant when understanding that the film itself is very much a product of the silent era. Dreyer’s camera, style, and profound sense of composition are crammed with the brand of legendary cinematic innovation connected so closely to the pre-sound silent era, yet his overall execution of the film feels very much like a yet to be understood tone from the future; a disconnected temporal aesthetic haunts the film’s very frames, constructing an almost alien space that is neither connected to the past nor the present. Dreyer’s spectatorial vantage point on the world of the film feels somehow inhuman; we witness both Joan and her accusers from behind a glorified visual prospective, one in which the very nature of human emotion is presented within its purest form. Joan is often viewed from a high angled close-up, her heart-breaking face filling the screen simultaneously with passion and hope, yet terror and fear. Dreyer’s frustrated camera movements allow Joan’s space to feel broken and dangerous, yet his closeness to her physical presence represents the warmth and mercy of her heart. The style of the piece elevates human brokenness past the point of mere presentation, reflecting upon a world normalised by shame and persecution, while at the same time offering a glimpse of forgiveness and compassion via a passionate maintaining of faith in the face of persecution. The film is an extraordinary work of art, operating profoundly on both an artistic and spiritual level, while at the same time offering a mystical sense of personality, as though the film itself was born from outside the human experience, looking in with both shame and sadness, yet coming out with nothing but praise and wholehearted grace.     

dir. Alfred Hitchcock

I first saw Psycho when I was six years old.

I saw it before I knew anything about it. I saw it before I knew the fate of poor Marion Crane. I saw it without knowing what was really going on with Norman’s mother. I saw it without the cultural significance and iconic legacy of the infamous shower scene bouncing through my head.

The movie affected me so deeply that it has never dropped lower than my top five favorite movies of all time. It terrified and thrilled me as a child. It fascinated and surprised me with its twists. To this day, I am still slightly anxious whenever I step into the shower.

But, chances are, you have either already seen Psycho or already know most of the cards in its cinematic deck. Initial audiences were not allowed to enter the theater after the film had begun, but audiences today are so saturated with Norman Bates references, spoofs, and clichés (not to mention a popular prequel TV show) that a recent viewing with my friend’s teenage son provoked laughter when Marion finally took that fateful shower, even though he had never seen the film before.

I understood, though. In today’s climate where the shock bar for violence in horror films has elevated beyond the stratosphere, that shower scene’s restraint and calculated editing is seen by fresh audiences as a step backwards instead of as the groundbreaking, daring, and horrifying moment its first audiences found it to be.

It’s difficult to appreciate, apart from the observational distance of a museum patron examining a Rembrandt, just how influential and important Psycho is to horror cinema and to films in a broader way. The atypical narrative shift, the defiance of traditional protagonist treatment, the skin-of-its-teeth censorship approval, and the overly talkative final moments where everything is explained could be seen as detriments to the film’s impact rather than defining characteristics of it.

So my opinion is that the ideal time to watch this movie is when you’re 6 years old. If 6 sounds offensively young, then pick your own more appropriate age when your mind isn’t geared to watch for twist endings and your heart still trusts that things are gonna work out ok for all the good guys.

Because in 1960, Alfred Hitchcock — a director who had come to be known for sweeping suspense adventures and lavish mystery thrillers — focused his storytelling powers on a much more intimate and vulnerable tale about a woman who made one horribly impulsive decision colliding with a mother and her son whose secluded little world was a domestic venus fly trap. A director known for getting the heroes home safely put a lovely and impetuous heroine in the place where she’s most exposed and then unleashed a predator after her. He flipped the expectations on his standard “innocent man” trope and in the process shocked and horrified his audience, legitimized horror cinema, and created one of his most memorable and powerful masterpieces.