Oldies Goldies

GONE WITH THE WIND
This is the most beloved movies of all time. The lead actress Scarlett (Vivian Leigh) plays an arrogant, spoiled, self centered gorgeous bitch and I would she truly deserved the best actress Oscar for this role.
You will love Scarlett with her adorable southern accent; she is the darling of her town.  All her life she hopes to get back Ashley Wilkes, who is married.
Enter my personal favorite Rhett played by none other than Clark Cable, he sees through Scarlett but still falls hopelessly in love with the spoiled brat. This couple has an exciting chemistry not like any movie romance.
Scarlett faces a lot of challenges in the second half of movie and stuns you with the commitment shown towards the vicissitudes that she faces.
Apart from the leads you will like the side character Mammy (Scarlett’s black servant) winning the Oscar for the best supporting actress.
Every detail and role of the movie is apt and amusing. No doubt the movie took away 10 Oscars.

CASABLANCA
Your all time favorite Love story. It is set during the world war 2: Rick(Humphrey Bogart) runs a café in Casablanca admired by the men and wooed by the women.  He hides the illegal letters of transit from the Nazis. The real story starts when his past love Ilsa, played by my favorite Ingrid Bergman, comes to Casablanca with her husband Victor, a famous rebel. Victor has to get to America and only mean is the letter of transit.
“PLAY IT SAM. PLAY ‘AS TIME GOES BY’”
She ushers to their common friend, Sam to play their old love song.
The heart broken Rick is stunned to see Ilsa in his café, and the old memories revive.
Now Ilsa back, wants to stay with Rick and leaves every decision up to Rick. Rick has to make the choice between sending Victor to America and staying with Ilsa!!!

ROMAN HOLIDAY

Princess Ann (Audrey Hepburn) is beautiful and charming but is bored to death by her strict schedules and always apt behavior. While on diplomatic trip to Spain she sneaks out and meets a journalist Joe Bradley (Gregory Peck). Joe recognizes her, but pretends to play along with her lie of running away from school and telling her name as Anya. Joe does that to get an exclusive interview while his friend secretly takes the Princess’s pictures.
Joe lures Ann to take a day off and enjoy the life which she had always wanted to do, and as expected the fall in love. Now Ann has to choose between her duties to her country and the life she had always wanted with the man she was now in love with?
Which one does she choose?? You would love this movie; it is another one of my all time favorite.

Foreign Films (beyond Hollywood)

LA VITA E BELLA / LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL

This movie is a comedy about or to be precise during Holocaust. I know I know it’s hard to believe! How can there be a comedy about the most horrible incident in history?                        But Roberto Benigni (actor/director/writer) did it. He has made a wonderful mixture of comedy, romance, tragedy and war.  Trust me you will laugh, smile and cry at the same time.

In the first part of the movie, Guido (Roberto Benigni) comes to live and work with his Uncle and in this town falls in love with Dora whom he calls Princepessa (Princess). The first part is entire comedy about how Guido tries to woo Dora involving the much travelled hat, the key, and the 7 seconds. HAHAHA, you’ll understand when you see the movie. The movie skips 5 years where we see Guido and Dora married with a beautiful son Joshua.

In the second part, the Holocaust part starts and Guido and Joshua being Jews are taken away by the Fascists while Dora (not Jew) gets on train to be with her family. Guido concocts an elaborate story to comfort his son: he explains that if they did exactly what Germans said they would get 1000points. He hides his son from the guard (making it sound like a game) because all Jew children were to be killed. Some scenes in this make you smile through your tears.

It’s a wonderful Italian movie and it also won Oscar for the best foreign language film in 1999. Roberto Benigni was just absolutely marvelous in the movie and did a great job off screen in making this Holocaust comedy. Do watch it.

AMELIE (2001)

It’s an honest, artistic, feel good kind of movie which either you are going to love or you may find it horribly boring and dull. It all depends on your perception. If you like two watch movies which are full of spice, action, drama, and twist & turns, then this Oscar nominee for best foreign film, is not your cup of tea.

The plot is very simple, Amelie, an innocent and naive girl in Paris, with her own sense of justice, decides to help those around her and along the way, discovers love. She helps other and this do have its hilarious moments.

I watched this movie in French only with English subtitles of course. And I liked it, a break from regular kind of movies. And I really liked the actress of the film, her reactions were superb. Rest I can’t really explain the movie, you got a gist of the idea of this picture so judge yourself.

CINEMA PARADISO

I loved it. I loved it. I loved it. And it’s impossible that you won’t like this 1989 Oscar winner. The movie begins when a famous director, Salvatore gets the news of death of an old friend back home. He starts reminiscing his childhood and youth. As a little boy Salvatore aka Toto loved movies and befriends the town projectionist Alfredo. This actor who plays Toto did a brilliant job and is so so so cute.  Toto learns to work the projector from Alfredo and forms a deep bond with him. Alfredo guides Toto about his career, ambition, love and he in the end of the movie force him to leave the town and never look back again. Toto falls madly in love with movies from childhood only, and when h comes off age he falls in love with a girl named Elena. But Elena vanishes from his life and Toto is heartbroken. While leaving his town he is asked by Alfredo to never come back or even write back. Alfredo missed him terribly but doesn’t want Toto to end up like he did.

 Salvatore comes back from for the funeral and asks about Alfredo who had left him a gift. Also he looks at his childhood possessions and a video of Elena he had made when he was young. The gift of Alfredo almost brought tears to my eyes.

There are very minor incidents in the movie that will leave an impression on you. And the movie will definitely make you nostalgic. The movie is sometimes funny, sometimes joyful, sometimes poignant hat makes you laugh, sentimental (not weepy), and think about life and relations and bonds. It’s a wonderful movie that I can watch over and over again and so will you. If you will take my advice then watch it in Italian only with English subtitles because you would not want to change anything about the movie not even the voice of the characters.

Drama, War history & Thriller!!

NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN

Yet one of the other crime thrillers. Don’t worry girls you’ll love it too given that you dote on fine movies.  Plus it got Javier Bardem in it, great huh?? The movie has got no story to tell because you need to see every scene yourself.  Base line is that some men are after $2 million and they crisscross each other’s path while ensuing to incredible cat and mouse drama.

So trust me and put this one on your watch list too!!

SCHINDLER’s LIST

It’s yet another excellent movie by none other than Steven Spielberg. I just adored this one.  It’s a fiction but giving you a fair and actual picture of Holocaust. The movie perfectly portraits the plight of Jewish community during WW2 as they had been forced to live in Ghettos, where money and valuables had no meaning at all.

The movie has two main characters: first Oskar Schindler who starts enamelware factory and hires Jews as they were cheaper than Poland workers. But how his money making motive changes during the course of the film is really poignant. He ends up doing, NO NO I’m not going to tell you and kill the thrill. Watch it for yourself.

The second character is Nazi commander, Amon Goeth who kills Jews without any reason. Although he hates all Jews but is reluctantly attracted to his Jew housekeeper, Helen and is disgusted by “this feeling”. Apart from this, the movie contains minor stories of many Jews like Helen, Danka, the “The girl in red coat” and many more.

You can’t argue with Steven Spielberg’s decision of shooting the movie in black and white with very little colored scenes. It gave the movie a realistic look.

You have to watch this movie as you’re gonna immensely like it.

REBECCA

This Oscar winning flick should be on the top of the list then. This movie is an incredible mixture of suspense, mystery and little bit of romance. Rebecca is a movie about a young, naïve, Van who marries a wealthy widower and becomes the lady of gigantic mansion.

Too bad for her fairy tale doesn’t actually work out as expected as surprises and shocks awaits her in her new palace. Here, she learns about the former lady of the mansion Rebecca, who still has an immense imprint on the house, servants and maybe her husband too??

Movie takes an exciting turn when something new is discovered about the alluring Rebecca, sending chills down your spine. It’s a classic black and white movie, any day much better than our so called Indian “Thrillers”.