Category: The Best Damn Movies EVER

WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: This series features reviews of some of my favorite films, many of which – while not forgotten – have been out of the mainstream so long, they've been neglected.  If I can introduce someone to a great film they've never seen before, my work will not be in vain. Michael Caine is one of my favorite actors.  While James Brown was often referred to as “the hardest working man in show business,” I would argue that Michael Caine – with over ...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: This series features reviews of some of my favorite films, many of which - while not forgotten - have been out of the mainstream so long, they've been neglected.  If I can introduce someone to a great film they've never seen before my work will not be in vain.In 1979, three years before director and screenwriter Nicholas Meyer saved the Star Trek franchise with his masterful second film incarnation, The Wrath of Khan, and five years after his debut novel, The Seven-Per-...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: I'm going to start featuring reviews of some of my favorite films, many of which -- while not forgotten -- have been out of the mainstream so long, they've been neglected.  If I can introduce someone to a great film they've never seen before ... my work will not be in vain.When Steve Martin made his leap from the stage to the Big Screen with 1979's The Jerk, he did so with the help of legendary writer/director Carl Reiner. These two would make three more films together,...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: It's been a little while since I wrote up an official post for the category The Best Damn Movies EVER -- originally intended to highlight forgotten classics that younger film lovers may have overlooked -- yet that category has been filling up with miscellanious entries anyway. Here, however, is a true forgotten classic, one of my favorites ...After the one-two punch of 1964's Mary Poppins (Best Actress Oscar) and 1965's The Sound of Music (Best Picture), British actress Juli...

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I've made no bones about my admiration for author Richard Matheson, and further, his indelible (and often unappreciated) influence on popular culture over the last 50 years.I've also spoken of the wild crush I had in my youth for Lindsay Wagner. (For a detailed biography of her, please visit my Celebrity Profile page at Examiner.)How am I going to tie these two together? Easy. The 1979 TV movie, The Two Worlds of Jennie Logan, was a time-travel love story regarding a woman struggling to keep...

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Although technically this is the day after Christmas, I just saw that one of my favorite holiday films was available for embedding -- what's a blogger to do?Like a cross between It's a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol (and I don't hesitate for a second to mention this movie alongside those other classics), 2000's The Family Man is one of the funniest, warmest and most entertaining holiday films of all time. (Especially of late -- Elf not withstanding, do we really need more seasonal slop li...

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At this time of year, how could I not do a post about It's a Wonderful Life? Much has been written about this most cherished of holiday movies -- the AFI has it listed on numerous lists, including the number 1 spot on the Most Inspirational Movies of all time:1998 AFI's 100 Years - 100 Movies #112002 AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Passions #82003 AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Heroes and Villains:George Bailey, hero #9Henry F. Potter, villain #62006 AFI's 100 Years ... 100 Cheers #12007 AFI's 100 Years ... 10...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: Yet another case of these categories being limiting. In many respects, Charlie Chaplin is not only an auteur, he was The Original Auteur. However, I am not going to file this post under The Auteurs, simply because this is indeed one of The Best Damn Movies EVER.I've always loved Charlie Chaplin -- although of late, I've been quite lax in my appreciation. Over the weekend, however, I re-watched Richard Attenborough's 1992 bio-pic Chaplin. The film has a number of flaws -- n...

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If one takes into account the "laugh quotient" while considering the funniest movie of all time, certainly one of the top contenders would have to be 1981's Arthur. Bravo places it at number 10 on their list of the 100 Funniest Movies, AFI has it at a criminally-low 53. This Dudley Moore vehicle has more genuine laughs-per-minute than most modern comedies put together.Written and directed by Steve Gordon (who died tragically of a heart attack the following year), Arthur tells the story of a ric...

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Renaissance storyteller Michael Crichton died this week, at age 66, after a long battle with cancer. While most know him as an author, The Andromeda Strain, Congo, Sphere, Rising Sun, Disclosure, to name only a few, he is best known for penning Jurassic Park and its sequel The Lost World. He assisted screenwriter David Koepp in adapting the former for Steven Spielberg. He also worked with Spielberg in creating and producing the long running TV drama ER.Yet one of the most interesting aspects o...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: Having thinned out my Categories recently, I'm not sure where to file this post. DVD Reviews? Pop Culture? The Auteurs? Screw it, let's just put this under The Best Damn Movies Ever. That would make this ... Part Five. Or is it Six?What's the scariest movie of all time? Jaws? Alien? The Exorcist? The Shining? The Thing? Night of the Living Dead? No matter your taste, any top ten list of the most blood-chilling films ever made, would have to include (near the top) ...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: Part Four in a series highlighting films that may have escaped the notice of younger film lovers.If you frequent this site, you've no doubt seen the plethora of PSYCHO movie banners in page rotation. I'm a longtime Hitchcock aficionado, so I'm surprised I've waited this long to post anything regarding his work. I intend to remedy that right now.While I've long considered Hitchcock's top 5 films to be Rear Window, Vertigo, North By Northwest, Psycho and The Birds, over recen...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: This is part 3 of a series called The Best Damn Movies EVER, highlighting forgotten classics that many younger film lovers may have overlooked. This one is a bittersweet gem.Director Robert Mulligan, who received worldwide acclaim for directing 1962's powerful drama To Kill a Mockingbird, struck gold again in 1971 with the coming-of-age story, Summer of '42.Based on the memoirs of screenwriter Herman Raucher, the autobiographical story tells of Raucher's teenage years on his...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: This is Part 2 in a series of reviews I call The Best Damn Movies EVER ... and boy is this one fitting of that description. My intent is to showcase great films that may have slipped the notice of younger filmgoers. If this is you, keep on reading.Were I to make a list of the 50 greatest films of all time, and another list of my 50 favorite films, the lists would not necessarily match up. There would be a few crossovers, one of which would be ... Cool Hand Luke.PAUL NEWMAN...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: I'm going to start posting reviews of some of my favorite films, many of which -- while not forgotten -- have been out of the mainstream so long, they've been neglected. If I can, through this new category, "The Best Damn Movies EVER," introduce someone to a great film they've never seen before ... my work will not be in vain.1981 was pretty much a banner year for Lawrence Kasdan. Hot after the success of a little movie George Lucas hired him to write, called, The Empire St...

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Elsewhere on this site, I have devoted many words to my admiration and respect for Steven Spielberg and Richard Matheson. I have also noted that the first television movie Spielberg directed was a brilliant adaptation of Matheson's short story, DUEL.The story doesn't get any more complicated than this: mysterious truck terrorizes man driving across desert. Dennis Weaver stars as David Mann, and does a remarkable job of emoting panic and paranoia with a taut-but-threadbare script (also by Mathes...

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WORDSLINGER'S NOTE: This is an older post that floated among a few categories on this site, but after creating a division called The Best Damn Movies EVER, I thought ... you know ... this one belongs here, too.Those of you who care about such things, may know that when director Richard Donner was filming his glorious Superman movie (1978), that he was actually filming two movies simultaneously. What eventually became Superman I and II, was originally one script, split into two parts. After fil...

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