Filed under: Alicia's Stuff
Everyone around the world seems to have a raging opinion on what we should and should not on view film or TV. So I have decided to have my own, as I call it, a Hollyopinon. This is the top five Hollywood flicks that are a definite must see. Each of the following films have had a profound impact on the movie industry and its viewers, so if you haven’t seen one or all of these, get out there and do so.
- Blazing Saddles: A Mel Brooks 1974 classic that has gags that still echo in today’s society. This hilariously crude, racist and sexist film is a Western parody that brought Brooks into the Hollywood limelight. This very clever film should not be watched once, but several times to pick up on the innuendo and digs that Brooks and his cast take at American society.
- Schindler’s List: is an uncompromising, 3-hour black and white Steven Spielberg film. This holocaust movie about Oskar Schindler, played by Liam Neeson, who rescued 1200 Jews from extermination in WW2 is emotionally gruelling but a brilliant portrayal of a true story. This film shouldn’t be viewed for its cinematography or acting but for the lives behind the camera. View it, then leave it and think.
Classic Spielberg movie, Schindler's List
- The Wizard of Oz: is there a more classic MGM film? The Wizard of Oz is the 1934 story of a Kansan farm girl Dorothy and her dog Toto being sent to the world of Oz in a crazy dream. The films iconic characters including the Wicked Witch, the Tinman and the cowardly Lion have been parodied ever since. The Wizard of Oz should be watched for its beauty, post war cleverness and the technology used for the time.
Judy Garland in the Wizard of Oz
- Jaws: Steven Spielberg believes that if the mechanical shark hadn’t broken down during filming, they would have lost millions at the box office. And he’s probably right. This shark attack film spends less time filming the shark and more time building tension. Jaws’ fun comes from the music, the shark and red ocean water after an attack.
The mechanical genius of Jaws
- The Dark Knight: Heath Ledger + face paint + one fantastic catch phrase = The Dark Knight. This was a film that changed the summer of 2008 following Ledgers death. The cast, the action and the plot weave together so intricately that it is hard to fault this film. It is a shuddering take on a once camp cartoon.
Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight
The politically incorrect Blazing Saddles
The attempted extermination of the Jewish race and their beliefs has irrevocably changed the world and it’s thinking. But as a wider community, where do we currently place the personal blame for the mass killing of the Jews, gypsies, gays, disabled and countless others in Nazi Germany?
Do we look upon those horrific events as the intentional and calculated murder by thousands of Germans, united by the ideology of a single political party? Or do we believe these deaths were the result of indoctrination, from years of brainwashing by a few unrealistic Germans, at the helm of a nation?
It isn’t easy to see where the world places the blame for the historic minefield that was Nazi Germany, but this sentiment has been beautifully portrayed in the wake of Oscar winning film, ‘The Reader.”
Film critics, opinion pieces and reader reviews are opening the Pandora’s Box of blame, with many stating they do not want a character (Kate Winslet’s Hanna Schmitz) to be romanticized when she was an obvious SS killer.
With good reason too.
In his article reviewing the post-holocaust film, journalist Tom Bower discussed a past interview done with SS General Karl Wolf. Here, the former Auschwitz killer admitted to Bower that murdering was just a “regrettable part a Nazi ideology.”
With this blasé attitude surfacing across the world, it is understandable that a real life comparison in Hanna Schmitz would spark much controversy. Developing your own thoughts, feelings and opinions on the film and the history is an important part of learning why our world will never be unified again.
Kate Winslet and David Kross in The Reader
A Film Affair 