Culture Study Podcast - Approximately 72 Old Movies to Fall In Love With

00:00:00.880 Hey everyone, it's Anne. Two things. First, we're preparing for some upcoming recordings

00:00:06.200 and are still taking your questions on how cookbooks get made and cleaning culture. We're

00:00:12.040 also working on an episode with Vanessa Zoltan about spiritual care for the non-religious.

00:00:17.740 If you've never been religious, or if you were once religious but now aren't, how do

00:00:22.720 you think about spiritual care? What does that even mean? What are those words? What

00:00:25.940 is a spirit? Why does it need care? Maybe you don't think about it. I don't know. We can go

00:00:30.860 in any direction here. If any of these prompts spark something for you, let us know in the

00:00:35.740 Google form at tinyurl.com slash culture study pod. And as always, you can also use that form

00:00:42.320 to give us your ideas for future episodes and to submit questions for ask and anything. And second,

00:00:48.460 today's episode is so fun. It's also so long, and it took a lot of work. So we're paywalling

00:00:55.060 a little bit more of it than usual. If you want the full episode, which includes a lot more

00:01:00.840 recommendations and a AAA conversation about thriving in a low-residency graduate program,

00:01:08.040 also all of the extensive show notes in which Melody lists out every single movie

00:01:12.700 and where you can watch it, head to culturestudypod.substack.com and become a paid subscriber.

00:01:19.580 Your subscriptions make this show possible. You make it sustainable. Without them,

00:01:23.980 we can't make the show. So please come join us today. Okay, let's get into it.

00:01:34.520 This is the Culture Study Podcast, and I'm Anne Helen Peterson.

00:01:38.400 And I'm Margaret H. Willison. I'm a writer and podcaster, previously featured on this program

00:01:46.240 to talk about celebrity outrage, and now, logically, back to talk about classic film.

00:01:50.720 Yeah, no, this is great. I you know, we have my friend Phil Macyak, who is trying to become the David Bianculli of culture study. That's his goal. So I feel like we can we can find you can be like the Pauline Kale.

00:02:04.040 I love that. Oh, my God. What an honor.

00:02:08.680 I know. Seriously. Okay. So for today's episode, we are talking all about old movies. And we will

00:02:16.100 define old just a little bit. But everything in the world feels very bad. And we all have different

00:02:23.300 ways of seeking escape during these times. And I also think we have a lot of precedent for the

00:02:28.400 ways in which movies themselves have served as a mode of escapism that I don't think is like a bad

00:02:36.980 thing during times of real peril um and also there are so many movies so many movies yeah like

00:02:45.340 there's like before we got on this call but I was like oh I'm a little bit late because I was

00:02:49.580 thinking of every single movie I've ever watched and and I my my credentials are that I have a

00:02:57.660 PhD in media studies, which forced me through the course of my coursework to watch a lot of old

00:03:04.800 movies. People often assume that because I followed that path that I was historically very into old

00:03:11.500 movies or like had a granddad that always showed me old movies. No, no. I was like the person who

00:03:17.600 rented Clue every single week from the movie store and just watched that on repeat. Like I was not a

00:03:22.960 connoisseur i mean that's a creature if you had to watch something on repeat i know it was like

00:03:29.580 that and three different endings you know i thought that was the height of cinema

00:03:33.500 it kind of is that's very impressive to pull off um and also gave me like oh this is tim curry like

00:03:41.900 when i eventually saw um rocky horror picture show for the first time i was like oh the butler

00:03:47.820 this is different this is different it's wadsworth what what is your history with old movies

00:03:54.360 so i'd say like i am actually that person i've sort of always been into classic movies because

00:03:59.860 like that onion article that's like dad alienates daughter from her peers by showing her exclusively

00:04:05.780 like high quality content i'm not gonna go that far like i watched i watched disney animated films

00:04:11.700 like everybody else. I saw Hocus Pocus, you know, but we also just watched a lot of old movies in

00:04:18.320 the house. So, you know, Bringing Up Baby was like a kid's film for me. Yeah, yeah. Which still

00:04:23.340 works. 100%. I'm lucky enough to have grown up and lived most of my life in Boston, where we've

00:04:29.900 always had a couple of really strong repertory film theaters. So that's also been a major help

00:04:36.180 where it's just like, oh, hey, the brattle is playing such and such.

00:04:41.620 I should go and see it.

00:04:43.120 That's actually how I saw one of my favorite movies of all time, The Third Man.

00:04:48.100 Just was like, sure, why not?

00:04:50.440 I like Orson Welles.

00:04:51.460 And so I've just kind of grown up always feeling like it was normal.

00:04:55.760 But my strongest credential is really that the entirety of my eighth grade,

00:05:01.380 all five sections of a certain art teacher, all watched Vertigo.

00:05:05.220 because I convinced him to play it Vertigo the Hitchcock movie

00:05:08.800 I was just he was he was he decided to do color theory through Vertigo

00:05:15.600 oh you know I mean that works you can do a lot you can do a lot 0.91

00:05:18.620 tracing the green symbolism of green really huge that movie is so fucked up though that 0.72

00:05:23.280 for an eighth grader I feel like there's just so much going on like you could have started with a

00:05:29.520 slightly more accessible Hitchcock well look the thing is and you want to know what my favorite

00:05:34.400 movie was from like age 10 to age 21 yes it was vertigo what i got out of it was not not a lot of

00:05:43.300 what was there watching it now as an adult i'm like wow okay there was there was a lot of subtext

00:05:49.200 here that sort of eluded me but it's a crackerjack mystery plotting yes and i've always been here for

00:05:56.140 crackerjack mystery plotting and what i can say all these eighth graders 130 of us watch this

00:06:00.780 and still to this day people will come up and be like you're the one who had us watch

00:06:04.280 vertigo right they're like man that movie was great so if you give yourself over to the different

00:06:10.580 pace and aesthetics of a classic film they're they're built to be enjoyed and i think we will

00:06:17.340 get to a lot of philosophical questions on why it's harder to access old movies like for me

00:06:23.960 there were always the old movie sections in like the local video store but then also like when i

00:06:30.480 was bored and scrolling through the channels there were always old movies on television

00:06:35.880 yeah and so you could access them in sort of like serendipitous ways that I think are a little bit

00:06:43.440 harder now because we live in this age of like you have infinite choice infinite choice that

00:06:50.580 you're always like choosing something deliberately yes right yes and it's infinite choice with

00:06:57.240 invisible constraint yes and it's hard to choose something that you also maybe feel like ambivalent

00:07:05.460 about or like i don't like this type of thing and then the other thing and we'll talk more about this

00:07:10.140 later is i think that it's harder to sit through old movies because the way that the narrative

00:07:16.020 plotting works is just different right it doesn't have like whammies every five minutes the way that

00:07:23.020 a contemporary blockbuster does like the narrative is is just gripping you in a different way and so

00:07:27.760 unless you are very intentional about i'm putting my phone in the other room or unless you have

00:07:35.060 access to like seeing it in a larger theater where you don't have any sort of distractions which

00:07:39.540 for me is always the optimal way to watch one of these movies but not everyone has access to

00:07:44.080 so we are admitting from the beginning there are challenges it is not easy to get yourself into old

00:07:51.220 movies. But sometimes if you give yourself a hook, you can kind of get addicted to it. So that's what

00:07:56.820 we're going to try to do. I think a lot about whether art wants to be enjoyed, how much aesthetic

00:08:02.100 friction the creator is deliberately inserting. And like on that scale, you have something like

00:08:07.500 David Lynch, where he's like putting a lot of aesthetic friction in there for you. And then

00:08:13.040 you have something like Nora Ephron, right? Where for me, just couldn't go down smoother. Just love

00:08:19.640 it with every fiber of my being. And it wants to be loved. What is very interesting about old

00:08:24.680 movies and about old media in general, I like this about old books too, is that there's aesthetic

00:08:29.260 friction, but it's not anything the creator intended to be there. The aesthetic friction

00:08:33.940 comes from the foreignness of it. And what's true about any amount of struggling through aesthetic

00:08:40.620 friction, that can make you tune into something more deeply. That's why some artists insert it

00:08:48.360 deliberately yes and i think with classic films it can work the same way it's like once you push

00:08:53.480 through the aesthetic friction of everybody talking kind of like this for no good reason

00:08:59.460 by golly once you get past all those weird differences they want to be loved these are

00:09:07.060 films that just like wanted you to leave the theater thrilled and i i love that i love

00:09:14.120 accidental aesthetic friction. Yes. And it gives you that special level of deeper engagement.

00:09:20.080 My favorite example of that is the Technicolor fashion show that takes 20 minutes in the middle 0.99

00:09:28.080 of the women, which is a famous quasi-screwball, but just like catty women going after each other. 0.88

00:09:37.040 But there is this moment where you go to this fashion show and it's just 20, like it's literally

00:09:42.120 and you're just looking at fashion and it's in technicolor the rest of the movie is not in

00:09:46.180 technicolor it's like you've gone to oz right but just for the fets yes and then it comes back

00:09:55.320 and you're like i feel like it's not responsible to talk about it and not

00:09:59.200 give both the gimmick and the tagline yeah so the gimmick is that there are no male actors

00:10:04.160 appear in the movie at any point uh but the tagline is the women colon it's all about men

00:10:10.300 which is also very classic very classic okay before we go down that route we're gonna start

00:10:20.640 with a question from Haley which is going to allow us to set the stage for how we're defining old

00:10:26.840 here what makes a movie old I was a film major in undergrad and people always expected me to

00:10:32.840 love old movies which I think of as black and white film I do not strongly dislike them I even

00:10:38.140 appreciate a lot of them, but they are not my go-to despite my education. They feel highbrow

00:10:44.060 to me in a weird way, which my focus in undergrad was pop culture. So I hated the question,

00:10:49.240 what's your favorite movie? From other majors who assume mine must be something like Citizen

00:10:53.720 King. Does Ferris Bueller count as old now? I love that film, but do not consider it old.

00:10:59.880 Does anything before digital editing count as old? I love starting off with an ontological

00:11:04.980 discussion you know yes uh the first thing i want to say i'm not going to answer the question at all

00:11:09.980 first is i'm going to say that citizen kane is held up as this like paragon of like if you're a

00:11:16.780 film major you like citizen kane and then it's like people shit on it and the thing is is having

00:11:22.160 revisited it when i was in my phd it is a very very good movie like it is an excellent like you

00:11:30.480 know when sometimes people do like um something's under hyped appropriately hyped over hyped like

00:11:35.940 citizen kane is appropriately hyped it is really good and it's also true that a lot of what makes

00:11:41.880 it special does not seem as special now yeah because every other movie does it right right

00:11:48.660 right like orson welles invented a ton of amazing different ways to do shots in that movie and none

00:11:55.200 of it registers as special to us right now because we're like okay yeah it's a tracking shot like

00:11:59.680 Right. Or like the idea that like, oh, you'd start with like a spoiler for the end of the movie that then you would like use as a puzzle piece to unpack the rest of it.

00:12:08.820 Right.

00:12:09.240 Like all of Christopher Nolan is indebted to Orson Welles in this movie.

00:12:14.740 So besides that, what are you bringing to the table today in terms of how you think of old?

00:12:21.160 So how I think of old right now relates to something I want to cite appropriately, so I got to find it at some point. But something I read about what percentage of streaming movies were older than 25 years. Right. And it's some dismal percentage of movies on streaming services are older than 25 years.

00:12:44.060 And so merely because that's the case, that's the loosest container I can put old in.

00:12:51.160 Equally, you know, much as my adolescence is now being resold on Depop to present day teenagers looking for the Y2K aesthetic.

00:13:00.600 What we liked as children, if you watch it now, it has the same, it has the same aesthetic friction that an old movie would.

00:13:06.880 Yes. Because it's not based the same. The values are like trash in a way you just like fully didn't

00:13:13.800 remember. The women are weirdly objectified in every family movie. And you're like, what's 1.00

00:13:19.780 happening? Yes. And like, I am glad that you brought up the narrative pacing and the friction

00:13:23.860 because I have experienced this a lot trying to show classics from our childhood as in came out

00:13:30.120 in our childhood yes to young kids now and because the narrative does not start with like

00:13:37.240 boom boom boom boom boom like it's not like immediate action into the narrative which has

00:13:42.760 become so commonplace like i tried to show miss doubtfire which you know there's some complicated

00:13:48.760 things going on that movie but also a classic and there's so much preamble like there's so much

00:13:55.560 like dun-da-dun-da-dun here we are in San Francisco like look there's parents um that

00:14:02.080 that even I think signifies as old and certainly young kids today anything where um the trailer

00:14:09.580 the original trailer used the like in a time where you know like that style of trailer that is old

00:14:17.000 right I think for this particular podcast I'm trying to skew largely older yes right because

00:14:25.160 i feel like that's the portion of things that the folks listening to this show who are all my age

00:14:29.680 are going to be less familiar with but you know uh i think the most modern movie i have in my list

00:14:36.720 is 1987 yeah and like that's that's old yeah 1987 i'm sorry now that's old yes it is and i think

00:14:45.020 mostly though both of us are going to skew uh golden age of hollywood and what is sometimes

00:14:50.460 called the silver age of hollywood which is like the 1960s and 70s like um there was a different

00:14:57.120 type of like new american style filmmaking that came in blah blah blah we'll talk about that but

00:15:01.460 those will be i think the bulk of our recs um okay this person also has some questions about

00:15:08.240 three contemporary movies that they like because they want us to recommend some stuff for them so

00:15:13.060 let's hear it here are three contemporary movies i love for old movie suggestions eighth grade

00:15:18.520 the social network and bottoms thank you so much this is this is diversity this is diversity like

00:15:26.320 tonally narratively um and and i love it because i actually i really like all three of those films

00:15:33.760 me too i love all three of those films what is the first thing that you think of today because i

00:15:38.560 actually i'm not going to come up i don't have a perfect answer for a film that combines the vibe

00:15:43.040 of all three of these i don't think that's possible but i have some that touch on different

00:15:47.320 one so what is your recommendation what i'm gonna name is a movie where you're in the viewpoint to

00:15:56.440 some extent of like a adolescent or pre-adolescent girl in conversation with eighth grade and it's

00:16:03.780 not quite as formally inventive as that film is but paper moon uh a movie from the 1970s

00:16:11.600 It opens up with a traveling con man played very charmingly by Ryan O'Neill, discovering that one of his old girlfriends has died and that she has a child who's almost certainly his.

00:16:28.680 Incidentally, played by his own daughter, Tatum O'Neill, at maybe the one moment when their parent relationship was like, kind of okay.

00:16:37.560 It's set during the Great Depression, and it is about the two of them navigating, coming to understand each other, and navigating this, like, sort of lawless life on the road together.

00:16:49.220 And it's fantastic.

00:16:51.680 So it's not a perfect fit, but that's my pick.

00:16:54.220 I, building on that pick, would also recommend Terrence Malick's Badlands, which is Terrence Malick's first film and the most accessible of all of his films.

00:17:05.260 And it stars a very young Martin Sheen and a very, very young Sissy Spacek.

00:17:11.080 And so also accessing some of that teen perspective.

00:17:15.360 She also does the voiceover for it, which is one of my favorite voiceovers.

00:17:19.300 and it's a story of like them being kind of on the lam but it also in terms of like this sort

00:17:27.460 of quiet reserved filmmaking is doing a lot like it allow it doesn't tell it allows you the film

00:17:33.280 to breathe in a similar way that i think bo burnham does with eighth grade uh the other

00:17:38.300 thing sort of in that vein which is kind of a wild card is i would recommend ozu's tokyo story

00:17:44.120 or an autumn afternoon i love ozu like he's probably one of my favorite filmmakers working

00:17:51.700 in the like 1940s 1950s early 1960s just gorgeous stylistically but also incredibly reserved um

00:18:00.120 in terms of filmmaking style in a way that forces you to pay attention and um kind of forces

00:18:06.620 contemplativeness and then the other thing that i thought of for social network and this is my

00:18:11.920 only fudge of the uh it has to be old is a movie that feels old and is made by one of like the

00:18:18.840 master craftsmen of it's usually a show associated with like 1970s 80s cinema and that is Gosford

00:18:25.200 Park which came out in like I don't know 2000 right like totally not technically old 2000 yeah

00:18:31.780 not old but feels old and is is like in it's using a lot of the conventions of a classic

00:18:40.900 hollywood caper but then employing altman's characteristic overlapping dialogue that forces

00:18:47.380 you again to pay very close attention so it is also it's just chalk filled with stars like

00:18:53.420 like every star you haven't seen it it is great that's one of those films though i feel like

00:18:59.860 people are like oh well i don't like downton abbey so i wouldn't watch gosford park and it's a very

00:19:04.340 different approach this is before julian fellows realized he could celebrate aristocrats and 0.99

00:19:10.300 everybody would get on board this is when you still had to be like very like you have to shit 0.79

00:19:17.880 on aristocrats at all what about for bottoms is there anything that like would get at that 0.86

00:19:24.160 absurdist humor like that is so hard i'm gonna i'm gonna poach from one of our subsequent question

00:19:32.820 recommendations that i'd set aside and i'm gonna say another peter bogdanovich movie

00:19:38.280 which is what's up doc yes which also has ryan o'neill in it um but it is ryan o'neill and

00:19:47.040 barbara streisand in a uh i totally forgot about that i think that she can get miscategorized along

00:19:54.720 with katherine hepburn and bringing up baby as a manic pixie dream girl but it's not one of those

00:20:00.040 sort of like cutesy things where she's like just weird enough to be delightful it's like no like

00:20:04.260 Like, this woman is going to come into your life and she is going to destroy it.

00:20:08.740 Like, your whole life's work will be building this dinosaur skeleton. 0.99

00:20:14.020 And the climax of the movie will be that dinosaur skeleton collapsing.

00:20:18.280 Right?

00:20:18.860 I think that that's a lot more threatening than Manic Pixie Dream Girl.

00:20:22.380 Yes. 1.00

00:20:22.920 But either way, Barbra Streisand is that character. 0.92

00:20:25.340 She is a wild, wily, Bugs Bunny, affected scenester in 1970s San Francisco.

00:20:33.180 and she meets hot nerd Ryan O'Neill

00:20:37.400 and she decides they're meant for each other

00:20:39.720 even if he hates her.

00:20:41.700 Shenanigans ensue around that

00:20:43.140 along with a spy caper

00:20:46.620 just sort of as like a side dish.

00:20:49.900 It's great.

00:20:50.860 And it all works together really, really well.

00:20:53.000 It's shot beautifully.

00:20:55.280 And best of all, this is a movie.

00:20:58.080 This is where Madeline Kahn 0.98

00:20:59.520 made like one of her film debuts. 0.99

00:21:01.600 Like one of the most substantial early roles for Madison Kahn is the stick in the mud musicologist fiance of Ryan O'Neill, who, you know, isn't going to make she can't hold a candle to Barbara.

00:21:15.000 so speaking of barbara's the only the only um film that i would recommend also in that vein

00:21:21.880 so this person needs to try it all of these is uh the lady eve which is about barbara stanwick

00:21:28.240 stuck on a cruise knows wants to seduce someone decides gonna seduce hot nerd uh henry fonda

00:21:36.600 and it is well con artist again yeah she's like a con and it's so funny it is it's

00:21:44.600 brilliant it's like really like actually incredibly funny and it's from i don't know 1941

00:21:50.500 um yeah yeah everyone's really hot though too like it is it is like i love when you look at

00:21:58.200 an old movie like that and you're like wow fine specimens this is one of the great joys of um

00:22:04.440 watching classic films is is discovering forgotten hunks yes later on in this episode i have like a

00:22:10.620 like an homage to my favorite, Joel McRae. I love Joel McRae. Exactly. Forgotten hunk,

00:22:17.680 Joel McRae. And you discover them and you're, and you just get to carry them around with you

00:22:21.720 forever. So next question is about something we've talked about a little bit, but like how

00:22:27.460 people find them, randomness, all this stuff. Let's hear from Molly. How has streaming changed

00:22:32.780 the way people can or can't discover old movies today? I attribute my lifelong love of old movies

00:22:39.220 to Turner Classic Movies.

00:22:41.140 Because I was in high school in the early 2000s,

00:22:43.640 I had the luxury of staying up until 2 a.m. during the summer

00:22:46.760 and just watching any random old movie

00:22:49.020 that TCM decided to air late at night.

00:22:51.480 Some of my favorite movies today are ones I stumbled upon

00:22:54.300 because the cable network chose to air them over my school breaks.

00:22:57.700 I'm thinking here especially of the Katharine Hepburn bomb, Sylvia Scarlett.

00:23:01.620 So many of the movies I fortuitously stumbled across

00:23:04.220 in the golden age of cable

00:23:05.500 are not only harder to stumble upon on a streaming service,

00:23:09.220 but are actually not even available to stream at all today.

00:23:12.280 What does this mean for the continued relevancy of older films

00:23:15.360 or for the possibility that they will gain new audiences today?

00:23:20.000 I think about this all the time.

00:23:22.480 Yeah.

00:23:22.680 Because the studios don't think of these films as like profit sources for them.

00:23:28.780 And so like the cost even of digitizing some old films, right?

00:23:32.520 Like there are a lot of films that are not even available in a digital format

00:23:36.860 and thus not able to stream.

00:23:38.520 which is part of why the campaigns that various still existing movie stories use in order to

00:23:45.620 proclaim their relevance and get support for them to continue to exist is like we are the

00:23:50.700 repository right like do you only want the library of congress to own sylvia scarlet like no this is

00:23:57.320 a film that has incredible meaning or available meanings to a lot of people so we should also say

00:24:03.020 sylvia scarlet is an amazing film because it features a lot of cross-dressing from very very

00:24:08.460 hot katherine hepburn looking like just an incredibly hot man if you don't know about

00:24:13.500 the haze code in hollywood uh i don't think we have time to get into all of it but it's valuable

00:24:20.980 to read up on it if you're at all curious about uh classic films because it's such a useful

00:24:25.500 interpretive frame and basically there was a time when the movies could just kind of do whatever

00:24:30.460 they wanted to and they did a lot of stuff that was really really transgressive like katherine

00:24:35.300 Hepburn cross-dressing constantly and seeming very queer and then there was a time when they

00:24:43.260 worried they were going to get government oversight so they started policing themselves 0.89

00:24:46.420 and that is why you'll see things like couples never sleeping in the same bed that's why kisses

00:24:52.920 are just like faces being smushed together or rather than like mouths being open to one another

00:24:57.960 one of the famous examples from now voyager with betty davis is like to insinuate that they

00:25:04.120 definitely had sex like you would light a cigarette for someone else and hand it to them

00:25:09.840 right like that was like sex boning right there um but yeah a sacred text to people our age 0.98

00:25:15.920 is uh the scene in the 2005 pride and prejudice where you see matthew mcfadyen like flexing his

00:25:22.820 hand after he's lifted lizzie bennett into the carriage if that means something to you

00:25:29.320 just welcome to classic film right because they couldn't show things more explicit than that

00:25:34.940 so in the same way that historical romance novels can enshrine these tiny moments as like deeply

00:25:42.160 meaningful gestures like lighting a cigarette as though they just fucked like that was all 0.82

00:25:48.140 paul henry and betty davis had yeah and you feel it yes and it's so hot and cool but okay this

00:25:56.380 go stark but you don't have like there's a lot of these um they're called pre-code films that

00:26:01.200 were the ones that were that were testing boundaries before hollywood self-implemented

00:26:06.840 this code on itself and then also those the the postcode era films and then the films that were

00:26:13.760 kind of like fucking around with the code in the 1950s like seeing what what can we get away with

00:26:18.980 are we breaking down the code like there's just there are so many different types of movies that

00:26:24.100 if they're not like part of i don't know like the bfi the british film institute top 10

00:26:29.080 they're not going to necessarily be included like or even accessible on like i don't know

00:26:36.120 not like certainly not netflix netflix does not give a shit about old movies no there are some

00:26:41.100 that are on max there i am actually usually surprised by how many there are on amazon but

00:26:46.620 i think that's just because like they're movies that you can buy certainly not stream right but

00:26:51.960 But at least they're digitized and easily accessible.

00:26:54.280 And they're usually pretty cheap to buy.

00:26:56.620 So yeah, are we worried about how this is going to impact their relevance?

00:26:59.480 Yes, constantly.

00:27:01.080 How can you still find them?

00:27:03.640 So the easiest thing is if you really just want to make this a project for a month or a year,

00:27:09.020 the Criterion streaming service is the closest thing you're going to find to something like Turner Classic Movies.

00:27:14.600 They do really thoughtful programming in terms of what's available at any given time.

00:27:19.720 They have a great newsletter where they'll sort of tell you how these films relate to each other.

00:27:23.940 I think some of them also pay attention to great film podcasts like You Must Remember This.

00:27:31.560 And so they'll sort of line up with seasons that she's doing.

00:27:35.940 So that's one way, streaming service, to get it.

00:27:39.220 And then a freer way, one of the most fun things my old roommate Bruce and I ever did

00:27:44.940 is we just decided to go in on like one random actor we really liked and just rent every DVD

00:27:53.160 the library had from that actor. We did it with George Sanders, who's this British character

00:27:59.980 actor who plays sort of like high class judgmental cats in a lot of different things. And we got to

00:28:06.980 see this whole range of high class judgmental cats and a bunch of movies where surprisingly,

00:28:12.260 he isn't one and it was just phenomenal and like you can create your own summer of stars yeah right

00:28:20.220 like go in on betty davis and just get everything your library has on them and if your library

00:28:25.020 doesn't own something and you want them to get it ask them to buy it they love to buy things for you

00:28:29.120 or they can interlibrary loan it too from a larger library which is amazing and libraries are amazing

00:28:35.140 for that i think people don't often think about dvds anymore it's no you can also do it with cds

00:28:40.380 which is pretty cool i don't and i know that i should like i can't throw away my dvds but i also

00:28:47.080 will not i won't watch one yeah yeah no i know but you have you must keep them right that's a level

00:28:53.300 of uh non-aesthetic that's a level of material friction that's too high a bar for me so if

00:29:00.020 that's true for you respect but i feel like especially if you've got like a curious young

00:29:05.220 teenager who's like sort of in on this with you this would be a great bonding activity getting

00:29:09.880 like a secondhand dvd player and just like going in on an actor yeah and finding all the stuff you

00:29:16.560 can from them and obviously your teen mileage might vary but teens like being into weird esoteric

00:29:21.680 shit so that is something that you can do um the other thing i would do if you were in any sort of

00:29:26.640 a larger metropolitan area is there almost always is a like some sort of like retrospective 0.98

00:29:35.760 summer series and they're often not super deep cuts but they're like there are some mid cuts

00:29:44.340 that come in like they like the one in austin which is my favorite in the entire world uh

00:29:50.560 they would do a bunch of early horror stuff then they would go to like you know kind of weirder

00:29:57.000 westerns and like neo-noir like everything and some of them were the things that like you would

00:30:03.620 see like you and I would be like yeah everyone's seen that but like maybe you haven't seen that

00:30:07.740 there are new people born every day who've never seen Raiders of the Lost Ark right right I think

00:30:12.820 that's beautiful and they would also they would go all the way up to like Jurassic Park and the

00:30:16.740 opportunity to see Jurassic Park in a movie theater again the original clearly um I was

00:30:22.680 sitting in front of Kyle Chandler it was one of the best moments in my entire life that was when

00:30:26.620 Friday Night Lights was going on uh wow but like look out for those and it also is a way to like

00:30:32.480 actually get yourself to do it right it's like appointment viewing right so okay that is our

00:30:37.420 commentary on that also it is sad because tcm served a very vital function also nick at night

00:30:42.680 like that's how i access so many old tv shows yeah yeah okay we have a couple of requests for

00:30:51.540 rex that are going to let us talk about comedies that we love let's hear first from amy i had a

00:30:57.700 fantastic social studies teacher in high school who introduced me to some classic old movies

00:31:03.200 like Rebecca, Roman Holiday, and The Philadelphia Story. And there's a new non-profit in my city

00:31:09.760 that shows old 16 millimeter films. In November, they showed Bringing Up Baby. I'd seen it years

00:31:16.360 ago and I've read about the popularity of comedies during the Great Depression, but watching it

00:31:21.240 myself at a tough time gave me a new understanding of the importance of laughter and escapism.

00:31:27.700 What other great comedy classics should I check out?

00:31:30.840 Or mysteries laced with comedy and banter like Charade and The Thin Man?

00:31:35.960 I've seen the major screwball comedies like His Girl Friday, It Happened One Night, and My Man Godfrey, as well as some Hepburn Tracy films.

00:31:45.160 I'm also open to 1950s to 1980s comedies in the screwball vein.

00:31:50.840 Thanks.

00:31:51.780 Okay, first of all, yay for this nonprofit showing 16mm films.

00:31:56.660 like gorgeous oh my god so cool totally like just seeing them on the original film is

00:32:01.480 I know it's nerdy but it's like it's a beautiful textured experience

00:32:05.620 the movie that I have is Sullivan's Travels see this is wild because I also I was basically

00:32:14.320 just going to be like I've got two names for you here Ernst Lubitsch and Preston Sturgis

00:32:18.120 yes exactly so I see you on Sullivan's Travels I had Lady Eve but tell the folks about Lost

00:32:24.100 hunk, Joel McCrea, and Preston Sturgis. He's very cute in this movie. Not as cute as someone that

00:32:29.920 she mentions in her question, though, which was a real discovery for me, which was Gregory Peck

00:32:35.340 in Roman Holiday. Are you freaking kidding me? Yeah, he's so handsome. His pants go up to his

00:32:41.500 nipples, and he is so handsome. Like, you're supposed to be looking at Audrey Hepburn, and I'm 0.96

00:32:46.980 like, nope, that's Gregory Peck. So Sullivan's Travels, the way that I first found out about it

00:32:53.920 is because it's like the source material very much in quotes for oh brother where out thou

00:32:59.060 there are film producers in sullivan's travels who want to make a very serious film that like

00:33:06.120 grapples with serious shit and they want to make it from this book or like the name of the movie

00:33:11.020 would have been oh brother where out thou and so it's kind of like this lampooning of like if you 0.98

00:33:17.080 like you need to make a movie about serious issues yes it would be called oh brother where

00:33:22.060 out thou and then it goes on to become like almost like a sort of picaresque um following

00:33:29.480 them around like in a yes very comedic fashion um the famous film producer decides to sort of

00:33:37.700 try to live as an as a regular man yeah right yes so that he can make this great picture yes

00:33:43.500 and comedy ensues i love a lot of sullivan's travels and then i found find it's like on that

00:33:51.920 That's why comedy matters message at the end.

00:33:54.200 Yes.

00:33:55.020 So you're like a little heavy handed.

00:33:56.380 It's a little on the nose, but it also, this is the question.

00:33:59.440 But Preston Sergis is a genius.

00:34:02.080 He wrote, so we talked about the Lady Eve earlier.

00:34:04.120 That's also his work.

00:34:05.240 And the one of his that I was going to mention here is the Palm Beach story, which is like

00:34:11.120 a screwball comedy. 0.99

00:34:12.900 Going to say, as with many films from this time, you're going to encounter some racial

00:34:18.880 stereotypes.

00:34:19.480 And you're going to be like, wow, these are really blatant and terrible.

00:34:23.620 And they're not pertinent to the plot. 0.99

00:34:26.540 It's not like Black people are evil, but it's just like there are some servant characters.

00:34:31.400 They're very broad African-American stereotypes, very clearly derived from a minstrel-like background. 0.99

00:34:38.260 And they're just like small bit characters who pop up in a couple of scenes to talk about how crazy these white people are. 0.95

00:34:45.020 And they're right. 1.00

00:34:46.020 These white people are crazy. 1.00

00:34:47.820 And this is about Joel McRae, Long Lost Hunk, and Claudette Colbert. 1.00

00:34:53.180 They are a young couple who are married and want to bone a lot.

00:34:58.160 They're really attracted to each other and they love each other.

00:35:00.220 But she has expensive taste and he just cannot get anyone to sponsor his idea for like a floating air strip.

00:35:12.320 And so she decides, it's like, well, God didn't make me this hot for no reason.

00:35:16.540 And so she's got to go to Florida, the land of the millionaires, and marry a rich guy. And he has to follow her and try to convince her not to marry a rich guy by being hot at her. And that's your loose frame. And within that, there's just like so much incredible satirical humor that feels modern.

00:35:39.160 there's so much physical comedy that feels like why don't we have more of this in modern movies

00:35:44.880 and hot people you'd never seen before yeah that's great it is so good and it also reminds

00:35:52.380 me of my other favorite undersung preston sturgis movie which is the miracle of morgan's creek

00:35:57.400 which is about like so satirical um this woman who wakes up and she's like oh my god i'm pregnant

00:36:03.920 and i'm married and i have no idea who the father is and like have to figure it out going

00:36:08.780 backwards from there and it's important like that was released miracle morgan's creek is 1943

00:36:13.420 lady eve is 1941 palm beach story is 1942 those are all released during the war like they are

00:36:20.920 serving a very specific function the other thing that i immediately thought of and like

00:36:26.560 this movie is not everyone's taste but i laughed so much during it um the first time i saw it was

00:36:32.700 like why did no one tell me about this movie it's shampoo which is Warren Beatty Goldie Hawn

00:36:39.520 Julie Christie who talk about like incredible hottie from the 1970s Julie Christie oh my god

00:36:46.440 um but this movie is set it's like it's a political movie in some ways in terms of like

00:36:51.780 it's set against the backdrop of Nixon's election but it's also just about like this hot kind of 0.97

00:36:59.400 stupid guy played by warren baity who has really good hair like gets his hair blow-dried and he's 0.98

00:37:05.300 the shampoo boy and like at a salon and has to figure out a bunch of other like shenanigans but 0.99

00:37:11.500 the the real appeal here is if you want to understand like who warren baity was what

00:37:17.020 warren baity meant this movie is very effective at that so i mentioned another director writer

00:37:23.580 screenwriter director ernst lubich he and preston surges are like my two like they're like the

00:37:29.380 ace i keep up my sleeve um and he is a hungarian emigre right before world war like uh in the 30s

00:37:37.940 he comes over and this particular movie to be or not to be is about a group of bad actors staging

00:37:46.940 a production of hamlet that they discover they must use to um thwart the nazis and sort of like

00:37:55.360 defeat hitler and like with slapstick and great again satire on what people in artistic communities 0.99

00:38:02.980 are like they really do a truly incredible job this movie walked so inglorious bastards could 0.82

00:38:09.040 run yes and i find movies like this so much more effective than like i don't know casablanca in 0.81

00:38:13.640 terms of like indicting the nazis but that one i haven't seen since college so that is a really

00:38:20.380 good reminder to to go back and revisit um okay next request comes from lexi i miss straight up

00:38:26.940 fun comedies that are so well made we watched game night recently and it's so great also really love

00:38:31.860 palm springs and long shot i do know and love some like it hot and gentlemen prefer blondes already

00:38:36.920 um i also love a great action movie that has some smarts or comedy like true lies or fall guy

00:38:42.260 and my third category is dance movies with heart like footloose or dirty dancing thanks okay where

00:38:49.220 Where do you go on this, Margaret?

00:38:50.520 I have a good idea, but I want to hear yours.

00:38:53.260 So my first one is jumping off from Longshot, which is, if you've never seen it, a phenomenal

00:38:59.820 romantic comedy.

00:39:01.160 And it is a romantic comedy in a political setting.

00:39:04.420 And so for that, I wanted to do the original 1950 Born Yesterday, starring Judy Holliday.

00:39:11.000 Oh, yeah.

00:39:12.680 And one of the things that is really fun about watching, about engaging with old media is

00:39:16.820 finding out that like every problem we have now has been had before like they've all been had

00:39:24.200 before yeah and so this particular one is um a big oily creep of like a mob boss slash business 0.98

00:39:32.100 tycoon uh comes to washington dc to um sort of grab power and he brings along his uh dumb blonde 0.99

00:39:41.300 girlfriend and he's told early on you know your dumb blonde girlfriend is really going to hold 0.99

00:39:46.400 you back in these elite social circles because she just doesn't know. She doesn't know her elbow 1.00

00:39:50.740 from her ass. So you've got to, you've got to, you've got to take care of that. And so he deals 1.00

00:39:55.080 with it by hiring an incredibly handsome man to tutor her in American history and civics and

00:40:05.180 literature. And through that, one, does she fall in love with the hot man who's tutoring her? Maybe

00:40:11.720 you could say. And then two, you get a very Capra-esque sort of clueless outsider perspective

00:40:20.440 on the machinations of Washington that even in this moment is still very refreshing. And it's

00:40:27.660 a film debut from Judy Holliday, who is an incredible comedic actress. And really,

00:40:33.180 she starred in this on Broadway, and she really had to fight to get the role in the movie because 1.00

00:40:38.480 she was considered too fat and too jewish which you're gonna look at her and be like her

00:40:43.220 but louis b mayor wasn't a great guy um no not a great guy at all uh so what i thought of

00:40:52.580 immediately was if this person i know they've seen um some of the kind of classic some like

00:40:59.580 a gentleman prefer blondes of that era i would also recommend a philadelphia story which is a

00:41:04.560 classic and very often recommended but it's a classic for a reason and it stars katherine

00:41:09.700 hepburn and carrie grant uh and jimmy stewart in like the most lovable jimmy stewart like i don't

00:41:15.800 always like jimmy stewart but i really like him in this movie um and it's a what's called a comedy

00:41:21.240 of remarriage which is a very common trope in uh screwball comedies where people have gotten

00:41:27.020 divorced and then are they going to get back together or aren't they um and that's katherine

00:41:32.480 Hepburn and Cary Grant and it actually it's one of it's interesting because Cary Grant is not as

00:41:38.480 likable in this movie usually like he's just like straight up likable all over the place but in this

00:41:43.920 case it's Jimmy Stewart who gets to play like this super likable person who maybe convinces

00:41:49.740 Catherine Hepburn that like oh there's something else to life than getting like being married to

00:41:54.660 this kind of stick in the mud who is Cary Grant and this movie I feel like opens up one of the

00:41:59.260 other great joys of engaging with old media, which is like, how would I rewrite this?

00:42:06.700 Because it's like three of the best performances, like the chemistry from the cast is incredible.

00:42:12.640 The performances they turn in are incredible. And there's also this sort of overarching

00:42:17.100 narrative where I'm like, I have a couple notes on this one. Can I tweak one or two things?

00:42:23.100 My dad in the late 90s had an aspiration to do a version of this with old California rich people and like the upstart fiance being like a dot com guy.

00:42:35.820 Yeah, totally.

00:42:36.920 And I think that that, I mean, now that would be a period piece in and of itself, but a period worth investigating.

00:42:42.420 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:42:42.880 And I think, I think this one, I don't think it should ever be remade, but I think that there is so much fun in sitting with your friends and talking through and being like, what would we do differently here?

00:42:53.740 Right. The other thing that came to my mind immediately for the like action movie that has smarts or comedy is Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

00:43:02.520 Oh, that's a fun one.

00:43:03.540 it's like such a like like ready-made classic like you have paul newman hottest of all hot

00:43:12.820 in this movie truly like just endlessly i mean i there's there's actually very few movies when

00:43:19.560 paul newman isn't the hottest of all hot but he's particularly handsome in this movie

00:43:23.560 they play um outlaws it's like loosely based on a sort of real story outlaws who are going around

00:43:30.980 and eventually make their way to south america and also there's a woman played by katherine ross

00:43:38.000 who's involved and also um this song raindrops keep falling on my head

00:43:44.600 was debuted in this movie and it's very like that it became a huge hit but it also has robert

00:43:50.340 redford how did i miss that there's a lot of witty banter it it was pretty responsible for

00:43:55.560 launching robert redford's career um like there's nothing super sophisticated going on in this movie

00:44:01.940 but that i think you could say the same if say true lies it is just a romp like it is incredibly

00:44:07.280 fun to watch and you will be like okay now i want to watch more of all of these people i want to

00:44:14.140 see everything that they're involved in so that would be my other rec yeah and for the action

00:44:19.900 movie with smarts it's cliche to point to hitchcock for this but sometimes cliches are true

00:44:24.820 If you haven't seen North by Northwest, watch it. Normal ad man Cary Grant gets mistaken for a spy and has to start running from a criminal organization determined to kill him and runs in the most debonair way anyone has ever fled.

00:44:42.520 And he has to like run up the nose of Mount Rushmore.

00:44:45.760 It is a classic for a reason. I'm almost hesitant to recommend it because it feels like one of those classic movies people have actually seen.

00:44:53.400 But that's not true. There are people who maybe have never seen a classic film. And if you haven't seen that one, if you've seen all the like, if you've seen like the big five Hitchcocks, but you haven't gone deeper in his catalog.

00:45:03.620 Yeah. The one I would recommend here. It came to me through my George Saunders dive and it is foreign correspondent. Oh, I haven't. Once again, Joel McRae. Joel McRae is a average American man who decides he can do a better job reporting for the local paper on World War Two than their current reporter.

00:45:24.700 And so he, you know, he convinces the managing editor, he gets sent over there, and then, you know, as you do in a Hitchcock movie, stumbles into a ring of Nazi spies and has to figure out who he can trust and who he can't.

00:45:37.980 There are these incredible climactic sequences with windmills in Holland.

00:45:43.340 And it's just, it is an absolute delight.

00:45:46.700 You do not know the twists are coming.

00:45:48.620 You don't know what they're going to be.

00:45:49.980 And everybody is witty and charming all throughout.

00:45:51.960 I don't know if people know this, but Margaret is the president of the Joel McRae fan club.

00:45:56.720 Yeah, I do.

00:45:58.300 I had one goal coming here.

00:46:00.660 Keeps it alive.

00:46:02.020 I think this is the last Joel McRae film I'm going to recommend.

00:46:05.440 You are stupendously good at recalling the exact plot points of movies.

00:46:09.240 I'm like, shampoo, the vibes, funny.

00:46:13.120 Vibe impeccable.

00:46:14.340 Look, that's the important part.

00:46:17.280 Okay.

00:46:17.620 Yeah, I got a good memory.

00:46:19.720 Oh, okay.

00:46:20.380 What about dance movies with heart?

00:46:21.960 I can't. Well, I mean, like the thing that I go to is like, and we're going to talk about this a little bit in the next one, which is about like how if you don't if you don't like musicals.

00:46:31.380 But I think for this person, an incredible dance movie with heart is singing in the rain.

00:46:36.740 Yeah. I mean, let's just we're going to we're going to introduce the concept of singing in the rain.

00:46:42.000 Yes. Then let's get the musical question, because I love that.

00:46:44.700 That was what both of us came up with for the musical question.

00:46:47.340 Like singing in the rain is like if you had someone whose heart was like blackened against musicals and was like, I will never watch a musical in my life.

00:46:57.760 You show them singing in the rain and they're like, oh, like one exception.

00:47:03.280 Yes.

00:47:03.800 And I can make a really good case for it based on the specific bits of aesthetic friction that the person mentioned in their question.

00:47:11.820 So we should hear the question.

00:47:13.240 And then I can be like, this is why I think this one will work.

00:47:15.860 okay this episode is going long so we're going to save the rest of it for paid subscribers

00:47:21.120 we're going to talk about musicals movies about people doing their jobs really well

00:47:25.760 like competency porn movies about catty women whodunits delightful romances and so much more

00:47:33.160 i don't know it's possible but we have a lot more and by the way if you're furiously taking

00:47:37.340 notes on all of us the show notes for paid subscribers will have a list of every single

00:47:41.500 movie we mentioned along with where you can watch it. It took Melody forever to do this. And that's

00:47:46.740 the kind of thing that subscriptions pay for. So if you want those notes, the rest of our

00:47:51.400 recommendations, plus a really good AAA segment about thriving in a low residency graduate program

00:47:57.740 and wanting to make the most of it, go to culturestudypod.substack.com and subscribe.

00:48:03.540 And this was so much fun.

00:48:05.200 We talked about so many movies.

00:48:06.780 we taped for an hour and 15 minutes

00:48:10.800 and I think we said

00:48:11.660 how many movie names did we say

00:48:13.360 like 300 movie names

00:48:14.880 approximately

00:48:16.540 give or take one or two

00:48:18.100 I commend you for keeping

00:48:19.120 all of those plots in your head

00:48:20.380 I had to like

00:48:21.080 look on Google to be like

00:48:22.560 oh right

00:48:23.220 yes this is what they do

00:48:24.640 is there

00:48:26.620 if people want to find you

00:48:27.640 where can they find more of your work

00:48:29.120 so where I'm most active right now

00:48:31.820 social media wise

00:48:33.220 is Instagram

00:48:33.900 under the handle

00:48:35.500 Mrs. Friday Next

00:48:36.460 I have a newsletter, Two Bossy Dames, presently at twobossydames.substack.com.

00:48:43.420 And most excitingly, I am going to be teaching an online class about Jane Austen's Mansfield Park

00:48:51.100 using a frame I call Adaptation as Empathy, where we rework aspects of it collectively as a group

00:49:00.260 to sort of develop understanding for a lot of the characters who are annoying.

00:49:04.100 And I'm doing that because there are so many annoying characters in Rachel Park.

00:49:08.380 I think it's going to be a really valuable exercise.

00:49:10.560 But it's low-key, one of my favorite, my favorite Austins.

00:49:14.060 And, like, I think it's because it's the first one I ever read.

00:49:16.500 And so I just hold it so close.

00:49:18.840 It's so under-read.

00:49:20.020 It's such an interesting part of her overall work.

00:49:23.020 Totally.

00:49:23.520 And the big reason I wanted to do it right now is because it's really messy.

00:49:26.980 And, like, I just didn't think I could do a less messy book at this moment in time.

00:49:32.640 Yeah, right.

00:49:32.840 Um, but building empathy with characters you hate is honestly a more emotionally grounding

00:49:39.540 thing to do in this moment than you might expect.

00:49:42.700 Oh, and you can find out about that at, um, mhwillison.com, but I'll also have links in

00:49:49.180 all the places I mentioned previously.

00:49:50.700 So that's going to be in March.

00:49:52.700 Thank you so much.

00:49:53.540 This has been an absolute pleasure.

00:49:55.320 I have so many movies to go revisit now.

00:49:57.300 I know, me too.

00:50:00.640 Thanks for listening to the Culture Study Podcast.

00:50:02.840 Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts because we have so many great episodes

00:50:07.000 in the works, and I promise you don't want to miss any of them.

00:50:10.420 If you want to suggest a topic, ask a question about the culture that surrounds you, or submit

00:50:14.780 a question for our subscriber-only advice time segment, go to our Google form at tinyurl.com

00:50:21.140 slash culturestudypod or check the show notes for our link.

00:50:24.380 If you want to support the show and get bonus content, head to culturestudypod.substack.com.

00:50:29.620 It's only $5 a month or $50 a year, and you'll get ad-free episodes, an exclusive advice time segment, weekly discussion threads for each episode, and a link to a special Google form so that your questions go to the front of the line.

00:50:42.580 And in this week's show notes, remember, Melody has listed out every single movie mentioned in this discussion and where you can watch it online now.

00:50:49.980 There are 43 of them.

00:50:52.160 I counted.

00:50:53.880 Do we have to change the episode title now?

00:50:56.560 No.

00:50:56.780 Probably.

00:50:57.600 I'm just chiming in.

00:50:58.920 that's the kind of labor your subscriptions pay for it the culture study podcast is produced by

00:51:04.600 me and helen peterson and melody rowell our music is by pottington bear and you can find me on

00:51:09.420 instagram at anhelen peterson melody at melodious 47 and the show at culture study pod

00:51:15.040 is there is there a baby no there is a uh construction next door oh it's like i was

00:51:26.300 just about to buzz saw so fun it does sound like a baby it does like a whining baby margaret is

00:51:33.900 there a baby do you want me to try like draping a blanket over my head i think no i think it's

00:51:39.740 fine we'll live yeah

Culture Study Podcast - February 19, 2025

Approximately 72 Old Movies to Fall In Love With

Episode Stats

Transcript