I often spend
late summer evenings with a good movie. As a writer, and playwright, I
sometimes get asked what is my favorite book or favorite movie. My favorite
book vary slightly from time to time, but when it comes to film, I usually
mentions Frank Darabont's masterpiece "The Shawshank Redemption",
based on a Stephen King short storie. It is an epic prison movie about
friendship, desperation, hope and human relations. It is a lingering drama that
grabs you right away, and slightly moves something in you as a human beeing. The production is
almost perfect in every aspect, but I really like how the subdued acting brings
an additional human depth to the film.
Stephen King is
also behind another of my favorites. "Stand by me" is based on an
autobiographical novel which was originally called "The Body". The
year is 1959, in a sleepy little town four twelve year old boys packs down
their sleeping bags and heading out into the woods. They are looking for a body
- a boy of their own age are reported missing and have probably been struck by
the train.
The trip is
perilous and fatiguing, and brings out the deepest of them all. Only mutual
trust and humor keeps them together when it gets tough. It will be their
first encounter with death, but it is the trip that alters the five boys and
sends them out on the road that forms a life. As already said,
the film is based on a story by Stephen King, but despite that the writer is named
Stephen King, there is no horror movie, but a film that is characterized by the
nostalgia that often settles over childhood memories.
Do you have a
movie recommendation for lazy summer evenings?
Jorn
Jorn, The Shawshank Redemption would be high up my list also. I've seen it two or three times. It's good to have as a companion on a long plane ride!
ReplyDeleteAnother Stephen King story converted to a movie that I really like is Hearts in Atlantis with Anthony Hopkins. He was brilliant in it. More memorable than as Hannibal Lecter.
Fried Green Tomatoes At the Whistle Stop Cafe! And, it has to be said, Wallace And Gromit, The Curse Of The Were Rabbit. The kids laugh at some bits, the more adult humour goes right over their heads. And the Cat's Meow, Gosford Park, Black Narcissus....etc etc
ReplyDeleteThank you both for giving me a list of movies for an uplifting summer evening. I can use them considering my "Deerhunter" mood at the moment.:)
ReplyDeleteI watched The Magus about a dozen times when I was at university - as much as I love John Fowles, I suspect it was more for Candice Bergen. Jeff you'd enjoy that one. Then any Kurasawa movie, particularly The Seven Samurai and Ran, almost any Fellini movie (Amarcord), Hitchcock, The Gods Must be Crazy, and any weird movie.
ReplyDeleteI am a fellow movie addict, Jorn, but I fear--though your two choices are also favorites of mine--that my list might be a little too tame for you. These I know by heart and still watch with pleasure: Cinema Paradiso, Il Gattopardo (The Leopard), Life is Beautiful, Gosford Park, Woody Allen's Manhattan, Out of Africa. Fellini's Roma. I have watched two films so often with the same people that we can recite the dialog by heart: Casablanca (with my friend Doris) and Blazing Saddles (with my brothers. It's the only thing the three of them agree on!)
ReplyDeleteAll of the above are good choices. How about The Princess Bride?
ReplyDeleteAll excellent choices (do the people that hang out here have class, or what?) A less well-known movie that I love is the 1998 "Sliding Doors." I'm not a big Gwyneth Paltrow fan, but I love this movie that examines how the smallest of changes in our lives can end up having massive effects down the line, for good and ill. I can think of NUMEROUS such situations in my own life, where seemingly minor things ended up having HUGE ramifications for me. One such, seemingly very trivial, five or six years ago introduced me to the writings of Timothy Hallinan, and through him to all of you!
ReplyDeleteYour trip down memory lane, EvKa, reminded me of "Back to the Future" where events can be changed via time travel.
DeleteI couldn't agree more about Shawshank. It's in my list of favorite movies.
ReplyDeleteJust rewatched Three Days of the Condor, a great thriller. A more contemporary legal thriller is by the BBC, The Escape Artist, thrilling.
Also, contemporary movies The Imitation Game and The Theory of Everything are very good.
Inside Man is an excellent bank robbery movie with many twists.