Intro/Disclaimer: Hi! All of us have our top 10 lists, ok? Well, here’s mine!
I’m not claiming that these are THE BEST 10 English films ever made. Far from it. These are some good films from the limited space of films i’ve seen. In selecting them i’ve adopted a few rules:
No recent blockbuster!(ie, no Titanic, weather it’s good or bad!)
No SFX/monster(ie, Matrix is out- oh, what a nice movie!..and sorry Godzilla!)
No Spielberg (yes, it was difficult not to incl. Indiana, ET, Jurassic Park...)
No superhero (yea, Spiderman I&II were terrific!)
Yes, these movies are great, but we’ve all watched them haven’t we ?
I felt that this page should make at least one person discover one nice movie s/he hasn’t seen till now or had forgotten long ago! If I see one comment to that effect, my purpose will be served and i’ll forget all the pains of 2-finger typing so much stuff!
Now to the movies (in random order):
1) Fools Rush In (1997): If you’ve watched ’Friends’ sitcom and liked Matthew Perry, you got to watch this. Paired against him is charming Salma Hayak. Basically Alex and Isabel had a one night stand and forget all about it. Then suddenly he comes to know that she’s pregnant and decides to marry her. After marriage they have to face many a crises since they belong to different cultures(she is a Mexican)and both don’t want to shift their locations. A lot of hilarious scenes are there involving their families. I thought may be Mani Rathnam got his inspiration for his ’Alaipayudhe’ from this flick!
2) Parent Trap(1998 remake): Twins Hallie & Annie got separated when their parents got divorced and they were unaware about each other, untill one day they meet in a summer camp quite by chance. They decide to switch places and then make a plan to reunite mom & dad. This film has spawned copy cat(but badly made) versions in many Indian languages! If you had seen any of them, it’s time you saw the original.
3) Legally Blond(2001):Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) is the proverbial blonde girl. She wants to woo Warner (Matthew Davis), but he seems to think that she is a bimbo and goes on to do law at Harvard. But Elle is not the one to give up that easily! She enters the same law school and proves to him and to the world that beauty and brains can go together!
4) Mars Attacks!(1996): What happens when the proverbial ’little green men’ from Mars are suddenly in front of us? The Martians attack us just for the fun
of it! This is one movie in which the American President(Jack Nicolson)too is a fair game and is shot while addressing the nation!The violence is almost morbid when they attack us with some laser guns! Pierce Brosnan is condemned to have a human head and dog’s body! Even Martians pose before the Taj for photograph before they evaporate it. I enjoyed this movie a lot!
5) A League of Their Own(1992): The story happens at the time of WW-II, when most men are away at war. It fells on the girls to save the base ball game. It’s the story of two sisters who played in the newly formed Girls League. Tom Hanks is their coach. The movie features Madonna. Gets senti towards the end!
6) MacKenna’s Gold(1969): Marshal MacKenna(Gregory Peck) accidently gets to see a map which indicates the location of a hidden treasure of gold. He simply throws the map into the fire. But gangster Colorado(Omar Sherif) kidnaps him and uses him as a human map! Now there are quite a few others who are also bent upon capturing the gold..The critics in the West may rip the movie apart, but for us Indians brought up on masala fare, there is plenty of it here!
7) Gandhi(1982):An extraordinary movie about an extraordinary man! This excellent production will live in memory forever! A fitting tribute to the Mahatma.
8) American Beauty(1999): A lot of nice reviews in MS itself! What can I say more? Amazing how such a beautiful movie can be made about the meaninglessness of mundane life! When can we expect such nuanced stuff from our film makers? Kevin Spacy as Lester Burnham is too good!
9) Halloween(1978):Michael Myers is a mentally disturbed man staying in a
sanatorium after he killed his sis on a Halloween day. 15 yrs after, he escapes and goes to the same town, on a Halloween day, and stalks three teenagers. His doctor from the sanatorium rushes to find him before he kills anybody again. A real horror flick, this!
10) Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines or How I Flew From London To Paris in 25 Hours, 11 minutes(1965): In the early 20th century a race is announced for flying across the English Channel. The racers and their weird contraptions are sheer delight to watch!
Oops..10 over already ? well who cares!
11) Coming To America(1988): Prince Akeem (Eddie Murphy)of Zamunda decides to see the world and find the love of his life and comes to America. From here, the movie simply has the viewers in splits in almost every scene! Arsenio Hall as Akeem’s aide is unforgettable too! If by any chance, you haven’t seen it please see it today, I beg you!
12) Psycho(1960/1998):This thriller classic doesn’t need any introduction.
It simply got to be in any list!
13) Jingle All The Way(1996): Arnold Schwarzenegger in a different role.
He plays the role of Howard who never finds time to be with his son Jamie.
So to show that he cares, he decides to present Jamie the one thing he desires the most for Christmas: a Turbo Man toy. Unfortunately he forgets it till the last minute and suddenly the Turbo Man is all sold out. The villain Myron (Sinbad) is also after the same toy..Thoroughly enjoyable till the end and for all ages.
14) The Accused(1988): Sarah(Jodi Foster)gets gang rapped in a bar. Her
attorney Kathryn (Kelly McGillis) has to make sure that not only the attackers but also the guys who cheered them on are also punished. She refuses to accept that Sarah’s character should have anything to do with her being raped. Superb court room drama.
15) Hyderabad Blues(1998):Nowadays there are a large number of Indian English films made. Back then, apart from Dev Benegal’s English, August not many had been made. This is sort of pioneering effort by Nagesh kukunoor. It brilliantly captured the tale of the middle-class India coming to terms with fast changing times, filmed using meagre resources.Nice one to watch.
Yes, I have left out a lot of very good films..but what to do..already it’s 15!...sad....
GOT ANY CRIBS WITH MY LIST ? THEN PLEASE READ ’MY PHILOSOPHY’ IN ’COMMENTS’. THANKS!!