Funny Girl

dvr this Turner Classic Movies Saturday, June 7 2:15 p.m. If you are one of the few people still watching Glee, you’ll know that Rachel (Lea Michelle) has inexplicably been cast as the lead in a Broadway revival of Funny Girl, the musical that made Barbra Streisand a Broadway star and then a movie star….

Read More

Godzilla, King of the Monsters

dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Saturday, March 29, 3:45 a.m. The original Godzilla movie was recut and dubbed for American audiences, and it is wonderfully creaky, silly fun, with weak, even for the era, special effects, poor lip-synch, and spliced-in scenes of Raymond Burr as an American reporter to make the movie more palatable to…

Read More

Shampoo

Turner Classic Movies, Saturday, March 15, 9 p.m. In one of Warren Beatty’s great roles (which is saying something), he plays George, a hair stylist to the more wealthy and fabulous women of Beverly Hills. He also spends of good deal of time sleeping with them, both the married and single ones, and he’s basically…

Read More

The Third Man

Turner Classic Movies, 6:30 p.m., Monday, Jan. 6 Carol Reed’s masterpiece of suspense stars Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles in a cat-and-mouse espionage game in post-World War II Vienna. The period dialogue is a bit creaky, but the direction, with stunning cinematography and unnerving pacing, is stunning. You’ll think you’ve seen it before because it’s…

Read More

Logan’s Run

dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Friday, Sept. 13, 9:15 p.m. Two hundred years from now, the survivors of humanity all live in a domed city and their lives are totally controlled by a computer that, among other unsavory things, kills every person when he or she becomes 30, though they think being vaporized means they…

Read More

West Side Story

dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Sunday, Aug. 18, 6 a.m. Arguably the greatest film musical ever made, West Side Story won 10 Oscars and is still an astonishing site to behold. Mostly this is because of Robert Wise’s and Jerome Robbins’ direction, which took a very stagey show and made it believable on the streets…

Read More

The Hunger

dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Tuesday, August 13, 1:15am TCM has The Hunger listed as a “horror” film, but it’s not. The movie is somewhat suspenseful, but it’s certainly not scary. It just happens to be about vampires. Really, really, really sexy vampires. Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie are a centuries-old vampire couple until Deneuve…

Read More

Gaslight

dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Saturday, July 20, 5 p.m.   Among the worst holes in my film watching history is Gaslight, the movie that gave us the term “gaslighting,” which means creating an elaborate lie to fool someone, ultimately driving them mad. The film is considered one of the greatest ever made, with (gay)…

Read More

Rebel Without A Cause

Turner Classic Movies, Sunday, July 7, 1 p.m. The movie that made James Dean a star is about a, yes, rebellious teenager in the 1950s whose charisma persuades a girl (Natalie Wood) and a boy (Sal Mineo) to question the stringency of post-war America. Wood and Mineo were both nominated for Oscars, while Dean became…

Read More

Auntie Mame

Auntie Mame dvr this Turner Classic Movies, Friday, June 28, 5 p.m. When his father dies, Patrick Dennis goes to live with his Aunt Mame, who is arguably the greatest diva ever to be filmed. Mame is an amazing combination of intellectual, partier, comedian, dilettante, muse and mother, and as played by Rosalind Russell, she…

Read More