The Damage Done

It's 1959.  Hollywood has been fighting a losing battle against television for a decade.  Widescreen, Technicolor, stereo sound, 3-D--none of it can change the fact that people now stay at home and watch entertainment for free.  The audience has been cut in half and the situation will never recover.

But that doesn't mean film is dead.  Over in Europe, they're starting to do new things, and Hollywood is even opening up a bit as well.

The blockbuster of the year, as well as Oscar winner, is Ben-Hur.  But what does Jesse Walker think of 1959 in film?

Here's his top ten:

1. The Four Hundred Blows
2. North by Northwest
3. Some Like it Hot
4. Rio Bravo
5. Warlock
6. Nazarin
7. Ride Lonesome
8. Jazz on a Summer's Day
9. The World of Apu
10. Anatomy of a Murder

Quite a list, and I agree with most of it.

The Four Hundred Blows is one of the great debuts in film history.  North By Northwest may be Hitchcock's greatest.  Some Like It Hot is maybe Wilder's greatest. While Rio Bravo is not Hawks' greatest (not even his best Western), it deserves its modern reputation as a pretty special Western (as opposed to its reputation back then as just another John Wayne film).

I haven't seen Warlock, though I'd like to.  Nazarin is Bunuel in fine form.  Ride Lonesome is another enjoyable Boetticher Western, but no classic.  Jazz On A Summer's Day is one of the greatest concert films (with amazing color).  The World Of Apu may be the best film of the Apu trilogy.  Anatomy Of A Murder I find a bit overrated. As much as I love something set in the U. P. featuring Duke Ellington, its innovations in style and content aren't a big deal today.

Honorable mentions:

11. I'm All Right Jack
12. A Bucket of Blood
13. Fires on the Plain
14. Odds Against Tomorrow
15. A Midsummer Night's Dream
16. Science Friction
17. Floating Weeds
18. Shadows
19. Cat's Cradle
20. Suddenly, Last Summer



11 is a classic for Peter Sellers alone.  A bucket of blood is great Corman (if you believe in that sort of thing).  Haven't seen 13, 15 or 16.  14 is pretty good, with fine location shooting.  17 is good.  18 was groundbreaking but was also (and remains) kind of dull.  19 is a short.  20 is the sort of florid melodrama that you get so often in the 50s.

Other films that would make my top ten or twenty:

Pickpocket

The Mouse That Roared


Other films I like:

Li'l Abner, Sleeping Beauty, -30-, Pillow Talk, The Beat Generation, Expresso Bongo, Les Cousins, Imitation Of Life, Our Man In Havana, The Defiant Ones, Plan 9 From Outer Space, But Not For Me, The Devil's Disciple (Olivier only), Operation Petticoat (for Cary Grant), Don't Give Up The Ship (sort of)


Other films of 1959:

The Crimson Kimono, The Gene Krupa Story, It Happened to Jane, Gidget, The Mating Game, Sampo, Black Orpheus, Compulsion, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Fugitive Kind, Hiroshima Mon Amour, Libel, The Nun's Story, On the Beach, Pork Chop Hill, Room at the Top, Ben-Hur, The Shaggy Dog, Porgy And Bess, Career, Orders To Kill, The 30 Foot Bride Of Candy Rock, The 39 Steps, Al Capone, Alias Jesse James, The Bat, Battle In Outer Space, The Battle Of The Sexes, The Best Of Everything, The Big Circus, The Big Operator, Career, Carry On Nurse, Carry On Teacher, Come Dance With Me, Darby O'Gill And The Little People, The FBI, Face Of A Fugitive, The Five Pennies, The Gazebo, The Giant Behemoth, Girls Town, Good Morning, The Gunfight At Dodge City, The Hanging Tree, The Hangman, Hannibal, A Hold In The Head,

Holiday For Lovers, Honeymoon, The Horse Soldiers, The Hound Of The Baskervilles, House On Haunted Hill, It Started With A Kiss, John Paul Jones, The Journey, Journey To The Center Of The Earth, The Last Angry Man, Last Train From Gun Hill, Le Signe Du Lion, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Libel, Look Back In Anger, The Man In The Net, The Mummy, Pork Chop Hill, The Roots Of Heaven, Say One For Me, The Scapegoat, Shake Hands With The Devil, Solomon And Sheba, A Stranger In My Arms, A Summer Place, That Kind Of Woman, They Came To Cordura, Tiger Bay, The Tingler, Too Many Crooks, The Trap, Up Periscope, Violent Summer, The Wasp Woman, Westbound, Woman Obsessed, The Wonderful Country, The World The Flesh And The Devil, The Wreck Of The Mary Deare, The Young Philadelphians