Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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HoldenIsHere
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by HoldenIsHere »

speedracer5 wrote: March 3rd, 2023, 7:15 pm
CinemaInternational wrote: March 2nd, 2023, 11:05 pm
I feel like you hit on something with generations that came of age in the 80s and beyond, that, maybe in part due to constant replays on videotapes (I can claim to be guilty in some of these cases), many kids films of the period are put on some sort of a golden popularity pedestal (some of which, like Beauty and the Beast, are good films, while others are decidedly not) where they remain the most talked about titles of their era, while some choice titles aimed at adults crying out for more attention slip farther and farther into neglect and oblivion. (It seems from Lawrence's list of most "popular" titles by year on Letterboxd left unseen that that website is awash with lots of 90s kids)
I agree with you here. Another film that my generation seems to have inexplicable nostalgia for is "Hocus Pocus." I have no idea why. I saw it exactly once, when it came out in 1993 when I was 9 and that was enough. Never once have I felt compelled to re-visit it. Just last year, I had to explain to someone only a year younger than me that "I Put a Spell On You" was not in fact, an original song from "Hocus Pocus." For the record, I prefer the Screamin' Jay Hawkins original, or the CCR cover.

My nostalgia is for things that I actually watched and enjoyed, such as "Batman: The Animated Series," and "Animaniacs." I also have nostalgia for 1985's "Summer Rental" because it is a classic film in my family. We have probably seen it over 100 times (no exaggeration). It's a tradition in my family and we never even owned an official copy. Our copy was a VCR recording off TV. Lol. We have since upgraded to a DVD.

Nowadays, there is inexplicable nostalgia for things that are touted as nostalgic via social media. Having nostalgia for a particular film or television show is a bandwagon fandom that social media devotees can jump on. "Hocus Pocus," "Nightmare Before Christmas," "The Goonies," "Matlida," "The Sandlot," "Casper," "Blank Check," etc. all fall under this category. I'm not saying that someone can't genuinely be nostalgic for a certain film, but when social media makes it seem like it's almost a law that you have to like [such and such] film because you were born at a certain time, I find it absurd. However, I'm definitely an outlier, since most of my childhood television and movie viewing consisted of Nick at Nite and movies and shows that were targeted to adults and not middle school kids. Lol. My nostalgia is rooted in family tradition (e.g. the aforementioned "Summer Rental") or specific memories that the film conjures up (e.g. seeing "Psycho" and "The Birds" for the first time because my dad rented them when my mom was out of town. She thought the films would be too scary for myself and my sister). And that's not to say that "Hocus Pocus" doesn't do these things for people, but I find the nostalgia for it (and other films) very suspect and disingenuous. Though I'm not one to jump on the social media bandwagon, so that's probably why.
I like HOCUS POCUS a lot. I was in the second grade when it was released in the theater and I enjoyed watching it on the Disney Channel when it aired there.
Unlike most people of my generation, I don't actively participate in the mainstream social media platforms. I did enjoy MySpace back in the day, but I don't have a Facebook account anymore. I have a Twitter account but don't really post or read tweets.
My love of HOCUS POCUS is all my own, but I know there are people who do jump on fandom bandwagons for movies and shows that are touted on social media.
Like you, a good chunk of my childhood TV favorites were the "old" shows that aired on on Nick At Nite (shows like BEWTCHED and THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW) so my nostalgia is not that of a typical millennial. I also watched shows targeted for adults in addition to things intended for my age group like BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES and SAVED BY THE BELL. My parents also permitted my sister and me to watch movies made for adults (with some restrictions ---- no PULP FICTION for example).

But back to HOCUS POCUS ---
I do genuinely like the movie, and it continues to make me laugh after all these years.

This is probably my favorite part:
"She really hurt my feelings. She doesn't even know me."

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HoldenIsHere
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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BagelOnAPlate wrote: March 3rd, 2023, 1:26 am I have never seen Gone With The Wind in its entirety.

I may be the only classic movie fan who hasn't.
I've seen GONE WITH THE WIND in its entirety exactly once.

I have no desire to see it again.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by CinemaInternational »

Assorted notes on some topics on page 6.

Re:nostalgia, I think it does weigh heavily on the way one views things. (Full admission, Speedy, I have to break with you by saying I did like Matilda and the 1998 Parent Trap; I do agree with you though on Hocus Pocus , The Nightmare before Christmas, and the fact of the 1976 Freaky Friday being far superior to the remake). I probably go a bit too kind on some titles that I saw when I was young on a frequent basis, not so much on titles I only saw once or twice. But I think that maybe part of nostalgia of films seen when one is young (whether that viewer is a member of the greatest generation, or a baby boomer, or Gen X, or millennial) is due to maybe longing for the time of childhood, when life seemed less complex and more reassuring. Another is perhaps because people generally get used to familiar tropes in films as they age, whereas in childhood, every film is a new experience, fresh and new. Whatever the issue is, it is a potent force, and I sometimes do cut a little slack on some films because of it, both kids films and some aimed more at adults that I saw when I was young. (And just for the record, the most repeated title in this household was 1987's Moonstruck. I think my father watches it 15 times a year)

Re: John Cassavetes, I feel like he is treated with respect mainly because he was the first real American filmmaker to go outside the major studios or the second string places (Monogram, AIP, Embassy) and made a film (Shadows) that received plenty of attention in its day. So , in some ways, he is the founder of the indie movement of film in America, even though it really wasn't bursting into full bloom until the last few years if his life. His films tend to be on the shaggy side, with elements that seem underbaked. I do feel like his wife, Gena Rowlands, was his ace in the hole. Her performances tended to make his films seem better than they actually are, and she helped him to what is by far his best film, 1980's Gloria. But outside of that film, Rowlands' work in some of the others , and some sections of 1977's Opening Night (Joan Blondell is quite good in that too), his work leaves me cold.

Re:John Hughes. His teen films and Home Alone seem inescapable now, but I wonder if he ever could have been capable (as writer or director) of a truly cohesive film. Planes Trains and Automobiles likely comes closest to being a whole, maybe Sixteen Candles as well for its sheer breathless fizziness (although it offends a lot of people these days), but otherwise, he's frightfully uneven. Telling moments in his films (Emilio Estevez's monologue revealing what got him in detention in Breakfast Club, Annie Potts' sheer eccentricity in Pretty in Pink, the art gallery scene and Mia Sara's farewell scene in Ferris Bueller, Mary Stuart Masterson's scenes in Some Kind of Wonderful, the "This Woman's Work" montage in She's Having a Baby, and, yes, certain sections of Home Alone, like Catherine O'Hara's scenes or a scene in a church with Roberts Blossom), are usually surrounded by escapes into excessive slapstick or into various types of cinematic "cuteness". He did have a good ear for music though.

Re: Stars and adverse reactions to them. I don't know if there is a star of the classic era that I feel actively cold to, although there are a few that it seems harder to attach oneself to their screen persona (Constance Bennett seems like that. Many of her films from her height of stardom, save for What Price Hollywood, are just not as interesting as those of her contemporaries) from a much later vantage point. There are some stars at work in today's Hollywood that rarely feel like they have put major effort in their performances in many years (Tom Cruise is probably the textbook example of this, but Robert De Niro has largely been stuck in a rut for 20 years, with worthy films like The Intern and The Irishman hardly making up for such alarming prospects as The Big Wedding or Dirty Grandpa). I do really like Joan Crawford, and have seen her in plenty of films, both in her youthful phase, and in her more mature era. Mildred Pierce is her best, but she was good far too many times to gloss over. I prefer her to Garbo in Grand Hotel, and I do feel like her most overlooked good work is in A Woman's Face, where she is quite fearless playing a very alarming character.

Re: Social Media and block opinions about films, I really do not think that there was ever that much block thinking of that sort on the TCM boards or here, but I have seen in on other websites, where if you have a differing opinion on a film than the general consensus in a group, you are viewed with suspicion. It does not just apply to childhood nostalgia films but also modern ones and various other titles. Every year at Oscar time in the one group, some contender would be feted as though it was the second coming while some other one would be used as a punching bag, sometimes even for years afterwards. I always secretly hoped to fit in with the consensus on those films, although I rarely did. I also made the mistake of standing up for some of those disparaged titles (of the new ones, American Hustle, American Sniper, Darkest Hour, Belfast, and the new Nightmare Alley, and titles dragged through the mud on a retrospective level like Gigi, Out of Africa, The English Patient, and Prizzi's Honor) . (And while not a big fan of the film, I thought it vaguely amusing how so many of them were losing their minds over 2018's Bohemian Rhapsody calling it one of the worst films in cinematic history. I fould it strictly middle of the road and could think of much worse films) And all too often, my reaction to the glorifed titles were often muted in comparison to everyone else (Moonlight, Parasite, Nomadland, The Power of the Dog) or downright hostile (The Florida Project, Promising Young Woman, Everything Everywhere All at Once). Anymore over there, not many would likely give me the time of day, so yes I do have an issue with group mentality on social media.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by CinemaInternational »

Assorted notes on posts on Page 7....

There is just too much hype around Hocus Pocus as it is, but it could have been even more heightened. A then unknown Leonardo DiCaprio was the first pick for the main teenage role, but he turned it down in favor of This Boy's Life, which was far better for his career. But if Leo had been in Hocus Pocus, I fear that it would have been even more inescapable.....

Disney is in some ways the most vampiric of movie companies; if a film is a hit, they will milk it for decades and make sure that everyone knows about it; but if its a flop, it disappears almost as entirely as Jimmy Hoffa.

That said, I did come across a weird story concerning Disney and a Halloween type film that flopped, and it might be especially interesting to Speedy here. In 1985, Disney lost their shirts financially over The Black Cauldron, deemed far too intense for children, and Disney responded by completely burying it (no VHS even) for 13 years.....or so I thought. A few weeks ago, I came across this strange story on the internet, where it seems like Disney tried to cut their losses on the film via a theatrical rerelease under a new, slightly more innocuous title: "Taran and the Magic Cauldron". But given the film's frosty reception in 1985, they only decided to try it out briefly in a few test areasin the first three months of 1990: Portland, Eugene, and Bend, Oregon, Las Vegas, Nevada, and one or two other places (Texas was mentioned). They had even a few children's books and toys emblazoned with the new title released and had print and TV ads in the test areas. But the rerelease attempt flopped, and Disney has buried all evidence of the brief 1990 "return" of the film. (They had originally thought of releasing it on videotape at that time [1990], but scrapped the idea and rushed The Little Mermaid's VHS release into the date they considered for Cauldron)


Lawrence, I can't much help you with the unseen foreign films, having only seen The Wild Cat (which is a fun early silent Lubitsch with crazy set design), and a few of the more recent animated ones (the boring Watership Down, the utterly charming My Neighbor Totoro, the chilly Castle in the Sky, Wallace and Gromit, Ponyo, and the constantly surprising and very moving Your Name)

As for the most seen on that site by year... let's see....

1910s: 3/10 (From the Manger to the Cross, Intolerance, Broken Blossoms)
1920s: 7/10 (missing Battleship Potemkin, Metropolis, Man with a Movie Camera)
1930s: 10/10
1940s: 10/10
1950s: 9/10 (missing The Killing)
1960s: 9/10 (missing The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly)
1970s: 9/10 (missing Halloween)
1980s: 10/10
1990s: 7/10 (missing Reservoir Dogs, Scream, Fight Club)
2000s: 6/10 (missing American Psycho, Spider-Man, Kill Bill Volume 1, Batman Begins)
2010s: 9/10 (missing Drive)
2020s: 1/3 (and I wish I had not seen Everything Everywhere All at Once)
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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skimpole wrote: March 4th, 2023, 6:44 pm I'm not sure if I've seen Shoulder Arms. Aside from that I've seen all of them from Birth of a Nation onwards except for the latest Spider-Man movie. I find it odd that The Aristocats is the most popular movie of 1970. I'm a bit surprised it to see it considered the best animated Disney movie between The Jungle Book and The Little Mermaid.
Yeah, The Aristocats is an odd choice. The rest of 1970's top ten are:
The Conformist
El Topo
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
MASH
The Bird with the Crystal Plumage
Five Easy Pieces
Le Cercle Rouge
Wanda
Donkey Skin

The Jungle Book came in second for 1967, and The Little Mermaid came in #8 for 1989. Most, if not all, of the Disney animated films are in the top ten of their respective years.
Watching until the end.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by speedracer5 »

LawrenceA wrote: March 4th, 2023, 2:14 pm And for anyone interested (and I know you all are), here are the most popular films from each year overall. How many have you seen?

1910 - Jeffries-Johnson World's Championship Boxing Contest
1911 - Dante's Inferno
1912 - From the Manger to the Cross
1913 - The Student of Prague
1914 - Cabiria
1915 - The Birth of a Nation
1916 - Intolerance
1917 - A Man There Was
1918 - Shoulder Arms
1919 - Broken Blossoms

1920 - The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
1921 - The Kid ***
1922 - Nosferatu
1923 - Safety Last ***
1924 - Sherlock Jr ***
1925 - Battleship Potemkin
1926 - The General ***
1927 - Metropolis
1928 - The Passion of Joan of Arc
1929 - Man With a Camera

1930 - All Quiet On the Western Front ***
1931 - M ***
1932 - Freaks
1933 - King Kong ***
1934 - It Happened One Night ***
1935 - The Bride of Frankenstein
1936 - Modern Times ***
1937 - Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs ***
1938 - Bringing Up Baby ***
1939 - The Wizard of Oz ***

1940 - Pinocchio ***
1941 - Citizen Kane ***
1942 - Casablanca ***
1943 - Shadow of a Doubt ***
1944 - Double Indemnity ***
1945 - Brief Encounter ***
1946 - It's a Wonderful Life ***
1947 - Black Narcissus
1948 - Rope ***
1949 - The Third Man ***

1950 - Sunset Boulevard ***
1951 - Alice in Wonderland ***
1952 - Singin' in the Rain ***
1953 - Tokyo Story
1954 - Rear Window ***
1955 - The Night of the Hunter ***
1956 - The Killing ***
1957 - 12 Angry Men ***
1958 - Vertigo ***
1959 - North By Northwest ***

1960 - Psycho ***
1961 - Breakfast at Tiffany's ***
1962 - Lawrence of Arabia
1963 - The Birds ***
1964 - Dr. Strangelove ***
1965 - The Sound of Music
1966 - The Good, the Bad & the Ugly
1967 - The Graduate ***
1968 - 2001: A Space Odyssey
1969 - Midnight Cowboy

1970 - The Aristocats ***
1971 - A Clockwork Orange
1972 - The Godfather ***
1973 - The Exorcist ***
1974 - The Godfather Part II ***
1975 - Jaws ***
1976 - Taxi Driver
1977 - Star Wars ***
1978 - Halloween ***
1979 - Alien ***

1980 - The Shining ***
1981 - Raiders of the Lost Ark ***
1982 - Blade Runner ***
1983 - Return of the Jedi ***
1984 - Ghostbusters ***
1985 - Back to the Future ***
1986 - Ferris Bueller's Day Off ***
1987 - Full Metal Jacket
1988 - My Neighbor Totoro
1989 - Dead Poets Society ***

1990 - Goodfellas ***
1991 - The Silence of the Lambs
1992 - Reservoir Dogs
1993 - Jurassic Park ***
1994 - Pulp Fiction
1995 - Se7en
1996 - Scream ***
1997 - Titanic ***
1998 - The Truman Show ***
1999 - Fight Club

2000 - American Psycho
2001 - Spirited Away ***
2002 - Spider-Man ***
2003 - Kill Bill, Vol. 1
2004 - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2005 - Batman Begins ***
2006 - Little Miss Sunshine ***
2007 - Ratatouille ***
2008 - The Dark Knight ***
2009 - Inglorious Basterds

2010 - Inception
2011 - Drive
2012 - Django Unchained
2013 - The Wolf of Wall Street
2014 - Whiplash
2015 - Mad Max: Fury Road
2016 - La La Land ***
2017 - Get Out
2018 - Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse ***
2019 - Parasite

2020 - Soul
2021 - Spider-Man: No Way Home ***
2022 - Everything Everywhere All at Once
I put asterisks next to each title I've seen. There's a massive drop-off after the 90s.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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CinemaInternational wrote: March 4th, 2023, 6:33 pm
That said, I did come across a weird story concerning Disney and a Halloween type film that flopped, and it might be especially interesting to Speedy here. In 1985, Disney lost their shirts financially over The Black Cauldron, deemed far too intense for children, and Disney responded by completely burying it (no VHS even) for 13 years.....or so I thought. A few weeks ago, I came across this strange story on the internet, where it seems like Disney tried to cut their losses on the film via a theatrical rerelease under a new, slightly more innocuous title: "Taran and the Magic Cauldron". But given the film's frosty reception in 1985, they only decided to try it out briefly in a few test areasin the first three months of 1990: Portland, Eugene, and Bend, Oregon, Las Vegas, Nevada, and one or two other places (Texas was mentioned). They had even a few children's books and toys emblazoned with the new title released and had print and TV ads in the test areas. But the rerelease attempt flopped, and Disney has buried all evidence of the brief 1990 "return" of the film. (They had originally thought of releasing it on videotape at that time [1990], but scrapped the idea and rushed The Little Mermaid's VHS release into the date they considered for Cauldron)
I would have figured releasing a weird Disney movie in Portland and Eugene would have been a big success. Lol. I'm from Salem, right in the middle of Portland and Eugene. I was 6 in 1990, so I could have gone to a re-release. However, Salem being a government town tends to be more conservative, whereas Portland and hippie town Eugene are far more liberal. "The Black Cauldron" is one of the few animated Disney films that I haven't seen. I think it's on Disney+ now. My BFF also considers "The Black Cauldron" one of her favorite Disney films, so I know that it'll either actually be good, or completely bizarre. I need to make a point to watch it this year.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by speedracer5 »

My responses in BOLD
CinemaInternational wrote: March 4th, 2023, 5:27 pm Assorted notes on some topics on page 6.

Re:nostalgia, I think it does weigh heavily on the way one views things. (Full admission, Speedy, I have to break with you by saying I did like Matilda and the 1998 Parent Trap; I do agree with you though on Hocus Pocus , The Nightmare before Christmas, and the fact of the 1976 Freaky Friday being far superior to the remake). I probably go a bit too kind on some titles that I saw when I was young on a frequent basis, not so much on titles I only saw once or twice. But I think that maybe part of nostalgia of films seen when one is young (whether that viewer is a member of the greatest generation, or a baby boomer, or Gen X, or millennial) is due to maybe longing for the time of childhood, when life seemed less complex and more reassuring. Another is perhaps because people generally get used to familiar tropes in films as they age, whereas in childhood, every film is a new experience, fresh and new. Whatever the issue is, it is a potent force, and I sometimes do cut a little slack on some films because of it, both kids films and some aimed more at adults that I saw when I was young. (And just for the record, the most repeated title in this household was 1987's Moonstruck. I think my father watches it 15 times a year)

I might just not be a huge Roald Dahl fan. I've read some of his books, but I find his stories somewhat depressing. They aren't stories that I want to return to again and again. That could be why I didn't care for it. That was also the period when they were trying to make Mara Wilson (from "Mrs. Doubtfire") into the next big child star, and I was sick of her, so that probably played into it as well. Even as a child (or a 12-year old in 1996), I never liked the child actors whose only talent it seemed was to be cutesy. The remake of The Parent Trap came out when I was 14, so by then I'd seen the Hayley Mills version many times. Hayley Mills was one of my favorites. I used to rent her live action Disney movies over and over. We had the original version of The Parent Trap on VHS. So in my eyes, Lindsay Lohan did not hold a candle to Hayley. I do like Lindsay Lohan in "Mean Girls." I agree with you on nostalgia. Even though I probably haven't seen it in 30+ years, I maintain that 1985's "Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer" is one of the best animated films ever. Lol. Re: "Moonstruck," my husband loathes this movie. I've never seen it. But his ex-girlfriend (who I did know, because the three of us all attended the same high school) was obsessed with it and he ended up seeing it dozens of times.

Re:John Hughes. His teen films and Home Alone seem inescapable now, but I wonder if he ever could have been capable (as writer or director) of a truly cohesive film. Planes Trains and Automobiles likely comes closest to being a whole, maybe Sixteen Candles as well for its sheer breathless fizziness (although it offends a lot of people these days), but otherwise, he's frightfully uneven. Telling moments in his films (Emilio Estevez's monologue revealing what got him in detention in Breakfast Club, Annie Potts' sheer eccentricity in Pretty in Pink, the art gallery scene and Mia Sara's farewell scene in Ferris Bueller, Mary Stuart Masterson's scenes in Some Kind of Wonderful, the "This Woman's Work" montage in She's Having a Baby, and, yes, certain sections of Home Alone, like Catherine O'Hara's scenes or a scene in a church with Roberts Blossom), are usually surrounded by escapes into excessive slapstick or into various types of cinematic "cuteness". He did have a good ear for music though.

I've always thought of John Hughes' films as being very formulaic. The Brat Pack films definitely share similar motifs. My husband always wonders why the guys in "Weird Science" didn't make a hotter dream woman. Lol. But I digress. It does seem like every Hughes film features a highly intense, perhaps contrived emotional scene, designed to solicit sympathy from the audience. "The Breakfast Club" is revered as this iconic coming of age drama, but it doesn't do anything for me. I don't identify with any of the characters. Thinking about his films, I keep thinking of pieces of each film I like but nothing on a whole, so I can see where you're coming from, saying that the films are incohesive. John Hughes' films though are an integral and iconic part of 1980s cinema. There's no escaping The Brat Pack. The films of his that I really do like from start to finish are Sixteen Candles (despite the controversy), Pretty in Pink, Planes Trains and Automobiles, and Uncle Buck.

Re: Stars and adverse reactions to them. I don't know if there is a star of the classic era that I feel actively cold to, although there are a few that it seems harder to attach oneself to their screen persona (Constance Bennett seems like that. Many of her films from her height of stardom, save for What Price Hollywood, are just not as interesting as those of her contemporaries) from a much later vantage point. There are some stars at work in today's Hollywood that rarely feel like they have put major effort in their performances in many years (Tom Cruise is probably the textbook example of this, but Robert De Niro has largely been stuck in a rut for 20 years, with worthy films like The Intern and The Irishman hardly making up for such alarming prospects as The Big Wedding or Dirty Grandpa). I do really like Joan Crawford, and have seen her in plenty of films, both in her youthful phase, and in her more mature era. Mildred Pierce is her best, but she was good far too many times to gloss over. I prefer her to Garbo in Grand Hotel, and I do feel like her most overlooked good work is in A Woman's Face, where she is quite fearless playing a very alarming character.

I dislike Mickey Rooney, June Allyson, and Kathryn Grayson. But I won't not watch a film that they're in. I just might not watch a film because they're in it. I love "Kiss Me Kate," and actually like Grayson in it, so that's a departure there. There are some other stars who I don't necessarily dislike, but I don't "get" their appeal. For e.g. Gary Cooper. He's fine. I don't not like him, but he seems so dull. Though I used to think this about Gregory Peck and I'm coming around on him. I also don't get why Spencer Tracy is so highly revered. He's great, but so are a lot of his peers who I find much more interesting. But I'll pretty much watch any movie if there's something about it that interests me. It kills me when these so-called classic film fans have huge laundry lists of stars and films that they won't watch for some random reason or another.

Re: Social Media and block opinions about films, I really do not think that there was ever that much block thinking of that sort on the TCM boards or here, but I have seen in on other websites, where if you have a differing opinion on a film than the general consensus in a group, you are viewed with suspicion. It does not just apply to childhood nostalgia films but also modern ones and various other titles. Every year at Oscar time in the one group, some contender would be feted as though it was the second coming while some other one would be used as a punching bag, sometimes even for years afterwards. I always secretly hoped to fit in with the consensus on those films, although I rarely did. I also made the mistake of standing up for some of those disparaged titles (of the new ones, American Hustle, American Sniper, Darkest Hour, Belfast, and the new Nightmare Alley, and titles dragged through the mud on a retrospective level like Gigi, Out of Africa, The English Patient, and Prizzi's Honor) . (And while not a big fan of the film, I thought it vaguely amusing how so many of them were losing their minds over 2018's Bohemian Rhapsody calling it one of the worst films in cinematic history. I fould it strictly middle of the road and could think of much worse films) And all too often, my reaction to the glorifed titles were often muted in comparison to everyone else (Moonlight, Parasite, Nomadland, The Power of the Dog) or downright hostile (The Florida Project, Promising Young Woman, Everything Everywhere All at Once). Anymore over there, not many would likely give me the time of day, so yes I do have an issue with group mentality on social media.

Heavy social media users, depending on how involved they are, especially if they're the type to go all-in on fandoms can be truly terrifying. Imagine stating that you disliked a movie (whatever movie it is) and having users dox you and make death threats. Some of those people are insane. I find it best to get a feel for the community before interacting. If the users seem insane, then I either lurk or avoid it completely. I hate watching videos people make of themselves (e.g. why do I care how you react to watching "Casablanca" for the first time? You've probably been practicing your reactions and comments for your 'first-time viewing' anyway, so I doubt it's genuine) so I am not even involved in things like Snapchat or Tik Tok, or whatever thing it is that's popular now. I also hate when people's entire lives revolve around taking photos of themselves, so Instagram and whatever else there is is a no-go for me too. I block people on Twitter and Facebook who post too many pictures of themselves. I use the SSO, Reddit, Twitter, Facebook and Letterboxd, but only to get inside info on local events or movies hitting the local theaters, or to discuss classic film, parrots, classic television, and talking to actual people I know in real life.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

Post by CinemaInternational »

speedracer5 wrote: March 4th, 2023, 9:45 pm
CinemaInternational wrote: March 4th, 2023, 6:33 pm
That said, I did come across a weird story concerning Disney and a Halloween type film that flopped, and it might be especially interesting to Speedy here. In 1985, Disney lost their shirts financially over The Black Cauldron, deemed far too intense for children, and Disney responded by completely burying it (no VHS even) for 13 years.....or so I thought. A few weeks ago, I came across this strange story on the internet, where it seems like Disney tried to cut their losses on the film via a theatrical rerelease under a new, slightly more innocuous title: "Taran and the Magic Cauldron". But given the film's frosty reception in 1985, they only decided to try it out briefly in a few test areasin the first three months of 1990: Portland, Eugene, and Bend, Oregon, Las Vegas, Nevada, and one or two other places (Texas was mentioned). They had even a few children's books and toys emblazoned with the new title released and had print and TV ads in the test areas. But the rerelease attempt flopped, and Disney has buried all evidence of the brief 1990 "return" of the film. (They had originally thought of releasing it on videotape at that time [1990], but scrapped the idea and rushed The Little Mermaid's VHS release into the date they considered for Cauldron)
I would have figured releasing a weird Disney movie in Portland and Eugene would have been a big success. Lol. I'm from Salem, right in the middle of Portland and Eugene. I was 6 in 1990, so I could have gone to a re-release. However, Salem being a government town tends to be more conservative, whereas Portland and hippie town Eugene are far more liberal. "The Black Cauldron" is one of the few animated Disney films that I haven't seen. I think it's on Disney+ now. My BFF also considers "The Black Cauldron" one of her favorite Disney films, so I know that it'll either actually be good, or completely bizarre. I need to make a point to watch it this year.
The Black Cauldron, as a film, is a very acquired taste. It's very dark in sections, most of the landscapes are forbidding looking, the villain is nightmare fuel (skeletal face with glowing red eyes, who plans to use reanimated skeletons to annihilate the population of the world), the main hero, although he comes around and matures, begins the film as an egotistical dolt, the film had ten minutes cut before release and there are gaps in the music to prove it, there is a wildly awkward scene where a character gets turned into a frog and gets stuck in between the ample cleavage of a witch that has the girth of The Little Mermaid's Ursula, and the story itself feels like a loose collection of vignettes, the effect of trying to condense elements of a 5 book series into a film that only runs a shade over 75 minutes, without credits.

With all that said, and with all the other trauma like the many different teams of animators that worked on it (some even leaving the studio before it was finished, like Tim Burton), the voice of the lead changing in between recording sessions in 1981 (he was 14, and his voice dipped a great deal. Even though the change is jarring in the film, it works because the character turns over a new leaf just around the time of the vocal change halfway through), Jeffrey Katzenberg taking a hacksaw to the finished film, and the adverse public reaction, the film means a great deal to me. I was too young when I saw it the first time around, but I trued it again many years later, at the right time, at a pretty low ebb of my life. What I saw felt like a diamond in the rough, and something very personal ( like the leading character Taran, I had been an egotistical dolt as a child and young adolescent before being humbled in late adolescence, and his journey and change to being someone better really hit home for me). The alternately melodious and forbidding musical score by Elmer Bernstein remains one of the best ever composed for a Disney film. The animation is mostly stunning, and the film itself felt bold and brave. It's flawed, but to me at least, its very special, and it has more guts than most major releases of 1985. I'd actually say it is one of the 10 best films of that year.

But again, you might feel entirely different about it. It's definitely not something for everyone, so any reaction to it, positive or negative, would seem appropriate. I do find it strange though how a film that flopped so hard had influence on some things in its wake. Disney reutilized some of the character traits in this film for a Saturday morning cartoon, Gummi Bears, the video game The Legend of Zelda took much of its look from this, and the odd voice of the cuddly, comic character Gurgi was practically entirely recreated by Andy Serkis to voice the grotesque and ugly Gollum in The Lord of the Rings series. Also, its reputation as the ultimate Disney flop should be over by now; last November's barely publicized Strange World lost a greater percentage of its mammoth budget than Cauldron did in the Summer of 1985.

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I went back and found some of that material about the aborted 1990 re-release. It played alternately as Taran and the Magic Cauldron (the most common title), The Magic Cauldron, and The Dark Cauldron. Theatres could ask for the original PG cut or an even more disembodied G rated version (just called The Magic Cauldron). And I found some more places it played: Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, Madison, Wisconsin, and....of all places.....

your hometown of Salem, Oregon, Speedy! According to old newspaper clippings from the time, it played in Salem, Oregon for a 2 week period of January 12-25, 1990 under the Taran and the Magic Cauldron title. There were some ads, but I feel as though Disney was using the fact that Little Mermaid was still very much in theatres at the same time, combined with some other G/PG related films still in release at that time (Prancer, Driving Miss Daisy, Dad, Back to the Future Part II, Always, Steel Magnolias) to hide the fact of the Cauldron test rerun. I am now beginning to wonder if your best friend, your husband, or maybe some old school friends of yours actually did see it during those two weeks at that time. It might explain why your friend loves it so, having the rare bragging rights of seeing a film that most other children could not see for many years.

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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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Dargo wrote: March 4th, 2023, 3:51 pm ...could never get past the first 20 minutes of A Clockwork Orange after a few tries at it
I know exactly what you mean...those kind of movies are best seen in a theater, you need that immersive experience. I drove 90 minutes just to see Clockwork Orange at the Eastman House and it was worth it.
I'm waiting for Eraserhead to show somewhere, I just can't get into it viewing at home, alone.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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CinemaInternational wrote: March 5th, 2023, 1:12 am
speedracer5 wrote: March 4th, 2023, 9:45 pm
CinemaInternational wrote: March 4th, 2023, 6:33 pm
That said, I did come across a weird story concerning Disney and a Halloween type film that flopped, and it might be especially interesting to Speedy here. In 1985, Disney lost their shirts financially over The Black Cauldron, deemed far too intense for children, and Disney responded by completely burying it (no VHS even) for 13 years.....or so I thought. A few weeks ago, I came across this strange story on the internet, where it seems like Disney tried to cut their losses on the film via a theatrical rerelease under a new, slightly more innocuous title: "Taran and the Magic Cauldron". But given the film's frosty reception in 1985, they only decided to try it out briefly in a few test areasin the first three months of 1990: Portland, Eugene, and Bend, Oregon, Las Vegas, Nevada, and one or two other places (Texas was mentioned). They had even a few children's books and toys emblazoned with the new title released and had print and TV ads in the test areas. But the rerelease attempt flopped, and Disney has buried all evidence of the brief 1990 "return" of the film. (They had originally thought of releasing it on videotape at that time [1990], but scrapped the idea and rushed The Little Mermaid's VHS release into the date they considered for Cauldron)
I would have figured releasing a weird Disney movie in Portland and Eugene would have been a big success. Lol. I'm from Salem, right in the middle of Portland and Eugene. I was 6 in 1990, so I could have gone to a re-release. However, Salem being a government town tends to be more conservative, whereas Portland and hippie town Eugene are far more liberal. "The Black Cauldron" is one of the few animated Disney films that I haven't seen. I think it's on Disney+ now. My BFF also considers "The Black Cauldron" one of her favorite Disney films, so I know that it'll either actually be good, or completely bizarre. I need to make a point to watch it this year.
I went back and found some of that material about the aborted 1990 re-release. It played alternately as Taran and the Magic Cauldron (the most common title), The Magic Cauldron, and The Dark Cauldron. Theatres could ask for the original PG cut or an even more disembodied G rated version (just called The Magic Cauldron). And I found some more places it played: Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, Madison, Wisconsin, and....of all places.....

your hometown of Salem, Oregon, Speedy! According to old newspaper clippings from the time, it played in Salem, Oregon for a 2 week period of January 12-25, 1990 under the Taran and the Magic Cauldron title. There were some ads, but I feel as though Disney was using the fact that Little Mermaid was still very much in theatres at the same time, combined with some other G/PG related films still in release at that time (Prancer, Driving Miss Daisy, Dad, Back to the Future Part II, Always, Steel Magnolias) to hide the fact of the Cauldron test rerun. I am now beginning to wonder if your best friend, your husband, or maybe some old school friends of yours actually did see it during those two weeks at that time. It might explain why your friend loves it so, having the rare bragging rights of seeing a film that most other children could not see for many years.

Image
Lol. That article is amazing. I would have been 5.5 in January of 1990. I can see that it was showing at the Lancaster Mall Theater. No wonder I didn't see it. That theater was awful! Movie theaters are stereotyped as having sticky floors. I think the stereotype came from that theater. I swear that you could step right out of your shoes without the shoes moving an inch. You forcibly had to pull your feet off the floor to walk. That theater was the last resort if the film you wanted to see wasn't at Movieland downtown or the South Salem Southgate theater. Disney should have picked a better theater.

My friend and her family are big fans of everything Disney. It is very possible that they saw The Black Cauldron in 1985 and again in 1990!
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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TikiSoo wrote: March 5th, 2023, 7:07 am
Dargo wrote: March 4th, 2023, 3:51 pm ...could never get past the first 20 minutes of A Clockwork Orange after a few tries at it
I know exactly what you mean...those kind of movies are best seen in a theater, you need that immersive experience. I drove 90 minutes just to see Clockwork Orange at the Eastman House and it was worth it.
I'm waiting for Eraserhead to show somewhere, I just can't get into it viewing at home, alone.
Eraserhead was just showing at The Hollywood Theatre in Portland! I think it just got a 4K restoration which is why it was being shown at that theater. I agree with you that some films just don't translate well from the big screen to the small screen. Some movies need to be on the big screen to have the same impact. And while this definitely isn't the best example of this, I can definitely say that seeing "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?" up on the big screen was definitely an experience. The scene of Bette Davis singing "I've Written a Letter to Daddy" while donning her Baby Jane get-up definitely seemed weirder, creepier, and sadder when up on the theater screen.
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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LawrenceA wrote: March 4th, 2023, 2:14 pm And for anyone interested (and I know you all are), here are the most popular films from each year overall. How many have you seen?
I've seen 81 of them. Not too shabby!
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Re: Really? You've NEVER seen that Classic Film?

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speedracer5 wrote: March 3rd, 2023, 7:15 pm I agree with you here. Another film that my generation seems to have inexplicable nostalgia for is "Hocus Pocus." I have no idea why. I saw it exactly once, when it came out in 1993 when I was 9 and that was enough. Never once have I felt compelled to re-visit it. Just last year, I had to explain to someone only a year younger than me that "I Put a Spell On You" was not in fact, an original song from "Hocus Pocus." For the record, I prefer the Screamin' Jay Hawkins original, or the CCR cover.
I'm 90% sure that most of the nostalgia generated for Hocus Pocus recently was a corporate driven thing by Disney on Social Media to promote Hocus Pocus 2 on Disney+. Not saying that EVERYONE nostalgic for it was influenced like this, but I do think it was a big factor. Corporations use guerilla marketing and hide the fact that they're involved in these things. Drives me nuts.
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