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Yesterday
Great 66 Points 2019

Yesterday is the best high-concept movie in recent memory. What if the entire world never knew of the Beatles? No Hey Jude, no Sgt. Peppers, no Revolution, no Fab Four. John, Paul, George & Ringo, just lads.

Except one guy never forgot, a failed singer-songwriter who only needed one gr…

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WikChip Video The only singer who knows the Beatles
River of No Return
Great 66 Points 1954

Marilyn Monroe didn’t want to appear in River of No Return, nor did Otto Preminger want to direct it, especially if Marilyn was to star. Studio contracts forced them into it and we’re all the better for it today. River of No Return is a fine mid-Fifties Western, with surprising Italian root…

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WikChip Video Marilyn sings: Let it wash over you.
In Old California
Good 66 Points 1942

In Old California is a simpleminded recreation of Old Sacramento in 1848 and then 1849, made in 1942. A quasi-historical tale, it mostly exists to showcase John Wayne looking quite-the-dandy, from Boston even. The settings are the thing now: pre-49er San Francisco and then up the river to Old…

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WikChip Image John Wayne, the Boston Dandy
Pal Joey
Great 66 Points 1957

Frank Sinatra won a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical as the womanizing nightclub singer in Pal Joey. Sandwiched between the glamorous Rita Hayworth and the luscious Kim Novak, he’s at his lounge-lizard best in this mid-century paean to pre-liberation sexual politics. It’s a wh…

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WikChip Video The Lady is a Tramp - Sinatra simmers
Johnny Carson: ...
Great 66 Points 2012

Here’s Johnny – blessedly again – in a documentary that reveals the man behind the curtain and reminds us why we treasured him above all others in front of it. It also suggests that his position as arbiter of pop culture will never exist again. Hundreds of cable channels and the web have seen t…

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WikChip Image Everybody wanted to laugh with Johnny
Drunk Stoned Br...
Great 66 Points 2015

National Lampoon – the maidenhead of post-modern comedy – was the ultimate risqué magazine for “well-to-do nobodies” in the Seventies. Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon lists in its title four conditions associated with the Lampoon, another being being ROFL. This gr…

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WikChip Video Doug Kenney, comedy genius
8 Mile
Very Good 66 Points 2002

Iconic rapper Eminem achieved pop culture immortality in this loose recreation of his emergence from the Detroit hip-hop scene. It’s been said that 8 Mile plays like a rap version of Saturday Night Fever. True enough, though it achieves greater resonance by profiling its own star and memo…

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WikChip Video Eminem's Lose Yourself set to 8 Mile ...
A Hard Day's Night
Perfect 68 Points 1964

The pop art perfection of A Hard Day’s Night captures the greatest band ever in their greatest movie. They’d make other movies and more transcendent music, but Richard Lester’s revolutionary film first revealed the Beatles to be as smart as they were sexy. And they were super sexy. Mockumenta…

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WikChip Image John plays with Patty Boyd and Pru Bury
A Late Quartet
Very Good 69 Points 2012

A Late Quartet is a pleasant surprise, a little movie getting its main airplay nowadays at 30,000 feet. Tune in when it comes on if you appreciate intelligent interpersonal drama, with relatable adults working through the consequences of a lifetime of decisions, mistakes and challenges. Four …

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WikChip Image Colleagues, Family, Lovers: Complicated
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Singin' in the ...
Perfect 71 Points 1952

Hollywood perfection, thy name is Singin’ in the Rain.

Forget the singing, forget the dancing, see it for the sparkling comedy. It’s simply studded with LOLs.

Though many of us have seen outtakes, especially Gene Kelly’s Singing’ in the Rain number, every movie fan should see the entir…

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WikChip Video Dancing with the Stars? Stars dancing.