"13"

There’s an extra frisson of excitement to be found in what I call “launch pad” movies. This is not necessarily a movie star’s first film, but rather the one that propels him or her to that exalted status. In these special outings, you can feel a certain electricity coming off the screen; it's as if the performer is announcing in a subliminal stage whisper: “I’ve arrived!”  Here are twenty key launch pad vehicles for some of my favorite stars, spanning eighty years of movie history.   

One of my favorite “insider” books about the film business is 1983’s “Adventures In The Screen Trade,”  an often lacerating, highly insightful expose about the inner workings of Hollywood. Its author is veteran screenwriter William Goldman, who scripted numerous high profile movies in the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s.  

They say the customer is always right — but not always right away. For instance, sometimes it takes a while for movie audiences to recognize just how special a film really is. When it premieres, there’s a barely audible thud, and very little box office.  The culprit could be poor distribution, half-hearted promotion, a storyline slightly ahead of its time, the ire of some influential critic with digestive trouble, or any combination of the above. A surprising number of now-classic films either just broke even, or actually lost money on initial release. Here are 10 classics from my list that fall into this category. 

 One of the major pleasures and sources of eye candy the movies provide are fantasy spaces of which dreams are made. For anyone who lives for their monthly issue of Dwell, or who forwards photo compilations of delicious décor, on-screen interiors offer a form of fun several notches up from catalogue shopping.  Whether these movies were shot on sound stages, or on existing locations dressed up for their close-up, they perform the task of drawing us into the world of the story, and making us forget about the tedious limitations of reality. If you could choose any movie interior to move into, which one would it be? 

Submarines perform wonderfully as containers for high-tension drama as the challenges of close quarters, the inability to see what’s going on above, and the vulnerability of sailors working at many fathoms beneath the sea become as compressed as the oxygen they breathe.

Just as the British once showed Americans how to reinvent rock music, so it was with the French and the crime film. Many of the top French directors of the ‘50s and ‘60s turned out memorable, enduring gangster films, and we are all the better for it. Though critics dubbed these young filmmakers as "The French New Wave," they may as well have called them "The French Crime Wave."  A key turning point was when an American director, Jules Dassin, found himself exiled to Europe during the McCarthy era, and directed French actors in the classic "Rififi" (1955). American film noir (ironically, a French term) was on the wane by this point, and France not only picked up the torch, they practically yanked it out of our tired hands. French directors did more than create rehashes of American crime movies. True, they borrowed many techniques and stories that were already familiar from Hollywood films, but they seasoned them with distinctly French flavorings, whether it was Jean Luc Godard's jump-cut editing technique, or the way existentialism seemed to crop up even in plots about car thieves.

Did you know the famous phrase, "you can't have your cake and eat it too" is really supposed to be "you can't eat your cake and have it too" (makes much more sense that way, doesn't it)?   What other quotes (perhaps these from your favorite films) do you get jumbled up? Test them out and see how well you really know your favorite phrasings.

We don’t usually think of them this way, but movies are made in pieces. Little bits of footage are cut and assembled into something that hangs together, and ideally, makes sense. Editing is a complicated, delicate skill, practiced by professionals who’ve spent years refining their craft.

Using smiles, warm hugs, fresh-baked goods, outright manipulation, and, occasionally, a baseball bat, Hollywood mothers shaped our favorite characters to be the men and women they are today. We all have mothers, after all – or did. Even the most evil entities the world has ever seen – Hitler, Godzilla, Michael Bay – have or had mothers who loved them. The characters in our favorite films are no different, and would probably be sending their mothers some cinematic roses if they could. So, just in time for Mother’s Day, we bring you the most memorable movie moms from the best films ever made.