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Here’s a bold statement: Giving your children the chance to watch classic films can be just as vital as anything they learn in school. 

It’s nearly impossible to discuss a truly great movie without mentioning its musical score. Can you  honestly ponder the Spielberg classic “Jaws” (1975) without hearing those relentless, alternating two notes (played on a tuba!) that announce the killer shark’s arrival? Or think of “Rocky” (1976) without remembering how Bill Conti’s soaring trumpet theme made your heart race? 

It is mystifying but true that when Alfred Hitchcock first visited Hollywood in the late thirties, none of the major studios was willing to offer him a contract — that is, until independent producer David O. Selznick stepped up.

When producer Ross Hunter decided to make “Pillow Talk” early in 1959, many industry insiders doubted his judgment. After all, the golden era of romantic comedy was long past. William Powell had already retired, and Cary Grant had only a few films left, most of which were not romantic comedies.

If you don’t remember the face of this peerless British player, whose film career spanned from the forties through the eighties, his silky, mellifluous voice will surely be familiar.

In my childhood, one of the movies that made me fall in love with movies was “North by Northwest” (1959). To my young, dazzled eyes, this film had everything: color, sweep, excitement, suspense, romance, humor, handsome scenery and even handsomer stars. It grabbed me from the first moment and never let me go. It was the most thrilling movie I had seen up to that time.

With the gradual passing of opening movie credits, we also lost a vital element that distinguishes many so-called “classic” movies: the original music score, including a heroic, memorable opening theme. What’s the last film you remember that had a score you could hum while walking home from the theater — a piece of music you knew you'd always remember and associate with the film?

His name is seldom invoked today, but if you compiled any list of innovators who’d actually changed the shape of movies, it would have to include Saul Bass.

In 1939, right before World War 2 transformed the movie industry and the world, Hollywood produced the most copious output of outstanding films in a single year, titles that endure to this day.