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Reviews
El Cid (1961)
He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live
To my mind, El Cid is the greatest movie ever made. It has the greatest musical score ever created for the movies, and the epic scale and majestic medieval scenery have never since been matched. (It has been said that no comparable movie will ever be made in the future, due to prohibitive costs.) Charlton Heston as Rodrigo combined courage and strength with humility and heart as it has rarely, if ever, been done on the screen. The story is unforgettable, and all the more so because there actually was an El Cid 1000 years ago. It is long, but goes by fast, with non-stop dramatic tension. At the center of the story are two immortal themes, one about a man who had to put duty to his nation before the person he loved the most, and the other about the faith that by uniting people of diverse backgrounds, good can triumph over evil. This wonderful movie has been around for almost a half century, and I hope, like the legend of El Cid, it will live for another 1000 years.
Someone to Watch Over Me (1987)
exquisite
This was a wonderful movie, almost like an opera. Tom Berenger had the perfect look, New York accent, and mannerisms for the cop. Mimi Rogers was classy and irresistible as the woman in the high society apartment. The dilemma of their animal attraction to each other while knowing they had no real future together was haunting. The classical music underlined the tension beautifully.
My favorite line in the movie was when the cop and his wife, Lorraine Bracco (who you knew would come through ultimately) were arguing in their home. The cop says "did you hear what I said?" The wife says "did you hear what I said?", and their 10 year boy shouts out in his soprano voice "did you hear what I said?". I knew then how the movie would end.
The Devil and Miss Jones (1941)
heartwarming story set in department store management-labor conflict
This is a wonderful story from the days immediately preceding America's entry into WWII, when the values that made America great were on display in the movies. A powerful department store owner, played by Charles Coburn, gets a job as a lowly clerk in his own store, in order to ferret out the workers who are trying to organize a labor union. He gradually gets caught up in the lives of the clerks in the shoe department (co-stars Jean Arthur, Bob Cummings, Spring Byington, Edmund Gwen) who accept him as just a poor, older man, and his view of things begins to shift. There are some excellent scenes in this movie, especially one in which Coburn is arrested while on a day at the beach with his fellow workers, and has to be kept out of jail by Cummings' bravado. Of course, everything works out well in the end, because this movie was made in the days when good was destined to triumph over evil.