Movies For a Snowy Afternoon

I'll include a list for those who love to wallow in snow, as well as for those who want nothing more than to get away.

For Wallowers:

The Shining (1980): For the person who loves snow, what could be better than being snowbound at home, watching a movie about a snowbound family whose patriarch is going mad? There is no time of year when The Shining isn't a favorite film of mine, but today seems like an appropriate day to watch Jack Nicholson get cabin fever.



Misery (1990): Snow seems to agree with Stephen King, or at least with those who adapt his work. This picture, done before Rob Reiner foolishly decided to stop shooting William Goldman scripts, made a star of Kathy Bates as Annie Wilkes, the world's most psychopathic obsessed fan, (and that's up against some stiff competition).



On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1968): Yes, you'll have to endure some sun kissed beaches in the South of France, but don't worry. You'll soon be in the Alps, watching 007 perform some of his best ski moves as he tries to stop Blofeld's plan to unleash a biological weapon on the world.



Downhill Racer (1969): It's not my favorite of Robert Redford's films about competition--that would be The Candidate but if you like ski action, this is your film. (Sorry, no video)

The Empire Strikes Back (1980): The ice planet of Hoth. Need I say more.



For Would-be Escapees:

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981): There is a brief sequence in snowy Nepal, but the rest of it is in the South American jungle, Egypt, and the Mediterranean. See? You're warmer already.



Lawrence of Arabia (1962): Vast stretches of desert, shot in 70mm splendor, serve as backdrop for one of the greatest movies ever made.



The Spy Who Loved Me (1977): This one could be thought of as a present for both sides. It opens with the most spectacular ski stunt ever performed in a Bond film before moving on to beautiful, balmy locations in Egypt and Sardinia.



Duel 1971: When you need to warm up, Steven Spielberg really is your pal. He loves desert landscapes, and this one is about as deserty as you can get. You will, however, learn to treat truck drivers with greater reverence and respect when this movie ends.



The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976) Clint Eastwood's most deeply felt western--with the arguable exception of Unforgiven--takes place, for the most part, in the deserts of Texas and Mexico. Exciting and thoughtful, The Outlaw Josey Wales is a worthy way to warm yourself up when the weather outside trends frightful.

The Ten Films I've Seen Most Often

10. For Your Eyes Only (1981) Roger Moore, Carole Bouquet, Topol. Until I was twelve years old, I wasn't aware that anyone other than Roger Moore had played James Bond. This was one of the first Bonds I remember seeing in the theatre, and it's the one I watched most often on cable or video. Though in later years I found other Bond pictures I've liked better, this was for a long time my favorite, and it's still in my top five. The ski stunts alone are worth the price of admission, and watching Bond have to elude his would-be murderers in the world's wimpiest Peugeot cinches it for me.

9. Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 1964 Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden: "You can't fight in here! This is the War Room!" This is one of my favorite pictures to quote, and of all of Stanley Kubrick's films--and I love them all--this is the one that most often finds its way into my DVD player. In this picture he gives Peter Sellers a workout that would have killed just about any other actor, and I love every minute of it.

8. Superman: The Movie and Superman II Christopher Reeve, Margot Kidder, Terrance Stamp, Gene Hackman. I find it easier to consider these films as a unit. For some people, Sean Connery will always be James Bond. For me, Christopher Reeve will always be Superman, and all others will be pretenders to the throne (yes, Brandon Routh, I'm looking at you). Reeve managed to find ways to be compelling and charismatic as both Clark Kent and Superman, and, in the sequel, revealed that, for Superman, the wish-fulfillment fantasy is to be Clark Kent--though he sours on the reality of being Clark Kent awfully fast. It's amazing how much the Superman character develops in these two pictures, and after that, almost anything would have been a letdown. (Though they didn't have to let us down quite so far or so fast, did they?)

7. Tootsie (1983) Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Bill Murray. Sydney Pollack. There were summers where I'd watch this picture two or three times in a day. I used to know it from memory, and would run through the first scene between Michael Dorsey and his agent, George Fields, in my head while on walks. "YOU WERE A TOMATO! A TOMATO DOESN'T HAVE LOGIC! A TOMATO CAN'T MOVE!" "That's what I said! So how can a tomato sit down, George?" I'd quote it as well. "I don't believe in hell. I believe in unemployment, but I don't believe in hell." I loved the writing. I loved Hoffman in a dress. I loved Bill Murray's entire role. Goddamn it, I love it all!

6. Wargames (1983) Matthew Brodderick, Ally Sheedy, Dabney Coleman. So many of my favorite movies involve Dabney Coleman in some way. (A couple of my favorite TV shows too.) There was never a man so good at being wrong about everything. Coleman raised being wrong to an art in Tootsie, 9 to 5 and this film about a computer that, because it doesn't know the difference between games and real life, tries to destroy the world in order to win a game. Though the film's ideas of what computers can do seems more fanciful now than when the movie was released, its message and its method are still compelling.

5. The Empire Strikes Back (1980) Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, James Earl Jones. The best of the Star Wars pictures, which used to mean more than it does now, Empire boasts character development, witty dialog, outstanding special effects, and the most dramatic lightsaber duel in the series' history. Favorite line: "Hey, your worship. I was only trying to help." "Would you stop calling me that?" "Sure, Leia." Never again was the series that funny.

4. Airplane! (1980) Leslie Nielsen, Robert Stack, Julie Hagerty, Robert Hays. Everybody knows this film by heart, so I won't bother quoting it. It's impossible to explain in a synopsis how funny it is, so I won't bother to summarize. I'll just say that never have I laughed so hard, for so long, at one piece of film. However many times I see it, I can't stop giggling.

3. Goodfellas (1990) Ray Liotta, Lorraine Bracco, Paul Sorvino, Joe Pesci, Robert De Niro. Whenever students ask me how to open a story or an essay, I refer them to one of the first lines of this movie: "As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster." The movie gets right to the point, and it stays on the point, unraveling The Godfather's myths about the mob to reveal how much of it had to do with just getting the best bread in the store and the best table in the club. From Ray Liotta on the front lawn to Joe Pesci's "Funny Guy" scene to, well, everything else, the movie never strikes a false note. Once it starts, I can't stop watching it.

2. Real Genius. (1985) Val Kilmer, Gabe Jarret, William Atherton. I first caught this movie on cable. My mother was watching it, and I, at first, wasn't too impressed. By the middle, however, I was hooked on this story about socially awkward genius's who were trying to prevent a crooked professor from using their laser as a space-based assassination weapon. This was partly because I thought of myself as a socially awkward genius, and partly because I wanted to be Val Kilmer's version of a socially awkward genius. I think I watched this movie roughly seven-trillion times. But I still haven't seen it as much as I've seen...

1. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Ricardo Montalban. Star Trek movies have never been, and likely can never be, better than this one. Do you hear me, Mr. Abrams? Nicholas Meyer took a Star Trek episode, "Space Seed", that was decent but not brilliant, and turned it into a meditation on revenge and the necessity of accepting loss that I still need to watch every now and then, even though I've committed the film to memory.

So that's it. The final proof that, in spite of my best efforts, I'm trapped in the 1980s. Oh, well, like all the rest, I'm a prisoner of a time. Cover my face.