Van Halen Reunites With David Lee Roth

Years ago I predicted the exact date this would happen: The second Tuesday after everyone stopped caring.

Whether you like their music or not, go back and watch Van Halen in their late ’70s-early ’80s prime. That was rock-n-roll — a guilt-free, turn-up-the-volume, dance-the-night-away pleasure. No anger, no guilt, no resentment — just a three-and-a-half minute prescription of Glad To Be Alive.

Hey you! Who said that?
Baby how you been?

Man, I miss the ’80s, and so does America.

They’re Still Colorizing ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’

A reader sent this, a clip from the new HD colorization. He writes, “Every single frame looks like a Rockwell painting.”

It might, but that’s not the way the film was meant to be seen. Technicolor was invented in 1916 and came of age in the late twenties and thirties. If filmmakers wanted to make their films in color, they could have. Sure, sometimes the cost was prohibitive, but when a film was produced for black and white the lighting, shadows, clothes and make-up were crafted and created deliberately around that reality. Nothing about any black and white film is appropriate for color. Nothing.

Jimmy Stewart himself was so incensed by colorization (his look at what was done to “It’s a Wonderful Life” was likely the last straw) he personally testified before Congress against it in 1988.

For a time, when Ted Turner was really going to town, you couldn’t even buy black and white VHS copies of some of these classics. You had to turn the color off on your television.

For the life of me, I can’t imagine why such a thing would enhance anyone’s enjoyment of a film.

A LOOK BACK AT ‘REMEMBER THE NIGHT’ WITH BARBARA STANWYCK AND FRED MACMURRAY

I’m convinced this is the next Christmas classic just waiting to be re-discovered. Written by Preston Sturgess, this, the first of four films co-starring Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck, is not only a lovely Christmas flick, but the contrivance that puts the two of them together is expertly handled, as is the resolution.

Sturgess was so unhappy (unjustifiably, in my opinion) with what director (Mitchell Leisen) did to his screenplay that he wouldn’t sell the studio his next script, “The Lady Eve,” unless he was allowed to direct it himself.

And the rest, as they say, is history.

‘Arachnoquake’ Coming to Syfy

Tell me this doesn’t sound awesome:

Tracey Gold (Growing Pains) will star in the new Syfy Saturday Original Movie Arachnoquake, scheduled to premiere on Syfy in 2012.

Joining Gold will be Bug Hall (The Little Rascals), Ethan Phillips (Star Trek: Voyager) and Edward Furlong (Terminator 2: Judgment Day).

In Arachnoquake, massive earthquakes unleash giant albino spiders. Freed from their ancient subterranean prison, the spiders go on a murderous rampage through New Orleans.

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LAST NIGHT’S SCREENING

Mildred Pierce (TV Mini-series 2011) — HBO’s five-part mini-series directed by Todd Haynes and starring Kate Winslet arrived on Blu-ray last week. I finished it last night and hope to publish a review today or tomorrow.

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SCOTTDS’ EPIC LINKTACULAR

NEW PHOTOS FROM ‘UNDERWORLD AWAKENING‘

TRAILER FOR BAD ASS, STARRING DANNY TREJO

JAMES BROLIN WAS ALMOST JAMES BOND

DIRECTOR WIM WENDERS WORKING ON A 3D FILM ABOUT ARCHITECTURE

WHAT PIXAR GOT WRONG WITH ‘CARS’

5 SHERLOCK HOLMES STORIES THAT SHOULD BE ADAPTED NEXT

AMC RENEWS ‘HELL ON WHEELS’ FOR SEASON 2

SHAME VS. DRAGON TATTOO AND THE ARBITRARY NC-17 RATING

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT IMAX

9 FILM AND TV GUILTY PLEASURES OF 2011

THE ONLY 4 CHRISTMAS MOVIES EVER MADE (OVER AND OVER AGAIN)

25 FACTS ABOUT YOUR FAVORITE CHRISTMAS MOVIES

THE EVOLUTION OF CLASSIC FILM TITLES

WISHING PIXAR WERE BRAVER ABOUT THEIR NEW FILM ‘BRAVE‘

11 REAL CHURCH SERMONS THAT USED SCI-FI TO PREACH SALVATION

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CLASSIC PICK FOR WEDNESDAY,  DECEMBER 28

TCM:

3:00AM EST: Bad Day At Black Rock (1955) –  A one-armed veteran uncovers small-town secrets when he tries to visit an Asian-American war hero’s family. Dir: John Sturges Cast:  Spencer Tracy, Robert Ryan, Anne Francis. C-82 mins, TV-PG, CC, Letterbox Format.

A real tribute to the talent of director John Sturges. A story with very little action and all about explosive tension. Great acting, cinematography, and a tight screenplay help, but Sturges’ steady direction and Newell P. Kimlin’s editing are the real stars.

Look also for Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Walter Brennan, and Dean Jagger.

There’s just nothing better than a film that ties a knot in your stomach and tightens it the rest of the way through. When the credits finally roll, you can actually feel yourself start to breath again.

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Please send comments, suggestions and tips to jnolte@breitbart.com or Twitter @NolteNC.

DO 2012’s NEW RELEASES PROMISE A BOX OFFICE COMEBACK?

In the New York Times story I wrote about earlier today, there was this quote:

The good news for Hollywood is that the first quarter of 2012 looks much stronger than the same period this year, when studios had little to generate audience excitement.

Warner has two sequels — “Journey 2: The Mysterious Island” and “Wrath of the Titans,” while Sony has a prominent remake in “21 Jump Street.” Disney will re-release “Beauty and the Beast” in 3-D, followed by Fox’s 3-D re-release of “Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace.” And Lionsgate will weigh in with its highly anticipated “The Hunger Games.”

So two re-releases, a sequel to a flop (“Journey 2″), and another remake of an ’80s television show rank as reasons for Hollywood to be optimistic?

The link in the title looks at the box office slate for the first three months of 2012. Take a look. Anything excite you?

What most struck me about those thirty or so titles was an almost complete lack of movie stars.

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LAST NIGHT’S SCREENING

It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) — Like a lot of people, the first time I saw this was when it played late at night on some independent station. This was years before the now-perennial was rediscovered and when I was in my early teens and just starting to discover the world of classic films. Like most of you, I make a point to watch it every year, usually on Christmas day, and like most of you I am gripped through every frame and moved inexpressibly by the closing scene.

And then it stays with me for days.

It’s the close-up when George Bailey realizes that what Clarence is telling him might be the truth; that he was never born. Capra fills the screen with the horror and helplessness on Stewart’s face after he sees what his mother’s become (I screencapped it above), and after that I start to fall apart.

Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives. When he isn’t around he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?

What a wonderful thing that Frank Capra, Jimmy Stewart, and Donna Reed lived to see their box office disappointment receive the credit it so richly deserves.

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SCOTTDS’ EPIC LINKTACULAR

WHO WROTE THE MEANEST REVIEW OF ‘EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE?‘

DIRECTOR ALAN TAYLOR CLAIMS ‘THOR 2‘

WHAT FILMS ARE COMING FROM MARVEL STUDIOS IN 2014?

THEN/NOW: THE CAST OF ‘NATIONAL LAMPOON’S CHRISTMAS VACATION’

5 SCENES WORTH REMEMBERING FROM OTHERWISE FORGETTABLE 2011 MOVIES

10 UNFAIRLY OVERLOOKED FILMS FROM 2011

THE 15 MOST SHOCKING TV DEATHS OF 2011

11 TV SERIES THAT SHOULD’VE SURVIVED 2011

PREVIOUSLY UNPUBLISHED PHOTOS FROM THE SET OF ‘IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE‘

‘IT’S A BUNDYFUL LIFE’ AND 21 OTHER TV VARIATIONS OF IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE

NEW CINEMATIC LAW: ONLY GENIUSES CAN USE 3D

AN AGE-BY-AGE GUIDE FOR INTRODUCING YOUR KIDS TO SPIELBERG MOVIES

A LOOK AT SOME GHOST MOVIES TO SUPPLEMENT THE HOLIDAY EXPERIENCE

GEORGE TAKEI’S GREATEST AND WEIRDEST MOMENTS

A LOOK BACK AT ‘EMMET OTTER’S JUG-BAND CHRISTMAS‘

COOL FAN-MADE POSTERS FOR ‘HOME ALONE‘

CELEBRATING 40 YEARS OF ‘WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY‘

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CLASSIC PICK FOR TUESDAY,  DECEMBER 27

TCM:

12:15 PM  Casablanca (1942)  –  An American saloon owner in North Africa is drawn into World War II when his lost love turns up. Dir: Michael Curtiz Cast:  Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid. BW-103 mins, TV-PG, CC.

When men were men, women were women, Hollywood believed in liberty, and the main protagonist’s character arc involved the shrugging off of narcissism to fight for something bigger than one’s self — for freedom and/or country.

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Please send comments, suggestions and tips to jnolte@breitbart.com or Twitter @NolteNC.

Since he went off to serve, Hollywood had found new leading men, such as Kirk Douglas and Gregory Peck, who both were seven years younger than he was. Some of “Life’s” early scenes called for the now graying Stewart to be just a few years out of high school. He felt ridiculous and considered plastic surgery, then thought better of it. But Jim was helped greatly by his co-star Donna Reed (Jean Arthur, Olivia de Havilland, and Ginger Rogers were among several actresses considered for the role of Mary Baily).

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Before the romantic scene where George and Mary tearfully and sensuously declare their love for each other, Reed encouraged her leading man to do it in only one unrehearsed take. Capra later joked that Stewart was so nervous during the tender sequence he was forced to wrap a phone chord around the celluloid couple so Jim wouldn’t run away.

“The nice part about living in a small town is that when you don’t know what you’re doing, someone else does.” — German Philosopher Immanuel Kant

Stewart was also helped by the actor who played the film’s villain, the wheelchair-bound Lionel Barrymore, who reminded him that movies had the power to make people happy around the world. The old man’s pep talks helped Jim regain his confidence in his acting chops, and Capra gave the Indiana, Pennsylvania-born Stewart great latitude in playing the role of the small town resident whose big dreams would never be fulfilled. Just before filming the sequence where the Bailey’s Bedford Falls neighbors came to take their money out of the building and loan, Capra advised the future grandma on TV’s “The Waltons,” Ellen Corby, to ask Stewart for $17.50, half the amount that the script called for. The leading man responded by staying in character and impulsively kissing Corby on the cheek.

In one of the films darker moments Stewart, who during the war was no stranger to nearly overpowering fear and had often prayed for the safe return of himself and his men before bombing missions, started sobbing on camera when he turned to God for help. As the show continued, some of Stewart’s cast mates, who at first were questioning the rusty movie star’s professionalism, became convinced that he and George Bailey were one and the same; Jim went on to deliver an Oscar-nominated performance.

“It bears out my feeling of the picture business, that it’s not a production line business—but magic” – James Stewart, on “It’s a Wonderful Life”

A brief aside: The 66-year-old Barrymore, who for years famously played Ebenezer Scrooge on the radio and suffered from crippling arthritis, showed no sign of his legendary ferocious temper on the Wonderful Life set. A few years earlier Lionel, had been directing a movie in which the actors kept blowing their lines, which resulted in several retakes; Barrymore had felt an explosion coming on. Still smiling, the enraged filmmaker excused himself, went upstairs to the sound control room and let loose a barrage of foul language. None of the cast members were spared his wrath. When he finished, he felt better and calmly returned to the set. To Lionel’s delighted surprise, his performers excelled for the rest of the day. Later a jubilant Barrymore told a crew member that patience always wins. The man replied, “That little broadcast from behind the glass booth didn’t hurt any either.”

In the 1930s director Capra had toiled at Columbia Pictures, which was ruled by the autocratic Harry Cohn, considered by some to be the meanest man in Hollywood. The mogul kept the entire studio electronically bugged, displayed a huge portrait of Mussolini in his office, and used an electrified chair to give unsuspecting victims sudden jolts.

Capra had sat in it once, received a shock, and angrily smashed the chair to bits. Yet the Sicilian-born director and the rough-and-tumble former streetcar conductor from New York mostly got on along well. They had made several classic hits together including the 1934 Academy Award winner It Happened One Night (1934) starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, before Columbia’s decision to cancel a biopic about the composer Chopin had led to the frustrated Capra leaving the studio. When filming began on “It’s a Wonderful Life,” Capra was excited to have his independence but nervous with his own money on the line. Known for making movie sets fun places to work, Frank was at first crabby and irritable with his cast and crew.

Filming a snowy Christmas movie in over one hundred degree heat in Encino did not help morale; many of the heavily dressed actors fainted. But there were nice moments. One scene required Donna Reed as Mary to throw a rock through an old mansion window and make a wish. Capra had a marksman ready off camera, but to his delight Reed shattered the glass on her own. She turned to him and said,” Why so surprised? Don’t you think an Iowa farm girl would know how to play baseball?”

“The importance of the individual is the theme – and no man is a failure. If he’s born, he’s born to do something, he’s born not to fail.”
– Frank Capra

As the shoot progressed, Capra regained his confidence. He disdained special effects when Clarence Oddbody the angel (Henry Travers) did his magic, preferring to tell the story through his actor’s faces. The director started to believe he was making the greatest movie ever. Eventually “Life” became a joyous project to work on; like earlier Capra films, the company went on picnics and sang in between camera setups.

“It was the most gentlemanly way of going broke, and the fastest way anybody ever devised.” – Frank Capra, on Liberty Films

Too dark; the country wanted to watch comedians such as Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Too dated; “Life” came off like a Depression film rather than a post-war movie. Cinema attendance dropped drastically in 1946 overall, as re-united couples often preferred spending quiet evenings at home. For whatever reason, unlike Capra’s blockbuster hits in the 1930s, the three million dollar production failed to make a profit.

Capra made one more movie under the Liberty Films banner “State of the Union,” 1948, with Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn), and then chose to fold his entrepreneurial tent, opting instead for the security of a Paramount Studios contract. Years after the sale, Capra mourned the loss of his artistic independence and admitted he was never again the same man or talent that he had been.

The newly energized Stewart, with his acting confidence restored, hinted to his agent that Reed was to blame for the movie’s disappointing box office performance (“Wonderful Life”’s trailers had emphasized the love story instead of the Christmas theme) and superstitiously turned down the opportunity have her as his leading lady again. Donna Reed, who later said she’d never worked harder on a movie, felt completely exhausted after “Wonderful Life” and wondered if her career was finished.

“What is remarkable about ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ is how well it holds up over the years; it’s one of those ageless movies, like ‘Casablanca’ or ‘The Third Man,’ that improves with age” – Roger Ebert, 1999

“Wonderful Life” got mixed reviews in its initial release and like any classic movie was continuously reexamined. Some critics found the film terrifying, citing moments where Stewart’s George Bailey, seeming barely to be able to restrain himself from committing physical violence, verbally abused his wife, children and their teacher.

Salon.com critic Rich Cohen expressed the view that the nightmarish Pottersville, which displaces the more idyllic Bedford Falls after the angel grants George Bailey’s wish to have never been born, was actually the real world that we all live in. Others saw the film as a damning statement on capitalism, ignoring that fact Mr. Potter harms George Bailey by resorting to thievery, while George’s friends make a free market, charitable decision to bail him out. (Socialism was arguably on display during the scene in which a dressed-to-the-nines Reed and Stewart fall into a pool after doing the Charleston; the retractable floor which a jealous Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer used to sabotage the two future newlyweds’ dance was a real-life Franklin Roosevelt New Deal project built for Beverly Hills High School.)

“I made mistakes in drama. I thought drama was when actors cried. But drama is when the audience cries.” –Frank Capra

Years passed. From that point on Capra, unwilling to either risk his own money or work for somebody else, directed only a handful of movies after “Wonderful Life.” He grew frustrated both by the rising power of movie stars combined with studio-imposed budget restrictions. In his 1971 autobiography, the always sentimental Capra, who forty years before had talked the foul-mouthed, tough-minded Harry Cohn into distributing Mickey Mouse cartoons, publicly despaired about the lack of wholesome movies coming out of Hollywood.

Although he continued to take on a variety of roles, James Stewart deliberately set out to create a stronger screen image. He shared Capra’s disdain for unrealistic war movies, preferring instead hard, gritty Westerns like “The Man From Laramie” (1954), which helped to make him rich and surpass John Wayne as the nation’s number one box office star. Donna Reed restored her career by winning an Academy Award for playing a prostitute in “From Here To Eternity” (1953) and then became one of television’s most wholesome mothers. She became a staunch anti-Vietnam War activist, putting her politically at odds with her more hawkish former leading man. In 1966, Brigadier General James Stewart flew on a non-publicized bombing mission, suffered the loss of his son Ronald killed in action two years later, and later publicly expressed contempt for those opposed the Vietnam conflict.

Meanwhile, “It’s a Wonderful Life” fell into the public domain in 1974 because no one renewed its copyright. The almost forgotten film, considered by many to be old-fashioned in it’s time, was shown repeatedly on cable television stations during the holiday season, achieved an enormous following, and became a perennial Christmas classic.

“It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen,” Capra told the Wall Street Journal in 1984. “The film has a life of its own now and I can look at it like I had nothing to do with it. I’m like a parent whose kid grows up to be president. I’m proud… but it’s the kid who did the work. I didn’t even think of it as a Christmas story when I first ran across it. I just liked the idea.”

However creating a Christmas classic certainly requires a magical mixture of ingredients.  A few cups of sentiment, a drop of imaginary wonder, spoonfuls of yuletide joy and unforgettable quotes that make it a definitive holiday trademark.

15. “Elf” - “Buddy the elf, what’s your favorite color?” Will Ferrell stars as Buddy, who thinks he is one of Santa’s little helpers, but is clearly out of place. One of the most hilarious Christmas stories ever written and Ferrell at his finest.

14. “A Christmas Carol” (Original B&W Version) - The 1951 British classic stars Alastair Sim as Scrooge and has its share of darkness and happiness as old Ebenezer is haunted by three spirits on Christmas Eve. The funniest moment is when Scrooge’s housekeeper Mrs. Dilber awakes him on Christmas morning and he raises her pay from 2 shillings a week to 10, she responds almost half frightened, “Merry Christmas Mr. Scrooge. In keeping with the situation!”

13. “The Office” – Season two’s “Christmas Party” is the show’s first Christmas episode and overall best holiday installment in the series. Michael Scott (Steve Carrell) turns the Secret Santa gift exchange into a “Yankee Swap” because he’s angry he blew the $20 limit on his giftee by getting an iPod, therefore he ends up with Phyllis’ DIY potholders, and Jim’s carefully selected gift that was supposed to go to Pam ends up going to Dwight.

12. “The O.C.” - I absolutely loved this show growing up! It was the perfect teen drama for my years in high school. One particular episode comes to mind around the holiday season, ”The Best Christmukkah Ever”, where Seth (Adam Brody) creates a holiday that celebrates his Christian and Jewish faith. In one memorable scene when things start to go awry at the family party, Ryan (Ben McKenzie) says to Seth, “You better pray for a Chrismukkah miracle.” Seth responds, “I’ve got Jesus and Moses on my side, man.” Plus, who can forget the Santa hat yarmulkes?

11. “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” – By far, the best out of the three, if you even count the third. When I think of ”Home Alone 2,” the Bird Lady, Duncan’s Toy Chest, the sticky bandits and Gangster Johnny all come to mind. But the one moment that sticks out is when Kevin (Macaulay Culkin) stands in front of the tree at Rockefeller Center, wishing to see his family again. Even though the film is a comedy, there is just something so touching about that moment when his mom runs and hugs him. Also, who can forget the short cameo of Donald Trump in the Plaza hotel?

10. “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” – This TV special defines Christmastime.  When Hermey, the elf who desperately wants to be a dentist, and Rudolph meet for the first time in the snow bank, Hermey says, “Hey, what do you say we both be independent together?” One of the best on-screen friendships was formed.

9. “Jingle All the Way” – Before Arnold went loopy, he played Howard, a father who decides on Christmas Eve that he’s going out to get the most sought-after Christmas toy ever for his son. He runs into Sinbad, Robert Conrad and James Belushi on the way, before turning up as actual Turbo Man himself at the Christmas Parade.

8. “Friends” – “The One with the Holiday Armadillo” is probably the best “Friends” episode of all-time. Ross (David Schwimmer) doesn’t have any luck finding a Santa outfit around Christmas, and he wants to get his son excited about Hanukkah. So what’s the next best thing at the costume shop? An armadillo outfit, of course!

7. “A Christmas Story” – I could make a whole list of favorite moments just from this movie, but the leg lamp is a classic scene that everyone loves.

6. “The Nightmare Before Christmas” - Tim Burton’s wonderfully animated classic can be watched from October to December. The film tells the story of Jack Skellington, the king of Halloweentown, and how the spirit of Christmas wins him over. If Christmas can win over the Pumpkin King, it must be a magical holiday.

5. “A Charlie Brown Christmas” - That moment when Charlie chooses the weakest tree in the bunch and the other moment when the Peanut gang start decorating the tree and it grows 50 more limbs in 10 seconds.

4. “Love Actually” – One of my favorite movies ever and a film that has a huge cast of characters whose lives interwine and is played out beautifully. The scene when Mark (Andrew Lincoln) admits that he’s in love with his best friend’s girl (Keira Knightley) via poster board makes girls swoon everywhere.

3. ”How the Grinch Stole Christmas” - If you say you didn’t like this TV special, you’re lying. The 1966 animated short film is narrated by the talented Boris Karloff, who wasn’t even included in the original credits! It’s one of the few Christmas specials from the 1960s that is regularly replayed on television today. The character of Cindy Lou Who (who was no more than two) is seriously underestimated. It wasn’t just the singing of the Whos that got the Grinch to rethink his evil plan, it was Cindy Lou Who who first pulled those heartstrings from the moment he saw her.

2. “The Muppet Christmas Carol” - A dedicated performance by Michael Caine as Scrooge and the full cast of Muppets make this movie the best version of ‘A Christmas Carol,’ even though we still have no idea what kind of animal Gonzo is.

1. “It’s a Wonderful Life” - Frank Capra’s classic black and white film is the ultimate of Christmas movies! When Clarence the angel (Henry Travers) appears on that snowy bridge, just as George Bailey (James Stewart) is contemplating jumping off it on Christmas Eve, goosebumps spring up on my arms every single time. Clarence then takes George through all of the significant points in his life where he’s touched the lives of others. and George really does find that he had a “wonderful life.” The most memorable scene in the movie is when George runs back to the bridge, begging Clarence to give him his life back. It starts snowing and George realizes he’s back in Bedford Falls and reunites with his family. The best “feel-good” movie that ever existed.

“It’s a Wonderful Life” (1946) began as a short story called “The Greatest Gift.” Pennsylvania-born writer Philip Van Doren Stern, who said that the heartwarming tale had come to him in a dream, was unable to sell it to a publisher, so he sent the story out as a long Christmas card to friends. His agent subsequently sold the fable to RKO pictures, where it went through several transformations.

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In one version a losing political candidate contemplated suicide, only to have an angel convince him to stick around and do good works. Finally it fell into the hands of director Frank Capra, who said it was the story he had been looking for all his life. He purchased it to be the first project for his new venture, Liberty Films (started by Capra in 1945 along with Producer Samuel J. Briskin, and directors William Wyler and George Stevens). With movie attendance booming during the Second World War II, a new independent film company for big name directors seemed like a can’t-miss idea.

Capra had long been an admirer of Amadeo Pietro Giannini, the founder of the Bank of Italy in 1904, renamed the Bank of America in 1928. Giannini earned a reputation for lending money to people other financial institutions had considered bad risks, including immigrants whose property had been destroyed by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. A.P. only required a handshake and was proud to say later that he was always paid back. Giannini also believed strongly in the hopes and dreams of some of the street merchants who gravitated into the fledgling film industry, and put his bank’s money behind their ventures.

Based on Giannini, Capra’s 1932 drama, “American Madness,” told the story of a bank president (Walter Huston) who makes lending decisions based more on character than collateral, which causes his board of directors to try and ruin him. The money man is bailed by his less well-to-do friends,who personally benefited from his past generosity. A movie about a bank run had proved too topical to be a big hit in 1932; now, fourteen years later, “It’s a Wonderful Life” would allow Capra to once again tackle a similar theme.

To play the unassuming savings and loan clerk in “Wonderful Life,” Capra wanted Jimmy Stewart, who had previously worked with him in “You Can’t Take It With You” (1938) and “Mr. Smith Goes To Washington” (1939). Coming back from World War II, the 37-year-old Stewart was no longer the easy going man-about-town he had been in the thirties. The former Academy Award winner for “The Philadelphia Story” (1940) had led a thousand men on bombing missions in the European theater in hard-to-maneuver B-24s. The loud plane engines damaged Jim’s hearing; in later years when people would greet him in public he would sometimes fail to respond. Some would mistake his partial deafness for a cold personality.

Stewart had displayed a great sense of humor when he’d first been inducted into the army; his salary had dropped from the hefty $1,500 a week he was being paid by MGM Studios to twenty-one dollars a month, and he earned his keep as a Buck Private whose duties included peeling potatoes. Upon receiving his first payment Jim immediately sent a check for $2.10 to his agent.

The actor was uncertain after five years away from the screen whether he still wanted to be in the movies; his life in the military at times made him feel like his old profession was insignificant. In 1943, when Stewart had tried to stay in one the best hotels in Madrid, he was turned away because he was an actor. Jim returned back to the military base, changed into his Lieutenant Colonel’s uniform, returned to the resort and was allowed to stay.

“Frank called me one day and said, ‘I have an idea for a movie, why don’t you come over and I’ll tell you?’ So I went over and we sat down and he said, ‘This picture starts in heaven’. That shook me.” James Stewart

When he returned to Southern California in 1945, Stewart took things easily. He refused to re-sign with MGM, despite tearful requests to do so from Metro’s hammy head honcho Louis B. Mayer. Like many World War II veterans, Jim had trouble sleeping and would instinctively duck down whenever a plane would fly overhead. He was content to spend time flying kites, building model planes and going bobcat hunting with Henry Fonda. Fonda had also been up for the George Bailey role; the two war veterans remained lifelong friends despite political differences which had once caused a fistfight between them in 1947. The liberal Fonda and conservative Stewart had promised, and kept their word, never to discuss politics again.

When Frank Capra made his pitch Stewart looked bored, out of it, which caused the director to lose confidence. “Well Jim, it’s about a savings and loan clerk who wants to commit suicide. There’s an angel named Clarence who shows him what life would have been like without him… aw forget it, it’s a stupid idea.” Capra was turning to leave when Stewart put his hand on his shoulder. “Frank, if you want me, I’m your man.” At least that’s how the film’s publicists told it.

“I can remember when nobody believed an actor and didn’t care what he believed.” –Lionel Barrymore

In Part 2 (which publishes tomorrow), we learn why “It’s a Wonderful Life” star Jimmy Stewart fought a bad case of nerves while shooting the film and how director Frank Capra got along with his dictatorial studio boss.

To be fair, I’m not Christian nor was I raised in a Christian household. I enjoy singing Christmas carols and appreciate the cheer and goodwill of the season, even if I watch askance at the capitalist excess and fist fights at Black Friday sales. A holiday about a so-called Prince of Peace subverted by a battle to get the best, the coolest, the “stuff” that says “yes, I’m a loving parent”?

That’s the backstory. When Big Hollywood asked me about my favorite Christmas films I balked, predictably, and said “not so much.” Instead, my list of five films that even us non-Christian, non-Christmas celebrating movie fans can enjoy…

The Hebrew Hammer (2003)

What, you want serious? Oy! Here’s the story: Mordechai Jefferson Carver (Adam Goldberg) is The Hebrew Hammer, an orthodox Jew who is on a mission to save Hanukkah from Santa Claus’s evil son Damien (Andy Dick), who has killed his dad after Santa got overly liberal. Now Damien is on a campaign to get rid of the Jewish holiday altogether. That’s okay; the Hebrew Hammer joins forces with the Jewish Justice League and the Kwanzaa Liberation Front to kill Damien and save Hanukkah. Hurray!

Jack Frost (1997)

A killer snowman terrorizes a small town during Christmas. Turns out he’s a reincarnated serial killer! Hair dryers, use your hair dryers! I mean, really, how can you not like a holiday B-movie with the tagline “He’s Chillin… and Killin!”

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

A fascinating and innovative stop-motion animated film produced by Tim Burton, the movie tells the tale of Jack Skellington (voice of Chris Sarandon), the pumpkin king of Halloween Town, who stumbles into Christmas Town and is startled by the idea of a positive, happy holiday. He tries to get the residents of Halloween Town to put on a Christmas celebration, but they can’t quite seem to get it right…

Trading Places (1983)

See that homeless guy? Yeah, let’s bet money that the rich guy can’t swap places with him and survive. The rich guy is Louis Winthorpe III (Dan Aykroyd) and the wiseass homeless guy is Billy Ray Valentine (Eddie Murphy, in one of his best roles), and they’ve become the victims of a cruel holiday season bet by a pair of callous millionaires. While there are a lot of laughs in this irreverent film, there’s also a thoughtful undertone about how we are products of our environment, particularly when Billy Ray first walks through his palatial new digs.

Holiday Inn (1942)

Bing Crosby. Fred Astaire. Virginia Dale. How can you go wrong, especially when you throw in music by Irving Berlin, including the mainstay “White Christmas” and the, well, rather dated musical number “Abraham”? The storyline: Jim (Crosby) and Ted (Astaire) are vaudeville performers who work at an inn that only opens on holidays and vie for the affection of beautiful Virginia (Dixon). Fun, fluffy, inoffensive, and way better than It’s a Wonderful Life. Trust me on this.

And a few to avoid…

Other than the obvious cloying Christmas movies, here are a few that I’ll just mention in passing as films I’ll switch off — or flip to the Home Shopping Network for relief — rather than watch: Christmas with the Kranks, Elf, Fred Claus, Miracle on 34th Street, The Polar Express and Silent Night Deadly Night.

Bah, humbug. Where’s my DVD collection when I need it?

Too Big to Fail, which premieres on HBO on May 23, 2011, features a star studded cast recounting the events that led to the financial crisis and bailouts by the U.S. government in 2008. It is a mini-series packed into a 98-minute made-for-television movie where several essential characters are quickly introduced and where finance and economics are casually discussed. It may help if one has a baseline of knowledge about the crisis before watching the movie. If one doesn’t know who Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke, and Timothy Geithner are or what Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, and AIG are, it may prove slightly difficult to follow.

Although the Director, Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential, 8 Mile), was limited to telling a very long and complicated story in a very short amount of time, he was able to skillfully pull it off. Perhaps this is because the screenwriter, Peter Gould (Breaking Bad), deftly adapted Andrew Ross Sorkin’s 2009 prize winning New York Times Bestseller, Too Big to Fail.

The cast was right out of a Robert Altman film, there was a large number of well known actors including William Hurt (Paulson – Sec. Treasury), James Woods (Fuld – Lehman Bros), Paul Giamatti (Bernanke – Chair, Federal Reserve), Bill Pullman (Dimon – JPMorgan Chase), Ed Asner (Buffet – Berkshire Hathaway), Billy Crudup (Geithner – President, Federal Reserve), Matthew Modine (Thain – CIT Group), Tony Shalhoub (Mack – Morgan Stanley), Topher Grace (Wilkinson), Cynthia Nixon (Davis), and many others. They all looked and played their parts very well with the exception that there seemed to be no effort made toward sounding like the people they played. It was difficult to get past the notable voices of the actors. Paul Giamatti sounds like Paul Giamatti and nothing like Ben Bernanke. Hurt sounded nothing like Paulson. Crudup nothing like Geithner. Perfection wasn’t necessary, but it seemed as though there was little to no effort made at all by the actors to at least sound a little more like the real people they were portraying and less like themselves.

The story opens on a  shot of Ronald Reagan. It is news footage of a speech he gives on deregulation. Credits play as we see an image of Clinton signing a piece of legislation as the audio of newsmakers make mention that this is Congress’ bill being singed. Alan Greenspan is seen and states, “Don’t regulate for regulation’s sake,” which is followed by Bush proclaiming everyone should live out the American dream and own their own home. Miscellaneous clips talks of high profits and subprime loans, and then mortgage meltdown and government bailout.

At this point, I am thinking this film is going to be about blame… and that blame is going to be deregulation ushered in by Reagan, the Republican Congress during the Clinton years, Bush 43, and Reagan through Bush’s Federal Reserve appointee, Alan Greenspan.

This prompts me to check the cast and crew to see who they support and if they are bringing their agenda to this story in their hopes to rewrite history and put Republicans in a negative light and Democrats in a positive light before the election in 2012. And, of course, the Director and the Writer are both ardent Obama supporters. All those at HBO support Obama like Co-President Eric Kessler, Co-President Richard Plepler, President of HBO entertainment Sue Naegle, President of HBO Films Len Amato and Executive Producers Paula Weinstein, Carol Fenelon, and Ezra Swerdlow. Even the Cinematographer Kramer Morgenthau and Casting Director Alexa Fogel have contributed to Obama’s 2008 campaign. And the Obama supporting list of actors is long too: Topher Grace, William Hurt, Matthew Modine, Cynthia Nixon, and Amy Carlson. As if that’s not enough, there are many other ardent left-wingers like Paul Giamatti, Bill Pullman, Tony Shalhoub, and Ed Asner.

Then the story opens on James Woods playing Dick Fuld, Chairman and CEO of Lehman Brothers… an ardent Democrat and Obama supporter. James Woods stands out as the political maverick in the cast. In a recent interview with New York Magazine, Woods is quoted as saying, “I’ve always said that the next Obama slogan should be, ‘Barack Obama: Putting America Out of Business,’ because that’s what he’s doing.” So I decided to turn off my bias filter and give this story a chance.

As the story unfolded, I saw that the villains in this film weren’t the Republicans, rather it was a single villain… the total and complete financial collapse of our nation, or as Bernanke puts it, “[replaying] the depression of the 1930s. Only this time… far, far worse.” So, regardless of any one American’s political affiliation watching this film, total and complete financial collapse is an enemy we can all collectively desire to defeat.

The heroes, however, that’s a little more complicated. The actual heroes of the story are Republicans Henry Paulson (Secretary of the Treasury), Ben Bernanke (Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve), and Independent Timothy Geithner (President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York). They artfully maneuver their way through the minefield of economic collapse. Bear Stearns has already collapsed, Lehman Brothers is on the brink, Merrill Lynch next, and with all this going on, AIG – the safety net for all these creditors – was in the process of imploding from its own lack of liquidity and inability to meet its obligations. If AIG falls, all the banks fall. People would pull their money out of their banks and there would be no George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) trying to stop the “run on the bank” by convincing his depositors to take only what they need from his honeymoon stash. America, as we know it, would be in ruins.

Every maneuver in their quest to stabilize the markets is met with unpredictable reactions. Once they believe they’ve averted disaster, the pundits, investors, and citizens react differently than expected. It’s a reminder of Nobel winning economist F.A. Hayek’s precept that, “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.”

But in the end, as we all know, it was capital injections in the form of a Troubled Asset Relied Plan (TARP) that would “save the day.” In short, the plan would see the U.S. government purchase assets and equity from all financial institutions, even if they didn’t need it, in order to stabilize and strengthen the financial sector. As Bernanke put it, the upside would be stabilizing banks faster, the downside would be nationalizing a few banks. Their plan to soften the blow was that they would force private banks to participate in this plan under law, but that the government would not have a voting interest or the ability to tell the banks how they use the money injected into their coffers… leaving the question to the viewer, “They will lend it out, won’t they?”

But, was TARP the right solution? If one believes it was, then the heroes of this story are without a doubt Republicans Paulson and Bernanke. But, if one believes it wasn’t the right solution, then the Republicans are just kicking the can down the road. Regardless, the story is a quest for a private solution, according to Paulson.

As Republican public relations guru Jim Wilkson (Topher Grace) says at one point, “You just can’t hand the banks massive piles of cash. Nobody’s going to go for it. To the Republicans, it’s nationalization. To the Democrats, it’s a bailout. And the banks are going to go ballistic.”

The story is well crafted and builds suspense out of the unexciting topics of finance and economics. There were parts that bothered me, like making the Republican Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Christopher Cox, look like an immature boob, or Republican presidential candidate Senator McCain look like he is clueless on economic matters contrasted by Senator Obama’s grip on the subject, or simplistically blaming deregulation while omitting the fault of Carter’s Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, or that derivatives and subprime loans were born during Clinton’s presidency, or more importantly that in 2006 Republicans pleaded with the Democratically-controlled Congress to begin taking measures by pulling the reigns back on Fannie and Freddie to mitigate the impending economic disaster.

Those criticisms, however, were offset by so many of the lines delivered by Topher Grace’s character, Jim Wilkson, who best resembled the attitudes and feelings of most Americans during this time. At one point, it is suggested that the government purchases up the toxic assets of the banks, to which he responds, “Ohhh, call it cash for trash,” he also calls nationalization “the N-word” and that it is un-American, and he suggests that the government running the banks would be like the government running the Post Office, which they “run like a dream.” Another character addresses the issue that the government having the ability to dictate compensation would be the biggest “brain drain this country has ever seen.” And House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is characterized as something like the head of the Mafia. Her character comes across as an elitist snob, which I particularly enjoyed.

The movie was a surprise. Although it wasn’t 100 percent balanced, it was enough for this right-winger to actually enjoy it. And the filmmakers did a pretty decent job packing in a lot of characters and a lot of story into a short amount of time. If Obama-loving HBO can pull off the upcoming Sarah Palin story, Game Change, and the Dick Cheney movie, Angler, with the same deftness and fairness, I will be pleasantly surprised.  Better yet… I will be astonished.

Politics make strange bedfellows and movies can make strange politics…

They might not necessarily further the political ideology of the filmmakers because, when good filmmakers do their jobs and serve their story, agendas you wouldn’t anticipate crop up. How else to explain The Dark Knight’s alleged defense of Bush II era terror fighting tactics or what appeared to be a subtle stay-the-course-in-Iraq-so-we-don’t-duplicate-our-past-mistake-in-Afghanistan epilogue in Charlie Wilson’s War?

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But no example (even the ol’ “The Yellow Brick Road” in The Wizard of Oz is a metaphor for the gold standard!) is more bizarre and unexpected than the politics of Rango, opening this weekend.

Yes, I’m talking about the computer animated flick from Paramount and Nickelodeon about a domesticated chameleon who gets lost in the wild wild west of the Mojave Desert, directed by Gore Verbinski (the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy) and featuring the voice of Johnny Depp.

Much of the plot is unabashedly borrowed from Chinatown, from the pipe mysteriously dumping water in the middle of nowhere, to the character found dead from drowning out in the desert, to the seemingly innocuous old man in a wheelchair (in this case, a turtle voiced by Ned Beatty, channeling John Huston) who is clearly up to no good. If you want to know what he’s up to, well, just see Chinatown.

This is a wonderfully entertaining and spectacularly well-made movie. The sophistication of the animation, the character modeling, their textures, the cinematography, Hans Zimmer’s marvelous Morricone pastiche score (with lively contributions by Los Lobos), everything is first rate. It amuses children while dealing with mature themes that engage adults. In fact, remove the animals and produce this script as a live action feature and you’d have a badass western.

It also contains genuine laughs and some of the most thrilling and blissfully coherent action I’ve seen at the movies in years. It is well choreographed, flawlessly “shot” and edited, the stakes are high, characters are in legitimate danger, and every punch, bullet, and bat-mounted mole (you’ll have to see the movie) lands.

The story pays homage to classic films other than Chinatown, including It’s A Wonderful Life and countless westerns, while the politics at work are distinctly Eastwoodian. The film flagrantly flouts big government, corruption, and cronyism, while still championing law and order and heralding the power of one; celebrating an individual with the courage to stand up to corruption and evil, even in the face of societal cowardice.

It also overtly riffs on modern political and economic calamities, complete with a devastating recession, a foreclosure crisis, a credit freeze, a run on the bank, et al.

The film’s climax, in fact, features a hallucinatory vision of “The Spirit of the West,” who appears in the guise of Hollywood’s most famous libertarian, garbed in his iconic “Man with No Name” wardrobe (Timothy Olyphant, doing a flawless Clint Eastwood impression).

After falling out of his owners’ car and onto the highway, the eponymous character (energetically voiced by Depp) finds his way to the archetypal western movie town, where the people (actually insects, reptiles, amphibians, and rodents) live in Dirt — literally, as they’re suffering from a severe drought, and because that’s the name of the town. As a chameleon in constant search of his own identity and place in the world, Rango seizes the opportunity as the new “stranger in town,” to invent a back-story that casts himself as a hotshot gunslinger who once killed seven men with a single bullet. Immediately sensing Rango’s ruse, Dirt’s all-powerful Mayor (the aforementioned John Huston-inspired turtle) pins a star on Rango’s colorful Hunter S. Thompson shirt and declares him Sheriff.

This is the first appearance of another (familiar) recurring theme: Hope. More to the point, how the powerful exploit hope and faith. The Mayor growls: “They believe it’s going to get better, against all odds and all evidence that tomorrow will be better than today. They have to believe in something… And right now, Mr. Rango, they believe in you.” He can barely hide his disdain for his hopeful, praying flock.

Despite a scene in which a character tells Rango, “Many years ago, this entire valley was covered in agua [water],” the movie somehow avoids turning into a predictable Hollywood alarmist tale, warning of the imminent disappearance of our precious limited natural resources. You see, in Rango, there is plenty of water, but it is being diverted and hoarded in an effort to manipulate, oppress and ultimately control the proletariat.

This is not an environmental film, it is a political film.

In fact, the Mayor is actually using a trumped-up environmental crisis (the drought) to panic the populace and, while an aquatic “cap and trade” policy is never suggested, shades of global warming hysteria are inescapable.

As a result of the supposed drought, land values are plummeting and the Mayor is buying up property from despondent landowners — who are packing up and leaving for bluer pastures — for pennies on the dollar.

The scene in which the townspeople desperately engage in their Wednesday high noon ritual of a zombie-like choreographed line dance for The Mayor — which includes their slapping each other in the face — in exchange for access to a natural resource that should be freely available to all, is chill-inducing.

When the faucet yields nothing but a dollop of mud, the Mayor addresses the distressed townsfolk, who he refers to as his “acolytes”:

These are difficult times, he tells them. “Sacrifices will have to be made,” echoing President Obama’s familiar refrain, repeated most recently this week.

And then the Mayor eats cake (proverbially), as he and his cronies take to the golf course, enjoying an endless supply of water and chuckling at the naivete of his constituents.

Meanwhile, the town bank’s vault contains a plastic water jug and, when it is revealed that only a 5-day supply remains in “the reserves,” there is a (literal) run on the bank. The Mayor is able to avert the town’s fears, insisting, “As long as we’ve got this water, we’ve got hope.”

All that changes the next morning when it’s discovered that the bank has been robbed — the entire water bottle, snatched by a thieving gang of moles.

The Mayor and his cronies insist that a posse be formed to chase the evildoers, which is little more than sleight of hand on the part of the Mayor, who is sending them on wild goose (mole) chase as a pure distraction, while his diabolical scheme forges ahead unabated.

When Rango and the posse catch up to the culprits, they discover that the water bottle was already empty when the moles stole it.

One astute mole observes: “Someone done robbed that bank before we robbed it.”

It reminded me of the Warren Buffett line: “It is only when the tide goes out that you learn who’s been swimming naked.” And we learned that we were being robbed all along.

When Rango and his dejected crew return to town, this dialogue exchange occurs:

“Where’s the water?”

“There weren’t no water.”

Much like, after the real world financial meltdown, befuddled Americans asked our leaders, regulator and Wall Street: “Where’s our economy?”

The answer, of course: “There weren’t no economy.”

Unlike the actual financial crisis, however, in Rango there is accountability and justice is done. If only life were like a Clint Eastwood movie.

“Mr. Smith” is not only one of the greatest films ever made, but it also shows the love that Mr. Capra had for his adopted country.  For those of you that do not know, Frank Capra was an Italian immigrant.  He came to this country with his family as a young man and somehow ended up in Los Angeles during the early years of the motion picture industry.  He started in silent films as basically a gopher and eventually became one of the top five directors of the Golden Age of Motion Pictures.  Some would even argue today that he is one of the top five directors of all time.

In addition to “Mr. Smith,” Capra is also responsible for some of the great motion pictures of all time.  Among them are “It Happened One Night,” “Meet John Doe,” “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town,” “You Can’t Take it With You,” and, of course, “It’s a Wonderful Life.”  From 1933 to 1946, Capra was nominated for six Academy Awards for Best Director and won three.  “It Happened One Night” was the first movie to sweep the Oscars in all five major categories.  This did not happen again until “One Flew Over the Cukoo’s Nest” in 1975.  It has only happened once since.

Capra single-handedly kept Columbia Pictures afloat.  He was the first of the star directors and one of the first to have his name about the title.  His movies were not just movies, they were Frank Capra movies.  And, they were basically all the same.  It was the little man taking on the establishment and usually winning.  Many of the current Hollywood stars love Capra and emulate him.  In fact, Adam Sandler has already remade two of Capra’s films, one directly and one indirectly; “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town,” and “Click” was basically a remake of “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

In “Mr. Smith,” Jefferson Smith, as portrayed by Jimmy Stewart, is appointed to the Senate from a small western state as a result of the death of the sitting Senator.  He is appointed with the intent of the political machine in his home state to maintain the status quo and to protect the illicit dealing of those in charge.  He is not supposed to upset the apple cart.

However, the machine in power underestimates Smith.  They see him as a dumb patriotic man who could be manipulated and controlled.  But, his patriotism and his love for the people create just the opposite.  He believes in the “city on the hill,” as did Ronald Reagan.  He believes that good will always triumph and that the evil and greedy will be defeated.

When he uncovers a scam within his state to further enrich the machine at the expense of young boys, he takes the machine on.  The machine fights back with all its force and attempts to destroy Smith.  But, Smith uses the rules of the Senate to his advantage and begins a 24-hour filibuster in an attempt to save himself and destroy the machine.  This last 15 minutes of the movie contains some of the most patriotic speeches ever put on film.  Smith quotes the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bible.  And, each of these quotes and dialogue in between show both Smith (and Capra’s) love for this country and its ideals.  It is without a doubt one of the most powerful 15 minutes in any movie ever made.

Another very poignant point of the film occurs when Smith first arrives in Washington.  Instead of going to his office and being controlled by his handlers, Smith wonders off and begins a tour of historical Washington.  The tour takes him to all of the major sites in the nation’s capital.  This sequence reaches its climax at the Lincoln Memorial where Smith sees a little boy reading the Gettysburg Address out loud to his dad.  During the sequence, Capra cuts to Smith and various other bystanders at the memorial including a black man.  Every line of the Address takes on a new meaning and leads us to an emotional high.  It is film making at its best.

In closing, I recommend that every one watch this movie and many of other Capra films.  You should also look up the series of war films that were made by Capra in response to WWII.  These films, known as the “Why We Fight” series, were made at the request of the War Department to educate the public on the reasons the US entered the conflict.  They too are very patriotic and full of Capra’s love for his country.

I just wonder, why doesn’t Hollywood show it’s love for America anymore?  Why does the product coming out of my industry only show the bad and not the good?  I just cannot answer that question!

6.  “Being exploited is different from being empowered ” – Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)

Often too-easily dismissed as a raunchy teen sex comedy, Fast Time was a tremendously influential and important mirror on young America in the early 1980s.  The fact that it is gut-bustlingly funny – Sean Penn’s turn as surfer/stoner Jeff Spicoli remains his only role where he doesn’t annoy me – seems to overshadow the serious undercurrents, as does the ample nudity culminating in the unforgettable swimming pool scene starring the glorious Phoebe Cates.

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However, there is a very, very dark undercurrent to this movie that provides a serious lesson to young people.  Jennifer Jason-Leigh’s Stacy is a pretty but not-so-bright 15/16 year old who does not understand the difference between love and sex.  In a world of absolutely no parents (not a single one is ever seen), she tries to find love (or at least attention) by basically trying to have tacky sex with every guy she meets – and it’s heartbreaking.  She’s not “empowered” – she’s used.  The ugly scene where she loses her virginity to a guy in his 20s in a Little League dug-out staring at graffiti reading “Surf Nazis Must Die” is a better repudiation of the “hook-up” culture than a hundred lectures.

After scaring off the one guy who actually likes her for herself by trying to bed him too, she seeks comfort underneath his skanky pal.  A grim, humiliating encounter in a pool house leaves her pregnant and she immediately seeks an abortion.  Regardless of one’s stand on the life issue, one cannot be anything other than horrified at how the fact she sees herself as literally nothing but a mere receptacle leads her to feel nothing at all about her decision.

But there is hope.  The film ends with her finally back with the boy who actually loves her, and a final title card assures us that they remain together and “still haven’t gone all the way yet.”

7.   “You make your destiny” — The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)

Liberal filmmakers would have you believe that you are nothing but a victim of forces you cannot control, and that without their help you have no future.  That is especially true for minorities, who liberal ideology requires be told again and again that without the help of their liberal masters they can never succeed.  But, of course, liberalism never leads to success, only to a few more scraps in the form of entitlements offered in exchange for perpetual ballot box fealty to the elite overlords.

The Pursuit of Happyness drives a Mac truck through that loser paradigm.  Will Smith is the lead in the true story of a man who hits bottom but simply will not quit.  Believing in himself, working his butt off, taking risks and – shock! – out-performing the competition, he goes from homeless to capitalist success story.

He doesn’t look for handouts.  He doesn’t sit back waiting for his the liberal overlords to decide what he gets.  He embraces the challenge of the free market and through sheer dedication makes himself a winner.  He makes his own destiny; he doesn’t wait to be told what it can or will be.

As such, Pursuit may well be the one of the most subversive films of the last decade.

8.  “Character is what you do when the stakes are the highest” – Bolt (2008)

This terrific Disney cartoon about a TV star dog who thought he was the superhero he plays on television then finds himself separated from the little girl who owns him makes a huge point about character.  It comes up most clearly at the end, where his little girl is trapped on a burning soundstage.  The dog who had replaced Bolt runs away, leaving her in the fire.  But Bolt, though he now knows he is just a normal hound, goes back in anyway.

Character isn’t something that you wear like a medal.  It’s what you do when the chips are down, when all hell is breaking lose, when everyone else is running away.

The message of Bolt is a powerful statement that is especially applicable to young people.  My little girl saw Bolt as a good dog who would not leave his girl behind and understood why that mattered; her dad thought of his own heroes who would not leave those they swore to protect no matter what the cost.

And when young people are a little older, they’ll be ready for the similar messages of Black Hawk Down – “It’s what you do right now that makes a difference” and “Leave no man behind.”  (BHD also teaches the vital lesson that there is no substitute for the firepower of heavy armor and artillery.)  But Bolt is a great foundation  for learning about character – as well as a great movie.

9.  “The west is worth defending” – 300 (2006)

If you enjoy lame liberal flicks that spend most of their time apologizing for our Western culture, you’ll probably want to miss 300.  I’m sure there will be plenty of seats available for the revival of Lions for Lambs down at the Nuart.

But if you unapologetically support the victory of the West in our current war against jihadi barbarism and its related pathologies, you might dig 300.  It makes no excuses about the superiority of our culture and our freedoms, which is why liberals hate it.

300 is the highly stylized story of the small Spartan contingent that fought a legendary delaying action at a narrow pass called Thermopylae in northern Greece that allowed the rest of the Greeks to prepare to meet the Persian horde and their self-styled demigod king. They were slaughtered to a man, but succeeded in their mission.

The beauty of 300 is the fearlessness with which the filmmakers tell the truth – though it is unclear if they intended to make that statement, make it they do.  While imperfect, the Greeks as portrayed in the film embody the Western values of individual freedom while the Persian hordes are mere faceless slaves.  The Greeks stand and fight because they are free men who choose to do so; the Persian soldiers fight with whips at their backs, mere cannon fodder for a tyrant’s ambition.

Nothing has changed in the last couple thousand years.

It’s almost shocking to see a major Hollywood film make clear that our way of life is unequivocally worth defending, and death in battle against tyranny is infinitely preferable to “life” as a slave.  When folks get all wrapped up about “creeping sharia” I usually mention that it doesn’t worry us American soldiers because we would never be alive to see it happen; we’d all be lying dead surrounded by empty magazines, spent shell casings, and the bodies of our enemies.  If you don’t understand that perspective, you might want to skip 300.  You might also want try and see if your doctor can help you out with a spine transplant.

10.  “Your personal happiness is not the most important thing in the world” – Casablanca (1942)

Besides being arguably the greatest movie ever made, Casablanca also teaches one of conservatism’s most important lessons.  The usual Hollywood pap tells you that your personal short term desires are your only guide; just look at the unspeakable moral disaster that is The English Patient.  While conservatism is about individual liberty, with liberty comes the responsibility to occasionally put your own needs aside when duty calls.

Hollywood’s moral compass was not always broken.  In Casablanca, Rick throws away his chance for happiness with Ilsa in order to help defeat the Nazis.  Watch this classic scene – probably Hollywood’s finest hour both artistically and morally:

Here’s the key quote.  Try imagining it coming out of the word processor of one of the pampered, over-paid Ivy League twerps churning out scripts today:

Rick:  We’ll always have Paris. We didn’t have, we, we lost it until you came to Casablanca. We got it back last night.
Ilsa:  When I said I would never leave you.
Rick:  And you never will. But I’ve got a job to do, too. Where I’m going, you can’t follow. What I’ve got to do, you can’t be any part of. Ilsa, I’m no good at being noble, but it doesn’t take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you’ll understand that.

Let’s assume there is still a director out there who would allow that many lines of dialogue in a row without a shaky camera jump cut.  Even then, we’d still get Victor Laszlo as an uptight, probably Christian, creep with the unreasonable expectation that his wife not start banging another man just because she finds him sexy.  Instead of sending her away, Rick would probably tell off Mr. Jesus J. Stickuphisrear, then he and Ilsa would jump on the plane together.  Let other people deal with the Nazis – inconveniences like honor and duty just get in the way of validating one’s own feelings!  Plus, they’d probably cast Ashton Kutcher as Rick and Katherine Heigl as Ilsa.  And switch the location to Vegas.  And change the Nazis into CIA agents.  And make Sam into a streetwise hustler played by 50 Cent, who could also do a hip-hop version of As Time Goes By that somehow incorporates the phrase “my bitches.”

No, the fact is that sometimes your problems don’t amount to a hill of beans, that you have to make hard choices and do the right thing even where – gasp! – it might make you feel bad.  Casablanca is easy to take because of great actors, a great script, and a great story, but its message is strong medicine.  And, as we enter a second decade of (open) warfare for our civilization’s survival, it could not be timelier.

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Again, this list is by no means complete, but it is evidence that within our popular culture there is the capacity for art to make powerful conservative statements.  After all, that is the whole point of Big Hollywood.  We cannot just leave our culture to the left – we know where that leads.  Instead, we need to identify and support positive popular culture, to demand it instead of accepting whatever crap the Hollywood elite tries to force down our throats.  And we need to fight back by calling out and mocking mercilessly the lefty nonsense offered to us by the Hollywoodoids, so coming soon:  “The Top 10 Idiotic Leftist Movie Messages.”

And it turns out that, try as I might, I cannot present a list of vital movies messages without citing Heat.  So here’s on key one that’s helped guide me in my daily life:  “It always helps to use intensive, controlled automatic weapons fire, along with rapid maneuver, to defeat your enemies.”  That’s truly a message we can all relate to.