Awesome Movie Year

The eleventh episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features our producer David Rosen’s pick, the Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor comedy Stir Crazy. Directed by Sidney Poitier from a screenplay by Bruce Jay Friedman and starring Gene Wilder, Richard Pryor, Georg Stanford Brown, Barry Corbin, Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams, Stir Crazy was the second of four movies that Wilder and Pr...

The tenth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features the Academy Awards Best Picture winner, Robert Redford’s Ordinary People . Directed by Robert Redford from a script by Alvin Sargent (based on the novel by Judith Guest) and starring Timothy Hutton, Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch and Elizabeth McGovern, Ordinary People was nominated for six Oscars and won...

The ninth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features the Venice International Film Festival Golden Lion winner, John Cassavetes’ Gloria . Written and directed by John Cassavetes and starring Gena Rowlands, John Adames, Julie Carmen and Buck Henry, Gloria tied with Louis Malle’s Atlantic City for the Golden Lion at the 1980 Venice International Film Festival. The contemporary...

The eighth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features Jason’s personal pick, John Landis’ The Blues Brothers. Directed and co-written (with Dan Aykroyd) by John Landis and starring Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, John Candy, Carrie Fisher and a cast of blues and R&B musicians, The Blues Brothers was the first feature film based on a Saturday Night Live sketch. The contemporary...

The seventh episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features our foreign film pick, Francois Truffaut’s The Last Metro . Directed and co-written by Francois Truffaut and starring Catherine Deneuve, Gerard Depardieu, Jean Poiret, Andréa Ferréol and Heinz Bennent, The Last Metro was nominated for both the Oscar and the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film. The contemporary rev...

The sixth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features Josh’s personal pick, teen comedy Little Darlings . Directed by Ronald F. Maxwell from a screenplay by Kimi Peck and Dalene Young and starring Kristy McNichol, Tatum O’Neal, Armand Assante, Matt Dillon and Krista Errickson, Little Darlings was a box-office hit that fell into obscurity after being unavailable on home video f...

The fifth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features our documentary pick, Les Blank’s Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers . Directed by Les Blank and featuring various garlic enthusiasts, Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers has been added to the National Film Registry and preserved by the Academy Film Archive. The contemporary reviews quoted in this episode come from Vincent Canby...

The fourth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features the Cannes Film Festival Palme d’Or winner, Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz . Directed and co-written by Bob Fosse and starring Roy Scheider, Leland Palmer, Ann Reinking, Jessica Lange, Erzsébet Földi and Cliff Gorman, All That Jazz shared the Palme d’Or with Akira Kurosawa’s Kagemusha . The contemporary reviews quoted in this e...

The third episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features the year’s biggest flop, Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate . Written and directed by Michael Cimino and starring Kris Kristofferson, Isabelle Huppert, Christopher Walken, Sam Waterston and Jeff Bridges, Heaven’s Gate is one of the most notorious flops of all time. The contemporary reviews quoted in this episode come from Roger...

The second episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features our pick for a notable filmmaking debut, Harold Ramis’ Caddyshack . Directed and co-written by Harold Ramis and starring Michael O’Keefe, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight, Chevy Chase and Bill Murray, Caddyshack helped launch Ramis’ career as one of Hollywood’s most successful comedy writers and directors. The contemporary r...

The first episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1980 features the second-highest-grossing film at the box office, 9 to 5 . Directed and co-written (with Patricia Resnick) by Colin Higgins and starring Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Dolly Parton, Dabney Coleman and Elizabeth Wilson, 9 to 5 grossed $103.3 million and was nominated for an Oscar for its theme song. The contemporary reviews quot...

This special bonus episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1967 features the James Bond film You Only Live Twice . Directed by Lewis Gilbert from a screenplay by Roald Dahl (based on the Ian Fleming novel) and starring Sean Connery, Tetsurō Tamba, Akiko Wakabayashi, Mie Hama, Karin Dor and Donald Pleasence, You Only Live Twice was the fifth and final film in Connery’s original run as Ja...

For the tenth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1994, the winning year in our audience choice poll, for Frank Darabont’s The Shawshank Redemption . Written and directed by Frank Darabont (based on the novella by Stephen King) and starring Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, Bob Gunton, William Sadler and Clancy Brown, The Shawshank...

For the ninth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1999 to feature another future cult classic, Jim Jarmusch’s Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai . Written and directed by Jim Jarmusch and starring Forest Whitaker, John Tormey, Isaach de Bankolé, Henry Silva, Camille Winbush and Tricia Vessey, Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai wa...

For the eighth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1994 to feature Dave’s personal pick, Alex Proyas’ The Crow . Directed by Alex Proyas, based on the comic book by James O’Barr and starring Brandon Lee, Ernie Hudson, Rochelle Davis and Michael Wincott, The Crow was marred by tragedy after Brandon Lee’s on-set death, but went o...

For the seventh episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1984 to feature another major box-office flop, Francis Ford Coppola’s The Cotton Club . Directed and co-written by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Richard Gere, Diane Lane, Gregory Hines, Lonette McKee and Bob Hoskins, The Cotton Club was part of a string of commercial failu...

For the sixth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1967 to feature another of Jason’s personal picks, Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde . Directed by Arthur Penn from a screenplay by David Newman and Robert Benton and starring Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Gene Hackman, Michael J. Pollard and Estelle Parsons, Bonnie and Clyde was no...

For the fifth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1989 to feature another foreign film pick, Giuseppe Tornatore’s Cinema Paradiso . Written and directed by Giuseppe Tornatore and starring Philippe Noiret, Jacques Perrin, Marco Leonardi, Agnese Nano, Salvatore Cascio and Leopoldo Trieste, Cinema Paradiso won the Oscar for Best F...

For the fourth episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 2007 to feature another of Josh’s personal picks, Gregg Araki’s Smiley Face . Directed by Gregg Araki from a screenplay by Dylan Haggerty and starring Anna Faris, Danny Masterson, John Krasinski, Adam Brody and Roscoe Lee Browne, Smiley Face premiered at the Sundance Film Festi...

For the third episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 2003 to feature another documentary pick, Jeffrey Blitz’s Spellbound . Directed by Jeffrey Blitz and featuring eight contestants from the 1999 National Spelling Bee, Spellbound premiered at the South by Southwest film festival and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Documentary...

For the second episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1996 to feature another notable filmmaking debut, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Hard Eight . Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and starring Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Gwyneth Paltrow and Samuel L. Jackson, Hard Eight was based on Anderson’s 1993 short film Cigarette...

For the first episode of our special retrospective season, we’re looking back to our season on the awesome movie year of 1977 to feature the second-highest-grossing film at the box office, Hal Needham’s Smokey and the Bandit . Directed and co-written by Hal Needham and starring Burt Reynolds, Sally Field, Jackie Gleason and Jerry Reed, Smokey and the Bandit grossed $126 million and spawned multipl...

In the second of two special holiday episodes for this year, we’re looking back to our season on the films of 2003, to talk about Christmas romantic comedy Love Actually . Written and directed by Richard Curtis and starring Hugh Grant, Colin Firth, Emma Thompson, Bill Nighy, Keira Knightley and an extensive ensemble cast, Love Actually has become a perennial holiday favorite and an influential rom...

This special bonus episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1999 features the Wachowskis’ The Matrix . Written and directed by Lana and Lilly Wachowski and starring Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Laurence Fishburne and Hugo Weaving, The Matrix was one of the highest-grossing movies of 1999 and has become one of the most influential sci-fi and action movies of all time. The contemporary...

In the first of two special holiday episodes for this year, we’re looking back to our season on the films of 2003, to talk about Christmas classic Elf . Directed by Jon Favreau from a screenplay by David Berenbaum and starring Will Ferrell, James Caan, Zooey Deschanel, Mary Steenburgen, Bob Newhart and Ed Asner, Elf has become a perennial holiday favorite on TV, in theaters and on streaming servic...