Liebster

Thanks to Love Letters to Old Hollywood!!

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Thank you, Michaela, for nominating me for a Liebster. And thank you even more for your wonderful blog, and all of the hours of enjoyment I’ve gained from it.

Here are my answers to Michaela’s great questions. She has posted her own answers here:
1. What’s your favorite thing that you’ve posted, or one of your favorites?
I’m attached to my post on Harold Ramis & Preston Sturges, just because I feel so strongly about comedy being underappreciated.
2. If you could change anything about classic movies, what would that be?
Michaela, you’ve hit it with the issues w/race. Racial stereotyping is really the only reason I’ll concede when people object to classic film. I think the 2nd thing I’d change would be the Production Code. What a glorious path we were headed on, right before it, and how many more people would watch classic film had it never happened.
3. Do you have a favorite modern day actor?
Bill Murray. I love his acting. I love his soul. I am simply happy he’s in this world.
4. Favorite modern day actress?
I don’t think I can pick a favorite, but I love Kate Winslet.
5. Tom and Jerry or Looney Tunes?
Looney Tunes. So clever.
6. What do you wish you had known when you first started blogging?
To be patient. To trust that with time, my blog would actually appear in search engines.
7. Do you have a favorite pet from a classic film?
The dog in The Awful Truth. Who else could accompany Cary Grant on the piano so perfectly?
8. Who is your favorite character actor?
I adore Eugene Pallette’s froggy voice.
9. What’s your favorite holiday and why?
Halloween. Because it’s all about silliness and fun and candy. Because it has no religious or ethnic associations (at least not anymore). Because it has no emotional weight to it, so everyone can enjoy it instead of mourning loved ones they’ve lost.  And because I have an irrational love for costumes, and own quite a few of them. It’s a glorious holiday.
10. Do you have a favorite episode of I Love Lucy? I don’t! I regret to say I’ve never gotten into her show, though I love her. I think it’s because I find Desi Arnaz smug. I just can’t get over it.
11. Favorite holiday film?
The Ref is my favorite. It’s hilarious. For classics, I have a soft spot for It’s a Wonderful Life and Remember the Night, of course.
Nominees/Rec
Since I listed many classic film bloggers the last time someone kindly nominated me for a Liebster, I’d just like to skip the nomination and instead give a shout out to  Girls Do Film, BNoirDetoir and Silver Screenings, who were not on my list last time only because they’d already received nominations. I just want you to check out their posts this week, which are amazing, as always.
11 More Facts about Me
To avoid repetition from the previous Liebster, all of these facts are related to the past 30 days:
1. I have watched the fitness parody of Adele’s “Hello” at least five times in the past week.
2. I want all classic movie fans to stop what they’re doing and watch the “Uptown Funk”-backed tribute to classic dance. I don’t care if you’ve seen it. It’ll make you happy to see it again.
3. My memoir about my aunt (also a classic movie fan) is ready for an agent. I hope you will all keep your fingers crossed for me.
4. I just spent many hours today rereading a spy novel I despised to avoid my writer’s block. And then I read reviews of it to discover others who hated it too. I am not proud of this fact.
5. I purchased a classic film poster of The Third Man for my office today. It’s perfect.
6. I just returned from a trip to my native Indiana. I had a wonderful time visiting with friends and family but experienced a sad setback in my attempt to turn my sister into a classic movie fan. I will blog about this travesty shortly.
7. While my sister has let me down again classic movie wise, I did just convert a good friend’s husband to Mae West love. Yeah!
8. I just finished Errol Flynn’s My Wicked, Wicked Ways. I’m simultaneously fascinated and feeling in need of therapy. That whole slaver segment messed with my head. I’m hoping it was the fictional part of his bio.
9. I have watched my first mystery series with subtitles (The Swedish/Danish TV series, The Bridge), and am afraid I’ve discovered a whole new method of procrastination. It was great.
10. I resisted watching Going My Way. I told my mother I was way too cynical for Bing Crosby. She said it was a classic movie, and I liked classic movies, so I should give it a try. I did, and I liked it. I stand corrected. I am not too cynical for Bing Crosby.
11. I’m very happy about Sylvester Stallone being nominated for a Golden Globe.
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The Liebster Award

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liebster-award-i
Thank you, Cinema Maven and Steve Bailey of MovieMovieBlogBlog, for nominating me for the Liebster award, and for being so patient with my horrible tardiness in giving responses! Everybody check out Cinema’s Maven’s responses to the questions she was asked, which are so funny and awesome. She also nominated 10 wonderful blogs I’m honored to see next to mine, as did Steve. Steve’s answers are also wonderful; I highly recommend reading #1 in his facts about himself. Hilarious.

For the award, my task is to nominate some folks for the award myself, answer questions, and ask my own. I don’t think I’ve yet honored these great bloggers. In no particular order:

Christina Wehner, K-Drama Today, A Person in the Dark, Critica Retro, Caftan Woman, MovieMovieBlogBlog, Carole & Co., Nitrateglow, Speakeasy, The Vintage Cameo, & Love Letters to Old Hollywood (I will try to remember to notify you as well, which I neglected to do on a similar occasion.)

To accept the award, answer my eleven questions, share eleven things about yourself, ask eleven of your own questions, and nominate up to eleven bloggers to answer them. If you don’t have the time right now, just know that I am a fan and wanted to give you a shout-out.

My Responses to Cinema Maven’s Great Questions

  1. You’re a casting agent. Tell me, what two stars who never acted together would you most like to see in a film? Barbara Stanwyck and Cary Grant in a comedy. It would have been perfection.
  2. What is your favorite line in a movie? “You know, junk food really doesn’t deserve the bad rap it gets. Take these fried pork rinds. This particular brand has 1 percent of the RDA—that’s Recommended Daily Allowance—of Riboflavin.” The Sure Thing.
  3. What is your favorite Alfred Hitchcock film, and briefly…why? Notorious. Perfect casting. The terrifying concept of living with your enemy—and being in his power. Plus, a creepy mother-in-law.
  4. Clark Gable or Cary Grant? Why? Cary Grant. He could do everything—and make it all look SO easy. I like Gable, but he was far less versatile (& no acrobatic skills).
  5. What movie should never EVER become a re-make? To Sir with Love.
  6. What classic film star would you like to interview? Full disclosure. They’d hold nothing back during your interview. Mae West. I wouldn’t want her to hold anything back.
  7. What movie or actor or actress ( pick one ) was absolutely, positively, unequivocally robbed of an Academy Award? For what film? Briefly, why should he/she/it have won? Barbara Stanwyck. For Ball of Fire. Also, for pretty much every movie she was in. Because there has never been another actress that natural on the screen, before or since.
  8. What classic film star, at the height of his or her fame, would you like to show up with you at your prom? Fred Astaire. Because he could make even me look like I could dance. 
  9. Which endings resonate MORE with you: movies with happy endings or movies with sad endings? ( Do NOT say, “that depends” ). Name the film. And why? I’m a sucker for a happy ending if it’s earned. The Shawshank Redemption is a good example.
  10. What actor or actress do you find too hyped up and over-rated OR what actor or actress do you find totally under the radar, and should be much more well-known? Tell us why. Anthony Hopkins—too theatrical. Johnny Depp—great taste, but not much talent (let the attacks begin).
  11. If you didn’t have classic films in your life, where else would your passion lie? What would your hobby be? My classic movie admiration reached its obsession stage when I started teaching writing and was too overwhelmed to read more than I already was. I suspect I’d go back to being the hardcore bookworm I am naturally.

My Responses to Steve Bailey’s Great Questions

1. “All-time favorite movie” is too tough. What is your favorite genre, and what is your all-time favorite movie in that genre? The screwball comedy. Ball of Fire.

2. “Theatrical” is too easy. What’s your all-time favorite TV-movie? I like the truly bad Lifetime ones. As a kid, I loved the If Tomorrow Comes TV miniseries (jewel thief love story–no lie). Surely Slugs was a TV movie? Also a favorite.

3. The Great Movie Genie is allowing you to permanently change the ending of one movie. Which one do you choose, and why? Four Weddings and a Funeral. Andie MacDowell’s unbelievably, comically flat delivery of the raining line, which nearly ruined an otherwise funny comedy. Also, it’s a dumb line.

4. You’re the latest heinie-kissing Hollywood exec, slavishly following trends. Which movie, good or bad, would you like to sequelize or remake? Clan of the Cave Bear was actually a fascinating book, and that movie was AWFUL. I’d like to see it done well. Never gonna happen.

5. Name the movie whose screening you’d like to co-host on TCM with Ben Mankiewicz. I’m No Angel. Who can’t talk about Mae West?

6. Describe your most memorable movie occasion — not necessarily your favorite film, but a movie you enjoyed with friends, one that evoked a particular memory, etc. Great question. Arsenic and Old Lace is attached to so many memories it deserves its own post. Also watching The Princess Bride with my younger sister. She knows every line.

7. What is your favorite line of movie dialogue? I answered this one above in #2 for Cinema Maven. Also, any  five minutes of The Thin Man. 

8. Why are movies special to you? I have many answers to this question, so I’ll just give one: Because I can feel pessimistic about everything around me, and walk out of a theater 2 hours later, inspired.

9. What do you enjoy most about blogging? Finding so many people who love what I do.

10. What is your favorite book about movies? Drama Queens by Autumn Stevens. Not great literature, but gossipy and so funny.

11. You have your favorite movie actor or actress to yourself for 24 hours to do with what you will. Name, please. Not my favorite actor, but Marlon Brando in 1951. I don’t think that requires an explanation.

11 Facts about Me

  1. Once when I returned a movie to Blockbuster, the woman at the counter said, “I won’t lie to you. That’s the worst fine I’ve ever seen.” That’s when I started buying movies.
  2. When my friends used to tan in high school and college, I’d hold up my pale, freckled arm so that they’d feel good about their progress.
  3. Cinema Maven, one of my very funny nominators, reminded me of my own cooking past. I tried to boil oatmeal once without any water. I guess that home ec class in middle school didn’t work.
  4. I used to excel at winning baked goods at the cake walk in school carnivals. I took great pride in this accomplishment.
  5. My parents used to send me to my room when it was messy, telling me I couldn’t leave until it was clean. I liked being in my room. I read there. I am a slob to this day. Let this be a lesson to parents out there.
  6. I have a gift for finding the coolest cat in the animal shelter, and not just for myself.
  7. The GPS changed my life. I spend much less of my time driving in circles now.
  8. I fear hail. It’s followed by tornadoes. The fact that I now live somewhere without them hasn’t changed my instinctual reaction.
  9. I am a hopeless klutz but can paddleboard. This means you all should try it.
  10. I’ve always attributed my good taste in friends to the caliber of people my sisters are. Unfortunately, my siblings hate classic films; nobody’s perfect.
  11. I think I have Fletch memorized.

Eleven Questions for My Nominees
1-5. What’s your favorite movie when you’re feeling:
*Blue?
*Angry?
*Nostalgic?
*Giddy?
*Undercaffeinated? Why (for any/all of the above)? Do they help you get over the mood, or intensify it?
6. What invention in your lifetime has affected you the most?
7. Which actor or actress (the performer/character he/she plays) would make the best superhero in your estimation? Why?
8. Which classic movie character would you ask romantic advice?
9. Which movie character (classic/current) would give you terrible advice about everything?
10. Which literary/movie character would you ask to help you with your least favorite errand?
11. Which actor/actress are you surprised you like? Why?

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