Pressing REPLAY

HALLIE EPHRON: I was saddened to see the recent obituary for Olympia Dukakis. I’m a huge fan and it got me thinking about one of my favorite movies: MOONSTRUCK. She plays Cher’s mother, worldly wise when she tells her husband that she knows he’s cheating on her, she wants him to stop, and “I just want you to know no matter what you do, you're gonna die, just like everybody else.” It’s a classic moment.

I watched the movie again the other night (it’s on Amazon Prime) and once again marveled at Dukakis’s performance. And Cher’s. And Vincent Gardenia as the father and Nicholas Cage as the wounded raging hot-as-hell Ronny Cammareri. It’s SO good. Even viewed for the umpteenth time. The opening scenes are full of little “Easter eggs” hinting at scenes that will take place later (a shot that establishes the neighborhood shows us a busy street with a moving van with METROPOLITAN OPERA emblazoned on its side).

I have the same experience when I watch THE WIZARD OF OZ again. And again. So much is seeded in those opening scenes on the farm (Dorothy falls into the pig pen and gets rescued by a terrified farmhand who will later be the cowardly lion). And it’s great fun anticipating the delivery of a great line. (“I’m a very good man - I’m just a very bad wizard.” “What a world, what a world.” )

Is there a movie that’s so good that you can watch it over and over again?

LUCY BURDETTE: Hallie, did you know that Frank Bruni recommended that everyone watch MOONSTRUCK again during the pandemic? So John and I did--it’s so fabulous! Every actor is amazing and the story, so romantic.

Another one that I love is LOVE ACTUALLY, but once a year for that is enough. And SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE--I can’t say how many times I have watched that one. I especially love Tom Hanks.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Such a good question. You know--WORKING GIRL, with Melanie Griffith and Harrison Ford. She’s from the wrong side of the river, but she’s smart and ambitious and willing to do the work.

I am a big fan of ugly duckling stories, especially when the ugly duckling is smart, and this is one of those. And that fantastic anthem “Let the River Run” sung by Carly Simon. And in the end, (spoiler) she is SO HAPPY, and then the camera pulls out to show she is just one little little person. Ahhh.

In that same smart duckling vein, THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA. Oh, when Andi comes out in the Chanel boots? When Miranda lectures her about turquoise? It’s touching, and wonderful, and SO funny.

And I would always watch The Godfather, and Casablanca, and Lawrence of Arabia. To Kill A Mockingbird, too, we watched that the other night, in fact. OH! And MY COUSIN VINNY. CLASSIC. Hilarious. Every. Time. I’ll stop now.

HALLIE: POSITRACTION!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Hank, I love WORKING GIRL, and you’ve inspired me to re-watch it again. It’s SO eighties, and yes, the Carly Simon song stands as one of the greatest movie themes ever. Every second-rate film gets an updated version; why hasn’t anyone done a remake of WORKING GIRL?

I’ve talked before about how my family has seasonal movie rewinds: THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW during the first big storm of winter, DIE HARD on Christmas Eve, and INDEPENDENCE DAY (the original, not the terrible, terrible sequel) on, well, you can guess when we watch that.

But if we’re talking about movies I will sit down again and again for, I have two comedies that never stop amusing me: SPY, starring Melissa McCarthy, Rose Byrne and Jason Statham (who is great at playing an over-the-top version of his usual tough-guy role) and DOWN WITH LOVE, a somewhat-obscure, wonderfully stylish homage to all those Doris Day/Rock Hudson romantic comedies of the early 60s, with Renee Zellweger in the Doris Day role, Ewan McGregor “as” Rock Hudson/Cary Grant/James Garner, and David Hyde Pierce, who is almost more Tony Randall than Tony Randall was!

JENN McKINLAY: Julia, I loved, SPY, and now I must see DOWN WITH LOVE. I was such an old movie buff as a teen that I consumed all the Doris Day/Rock Hudson or James Garner movies, fell in love with Sandra Dee and Bobby Darin in IF A MAN ANSWERS (so great!), and decided to become a writer of rom-coms because of ROMANCING THE STONE. Also, I will stop whatever I’m doing and watch any movie Elvis is in if one comes on. The movie that I always double back to, however, is FIELD OF DREAMS. A multi-layered, poignant, family centric movie with loads of magical realism -- it ticks all of my boxes. Plus, I’ve been in love with James Earl Jones forever, so there’s that.

RHYS BOWEN:; The movies I watch over and over depend on my mood. Like Hank I can rewatch THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA. I adore OUT OF AFRICA but only when I’m prepared for a good weep. I have the DVD of ENCHANTED APRIL which is the perfect escape movie for me, also MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, ROMAN HOLIDAY and even LETTERS TO JULIET. I suppose I rewatch sweet, sappy movies when I need calming down or cheering up. My recent go-to was MAMA MIA. Who couldn’t feel cheerful when singing along?

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Love love love MIDNIGHT IN PARIS. So many good suggestions here, but I haven’t seen SPY or DOWN WITH LOVE. I’m a huge Ewan McGregor fan so that one is going on my list asap.

I have my perennial faves, like LOVE ACTUALLY and THE HOLIDAY, oh, and NOTTING HILL, of course, but I would love to see ROMANCING THE STONE again. FIELD OF DREAMS is my daughter’s favorite movie ever, and I love BULL DURHAM. It’s summer and baseball season, time to get those out again!

But you know what I’m thinking I’d like to rewatch? SPEED. Such a great action movie. Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock were adorable, the supporting cast was terrific, and the stunts were amazing.

HALLIE: I’ve never seen SPEED. Or DOWN WITH LOVE. Or MIDNIGHT IN PARIS. What about you, what’s going on your to-watch list and what would you recommend for over-and-over watching?

Twas the Best of Movies, Twas the Worst of Movies

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I love disaster movies. If there's a flick that has meteors hurtling to the earth, tidal waves that topple New York, people getting flash-frozen in the midwest or Los Angeles getting smoked in an earthquake/volcano/alien invasion, I'm there. Which is to say why the Smithie, her girlfriend and I were recently in the audience for GEOSTORM, despite its abysmal rating of 11% on Rotten Tomatoes.

The terrible reviews are well deserved. This movie didn't just ignore actual science (which, frankly, is to be expected in this genre. There's zero explanation, for instance, of why the planet starts cracking like a hardboiled egg in 2012. The Mayans said it would, that's good enough for us.) GEOSTORM also ignored human nature, political reality, basic engineering standards, OSHA, the passage of time and the fact that a deputy undersecretary at the US State Department wouldn't show up for work with shaggy hair and a three-day SexyStubble(TM).

Nonetheless, we had a GREAT time watching it. We snorted at the ridiculous plot twists, whispered, "Wait, didn't he say earlier..." to each other, and every time a character said, "There's going to be a GEOSTORM!" (which happened, I'm happy to say, frequently) we would make faces like the Screamer in Edvard Munch's painting. The movie lasted an hour and three quarters, and we spent at least twice that long afterwards tearing it apart. It was that rare bird; a deeply enjoyable, thoroughly Bad Movie.

Reds, do you have any cinematic stinkers you love?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I burst out laughing, picturing you two. SO many great bad movies. And they are definitely a different animal than just a bad movie. Take, for example POINT BREAK. So ridiculous, with Patrick Swayze as an enlightened surfer who moonlights with the presidential mask-wearing surfing colleagues as bank robbers. So, of course, FBI agent Keanu Reaves learns to surf so he can infiltrate the gang. I forget the rest. but it is wonderfully bad. Especially the "ending."

BEETLEJUICE, but wait, that's actually good, right? And SPEED, again, sorry, Keanu Reeves as a state cop who has to keep driving the bus at 50 miles per hour so the speed-detonated bomb on it doesn't go off.  Or wait, does Sandra Bullock drive the bus? Anyway, fabulous.  CONTAGION, with Dustin Hoffman, I think, trying to stop the world from dying of plague or something.

There was recently a movie that I almost made Jonathan go to that was supposed to be so bad that it was famous for being terrible. Anyone know what that was? And forgive me, but I thought WONDER WOMAN, though fun to watch, was absolutely ridiculous. Made NO sense whatsoever. I KNOW it's fantasy. But fantasy still has to make sense. Don't get me started on what didn't make sense, because the list is too long.

I can't wait to hear what movies you all pick. And the old horror movies don't count. The Incredible Shrinking Man. That was great.


JENN McKINLAY: I saw SPEED eight times. In the theater. I am not kidding. It is bad and my girlfriend and I loved it so hard. Still do.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Hank, you can't diss SPEED! I love SPEED! Who cares if Sandra Bullock could really drive the bus? But, seriously, the first thing that comes to my mind is THE LAST STARFIGHTER. In case anyone has missed this gem, it came out in 1984 and starred Lance Guest (did he ever make another movie?) and Robert Preston. Yes, THE MUSIC MAN. It's about a poor boy from a trailer park in New Mexico who is a whiz at video games, so aliens recruit him to fly a spaceship and SAVE THE UNIVERSE!!!! There is a car that takes off, and Robert Preston pulls off his human face to reveal his alien face! The space battle scenes look like they were done in somebody's garage with Star Wars toys. The dialogue is dreadful. But, still, there's something so charming about the trailer park that I'd watch it just for those parts. And, no big spoiler, Alex (Lance Guest) really does save the universe.

HANK: I LOVE The Last Starfighter. Brilliant. Genius.  What a great plot, right?  And Robert Preston, perfection.

HALLIE EPHRON: My vote goes to STAR WARS: THE PHANTOM MENACE. I'm afraid Jar Jar Binks hammered the nail in that coffin for me. But I've heard the SWs movies have gotten better since. In that one, it was like they fired all the writers and the actors ad libbed. Dreadful, except for special effects.

My daughter and I just disagreed on LA LA LAND. I loved it. She HATED it. Unbelievable, she said. Well duh, I said.

JULIA: Hallie, I just pretend the prequel trilogy never happened.

RHYS BOWEN: I am so picky about movies that I rarely see stinkers. I don't like disaster movies. I would have had to be dragged to Sharknado which my daughter in LA thought was screamingly funny. I enjoyed the first three Star Wars but my interested quickly waned from then on. I actually quite liked WonderWoman, but then I did watch it on a plane, snuggled in my pod with a glass of wine, with nothing else to do and nowhere else to be! Loved LA LA LAND. I've seen it since twice on planes (I seem to do much of my movie watching on long flights). I really hated THE HOBBIT--so different in tone from the book that they missed the point of it. But since most of the movies I go to seem to star Judi Dench or Maggie Smith or Kate Winslett or all three, nobody ever has to save the world from sharks or aliens!

HANK: Rhys, you had me at snuggling in a pod with wine.

JENN: Hank, you aren't alone with POINT BREAK. Hub loves that movie while admitting it's ridiculous. TREMORS with Kevin Bacon, we both adore. I mean, giant worms in the desert, come on, what is not to love? And, Julia, I hear you on disaster films. My favorite disaster type movie is Twister. Helen Hunt chasing tornadoes with Bill Paxton. Cows fly by. This is great stuff! Am I right?

JULIA: Oh, yes.

INGRID THOFT: SPEED is not a bad movie!  SPEED is fabulous!  I think I saw it about five times in the theaters, Jenn, and I watched a year ago on a long plane flight.  It held up after all this time!  I also share Julia’s love of disaster films.  TOWERING INFERNO is a winner, as is THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE.  I was so hopeful that the recent THE MOUNTAIN BETWEEN US starring Kate Winslet and Idris Elba was going to be good, but it tanked on Rotten Tomatoes and in the theater.  Fingers crossed it’s the good kind of bad, and it will become a new favorite when I can watch it on demand.

JULIA: Let us know, Ingrid! How about you, dear readers? What are your favorite bad movies?