Old movies that are still good (if even for the wrong reasons)

[Bells]

Good old movies because they rock?

Good old movies because they are so bad they are good?

I'm calling old movies that go around earlier 2000 and before

So, what your picks?

Just out the top of my head i could call "House Arrest" and "Dancing in the rain" as movies that i really love.

i mean, nobody got shit on Dancing in the Rain! Is like Jackie chan with tap dancing

[42PETUNIAS]

Troll 2. No question.

[Kaneda]

I consider Dr. Strangelove to be one of the earliest movies that is actually clever.

[Masked Jedi]

This is far too broad for me to begin. But Troll 2 does rock.

[Mr.Bookworm]

Death Race 2000 is totally awesome in a campy way.

Dr. Strangelove is one of the best movies ever made, period.

[POS Industries]

I have to take this time to recommend The Manchurian Candidate. The original one, with Sinatra. Honestly, it's one of the finest movies I've ever seen. Also, Angela Lansbury plays a fantastic villain. Go find it.

[Seil]

The Labyrinth?

I dunno - I'll go with The Gremlins movies. Both of them. Gizmo was awesome and you know it:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/127/342148493_5a6ad5c72c.jpg?v=0

[TDK]

Army of Darkness. Hell, all the Evil Dead movies.

And Super Troopers, but I don't know when that came out.

[Bells]

'Head of State" - Chris rock as president? I lol'ed, couldnt help it!

"Liar Liar" - My favourite Jim Carey movie.

"Mantan" - That movie was awfull... but dear god, i couldnt avoid watching it.

"Top Gang" - How can you not love it?

[Cid Highwind]

Shawshank redemption is one of my absolute favorite movies ever.

[Seil]

Any movie made by Pixar.

Including the shorts.

[Magus]

I personally thought the original 3:10 To Yuma was still so good I'm not sure why they thought they had to remake it (other than to make money and give Russell Crowe something to do).

Any movie with Clint Eastwood or Lee Van Cleef are also good movies. Yes, even God's Gun or Sabata, even Bad Man's River. They're still better than 90% of movies even if they are cheesy spaghetti westerns. But the Dollars Trilogy is the best because it has both of them, and all the Dirty Harry movies are arguably the best Clint Eastwood films to have been made (barring possibly the supposed final Dirty Harry movie that is supposed to be upcoming in the near future).

[Truce]

Jurassic Park.

It fueled velociraptor nightmares for me for years.

[Bells]

Shawshank redemption is one of my absolute favorite movies ever.

Oh HELL yeah.

The Green Mile aint bad either

[POS Industries]

The fact that most of the movies mentioned here are being called "old" makes me hurt.

[Bells]

well, i did just downloaded Inherit the Wind (1960) and like it quite a lot to be fair

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

I have to take this time to recommend The Manchurian Candidate. The original one, with Sinatra. Honestly, it's one of the finest movies I've ever seen. Also, Angela Lansbury plays a fantastic villain. Go find it.

All I have to say is how does Sinatra pick up that chick on the train? He's just dropping his cigarette everywhere, mumbling incoherentely and then she goes straight home, drops her fiancee for him even though she nexts finds him in the police station under arrest. WTF?
But it is quite a good movement.

While I pretty much every movie I watch is old and I have no idea where to start I recommened finding the Welles version of the Trial. It's totally badass.
Also I suggest Mr Smith Goes to Washington. The other movie made in 1939.

I also can't believe that some of these movies are being called old. Pixar? Jurrasic Park? These are really new people!

By the way if you want to watch a movie and not commit piracy then get the 60s version of To Kill a Mockingbird. They lost the copyright so no one holds it! I really didn't like it though.

[Masked Jedi]

I have to take this time to recommend The Manchurian Candidate. The original one, with Sinatra. Honestly, it's one of the finest movies I've ever seen. Also, Angela Lansbury plays a fantastic villain. Go find it.

That is the only movie I'm willing to rank. It's my favorite move ever.

[Mauve Mage]

The fact that most of the movies mentioned here are being called "old" makes me hurt. Yeah, when I read "Old" I was thinking "Maltese Falcon" and "Notorious."


Both of which are still good.

[Satan's Onion]

Animal Crackers, Monkey Business, Horse Feathers, Duck Soup, and A Night at the Opera.

All of these films feature the Marx Brothers, and all of them are incomparably brilliant and hilarious. Go watch them. You'll thank me later.

[Julford Hajime]

Patton. I've watched the movie six times in the last four days, it's that awesome. The musical score alone wins me over, but Patton's portrayal is so unbeleivably awesome. He slaps bitches, shoots jackasses, AND wins WWII!

To Kill a Mockingbird was a nice movie, I thought. Then again, I haven't seen it since sophomore year of high school, where ANY movie you watch in place of actually learning things is good, so my opinion is quite possibly warped.

And for a more recent movie, I vote for the first Power Rangers movie. While it was "OMGTHISISTHEBESTESTTHINGEVER" to me when it first came out (I was like, seven. Gimme a break), nowadays watching it is hilarious because of how... odd it was, especially compared to the show itself. They invented a new sidekick that reminded me of Invader Zim's Mini-Moose ("Yup, been here with me the whole time"), gave the Rangers random skills/items they never had in the show, and had this very wierd, convoluted world-domination scheme that I never understood.

[Bells]

To Kill a Mockingbird. They lost the copyright so no one holds it!

Wait.

Really? No one?

My mind travel into dark uncharted waters... thus this question... does it mean i can do whatever i want with it? Or.. like... "take it"? Is really possible that "Nobody" owns it?!

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

Wait.

Really? No one?

My mind travel into dark uncharted waters... thus this question... does it mean i can do whatever i want with it? Or.. like... "take it"? Is really possible that "Nobody" owns it?!

True. It's public domain.
There's no laws to restrict your use. You can do whatever you want.

[Kaneda]

Fuck yes, Atticus Prime: Time Traveling Lawyer.

[Mauve Mage]

Animal Crackers, Monkey Business, Horse Feathers, Duck Soup, and A Night at the Opera. YES. SATAN'S ONION IS CORRECT HERE. MARX BROTHERS RULE ALL.

Other good old movies:
Gaslight
Rebecca
The Enchanted Cottage
Rear Window (The original Hitchcock version.)
James Bond movies featuring Sean Connery.
Speaking of Connery... "Hunt for Red October" and "The Rock", while not as old as the others I mentioned, ARE STILL AWESOME.

[Satan's Onion]

Also, The Pink Panther and A Shot in the Dark are both quite excellent films featuring Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau. Bless you, Steve Martin--you tried so very hard in the remake, but you'll never be anything other than a mediocre replacement.

[Toastburner B]

Actually, this thread has answered my wondering as to why To Kill a Mocking Bird was in The Darkness game.

Anyways...

The Thing From Another World: 1950s sci-fi at its best. This a personal favorite of mine, and I look forward to Halloween time when TCM plays it more often. Good characters, witty dialog...sure, the monster is all that intimidating, but where any of them in 1950s sci-fi flicks?

Them!: 1950s sci-fi at its cheesy best. Giant ants? Yes. Giant ants that attack a train to get at the sugar on it? Heck yes. Giant ants that end up colonizing the sewers of LA? Yes, please!

Charade: Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn...what's not to like?

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

If you're hitting the Marx Brothers Day at the Races is so the best.

[Satan's Onion]

It does have some great stuff in it, but be warned that it's also full of overlong scenes like the "Water Carnival" that just go on and on and on and on and on without the slightest hint of funny. I think A Night at the Opera has a slight edge on A Day at the Races in terms of the funny:not funny ratio. But they are both pretty damn good.

The Cocoanuts ain't bad either, altho' it's incredibly stagey at times (look at all the incredibly unconvincing sets), and some of the editing is rather sub-par (the harp solo comes out of nowhere and is connected to nothing else in the film), and as for the musical numbers--I figure you're either gonna hate "The Monkey Doodle-Doo" or think it's great. (Feel free to hate "When My Dreams Come True", tho'. Even Gershwin didn't much care for that one.) It also has some of my favorite moments with Harpo, like, evar.

[Hawk]

The original Star Wars trilogy.
The Back to the Future Trilogy.
Alien and Aliens.
Predator 1 and 2.
Terminator 1 and 2.
The Indiana Jones Trilogy.
Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston 1959 version).
Spartacus (1960 version).

I think these are all old enough to accurately apply for this thread.

[Invisible Queen]

Them!: 1950s sci-fi at its cheesy best. Giant ants? Yes. Giant ants that attack a train to get at the sugar on it? Heck yes. Giant ants that end up colonizing the sewers of LA? Yes, please!
Fun tidbit: In Sweden Them was translated to Spindlarna. If you can't guess what that word means, I'll give you a hint: It doesn't mean "Ants".

Slightly old, awesome movies: Hot Shots! part 1 and 2.

[POS Industries]

I think these are all old enough to accurately apply for this thread.
I'd consider the last two of them as qualifiers.

[DFM]

I get where you're coming from but I have a really hard time considering any movie that's older than I am as not old.

[greed]

I consider Dr. Strangelove to be one of the earliest movies that is actually clever.

This statement is so wrong. Watch some Marx Brothers or some Chaplin. There are probably some really clever silent films that predate both of their works as well and there sure are a lot of great comedies between them and Strangleove. As a suggestion one of the highlights of history in high school was watching The Great Dictator (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Dictator). And I really liked high school history.

On a general note, Dr Strangelove is indeed as I have said before the best comedy ever. Also seeing as they haven't been mentioned yet, a good foreign(or not if you're in Hong Kong) movie series is the A Better Tomorrow series that started off the careers of Chow Yun Fat and John Woo.

Also how is pre2000 old? Seriously I'd say it would be pre70s.

[Lord of Joshelplex]

Citizen Kane

[Zakreon]

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

[I_Like_Swordchucks]

The Princess Bride!

My name is Inigo Montoya! You killed my father, prepare to die!

[Mr.Bookworm]

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Isn't any Monty Python movie pretty much a given?

[Hawk]

I get where you're coming from but I have a really hard time considering any movie that's older than I am as not old.

My logic for my list was just that; most of them are older than me, except for about 3 of them and even then there's only a few years difference anyway. Basically all of those films were a good 10 years old at least by the time I was able to watch them for the first time and are even older now, hence old.

[Archbio]

You can do whatever you want.

You can pit Sherlock Holmes against Yog-Sothoth. If no one already did it, that is.

Metropolis, M and the Dr. Mabuse movies by Fritz Lang are all still very much worth the watch.

Old is relative.

[Invisible Queen]

I get where you're coming from but I have a really hard time considering any movie that's older than I am as not old.
Perfectly understandable, but it just confirms what we've always thought: Young people shouldn't be allowed to, well, heck, they just shouldn't be allowed. They make us feel old! :shifty:

[Lord of Joshelplex]

Got damn young people. GET OFF OUR LAWNS!

[POS Industries]

Perfectly understandable, but it just confirms what we've always thought: Young people shouldn't be allowed to, well, heck, they just shouldn't be allowed. They make us feel old! :shifty:
This right here. Granted, there are movies in the original Star Wars and Indiana Jones trilogies, as well as the first Alien movie, that are anywhere between 2 and five years older than me, but the series themselves are more or less my own age.

But Back to the Future is right out!

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

You can pit Sherlock Holmes against Yog-Sothoth. If no one already did it, that is.

Metropolis, M and the Dr. Mabuse movies by Fritz Lang are all still very much worth the watch.

Old is relative.

Actually Metropolis is awesome but its terrible difficult to get a proper cut these days. It's been reedited so many times its hard to know what you are watching. Most of the copies floating around have beenspeed up due to the odd nature in which it was filmed and how we put it together today. Everybody moves reallly fast and it is rather disturbing.

Old may be relative but some things just totally don't count.

Battleship Potemkin is always a classic.
And for pure noir class one can't go past Double Indemnity.

[Mike McC]

Isn't any Monty Python movie pretty much a given?Outside of Holy Grail, it is really rather hit and miss, actually.

Also, what the hell, calling movies a mere 9 years old as 'old' movies? I mean, at least set the bar at 20 years, before 1988.

Going by that 20 year bar, The Goonies. Seriously, do I need to say why?

[bananarama]

Goddamn everybody has mentioned movies that I would have said, but just to reiterate, any movie starred by:

Cary Grant
Humphrey Bogart
Clark Gable
Marx Brothers
Charlie Chaplin
Peter Sellers
Clint Eastwood
John Wayne
Marlin Brando

Yeah just IMDb those names and watch any of the movies listed done by those guys and you should be good.

For some of the movies that don't have the previously mentioned actors, there are:

Rebel Without a Cause
The Magnificent Seven
Blade Runner
Citizen Kane
Brazil
and any movies directed by Alfred Hitchcock and Akira Kurosawa

[Savage Thinking]

No mention of the first Ghostbusters movie?

The Stay Puft Marshmellow Man still scares the crap outta me..

[Bells]

I'm from 85, so i was thinking that any movie from 1990 and back would be really old by Now... right? (even thoug i mentioned a few 2000+ movies here)

I mean, there are old movies in color... Ferris Bueller's Day Off ? C'mon!

EDIT:

I dont think i should mention that movie... every time i do, i get the fear that they might want to do a Remake of it

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

Goddamn everybody has mentioned movies that I would have said, but just to reiterate, any movie starred by:

Cary Grant
Humphrey Bogart
Clark Gable
Marx Brothers
Charlie Chaplin
Peter Sellers
Clint Eastwood
John Wayne
Marlin Brando



I don't know. Most of these actors (particularly Brando, Bogart and Sellers) made a lot of great movies but they also made some awful awful movies which have been pretty much forgotten by time but if you going across the list of thier movies you will find them.
And Grant and Gable? They pretty much made the same movie about 50 times over and it wasn't even very good.

I'm always a fan of the collected work of Welles. It has some truly truly bad movies but Welles is jsut so much fun to work. Especially in the Trial (fuck you Citizen Kane).

My rubrick has basically been mid1970s and early. It might help that about half the movies I watch are from here but oh well.

And mention of Brando leads me to a classic but it hasn't been mentioned: On the Waterfront. I love that movie.
Seriously the scene in the Taxicab with his brother has to be one of the greatest scenes of all time.

[Savage Thinking]

You know, I remember watching the original 12 Angry Men movie at school, and I friggin' loved it. Although I thought the ending was quite lacking, everything else made up for it.

[Mr.Bookworm]

Outside of Holy Grail, it is really rather hit and miss, actually.

Can someone give me an example?

I think I've watched all of them, and I found all of them ranging from good to excellent.

[Mauve Mage]

Can someone give me an example?
Meaning of Life.
Life of Brian.
Not as funny.


Also-- I am shocked and disgusted by the lack of The Thin Man movies on this list. You guys all fail. Except Satan's Onion.

[Bells]

Meaning of Life.


Yeah... that one wasnt really funny for me.

[bananarama]

I don't know. Most of these actors (particularly Brando, Bogart and Sellers) made a lot of great movies but they also made some awful awful movies which have been pretty much forgotten by time but if you going across the list of thier movies you will find them.
And Grant and Gable? They pretty much made the same movie about 50 times over and it wasn't even very good.

I'm always a fan of the collected work of Welles. It has some truly truly bad movies but Welles is jsut so much fun to work. Especially in the Trial (fuck you Citizen Kane).

My rubrick has basically been mid1970s and early. It might help that about half the movies I watch are from here but oh well.

And mention of Brando leads me to a classic but it hasn't been mentioned: On the Waterfront. I love that movie.
Seriously the scene in the Taxicab with his brother has to be one of the greatest scenes of all time.
Oh come on, you gotta give Grant and Gable SOME credit. What about Gone With The Wind and The Misfits for Gable? What about almost every Hitchcock movie Grant starred in? Are you saying that all of those aren't very good? I admit though just listing the actors is probably a bit vague since as you say, there are plenty of crappy movies that these guys have done. So there are:

Casablanca
A Night at the Opera
The Gold Rush
The Pink Panther
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
The Shootist
On The Waterfront

[POS Industries]

No mention of the first Ghostbusters movie?
It's not old!

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

Oh come on, you gotta give Grant and Gable SOME credit. What about Gone With The Wind and The Misfits for Gable? What about almost every Hitchcock movie Grant starred in?

I really hated Gone With The Wing and The Misfits and thought they were atrocious.
I haven't really watched any Hitchcock movies but that might be good for Grant as it different from the others ones I've seen.

And I found Life of Brian is far better than Holy Grail, mostly because Holy Grail was just a series of skits whereas the jokes of Life of Brian tied in better to the plot (apart from those aliens? That was ridiculous). Holy Grail was hilarious but it was too much like Flying Circus for me and I want a different experience out of a movie.

[Satan's Onion]

I don't know. Most of these actors (particularly Brando, Bogart and Sellers) made a lot of great movies but they also made some awful awful movies which have been pretty much forgotten by time but if you going across the list of thier movies you will find them.
...

Even the Marx Brothers' films are arguably kind of hit-and-miss (which is kind of a pity as there's only, like, twelve or thirteen of them), altho' even the worst of them usually has at least one good line or scene.

As for Chaplin, he's great, but watch out for his ego. I tried watching The Gold Rush--a re-release from the '40s, I think, with Chaplin narrating over the silent footage--and his talent for physical humor really is incomparable. But every other sentence out of narrator-Charlie's mouth was "Poor little Tramp! Poor little fellow!", as if the Tramp's regular Sad Looks to the Camera weren't enough to clue us in on the Tramp being a sad, sympathetic figure. I am not entirely brainless, thank you, Mr. Chaplin, and I don't really need the Tramp's feelings spelled out to me further. (There was an earlier short film of his on after it, called Pay Day I think. His work was so much better without the narrating all over it--the difference was remarkable.)

The works of W.C. Fields are also pretty good--or at least I think The Bank Dick is, as is My Little Chickadee (Mae West is also pretty awesome :D ). I haven't seen anything by Laurel and Hardy yet, either, but I've heard good things about their work too.

[Invisible Queen]

Rebel Without a Cause is a funny movie. On both the DVD cover (that I have seen) and in the actual title screen of the film, it's spelled with quotes, i.e. ""Rebel Without a Cause"".

Kind of unique I think.

Meanwhile, did anyone mention Stanley Kubrick, aside from Dr Strangelove? I don't think The Shining is not-old,and it's brilliant. And 2001. . . well, it's at least interesting.

[Hawk]

It's not old!

Dude, it's 24 years old. Almost a quarter of a century. It's old.

[Odjn]

Oh come on, you gotta give Grant and Gable SOME credit. What about Gone With The Wind and The Misfits for Gable?


Isn't Gone with the Wind the movie a teensy bit racist and Gone with the Wind as a book really goddamn racist?

[I_Like_Swordchucks]

Isn't Gone with the Wind the movie a teensy bit racist and Gone with the Wind as a book really goddamn racist?

No more than a movie about the holocaust being anti-Semitic. It basically portrayed black people as being slaves controlled by white people during an era where black people were slaves being controlled by white people.

If anything, the black people in the movie/book are the only characters who show loyalty and integrity in my opinion.

One of the black actors in the movie said there was no shame in portraying his race how they once were, because he felt a sense of pride in how far they've come.

[POS Industries]

Dude, it's 24 years old. Almost a quarter of a century. It's old.
If it's not full of fast talking and high trousers, it's not old.

[Toastburner B]

Man...this thread makes me feel old. :sweatdrop

Anyways...I'm going to throw in a few more:

Rio Bravo(1959) and El Dorado(1967): I'm putting these together as they were both directed by Howard Hawks, star John Wayne, and purposely have a similar plot. I do enjoy both of them, however, and there is enough of a difference between them to merit watching both of them.

The Road To... movies(1940-62), starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour. I admittedly haven't seen all of them, but the ones I have seen are great. Very funny.

EDIT:
Oh, and I have to agree with the people that say that Gone with the Wind isn't very good. My family watched it last year for some reason, I don't think any of us, even my sisters, liked it.

[Invisible Queen]

Isn't Gone with the Wind the movie a teensy bit racist and Gone with the Wind as a book really goddamn racist?
The other day I heard someone confidently say that it's extremely sexist. Apparently it gives the message that when women are allowed free choice they always make bad choices. Not that I have seen, or read it, so I wouldn't know.

[Smarty McBarrelpants]

No more than a movie about the holocaust being anti-Semitic. It basically portrayed black people as being slaves controlled by white people during an era where black people were slaves being controlled by white people.

If anything, the black people in the movie/book are the only characters who show loyalty and integrity in my opinion.

One of the black actors in the movie said there was no shame in portraying his race how they once were, because he felt a sense of pride in how far they've come.

But there is a feeling that some of the black characters in the movie actively endorse racial stereotypes and even endorse slavery.
It even goes a bit beyond what is authentic to end up at a romanticised view of slavery and the past like the French used to romanticise the revolution after the restoration.
It's in part the nature of the story they chose to tell and the way they told it but one can certainly argue it looks fondly on the slaveholding past, when compared to the modern day, especially as they had just been through the depression and even the institution of slavery.


As for being sexist I wouldn't say that. I mean there are empowered women like Scarlet who consistently make horrible choices but that's more of an individual thing, possibly.

[TheSparrow]

Ive noticed in this thread a lack of foreign films on this list (aside from the A Better Tomorrow series, which being mid 80s isnt all that old)

Throne of Blood - (Japanese) Kurosawa directs the single greatest Shakespeare adaptation I've seen, bringing MacBeth to fuedal Japan and featuring the acting of Toshihiro Mifuni

Le Samourai - (French) Alain Delon plays a contract killer in this clash of 60s eurpoean pop and film noir.

Seven Samurai - (Japanese) Need I say more? More Kurosawa/Mifuni. Later turned into another film classic, the western The Magnificent Seven

The Seventh Seal - (Swedish) Yes, this film has a lofty reputation, its a powerful movie. A Bergman Classic

M (1931 version) - (German) Peter Lorre stars as a truly creepy child killer in Fritz Langs first "talkie"

Yojimbo - (Japanese) Yes yes, I love Kurosawa (If it hadnt been made in 85, Ran would be on this list too) wandering Samurai Yojimo plays both sides of a feud. Later turned into A Fistful of Dollars and later into Last Man Standing

The Yakuza Papers - (Japanese) in the wake of the Bomb, bloody crime spread through Hiroshima, and this series of films takes a brutal look at it...its the godfather without the romance with the, as the full title says "honor and humanity"

[Archbio]

I don't think that time has blunted the 1963 adaptation of Il Gattopardo at all, which I think to mention only because Alain Delon has been brought up. I don't know if the fact that it's a melancholic period piece has anything to do with it aging well.

[Fifthfiend]

Successor threads must specify "movies between 10 and 25 years old" and "movies that are older than 25 years old".

Movies that are less than 10 years old don't count you don't get to count fucking American Pie as an old movie.