The Sound of Music (1965)
For the magic of pure escapism, there is no genre more transportive or joyful than a musical done right. The soaring crescendo of a beautiful song, performed exquisitely by gorgeous talent, is the stuff of Broadway and Hollywood dreams. And you get all three inside of the first few minutes of Robert Wise’s The Sound of Music , the rare adaptation of a Broadway show that improves on the stage version. All of the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein songs are here, but in the movie Julie Andrews is belting “the hills are alive” right there atop the Austrian Alps!
The unforgettable moment sets the stage for an epic 70mm spectacle that soars as Andrews’ wayward nun, Sister Maria, takes on the task of tutoring, caring for, and ultimately becoming a mother to seven precocious von Trapp children. The romance between her and the stern Captain von Trapp (Christopher Plummer) is simultaneously schmaltzy and swoon-worthy, and her aural lessons sweeping. Oh, and this loose adaptation of the real-life von Trapp family’s flight from the Nazis after the goose-steppers took over Austria includes a third act where the von Trapps outwit a bunch of fascists and leave one over eager young brownshirt humiliated. These are a few of my favorite things.
The Blues Brothers (1980)
On days like this, it’s nice to know folks like Jake and Elwood Blues are out there. Brothers who on the right occasion can be tapped to go on a mission from God. It is their destiny to spread the gospel of good music, better vibes, and feel-good cinema around the globe. Ray Charles, James Brown, Cab Calloway, and a showstopping Aretha Franklin (to name but a few) are likewise on hand to drop some jazz and R&B standards in between comedy hijinks undertaken by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd at the height of their cool.
John Landis helms the first (and still best) film adaptation of an SNL sketch, which expands the concept of former castmates geeking out in sunglasses into an easygoing hangout movie where Aykroyd and Belushi slouch through the greater Chicago area. Along the way, they get a band together, piss off rednecks, and merrily lead local law enforcement through one of the greatest car chase sequences of all time. Wacker Drive might as well be renamed after them. Also, lest we forget, they happen to destroy a Neo-Nazi demonstration with the Bluesmobile, leading a couple of American fascists to chase them for the rest of the picture until the Blues boys trick the brownshirts into plummeting to their deaths. Good times all around.
Casablanca (1942)
Pound for pound still the greatest movie made in Hollywood’s Golden Age, Michael Curtiz’s Casablanca is a dizzying collection of all-time movie quotes courtesy of a screenplay by Julius and Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch. “Here’s looking at you, kid;” “everybody comes to Rick’s;” “we’ll always have Paris;” “of all the gin joints in al the towns in all the world, she walks into mine;” “round up the usual suspects;” “Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship;” “play it [again], Sam.” And more!
But beyond a witty and wistfully romantic screenplay, Casablanca is still a sweeping WWII melodrama about the problems of three little people, one of whom (Ingrid Bergman) thought her husband was dead in a concentration camp when she met Rick (Humphrey Bogart), only to find the hubby (Paul Henreid) returned to her when they’re all trying to escape the jackboots in Vichy-controlled Morocco. Also released during the war, and at a time when the Nazis still occupied Paris and North Africa, there is a pang of raw, tangible emotion as the cast of largely expat Europeans, including French actress Madeleine Lebeau, sing the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise,” while drowning out the fascists at a nightclub. It’s still put a lump in your throat to hear Lebeau shout, “Vive la France! Vive la liberté!”
