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Media Relations

IU film experts reveal the top must-see classic films

We live in the era of prolific filmmaking -- Hollywood may be soon competing with Bollywood for the number of movies it produces in a year. And while we have numerous titles to choose from, we are also more apt to be disappointed with a movie we waste an hour or two of our lives on.

But there are films, classic films, that it would be a shame to miss out on -- movies that have made an impact on American culture, have marked a certain point in the history of American life and society, or have changed the way we think about certain issues and the world around us. In other words, those films that reflect human experiences vis-à-vis the society at a particular point in our history.

While it is hard to find two people who would agree on a list of classic films or the very definition of what a "classic movie" is, suggestions from film connoisseurs can be a good starting point or guideline in deciding on titles to include in our private film collections. In order to find these titles, Live at IU asked a few film connoisseurs at the Indiana University Department of Communication and Culture for their suggestions and reasons behind them.

Karen Bowdre, an IU film studies professor, says that it is important to "know your own taste and not to discount it" while reading through magazine ratings and reviews. "Understand your own opinion too," she says. "What you like is important, something that resonates with you. It is in the eye of the beholder."

"Films are reflections of our culture," says Bowdre. "Most films, even with new ideas, capture ideas that have been circulating in the society before."

So, in this light, here are her suggestions:

• Gone with the Wind (1939)
• Citizen Kane (1941)
• To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) -- "The film made people think about the issues with race. Even today, most people admire Gregory Peck's character."
• Guess Who is Coming for Dinner (1967) "The film portrays realistic conversations and scenarios in a family."
• Norma Rae (1979)
• The First Wives Club (1996) -- "An interesting film in a sense of gender issues -- it reflects the trend among men who once get to a certain age, get younger, model-like women. It also portrays the camaraderie among women, which is not usual in Hollywood movies."
• Lumumba (2000) -- "The film depicts battles in politics -- inside and outside."

Jason Sperb, a member the IU Department of Communication and Culture's Film Indiana, also thinks that "classic films (in his list) both reflect and create a particular sense of the time in which they were produced and received.

"Their cultural impact lies in both tapping into existing sensibilities but also in crafting new perceptions," Sperb says. "The distinction is important because classic movies also create ways in which we perceive a particular period in American history. We remember them because they become a literal symbol of a particular time."

Here is his list of classic films:

• Birth of a Nation (1915) -- "One of the most racist films ever made, and it's thought to have encouraged a revival of KKK activity in the 1920s. This is also an example of how some films create conditions in culture, not only reflect pre-existing ones. For those reasons, we need to be mindful of the film and hold onto it as a cultural document, however offensive."
• Sunrise (1927) -- The film depicts the way "we see America in the 1920s."
• Modern Times (1936) -- "The film is about the Great Depression and about America as an increasingly Fordist/Taylorist nation, and how we see America during that time."
• The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
• All that Heaven Allows (1955)
• The Wild Bunch (1969)
• Apocalypse Now (1979)
• Aliens (1986)
• Fight Club (1999)
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

These films "are classic not because they accurately or realistically depict a particular period, but how they have taken a place in our cultural imagination of what a respective period looked and felt like -- irrespective of how historically accurate they really are," says Sperb.

But, what about classic films in terms of their significance in filmography and moviemaking techniques, in addition to their cultural impact?

Mark Benedetti, associate instructor and Ph.D. student in the Department of Communication and Culture, gives his selection of titles and explains reasons why he includes them in his list:

• The Birth of a Nation (1915) -- "Though it's not very easy for contemporary audiences to watch, this film synthesized many techniques for narrative storytelling that had been developed over the previous two decades into a blueprint for Hollywood filmmaking. It was also the most popular, and most controversial, film of its era."
• Un Chien Andalou (1929) -- "This is probably the best-known of all experimental films, and its surrealist fingerprint is evident in many more recent films by directors such as Peter Greenaway, David Lynch and Steven Soderbergh. It is also a very 'watchable' experimental film, one that general public often seems to like."
• Gone with the Wind (1939) -- "The most popular film of all time in terms of ticket sales, and a major film in the popularizing of Technicolor."
• Citizen Kane (1941) -- "Welles' first feature routinely tops 'best films of all time' lists, and its inventive uses of lighting, deep focus, and the long take expanded Hollywood's formal repertoire, paving the way for film noir and highlighting the influences of German Expressionism and French Poetic Realism."
• Breathless (1959) -- "The first feature of Godard's long and adventurous career remains the best-known film of the French New Wave cinema, a movement that played a major role in developing new approaches to filmic storytelling as well as the notion of independent film."
• Chelsea Girls (1966) -- "The most commercially successful film to emerge from the 1960s film underground, and it helped create the notion of the 'midnight movie.' While it certainly wasn't the first film to use two projectors to place images side-by-side, it was likely the first to do so for its entire three and a half hour running time."
• Bonnie and Clyde (1967) -- "While it may seem somewhat tame to a contemporary audience, the violence in the film was shocking to audiences of its time, and its apparent celebration of murderers was rather controversial. The film helped spawn the New Hollywood era, films which dealt with provocative material in explicit ways and which appealed largely to young audiences."
• Night of the Living Dead (1968) -- "A kind of a horror version of Bonnie and Clyde, the film combined biting social critique with gory effects and a low-budget look to lay the foundation for a new era of horror filmmaking in the U.S."
• Billy Jack (1971) -- "A somewhat silly political film about Native American issues. It is also the first film in the U.S. released in the now-standard blockbuster format, which refers to widely releasing a film from the beginning, rather than relying on small test market releases to determine whether the film is worth releasing more broadly."
• Jaws (1975) -- "While not the first blockbuster, the film established the blockbuster release as standard practice, and it is often recognized as the first 'high concept' film. It also launched Spielberg's career as the most popularly successful American director."

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