Top Five Fave Films: Movies I Couldn't Live Without

 Ok so all this  excitement over The River premiering last week, has renewed a long of the movie Across the Universe in me. It got me thinking about my top fave movies. Everyone has them, those movies tat you know every word by heart, and will watch over and over and over again, and even though you obviously own them, you HAVE to watch them every time they come on tv. So here, in no particular order are my Top Five Fave Films:

1) A League of Their Own - This may be my all time favorite movie ever. I remember going to see it in theaters with my mom and sister, which is slightly odd since I couldn't have been more that 7 years old at the time. Something about the movie really stuck with me, I even played softball for an entire season, which if you know me is kind of a big deal. Seriously though, the movie has an amazing cast, Tom Hanks, Geena Davis, Bill Pullman, not to mention it's one of the few movies Madonna was actually good in. Plus the dialogue is great, "There's no crying in baseball" is listed at number 54 on The American Film Institute's Top 100 movie quotations in American cinema.

2) Clueless - This is another movie with an awesome cast, baby Paul Rudd, baby Jeremy Sisto, baby Breckin Meyers and baby Donald Faison, just to name a few. Not to mention the fact that this movie added a ton of new phrases into my generations lexicon, Betties, Barneys, Monet, just to name a few. Also the soundtrack was incredible with songs from, No Doubt, The Cranberries, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones and my personal favorite, The Muffs version of "Kids in America".

3) The Princess Bride - Seriously, there was no way to write this list without including one of the greatest action/adventure/romance/comedies of our time. Again the movie has an amazing cast, and wonderfully memorable dialogue. There is literally something for everyone in this movie. I won't lie, my life was made by the fact that when I saw Mandy Patinkin live in concert in Philly, several years ago, that he ended his encore by uttering the famous line: "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.

4) Robin Hood: Men in Tights - I kind of feel like it is impossible to have any top of top movie list without having at least one Mel Brooks film on it. Let's face it the man is a comedic genius. Everyone has their fave, my mother's is Young Frankenstein, The Boy's is Blazing Saddles, but mine has always been Robin Hood: Men in Tights. I remember watching it when it first came out on VHS, when I was probably a little too young to be watching it, but most of the inappropriate jokes went over my head anyway. That's the great thing about Mel Brooks' writing, it's layered. You can watch one of his films over and over and constantly find something new.

5) Across the Universe - You knew it had to be on here, after all it is what started me on this topic. While this movie definitely isn't for everyone, it is one of my all time favorites. Casting was done by Telsey + Co which is actually largely a theatre casting company and so the cast of this movie, mostly the featured extras, is made up of mostly theatre actors. As one of them put it, "Bernard Telsey is a pimp, and all his hos are are in this film". There is just something that will never get old about seeing people I've known for years in the film. When my friends and I saw the film in theatres, we spent the entirety of the "A Little Help From My Friends" in fits of giggles at the actions of the people we knew, much to the confusion of everyone else in the theatre. Factor in the fact that the music is amazing, um hello it's The Beatles, I went right home from the theatre that night and downloaded the soundtrack off iTunes, and all the little references to Beatles lyrics hidden with in the film and I am on heaven.

Honorable Mentions

Ok, so I know it's supposed to be a top five, but there were two movie who came so close that I felt they had to be mentioned:

Newsies - A live action musical, with Christian Bale, Arron Lohr, and Bill Pullman? How could I not love it. This is another one of those movies I can recite word for word, and I often do while watching it. It is one of my fave movies from childhood and I still adore it. The stage show definitely doesn't even begin to do it justice.

Clue - It's hard for me to imagine anyone not loving this film. The Boy's college roommate and I once quoted the entire movie back and forth over our Facebook walls. It's a silly fun film, made for pure entertainment, plus it has Tim Curry at his finest.

Newsies: AKA: Extra, Extra, Newsies FINALLY Get's a Stage Production...Sort Of...

 I first want to state, I didn't hate the show, which if you know me & my aversion to change, that's a big deal. That being said I kin of feel the show had so many changes that maybe they should have renamed it.

I mean I get that some lines, most specifically, "He'll be covering, Brooklyn to Trenton, our man Denton", seeing as the replaced Bryan Denton, ace war corespondent, with Katherine Pulitzer, however did they half to change like 90% of the lyrics? Most of the lines they changed didn't need to be, and the changes also made them sound more violent. It may sound weird but half the time, the lyrics were changed to something about being out for blood, or "making them pay"...um really Disney? It was as if I was listening to parodies of the songs, the music was the same, but the lyrics were almost completely different. Aside from the music, "Seize the Day" was almost unrecognizable and to be honest I found it really distracting. That being said, if you have never seen the movie, or only seen it once or twice I don't suppose it will really bother you.

While I was not happy with the axing of our beloved Denton, played by the insanely awesome Bill Pullman in the film, they needed a love interest for Jack, because let's face it Sarah, played by Ele Keats, was just awful. And for the most part I liked Katherine, in fact I thought her solo in act one, "Write it Good" was great, however I did have a couple of issues with her role. The major one being, although they do not specifically say it in play so I'm basing this the movie prologue/history, the newsies strike occurred in 1899, and I don't care who's daughter she is, there WOULD NOT be a female reporter. I know they tried explaining it away by saying she wrote for the society pages, but no. I just don't buy that any newspaper would hire her.  Also she kept calling the newsies, Jack included, "kids". How old is she then? And if she's really that much older then them, it's a bit creepy that she's ends up with Jack then.

I also feel like, aside from Crutchy and Les, who's roles definitely grow from the film, the rest of the newsies were reduced to kick ass background dancers. The dancing was amazing, but I had no idea who anyone, aside from Specs, was. Spot Conlon, one of my fave characters from the film, was reduced to a bit part really. Even Davey's part was drastically slashed, there was almost nothing left to the friendship between him and Jack.

Jack's role was turned into a tortured artist loner. Was I the only one thinking that in a few years he was going to grow up and end up on the Titanic when they started that whole, "Jack's a fabulous artist" plot line? Seriously, the timeline could work...and I find that extremely funny considering Christian Bale was in strong contention to play Jack Dawson in James Cameron's 1997 film.

I guess they need something to replace the whole "Francis Sullivan" storyline from the movie, though I'm not sure why they took that out. After all it makes a pretty powerful moment when Davey stands up to Jack for turning against them. I also didn't like that Jake never seemed to be part of the group. Jack is their leader, he rallies them, lifts their spirits, he is the face of the strike, however in the show he's always off on his own, he's not even their to celebrate in Jacob's Deli (what replaced Tibby's in the stage version), during "King of New York". It almost doesn't make sense that the newsies are asking for him at the rally. I also didn't really care for the fact that he kept waltzing into Pulitzer's office, it took away the power of having Pulitzer ask for him in the end.

I'm not sure why they decided to start the show off with "Santa Fe". I read some one comparing beginning Newsies with "Santa Fe" like beginning West Side Story with "Tonight", which I agree with. Then again the song was once again almost unrecognizable so I guess it shouldn't matter then.

I HATE the set. It was boring, well to me anyways. It was just a bunch of metal platforms which move about, which is fine, but ever since Next to Normal did it, I feel I've seen it done a hundred times over. It's not that I'm a huge traditionalist when it comes to sets, um hello there were a few years in the past where I practically lived at RENT, but I am just sick of this metal platform phase.

Over all it was a good show, full of campy Disney fun...but it wasn't Newsies...