70 Summer Escape Movies

 

1. Get Shorty
2. Sullivan's Travels
3. Beverly Hills Cop
4. Other People's Money
5. Back to the Beach
6. His Girl Friday
7. Moonstruck
8. Amelie
9. Galaxy Quest
10. The Full Monty
11. The In-Laws (with Alan Arkin and Peter Falk)
12. My Favorite Year
13. Napoleon Dynamite
14. Annie Hall
15. Some Like It Hot
16. My Cousin Vinny
17. Local Hero
18. Field of Dreams
19. Clue
20. A Good Year
21. Major League
22. Delicatessen 
23. Topsy-Turvy
24. The Hospital
25. Ruthless People
26. The History Boys
27. The General (Buster Keaton)
28. Sherlock Jr. (Buster Keaton)
29. Best in Show
30. It Happened One Night
31. Network
32. A Long Way Down
33. O Brother Where Art Thou?
34. Young Frankenstein
35. Pirates of the Caribbean 
36. Dr. Strangelove
37. Shaun of the Dead
38. Lost in America
39. A Hard Day's Night
40. Tea with Mussolini
41. Shakespeare in Love
42. Beetlejuice
43. Barbershop
44. Fast Times at Ridgemont High
45. National Lampoon's Vacation
46. Love Actually
47. Tootsie
48. Trading Places
49. Cat Ballou
50. Little Miss Sunshine
51. Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines
52. Ghostbusters
53. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
54. Animal House
55. Being There
56. The Grand Budapest Hotel
57. Rustler's Rhapsody
58. Airplane!
59. Office Space
60. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
61. A Night at the Opera
62. Tremors
63. The Princess Bride
64. It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World
65. The Ladykillers (with Alec Guinness)
66. The Naked Gun
67. The Producers
68. Groundhog Day
69. Barcelona (Whit Stillman film)
70. Caddyshack

[Photo by Ronald Crow at Unsplash]

Being Released in English Tomorrow

 

Whoa!

 

Find Something Beautiful Today

 

[The Metropolitan Museum of Art at Unsplash]

Serious Warnings

 

First Paragraph

 

Snow falling upon water makes a sound so close to silence that no heart exists it cannot calm. It fell across the Chesapeake and in the harbors and inlets and far out to sea, surrendering to the waters with the slightest exhalation and a muffled hiss. Though few are there to see it, in winter this happens often.

- From The Oceans and the Stars: A Sea Story, A War Story, A Love Story by Mark Helprin

Teaching Students to Debate

 I plan on writing about this on Substack but for now will note that in recent years students have appeared to be more apt to level accusations than to argue for a particular side.

The idea that accusation is sufficient is very dangerous. The ability to convince instead of simple intimidation requires the ability to research and reason.

Absent those positive skills, we're at the mercy of smash and grab artists.

Just as a mother and a father are key members of a family, so too is reason a key part of education.

Unfortunately, a great deal of modern education has focused on accusation more than serious analysis. 

[Let's call Rudyard Kipling a racist and dismiss anything he ever wrote.]

Healthy debates would be an important way to foster crucial skills.

And here is the simple question that should be frequently asked: 

What are the best arguments for the opposing side?

We May Be Seeing Far More of These Outrages

 Former Member of Parliament Ann Widdecombe was murdered.

An arrest has been made.

Grab These!

 Nicholas Bate is offering a bargain on several of his books.

He's also working on another novel which I eagerly await.

Films About Totalitarianism: A Series