Grateful I'm Not Living in the 30's

For the obvious reasons I'm so grateful I'm not currently living in the 30's. As if The Great Depression and the start of World War II were not enough, they also had really crappy viewing entertainment.

I'm currently on a really pointless escapade of watching all of the movies in history that ever won Best Picture of the Academy Awards. Not that I'm really into the Academy Awards or think that their first pick in movies are always the best of that year but it's something that I've always inexplicably wanted to do.  I’m always curious of the allusions that historical movies are mentioned in so much of the literature I read.  I may possibly go back and pick out some of the other nominations of each year and watch them one day as well but since they’ve started giving out Oscars since 1928 I already have over 80 movies to watch.  I think I’ve also decided that I won’t be watching any more movies from the 1930’s if at all possible unless for some reason one of the names pops out at me from somewhere and I feel compelled to be utterly depressed for an afternoon.

My children have been amazing throughout this entire ordeal.  One good thing about watching movies from this time is they are a lot cleaner than they are now.  I’m not as nervous letting the kids pop in and out of the living room because the sex scenes are virtually not existent and all of the fighting or battle scenes look like a kid’s playground compared to our todays films.  They are also incredibly boring and in black and white so the kids pretty much take one look and run to somewhere else.

I don’t mind so much the movies being in black and white, I can appreciate how far we’ve come now and appreciate the time it came from.  I can now also say that I think Clark Gable was a fantastic actor, especially for his day.  It’s not a real surprise that I’ve currently watched 3 movies that won Academy Awards that he was the lead actor for.  I can however say that I don’t think that I’ll be subjecting myself to watching “Gone with the Wind” ever again and for sure will never watch “Cimarron” or any of its remakes for as long as I shall live, once was enough torture for one lifetime.

I’m excited to be getting into the 1940’s films.  There are already a few names in there that I actually recognize.  From there on I have seen a lot of the movies.  I’m going to sit through all of them and have been giving them my own personal score based on how much I actually liked it and trying to take into account of when it was made.  I will NOT however be subjecting myself through the Godfather movies again. I watched them a couple years back and can honestly say I’ll never get the hype (and usually like a good gangster flick, Sopranos was one of my favorite HBO series).

Anyhow the kids are napping so that means I know I have at least a couple hours where I will be in peace while watching my next movie. I will sign off for now and crossing my fingers that “The Great Ziegfeld” (1936) isn’t a waste of some precious me-time!