MY 100 FAVOURITE FILMS (PART SIX). The sixties will be in full swing during these ten films which take us right up to my natal date. Once again, these are another ten films which may not be the best films ever made but are among my top 100 favourites to watch and watch again. But count yourself lucky so far -- just think how scary it's going to get in here when I reach the 1970s and 1980s, fer goshsakes! But right now, we're still stuck in the sixties with the following ten:

• The Innocents (1961) dir. Jack Clayton -- Classic ghost film adapted from the Henry James novella "THE TURN OF THE SCREW" and featuring a bravura performance from Deborah Kerr as the sexually frustrated governness who may or may not be seeing ghosts in the old country pile in which she's employed. Particular note must be taken of the two child actors who (in an almost UNHEARD of occurrence) are actually quite excellent: Martin Stephens and Pamela Franklin. Megs Jenkins and Michael Redgrave round out the human cast while demonic Peter Wyngarde smolders from the underworld. And don't forget that haunting song: "O Willow Waly".

• To Kill A Mockingbird (1962) dir. Robert Mulligan -- adaptation of one of my favourite books scores very high. Gregory Peck is the lawyer who defends Brock Peters against the charge of raping a white woman. Paired with this very upsetting story of an innocent man wrongly accused is the parallel story of Peck's two young children. The world of a child in a small country town back in the day is expertly captured. . . especially when gifts are found inside a "magical" tree left by an unseen hand.

• L'Eclisse (1962) dir. Michelangelo Antonioni -- Something of an obsession, I've watched this movie about 12 times in the last six months and there's no telling when it's going to force me to watch it again. I dealt with this one at length in this blog last April so I'm only going to say that the film is an example of pure cinema that is totally engrossing and fascinating as well as having an ending to make the jaw drop in its audacity. Antonioni's muse Monica Vitti and Alain Delon are perfectly cast and give excellent performances for what must have been an extremely challenging shoot.

• Long Day's Journey Into Night (1962) dir. Sidney Lumet -- Basically a filmed version of the Eugene O'Neill play features a staggering performance from Katharine Hepburn as the morphine-addicted Mary Tyrone. She's surrounded by a pretty fantastic cast as well: Ralph Richardson (who I don't think is miscast), Jason Robards Jr. and Dean Stockwell. It's absolutelys shocking that Kate didn't win the Oscar for this role. Sometimes harrowing; it's like a symphony of disfunction.
• Donovan's Reef (1963) dir. John Ford -- There was no excuse for this film other than for John Ford to gather together his old cronies and have a hell of a lot of fun. No lofty messages or artistic striving here. And being a John Ford fan myself, that makes the film incredibly enjoyable and fun for me. This is the last time Ford would work with John Wayne and they take their partnership out in style. The breathtaking setting is the South Seas where Wayne owns a dive bar and passes his time getting in bar fights with cronies like Lee Marvin. That is, until high society dame Elizabeth Allen shows up. Ford yet again gets to indulge his famous penchant for having his leading lady knocked on her ass and Allen is always game. Simply a whole lot of fun from beginning to end. I think you have to watch a whole lot of John Ford movies before watching this one or else you really won't appreciate it.
• The Haunting (1963) dir. Robert Wise -- If not my favourite ghost movie, it's diggety-damn close. I just love the whole atmosphere of this movie and (naturally for me) have been dying to move into Hill House since I first saw it as a little boychik. Superb cast, evocative music, incredible sound effects, beautiful photography. This one has it all. I can literally live inside the film over and over again. Maybe the house picked the wrong one when it chose Julie Harris because I would obviously be a much more enthusiastic resident. And at least the doors are sensibly shut.
• Mary Poppins (1964) dir. Robert Stevenson -- Another movie I must have watched over and over hundreds of times as a kid when Disney movies actually played on HBO. I despise THE SOUND OF MUSIC but here I absolutely love Julie Andrews; probably because she's not terribly nice. In fact, she's actually kind of sharp and acidic in her interactions with the Banks children when she realizes what little terrors they are. The music, needless to say, is some of the best ever placed in a Disney flick. Even Dick Van Dyke, whose Cockney accent is correct is you're listening to an Englishman with a mouth full of marbles, overcomes that little handicap with a spirited performance. I'm more of a fan of the dirty, grimy Victorian settings than the sunny, animated ones but luckily for me there are much more of the former than the latter. The "Step In Time" dance sequence is also a showstopper while "Feed the Birds" is one of the most beautiful songs ever written. Our friend over at Paleocinema may also take heart in realizing the fact that this is the first and probably last appearance of a Disney movie on this list.

• My Fair Lady (1964) dir. George Cukor -- While Julie Andrews was making waves over in the last film discussed, she was shut out of this one. Unable to reprise her Broadway triumph as Eliza Doolittle in the film (because, believe it or not, at this time Andrews wasn't a big star), the studio wanted a name and got it with Audrey Hepburn. I'm certainly no big fan of Broadway musicals and I'm not one of those people who let this type of thing bother me (and neither, I might add, does Julie Andrews). I simply judge the movie for what it is and not what it's not. And what it is is a sublime musical adaptation of Pygmalion with terrific songs and great performances from Hepburn and Rex Harrison. It's also kinda shocking to see such a young Jeremy Brett!

• The Comedy of Terrors (1964) dir. Jacques Tourneur -- A horror fan's dream ticket: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff and Basil Rathbone together in one film. And it's a comedy. From the folks at AIP who brought us all those great Poe films comes this black comedy of a pair of undertakers who make their own customers. All the cast (along with boisterous Joyce Jameson) are having one hell of a good time and, luckily for us, that carries over to the viewer. The charm and good natured fun of this film is catching and one can't help but be carried along with it. The gags may be ollllllllllld but the performances carry them off. I deeply love this film.
• Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965) dir. Freddie Francis -- The first omnibus/portmanteau horror film in colour is also the first attempt by Hammer Horror's chief competitor Amicus (if one doesn't count AIP, that is). If Hammer specialized in feature length period pieces, then Amicus would specialize in multi-story modern-day horror movies in the DEAD OF NIGHT mode. And they were quite successful with it. This film would inspire most of their subsequent output and it's one of the best (probably in the number two spot -- the number one Amicus will be along later on in the list). A group of five train passengers encounter Peter Cushing as tarot-reading Dr. Schreck ("terror" in German) who predicts dire, supernatural events for each of them. We then get to see those dire events in separate stories. The "crawling hand" sequence with Christopher Lee and Michael Gough is probably the most famous but other sequences involve vampires, werewolves and voodoo. Atmosphere and mood carry the picture all the way to the end. Another childhood favourite of mine (you'll see more and more of those popping up from now on).

But here we are only halfway through the sixties and we've got to wait until next time for the next ten films in my favourite 100. On deck we have a few comedy/parodies of popular film genres, a little bit of the middle ages, some faked suicides, some gut munching, some more (slightly unusual) musicals, Satan and the Cuban Missile Crisis. And I promise that next time we'll finally make it into the 1970s! I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing -- as we'll be venturing more and more into those films I love because I saw them as a child. Be forewarned!