Daily Dose of English 189
Old Movies
Daily Dose of English 189
Intermediate
Hey everyone, my name is Ben and you're listening to a Daily Dose of English. This is a short, simple podcast that you can listen to every day to improve your English. You can find the transcripts for all episodes and more on benslanguagelab.com. I'm glad you could make it today. In this episode, we're going to be talking about old movies, which is a bit of a funny topic. I think a lot of people hear like, oh, old movies are so good, like an art thing, you know, like, oh, they're so cool. But it does kind of sound like that, where you're just like, okay, they're old movies. Like, why do I care about old movies? They're black and white. There's new movies all the time. But I don't think that's necessarily true. And I quite like a lot of old movies. And I've been exploring more of them recently. And I want to talk a little bit about it. So first off, it is worth saying, what counts as an old movie at this point? Because film has been around for quite a long time. The earliest movie I've ever seen is from 1939, which is not too far from... Wait. That's a lot of years, right? That's almost 80. Oh shoot, what's that? How do I do that math? Let's see, 1939 plus 60 years plus 25 years. So yeah, it's 85 years old, right? And that's the Wizard of Oz, by the way. So 85 years of film history, that's definitely an old movie, but what else is an old movie, right? Is a movie from the 80s, the 1980s, is that an old movie? What about the 2000s, right? That's over 20 years ago. So that's definitely a good question. In my mind, old movies are from the early 70s, but mostly from the 60s and earlier. Classic movies are more from like the 70s, 80s, and 90s. I don't really have a specific name for early 2000s movies, honestly. And then modern movies are like 2010 and older. However, that is a completely just made up numbering system that I have, that basically have in my head. So there's not, it's not really, don't take that for anything, right? Don't think that that means anything specific. Uh, so, but when I talk about old movies, I mostly am talking about things, uh, before 1980, but if you are, um, If to you, 1980 or 1990 is also an old movie, oh my God, there are so many amazing ones, right? Because I always knew that. I was always into movies from the 80s and 90s, even though I grew up in the early 2000s, right? I still, some of my favorite movies are from that time period. but recently I've been going a little bit further back into the 60s and even a little bit beyond. Actually, I just, I watched relatively recently, wait, oh, did I not, I don't think I actually, so I use this service called Letterboxd, which is really fun for tracking the movies that you've seen, but I forgot to put in the movie that I watched recently, which was actually older than 1939, It was Modern Times, ironically is the name of the movie. And that's from 1936 from, it's a Charlie Chaplin movie. And it was, it's actually really good. I kind of put off watching it for a while because it's like, oh, it's a, it's an old movie. It's super old. There's no real speaking. It's a silent movie sort of thing. But I ended up watching it. It's relatively short and it's really good. There is not a lot of speaking, so it's not great for English immersion, obviously, but it's a really interesting look into film history. It's a fun story. It's very simple, but it's got some fun stunts and things, and it looks cool. And so I think it's... It's something that if it came out today would be like impressive that it's actually quite good while being so simple. But then when you think of that, it's also just really old. It's from 1936. So it's almost, what, that's three years older than the other one, which is 85 years old. So it's 88 years old is pretty impressive. So that's a fun one you can watch. Ones with more talking though that I think are really good, especially American films that I've recently enjoyed are Rope. It's an interesting thriller, whodunit murder mystery from 1948. And the entire thing takes place in one living room. That was a good one. I also really enjoyed Roman Holiday, which is from 1953. It's a, oh, what's her name? Oh God, I'm forgetting her name. Audrey Hepburn. It's an Audrey Hepburn film, who was a classic sort of beautiful woman actress from that time period. And that was, I quite liked that. That was a fun sort of romantic movie. 12 Angry Men is a classic. That one's really good. Definitely recommend 12 Angry Men. That is about 12 men who are on a jury and they have to decide if the person that committed a crime or supposedly committed a crime is or is not innocent and should or should not go to prison. Um, that is a very good film. I highly recommend it. Um, the apartment was also quite good, 1960. Um, that's a, that one's I really like because it's a cool look into life in the 1960s because it takes place in New York and, uh, well, 1960 actually. It takes place in New York and it's a lot in like a guy's apartment and his work. And so you just get to see into that world a bit. Like it's not supposed to be set in the 1960s, they just are in the 1960s. And so you see things about what life was like then and that sort of thing. And then another classic from a few years later is The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. Then there's several more on here. Monty Python and the Holy Grail is 1975. Now we're getting the 70s, and that's where things like The Godfather are and whatnot. I've got more on my list here of other good old movies, but they're also foreign. So like the Exterminating Angel is a Mexican movie from 1962 that I really liked. That one's really good. Definitely recommend that one, especially if you're learning Spanish. Oh, I skipped over Psycho. Psycho is a classic. I didn't like it that much. I'm not really into those sorts of movies because they're not like that scary to me. But a lot of people really like Psycho. Another... There's also some really, really good classic Japanese films from this time that are just amazing. Seven Samurai and Harakiri. I just watched recently. Harakiri is very, very good. And yeah, so those are some older movies that I think are worth watching and I really enjoy them. I find their pacing to be really nice. They're slower, but they have a lot of really good storytelling since that's what's most important in it. But then if we jump up into the 1970s, I think there's way more just like amazing films, right? That was a really, really good time for a story-driven film. That's where we get things like Rocky, Taxi Driver, The Godfather, Star Wars. What else is on here? Yeah, those are all the ones that I have in the 70s here. So I haven't watched a ton of 70s film. Jaws, that's another classic. And a lot of these are worth it, right? I definitely recommend them. Actually, I think my least favorite of those ones I listed is actually The Godfather, which is very, very often quoted as being one of the greatest films of all time. I don't really agree with that. It's solid. Maybe I need to watch it again, but I wouldn't put it up there. I, for example, enjoyed One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest more. I enjoyed Taxi Driver more. I enjoyed Star Wars way more. That sort of thing. Another one that I watched recently from 1979 is The Life of Brian, which is another multi-python film. It's very good. I really liked it. It was very funny. It was very fun. And another comedy from around that time that I like a lot is Airplane! Airplane is just a really good movie. It's very funny. It's very stupid as well. I like that kind of humor. Definitely a stupid movie. Getting into the 80s, if you're still considering this, old movies. You get amazing films like Indiana Jones and Raiders of the Lost Ark. You get the second and third Star Wars movie, which is Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. You get some classic comedies like Trading Places, A Christmas Story, Ghostbusters. um this is spinal tap is also fantastic um the breakfast club is one of my favorites of all time the goonies the goonies was filmed in oregon pretty close to where i'm from uh yeah i think 80s movies might be one of my favorite just like general genres i just like the vibe of 80s movies a lot they are uh I don't know. They sort of stand out as being different from 90s movies to me. And so I definitely recommend exploring some of the 80s film. Other favorites in there are The Princess Bride, Good Morning Vietnam, Dead Poets Society, When Harry Met Sally. When Harry Met Sally is one of my favorite rom-coms of all time. Although it's not really a rom-com. It's more of a... It kind of is. More of a drama, romantic drama. Dramcom. Is that a thing? Anyways, I really liked that movie. It's one of my favorite dramcoms of all time. Uh, for sure. Um, okay. Anyways, that's enough talking about old films or kind of old films, depending on your point of view. I hope that you enjoyed this episode and maybe learned a little something here and there, and maybe you have some new movies that you want to watch. If you have, if you want more suggestions, let me know. I've got plenty, but I'll see you again tomorrow for another episode. Have a good one. Bye.
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