Approximately 72 Old Movies to Fall In Love With

I love old movies — but I didn’t always! In fact, I needed many years of directed classwork to fall in love with them. But if you’re not in the mood to pause your life and take on significant graduate debt, THERE ARE STILL OPTIONS, and Margaret H. Willison and I are here to offer them. In this episode, we offer specific suggestions to listeners based on short lists of their (recent) film favs, talk about “aesthetic friction” and how to overcome it, strongly invite you to put your phone in the other room, and travel all over film history in a very earnest attempt to help you find your own entry point into the expansive mansion that is “old movies,” broadly defined.Show Notes (Scroll Down for a List of EVERY MOVIE MENTIONED):Follow Margaret on Instagram!!Find out more about Margaret’s course on Mansfield Park hereIf you want to learn A LOT more about Pre-Code Cinema, this book is my go-to (and very accessible)A bunch of classic streaming services have challenged some of the arguments in this piece, but it’s a decent overview re: the disappearance of classic film from NetflixIf you want to go deep on screwballs and the comedy of remarriageMy Scandals of Classic Hollywood on Warren Beatty lives onEVERY MOVIE MENTIONED AND WHERE TO FIND IT(as best as Melody could figure out) (recs for checking the local library are implicit)Vertigo (1958) - rentPaper Moon (1973) - Paramount+Badlands (1974) - rentTokyo Story (1953) - MaxAn Autumn Afternoon (1962) - MaxGosford Park (2001) - rentWhat’s Up, Doc? (1972) - rentBringing Up Baby (1938) - rentThe Lady Eve (1941) - Criterion, rentSylvia Scarlett (1935) - rentNow, Voyager (1942) - Tubi, TCM, rentSullivan’s Travels (1941) - rentThe Palm Beach Story (1942) - rentThe Miracle of Morgan’s Creek (1944 ) - rentShampoo (1975) - rentTo Be or Not To Be (1942) - Max, CriterionBorn Yesterday (1950) - rentThe Philadelphia Story (1940) - Tubi, rentButch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) - Tubi, rentNorth by Northwest (1959) - Criterion, Tubi, TCM, rentForeign Correspondent (1940) - Max, Criterion, Tubi, rentSingin’ in the Rain (1952) - Max, rentMagnolia (1999) - Paramount+, rentMcCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971) - rentCabaret (1972) - Tubi, rentNew York, New York (1977) - not available for streaming :(Broadcast News (1987) - Starz, rentDesk Set (1957) - rentThe Conversation (1974) - Paramount+, Criterion, rentEvil Under the Sun (1982) - Prime, rentDouble Indemnity (1944) - rentThe Third Man (1949) - rentKind Hearts and Coronets (1949) - rentThe Shop Around the Corner (1940) - rentHoliday (1938) - rentShadow of a Doubt (1943) - Criterion, rentThe Women (1939) - rentAll About Eve (1950) - rentFunny Face (1957) - rentBarefoot in the Park (1967) - rentCharade (1963) - Prime, rentAnatomy of a Murder (1959) - rentRear Window (1954) - Criterion, rentWe’re currently looking for your questions for future episodes about:Dark AcademiaHow cookbooks get madeVan/Skoolie/RV LifeSpiritual care for non-religious peopleAnything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment. You can ask about anything, it’s literally the name of the segment!You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) hereFor today’s discussion: What suggestions did we miss? Which suggestions do you endorse? Share the old movie love! Join the ranks of paid subscribers and get bonus content, access to the discussion threads, ad-free episodes, and the knowledge that you're supporting an indie pod trying to make its way in the world.Got a question to submit, a prompt for Ask Anne Anything, or an idea for a future episode? Tell us here.Catch up on everything else happening in the Culture Study universe here.Transcripts will be available here within 24 hours of publishing. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.