A rainy Sunday afternoon of movies

We start our Sunday film recommendations in 1959 in the company of Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon. Often labelled as one of the funniest films ever made, Some Like It Hot is a laugh a minute, outrageous story of two witnesses of a crime on the run from the mob. In order to evade the spats wearing gangsters, the two lead male characters join an all-female jazz band in Florida with a suitcase of dresses and a bucket of one liners. Referring to Monroe’s figure as ‘Jello-O on springs’ if you are looking for something light-hearted and at times farcically this is one to watch.

 

John Hughes was the man behind several cult teen movies in the 1980s including Sixteen Candles and Pretty in Pink. However our absolute stand out classic would be Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, an arrogant and entitled comedic romp following Ferris as he bunks off school one more time before graduation. Breaking the fourth wall within the first minute of the film, Matthew Broderick as Ferris is the overconfident teen that manages to convince his local school that he is on his death bed, while simultaneously leading a parade in downtown Chicago and driving around in a borrowed Ferrari. With Jeffery Jones as the School Principal providing the slapstick moments, this is a must-see. As relevant today as it was in 1986.

 

While the storyline appears a little muddled at times, the location and soundtrack to The Beach is a visual and audio delight. Featuring a young Leonardo DiCaprio three years after Titanic, we see him head to Thailand and enter a contained community living in secret. What follows is a tale of adultery, death and lies all set with a stunning backdrop. In a pre-social media setting this is a great film to escape to, and as a sign of the time of when it was created, even features an Internet Café (who remembers those?) Grab a fruity mocktail and pretend to be somewhere exotic for a few hours.

 

Funny yet emotional this film will resonate with many individuals. Following the story of Carl Fredricksen, a 78-year-old recently widowed balloon salesman, he makes it his mission to live out his dead wife's dream of wander South America. Armed with a mighty amount of helium balloons and a young explorer by the name of Russell, they together take on the adventure of a lifetime where villains are beaten and new bonds formed. A wonderful film where tears of sadness quickly turn to those of laughter, this Pixar animation is a classic.