I'm deeply saddened by the loss of a man who had been there for nearly twenty years of my life. More-so his impact with in-depth interviews, his knowledge on classic film and television, and his avid love for the silver screen parallels mine, and he had been a driving force on how to do journalism in the realm of entertainment. He's a massive influence on my life, even-more-so the past ten years. Most people subconsciously see hosts as just introductions to the film/event you're settling in with your popcorn and soda pop to see, but as a TCM veteran, Robert Osbourne made you find a nuance of yourself in every movie he introduced. He never made it feel like a hundred years ago the film was made, but that in troubling times, and historically how repetition is bound to occur, each film itself is a part of my life, as it was for people my age in the twenties, or earlier. TCM saved classic film, and the more I've watched, the more I realized that it wasn't that film gets better with technology or stunts, but it loses humanity, and today's films barely ever hold a candle to the production of such classics as Casablanca, Gojira, What Ever Happaned to Baby Jane? Or the cult classic Spiderbaby, a more risqué version of the Addams Family.
Robert's a lovingly familiar part of my upbringing, and he was and will be a class act, a man that no matter your beliefs, no matter your political hook-ups, he was beloved by a great deal of people who harken back to a time when film was risqué by pushing the boundaries of the screen, not from the sexualized denigration, the blatant lack of mystery, and the loss of subtex, along with superb dialogue. He was a gentleman, and a wild duopoly of what Hollywood was, and what it could never quite bring itself back to again now. I will sorely miss the man, and I know that Ben Mankiewicz, has huge shoes to fill, but he too adores classic film, and will help another generation come to terms with these classic movies that are deserving our attention. Great actors like Bogart and Bacall, Rhett Butler, Joan Crawford and Bette Davis, Elizabeth Taylor and Rex Harrison. Even the great Carey Hrant would be lost on our generation, and future generations to actors who quite frankly, couldn't fit the bill in one iota of the way the former mentioned could do.
I thank Robert Osbourne for bringing TCM to life, and making some of the greatest films in history spring out of the vaults, and back onto the screen. From Vaudevillian musicals, to cornball horror cult classics, TCM reminds us all why we love film, and why Robert Osbourne was a benevolent host that gave each of these films care as he would his one baby child. He swaddled them and magnified them to greater than any eldest ions could think to be met, and supersede them to make old classics instance once again. I could stop right there, but I'd mention one last quality that we should all replicate in ourselves: the man was selfless, and never got too big for himself, and that is something no matter how bright, or dim our personal lights shine, we should always, always remember be humble for the good we have, and to not let the bad we have weight heavy on our shoulders. Thank you again, Robert Osbourne fry your gear work, and now I hope we can keep these films alive even longer for many more generations to come.
And now onto the post I was going to release in May, this is a discussion, not a list, on the reasons you should watch TCM, and not just for the study of film, but for the enjoyment of the format.
Turner Classic Movies is a cable station that plays some of the most classic films in world history. They do older foreign films, nearly extinct American film noir, and the channel has gritting details on almost every film presented, with s bleaker, and sfter look, as though the host was sitting right next to you on the couch, waiting to have an avid discussion on the film at the end fo the credits. Film is a medium we still use today. Whether we load up online, or we watch Nextflix or other streaming services, such as Hulu. It is all based on the oldest of technological advancements in the play format, and that is film. TCM has done well enough to bring back films that were decaying in a vault, some of the oldest still not formatted to videocassette, others that ar just being put onto Blu-Ray. These films are collected like first edition books, not Nike the c a parison of modern books being the flavor of the week to their Tuesday released Blu-Ray counterparts.
Each showcase film is deserving of being watched for a reason. TCM brings in films previously I leased in the U.S., along with films that may have bend too risky to showcase to the American populous prior, like Lolita, and A Clockwork Orange. Films are like gems, you have many that shine and appeal to all, and the lesser shiny, more coarse ones that appeal to a select few, but each is a splendid piece of film history, and TCM are the objective geologists that allow you to actual,y feel for w film. What is film but an evoked emotion, one that troubles you, makes you argue, or fall in love,mor showcases humanity in the surrealist form, placating our very essence of life? Few films today touch on that emotion, and the dialogue is as forgettable as the plots that are half-assed. No, TCM doesn't kowtow to such below par regiments, but has only the benchmark quality of films that our grandparents, and even their parents were given opportunity to watch. It's amazing to think in just a good decade that some of these classics will be s hundred years old, and the dust of these great performers will begin to become one with the soil again. It's sad, melancholic to think the likes of Humphrey Bogsr, and Rhett Buttler will be gone from our screens for nearly three generations, even four if you count the youngest of children born. Still, however you shake it, however you question it, we still admire the moving pictures of yore, because they still hold the truths that today are now covered up because we fear them. Film is unabashedly honestly, it forces people to take a truth pill, and to leave as a space, because for that two hour intermittency,the director is in charge, and the writer tells the tale.
Turner Classic Movies are for everyone, young and old. If you're a teenager interested in film, or general purpose writieing, just listen to the dialogue between two great actors on screen. Listen to Orson Welles' rousing speeches in Citizen Kane,mor Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton's back-and-forth diatribes in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? The same for the acting prowess of film legends like Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in What Eveff Happaned to Baby Jane? A film that list ched horror into the serieous realm of film, and not some slasher flick made on a few thousand dollars.
Film is appropriately important,miss not just for the critics,mor the scholars,mbut it's a part of our culture history that is reflected in a way that other media simply cannot capture. The racial tension that flared in films like In the Heat of the Night, or the less serious, but ever as relevant Guess Who's Coming to Dinner with Sidney Poitier playing a superb role in both.
Films like The Wild One, Rebel Without a Cause, and The Concrete Jungle in their own repeats showcase rebellious youths that are fighting for an identity, much like today, these films are forever relevant, because. Long as youth exists, these films will have a generation who can resonate well with them, and the older generations can resonate with the parents of these youths fighting, perhaps negatively, for a purpose and identity.
TCM has introduced great film noir to me, like Metropolis, a classical science fiction fantasy that is one of the most beloved classics in the genre. Frankenstein, Dracula, the Mummy and The Wolfman, these are films we all know the story to, even the Invisible Man, another great film, but only she. We sit through these classics with an open mind, do we see why they have the accolades they had at premiere, and why they hold the same adoration today. Films have a certain gerneration, speak to those doomed to repeat the same follies of the past, and TCM is a better teacher for kids than any puppet on a stick, or poorly-drawn cartoon could ever be. The films bring families together, and they make for a great discussion afterwards. If you can, have your kids sit with you and have them watch classics like March of the Wooden Soldier, or even comedic roles lime Harvey with James Stewart. Have them sit through a Charlie Chapalin film like The Little Tramp, or if three older films like The Great Dictator, or Modern Times.
Children should be taught what the history of film was, because it will help them bette uneerstand why such channels on You Tube like Markiplier, or Game Grumps are now replacing the familiar recipe that the likes of Laurel and Hardy, or Abbot and Costello had filled, and they too replaced with shows like Mystery Science Theater 3000. It might also be smart to have younger generations watch films that have been remade ad nauseum like King Kong, I am Legend, numerous monster films/comedies that now plunder the box office with little-to-no innovations. I even find the original Cape Fear to be greater than the Dinero remake.
So this Spring, why not watch The Easter Parade with July Garland, or even the Ten Commandments with Charles Heston, or the original Ben-Hur, which still supersedes the remake with the amazing Morgan Freeman. Or if you're a fan of the new HBO series Westworld, perhaps take a trip down memory lane with the original film starring Yul Brynner, and catch him, Charles Bronson, and Steve McQueen in the westernized remake of Akria Kuriosawa's Seven Samurai. Then perhaps pick up the original, watch it, then grab the kids and watch the Disney version of the film in A Bug's Life.
Film is eternal, because it is board sated throughout the universe. So somewhere deep beyond the edges of the Andromeda Galaxy, there is still going to be a frequency capable of picking up The Andromeda Strain. Film is important,a me it never stops being important. So share TCM with your family, your friends, mention a great old film, and it lives on for another generation. Take a friend or loved one to a film festival, and share good drink over good stories, and be blessed to live in an age where so many have seen these great films, and the communication technology allows us to know more than even the producers could at the time of the finished product!
Whatever age, film is human history. From Federico Fellini, to John Hughes, to Steven Spielberg, and even Hal Roach, film is crucial to a modern society, and a modern history. That is why now, more than ever, do I believe you, the reader, should be watching Turner Classic Movies channel if applicable, because without these classic films, we lose ourselves, and the very people who came before,mane who are sorely missed.
I'd like to humbly dedicate this post to the late, great Robert Osbourne. I recommend you all go back and watch several of his amazing interviews, which replay occasionally on TCM network, but I'm sure you can see them at TCM.com. I'd also like to say that the post I was meant to do in May will be switched around with another, and that it will not change the scheduling much, I just couldn't wait two months to pay my dearest respects to one of the most influential hosts, actors, and journalists in television history. I'm forever grateful to the man for his love of film, and that in-turn has given me immeasurable love for classic film, and the art of acting that has been around since the dawn of man.
On another note I will have a new short story post up by the end of the month, and I am working on several posts for April, including a review of Wrestlemania, and a summer reading guide for upcoming books that are worth your time over the summer. Some have been released, and some are set to release prior to the official start of summer. Thank you so much for reading the Malacast Editorial, and please feel free to look up Robert Osbourne's stellar interviews. If you're a student of journalism, he is a great man to take notes from, and he's a classy gentleman that was one of the most influential men to the art of film, most import tally by keeping the classics alive for over twenty years.
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