How Green Was My Valley (1941)

How Green Was My Valley (1941)

[9] Director John Ford follows up The Grapes of Wrath with another powerfully moving, literary adaptation about working families weathering a crushing economic tide. How Green Was My Valley, based on the novel by Richard Llewellyn, centers around the warm-hearted Morgan family…
A Monster Calls (2016)

A Monster Calls (2016)

[7] A twelve-year-old boy (Lewis MacDougall) is visited by a towering tree monster (voiced by Liam Neeson) who helps him deal with school bullies and his mother's terminal cancer. A Monster Calls is a beautifully crafted film directed by J.A. Bayona (The…
The Virgin Soldiers (1969)

The Virgin Soldiers (1969)

[6] Hywel Bennett and Lynn Redgrave (Gods and Monsters) lead an ensemble cast in this comedy-drama about young British soldiers stationed in Singapore in 1950. Most of the men are fulfilling their mandatory national service, thankful that any real chance of life-threatening…
The Rules of Attraction (2002)

The Rules of Attraction (2002)

[8] Roger Avary, Oscar-winning co-writer of Pulp Fiction, adapts Bret Easton Ellis's novel about drunken, drug-addled college students reaching for meaningful human connection. We experience The Rules of Attraction primarily through three lovelorn characters: a virgin named Lauren (Shannyn Sossamon), a sociopath…
Porky’s (1981)

Porky’s (1981)

[9] Before he'd go on to make one of the most beloved holiday films of all time (A Christmas Story), writer/director Bob Clark took the teen sex comedy to new heights with Porky's. An amalgamation of Clark's high school experience and first-hand…
East of Eden (1955)

East of Eden (1955)

[10] James Dean received the first posthumous acting nomination from the Academy Awards for his riveting performance as the troubled Cal in East of Eden, his first major film role. (He died in a car accident just a few months after the…
Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

[10] James Dean gives one of the most iconic performances in movie history as Jim Stark, an angst-ridden teenager who quarrels with his parents almost as much as he tangles with high school bullies. I normally hate tough guy movies, and I'd…
Kes (1969)

Kes (1969)

[5] I put off watching Kes for many years because, as a 'bird person', I knew the title falcon died at the end of the movie. I finally gathered the courage to see the film, and I'm surprised to report that the…
Corvette Summer (1978)

Corvette Summer (1978)

[4] Mark Hamill (Star Wars) and Annie Potts (Ghostbusters) star in this tepid comedy-romance about a car-obsessed Los Angeles high school senior (Hamill) who travels to Las Vegas to reclaim his auto club's stolen, restored Corvette. He's aided by a forthright, aspiring…
Secondhand Lions (2003)

Secondhand Lions (2003)

[7] Haley Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense, A.I.) plays Walter, a boy whose mother abandons him with his two reclusive old uncles, Garth and Hub (Michael Caine and Robert Duvall), who end up providing him with a more meaningful upbringing than he…