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Movie Quote of the Day – Cluny Brown, 1946 (dir. Ernst Lubitsch)
Adam Belinski: What made you think you were out of place?
Cluny Brown: Oh, I didn’t think I was. It’s Uncle Arn. He’s always telling me, “Cluny Brown, you don’t know your place. Think of your place. Cluny Brown, you ought to learn your place.”
Adam Belinski: Where does Uncle Arn think your place is?
Cluny Brown: He didn’t say.
Adam Belinski: Because he doesn’t know. Nobody can tell you where your place is. Where is my place? Where is anybody’s place? I’ll tell you where it is. Wherever you’re happy, that’s your place. And happiness is a matter of purely personal adjustment to your environment. You’re the sole judge. In Hyde Park, for instance. Some people like to feed nuts to the squirrels. But if it makes you happy to feed squirrels to the nuts, who am I to say nuts to the squirrels?
Oscar Vault Monday – The Towering Inferno, 1974 (dir. John Guillermin)
Believe it or not, the Irwin Allen produced The Towering Inferno was not only nominated for eight Academy Awards, it won three of them. This star-studded ensemble disaster flick was not the first of its kind, but it is definitely one of the best. I remember when I first watched it, I was dubious of its merit and wondered about its Oscar pedigree, but in the end, I was sucked in by it and entertained from start to finish. If you look at a lot of the other Oscar nominated films from 1974 – and the 70s in general – The Towering Inferno is like a breath of fresh air made of pure entertainment. I hate the notion that Oscar nominated films need to be serious or arty or what have you. This is cinema in all its glory. The Towering Inferno’s Oscar nominations were as follows: Best Sound, Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography (won), Best Film Editing (won), Best Original Song (won), Best Original Dramatic Score, Best Supporting Actor Fred Astaire and Best Picture. The other films nominated for Best Picture that year were Chinatown, The Conversation, Lenny and winner The Godfather Part II.
the diary of a film history fanatic 