My Favorite Comfort Movies – December 2022

December 16, 2022

It’s hard to believe that another year is winding down, yet here we are with the holidays coming up fast.  It’s a busy time of the year for movies, with new releases hitting theaters in advance of the awards season.  Some of these films are staying for longer stretches than others – unfortunately, the box office has been hit or miss and we are seeing studios quickly sending movies to video on demand after only a few weeks in the theaters.  So, there are plenty of new films you can check out right now, including some of my favorites from this year.  I’m saving my thoughts on the year in movies until next month as I still have a lot of films to check out before I finalize my top ten list.

Even with all of the new content available in both movies and television (speaking of which, if you haven’t been watching The White Lotus on HBO Max, I highly recommend it.  The second season that just finished was excellent), sometimes what hits the sweet spot for a cold winter night is a comfort movie.  And sometimes it’s fun to stumble upon a favorite one while scrolling through your cable program guide.  That happened to me the other night when I noticed last year’s wonderful Licorice Pizza had just started on one of my cable channels.  Naturally, I got sucked in to watch it again.  So, it seems like a good time to provide some new comfort movie recommendations.  We’re going to start with a comedy that came out forty years ago and given the premise, shouldn’t have aged very well.  But damn if this movie doesn’t still crack me up.

Tootsie  (1982)

Dustin Hoffman has been known as one of the more difficult actors in Hollywood to work with for decades.  He employs method acting, where he dives deep into his characters, and is sometimes a real pain in the ass perfectionist, which can drive his directors and co-stars crazy.  It seemed like a perfect match for director Sydney Pollack to cast Hoffman in the lead role of Tootsie, a romantic-comedy about acting, gender roles in society, and workplace dynamics in the 1980s.

Hoffman plays Michael Dorsey, a theater actor who can’t seem to keep a job, other than the one he has at a restaurant to pay the bills.  In the opening sequence, we see him flame out at every audition, intercut with him teaching an acting class to aspiring thespians.  When we finish the credits, he comes home (with his roommate, played by Bill Murray – more on him later) to a surprise birthday party.  As he mingles around talking to the guests, it’s clear that he is wrestling with his lot in life – will he ever be the successful actor he wants to be?  The next day he meets with his agent (played by Pollack in an outstanding performance) who gives him the brutal truth.  “You’re not going to earn one red cent.  NO ONE WILL WORK WITH YOU.”  Dorsey responds, “Oh, yeah?”  And we’re off to the races.

When Hoffman assumes the identity of Dorothy Michaels and lands a spot on a popular daytime soap opera, not only is he earning a paycheck – he turns the show upside down.  Michaels challenges the stereotypical treatment of women in show business (both onscreen and off-screen) and doesn’t take shit from anyone, especially the show’s director (Dabney Coleman in a nice heel-turn kind of role).  One other complication – Dorsey falls in love with his co-star, played by Jessica Lange, who won an Oscar for her performance.  The complication being that she doesn’t know his true identity.  As Dorsey slowly loses his mind trying to keep up the façade and realizing he can’t get out of his contract (the conversation he has with Pollack on this topic is an incredible scene), he decides to reveal everything during a live airing of the soap opera.  And we all know how that one ends, with Murray stating the obvious, “Now, that is one nutty hospital.”

It goes without saying that Hoffman is the MVP of Tootsie and the movie probably doesn’t work with anyone else.  He perfectly captures the arrogant, neurotic actor who thinks he’s better than everyone else and isn’t afraid to share his opinion, along with creating a new persona when he is acting as Dorothy.  But the supporting cast is incredible as well with Terri Garr as his best (platonic….well, kind of…) friend and Charles Durning as a man who falls in love with Dorothy, in addition to Lange, Pollack, Murray, and Coleman.  This is truly a 1980s All-Star lineup, including Geena Davis in a very early role.

Now, you would think that a comedy about an actor pretending to be a woman to get a job would age pretty poorly, but I recently watched this again and I think it’s aged very well.  Yes, you can argue that a plot where it takes a man dressed as a woman to show everyone what’s wrong with 1980s gender stereotypes is pretty stale.  And I get that.  But one thing I don’t take too seriously is comedies that are not trying to take themselves too seriously.  Yes, there are some messages inherent in the plot, and it could probably never be made again or even worse, would be canceled by today’s hyper-sensitive society.  But not by me – don’t ever take away this hysterical satire comedy.

North by Northwest (1959)

In writing about some of my favorite movies over the last few years, I’ve mentioned that my experience with motion pictures was galvanized by the love of old movies in our house while I was growing up.  A staple on our television was the work of Alfred Hitchcock.  I previously covered Rear Window and Dial “M” For Murder in this series, and now it’s time for Hitchcock’s adventure of mistaken identity, a man on the run, a finale on Mount Rushmore and oh yeah, a crop duster.

In North by Northwest, Cary Grant plays Roger Thornhill, a successful advertising executive who accidentally raises his hand in a restaurant when someone announces that there is a phone call for George Kaplan.  He just wanted to send a telegram to his secretary.  (Remember, this is 1959.)  Thornhill is kidnapped, brought to a house in the country, forced to get drunk, and shoved into a car to (seemingly) drive over a cliff to his death, barely escaping intact.  When he tries to find the people who kidnapped him, leading to him being mistaken for killing someone at the United Nations, he is forced on the run from the authorities and the mystery villains trying to kill him.  And we are off on an adventure that only someone like Hitchcock could create.

Grant is perfect in this role as the everyday man who is somehow caught up in an international mystery involving U.S. intelligence agencies and foreign operatives.  There is the MacGuffin they are looking for (a common Hitchcock trope – in this case, it’s confidential microfilm), but that’s not really important to the plot.  What’s critical to the story is if Thornhill can exonerate himself, prove he is not Kaplan, and escape alive.  He enlists the help of Eva Marie Saint, who he meets on a train while escaping New York.  The two hit it off and she is game to help, but is she really an innocent bystander?  We learn more when she instructs him to meet someone at a bus top in the middle of Nowhere, Indiana.  What transpires is seven minutes of (virtually) no dialogue as Grant waits for his contact to show up, and slowly begins to realize that he is being hunted by a crop duster.  One of the all-time iconic scenes in the history of movies.

Hitchcock had an incredible career as a director, and a number of his films could be classified as murder mysteries, or set in a single location, but this is one of the exceptions to be a true adventure that literally travels across the country from New York to South Dakota for the film’s climax on Mount Rushmore.  It is a nice departure from some of the more “depraved killer” types of movies we usually associate with him.  Of course, there are villains in North by Northwest – you need to have some conflict, after all.  In another display of excellent casting, Hitchcock chose an early James Mason to play the heavy, with Martin Landau (in a very early performance) as one of his chief goons.  Mason was a brilliant actor, accomplished across a number of genres, and he plays this role to perfection, with his velvety voice gently reminding Thornhill that he won’t escape during the climactic scenes.  Spoiler – he does escape, the villain is captured and the heroes live happily ever after.  Even if you can see the resolution coming from a mile away (somewhat typical for 1950s movies), the joy in watching North by Northwest is the journey from Manhattan to Mount Rushmore.  A true Hollywood classic.

The Fugitive (1993)

Next year will see Harrison Ford portraying our favorite archaeologist for the fifth (and final) time in the forthcoming Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.  The trailer just came out last week in case you missed it.  Two things – first, I’m not wild about the title, but I’m not going to get too concerned.  Second, it looks really good, despite my concern about Ford still chasing artifacts and dodging bad guys at the ripe old age of 80.  And in case you read any headlines about Ford being “de-aged”, it was just for the opening sequence which takes place during the same time period as the last film.  So don’t panic – I’m encouraged.  Now maybe I am just biased because I’m hopeful that some fresh blood in the series will help me forget the last film, which was so bad, I barely remember the plot, let alone the name.  The next installment will be directed by James Mangold (Ford v. Ferrari, Walk the Line, and the Wolverine movies with Hugh Jackman) taking over for Steven Spielberg, and co-stars Phoebe Waller-Bridge, another opportunity for new blood in the series.  We’ll have to wait until next June to see if this one is successful.

2023 will also be the thirtieth anniversary of the wonderful film The Fugitive, with Ford starring as Richard Kimble, the accomplished surgeon who is wrongly-accused of killing his wife, but escapes from custody and sets out to find the real killer.  The movie was, of course, a re-telling of the 1960s television series that was so popular that it’s estimated almost half of the country watched the last episode.  Think about that for a minute.  This iteration of Kimble’s story was also very successful, generating a strong box-office result and a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Tommy Lee Jones as the wise-cracking U.S. Marshall chasing Kimble.  And let’s be honest, Jones is probably the best part of the movie.  As much as we love Ford and root for him to be exonerated, the way Jones portrayed the “I don’t give a shit about anything but catching this guy” Deputy Gerard is very funny.

The Fugitive has some pretty memorable dialogue, including Gerard’s announcement to his team to find Kimble (“every warehouse, farmhouse, henhouse, outhouse…”) and their exchange in the viaduct tunnel (“I didn’t kill my wife” / “I don’t care”), and pretty much anything Gerard says to his team.  And you can quibble with the plot having way too many holes in it (like how Kimble found the one-armed man so quickly when the cops couldn’t before he was convicted, and the paper-thin motivation for killing his wife), but that’s not the point of the movie.  It’s the thrill of the chase and watching Gerard and Kimble match wits through the streets of Chicago. 

And thank goodness director Andrew Davis chose to film on location, because Chicago is a great setting for a movie (just watch The Blues Brothers if you don’t believe me.)  And we get some very exciting action sequences – the viaduct tunnel chase culminating with Kimble leaping into the water to escape, the scene in the prison leading to the St. Patrick’s Day parade, and of course, the train crash where Kimble escapes.  This is just an outstanding demonstration of stunt work.  You can take all of the wonders of CGI and keep it on your computer.  Give me an old-fashioned real-life stunt any day of the week.  And the way they filmed this is quite incredible.  Talk about only having one chance to get it right.  Here is an interesting video about how the scene was created and if you are ever in the Smoky Mountains in Western North Carolina, you can see the remnants of the crash that are still there.  Pretty incredible all of these years later.  If you want a nice popcorn movie with thrills and laughs featuring two stars at the top of their game, then The Fugitive is a great choice.

When Harry Met Sally… (1989)

If I could sum up one way to describe a comfort movie, it’s this – I will never get tired of watching it.  A close second would be when someone suggests watching it, the answer is an instant “Yes.”  In fact, about a year ago, we were trying to decide what to watch one night and that is exactly what happened.

When I cover movies, I usually start with the director or the actors, but there is only one place to start with When Harry Met Sally… and that’s the incredible screenplay, written by Nora Ephron.  This film is a tight 95 minutes and that is due almost entirely to Ephron’s script, which sparkles with sweetness and comedy, with no filler.  The success of this movie helped showcase her strength as a writer and she would go on to write and/or direct many successful comedies over the next twenty years, including Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail, and Julie & Julia. 

When we first meet our couple of destiny (played by Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan), they are sharing a car ride from Chicago to New York, matched by convenience and (maybe) fate.  He has a dark side, she has a sunny personality, and they take an instant dislike to each other.  At a roadside diner (no, not that scene), we see Sally’s obsession with “on the side” and hear Harry’s theory on men and women, which is the premise of the movie.  Can a man and a woman be friends without sex getting in the way of a relationship?  Five years later they run into each other on a plane and their views are pretty much the same, except they are now both in committed relationships.  Once again, there is more hate than love in this love/hate dynamic. 

The film picks up steam when they once again run into each other in a bookstore, this time when they are both coming out of bad breakups.  Their despondent feelings bond them and a friendship is born.  This portion of the film is also where we meet their best friends, Jess and Marie, played by Bruno Kirby and Carrie Fisher, in perfect casting by director Rob Reiner.  The dynamic between the friends and the couples is just outstanding and there is a good reason for it.  Reiner and Ephron based the themes of this story on their own experiences and misconceptions men have about women and vice versa.  There’s a reason so many of the jokes hit perfectly – because there is so much reality in them.

As I watched When Harry Met Sally… again recently, I was struck by how many moments and lines resonate so many years later.  It’s like Seinfeld – the jokes never get old.  Hearing the deadpan delivery of the lines, or watching the outrageous situation from each scene is like putting on a warm blanket.  The quotes are endless – Mr. Zero knew?  You made a woman meow?  Baby Fish Mouth, the legal firm of “That’s Mine, This Is Yours,” white man’s overbite, days of the week underpants, pecan pie (famously improvised by Crystal – next time you watch it, you’ll see Ryan looking offscreen at Reiner wondering what to do), Roy Rogers garage sale coffee table, “on the side” when ordering at a restaurant, and of course – I’ll have what she’s having.  That’s right – the most famous diner scene in movie history (with apologies to Pacino and De Niro for their memorable scene in Heat).  It was Ryan’s idea to add the (ahem) exuberance to demonstrate her point about women’s ability to (ahem) well, you know.  You have to give her credit for delivering that scene after many takes to get it right.  And of course, the deadpan response from the woman at the next table, played by Reiner’s mother.  Just comedic perfection. 

One other piece of perfection is the soundtrack, with arrangements and vocals by Harry Connick, Jr.  This was the film that introduced us to his incredible talents and after watching this movie, I was a card-carrying member of the Connick bandwagon, and still am to this day.  His take on old standards and holiday songs are wonderful.  And in case you are wondering if this is a Christmas movie (for some reason, this becomes a debate every year online with films like Die Hard and Home Alone), in my opinion it is.  The iconic scene at the end is set at a New Year’s Eve party and some of the best imagery is during the holiday season, so for me it qualifies.  But that doesn’t really matter.  What’s most important is what Reiner and Ephron talked about when describing this movie and relationships.  At the end of the day, if you can find someone who you can enjoy spending time with, and who makes you laugh every day, you should consider yourself very lucky.  I’m fortunate to consider myself one of those people, which is probably why I love this film so much and why it will forever be a comfort movie.

That’s all for this week.  I hope you enjoyed this look at some of my favorite comfort movies.  If you’d like to find where to watch these films or any of the movies I’ve covered in my blog, as well as a link to the post where I wrote about them, you can check out my film index here.  I’ll be taking a few weeks off, but back in early January.  Thanks for reading and have a great holiday season.