Then she asked for their favorite movie. This tells a lot about a person, but if one wants to be honest it is a very difficult question to answer.  After all, we each have lots of “favorite” movies, but picking only one implies that there is one that says it all.  I am not sure that is even realistic.  I, for one, would find it impossible to answer.  Each era of my life has had one or more movies that defined it, so I would have to consider what era was the most defining in my life, and that would take much thought and deliberation. 

The first movie I actually remember was When Worlds Collide.  I was 8 years old, and apparently was already becoming fond of “other worldly” genres.  Then the next movie I remember was the Long Long Trailer, since we were living in a house trailer at the time. I was 10. A few years later during a trip to San Francisco to the doctor,  one very memorable thing we did was to see The Ten Commandments in the new wide-screen Cinerama format. Then in college the Mersey movement sprang onto the scene, so my favorite became Ferry Cross the Mersey, starring my honey, Gerry Marsden of Gerry and the Pacemakers. 

After that for many years, I always said my favorite was the Quiet Man, with John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara.  For that reason it was the first movie I ever played on my first VCR.  And when the movie Ghandi came out it brought back memories of my time in India, so it zoomed to the top for a while, and remains high on the list even today. 

When the Sound of Music first came out in the 60’s, I purposely avoided going to see it. I resented the fact that it was given so much attention because Audrey Hepburn had been given the lead in My Fair Lady.  Fans of Julie Andrews were apparently very vocal in their objections, since it had been Julie’s role on stage.  So to placate Julie’s fans we heard that the studio made sure she got the next role that moved from the stage to film.  Boy, I could not have been more wrong, and because of that I deprived myself of many years of enjoying that movie.  When I finally did see it on TV one Christmas in the 80’s I was totally mesmerized by it, and when I later finally got a VCR I recorded it from the TV so that I could watch it again and again.  Of all movies, today I believe it remains at or close to #1 for me.

Then when TCM and other movie channels came along and offered a plethora of classic movies it really became a challenge to keep my list of favorite movies down to less than a hundred.  Lately there are very few new ones that can even make it to my top 25,  but I find that looking at the actors rather than the subject says more to me about whether the movie is worth my time or not.  And most of the actors I prefer, of course, are nearer to my age.  I have in the past couple of years just discovered the “romantic comedy” genre, and have a few favorites there.  But they are mostly now 10-20 years old, and only occasionally surface.  So in my search for better TV fare I have stumbled upon the Hallmark Channels, and that has been a real bonanza for me.  But to pick out one of their movies as a favorite would be to say that the others are not as good. 

I guess the bottom line is, if I expect to find a match based on my choice of a favorite movie, I am pretty much out of luck.  But I have really enjoyed revisiting all these eras and their accompanying movies, and realizing how they have together helped to shape who I am today. I hope that all of you who have survived my ramblings on the subject are also having fun reviewing the eras of your own lives and the movies that defined them.