Ready for my close-up

All oldies, all the time

I'm pretty sure I've seen more movies made before 1960 than my 82-year-old grandmother. Of course, she never had narrative film classes in college and hasn't read a lick of film history/theory books and essays either. Does that make me an expert (at anything)? No. Watching more TCM than I do any other channel does. Well, at least I'm an expert at hitting RECORD whenever a Cary Grant(RAWR) movie shows up on the cable guide.

I'm 32, and I've been a classic film fan for half my life. Ever since I saw my first Fred and Ginger movie ("Top Hat," 1935), I was smitten. I recently saw "Top Hat" at the historic Tampa Theatre with my husband, who, thanks to my constant watching, has now developed a taste for the time-tested motion pictures that occupy my mind and free time. Sure, I consume all sorts of film subjects out there--dinosaurs, Bollywood, and anything by Sir Kenneth Branagh immediately comes to mind--but TCM provides me with the comfort food. Nothing thrills me more than learning a clever line (especially from Mae West) or witnessing an established star's film debut (I just saw little "Ronny" Howard yesterday in "The Journey," 1959 when he was five years old).

So, if your film history education starts and ends with AMC (God help you) OR you're just as titillated by a good Bing and Bob "Road" flick as I am, tune in every week for my running digest of all things classic.



Seriously though, I just want to call my constant TCM watching "research for my blog." So there.