What's on your list?

With the Academy Awards on the way, everybody's talking movies. It seems only right that Ralph and I should stick our oar in as well.

A lot of writers like to take this time of year to roundly berate the Academy for it's lack of judgment in past Oscar awards. It's an easy exercise -- just pick your favorite movies that didn't win "Best Picture" and contrast them with the undeserving winner. It's like shooting fish in a barrel. Here's a good example.

For a more interesting exercise in movie criticism, I'm going to let you take a look at my Netflix queue's top 5 movies -- what I picked, and why it's on the list. So, for February 22, 2007, here it is:

1. The Lavender Hill Mob -- I've had a taste for classic comedies lately. I really enjoyed Preston Sturges' Sullivan's Travels and Billy Wilder's One, Two, Three. I thought I'd give this old favorite a spin. And anything with Alec Guinness can't be bad.

2. The Battle of Algiers -- OK, I've had this sitting by the DVD player for weeks now. I know it's an important film, with prescient insights into our country's current Middle Eastern mess, but it looks like a real downer. I'm just not in the mood for it...

3. The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes -- Three episodes from the classic Granada TV adaptations of Arthur Conan Doyle's stories. Purely comfort food.

4. Casino Royale -- I'm a Sean Connery 007 guy all the way, but I've heard good things about this...

5. Children of Men -- This hasn't been released on DVD yet, but I'm anxiously awaiting it. I'm always game for a well-done vision of an apocalyptic near future.

That's what's on my list -- your turn, Ralph.

Ken