All month long, I’m ranking the Best Movies of All Time over 30 different genres.
Now, it’s time for other local critics to break down the list and offer their picks.
This week, I joined the “At the Movies” podcast with Arch Campbell, 40-year veteran on NBC-4 and ABC-7; Jen Chaney, TV and film critic for Vulture with weekly liveshots on WTOP; and Loo Katz, former WASH-FM personality and founder of Hound Radio.
“It’s a list a day for the month of July and I think the movies are numbering into the thousands,” Campbell said. “Your 900 movies for July has my head spinning!”
What are their picks for the best comedy movie of all time?
“I’m gonna go with the original version of ‘The Producers,'” Campbell said. “Gene [Wilder] and Zero Mostel, I think it was the original buddy movie. … Seeing it in the late ’60s, people were just screaming in the theater because it so pushed the envelope.”
“I think I’m more modern when it comes to my choices for comedies,” Katz said. “For me, it’s a tie between the original ‘Anchorman’ and ‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin.'”
“I think I would have to say ‘Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,'” Chaney said.
You’ll note that “Ferris Bueller” is instead in our Coming-of-Age list, but Chaney was glad to see that list now includes “Clueless.” She wrote a book on the film and was disappointed to see it missing from our previous version of the list back in 2018.
“He obviously did the right thing,” Chaney said.
What is the best horror movie of all time?
“My favorite horror movie is the original 1932 version of ‘The Mummy’ with Boris Karloff and Zita Johann as his soulmate who’s traveled through time,” Campbell said.
“My two favorites are the original ‘Halloween’ and ‘Poltergeist,'” Chaney said.
“I normally don’t like horror movies at all, and it’s probably that crossover between horror and sci-fi, but ‘Alien,'” Katz said. “When that thing jumps out of that guy’s chest … that was it. I was at the Uptown [Theatre] when I saw it and I walked out.”
What is the best sci-fi movie of all time?
“I’m thinking of the ‘Twilight Zone’ movie they made,” Campbell said. “The segment where John Lithgow is on an airplane and the little gremlin is riding out on the wing.”
“That’s an easy one for me: ‘E.T’,” Chaney said. “The two most formative movies of my childhood were ‘The Wizard of Oz’ and ‘E.T.’ … ‘E.T.’ made me want to do what I do.”
“I gotta side with Jen,” Katz said. “I think ‘E.T.’ is just a wonderful classic.”
In the end, it’s all subjective but it’s an endlessly entertaining exercise.
“You should put this together as a book,” Campbell said.
Listen to our full convo at the top of the article and subscribe to the podcast here.
