While the world is donning 3-D glasses and soakin
g up the latest craze in cinematic spectacle, there still exist a few classics that will forever flicker without flashy special computer effects and a silly pair of outsized specs. Filmstrips embedded with the faces of
Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly, Liz Taylor, Audrey Hepburn, and
Humphrey Bogart that will always light up the silver screen.
There was a time when movies reached out to an audience's psyche, rather than their retinas. A time when space and time continuums didn't need to be crossed to bring to light the essential truths. A time when a twirling umbrella being pelted with droplets of rain made you wish it were raining outside. An era where gentlemen reigned and women swooned accordingly.
The empathy that surges through you during the cremation scene in the original Oceans 11 film can only be felt by watching the 1960's crime caper classic. In the 1963 epic, Cleopatra (Elizabeth Taylor) dripped with jewels and eloquence, captivating audiences and the stunning Mark Antony (Richard Burton) by her side in a movie masterpiece that deservedly won four Oscars.
The tailored suits and divine gowns remain the pièce de résistance they once were; Audrey Hepburn's famous black dress in Breakfast at Tiffany's designed by Hubert de Givenchy, went under the ha
mmer for £467,200. Almost 70 years later, Fedora's are now aptly named after Bogart, who ignored Hal B Wallis' concerns that he'd look too much like a gangster when he wore it during the filming of Casablanca in 1942. Scripted lines from 1939 are still recited in 2012 - “Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn” –and express the same human emotions better today than they ever did decades ago.
Movies that make us catch our breath, pulled us closer toward the screen, made us clutch the armrests and reach for the tissues have become the irreplaceable treasures of cinema that have to be seen – and seen again.