A-Z of favourite films - Y, oh, Y did I start this?

Okay, 24 down, 2 to go, and we reach the penultimate entry in my series of blogs on my A-Z of favourite films.

Right, hopefully a quick entry here as we reach Y. It’s a small category – have only seen 9 films beginning with Y. Thus, as I’ve said before in a Groundhog Day style, the top five will contain several films that wouldn’t make the top five in many other categories, but do here because of the shortage of films. Got that? It was a silly system I came up with, doing the films by letter, but I’m not changing it now that the endings within touching distance. So there.

We’ll start in 1928 with the last Laurel and Hardy film that will be mentioned in this series of blogs – the 1928 silent short You’re Darn Tootin’ which sees the boys fired from an orchestra, having troubles with their landlady, and then busking in the street before it all predictably descends into a full scale fight at the end. Good fun from the duo.

Two consecutive years in the 1930s bring two entries from two of the finest directors in film history. First, Hitchcock appears for the last time in this blog series (I have mentioned him before, haven’t I?) with his 1937 British film Young and Innocent. Admittedly it’s not one of his greatest works and some of the casting does not convince, but even an average Hitchcock film is well worth watching and this is no exception. The following year Frank Capra made You Can’t Take It With You, a film that won Best Picture Oscar for that year, as well as a Best Director gong for Capra himself. It’s a fine comedy starring James Stewart (yes, I know I’ve mentioned him a fair bit too!) and Jean Arthur as the romantic leads who run into trouble when Stewart’s snobby parents have to meat Arthur’s very eccentric family. Although I wouldn’t rate the film as quite up there with Capra’s finest such as It’s a Wonderful Life or Mr Smith Goes to Washington, it’s still a charming tale and well worth two hours of your time.

Skipping forward a bit to the 1960s we find a work from another great director, this time Yojimbo from the Japanese master-director Akira Kurosawa. His regular collaborator Toshiro Mifune takes the lead in an acclaimed drama made partly as a tribute to Hollywood Westerns; it was subsequently remade by Sergio Leone as A fistful of Dollars. Mifune turns up in a town where two rival gangs are at each others' throats and Mifune plays them against each other, just as Clint does in the later film, until they are all either dead or just wish they were. As with Capra, I don’t think this is Kurosawa’s best work, up there with Seven Samurai or Rashomon, but again, an average Kurosawa film still blows films by many other directors right out of the water. Also from the 1960s is You Only Live Twice, which is the fifth Sean Connery film in the franchise. It’s the one with the Japanese secret service ninjas, and with Bond trying to stop America and Russia heading towards nuclear war having been manipulated by Donald Pleasance’s Blofeld. And from what I remember, it’s a fairly decent entry in the series.

Into the 1970s and one of my favourite Mel Brooks’ comedies appears in the form of Young Frankenstein. It’s a great spoof of the old Universal Horror films starring Gene Wilder as the great grandson of the original Dr Frankenstein. He finds himself at the old castle of his grandfather and history begins to repeat itself. Lots of laugh-out-loud moments and like I say, this is one of Brooks' best, also featuring Peter Boyle as the monster and Gene Hackman in a small but funny role as a blind man.

From horror to western in the 1980s with Young Guns about a gang of young men who seek revenge following the killing of their mentor,Terence Stamp. Charlie Sheen ,Emilio Estevez, and Kiefer Sutherland are among the group in this updating of the Western for the MTV generation. A reminder of the old school remains though as Jack Palance plays the villain.

You’ve Got Mail is our Y entry for the 90s, with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan teaming up yet again in this romantic comedy. No matter what its merits or failings, the reality is unavoidable – it’s nowhere near as good as the 1940 Jimmy Stewart movie, The Shop Around the Corner of which it is a remake, and whilst watching the latter film, there’s just no avoiding that fact. Finally, from 2004 there’s Yasmin which I suppose was more a TV movie starring Archie Panjabi as a Western Muslim living in Britain in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Not a barrel of laughs but an interesting piece of contemporary drama nevertheless.

So, them’s the runners and riders. What are the final five – (not difficult, only have to get rid of four films!)


Young and Innocent 1937
You Can’t Take it With You 1938
Yojimbo 1961
You Only Live Twice 1967
Young Frankenstein 1974


And the winner is Young Frankenstein, just edging out You Can’t Take it With You – either of them could have won it to be honest.