General questions about movies, TV and more

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When I was younger I watched an old black and white film, it had 3 firemen in a old fire house and there was a headless horseman in it as well. I would love to see the film again if I can find it but I don't know the title, does anyone know it?

Answer: It might be "Ask A Policeman."

Looking for where the following TV commercial came from (product or sponsor). It was from the 1970s. It started with a burglar shown outside a house at night by a door. He was about to break in, but then was frozen solid while a voice on a speaker warned him he was in a forcefield (or something) and if he tried to move, he would be vaporized and then the burglar tried moving and did get vaporized into thin air. Anyone remember this or know where it came from?

I watched a movie after 2010 about Watergate and the two journalists but I don't remember the name.

i_harfoush

Answer: The two journalists who broke the Watergate story are generally considered to be Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. The only two movies with both reporters, that I can think of is, "Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House" (2017), and, "All the President's Men" (1976).

Bishop73

I am looking for the name of a movie that came out in the late 1960's or 1970-71. The only thing I can remember about this movie is a scene that occurs in an underground cavern with a natural pool of water with a woman (Ursula Andress?) wearing a long flowing gown appearing to walk on water. There is also a man (actor unknown) there with her. She may be an apparition that suddenly appears to him.

Clockman

Answer: This sounds like 'She' from 1965. It stars Ursula Andress, John Richardson, Peter Cushing and Bernard Cribbins. A band of ex-military men go looking for and find a lost city, and Ursula Andress is ruler of the city. I don't recall the walking on water, but she did wear a beautiful flowing dress and there were several scenes in a stone cavern.

Purple_Girl

Thanks for your answer. I bought this movie after seeing your answer and it turns out that this is the movie I was looking for. Thanks again.

I saw a show or movie in the mid-80's that was a horror. A spotlight shone on a large chair in the middle of the room where a woman sat, looking at a child playing in front of her. She calls to the child "come to me, come to mother," and the child gets up to go towards her. As she approaches, the camera pans behind the chair and all we hear is an animal noise and the woman's arm fall limp off the side of the chair. What is this from?

Answer: That's from a 1977 movie, The Haunting of Julia, aka Full Circle. Mia Farrow plays a mother whose daughter dies, moves into a haunted townhouse and replaces her with a ghost girl, who is evil.

I remember a poignant scene in a (new-ish) movie where a dead person communicates with their living loved one by dropping all the blossoms off a tree all at once. I think pink blossoms, and it was perhaps as an answer to a question. What is the movie?

Answer: Sounds like a scene from "What Dreams May Come" with Robin Williams and Annabella Sciorra.

Greg Dwyer

When sitcom TV shows have restaurant scenes, are these typically filmed in a real restaurant or is a set created?

Answer: Due to the logistics involved in filming, in most cases, a set would be created. In some cases, a real restaurant might be used, but it would involve compensating a business for lost revenue during the filming, obtaining special city permits, hiring police to monitor crowd control, etc. It is simpler and more economic to build a confined set.

raywest

The above is certainly true but a rare third option is filming in an old, closed business. The place is refurbished by the crew, it looks realistic and it is simple to move the action in and out of the venue. An example is the bar at the beginning of The Wolverine, set in the USA but filmed in an old, closed pub in rural Australia.

There was a movie that I believe had Margot Kidder in it. In the movie she is a cop and her and her partner go to a woman's house. When Margot opens the door she is immediately shot at so she ducks to avoid being hit. When she looks up, she sees a boy about four years old holding the gun. After she takes the gun from him, the little boy tells her that his mom gave him the gun and told him how to shoot the gun. He also tells her that his mom told him to shoot whoever came into the house while she was gone.

There's a movie I have been searching for, I thought it starred John Stamps. When I search for his movies I don't see it. He played a dark character, and the only scene I remember is him taking his cousin or some other family member's pregnant wife on a drive, he got her in the car by acting nice to her, During the drive, he turned on her and eventually killed her, stole her baby, and gave it to his wife. Can anybody please help me?

movielover1

Saw a black and white movie on TBS in early morning hours in 1981. Guy with an eye patch holding a woman hostage in an apt that was sub ground. Looking out of the window she saw people's legs walking by. Anybody ever see it?

Codymuck

Answer: The movie is "Something Wild," 1961. Carroll Baker plays a young woman who is raped. Feeling ashamed, she doesn't go to the police or the hospital. Later, she learns she's pregnant. Distraught, she tries to commit suicide by jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge. Ralph Meeker plays a blue-collar mechanic who stops her, taking her to his sub-ground apt. He refuses to let her go until she gets rid of her suicidal thoughts. At first, she is antagonistic towards him, injuring his eye. As time goes on, she accepts her situation and realizes that Ralph loves her and she loves him.

What was the name of the movie about a young boy named Matt and his neighbor who was an old woman recluse? He broke her fence and she made him repair it, and little by little they became friends - she taught him many things. She dies at the end of the movie.

Answer: Sounds like "A Rumor of Angels" starring Trevor Morgan and Vanessa Redgrave.

KeyZOid

Saw some of this movie sometime in the ‘90s. A man is released from prison and goes to live in a small community. It's known by everyone who lives in the community that the man was a rapist, so they let him know they don't approve of him living among them. One day, he comes home and finds his dog was murdered. The end of the movie had him taken someplace else where he'll be safe and is told he can come and go freely from his new home when he wants.

Answer: It's a 1996 TV Movie, The Man Next Door. Michael Ontkean plays the paroled rapist trying for a second chance and Pamela Reed, the cop reluctant to help him.

That's it.

Several times I've only seen the ending of this movie. A man goes to an abandoned construction site at night to rescue a woman and her son who have been abducted. When he gets there, he sees little robotic machines. The kidnapper tells him that the machines won't attack him and he goes to the top of the site. When he gets up there and confronts the kidnapper, he's told that the machines will attack and kill the first person that appears on the ground floor. A fight ensues and the kidnapper gets knocked to ground level and is killed by his own machines.

Answer: Sounds like the ending of "Runaway", 1984 with Tom Selleck and Gene Simmons. Http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088024/?ref_=nv_sr_3.

David George

Answer: This is done because according to animators, it's easier to draw hands with three fingers instead of four. This is a practice that dates back to the early days of animation; characters such as Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny. And Popeye were usually drawn with three fingers, thus setting the precedent still in use today.

zendaddy621

Answer: The answer is pretty complex and there's YouTube videos delving into the many reasons. It started in the 1920's and the idea behind Mickey Mouse, in 1928, having 4 fingers is the style he was drawn in, with rounded shapes, making 5 fingers too crowded. Walt Disney allegedly said with 5 fingers Mickey's hands would look like a "bunch of bananas." Additionally, there's a theory called the "uncanny valley", which basically states that humanoid objects that look almost, but not exactly, human tend to make people have uncanny feelings of eeriness (think of life-like dolls or why some CGI looks strange to us). For some reason, 4 finger characters make us recognize they're human-like, without that eerie feeling. There are several other theories and ideas behind the 4 fingers (such as many characters being anthropomorphized animals.) Although Japanese anime often have 5-fingered characters for cultural reasons (in fact some 4-fingered characters have been edited with 5 fingers when released in Japan), so it's not always based on saving time or money, but tradition. With the aid of computer generated animation and people breaking from tradition, the future of cartoons may include more and more 5-fingered characters being the norm.

Bishop73

I once saw a film where, in one scene, a girl tastes a bit of a cake, a man sees her do it, and the girl says she was "just looking at it." The girl also gets taken in to the home she stays in. Any idea what movie that was?

I am looking for an action movie set in either the 20's, 30's or 40's that came out within the last three years.

Answer: Finding movies released in the last 3 years is difficult, but some films set in the 20s-40s are: Allied - 2016 Public Enemies - 2009 Cinderella Man - 2005 Hugo - 2011.

Ssiscool

I remember seeing this cheesy movie on the premium channels (I think it was Showtime Beyond or one of the similar channels) a lot in the early 2000's. I don't remember much about it, except a few details. The movie was stylistically very peculiar. Many shots were at a tilted (usually "dutch") or otherwise strange angle, there was often not a lot of music (many scenes had none at all), and the colors seemed to always be a bit desaturated, overly contrasted and have an orange or green tinge to them. It was on one of the genre-channels, so I'm assuming it was either an action/suspense or Sci-Fi movie? But there weren't any aliens or anything more blatant like that. The main character was a sort-of scruffy, tall Caucasian man wearing a jumpsuit (like a mechanic or prisoner-type one-piece work outfit), and I think he was either on-the-run or had a time limit to get somewhere? It was pretty bad, and it looked fairly low-budget, so I'm guessing it was either an indie film, a direct-to-video/TV movie, or a limited release. The only specific scene I recall was the main character confronting a fairly large obese man in a near-empty parking lot, the main character kicks the fat-man in the groin, and the fat guy topples over on top of him. It was supposed to be funny, but it was just kind of awkward. Any ideas?

Saw an old black and white war movie. It had a bunch of students who were friends with one of their teachers. Eventually, the students were drafted into a war and when they see their teacher walking into the barracks, they are very happy to see him and even make jokes when he informs them that he's their superior officer. His pleasant demeanor which he showed as a teacher is changed to being tyrannical to the point that the cadets finally tie him up in a huge bag and drop him into a huge mud puddle as for revenge for the harsh treatment he gave them.

Answer: The film you are referencing is the classic WW1 movie "All Quiet on the Western Front" starring Lew Ayers and Louis Wolheim.

Scott215

I'm looking for a cartoon seen in the early 70s (but may be from earlier decade). I was a very young kid at the time so my info may be slightly off. All I remember is someone not too strong was given strength from something in the shape of a missile, and you heard a low voice (or voices) with music in the background saying "Guided Missile, Guided Missile " etc. Does anyone know what this was from?

Answer: I actually found the answer to what I was looking for. It's Harecules Hare (from the Beany and Cecil cartoons of the 60s). It was actually Guided MUSCLE (not missile) that Harecules Hare made out of an invention (a golden fist-looking robot type) that destroyed an eviler character.

What was the movie in which a vampire rematerializes in one of the opening scenes when a wooden stake is removed from a coffin?

Answer: I'm sure this happens in multiple films. One that immediately comes to mind is House of Frankenstein.

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