Was 1939 the greatest year of Hollywood movies?

1967

1933

1916

r3 yes! "Intolerance," "Mystery of the Leaping Fish," "One A.M."

Yes, I don't believe there has ever been a year in film as glorious as 1939.

So many films were made in 1939 that they couldn’t all get released that year so they were released a year later making 1940 an extension of Hollywood’s greatest year. On the list: Grapes of Wrath, Citizen Kane, His Girl Friday, The Letter, Rebecca, The Philadelphia Story, Fantasia, Pride and Prejudice and many others.

1939 was first

1950 was a close second

All About Eve

Sunset Blvd

Born Yesterday

In A Lonely Place

Summer Stock

The Asphalt Jungle

Cinderella

Gun Crazy

Father of the Bride

Night And The City

King Solomon's Mine

Stage Fright

Caged

No Way Out

Cheaper by the Dozen

Shadow on the Wall

711 Ocean Drive

Harriet Craig

The Furies

Where the Sidewalk Ends

Annie Get Your Gun

1997

Explain your choice, R8.

1962 and 1999 are also usually cited as great years for movies. We’re probably going to get a ton of 20 year retrospectives on that year’s releases as the year comes to a close.

I’m also curious why R8 chose 1997, but I can kind of see it.

If I had been alive back then I would’ve just lived at the movie theater.

Well 1997 was the year of My Best Friends Wedding and Titanic.

Boogie Nights

Good Will Hunting

L A Confidential

The Full Monty

Mrs. Brown

The Ice Storm

As Good As It Gets

Romeo + Juliet (Baz)

The Wings of The Dove

Liar Liar

Chasing Amy

Men In Black

Jackie Brown

I grew up on Hollywood movies back in the 70's. Coppola, Scorsese, Bogdanovich, Peckinpah, Polanski. That was the Golden Era for me. Still the 1939 "Gone With the Wind" is the greatest American movie I can think of.

Not as great as 1919 ...

Racist^

Have you bitches ever been to theatre?

The documentary is really good.

Racist? Moi? Pourquoi?

My Best Friends Wedding? Are you delusional? Just as Jackie Brown and the other artistically insignificant crap you have mentioned R12?

They were notable movies that's why I listed them. My Best Friends Wedding did significant box office.

I did not list for quality, I listed notable.

You fucking bitch.

Darling R20 have ever considered either anger management therapy or an art course. Either one would be really helpful ... since your language, just as your movie taste is quite below my standards.

R20 I think the thread is about which year had the greatest, classic movies, not the biggest hits. Not being snarky.

I have to agree with 1939 although I prefer GWTW to the others. These last 10-15 years have been so lamentable, just look at some of the year end "Best Pictures" - Argo, The King's Speech, The Departed, Crash.

I believe the documentary OP is referencing is 1939: Hollywood's Greatest Year (2009) .

But Blanche- 2 is critical. A barely adequate look at the golden year of 1939, concentrating, as usual, on films owned by TCM and ignoring films they don't own and studios whose libraries they don't have. I certainly can understand them wanting to push the stars and films they own, but please don't call this film history. Though TCM was not listed as the producer, they in fact were - they farmed it out to New Wave Entertainment, which has made many of their documentaries. Most slighted, as usual, was 20th Century Fox - I'll say this, they did mention it. Usually they leave it out all together. Tyrone Power in 1939 was one of the most popular stars in the world, in the top 10 box office stars - lucky him, they mentioned him once. The documentary said that Gone with the Wind "swept" the Oscars, failing to mention that "The Rains Came" beat it - and the Wizard of Oz - in special effects. As usual, people watching this walk away believing the only stars were Clark Gable, Greta Garbo, Mickey Rooney, Bette Davis, Errol Flynn, etc. and the rest of them were people who did some acting on the side. After all, if you weren't with MGM, Warners, or RKO, you were nobody.

R1, 1967

The Graduate

Bonnie and Clyde

In the Heat of the Night

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

Cool Hand Luke

Wait Until Dark

Two for the Road

Thoroughly Modern Millie

In Cold Blood

Valley of the Dolls

Camelot

To Sir With Love

The Dirty Dozen

Doctor Dolittle

Point Blank

The Taming of the Shrew

Poor illiterate r21.

R25 1967 was good and I would say it and 1950 R7 are tied for the second greatest year of American cinema. R12 1997 doesn't come close, outside a few of the films you mentioned, I doubt people will be still watching and discussing them for decades from now, many of them have already fallen from such favor, if they ever had it.

I would like to see a documentary focused on the films of 1933 which many feel was even more important than 1939.

The best film released in 1939 wasn't even American.

r24, actually 20th Century Fox does have a section in the documentary. They say that it was the young upstart studio in 1939 as it had only been around for 5 years. Though it's true that IIRC Jesse James was their only hit that year. Or was Young Abe Lincoln also from Fox? If so, there are several scenes featured.

Paramount is actually the studio that gets the shortest play. The doc says that they were in decline at the end of the 30s and I don't think a single film of theirs was mentioned. Of course, they had a big comeback during WWII with the Hope/Crosby/Lamour Road films, not to mention the advent of Betty Hutton, Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake and the brilliant films of Preston Sturges.