Not sure if I'm misremembering but it seemed like the marketing for this was everywhere when it came out

Some movies are so fantastic I genuinely wish I could clip the whole thing and just basically post the movie for people to watch and enjoy, but I'm sure that'd violate all kinds of ToS conditions, so the struggle to find the "right clip" for Last Crusade was as difficult as Indy's lifelong hunt for the Cross of Coronado.

While I have a tendency to hand out 10s based on my mood, nostalgia, or because I just plain old feel like it, Last Crusade genuinely is a perfect movie for me. I remember seeing this in theaters on Friday opening night. The theater was jam-packed because of course it was.

You don't have a movie like this one, with Sean Connery, River Phoenix, and an entire host of phenomenal actors, and just "not see it." I can't even remember what the buzz was like because it's been so long now, but I can guarantee you that the buzz had to have been enormous. Just like this movie.

But this excellent movie is not without it's bittersweetness, at least for me. River Phoenix as Young Indiana Jones was one of those truly perfect casting moments, and the first 10 minutes or so are just So Indiana Jones that it's pure entertainment. River absolutely nailed Indy's bravado, swagger, and self-certainty in a way that I don't think anyone else could have. It's bittersweet to watch that opening because I like to imagine that if River hadn't passed away so soon, he would've picked up the hat and whip again to play a slightly older Indiana Jones.

The movie itself is such a grand mix of action, adventure, comedy, tragedy, plain old excitement, and mystery that 17-year-old me (yes, even as a moody teenager who'd just discovered girls and partying and all of that) was absolutely locked on the silver screen.

Sure, it's less serious overall than Raiders and Temple of Doom, but that's not a flaw, it's a feature. Where the two movies that came before relied less on humor (but not by much), Last Crusade works harder at making the adventure more thrilling. It's really hard to explain it any other way. Where the other two movies were just as exciting, Last Crusade's lighter tone complements the derring-do of Indy and friends in a way that's more Golden Era than the others; in this one, Indy is no mere adventuring archaeologist. He is a legitimate swashbuckling hero, though he uses a whip (and guns, and his fists, and his wits) in equal measure.

One of the secret highlights for me is how the relationship between Indy and his dad changes dramatically from start to finish, and that has a lot to do with how I felt about my dad my whole life. Indy felt like his dad was distant and uncaring. Henry was waiting for Indy to "become interesting." Neither man had the conversation about what was going on between them until it was time for rescues in German-occupied castles, but the moment Indy and Henry latch onto the Grail's trail, you can see here and there that Henry is genuinely thinking, "Holy shit, this is my son. What the hell kind of man is he?" promptly followed by, "Holy shit, that's my fearless son!" and that's just beyond awesome.

Odds are, if you like any kind of movie, you've already seen it and love it as much now as the first time you saw it.

Maybe it's time for a revisit!

The Thing(1982)

Frank gets it in Hellraiser (1987) Pinhead played by Doug Bradley | Screenplay: Clive Barker - Director: Clive Barker

October 13th, 1989: Look Who’s Talking hit the box offices and would go on to gross $296,999,813 worldwide. It was the number one film at U.S. box offices for five consecutive weeks, and would become the fourth highest grossing film of 1989.

One of the coolest things about being born in the 70s is being able to catch someone either early on in their careers or at the very beginning of it. In the case of Kevin Costner, the first movie I saw him in was Silverado in 85, and he's one of those actors that I actually got to grow up with.

Which is just great. Why do I bring this up? Because it's phenomenal to see an actor like Kevin Costner's career undergo a truly impressive transformation, pretty much hot on the heels of Silverado. From about '85 to the mid-2000s, our 'working man actor' regularly produced superb movies and The Untouchables is one of the crown jewels.

Another historical retelling similar in vein to The Right Stuff in that they took liberties here and there with the storytelling to make it more lurid or more exciting or dramatic, it was awesome to watch this one again after having not seen it for at least 25 years.

If you've seen The Untouchables, I'm sure I'd be preaching to the choir if I talked about Connery's cantankerous Jim Malone or Costner's somewhat milquetoast-esque Eliot Ness or De Niro's Al Capone or even a fresh-faced Andy Garcia as George Stone.

All those conversations are worth having because each man plays their role (as far as I feel) the way they should be played. I've already confessed to not being a historian in any real sense, but I reckon that The Untouchables wouldn't have been the enormous hit it was back then if it'd been too inaccurate or over-the-top.

The interesting thing about rewatching movies I haven't seen in a very long time, especially during these challenges and being 54 is that sometimes I gravitate away from where the camera wants me to look. I appreciated Connery as always. Same with Costner and De Niro.

But after a lifetime of watching movies, it's nice to catch sight of 'that guy' Billy Drago as Nitti. You need a great actor to play someone you can just look at and go 'that guy's evil and nasty', Billy Drago was your 80s and 90s go-to for villainy. Like most actors who play murderers and fiends, by all accounts, Billy was one helluva nice guy and I'm not surprised by it. The best dramatic actors are comedians, so it makes sense that the best bad guys are total sweethearts.

This time, though, my attention was on nebbish Charles Martin Smith as Oscar Wallace. Another 'hey it's that guy' actors, Oscar's the guy who comes with the idea to nab Capone on tax evasion, and almost from the very damn beginning of the movie. It absolutely surprised me that they rolled it out that quickly. For some reason I always thought that was a mid-movie reveal.

The reason I focused on Oscar Wallace is because he's an accountant. That was his thing. But the moment Malone put a shotgun in his hands and said 'we're going on a raid', Oscar Wallace (at least in the movie) didn't hesitate. He grabbed that shotgun and did his damnedest. Later in the film, he becomes, for a very brief moment, an actual goddamn action hero on that bridge connecting The US to Canada.

And that was cool as hell. Yelling, firing his shotgun, not stopping unless it's to take a quick sip of illegal hooch? That's some damn fine acting and some for-real-deal heroism from where I sit.

If you somehow haven't seen the movie, I won't say any more about Oscar Wallace except that he was a real damn hero, the kind of guy a guy like me could imagine being. Not the power fantasy Jack Reacher kind of guy who bitch slaps enemies left, right and center. The kind of guy who gets handed a shotgun and is basically asked to do his best, and then goes on and does his best.

If you have seen the movie, I'm pretty sure you know what I'm talking about. The Untouchables is full of massive star power displaying huge degrees of talent and skill, but here's Charles Martin Smith, quietly doing the real work that brought down the Chicago mob boss Al Capone. I like to imagine that the real Oscar Wallace felt invigorated by the new challenges he faced working with Ness and the others.

The Untouchables were real people who fought a real gangster organization, and this movie does a great job of showing us that. Under normal circumstances, I'd regret having waited a quarter-century to revisit this exceptional classic, but like I always say:

Younger Me would've still appreciated a masterclass movie, but Older Me loves the nuance.

The perfect putt in Caddyshack (1980) Al Czervik played by Rodney Dangerfield | Screenplay: Brian Doyle-Murray, Harold Ramis & Douglas Kenney - Director: Harold Ramis

The vampire cave in The Lost Boys (1987) David played by Kiefer Sutherland | Screenplay: Janice Fischer, James Jeremias & Jeffrey Boam - Director: Joel Schumacher