Editor’s note: This is part of The Know’s series, Staff Favorites. Each week, we give our opinions on the best that Colorado has to offer for dining, shopping, entertainment, outdoor activities and more. (We’ll also let you in on some hidden gems.)
We used to be . So why have so many of us forgotten practical solutions to the bugs of modern technology?
I use “we” because this was me a couple of weeks ago: on the couch, remote in hand, scrolling through Netflix’s latest offerings for a movie as the clock neared midnight. One carousel of options bled into another, until I finally settled on a mid-series episode of “Breaking Bad” because, well, I had already seen the entire show three times through and was starting to get sleepy.
But there are better — and cheaper — ways to watch movies from home. It takes a digital TV antenna, the kind one can find at hardware or retail stores for about $20. Hook it up to the television, mount it high on the wall or roof and scan for channels. Then flip to channel 26: it’s Movies!
Fox Corporation and Weigel Broadcasting launched the Movies! network in 2013, offering round-the-clock programming of films from the 20th century. It is transmitted in Denver through a low-powered digital station that broadcasts in grainy, standard definition. The westerns, noirs, dramas, action movies and comedies of yesteryear screened on Movies! are so unpredictable, so hit-or-miss, yet mostly always admirable as the products of bygone eras of film.
It’s the offbeat, occasionally off-putting cousin of Turner Classic Movies, with commercial interruptions.
That’s not to say it doesn’t have class. My last couple of peeks dropped me in the middle of the salacious 1954 noir “Mildred Pierce,” starring Joan Crawford; the steamy “Key Largo” from 1948, with Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall and a memorable Edward G. Robinson; and “A Stolen Life” from 1946, in which Bette Davis plays twins through impressive special effects for the period.
The channel designates special time slots throughout the week to specific movie stars: Audrey Hepburn, Robert Redford, Roy Scheider. It’s how, one Saturday morning, I caught “The Seven-Ups” (1973), starring Scheider as a brazen NYPD detective. A lengthy car chase building up to the movie’s climax riveted me, all roaring engines, screeching brakes and vintage shots of cars speeding through New York City thoroughfares. The action felt fresh and urgent. New York City looked iconic in its grey splendor. “The Seven-Ups” would’ve likely remained in the film vault for me had this channel not screened it.
For every surprise discovery, however, there are one or more duds.
Some of those duds would file nicely in a “so bad it’s good” category. I saw Frank Sinatra in the only movie he directed, 1965’s “None but the Brave,” whose anti-war message was bogged down by poor acting and stage sets. Then I watched Tom Hanks in one of his earliest film roles in the comedy “Bachelor Party” (1984), full of groan-inducing dialogue. (When someone asks Hanks’ character who he is, he replies, “Bond. James Bond.” Gag.)
Others are just plain offensive when seen through modern eyes, serving as reminders of the rampant whitewashing of the early film industry. One period movie, whose name I can’t remember, had actors in makeup playing the roles of Asian characters. “None but the Brave” was lauded at the time for using a Japanese cast for the roles of Japanese soldiers. The inclusion mattered. It wasn’t always that way.
But the truly bad flicks are few and far between. Take it from someone who has watched broadcast television since middle school, and has seen it devolve from general programming to dusty reruns of “The Andy Griffith Show” and new shows with names like “Police,” “Ambulance” and “Fire.” While viewing audiences have migrated away from broadcast television to streaming services, the offerings on some of those platforms aren’t any better. Sometimes the act of scrolling up and down, left and right on a streaming app’s home page can sound more interesting than any of the digital titles on the shelf.
The movies on Movies! are usually worth your time. If you think otherwise, at least you’ll have an antenna to watch live sports, award ceremonies and dating competitions without the fear of a stream buffering or crashing. No subscription necessary.
