My Movie Year: 1963

Note: this post is my contribution to the My Movie Year Blogathon, sponsored by Andy over at the Fandango Groovers Movie Blog. Head over there on April 15th for a list of other blogs participating in the event.

The biggest box office hit of 1963?

1963 was quite a year. It was the year John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Martin Luther King gave his "I have a dream..." speech. Everybody’s favorite prison, Alcatraz, closed down. In America, the Beatles had their first number one single, "I Wanna Hold your Hand." A gallon of gas cost 29 cents, a loaf of bread 22.  The average yearly income was $5,807. (1)  In the U.K., a little show called Doctor Who premiered on the BBC.


It was a turbulent, violent time for America, and the world. But it was a great time for the movies.

Everyone touts 1939 as the gold standard of great movie years, and it is indeed an incredible year. But 1963 was none too shabby either. Take a gander at these titles:

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Cleopatra                    
55 Days in Peking
Tom Jones
The Leopard
The Haunting
The Damned
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World    
8 ½
Hud
The Servant
This Sporting Life
Contempt
Bye Bye Birdie
Irma La Douce
Love with a Proper Stranger
Disney’s The Sword and the Stone

The Pink Panther
The Prize
Sunday in New York
The V.I.P.s
Donovan’s Reef
McClintock
Shock Corridor
The Nutty Professor.
The Raven
X -- The Man with the X-Ray Eyes
Jason and the Argonauts
High and Low
Four for Texas               
Lillies of the Field

Box office hit #2

There are a lot of great movies on that list, and most of the rest are at least a good time. But for my money, five additional movies released that year really stand out in my personal pantheon as grand entertainments.

They may not be the best, or the most critically well-regarded, but they are all very special to me. I’ll talk a little about why, starting from number 5 and working my way up to numero uno.

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