It’s a special Throwback Thursday this week and for the rest of September as Spinning the Reel embarks on another Decades Project. This time we are covering the 1960s on the podcast and right here on the blog. First up is my pick for the month: Agnes Varda’s Cleo from 5 to 7.

Of all film genres, it seems to me that comedy has the worst reputation when talking about classic movies. It makes sense, humor is far from static. What we find funny now may have been appalling to our grandparents (who among us hasn’t had an awkward experience watching a movie with older family member.) Conversely older comedies can feel inaccessible at best and outright racist, sexist or homophobic at worst. Crowd pleasers of old can feel entirely inaccessible now and often lead to the negative image of classic film, so for this week’s throwback lets talk about a nearly 60 year old comedy that still holds up: Dr. Strangelove.
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Welcome to the inaugural Throwback Thursday review! With our Movie of the Week, Jungle Cruise, sailing to the top of the box office I thought it would be fitting to dedicate our first Throwback Thursday post to one of the films that directly inspired it. Our initial throwback review is none other than the 1951 classic The African Queen.