Inspired by The Phoenix Lights, the largest mass UFO sighting in U.S. history, Star People is a sci-fi thriller that tells the story of a photographer who receives a tip that could finally shed light on her childhood UFO sighting, but a deadly heatwave and unexpected guests threaten to derail her obsessive search for answers.
The film stars actor and recording artist Kat Cunning, McCabe Slye, Connor Paolo, Eddie Martinez, Bradley Fisher, and Adriana Aluna Martinez.
Adam Finberg (Writer/Director/Producer) grew up in Phoenix, Arizona and moved to Southern California to attend the American Film Institute’s directing program. He’s worked the past 20 years as a writer, director and editor. Star People is his first feature length narrative film.
Adam began his career directing music videos (Armin van Buuren, Malbec, Otis) before moving on to commercial work (Napoleon Perdis, Go Daddy). His first documentary, After Katrina: Rebuilding St. Bernard Parish, shined a light on the perils and pains of post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans. His first feature documentary, The Business of Recovery, dove into the secret lucrative world of the American addiction treatment industry. The film was featured on Last Week Tonight With John Oliver as it sparked conversations about the rehab industry and was even showcased at the International Drug Policy Reform Conference in Washington, DC to help guide policy decisions.
Star People will have its world premiere at Dances with Films: LA 2025 on the 28th of June.
Editor-in-Chief at Moviescramble. A Fan of all things cinematic with a love of Film Noir, Sci-Fi and Julia Roberts in Notting Hill. He hopes to grow up some day.
Little White Lies was established in 2005 as a bi-monthly print magazine committed to championing great movies and the talented people who make them. Combining cutting-edge design, illustration and journalism, we’ve been described as being “at the vanguard of the independent publishing movement.” Our reviews feature a unique tripartite ranking system that captures the different aspects of the movie-going experience. We believe in Truth & Movies.
Dreaming of You: The Making of The Coral follows the story of six childhood outsiders from Merseyside as they transform into one of the most influential British guitar bands of the new millennium. Their high-energy blend of psychedelic rock ‘n’ roll revitalised the doldrums of the post-Britpop music scene.
Narrated by the band, the film is an immersive experience that creatively combines reconstruction, archive footage, and animation to capture the early 2000s era through the eyes of six northern teenagers, who together created their own strange, endlessly creative escapist universe. As the friends leave their sleepy hometown of Hoylake in pursuit of musical glory, the spotlight eventually finds them, but is it fame they’re after, or is it just being together?
With appearances from The Lightning Seeds, The Zutons, and Tramp Attack, Dreaming of You: The Making of The Coral is a dreamscape of friendship, fame, and fuzzy guitars. The film commemorates The Coral from their working-class Merseyside roots, through their rise in Liverpool’s Bandwagon Scene, going on to become one of the UK’s most influential bands.
For director James Slater, the creative direction for the film was as important as the story itself, speaking on this James said, “I wanted Dreaming of You to be an immersive experience—one that transports us back to Northwest England in the late ’90s and early 2000s. …The visual aesthetic of the film is further enhanced by the formats used to shoot both the GVs and reconstructions—Mini DV, Hi-8, 16mm, and 8mm—all mediums that were used to document the band at the time. This rich visual tapestry is accompanied not only by the band’s musical archive but also by a layered sound design that further immerses us in the era, embedding us deeply within the time and place.”
On celebrating the World Premiere at Sheffield Doc Fest, director James Slater commented, “It’s an honour to be part of Sheffield DocFest, especially alongside such an incredible line-up of films. Dreaming of You is a northern coming-of-age story at heart, so it feels especially fitting for the journey to begin here…”.
Dreaming Of You: The Making Of The Coral will premiere at the Sheffield Doc Fest on the 21st of June.
Editor-in-Chief at Moviescramble. A Fan of all things cinematic with a love of Film Noir, Sci-Fi and Julia Roberts in Notting Hill. He hopes to grow up some day.
Cucks are having their pop culture moment, from HBO productions like Mountainhead and The White Lotus to Apple TV+’s Your Friends and Neighbors, to the Manhattan courtroom where Sean “Diddy” Combs stands trial.
The word cuck, short for cuckold, refers to a man whose female partner has sex with other men, often humiliating him in the process. It alludes to the cuckoo bird, because of its tendency to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds. The word dates back to medieval times: References to cuckolds are found in the works of Chaucer and William Shakespeare. Humiliated men are natural fodder for drama.
That’s especially true today, an age when the term cuckold has been co-opted and shortened by conservatives, who demean moderate or conservative men they deem to be soft as “cucks.” Liberals (and sometimes fellow conservatives) have fired back by calling supposedly soft right-wingers as “cuckservatives.” The phrase has also come into common use to refer to anyone who is a sucker or rube.
But cuckolding need not be humiliating: For some, it’s a turn-on. Some research indicates that as many as 20 percent of North Americans have engaged in consensual non-monogamy, or CNM. (This of course includes men who have sex with multiple women, who are not, by definition, cuckolds.)
Hollywood’s cuck fascination may just be catching up to the general population. PornHub’s 2024 Year in Review, one annual indicator of people’s secret desires, indicated a slight uptick in the terms “cuckold wife” (up 8%,) and “wife swap” (up 6%).
And as modern pop culture reflects, cuckery is complicated: Sexologist Jill McDevitt has said that it can be a form of masochism or sadism. Some cuckolds enjoy “the arousal that comes from relinquishing power and being humiliated,” she told Men’s Health last year. Others, she said, enjoy watching their partner with someone else, from a sadistic perspective, because he is role-playing “getting revenge on his partner by pimping her out.”
Nowhere is the complication more evident than in the Diddy trial, where the rap impresario is accused of hiring male escorts to have sex with his then-partner, Cassie Ventura, in “freakoffs,” or, in their shorthand, FOs. Prosecutors say the freakoffs amounted to sex trafficking, but Diddy’s lawyers have used texts between Ventura and Combs to argue that they were consensual, and that she enjoyed the freakoffs.
Jurors will have to decide whether Diddy’s orchestration of his partner into something that has been, since Shakespeare’s time, a shorthand for humiliation was, in fact, a power move — and abuse of power.
Hollywood is asking viewers to ask the same questions about a wide range of fictional characters. But what’s different about the cucks of today and the cucks of old is that today’s cucks are often fully aware of their partner’s sex with others, if not fully on board.
Hollywood’s Fascination With Cucks
In Wes Anderson’s 2021 The Royal Tenenbaums, Bill Murray’s Raleigh St. Clair cuts a pitiable figure as he realizes the extent of his wife Margot (Gwyneth Paltrow’s) cheating: “You’ve made a cuckold of me,” he laments.
But the Hollywood cuckolds of today are likely to be well aware of their partner’s cheating, if not encouraging of it.
Whatever the reasons, cucks and cuckery are very much in the zeitgeist, especially on prestige TV: On Season 3 of The White Lotus, the malevolent Greg Hunt (Jon Gries), who recently came into a fortune via the murder of his wife, has a fetish for watching his new partner with younger men. In the new HBO film Mountainhead, the sole likable character, Jeff (Ramy Youssef), is a multibillionaire who doesn’t want his significant other going to a sex party in Mexico, but feels powerless to tell her it’s a dealbreaker. He is open with the other powerful men in his wealthy cohort about his hopes that she won’t sleep with anyone else.
Jesse Armstrong, the writer-director of Mountainhead, previously examined cuckoldry on his show Succession, in which Tom Wambsgans (Matthew MacFayden) was afraid his wife Shiv Roy (Sarah Snook) would leave him if he objected to her sleeping around.
Perhaps the most prominent cuckold now on television is Andrew “Coop” Cooper (Jon Hamm), the protagonist of Apple TV+’s hit Your Friends and Neighbors. Coop appears, in most senses, to be an alpha male: He has a big house, a huge finance job, and a Maserati. In some ways he’s a modern Don Draper, the sturdy, traditional alpha Hamm played on Mad Man.
But Coop becomes a cuckold against his will when his wife Mel (Amanda Peet), sleeps with one of his best friends, former NBA star Nick (Mark Tallman). Unlike many other TV cucks, Coop exits the marriage because of her infidelity. But in a shock to all the friends and neighbors of the show’s title, Coop remains friendly with both Mel and Nick, and even shocks everyone by attending a party at Nick’s house. (He gets in a fight there — but not with Nick.)
In an interesting reversal, Coop makes a cuck of the man who cucked him when he sleeps with Mel on a visit to Princeton. Nick doesn’t take it well, punching Coop. But, soon after, they put their differences aside and bro out with a night on the town.
Perhaps both are heeding the words of Iago in Shakespeare’s Othello: “Beware, my lord, of jealousy/It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock/The meat it feeds on/That cuckold lives in bliss/Who, certain of his fate, loves not his wronger.”
Main image: Ramy Youssef as Jeff in Mountainhead. HBO
These movie masks are the coolest in cinematic history.
Remember when everyone was wearing masks all the time?
We’re glad we don’t have to do that anymore.
The Bane Mask in The Dark Knight Rises
Tom Hardy as Bane, Christian Bale as Batman – Credit: Warner Bros
We’ve all replicated the “Bane mask voice” by cupping our hands around our mouths and talking with a high-pitched British accent.
But the mask also gives Bane an aura of mystery: Does it help him breath? Does it hide scars? Bane’s mask is as enigmatic and stylish as the man who wears it.
The Ghostface Mask in the Scream Saga
Matthew Lillard as Ghostface – Credit: Miramax
The Scream Ghostface-slasher mask is somehow silly, pulpy, and menacing all at once. Its innocuous simplicity hides the dreadful killer(s) underneath.
It would be very unusual to experience a Halloween absent of this costume, built around one of the most immediately recognizable movie masks.
The Hannibal Lecter Mask in The Silence of the Lambs
Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter – Credit: Orion
Hannibal Lecter technically wears two famous movie masks in the greatest Thomas Harris adaptation, The Silence of the Lambs. The first is his terrifying muzzle, a Jason Vorhees-esque mask with bars blocking his mouth.
The second is not nearly as stylish — it’s an actual human face.
The former has certainly been more integrated into pop-culture more than the latter, but both are worth mentioning.
The Jason Mask in the Friday the 13th Films
Derek Mears as Jason Voorhees – Credit: Paramount
The cinematic influence of the Jason Vorhees hockey mask is incalculable. So many films reference Jason Vorhees’ crude face-covering that it is practically expected every time a bank robbery is depicted on screen.
Fascinatingly, the mask that would become the trademark of Friday the 13th — and slasher movies in general – didn’t make it to the screen until Friday the 13th Part III, released in 1982.
The hockey mask is a cheap yet effective symbol of dread that won’t be disappearing from the zeitgeist anytime soon.
Tie: All the Eyes Wide Shut Masks
Tom Cruise in Eyes Wide Shut – Credit: Warner Bros
The Venetian masks that appear in the secret party sequence of Eyes Wide Shot represent exactly the kind of extravagance and costume work we expect from a Stanley Kubrick film.
They are ethereal and refined — a beautiful piece of ironic characterization designed to protect the identities of those about to become intimate. Among the most jarring and tragic movie masks.
The Darth Vader Mask
David Prowse as Darth Vader, Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia – Credit: 20th Century Fox.
The most obvious, and inevitable choice is still a correct one for this list. Darth Vader’s masked visage is still the most awe-inspiring in the history of movie villains. It made countless other filmmakers realize great movie masks are among the most cost-effective storytelling devices.
Max’s Mask in Mad Max: Fury Road
Tom Hardy as Max – Credit: Warner Bros.
Though he spends the majority of his time with the mask attempting to forcefully remove it, Max’s metal face protector is nonetheless visually compelling.
There is a running joke in the film world that every director Tom Hardy works with makes him cover his face. He could easily have made this list more than twice.
The Guy Fawkes Mask in V for Vendetta
Hugo Weaving as V – Credit: Warner Bros.
The Guy Fawkes mask that V wears in V for Vendetta was infamous long before the film was released.
But the rhyming swashbuckler certainly provided it with a new flair, and turned it into one of the best movie masks of this century.
The Dread Pirate Roberts Mask in The Princess Bride
Cary Elwes as Wesley, aka The Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride. 20th Century Fox.
As you wish. Wesley returns to save his Princess Buttercup disguised as the Dread Pirate Roberts, and his mask allows him to find out if he’s still her true love.
Sporting a new mustache and elegant, black mask-scarf, he is skilled, debonair, and frightening, no longer the farm boy she once knew.
The Princess Bride is captivating even before the Dread Pirate Roberts arrives, but then he takes the movie into the stratosphere. With a detour through the Fire Swamp, of course.
The Mask of Zorro in The Mask of Zorro
Antonio Banderas as Zorro – Credit: C/O
See what we did there?
Antonio Banderas’ incarnation of Zorro is overflowing with charisma. His classic combination of black mask, large gaucho hat, and flowing cape never disappoints.
There have been many Zorros throughout cinematic history — in fact, Zorro helped inspire Batman to become a vigilante, decades ago. But Banderas’ Zorro is our favorite.
When the handsome David Aames (Cruise) has his face disfigured in a car crash, he takes to wearing a blank, expressionless mask to cover his scars and deformity.
The mask’s total absence of expression suggests that all life and joy has gone out of David, and maybe it has. But Vanilla Sky still has plenty of twists ahead.
The Michael Myers Mask in Halloween
Credit: C/O
Sometimes simplest is best.
Tasked with finding a suitable mask for Michael Myers, the monster of John Carpenter and Debra Hill’s horror masterpiece, production designer Tommy Lee Wallace went to a Hollywood Boulevard magic shop, where he found a Captain Kirk mask designed to look like Star Trek star William Shatner. He painted it white, changed the hair, and Michael Myers was born.
Wallace later directed Halloween III: Season of the Witch — which is all about masks. Specifically, a plot to take over people’s minds through microchipped Halloween masks.
Some old scary movies just don’t feel scary anymore. But these films stood the test of time.
The Exorcist (1973)
Warner Bros. – Credit: Warner Bros.
Profoundly chilling even before Linda Blair’s head starts spinning, The Exorcist did for unearthing ancient demons what Jaws did for going in the water.
The franchise returned last year with David Gordon Green’s Exorcist: Believer, in which Ellen Burstyn reprised the role of Chris MacNeil for the first time in 50 years.
Jaws (1975)
Universal – Credit: Universal Pictures
A perfect movie that deploys its doll-eyed villain with impeccable skill, Jaws made everyone who has ever seen it think about sharks at least a little bit every single time we went to the beach for the rest of our lives.
It’s still every bit as scary now as it was nearly 50 years ago.
The newest film on this list, based on the first Stephen King novel, remains anxiety-inducing not because of the literal bucket of blood, but because of the high-school cruelty that still rings in the souls of anyone who experienced it.
The casual bullying, from a time when it was much more tolerated than it is today, is as upsetting to watch as it ever was.
This low-budget George Romero masterpiece retains an eerie, simple power that makes it more frightening than The Last of Us, The Walking Dead, or any of the other countless zombie stories and other scary movies it inspired.
Everyone today talks about gaslighting all the time, but Rosemary’s Baby takes us inside a Manhattan apartment building that has perfected it to terrifying extremes.
When Rosemary (Mia Farrow) becomes pregnant, everyone around her attributes her well-founded fears to hormones and paranoia. But just because you’re paranoid, as the saying goes, doesn’t mean they’re not after you. Or your baby.
Psycho (1960)
Paramount – Credit: Paramount Pictures
The Alfred Hitchcock classic implied more than it showed, but implied it quite effectively.
Psycho spawned the slasher genre, made horror respectable, and made lots of people feel a lot less safe in the shower.
A giallo masterpiece worth watching for the lurid colors alone, Dario Argento’s beautiful, haunting and terrifying story follows an American (Jessica Harper, above) at an elite German ballet academy who realizes, via some very creatively presented murders, that the school is hotbed of witchcraft.
The very confusing sequel, Inferno, released in 1980, is also very worth a watch. Don’t try to sort out the plot. Just let yourself be hypnotized in a wash of blood, color and fire.
Like them or not, Argento makes the most visually stunning horror movies.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
Bryanston Distributing Company – Credit: C/O
You’re creeped out just reading that title. The film’s relentlessly menacing atmospherics — buzzing flies, animal sounds — make it one of the creepiest things ever committed to film. The chainsaw stuff pushes it far over the top. But Tobe Hooper’s very smart direction also lifts it far above its many imitators.
Despite the ominous title, the film implies more than it shows — like all the best horror movies.
Also: Grainy ’70s film stock makes everything scarier.
What Have You Done to Solange? (1972)
Italian International Film – Credit: C/O
This giallo thriller has a straightforward premise: a private school teacher becomes a murder suspect when he can’t provide an alibi for a killing — because he was in the arms of one of his students. The manner of death remains gasp-inducing, all these years later.
Please note that all the other scary movies on this list are quite tame compared to the next two scary movies.
Last House on the Left (1972)
Hallmark Releasing – Credit: C/O
The directorial debut of future Scream and Nightmare on Elm Street icon Wes Craven, Last House on the Left is a difficult-to-watch story of two young women who are terrorized by escaped convicts.
Eventually, parents seek vengeance. But before that you have to sit though a deeply unpleasant scene where the convicts treat the women horribly, and one walks hopelessly into water to die, rather than let it go on any longer.
It’s loosely based on Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring, and carried the infamous tagline, “To avoid fainting, keep repeating, ‘It’s only a movie … Only a movie … Only a movie …’”
Johnny Got His Gun (1971)
Cinemation Industries – Credit: C/O
Based on a 1939 Dalton Trumbo novel, and adapted into a film by Trumbo during the Vietnam War, this powerful and deeply affecting anti-war story follows a young man named Joe who suffers battlefield injuries that cost him his arms, legs, sight and ability to see and hear. He’s left trapped in his own mind.
Long after Vietnam, the movie managed to terrify Gen X audiences thanks to Metallica, who featured clips of it prominently in their 1988 video for “One.”
Its entire ambiance is unsettling, even before we get to the scenes of Joe in his hospital bed. It’s not even technically a horror movie, but it’s one of the most resonant scary movies we’ve ever seen.
The Simpsons is such a good show that even minor Simpsons characters are often better than the lead characters on lesser shows.
Here are the best minor Simpsons characters who have passed through Springfield since the Simpsons‘ debut, 35 years ago.
But First — What Makes a Character ‘Minor’?
FOX – Credit: C/O
Obviously, it’s subjective — even secondary characters, such as Krusty the Clown and Principal Skinner, have been at the forefront of several episodes. They are probably too “major” to be “minor.”
For the purposes of defining a minor character, we are looking for the tertiary folks. They don’t appear in every episode, and they often appear in only one scene when they do.
We still had plenty of options, though!
Kirk Van Houten
FOX – Credit: C/O
Milhouse, Bart’s best friend, was established early in the run of The Simpsons. He actually debuted in an ad for Butterfingers. At first, Milhouse’s parents were just, you know, Milhouse’s parents. They were there because Milhouse needed parents, and they were thought out so little that Kirk and Luann look like one another.
Then, “A Milhouse Divided” happened. The fantastic episode is focused, in part, on Kirk and Luann getting divorced. Kirk got a racing car bed and recorded “Can I Borrow a Feeling?”
Suddenly, Kirk was basically the adult version of Milhouse, but with the existential bleakness of adulthood added onto the character.
You may remember Troy McClure from such films as Leper in the Backfield and Christmas Ape Goes to Summer Camp. And also from The Simpsons, in which Troy was the resident formerly-famous actor now relegated to infomercials and other less prestigious gigs.
And yet, Troy maintained enthusiasm, and of course a desire to remind you of what projects he had been in.
He was usually a one-scene character, but McClure did have one significant role, which gave us the beloved Planet of the Apes musical.
After the murder of Phil Hartman, the brilliant actor who voiced by Troy McClure, The Simpsons, out of respect, decided to retire McClure.
Agnes Skinner
Credit: C/O
We mentioned Principal Skinner, a classic secondary character, but with Seymour, you occasionally get Agnes. As Skinner developed as a character, it became canonical that he lived with his mother, Agnes. She’s, well, she’s a lot. Agnes makes Seymour’s life tough, but she makes us laugh.
The elderly woman is mean spirited and free with her opinions, most of them negative. She’s harsh with Seymour, and a common comedic trope on The Simpsons is the Norman and Mrs. Bates vibe between the two.
But she doesn’t save her criticisms solely for her son. Nobody avoid the hostility of Agnes Skinner.
Superintendent Chalmers
FOX – Credit: C/O
Former Simpsons writer Bill Oakley has called Chalmers his favorite character. The superintendent was introduced into the show to be a “straight man,” the one sane individual in a town full of wacky characters. He provided a fine juxtaposition to Skinner, and the two provided a lot of great comedy together.
As time went on, Chalmers started to pop up more. He’s even been central to a couple episodes, and now he has a daughter, Shauna, who shows up occasionally as well. Good ol’ Gary Chalmers has no patience with anybody, and in many cases rightfully so.
Different types of comedic archetypes are important, especially in a show that has been on for over 30 years.
Lunch Lady Doris
FOX – Credit: C/O
The trope of an apathetic lunch lady serving up slop is well worn. Adam Sandler wrote an entire song about it. But The Simpsons‘ Lunchlady Doris (now known as Dora after the death of Doris Grau, the original voice actor) is arguably the foremost purveyor of garbage food served to kids.
With a cigarette ever dangling from her mouth, Doris is brimming with a lack of consideration for health or nutrition.
Horse meat. Malk. Enough grease to lube up a jacked Scotsman. Doris has it all. Her deadpan, distinct voice helped to make the character memorable, even if minor.
If you want a reasonably good doctor, you go to Julius Hibbert. If you want to save money, or need a quack for an iffy lawsuit, you go to Dr. Nick. While the doctor has largely disappeared from the show, he made quite the splash. There was no dubious product he wouldn’t put his name on, even if it was a gravestone cleaner.
His incompetency never marred his enthusiasm. The medical “professional” was always ready with a chipper “Hi, everybody!” leading to the familiar reply, “Hi, Dr. Nick!” Then, the medical malpractice would begin.
Hey, if you’re going to be a risk to your patients, you might as well have a bright bedside manner.
Roger Meyers Jr.
FOX – Credit: C/O
In the world of The Simpsons, Itchy & Scratchy is the most-popular cartoon. It’s basically Tom & Jerry, but overtly violent to the point of being gory.
The man behind the cartoon mouse and cat (and briefly Poochie)? That would be Roger Meyers Jr.
Voiced by the late Alex Rocco, Meyers was an ornery sort. Whether with Marge, his writers, or Chester J. Lampwick, Meyers wasn’t afraid to raise his voice or to get combative. Every time Meyers showed up, it was fun. While we likely won’t see him again, Meyers had a few memorable turns as one of our favorite minor Simpsons characters.
Disco Stu
FOX – Credit: C/O
He started as a one-off joke. Homer had a jacket he tried to emblazon with the words “Disco Stud,” but ran out of room. The jacket, available at a yard sale, was seen by Disco Stu, who let us know that “Disco Stu doesn’t advertise.” So began a one-note, but delightful, run.
The joke is simple. Stu loves Disco. He talks in the third person, and in rhymes. You could never build an episode around him. Heck, you can barely build a scene around Disco Stu.
Still, he’s one of many minor Simpsons characters who have hustled laughs out of us time and time again. Plus, he deserves sympathy. He can’t get his fish out of his platform shoes!
Elizabeth Hoover
FOX – Credit: C/O
The late Edna Krabappel was a secondary character, like her on-and-off paramour Skinner. Hoover, Lisa’s teacher, gets a lot less attention. Maybe she’s not as funny as her former coworker, but Hoover has her good moments as well.
Hoover is just as apathetic as Edna, but doesn’t have the same world-weariness. Maybe it’s because she drinks Kahlua while she grades tests.
Sure, Hoover may be in the shadow of Krabappel. But Scottie Pippen was in the shadow of Michael Jordan, and he’s still a Hall of Famer.
Surprisingly, Carl Carlson has arguably graduated to being a secondary character. He’s gotten a couple episodes built around him.
But Lenny? Well, he’s still stuck in minor character standing. Of course, that hasn’t stopped him from being funnier than Carl.
Lenny is put upon, and his eyes are often in peril. He’s dumber than Carl, his best friend and possible unrequited love (though that joke has sort of dissipated in recent years). In the early days, Lenny was just Homer’s jovial buddy and coworker, and he had good lines even then.
Eventually, the writers started to make a joke of his Simpsons minor character status, and that took him up a notch.
Mona Simpson
FOX – Credit: C/O
Homer’s dad, Abe, is a great character, but also arguably at or near the top of the secondary level. On the other hand, Homer’s mother, Mona, has had such infrequent appearances that they can be counted on one hand. Her first appearance, though, ensured she would be memorable from the get go.
The fittingly titled “Mother Simpson” gave us our first look at Homer’s mother, voiced by Glenn Close. She had disappeared from Homer’s life one night when he was a young kid, and there was a lot of time to make up, but also some making up to do emotionally.
Then, alas, Mona had to flee again. “Mother Simpson” is a funny episode, but also one of the sweeter ones.
Sideshow Bob
FOX – Credit: C/O
With Bob Terwilliger, it’s tricky. Almost every time he shows up, Sideshow Bob is central to the episode. They are literally considered “Sideshow Bob” episodes. On the other hand, there are only 14 Sideshow Bob episodes in a show that has had well over 700 episodes.
Voiced indelibly by TV icon Kelsey Grammer, Bob is Krusty the Clown’s former sidekick, a genius, an aesthete, and, oh yeah, a homicidal maniac. When he isn’t singing opera, Bob is probably trying to commit a crime, most likely trying to kill his nemesis, one Bart Simpson.
A few of the Bob episodes are dicey, but about a half-dozen of them are all-timers. Bob is a star when he shows up, but he shows up so rarely he’s still special (and, just barely, a minor Simpsons character).
Like This List of the Best Minor Simpsons Characters?
What’s the best superhero movie ever made? For our money, it’s one of the following — presented in no particular order.
The Dark Knight (2008)
Heath Ledger as The Joker in The Dark Knight. Warner Bros. – Credit: C/O
This is the most obvious choice — a jittery, chilling morality play in which everyone does everything right, anchored by Christian Bale as the best Batman and Heath Ledger in an Oscar-winning role as one of the best-ever screen villains, a mastermind posing as a clown.
One could argue this doesn’t belong on a list of superhero movies, since no one has super powers… but that’s part of what we love about The Dark Knight.
Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
Disney – Credit: C/O
After an astonishing opening that promises anything could happen, Infinity War invests in character development as much as action before ending on a cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers.
Its sequel, Avengers: Endgame, not only resolves that cliffhanger but also pays off more than a decade of Marvel superhero movie storylines.
Watching Infinity War and Endgame back to back, it’s hard not to feel like you’re revisiting the high water mark of the MCU. Hopefully Kevin Feige and company can recapture the greatness of the late 2010s with Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, which will bring back some of our old favorites.
Spider-Man 2 (2004)
Sony – Credit: C/O
Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) learns that with great power comes not just great responsibility, but great sacrifice, as he realizes that his role as Spider-Man endangers the love of his life, Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst).
Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) is one of the all-time best spider villains, and the highlight of the whole film comes in a truly marvelous sequence in which New York City saves Spidey, for a change. The most romantic of all superhero movies, except for the last one on our list.
Sony made an inspired choice when they hired Sam Raimi to land this one, and he nailed it — he brought the very Peter Parkeresque scrappiness of his Evil Dead franchise to an at-the-time unproven property, recognizing that Spider-Man is as much about heart as heroics. And sometimes heart and heroics are the same thing.
X2: X-Men United (2003)
Fox – Credit: C/O
2003’s X-Men 2 far improves on the original from the first scene: It starts with Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming) operatically invading the Oval Office, and never slows.
The fight between Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) and Lady Deathstryke (Kelly Hu) feels far more grounded and high-stakes than terrible CGI fights that would ruin so many superhero movies in the years to come, and Brian Cox is menacingly flawless as Col. William Stryker, a very believable nemesis to our favorite band of mutants.
Fox seemed timid about the first X-Men, since superhero movies seemed a little niche at the time of its release. But X2 stays truer to the Chris Claremont X-Men comics, and soars as a result.
Logan (2017)
Hugh Jackman in Logan. Fox – Credit: C/O
A break-all-the-rules story of sacrifice, loss, and one loner’s struggle to get through centuries on this planet doing more good than harm.
Director James Mangold proved once and for all that comic book movies aren’t just for kids with a metaphorical story of aging as gracefully as you can.
Mangold returned to the theme of an aging action hero, meanwhile, in the recent Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. But honestly, we prefer Logan.
Deadpool (2016)
Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) in Deadpool. Fox – Credit: C/O
The most flat-out funny comic-book movie ever made, which made it to the screen through Ryan Reynold’s stubborn insistence that one of Marvel’s weirdest, least likely screen stars could be one of its greatest.
And yes, we enjoyed last year’s megahit Deadpool vs. Wolverine — but not as much as we enjoyed their solo adventures.
Black Panther (2018)
Disney – Credit: C/O
The world-building is stellar and acting top-notch throughout. Michael B. Jordan plays perhaps the MCU’s best villain ever, and Chadwick Boseman delivered a beautiful turn as a king torn between his people and the people of the world in this Best Picture nominee from Ryan Coogler.
It’s kind of stunning that both Black Panther and Infinity War were released just months apart — 2018 was quite a year for Marvel, and superhero movies in general.
And that’s before we even get to the next super movie on our list.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse (2018)
Sony – Credit: C/O
Breaking with every kind of staid tradition, this boldly experimental, utterly gorgeous animated film is a loving, awe-inspiring homage to decades of Spider-mythology and an optimistic look ahead at what comic book movies — and their young fans — can aspire to be.
It’s incredible how many spider friends — and villains — the movie fits in, making it all look effortless. It’s a movie you can watch dozens of times, catching something new on each viewing.
We just wish its often-fantastic sequel, Across the Spider-Verse, hadn’t ended on such a tough cliffhanger.
X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique in X-Men: Days of Future Past. Fox – Credit: C/O
A fairly faithful screen adaptation of one of Christopher Claremont’s most iconic storylines from the comics, though it puts Logan (Hugh Jackman) center stage instead of Kitty Pryde and ambitiously melds the X-Men movies of the 2000s and their prequels of the 2010s.
Long before the many movie metaverses made time travel or alternate realities feel exhausting, this X-Men film had what was then a fresh and thrilling take.
Blade (1998)
New Line Cinema – Credit: C/O
Blade isn’t perfect, but it expanded everyone’s idea of what a superhero movie could be by pulling from one of Marvel’s lesser-known heroes: a vampire hunter who wears a leather jacket instead of a cape or tights.
Blade opened the door to the reality that Marvel could have as much or even more success with its second-tier or forgotten characters, like Ant-Man or the Guardians of the Galaxy, than it could with heroes we had seen onscreen before.
And of course Wesley Snipes is awesome in the lead role, and delivers the classic line, Some mother—-er’s are always trying to ice skate uphill.”
The Incredibles (2004)
Pixar – Credit: C/O
Pixar’s The Incredibles is both a great family superhero movie and a dark deconstruction of superhero tropes — note that Mr. Incredible bails out on the business because of legal threats, not because of bad guys.
The animation is groundbreaking and stellar, combining dynamic character design with Art Deco touches that harken back to the days of Batman and Superman. It’s funny, it’s sweeping, it’s curiously dark. The grainy black-and-white rescue segment takes it to a daring new level. It’s a super movie in every way.
Superman (1978)
Warner Bros. – Credit: C/O
The film that started it all. Its earnestness and total reliance on practical effects — as well as stellar performances and moving love story between Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) and Supes make it feel more charming and inspiring with each passing year.
Christopher Reeve will always be our Superman, and, as we mentioned, it’s the most romantic superhero movie.
How many of these 11 hit movies of the 1970s can you guess from the image? Remember your number, because we’ll tell you how you scored at the end.
1970
Universal Pictures – Credit: C/O
This was the No. 2 top-grossing movie of 1970, with an all-star cast that included Burt Lancaster, Dean Martin, George Kennedy, Helen Hayes, Jean Seberg and Jacqueline Bisset. It earned more than $106 million at the box office.
Want a hint? Note the background of the shot, and where our stars are.
Ready for the answer? OK. It is… scroll down…
1970 Answer: Airport
Universal Pictures – Credit: C/O
Coming in just behind the top-grossing film of 1970s, Love Story, Airport followed a formula that The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno, and other 1970s disaster movies would follow:
Take a bunch of A-list stars, put them in peril, and watch the sparks fly.
Burt Lancaster once dismissed Airport as “the biggest piece of junk ever made,” but it inspired three sequels and was later satirized, of course, by 1980’s Airplane.
1971
Warner Bros. – Credit: C/O
This story of a Vietnam veteran, part-Navajo hapkido master was one of the biggest hits to come out in 1971 — especially after its re-release — and even beat Dirty Harry, the first of Clint Eastwood’s five films about San Francisco cop Harry Callahan.
Okay, one more huge hint: It starred Tom Laughlin in the title role, and was known for the song “One Tin Soldier.”
Ready? Scroll down for the answer…
1971 Answer: Billy Jack
Credit: C/O
Warner Bros.
Yes, we know it’s crazy, but Billy Jack really did beat Dirty Harry. Of course, Billy Jack had the advantage of being based on a character audiences already knew: Billy Jack had made his debut in the 1967 outlaw biker hit The Born Losers (above).
Billy Jack remains one of the cult favorite movies of the 1970s.
1972
United Artists – Credit: C/O
Marlon Brando starred in two of the Top 10 movies at the box office in 1972. The first, as you probably guessed, was The Godfather.
Can you guess the second one, in which he starred with Maria Schneider (above)?
Hint: It has a city in its title.
And the film is…
1972 Answer: Last Tango in Paris
Credit: C/O
United Artists
Yep, it’s Last Tango in Paris, a film that has been castigated in recent years because of Schneider’s allegations that she was mistreated by Brando and director Bernardo Bertolucci during a crucial scene involving butter.
This one looks like a classic film from the 1940s, not one of the hit movies of the 1970s, and that’s very much by design.
If you’ve seen this absolute charmer, featuring the star of the biggest hit of 1970 and his real-life daughter, you certainly remember it.
It’s sad, but also an absolute charmer.
Scroll down for its title…
1973 Answer: Paper Moon
Credit: C/O
Paramount Pictures
Paper Moon starred Ryan O’Neal, who also topped the box office opposite Ali MacGraw in 1970’s Love Story. For Paper Moon, a Depression-era story of a con man on a road trip with a cantankerous child who just might be his daughter.
Director Peter Bogdanovich wisely paired O’Neal with his real-life daughter, Tatum, who deservedly won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress.
1974
20th Century Fox – Credit: Teri Garr and Gene Wilder in Young Frankenstein. 20th Century Studios
1974 was a very good year for Mel Brooks: He released not only the Western satire Blazing Saddles, the top film of the year, but also another comedy, satirizing another genre.
The comedy classic Young Frankenstein was still playing in theaters through 1975, when members of Aerosmith saw it and borrowed one of the best jokes in the film for the title of their hit “Walk This Way,” as we detail in this list of Classic Rock Songs Inspired by Movies We Love.
So it isn’t just one of the hit movies of the 1970s — it also helped inspire one of the biggest hit songs of the 1970s.
1975
20th Century Fox – Credit: C/O
This one is a cult hit that still plays in theaters all over the country today.
If you don’t know what it is, please go see it immediately. Preferably at midnight.
And scroll down for the title…
1975 Answer: The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Credit: C/O
20th Century Fox
Yep, it’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show, starring Susan Sarandon, Tim Curry, and many more.
Rocky Horror isn’t just a cult hit, but also a legit hit: It was solidly in the Top 10 movies of 1975, behind hits like Jaws, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and Shampoo.
All of those movies are terrific, but they don’t inspire midnight singalongs across America.
1976
20th Century Fox – Credit: C/O
We can’t stress enough what a red-hot star Gene Wilder was in the 1970s.
This was the first of his four pairings with one of the greatest comics of all time, Richard Pryor.
Scroll down for the name of the film.
1976 Answer: Silver Streak
Credit: C/O
20th Century Fox
Silver Streak casts Gene Wilder as harried book editor George, who teams up with car thief Grover (Richard Pryor) after George is falsely accused of murder.
Wilder and Pryor would pair up again in 1980’s Stir Crazy, 1989’s See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and 1991’s Another You.
1977
Columbia Pictures – Credit: C/O
1977 is of course a crucial year because it was the year of the original Star Wars, a movie that changed forever what type of movies get the green light in Hollywood and was perhaps had the greatest cultural impact of all the hit movies of the 1970s.
The movie above, while less popular, got a lot of attention in 1977, thanks in large part to its female lead.
We’ll give you another hint: It was co-written by Peter Benchley, the writer of the novel Jaws and co-writer of the film.
Scroll down for its title…
1977 Answer: The Deep
Columbia Pictures – Credit: C/O
The Deep, starring Jaqueline Bissett and Nick Nolte, is about a pair of divers who uncover treasure and then have to defend it.
The marketing focused heavily on underwater shots of Bissett.
It earned $47.3 million, making it No. 6 on the list of the 10 top movies of 1977, by domestic box office, not adjusted for inflation.
1978
Universal Pictures – Credit: C/O
This is a very easy one if you were around in 1978. It’s one of the biggest hit movies of the 1970s.
It starred a the Not Ready for Prime Time Player above, who is also one of the subjects of the recent Jason Reitman film Saturday Night.
Scroll down for this very easy answer.
1978 Answer: Animal House
Universal Pictures – Credit: C/O
This John Landis-directed National Lampoon film was a breakout hit for John Belushi, the Saturday Night Live star who became an instant movie star for his portrayal of the hard-partying Bluto.
In the same year he appeared in Animal House, Belushi also appeared in Goin’ South, which Jack Nicholson starred in and directed.
Belushi felt like he didn’t have enough to do in Goin’ South, which Animal House trounced at the box office.
1979
MGM – Credit: C/O
Margot Kidder starred in both the No. 1 and No. 2 movies at the 1979 box office.
The No. 1 movie was Superman.
Can you guess the No. 2 movie, above?
Scroll down for its name…
1979 Answer: The Amityville Horror
MGM – Credit: C/O
Margot Kidder starred with James Brolin in the Stuart Rosenberg-directed Amityville Horror, based on Jay Anson’s 1979 book of the same name about the Lutz family, who said they endured paranormal activity while living in a home where Ronald DeFeo murdered his family in 1974.
It was one of many films about the Amityville story, which remains haunting today — whether or not you believe the house is haunted.
And that ends the movies of the 1970s. Or does it?
Bonus: 1980
Paramount Pictures – Credit: C/O
We’re adding this one for those of you who contend that a decade ends in its 10th year. And because we’re having fun and don’t want this list of hit movies of the 1970s to end.
Though Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back was easily the No. 1 movie, the film above, directed by Robert Redford, won Best Picture at the Oscars. Can you remember its title?
Scroll down if you like…
1980 Answer: Ordinary People
Paramount Pictures – Credit: C/O
Ordinary People earned a very respectable $55 million in domestic box office in 1980, and cleaned up at the Oscars.
Besides winning Best Picture, it earned Best Director for Robert Redford, a Best Supporting Actor for Timothy Hutton, and Best Screenplay for Allen Sargent.
It has aged very well.
How’d You Score?
Fozzie Bear in The Muppet Movie. Disney – Credit: C/O
How many of these hits of the 1970s did you recognize? Here’s how you score:
