Best Films - 1964
by Andre Soares
On paper, there is precious little that is innovative about Jacques Demy’s Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. It’s just your usual story of a handsome boy and a beautiful girl who are madly in love, and who are eventually separated by the outside world — in this case, both the Franco-Algerian war and the girl’s mama. On film, everything seems new and fresh in Demy’s unique musical rendition of love lived and lost. One of the most romantic and most hauntingly beautiful movies ever made, Les Parapluies de Cherbourg explodes on-screen in beauty (Nino Castelnuovo and Catherine Deneuve), in color (cinematography by Jean Rabier; production design by Bernard Evein), and in music — its dialogue is all sung, with music and lyrics by Michel Legrand. From the moment those colorful umbrellas of Cherbourg first appear on screen to the final heart-wrenching shot of a snow-covered gas station, Les Parapluies de Cherbourg radiates sheer screen magic.
FILM
Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
Les Amitiés particulières / This Special Friendship
The Best Man
Fail Safe
Hush…Hush Sweet Charlotte
My Fair Lady
The Night of the Iguana
Seance on a Wet Afternoon
Seven Days in May
DIRECTOR
Jacques Demy (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
Robert Aldrich (Hush…Hush Sweet Charlotte)
George Cukor (My Fair Lady)
Jean Delannoy (Les Amitiés particulières / This Special Friendship)
Bryan Forbes (Seance on a Wet Afternoon)
John Frankenheimer (Seven Days in May)
John Huston (The Night of the Iguana)
Sidney Lumet (Fail Safe)
Franklin J. Schaffner (The Best Man)
ACTOR
Rex Harrison (My Fair Lady)
Richard Attenborough (Seance on a Wet Afternoon)
Stanley Baker (Zulu)
Richard Burton (The Night of the Iguana)
Michael Caine (Zulu)
Henry Fonda (The Best Man)
Henry Fonda (Fail Safe)
Cliff Robertson (The Best Man)
Peter Sellers (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
Saro Urzi (Sedotta e abbandonata / Seduced and Abandoned)
ACTRESS
Deborah Kerr (The Night of the Iguana)
Anne Bancroft (The Pumpkin Eater)
Joan Crawford (Strait-Jacket)
Bette Davis (Dead Ringer)
Bette Davis (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
Olivia de Havilland (Lady in a Cage)
Audrey Hepburn (My Fair Lady)
Deborah Kerr (The Chalk Garden)
Sophia Loren (Matrimonio all’italiana / Marriage Italian Style)
Kim Stanley (Seance on a Wet Afternoon)
SUPPORTING ACTOR
Fredric March (Seven Days in May)
Michel Bouquet (Les Amitiés particulières / This Special Friendship)
Wilfrid Brambell (A Hard Day’s Night)
Cyril Delevanti (The Night of the Iguana)
Sterling Hayden (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
Stanley Holloway (My Fair Lady)
Wilfrid Hyde-White (My Fair Lady)
Cecil Kellaway (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
James Mason (The Fall of the Roman Empire)
SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Grayson Hall (The Night of the Iguana)
Julie Andrews (Mary Poppins)
Mary Astor (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
Hermione Baddeley (The Unsinkable Molly Brown)
Olivia de Havilland (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
Kathleen Freeman (The Disorderly Orderly)
Rita Hayworth (Circus World)
Lila Kedrova (Zorba the Greek)
Irene Papas (Zorba the Greek)
Anne Vernon (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
SCREENPLAY
Walter Bernstein (Fail Safe)
Jean Aurenche & Pierre Bost (Les Amitiés particulières / This Special Friendship)
Jacques Demy (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
Bryan Forbes (Seance on a Wet Afternoon)
Pietro Germi, Luciano Vincenzoni, Agenore Incrocci & Furio Scarpelli (Sedotta e abbandonata / Seduced and Abandoned)
Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern & Peter George (Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)
Alan Jay Lerner (My Fair Lady)
Rod Serling (Seven Days in May)
Anthony Veiller & John Huston (The Night of the Iguana)
Gore Vidal (The Best Man)
CINEMATOGRAPHY
Harry Stradling (My Fair Lady)
Joseph Biroc (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
William H. Clothier (Cheyenne Autumn)
Daniel L. Fapp (The Unsinkable Molly Brown)
Roger Fellous (Le Journal d’une femme de chambre / Diary of a Chambermaid)
Gabriel Figueroa (The Night of the Iguana)
Ernest Haller (Dead Ringer)
Arthur Ibbetson (The Chalk Garden)
Walter Lassally (Zorba the Greek)
Jean Rabier (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
ORIGINAL SCORE
Michel Legrand (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
John Barry (Seance on a Wet Afternoon)
John Barry (Zulu)
Frank De Vol (Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte)
"Best Films of …" Annual List
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