Jumanji
dir. Joe Johnston (1995)
Although not so magically captivating as The Never-Ending Story, this family adventure fantasy concocts a certain chaotic wonder out of a board game that brings the jungle to predatory life in suburbia. Stars Robin Williams and cutting-edge (at the time) special effects.
Return of the Jedi
dir. Richard Marquand (1983)
As the denouement to a full-fledged trilogy (not merely the second of two opportunistic sequels), Return of the Jedi first built on the foundations of its ground-breaking predecessors, then brought the Star Wars saga to a towering conclusion, dazzling in cinematic force.
Sherlock Holmes
BBC, 1968
Peter Cushing rises above the BBC’s stinginess and inept adaptations to embody a Sherlock Holmes at once cerebral yet exuberant, aloof but socially aware. Nigel Stock’s Watson is something of a retired teddy bear and only six of sixteen episodes survive un-junked.
The Great Escape
dir. John Sturges (1963)
Whereas old movies often seem ponderously dated to modern viewers, this World War II POW drama uses pacing to good advantage and — half a century on, no less — remains a genuine classic: an ensemble cast tour de force of British film actors.
The Fox Busters
by Dick King-Smith (1978)
Endemic to an era when it was de rigueur for children’s authors themselves to be literate, this story remains a high-spirited classic: skills honed by natural selection, farmyard fowls fight to outwit then turn the tables on the foxes who hunt them.
The Goodies, Series 1
by Graeme Garden & Bill Oddie (with Tim Brooke-Taylor) (BBC 1970)
In 1970 comedy trio the Goodies arrived under their own names, riding a trandem bicycle and pioneering a freeform sitcom where they claimed to do anything, anytime. Exuberant, irreverent, chaotic: Tim, Bill and Graeme soon found themselves (to quote their song) needed.
Star Wars: Splinter of the Mind’s Eye
by Alan Dean Foster (Del Rey, 1978)
Set and first published between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, Foster’s hurriedly written, workmanlike tie-in novel sends Luke and Leia on a meandering, curiously pointless quest, before pitting them (belatedly) against an ineffectual and always-likely-to-be canonically suspect Darth Vader.
The Two Ronnies, Series 1
(BBC, 1971)
Ronnie Corbett and Ronnie Barker reigned for fifteen years in iconically uncool glasses, starting in 1971 with their trademark fast wordplay (the acme being episode five’s spoonerisms sketch) and a touch of the risqué, interspersed with novelty and (now passé) musical acts.
Flatliners
dir. Joel Schumacher (1990)
Twenty-five years on, Flatliners’ ensemble all-star cast looks to have injected water from the fountain of youth. This shadowy supernatural film hasn’t aged either, suspense levels and consequences spiking as five medical students kill then revive themselves in search of the afterlife.
Red Dwarf VI
by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor (BBC, 1993)
After a stellar run from 1988-1992, Red Dwarf returned in 1993 as a caricatured shadow (almost a parody) of its first five seasons, stripping the crew of all seriousness and sacrificing thematically self-contained episodes for cheap laughs and a token story arc.