You have to understand that I'm so completely shallow, that Sigourney Weaver in her underwear is usually good enough for me. What's disappointing these days is that Ridley Scott tends to go for overblown CGI and that bores me to death. This 2012 thing looks like s h i t to me. However. John Carpenter's The Thing is absolutely great in my view. As is Escape from New York - the Snake Plissken character is perfect Americana of the 80's.
"What are you doing up there Snake?"
"Playing with myself - I"M GOING IN!"
I love it when Yanks are 'going in'. [:P][:D]
Yeah - Terror from Beyond Space is a great film ( I think they set fire and then electrocute the 'being' in that one - and that's always good for me) and Quatermass 50's tv took a lot from that. I remember being left alone in the house in the 50's when the only tv channel then was the one BBC channel - and the tv production of Quatermass came on (you would get Champion the Wonder Horse, Whirlybirds and then Quatermass in those days). Haven't recovered to this point. There are far too many tv channels nowadays, so one tends to get mass produced crap being delivered most of the time - including films that are simply made for dvd and tv.
I watched the 1940's production of Jane Eyre last night actually - that is brilliant and brilliantly produced and photographed. Music is by Bernard Herrmann (quite eccentric music) and it's well worth watching just to remind oneself of what it was like before pandering to uneducated morons became the norm.