Missing (1982)

The '80s were good for popular comedies, fantasies, and adventures on screen, but only a handful of serious works from the decade enjoy esteem to this day. Checking out an '80s drama I never hear about is a slight gamble. But this one got a lot of honors back in the day and retains high marks across rating sites. That plus its basis in a true story drew me in.

In what is implied but never specified to be Chile during Augusto Pinochet's '73 coup, Charlie Horman (John Shea) and his wife, Beth (Sissy Spacek), find their lives as American migrants disrupted. Charlie's activist journalism may have caught up with him, because he disappears. Beth can't find out where he was taken or whether he lives, tho she refuses to believe he'd go into hiding without ever notifying her. Charlie's estranged father, Edmund (Jack Lemmon), flies in to help with the search for answers.

Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)

I'd seen a few movies written by David Mamet before, but not based on a play of his. Oddly enough, the most oft-cited moment does not occur in the play: One-scene wonder Alec Baldwin features as a company-hired motivational speaker with the attitude of a prototypical drill sergeant (Baldwin did look to Patton for inspiration). In truth, he seems to be channeling Al Pacino, for whom he was something of an understudy herein. I had seen this part already, and it didn't exactly make me eager for more, but I value my cinematic education.

That early scene helps establish the plot. At a super-shady real estate agency that cold-calls individuals to sell them overpriced land, business has not been good lately. The agency offers prizes for the two salesmen who accomplish the most in the near future but will fire the other two. It feels unfair to the less successful, because they've done well in the past and have just fallen on bad luck with regard to sales leads, if "luck" is the right word. In desperation, two conspire to steal the good leads and make it look like a plain burglary.

The Out-of-Towners (1970)

I might have taken no notice of this comedy if not for the remake with Steve Martin. That remake was thoroughly panned, but at least it did its part of calling attention to the original. With that in mind, I kept an eye out for the unfulfilled potential that would lead someone to decide on a remake.

George (Jack Lemmon) and his wife, Gwen (Sandy Dennis, whom I'd known only from Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?), head from small-town Ohio to New York City, where George expects to get a promotion. He sets off with an odd mix of anxiety and confidence, repeatedly attributing his own worries to Gwen. Bad weather delays the flight landing, upsetting what little equilibrium he had. It only gets worse from there.