30 Movies Celebrating Milestones In 2022

By Rachel West. 24 Dec 2021 10:00 AM

Want to feel old? These movies are celebrating some major milestone anniversaries in 2022.

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‘Chicago’ – 20 Years
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Filmed in Toronto, the 2002 musical would go on to nab six Oscars including Best Picture and Best Supporting Actress for Catherine Zeta-Jones.
‘Men In Black’ – 25 Years
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Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones launched the “Men In Black” universe in 1997. 25 years later, it’s spawned two sequels, a spin-off and an animated series.
‘Good Will Hunting’ – 25 Years
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The world learned who Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were thanks to “Good Will Hunting”. Now Hollywood A-listers, the pair of Boston buds earned an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for the timeless classic that also earned Robin Williams an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
‘Titanic’ – 25 Years
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Twenty-five years later and we still think Jack could have fit on that door with Rose.
‘Reservoir Dogs’ – 30 Years
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Named the Greatest Independent Film of All-Time by Empire magazine, Quentin Tarantino’s film turned heads following its debut at the Sundance Film Festival, becoming even more popular after the director’s follow-up, “Pulp Fiction”, in 1994.
‘A League Of Their Own’ – 30 Years
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There’s still no crying in baseball.
‘Moonstruck’ – 35 Years
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Canadian director Norman Jewison’s romantic comedy with Cher and Nicolas Cage took home three Oscars, including one for Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress for Cher, and Best Supporting Actress for Olympia Dukakis, who passed away in 2021.
‘Empire Of The Sun’ – 35 Years
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Steven Spielberg’s coming of age tale about a young boy’s experiences in China during WWII feature a breakout performance by a then-12-year-old Christian Bale who nabbed the part out of the 4,000 child actors who auditioned for the role.
‘E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial’ – 40 Years
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Steven Spielberg’s story about a lovable alien and the bond he forms with a boy and his family was the number one draw at the box office 40 years ago, earning over $359 million in ticket sales. The Hershey Company saw its profits rise 65 per cent in 1982 thanks to E.T.’s love of Reese’s Pieces.
‘Blade Runner’ – 40 Years
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While not a box office smash, Ridley Scott’s seminal sci-fi epic would eventually be hailed for its depiction of the decaying future world of – wait for it – 2019. A prime example of neo-noir cinema “Blade Runner” influenced everything from video game to TV series and bringing the works of author Philip K. Dick to prominence before eventually spawning a sequel 35 years later.
‘The Thing’ – 40 Years
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A mere blip at the box office in 1982, John Carpenter’s icy alien R-rated horror “The Thing” has since become a cult classic and hailed as a masterpiece. In later years, Carpenter stated “The Things”’s failure to connect with audiences might have had something to do with two of the year’s other mega-hits – the release of the family-friendly look at aliens in “E.T.” and the fact that it was released on the same day as “Blade Runner”.
‘Poltergeist’ – 40 Years
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The tragedies and creative controversies surrounding the cast and crew of “Poltergeist” are almost as famous as the horror movie itself. Occasionally gruesome, the spooky ghost story with a child at the centre is widely regarded as a horror classic.
‘Saturday Night Fever’ – 45 Years
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“Saturday Night Fever” not only made a movie star out of TV actor John Travolta, it helped popularize disco music. Fames film critic Gene Siskel named it his favourite movie of the year and would later purchase the iconic white suit Travolta wears at a charity auction.
‘Cabaret’ – 50 Years
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Liza Minnelli got her first chance to sing on screen in Bob Fosse’s musical “Cabaret”. The film won 8 out of its 10 Oscar nominations including Best Actress for Minnelli, Best Director for Fosse, and Best Supporting Actor for Joel Grey. As of 2021, it still holds the record for the film with the most Academy Award wins without being nominated for Best Picture.
‘Deliverance’ – 50 Years
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Unflinching survival thriller “Deliverance” starring Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Jon Voight is best remembered for its “Dueling Banjos” scene at the beginning of the film. Filmed on location in Georgia – a rarity at the time – the success of the film led Governor Jimmy Carter to establish a state film commission to draw in film and television productions. Georgia has now established itself as one of the top-five production sites in the U.S. where everything from “The Walking Dead” to Marvel projects and Tyler Perry productions are filmed.
‘The Graduate’ – 55 Years
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Oscar-winner Mike Nichols’ romantic comedy-drama starring Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft was the biggest box office draw on 1967, earning $104.9 million – adjusted for inflation, that’s over $857 million, a rare achievement for a romantic comedy.
‘In The Heat Of The Night’ – 55 Years
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Winner of five Academy Awards, Sidney Poitier’s iconic – and parodied - line “"They call me Mister Tibbs!" was named one of the top film quotes of all-time by the American Film Institute.
‘Lawrence Of Arabia’ – 60 Years
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Widely considered one of the greatest and most-influential films ever made, David Lean’s desert epic starring Peter O’Toole and Alec Guinness won seven Oscars including Best Picture. A huge critical and financial success, celebrated filmmakers including Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Oliver Stone, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas have all cited the film’s visual style as a great influence on their own filmmaking.
‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ – 60 Years
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Adapted from Harper Lee’s novel, as Atticus Finch Gregory Peck nailed his famous court room summation speech in a single take. The actor earned his only Academy Award for the performance.
’12 Angry Men’ – 65 Years
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Ranked at #5 on IMDb’s Top 250 Movies, Sidney Lumet’s debut feature “12 Angry Men” was filmed in New York on a small budget over three weeks following a short rehearsal schedule. Star and producer Henry Fonda took a deferral payment for his salary to be paid out following the film’s release, which he allegedly never received.
‘High Noon’ – 70 Years
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Though its release was shadowed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) during its investigation of "Communist propaganda and influence" among Hollywood, the Western starring Gary Cooper would go on to earn the actor a Best Actor Oscar. Lacking the chase and gunfights most-associated with Westerns, the complex and moral storyline that unfolds in real-time earned the film some famous fans, including Ronald Reagan who called is his favourite film and Bill Clinton who screened the movie a record 17 times while at the White House.
‘Nightmare Alley’ – 75 Years
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At its time of release, the film noir earned mixed reviews and was a box office flop with leading man Tyrone Power playing against type as a carnival conman. Later reevaluated, the film is now considered a hidden gem of the era, with Guillermo del Toro adapting the original 1946 novel into a new vision with Bradley Cooper in the role originated by Power.
‘Miracle On 34th Street’ – 75 Years
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The heartwarming and sentimental Christmas movie about a department store Santa earned three Academy Awards. A holiday staple on TV, in 1985 “Miracle On 34th Street” became one of the very first black and white films to be colourized.
‘Bambi’ – 80 Years
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Eighty years later, the loss of Bambi’s mom still brings us to tears.
‘Casablanca’ – 80 Years
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Considered by many to be one of the greatest films of all-time, the Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman romantic war drama would go on to win the Oscar for Best Picture. In addition to its memorable characters, the film has had several highly-quotable lines endure for eight decades, including “Here’s looking at you, kid” and the movie’s final line, “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
‘Freaks’ – 90 Years
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“One of us! One of us!” Tod Browning’s horror was a total box office bomb whose sympathetic but stark portrayal of sideshow performers divided audiences and critics but earned growing appreciation in the 1960s, setting it on track to be the highly-influential cult classic it is today.
‘Metropolis’ – 95 Years
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The pioneering silent film “Metropolis” is one of the very first feature-length science fiction movies. The dystopian story was filmed over a 17-month period between 1925 and 1926 for an astonishing equivalent of $27.8 million Canadian in 2020. Directed by Fritz Lang, “Metropolis” became the first film inscribed into UNESCO’s Memory Of The World Register, a compendium of documents, manuscripts, oral traditions, and audio-visual materials of worldwide significance.
‘The Jazz Singer’ – 95 Years
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“You ain’t seen nothing yet”. Truer words were never spoken as “The Jazz Singer” starring Al Jolson became the first feature-length film to be presented as a “talkie”, despite only have some sound sequences of both recorded musical score and dialogue. While there are some controversial story elements to it including the use of blackface, nevertheless, the film effectively ended the silent era of filmmaking.
‘Nosferatu’ – 100 Years
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An unauthorized and unofficial adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, “Nosferatu” enraged the author’s heirs who sued over the adaptation leading a court to rule that all copies be destroyed. Luckily for the rest of us, a few prints of the earliest depiction of vampires on film survived. The film techniques in “Nosferatu” and vampiric traits attributed to the lead blood sucker Count Orlok have become accepted vampire traits and clichés for on-screen vampires in the last century.
‘Nanook Of The North’ – 100 Years
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Considered the first feature-length documentary movie ever made, director Robert J. Flaherty’s movie follows the struggles of an Inuk man named Nanook in the Canadian Arctic. Though criticized due to the staging of several scenes by the filmmaker and constructed cultural presentations, it nevertheless the film remains a groundbreaking example of non-fiction storytelling and bringing a little known world of the North to audiences.

30 Movies Celebrating Milestones In 2022

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