Catch Some Bass

I refuse to watch a movie if I'm too late for the opening credits (or the opening of the Milk Duds).

I have been known to turn around at the theatre door and go home because I missed the 20th Century-Fox logo and little else. Motion pictures should be seen from the first frame until the last. That is the proper experience and I don't care to settle for less, so don't even think about nibbling my Duds.

The top moments in many films are the title sequences, a specialized visual art form which can encompass all of the imagery beyond the lettering -- and make an unknown, like the Pink Panther, a star!

Among the finest of the title designers was Saul Bass ("Psycho," "Vertigo," "West Side Story," "Around the World in Eighty Days," "North by Northwest"), who became an A-lister in the 1950s with stylish, jazzy credits like these.



"Anatomy of a Murder" (1959)
_{Can't see the video? Try here or watch at TCM.com.}



"The Man With the Golden Arm" (1955)
_{Can't see the video? Try here.}



"Star Wars: A New Hope" (1957)
_{Can't see the video? Try here.
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