On March 2, 1965, a movie about an almost-nun who becomes governess to a forbidding Austrian widower's seven Aryan kids on the even of World War II opened in U.S. theaters. Although it was famously panned upon release (Pauline Kael called it "the sugar-coated lie that people seem to want to eat"), it nonetheless won Best Picture at that year's Oscars and eventually went on to become the fifth highest-grossing movie (adjusted for inflation) of all time.
And I've never watched it.
Somehow, over all the decades it was aired annually on network TV (on a Sunday night, when I was usually scrambling to complete an entire weekend's worth of homework in two hours), the advent of VHS, DVD and the interwebs, and even an ill-advised live version, I still managed to miss it. Did such an oversight contribute to my disinterest in blonds? Or perhaps lead to my current oft-surly persona? Perhaps, but it's hardly the only so-called "classic" film I haven't seen.
Gone with the Wind (1939) - Might as well get this one out of the way. I've mentioned it before, but the movie's length, while not unusual in these days of 2.5-hour Lone Ranger movies, worked against it for me. It either aired across two nights on TV (getting my family together for anything other than Ghostbusters or National Geographic specials required a Congressional subpoena) or came on two videocassettes, and I could always come up with something else I needed to do after that first tape ended.
I mean, I'm pretty sure I've seen all of it at various times, but never all at once, beginning to end. And Christ is Scarlett annoying.
It's A Wonderful Life (1946) - Yeah, this is a weird one. Even though it aired every holiday season, even in the pre-cable days, I can't remember it ever being on at my house. Further proof my parents were sleeper Commie agents à la The Americans.
When a neighbor family (I was friends with their son in high school) discovered this oversight, they insisted I come over to watch it with them, which seems very Flanders-like now. We made it about halfway through before the son and I excused ourselves to go play Axis & Allies.
Titanic (1997) - Fine, I actually did see this, though I really tried not to. Went to the theater with my family over Christmas and did my best to zone out for three hours. Billy Zane was in it, right?