You like "basically dead" old? I'll show ya "advanced state of decomposition" old...
You know what film my father took me to see when it came out?
"Midway".
Not Michael Bay "Midway", no siree... I'm talking Charlton Heston, Glenn Ford, Henry Fonda "Midway", in glorious Sensurround Sound™️, which seemed to be a big selling point at the time, the latest and greatest Hollywood movie magic tech.
It uses a combination of practical footage (like Christopher Nolan did with Dunkirk), a ton of cleaned-up WWII archival footage, and a sprinkle of special effects with miniatures. Overall, it looks pretty good.
The "cast of thousands" is front-loaded with some old school screen legends, plus many who went on to become TV stars (Tom Selleck, Erik Estrada, Dabney Coleman).
The film slowly builds up momentum, the way other war films of the time like "A Bridge Too Far" did. It takes over an hour for the Battle Of Midway itself to begin, putting all the pieces into place, and historically it was a painstaking process, so many things had to happen for the battle to start and unfold the way it did.
And unlike so many more recent films of the genre, there isn't any fictional personal drama nor romantic subplots. It's long enough as it already is, telling a grand sweeping story.
Very much a product of its' time, yes I'd definitely recommend it, although I prefer that leisurely pace of 70s films, it's a matter of personal taste, maybe because growing up with those kinds of films.
It's about 100x better than the Michael Bay version, but that's still not saying much. Yes, it's a good movie for its era. If you watch it today then you'll need to be a little generous about the movie style, since we've come a long way since then.
From the looks of another comment down the thread, there's gonna be quite a bit of people like me, who get Emmerich and Bay mixed up.
The bombastic, clumsily unrealistic abuse of CGI might fit fantasy or disaster movies, but it is positively jarring in a war movie, which requires a more sober or constrained style of direction. WWII physics of motion shouldn't look like a fucking video game on the large screen, not even the dogfights.
And let's not even get started on the rote and clichéd emotional palate palette in the romantic subplots.
It was the first one, Alien, for me. I was maybe four. Nightmares didn't stop until my late twenties, but it's my favorite movie now. No movies scared me after that!
Never saw the movie but I went to school with the directors daughter and had such a crush on her. Does that count?
Edit: actually I think it was an even worse movie, but I was a mindless NPC in high school so I can even remember which beyond there being a handsome dude in armor on the cover.
Oh, no no, I think I mixed up my roman movies. Looking it up, Gladiator is a way better movie than what I was thinking. WTF was the movie I'm thinking of... Something from around that era. I remember the father never being around and like, Brentwood level rich.
(Note I clearly didn't see the movie, it was popular enough but I was an anime nerd at the time and rarely watched mainstream stuff).
A bit later but I do remember seeing Back to the Future in its first week at a drive-in. Was fun.. I remember my mum made burgers and wrapped them In paper napkins. And my dad couldn't see the napkin in the dark and ate the whole burger napkin and all.
I can remember that shit but not what I told a client last week.