The Dish (2000)

In 1969, when the world watched as man went to the moon, America needed help from Australia to see the action. Twelve hours of the day, Houston was facing away from the moon; during those times signals from the mission could only be received from the southern hemisphere.

Enter a small Australian town with a big radio telescope — the setting for this weightlessly charming, loosely fact-inspired ensemble comedy.

Given the Australian setting, we aren't surprised to find that the radio telescope is located in the middle of a sheep paddock or that the town is populated by an appealingly quirky cast of local characters.

Cliff Buxton (Sam Neill), the laid-back, pipe-puffing scientist in charge of the dish, plays Andy Griffith to this down-under Mayberry.

The appeal of The Dish lies in its affection for its small-town characters, its acute sense of place and its appreciation for the sense of awe that the moon mission brought to a wide-eyed world in 1969.

It Happened One Night (1934)

One of the most enduring romantic comedies of Hollywood's golden age, It Happened One Night is an unassuming road picture following an out-ofwork newspaperman (Clark Gable) and a spoiled heiress (Claudette Colbert) as they travel together from Miami to New York. She's fleeing from her concerned father (Walter Connolly) and returning to the shiftless beau (Jameson Thomas) she married in a civil ceremony to spite her father (who had her whisked away from the service, so it's not final legally or sacramentally).

Gable discovers her on the road and aids her, ostensibly for her exclusive story — though, as much as they grate on each other, it's inevitable that they'll wind up falling in love. The oppositesattract comedy still works, though Gable's dismissive treatment of pampered Colbert, which played well with Depression-era audiences, seems dated today. Of the pioneering screwball comedy's many celebrated comic scenes and conceits, easily the most memorable is the famous “Walls of Jericho” running theme: Gable hangs a sheet between twin beds when necessity compels Colbert to share a room with him. This prop to modesty eventually becomes a metaphor for purity before marriage, culminating in the film's satisfying, romantic final image.

The Wrath of Khan (1982)

One of the strongest and most popular entries in the Star Trek film franchise, The Wrath of Khan has everything you could ask for in a good sci-fi action-adventure film: sympathetic, well-drawn heroes, a terrific villain (Ricardo Montalban as Khan), exciting outer-space showdowns, gee-whiz visuals (the Genesis effect) and a touch of moral depth (the Enterprise crew finally faces up to age and mortality, and questions about the wisdom and consequences of playing God are hinted at).

The plot picks up on a scenario from an episode of the original TV series that involved a group of bioengineered superhumans whom Kirk (William Shatner) had earlier marooned on an uninhabited planet.

The legacy of Kirk's life surfaces in other ways as well, as Kirk revisits an old flame (Bebe Besch) and makes a discovery both surprising and perhaps ultimately inevitable.

The familiar trio of Kirk, Spock (Leonard Nimoy) and Bones (DeForest Kelley) has an easy camaraderie that's become seasoned with time.

Remarkably, the climax retains its power, in spite of what fans know about how things turn out in subsequent films. Escapist entertainment doesn't get much better than this.