A new season of TCM's Essentials

Now that 31 Days of Oscar is over, TCM is starting the 2009 season of The Essentials, in which Robert Osborne sits down with a guest host to discuss some movies that are "essential" for any movie buff to see. This year's guest host is Alec Baldwin, and their first selection is the 1935 Marx Brothers' movie A Night at the Opera; tonight at 8:00 PM ET.

To be honest, I'm not that big of a fan of the Marx Brothers. However, I do think that The Essentials is a good idea. As I have mentioned before, not everybody knows the classic movies all that well, and for those of us who would consider ourselves serious film fans, our taste in movies might seem a bit obscurantist when viewed from the eyes of an average person. (After all, we get the Korda brothers on Thursdays this month.) Consequently, it's a good idea for TCM to do things to introduce some of the better-known classics to people who might not realize they'll like such movies.