In Hamilton McFadden's 1934 film "Stand Up and Cheer!," the unnamed off-screen president (actually Franklin D. Roosevelt) posits that the real reason for Great Depression was a sudden crisis of optimism. Additionally, wicked bankers were running amok and getting rich while the rest of the nation starved, leaving everyone nihilistic and horrified. The wasteful and corrupt Warren Harding administration followed by the Crash of '29 isn't mentioned, as McFadden's film sought to cheer people up, not make their depression — and the Depression — any worse. In "Stand Up and Cheer!," Fdr created a Department of Amusement and appoints a secretary (Warner Baxter) to oversee a feel-good, nationwide show to keep morale up.
The bulk of the 80-minute film is a series of auditions in the secretary's office wherein performers come in to sing and dance, effectively turning the movie into a revue. Modern audiences may bristle at some racist caricatures, notably actress...
The bulk of the 80-minute film is a series of auditions in the secretary's office wherein performers come in to sing and dance, effectively turning the movie into a revue. Modern audiences may bristle at some racist caricatures, notably actress...
- 4/17/2024
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
In the realm of classic Hollywood cinema, few names shine as brightly as that of John Ford. Known for his remarkable storytelling prowess and unparalleled directorial vision, Ford’s impact on the film industry is undeniable. Join us on a journey through the life, works, and enduring legacy of this legendary director as we delve into the cinematic masterpieces that have solidified his place in movie history.
Early Life
John Ford was born John Martin Feeney on February 1, 1894 in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He was the youngest of 13 children born to Irish immigrants John Augustine Feeney and Barbara Curran. The Feeney family were devout Roman Catholics, and Ford’s childhood was steeped in Irish traditions and values.
At a young age, Ford developed a love of the sea. He worked as a deckhand and boatman during his teen years, gaining experience that would later influence his filmmaking. Though his beginnings were humble,...
Early Life
John Ford was born John Martin Feeney on February 1, 1894 in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He was the youngest of 13 children born to Irish immigrants John Augustine Feeney and Barbara Curran. The Feeney family were devout Roman Catholics, and Ford’s childhood was steeped in Irish traditions and values.
At a young age, Ford developed a love of the sea. He worked as a deckhand and boatman during his teen years, gaining experience that would later influence his filmmaking. Though his beginnings were humble,...
- 4/6/2024
- by Penelope H. Fritz
- Martin Cid Magazine - Movies
It’s been over three years since Netflix announced it bought LA’s iconic Egyptian Theatre, the Hollywood Boulevard landmark that opened in 1922 and hosted the first-ever Hollywood premiere for Allan Dwan’s “Robin Hood” starring Douglas Fairbanks.
Now, after an extensive renovation, the Egyptian’s reopening date is set: November 9 is when Netflix, in partnership with the American Cinematheque, will open the doors of this landmark once more. It’ll do so with quite the event: a screening of David Fincher’s “The Killer,” one of the streamer’s top Oscar contending titles this fall, followed by a Q&a with the filmmaker himself.
That day, Netflix will also stream a short documentary titled “Temple of Film: 100 Years of the Egyptian Theatre” in celebration of the event. The film features interviews with Rian Johnson, Guillermo del Toro, Lynette Howell Taylor, Autumn Durald Arkapaw, and the theater’s restoration architect Peyton Hall.
Now, after an extensive renovation, the Egyptian’s reopening date is set: November 9 is when Netflix, in partnership with the American Cinematheque, will open the doors of this landmark once more. It’ll do so with quite the event: a screening of David Fincher’s “The Killer,” one of the streamer’s top Oscar contending titles this fall, followed by a Q&a with the filmmaker himself.
That day, Netflix will also stream a short documentary titled “Temple of Film: 100 Years of the Egyptian Theatre” in celebration of the event. The film features interviews with Rian Johnson, Guillermo del Toro, Lynette Howell Taylor, Autumn Durald Arkapaw, and the theater’s restoration architect Peyton Hall.
- 10/18/2023
- by Christian Blauvelt
- Indiewire
Mubi has announced its lineup of streaming offerings for September, including the exclusive streaming premieres for Rebecca Zlotowski’s Other People’s Children; and Lola Quivoron’s Rodeo; and Rotting in the Sun by Sebastián Silva, whose work is highlighted in a series that also includes The Maid, Life Kills Me, and Nasty Baby.
Additional selections include a mini-retro of last year’s TIFF (Pacifiction and the newest film by Sophy Romvari among them), 10 by Pedro Almodóvar, and David Lynch’s rare 1988 short The Cowboy and the Frenchman, starring Harry Dean Stanton and Jack Nance.
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
September 1
Volver, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Matador, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Dark Habits, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Law of Desire, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
High Heels, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Kika, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Live Flesh,...
Additional selections include a mini-retro of last year’s TIFF (Pacifiction and the newest film by Sophy Romvari among them), 10 by Pedro Almodóvar, and David Lynch’s rare 1988 short The Cowboy and the Frenchman, starring Harry Dean Stanton and Jack Nance.
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
September 1
Volver, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Matador, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Dark Habits, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Law of Desire, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
High Heels, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Kika, directed by Pedro Almodóvar
Live Flesh,...
- 8/31/2023
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Few American filmmakers of the last 40 years await a major rediscovery like Hal Hartley, whose traces in modern movies are either too-minor or entirely unknown. Thus it’s cause for celebration that the Criterion Channel are soon launching a major retrospective: 13 features (which constitutes all but My America) and 17 shorts, a sui generis style and persistent vision running across 30 years. Expect your Halloween party to be aswim in Henry Fool costumes.
Speaking of: there’s a one-month headstart on seasonal programming with the 13-film “High School Horror”––most notable perhaps being a streaming premiere for the uncut version of Suspiria, plus the rare opportunity to see a Robert Rodriguez movie on the Criterion Channel––and a retrospective of Hong Kong vampire movies. A retrospective of ’70s car movies offer chills and thrills of a different sort
Six films by Allan Dwan and 12 “gaslight noirs” round out the main September series; The Eight Mountains,...
Speaking of: there’s a one-month headstart on seasonal programming with the 13-film “High School Horror”––most notable perhaps being a streaming premiere for the uncut version of Suspiria, plus the rare opportunity to see a Robert Rodriguez movie on the Criterion Channel––and a retrospective of Hong Kong vampire movies. A retrospective of ’70s car movies offer chills and thrills of a different sort
Six films by Allan Dwan and 12 “gaslight noirs” round out the main September series; The Eight Mountains,...
- 8/21/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
La BêteCOMPETITIONComandante (Edoardo De Angelis)The Promised Land (Nikolaj Arcel)Dogman (Luc Besson) La Bête (Bertrand Bonello) Hors-Saison (Stéphane Brizé) Enea (Pietro Castellitto) Maestro (Bradley Cooper)Priscilla (Sofia Coppola)Finalmente L’Alba (Saverio Costanzo)Lubo (Giorgio Diritti) Origin (Ava DuVernay) The Killer (David Fincher)Memory (Michel Franco)Io capitano (Matteo Garrone)Evil Does Not Exist (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi)The Green Border (Agnieszka Holland)The Theory of Everything (Timm Kröger)Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos)El conde (Pablo Larrain)Ferrari (Michael Mann)Adagio (Stefano Sollima)Woman OfHolly (Fien Troch)Out Of COMPETITIONFictionSociety of the Snow (J.A. Bayona)Coup de Chance (Woody Allen)The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (Wes Anderson)The Penitent (Luca Barbareschi)L’Ordine Del Tempo (Liliana Cavani)Vivants (Alix Delaporte)Welcome to Paradise (Leonardo di Constanzo)Daaaaaali! (Quentin Dupieux)The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (William Friedkin)Making of (Cedric Kahn)Aggro Dr1ft (Harmony Korine)Hitman (Richard Linklater)The Palace (Roman Polanski...
- 7/29/2023
- MUBI
Jessica Lange came by her restlessness naturally. Born on April 20, 1949, to a stay-at-home mom and a traveling salesman father who moved the family all over the state of Minnesota, she quickly became acclimated to the process of re-acclimating. Eventually, the need for stabilization lost its appeal. Three years into studying art and photography at the University of Minnesota, she married Spanish photographer Paco Grande, at which point their shared wanderlust took them all over the United States and Mexico. The pair split upon moving to Paris, where Lange discovered Étienne Decroux and corporeal mime -- which departs from the conventional white-faced japery you're familiar with, and seeks to find abstract poetry in the movement of people and things.
Lange possessed the soul of a poet, but found this form of performance emotionally unrewarding, so she decamped for New York City to study acting with Mira Rostova at Hb Studio. She...
Lange possessed the soul of a poet, but found this form of performance emotionally unrewarding, so she decamped for New York City to study acting with Mira Rostova at Hb Studio. She...
- 7/25/2023
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
The 26th San Francisco Silent Film Festival was another joyous gathering of silent cinema fans, historians, scholars, and all stripes of movie buffs. Launched in 1995, the festival has grown from a single-day event to—excluding two years of Covid shutdowns—an annual, five-day celebration. It’s about the movies, of course, and this year Sfsff presented 20 features and seven shorts. But it’s also about the silent movie experience. All shows were accompanied by live music, from solo piano to small combos to a 10-piece mini-orchestra for the closing-night event, playing both archival music and original scores, many composed for the screenings.
Allan Dwan’s The Iron Mask, from 1929, opened the festival with a bittersweet farewell to the silents. The film, the swashbuckling final silent feature to star Douglas Fairbanks, has added resonance for Sfsff audiences because of the legacy of the Castro Theatre, the festival’s home for its entire 26 years.
Allan Dwan’s The Iron Mask, from 1929, opened the festival with a bittersweet farewell to the silents. The film, the swashbuckling final silent feature to star Douglas Fairbanks, has added resonance for Sfsff audiences because of the legacy of the Castro Theatre, the festival’s home for its entire 26 years.
- 7/24/2023
- by Sean Axmaker
- Slant Magazine
At a certain point you care less about world premieres and fixate mostly on a festival’s repertory slate. And even by the high standards set with Cannes Classics or NYFF Revivals is this year’s Venice Classics in a class of its own. We could start at the new cuts for three of the greatest directors ever: One from the Heart is the latest film to be given a revision by Francis Ford Coppola, following recuts of Apocalypse Now, Twixt, and Dementia 13––to say nothing of restorations like The Rain People, of which we’re hosting the New York premiere next weekend––while Andrei Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev will debut in “the reconstruction of the complete original version, which was censored before its release and has never been seen until now.” Meanwhile one of Yasujiro Ozu’s greatest films, There Was a Father, has been amended by “recent rediscovery...
- 7/21/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
The first screening of the uncensored version of ’Andrei Rublev’ by Andrei Tarkovsky has also been programmed.
Venice Classics will include a screening of ‘The Exorcist’ and tributes to late filmmakers Ruggero Deodato and Carlos Saura as part of its line-up of restored features for the 2023 edition.
The Exorcist, by William Friedkin, returns in a restored version, to mark the 100th anniversary of its distributor, Warner Bros.
Italian genre master Deodato passed away last year. One of his most extreme films, Ultimo Mondo Cannibale, has been programmed in tribute. This edition also pays homage to Italian actor Gina Lollobrigida, who died in January,...
Venice Classics will include a screening of ‘The Exorcist’ and tributes to late filmmakers Ruggero Deodato and Carlos Saura as part of its line-up of restored features for the 2023 edition.
The Exorcist, by William Friedkin, returns in a restored version, to mark the 100th anniversary of its distributor, Warner Bros.
Italian genre master Deodato passed away last year. One of his most extreme films, Ultimo Mondo Cannibale, has been programmed in tribute. This edition also pays homage to Italian actor Gina Lollobrigida, who died in January,...
- 7/21/2023
- by Mona Tabbara
- ScreenDaily
Recently restored versions of William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist,” Terrence Malick’s “Days of Heaven” and Francis Ford Coppola’s “One From the Heart” feature in the Venice Classics section of the 80th Venice Film Festival.
The lineup of recently restored films in Venice Classics, which is curated by the festival’s artistic director Alberto Barbera in collaboration with Federico Gironi, was unveiled on Friday.
“The Exorcist” is screened, 50 years after it was produced by Warner Bros., alongside Disney’s “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm,” starring Shirley Temple and directed by “the prolific and sometimes brilliant” Allan Dwan, to mark the Hollywood studios’ 100th anniversaries.
“One From the Heart” and Arturo Ripstein’s “Deep Crimson” are “not just restored, but also revised by the filmmakers themselves in what are genuine Director’s Cuts,” Barbera and Gironi said, while Andrei Tarkovsky’s masterpiece “Andrei Rublev” will be presented in the reconstruction of the original version,...
The lineup of recently restored films in Venice Classics, which is curated by the festival’s artistic director Alberto Barbera in collaboration with Federico Gironi, was unveiled on Friday.
“The Exorcist” is screened, 50 years after it was produced by Warner Bros., alongside Disney’s “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm,” starring Shirley Temple and directed by “the prolific and sometimes brilliant” Allan Dwan, to mark the Hollywood studios’ 100th anniversaries.
“One From the Heart” and Arturo Ripstein’s “Deep Crimson” are “not just restored, but also revised by the filmmakers themselves in what are genuine Director’s Cuts,” Barbera and Gironi said, while Andrei Tarkovsky’s masterpiece “Andrei Rublev” will be presented in the reconstruction of the original version,...
- 7/21/2023
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
When Twa Flight 3, a twin-engine DC-3 concluding its cross-country route from Indiana to Burbank, California, slammed into Potosi Mountain just outside of Las Vegas in the early evening of January 16, 1942, the movies lost its greatest screwball comedienne.
Carole Lombard was 33 years old, and had just weathered a run of tepidly received dramas to reclaim her stature as one of Hollywood's most dependably hilarious performers via Alfred Hitchcock's "Mr. and Mrs. Smith." She was about to receive another round of critical acclaim for her turn as the Polish theater diva Maria Tura in Ernst Lubitsch's masterful "To Be or Not to Be." She was married to Rhett Butler himself, Clark Gable, and had committed herself to the war effort (she'd been in her home state of Indiana to host a war bond rally). Lombard was as beloved and consequential an actor as there was in the industry, and, just like that,...
Carole Lombard was 33 years old, and had just weathered a run of tepidly received dramas to reclaim her stature as one of Hollywood's most dependably hilarious performers via Alfred Hitchcock's "Mr. and Mrs. Smith." She was about to receive another round of critical acclaim for her turn as the Polish theater diva Maria Tura in Ernst Lubitsch's masterful "To Be or Not to Be." She was married to Rhett Butler himself, Clark Gable, and had committed herself to the war effort (she'd been in her home state of Indiana to host a war bond rally). Lombard was as beloved and consequential an actor as there was in the industry, and, just like that,...
- 5/13/2023
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
A couple months after spotlighting the world’s greatest actress, the Criterion Channel have taken a logical next step towards America’s greatest actress. May (or: next week) will bring an eleven-film celebration of Jennifer Jason Leigh, highlights including Verhoeven’s Flesh + Blood, Miami Blues, Alan Rudolph’s Mrs. Parker, her directorial debut The Anniversary Party, and Synecdoche, New York, and a special introduction from Leigh. Another actor’s showcase localizes directorial collaborations: Jimmy Stewart’s time with Anthony Mann, an eight-title series boasting the likes of Winchester ’73 and The Man from Laramie. Two more: a survey of ’80s Asian-American cinema (Chan Is Missing being the best-known) and 14 movies by Seijun Suzuki.
That would be enough for one month (or two), but No Bears and Cette maison will have their streaming premieres, while Criterion Editions offers the Infernal Affairs trilogy (plus its packed set), Days of Heaven, and the aforementioned Chan Is Missing.
That would be enough for one month (or two), but No Bears and Cette maison will have their streaming premieres, while Criterion Editions offers the Infernal Affairs trilogy (plus its packed set), Days of Heaven, and the aforementioned Chan Is Missing.
- 4/20/2023
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
In 1949, John Wayne was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Allan Dwan's war film "Sands of Iwo Jima." Despite several thoughtful antiwar films that preceded it -- specifically "All Quiet on the Western Front" and "The Best Years of Our Lives" -- "Iwo Jima" came at a time when patriotic, downright jingoistic movies about World War II were coming into vogue. In particular, 1949 saw the release of films like "Battleground" and "Twelve O'Clock High," both films about the nobility of war and the heroism of soldiers. Both those films were nominated for Best Picture, although they lost to the political corruption drama "All the King's Men." Wayne himself lost Best Actor to Broderick Crawford, the star of "King's Men."
In 1969, Wayne looked back on "Iwo Jima" in an interview with Roger Ebert, and posited that he lost his Oscar for political reasons. A...
In 1969, Wayne looked back on "Iwo Jima" in an interview with Roger Ebert, and posited that he lost his Oscar for political reasons. A...
- 2/28/2023
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
Movie star John Wayne had dedicated fans who hated seeing any deaths surrounding the characters he played. He held an image that represented America to many moviegoers, making it hard for some to stomach watching his characters die. Nevertheless, Wayne had 8 character deaths out of his large filmography totaling over 200 motion pictures, not including 1955’s The Sea Chase, which left his character’s fate unknown.
‘Reap the Wild Wind’ (1942) L-r: Paulette Goddard as Loxi Claiborne and John Wayne as Captain Jack Stuart | FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images
Cecil B. DeMille’s Reap the Wild Wind is set in the 1840s, when a group of salvagers go from profiting off shipwrecks to to causing them. All those in the American South consider King Cutler (Raymond Massey) the most dangerous, who sets his eyes on the ships of the wealthy Devereaux Company, Captain Jack Stuart (Wayne), and the company’s lawyer,...
‘Reap the Wild Wind’ (1942) L-r: Paulette Goddard as Loxi Claiborne and John Wayne as Captain Jack Stuart | FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images
Cecil B. DeMille’s Reap the Wild Wind is set in the 1840s, when a group of salvagers go from profiting off shipwrecks to to causing them. All those in the American South consider King Cutler (Raymond Massey) the most dangerous, who sets his eyes on the ships of the wealthy Devereaux Company, Captain Jack Stuart (Wayne), and the company’s lawyer,...
- 2/15/2023
- by Jeff Nelson
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
It was the shootout that elevated the likes of Wyatt Earp and dentist-turned-gunslinger Doc Holiday to mythic status. Several features have honored the fabled event, but John Sturges' "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" stands tall as one of the most illustrious retellings of the infamous 1881 Tombstone, Arizona shootout.
The classic western stars Burt Lancaster as Wyatt Earp and a bristled Kirk Douglas as Holiday, in one of their several big-screen collaborations. Stricken with tuberculosis, Holiday's scenes are earmarked by an intermittent tickle in the throat that, over the runtime, progresses to a full-blown hack. "This kind of cough doesn't go away," he tells the lawman, but he won't resign himself to a slow, peaceful death. Never cowering, whether by the bullet or by bacteria, Douglas keeps his character's physical ailments wrapped under a thick cloak of steely-eyed grit. Earp saves his life from a lynch mob, earning loyalty – and in his own estimation,...
The classic western stars Burt Lancaster as Wyatt Earp and a bristled Kirk Douglas as Holiday, in one of their several big-screen collaborations. Stricken with tuberculosis, Holiday's scenes are earmarked by an intermittent tickle in the throat that, over the runtime, progresses to a full-blown hack. "This kind of cough doesn't go away," he tells the lawman, but he won't resign himself to a slow, peaceful death. Never cowering, whether by the bullet or by bacteria, Douglas keeps his character's physical ailments wrapped under a thick cloak of steely-eyed grit. Earp saves his life from a lynch mob, earning loyalty – and in his own estimation,...
- 2/12/2023
- by Anya Stanley
- Slash Film
When someone makes the misguided assertion that John Wayne had no range or, worse, was actually a bad actor, you can be sure they've never seen "The Searchers," "Red River" or "True Grit." They most certainly haven't seen "She Wore a Red Ribbon," the conclusion to John Ford's "Cavalry Trilogy" which boasts what might very well be the finest performance of The Duke's career.
To be fair, Ford, Wayne's most trusted collaborator, wasn't entirely sold on Wayne's potential beyond his star power until he saw Howard Hawks' "Red River" in 1948. Upon seeing Hawks' Western, Ford reportedly exclaimed, "I didn't know the big son of a b**** could act." While it's worth noting that Ford had a penchant for razzing his frequent leading man, Wayne's portrayal of rancher Thomas Dunson is surprisingly shaded. Dunson is a hard, unyielding man at the outset, but an arduous cattle drive compounded by...
To be fair, Ford, Wayne's most trusted collaborator, wasn't entirely sold on Wayne's potential beyond his star power until he saw Howard Hawks' "Red River" in 1948. Upon seeing Hawks' Western, Ford reportedly exclaimed, "I didn't know the big son of a b**** could act." While it's worth noting that Ford had a penchant for razzing his frequent leading man, Wayne's portrayal of rancher Thomas Dunson is surprisingly shaded. Dunson is a hard, unyielding man at the outset, but an arduous cattle drive compounded by...
- 11/29/2022
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
Do you know when the first movie premiere in Hollywood history was held?
On Oct. 18. 1922 Sid Grauman opened his movie palace the Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Blvd. with superstar Douglas Fairbank’s latest swashbuckler “Robin Hood.” The red carpet was rolled out for Fairbanks, his wife Mary Pickford and their good friend (and partner in United Artists) Charlie Chaplin. It cost 5 to attend the premiere. And the movie, which was the top box office draw, played there exclusively for several months. The Egyptian cost 800,000 to build and took 18 months to complete for Grauman and real estate developer Charles E. Toberman. It is currently being renovated by Netflix in cooperation with the American Cinematheque.
“Robin Hood,” directed by Allan Dwan, was one of the most expensive movies of the silent era, costing just under 1 million. The castle was the biggest set ever made for a silent movie. Some scenes feature over 1,200 extras.
On Oct. 18. 1922 Sid Grauman opened his movie palace the Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Blvd. with superstar Douglas Fairbank’s latest swashbuckler “Robin Hood.” The red carpet was rolled out for Fairbanks, his wife Mary Pickford and their good friend (and partner in United Artists) Charlie Chaplin. It cost 5 to attend the premiere. And the movie, which was the top box office draw, played there exclusively for several months. The Egyptian cost 800,000 to build and took 18 months to complete for Grauman and real estate developer Charles E. Toberman. It is currently being renovated by Netflix in cooperation with the American Cinematheque.
“Robin Hood,” directed by Allan Dwan, was one of the most expensive movies of the silent era, costing just under 1 million. The castle was the biggest set ever made for a silent movie. Some scenes feature over 1,200 extras.
- 10/25/2022
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
Above: 1919 Swedish poster for Out West. Design by Eric Rohman.I’ve recently come across a little known, rather brief but quite extraordinary chapter in illustrated movie poster history, thanks to the poster department of Heritage Auctions. Just over one hundred years ago in Sweden, one distribution company or state agency seems to have commissioned an astonishing series of posters for imported American silent films that to today’s eyes seem both retro and modern at the same time (some of them could be mistaken for Mondo designs). They have been popping up for auction at Heritage over the past few years, reaching prices as high as 4,320 for Out West (above) and as low as 73 for the lovely Kingdom of Youth seen below. In fact there are a number coming up for auction next month and bidding begins next week.The posters are all 2- or 3-color linocut designs and...
- 10/23/2022
- MUBI
The Criterion Channel’s July lineup is an across-the-board display of strengths, ranging as it does from very specific programming cues to actor retrospectives and hardly ignoring the strength of Criterion Editions. Surely much fun’s to be had with “In the Ring,” a decade-spanning, 16-film curation of boxing pictures—Raging Bull and Fat City, of course, with some you forget are boxing movies (Rocco and His Brothers) and others you’ve likely never seen at all (count me excited for King Vidor’s The Champ). “Noir in Color” brilliantly upends common conception of a drama (and gives you excuse to see Nicholas Ray’s Party Girl); Setsuko Hara films are gathered into a handy collection; and Blake Edwards gets six.
On the Criterion Editions front they’ve gone all out: the Before trilogy, Alex Cox’s Walker, Leave Her to Heaven, Shaft, Destry Rides Again, Raging Bull, Hedwig and the Angry Inch,...
On the Criterion Editions front they’ve gone all out: the Before trilogy, Alex Cox’s Walker, Leave Her to Heaven, Shaft, Destry Rides Again, Raging Bull, Hedwig and the Angry Inch,...
- 6/21/2022
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Not many movie buffs have the chance to meet, let alone interview or become friendly with, their favorite moviemakers.
Peter Bogdanovich, who died January 6 at the age of 82, managed the trick many times over. First as a film scholar and magazine features writer, then as a filmmaker in his own right, Bogdanovich cozied up to the likes of directors like Ford, Hawks, and Welles, and actors like John Wayne, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart, among countless others.
By some combination of luck and persistence, Bogdanovich saw to it that these men, whose movies he had seen, inhaled, and studied as a youth in New York, became his teachers, mentors, and friends.
He accomplished what had been the dream of every movie buff since before the movies talked: to get to know, in flesh and blood, those icons of the silver screen.
It was with that model in the back of...
Peter Bogdanovich, who died January 6 at the age of 82, managed the trick many times over. First as a film scholar and magazine features writer, then as a filmmaker in his own right, Bogdanovich cozied up to the likes of directors like Ford, Hawks, and Welles, and actors like John Wayne, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart, among countless others.
By some combination of luck and persistence, Bogdanovich saw to it that these men, whose movies he had seen, inhaled, and studied as a youth in New York, became his teachers, mentors, and friends.
He accomplished what had been the dream of every movie buff since before the movies talked: to get to know, in flesh and blood, those icons of the silver screen.
It was with that model in the back of...
- 1/8/2022
- by Peter Tonguette
- Indiewire
One Shot is a series that seeks to find an essence of cinema history in one single image of a movie. There are those who believe silent films are indecipherable to a modern audience. Yet this image from 1924’s Manhandled bridges a century capturing city living far below penthouse level. After holding her own on a rush-hour subway, shopgirl Tessie McGuire stands crushed in body and spirit. Examining the lone grape left on her stomped cloche, she wears the mix of burnout, self-recrimination, weltschmerz, and disappointment that’s crossed the mind of anyone living in NYC too long. We move into shoebox apartments of questionable legality and dubious physical stability. We put up with New York’s indifference, anger, grime, and congestion. We're overcharged and underpaid, all in hopes of catching a little bit of the city’s promised magic; sophisticated elegance, nouveau nightlife, chance encounters and singular sights. This...
- 9/29/2021
- MUBI
The Criterion Channel has unveiled their lineup for next month and it’s another strong slate, featuring retrospectives of Carole Lombard, John Waters, Robert Downey Sr., Luis García Berlanga, Jane Russell, and Rob Epstein & Jeffrey Friedman. Also in the lineup is new additions to their Queersighted series, notably Todd Haynes’ early film Poison (Safe is also premiering in a separate presentation), William Friedkin’s Cruising, and Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Teorama.
The new restorations of Manoel de Oliveira’s stunning Francisca and Francesco Rosi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli will join the channel, alongside Agnieszka Holland’s Spoor, Bong Joon Ho’s early short film Incoherence, and Luc Dardenne & Jean-Pierre Dardenne’s Rosetta.
See the lineup below and explore more on criterionchannel.com.
#Blackmendream, Shikeith, 2014
12 Angry Men, Sidney Lumet, 1957
About Tap, George T. Nierenberg, 1985
The AIDS Show, Peter Adair and Rob Epstein, 1986
The Assignation, Curtis Harrington, 1953
Aya of Yop City,...
The new restorations of Manoel de Oliveira’s stunning Francisca and Francesco Rosi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli will join the channel, alongside Agnieszka Holland’s Spoor, Bong Joon Ho’s early short film Incoherence, and Luc Dardenne & Jean-Pierre Dardenne’s Rosetta.
See the lineup below and explore more on criterionchannel.com.
#Blackmendream, Shikeith, 2014
12 Angry Men, Sidney Lumet, 1957
About Tap, George T. Nierenberg, 1985
The AIDS Show, Peter Adair and Rob Epstein, 1986
The Assignation, Curtis Harrington, 1953
Aya of Yop City,...
- 5/24/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
While the summer movie season will kick off shortly––and we’ll be sharing a comprehensive preview on the arthouse, foreign, indie, and (few) studio films worth checking out––on the streaming side, The Criterion Channel and Mubi have unveiled their May 2021 lineups and there’s a treasure trove of highlights to dive into.
Timed with Satyajit Ray’s centenary, The Criterion Channel will have a retrospective of the Indian master, along with series on Gena Rowlands, Robert Ryan, Mitchell Leisen, Michael Almereyda, Josephine Decker, and more. In terms of recent releases, they’ll also feature Fire Will Come, The Booksellers, and the new restoration of Tom Noonan’s directorial debut What Happened Was….
On Mubi, in anticipation of Undine, they’ll feature two essential early features by Christian Petzold, Jerichow and The State That I Am In, along with his 1990 short documentary Süden. Also amongst the lineup is Sophy Romvari’s Still Processing,...
Timed with Satyajit Ray’s centenary, The Criterion Channel will have a retrospective of the Indian master, along with series on Gena Rowlands, Robert Ryan, Mitchell Leisen, Michael Almereyda, Josephine Decker, and more. In terms of recent releases, they’ll also feature Fire Will Come, The Booksellers, and the new restoration of Tom Noonan’s directorial debut What Happened Was….
On Mubi, in anticipation of Undine, they’ll feature two essential early features by Christian Petzold, Jerichow and The State That I Am In, along with his 1990 short documentary Süden. Also amongst the lineup is Sophy Romvari’s Still Processing,...
- 4/26/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Perhaps the highest compliment I can offer Swiss brothers Ramon and Silvan Zürcher is that while watching their first film, the precocious The Strange Little Cat (2013), and their much-anticipated second, The Girl and the Spider, my imagination ping-pongs around myriad other kinds of movies the duo could make. A spy film? Adapting La princesse de Clèves? A sports drama? An episode of Bridgerton? The mind-boggles. This is because these two movies, the first set in one apartment and the second—which is premiering at Berlin in the Encounters competition—ambitiously set in two, are exquisitely compact pinball machines of characters entering and leaving each frame, each room, each scene, and adding to and changing the movie at each occurrence, deepening the story’s mystery. Theirs is a cinema that refreshes moment to moment as person A talks to person B, a conversation we soon realize is being witnessed by person C,...
- 3/3/2021
- MUBI
The Notebook Primer introduces readers to some of the most important figures, films, genres, and movements in film history.Speaking after her tragic death at the age of 33, President Franklin D. Roosevelt testified to the legacy of Carole Lombard. “She is and always will be a star,” he stated in 1942, “one that we shall never forget, nor cease to be grateful to.” Although the president’s words were at least in part influenced by Lombard’s recent patriotic zeal (she died in a plane crash after traveling to sell war bonds), his comments resonated throughout the country, especially Hollywood, where the actress’s impact had been progressively pronounced for years. Her films were like a breath of fresh air to Depression-era audiences, adding silver screen levity to individuals seeking a brief reprieve from day-to-day hardship. By contrast, Lombard’s cinematic sphere was often one of glamour, romance, and, above all,...
- 1/6/2021
- MUBI
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSThe prolific Rhonda Fleming, a "movie star made for Technicolor" who shone in films like Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound, Jacques Tourneur's Out of the Past, and especially Allan Dwan's Slightly Scarlet and Tennessee's Partner, has died at 97. Recommended VIEWINGBarry Jenkins has released a "preamble" for his upcoming Amazon series The Underground Railroad, based on the novel by Colson Whitehead. The series follows two slaves who escape a Georgia plantation by following the Underground Railroad. The trailer for Werner Herzog and Clive Oppenheimer's Apple TV+ documentary, Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds, which focuses on the impact of meteorites on our planet. Roni Moore and James Blagden's Midnight in Paris follows a group of teenagers in Flint, Michigan, during the lead-up to their senior prom. The film will have its online...
- 10/26/2020
- MUBI
Rhonda Fleming died last Wednesday in Santa Monica, California. The 97-year-old actress, who had left a successful 15-year career as a leading lady in studio films 60 years ago, was correctly noted in her obituaries as “the Queen of Technicolor” because of her flaming red hair, as well as her significant presence as a film noir actress, particularly in Jacques Tourneur’s masterpiece “Out of the Past” (1947).
Her films included a number of now-acclaimed auteurist titles like Budd Boetticher’s “The Killer Is Loose,” Allan Dwan’s “Slightly Scarlet” and “Tennessee’s Partner,” and Fritz Lang’s “While the City Sleeps,” to go along with more mainstream titles like “The Spiral Staircase” and “The Gunfight at O.K. Corral.”
Unlike actresses like Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Tippi Hedren, and others who made multiple films with Alfred Hitchcock, Fleming is less identified with the master. But he provided her with her breakout role in 1945’s “Spellbound.
Her films included a number of now-acclaimed auteurist titles like Budd Boetticher’s “The Killer Is Loose,” Allan Dwan’s “Slightly Scarlet” and “Tennessee’s Partner,” and Fritz Lang’s “While the City Sleeps,” to go along with more mainstream titles like “The Spiral Staircase” and “The Gunfight at O.K. Corral.”
Unlike actresses like Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Tippi Hedren, and others who made multiple films with Alfred Hitchcock, Fleming is less identified with the master. But he provided her with her breakout role in 1945’s “Spellbound.
- 10/18/2020
- by Tom Brueggemann
- Indiewire
As Disney quietly disappears huge swathes of film history into its vaults, I'm going to spend 2020 celebrating Twentieth Century Fox and the Fox Film Corporation's films, what one might call their output if only someone were putting it out.And now they've quietly disappeared William Fox's name from the company: guilty by association with Rupert Murdoch, even though he never associated with him.***I believe David Thomson once said something about Fox's fifties output being "the antithesis of cinema," which is very slightly nuts if you consider the films of Samuel Fuller (Pick-Up on South Street among others), Nicholas Ray (Bigger Than Life), Frank Tashlin (The Girl Can't Help It), and more.But we sort of know what he means: the advent of CinemaScope caused aesthetic confusion, as technical advances often do, and we can all picture laundry lines of less-than-fresh 1940s actors eking out their remaining B.
- 9/1/2020
- MUBI
The Notebook Primer introduces readers to some of the most important figures, films, genres, and movements in film history.Above: The Light that FailedShe had the beauty and talent of the most captivating star, the unwavering determination of the most ambitious producer, and the fervent creative vision of the most gifted director. Ida Lupino could fall into any number of categories, yet with a significance that remains almost immeasurable, perhaps the one word best describing this groundbreaking artist is simply this: she was a pioneer. Born February 4, 1918, in South London, Lupino belonged to a revered family of entertainers. Her mother, actress Connie O’Shea (also known as Connie Emerald), and her father, music hall comedian Stanley Lupino, were part of an ancestral dynasty of performers, and young Ida was accordingly encouraged to take the stage during her earliest years. In addition to writing her first play at the age of seven,...
- 7/27/2020
- MUBI
As Disney quietly disappears huge swathes of film history into its vaults, I'm going to spend 2020 celebrating Twentieth Century Fox and the Fox Film Corporation's films, what one might call their output if only someone were putting it out.And now they've quietly disappeared William Fox's name from the company: guilty by association with Rupert Murdoch, even though he never associated with him.***I really love old movies, and in tough times escaping into the past can be awfully attractive. Even the uglier side of studio product, for instance the racial caricaturing can seem like the necessary abrasive element in an otherwise smoothly pleasurable experience.I suppose everyone has their own tipping point, though, when the uncomfortable or disturbing elements overwhelm the entertainment. I can laugh at (not with) the jaw-dropping "Goin' To Heaven on a Mule" number in Warner Bros' Wonder Bar (1934), with its blackface afterlife and spot...
- 3/31/2020
- MUBI
When you speak to Kevin Brownlow, you have a direct link to some of the greatest silent film directors who ever lived. The British film historian, now 80, interviewed and befriended many early film veterans when he was just in his twenties. He then spearheaded early efforts to preserve and restore silent films at a time when silent film was often derided. To say Brownlow has some stories about those early directors would be an understatement.
“King Vidor would say to me, ‘Every time I saw a Cecil B. DeMille picture, it made me want to quit the business,’” Brownlow said during a phone interview with IndieWire from his home in London — a sentiment about the “Ten Commandments” filmmaker Brownlow disagrees with. In the 1960s, he also encountered Josef von Sternberg, Allan Dwan, and Abel Gance, whose 1927 epic “Napoleon” Brownlow spent over 12 years restoring before debuting a reconstituted print of the...
“King Vidor would say to me, ‘Every time I saw a Cecil B. DeMille picture, it made me want to quit the business,’” Brownlow said during a phone interview with IndieWire from his home in London — a sentiment about the “Ten Commandments” filmmaker Brownlow disagrees with. In the 1960s, he also encountered Josef von Sternberg, Allan Dwan, and Abel Gance, whose 1927 epic “Napoleon” Brownlow spent over 12 years restoring before debuting a reconstituted print of the...
- 4/20/2019
- by Christian Blauvelt
- Indiewire
In the extensive filmography of director Allan Dwan, there’s perhaps no more glorious period of his filmmaking than his DeLuxe color film noir period of the 1950’s. Following on the heels of the tawdry Slightly Scarlet, which featured red-heads Arlene Dahl and Rhonda Fleming squaring off with John Payne, Dwan inverts the ménage a toi for The River’s Edge utilizing another red-head, Debra Paget, positioned between the amorous interests of Anthony Quinn and Ray Milland in one of his most sinister on-screen personas. Like a cross between Joseph Pevney’s Fox Fire (1955) and the classic The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), a beautiful woman finds herself indebted to her husband while languishing in a rural backwater, this time a New Mexican ranch.…...
- 4/16/2019
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Exclusive: Netflix is in preliminary talks with American Cinematheque to buy the venerable Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard. This will become the first brick and mortar movie theater acquisition for Netflix. But sources said it would be wrong to eye this as the start of a move into the operational theater business.
This is a deal that sources place in the many tens of millions of dollars, and it will put Netflix in good standing with the Hollywood cinephile community as the disruptive streaming company helps to preserve one of Hollywood’s landmark movie theaters and its long tradition. It is also putting the non-profit American Cinematheque on firmer financial footing in the process.
Built by Sid Grauman in the early 1920s, the pharoah-themed theater hosted Hollywood’s very first movie premiere in 1922. That was Robin Hood, the Allan Dwan-directed silent film that starred Douglas Fairbanks as the title character,...
This is a deal that sources place in the many tens of millions of dollars, and it will put Netflix in good standing with the Hollywood cinephile community as the disruptive streaming company helps to preserve one of Hollywood’s landmark movie theaters and its long tradition. It is also putting the non-profit American Cinematheque on firmer financial footing in the process.
Built by Sid Grauman in the early 1920s, the pharoah-themed theater hosted Hollywood’s very first movie premiere in 1922. That was Robin Hood, the Allan Dwan-directed silent film that starred Douglas Fairbanks as the title character,...
- 4/9/2019
- by Mike Fleming Jr
- Deadline Film + TV
Is it a film noir? This desert-set crime tale sees a rat (Ray Milland) escaping to Mexico with a bag of cash, forcing a hunting guide (Anthony Quinn) to show him the way and stealing his wife (Debra Paget) in the bargain. Remember what Godard said about only needing a girl and a gun to make a movie? Veteran director Allan Dwan has already memorized that lesson, and pulls it off in color and CinemaScope on Mexican locations. Ms. Paget takes both a bath and a shower, only to be upstaged by a peach-colored T-Bird convertible.
The River’s Edge
Blu-ray
Twilight Time
1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 87 min. / Street Date March 19, 2019 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95
Starring: Ray Milland, Anthony Quinn, Debra Paget, Harry Carey Jr., Chubby Johnson, Byron K. Foulger, Tom McKee, Frank Gerstle.
Cinematography: Harold Lipstein
Film Editor: James Leicester
Original Music: Louis Forbes
Written by Harold Jacob Smith,...
The River’s Edge
Blu-ray
Twilight Time
1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 87 min. / Street Date March 19, 2019 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95
Starring: Ray Milland, Anthony Quinn, Debra Paget, Harry Carey Jr., Chubby Johnson, Byron K. Foulger, Tom McKee, Frank Gerstle.
Cinematography: Harold Lipstein
Film Editor: James Leicester
Original Music: Louis Forbes
Written by Harold Jacob Smith,...
- 4/6/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Above: Title lobby card for 3 Bad Men.The Museum of Modern Art in New York is in the middle of the second part of their essential series of films made by the Fox Film Corporation between 1920 and 1933. Born in Hungary in 1879 but raised in New York, William Fox (born Wilhelm Fuchs) bought his first Nickelodeon in 1904 and spent ten years as an exhibitor and distributor before setting up the Fox Film Corporation production company in 1915 in Fort Lee, New Jersey. The studio eventually moved to Hollywood and for twenty years—before merging with Twentieth Century Pictures to form 20th Century Fox in 1935—was, as MoMA says, “home to the most dazzling lineup of directorial talent in the studio era. As silent film transitioned into sound, Fox’s roster of directors included Frank Borzage, Allan Dwan, John Ford, Howard Hawks, William K. Howard, Henry King, William Cameron Menzies, F. W. Murnau,...
- 3/8/2019
- MUBI
The Half Breed (1916) with live music by The Rats and People Motion Picture Orchestra will screen after the new documentary I, Douglas Fairbanks Saturday at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium as part of this year’s St. Louis International Film Festival. The prgram starts at 7pm. Ticket information can be found Here
There’s nothing better than silent films accompanied by live music! The Rats and People is a treasure and St. Louis is lucky to have them here. I’ve seen them perform with silent films several times, often at The St. Louis International Film Festival, and usually at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium and it’s always a stunning good time at the movies. You’ll have the chance to see them perform their magic this Saturday, November 10th when they premiere their new score for The Half Breed (1916)
During the peak of the silent era, the dashing...
There’s nothing better than silent films accompanied by live music! The Rats and People is a treasure and St. Louis is lucky to have them here. I’ve seen them perform with silent films several times, often at The St. Louis International Film Festival, and usually at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium and it’s always a stunning good time at the movies. You’ll have the chance to see them perform their magic this Saturday, November 10th when they premiere their new score for The Half Breed (1916)
During the peak of the silent era, the dashing...
- 11/6/2018
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Review by Roger Carpenter
As so often has happened over the years, silent films have been lost to time, or survive only in very poor or often incomplete prints. Because these films weren’t thought of as “art” many were scrapped due to high storage costs, recycled for their silver content, or were destroyed by fire due to their high combustibility. Others were resold to budget distribution companies, recut and retitled, and released as totally different films. Thus was the fate of many Douglas Fairbanks movies from his time at Triangle Pictures. The Half-Breed is a classic case in point.
Based upon a short story and rewritten for the screen by its author in collaboration with Gentlemen Prefer Blondes novelist and pioneering screenwriter Anita Loos, The Half-Breed tells the story of a baby abandoned by his white father and Native American mother and raised by an elderly man who lives deep in the woods.
As so often has happened over the years, silent films have been lost to time, or survive only in very poor or often incomplete prints. Because these films weren’t thought of as “art” many were scrapped due to high storage costs, recycled for their silver content, or were destroyed by fire due to their high combustibility. Others were resold to budget distribution companies, recut and retitled, and released as totally different films. Thus was the fate of many Douglas Fairbanks movies from his time at Triangle Pictures. The Half-Breed is a classic case in point.
Based upon a short story and rewritten for the screen by its author in collaboration with Gentlemen Prefer Blondes novelist and pioneering screenwriter Anita Loos, The Half-Breed tells the story of a baby abandoned by his white father and Native American mother and raised by an elderly man who lives deep in the woods.
- 5/22/2018
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Dressed to KillMore from MoMA's spectacular retrospective (see part 1 of our guide here), skimming the cream from the top of the William Fox archives, a major studio whose films, apart from a few known classics by Frank Borzage, John Ford, et cetera, have been sunk in obscurity for too long. Fox opened his doors to experimental geniuses like F.W. Murnau and Erik Charell, and encouraged major talents like Ford, Howard Hawks, Raoul Walsh and Borzage to spread their wings.In Borzage’s masterpiece 7th Heaven, how many viewers have any problem with the glaring fact that the garret where Janet Gaynor lives is apparently reached by two completely different stairwells, one that’s angular, for the crane shot, and one that’s spiral for the overhead angle?UpstreamThe idea is consistent with the expressionist approach at Fox. Edgar G. Ulmer claimed that the German expressionists would build a new set for every camera angle,...
- 5/21/2018
- MUBI
(Welcome to The Movies That Made Star Wars, a series where we explore the films that inspired George Lucas’ iconic universe. In this edition: the family classic Heidi.) 1937 saw the release of Heidi, a classic film starring Shirley Temple and directed by the legendary silent film maker Allan Dwan. Temple, a box-office powerhouse, stars […]
The post How a 1937 Shirley Temple Movie Influenced the ‘Star Wars’ Universe appeared first on /Film.
The post How a 1937 Shirley Temple Movie Influenced the ‘Star Wars’ Universe appeared first on /Film.
- 5/9/2018
- by Bryan Young
- Slash Film
Ricardo Cortez: Although never as big a star as fellow 1920s screen heartthrobs Rudolph Valentino, Ramon Novarro, and John Gilbert, Cortez had a long – and, to some extent, prestigious – film career, appearing in nearly 100 movies between 1923 and 1950. Among his directors: Allan Dwan, Cecil B. DeMille, D.W. Griffith, James Cruze, Alexander Korda, Herbert Brenon, Roy Del Ruth, Frank Lloyd, Gregory La Cava, William A. Wellman, Alexander Hall, Lloyd Bacon, Tay Garnett, Archie Mayo, Raoul Walsh, Frank Capra, Walter Lang, Michael Curtiz, and John Ford. See previous post: “Remembering Ricardo Cortez: Hollywood's Silent “Latin Lover” & Star of Original 'The Maltese Falcon'.” First of all, why Ricardo Cortez? Since I began writing about classic movies and vintage filmmakers roughly 30 years ago, people have always been curious why I choose particular subjects. It sounds kind of corny, but I have always wanted to do original work and perhaps make a minor contribution to film history at the...
- 7/7/2017
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Ricardo Cortez biography 'The Magnificent Heel: The Life and Films of Ricardo Cortez' – Paramount's 'Latin Lover' threat to a recalcitrant Rudolph Valentino, and a sly, seductive Sam Spade in the original film adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's 'The Maltese Falcon.' 'The Magnificent Heel: The Life and Films of Ricardo Cortez': Author Dan Van Neste remembers the silent era's 'Latin Lover' & the star of the original 'The Maltese Falcon' At odds with Famous Players-Lasky after the release of the 1922 critical and box office misfire The Young Rajah, Rudolph Valentino demands a fatter weekly paycheck and more control over his movie projects. The studio – a few years later to be reorganized under the name of its distribution arm, Paramount – balks. Valentino goes on a “one-man strike.” In 42nd Street-style, unknown 22-year-old Valentino look-alike contest winner Jacob Krantz of Manhattan steps in, shortly afterwards to become known worldwide as Latin Lover Ricardo Cortez of...
- 7/7/2017
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Ida Lupino was the first woman to direct a classic noir film. In fact, she was the only woman working within the 1950s Hollywood studio system to direct a feature and she directed seven features and more than 100 TV episodes. She was the only woman to direct episodes of the original “The Twilight Zone” series, as well as the only director to have starred in the show.
She was born in London on Feb. 4, 1918, during a German zeppelin bombing. Her father’s forbears were traveling players and puppeteers in Renaissance Italy. Later generations migrated to England in the 17th century. Her father, Stanley Lupino, was a noted comedian, and her mother, Connie Emerald, was an actress who was also descended from a theatrical family. A cousin, Lupino Lane, was an internationally popular song-and-dance man.
As a child, she improvised and acted scenes with her younger sister, Rita, in a small...
She was born in London on Feb. 4, 1918, during a German zeppelin bombing. Her father’s forbears were traveling players and puppeteers in Renaissance Italy. Later generations migrated to England in the 17th century. Her father, Stanley Lupino, was a noted comedian, and her mother, Connie Emerald, was an actress who was also descended from a theatrical family. A cousin, Lupino Lane, was an internationally popular song-and-dance man.
As a child, she improvised and acted scenes with her younger sister, Rita, in a small...
- 11/10/2016
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Since any New York City cinephile has a nearly suffocating wealth of theatrical options, we figured it’d be best to compile some of the more worthwhile repertory showings into one handy list. Displayed below are a few of the city’s most reliable theaters and links to screenings of their weekend offerings — films you’re not likely to see in a theater again anytime soon, and many of which are, also, on 35mm. If you have a chance to attend any of these, we’re of the mind that it’s time extremely well-spent.
Metrograph
“Queer ’90s” continues with the likes of Basic Instinct, The Crying Game, and Priscilla.
Films from George Cukor and Azazel Jacobs can be seen on Friday.
The Disney documentary Oceans plays this Saturday; Allan Dwan’s The Inside Story screens this Sunday.
Anthology Film Archives
A series on voyeurism and surveillance brings Citizenfour, Haroun Farocki’s Prison Images,...
Metrograph
“Queer ’90s” continues with the likes of Basic Instinct, The Crying Game, and Priscilla.
Films from George Cukor and Azazel Jacobs can be seen on Friday.
The Disney documentary Oceans plays this Saturday; Allan Dwan’s The Inside Story screens this Sunday.
Anthology Film Archives
A series on voyeurism and surveillance brings Citizenfour, Haroun Farocki’s Prison Images,...
- 10/14/2016
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
by Daniel Crooke
While known most casually as the Cool Mom of awards ceremonies – here, you and your friends can drink as much champagne as you want but make sure you do it under my roof, in front of my cameras – the Hollywood Foreign Press Association accomplishes much more every year than pulling off Oscar season’s liveliest, sloppiest party. At their annual Grants Banquet last week, the HFPA awarded over two million dollars worth of grants to non-profit arts organizations, higher education fellowships, professional trainings, and other film-centric or adjacent projects and spaces.
To Angelino cinephiles, film history buffs, and fans of landmark cultural sites, one additional grant announcement might spark some interest: a $500,000 grant to renovate and restore the legendary movie palace, the Egyptian Theater. Home to reams of Golden Age Hollywood lore and, contemporarily, the encyclopedic repertory organization American Cinematheque – the recipients of the grant, and masterminds...
While known most casually as the Cool Mom of awards ceremonies – here, you and your friends can drink as much champagne as you want but make sure you do it under my roof, in front of my cameras – the Hollywood Foreign Press Association accomplishes much more every year than pulling off Oscar season’s liveliest, sloppiest party. At their annual Grants Banquet last week, the HFPA awarded over two million dollars worth of grants to non-profit arts organizations, higher education fellowships, professional trainings, and other film-centric or adjacent projects and spaces.
To Angelino cinephiles, film history buffs, and fans of landmark cultural sites, one additional grant announcement might spark some interest: a $500,000 grant to renovate and restore the legendary movie palace, the Egyptian Theater. Home to reams of Golden Age Hollywood lore and, contemporarily, the encyclopedic repertory organization American Cinematheque – the recipients of the grant, and masterminds...
- 8/11/2016
- by Daniel Crooke
- FilmExperience
Relatively few films from Fox Pictures (before they became Twentieth Century Fox) are readily available: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans is the big one. The modest caper Black Sheep wouldn't be high on the list for reissue: stars Edmund Lowe and Claire Trevor aren't too well-remembered, though he's in Dinner at Eight and she's in Stagecoach. Despite a large cast of supporting players, rotund character man Eugene Pallette is the only other really familiar figure, though founding Keystone Kop Ford Sterling has a good bit as a ship's detective.We're on a transatlantic liner, see, and there are warnings posted about professional gamblers: The Lady Eve territory, before Sturges thought of it. Lowe is such a gambler, but he's a swell guy really. Trevor plays an actress, which is no stretch, and the two have real chemistry. He has a debonair manner and a mellifluous voice—and a drunk scene,...
- 5/18/2016
- MUBI
After falling into the public domain, Phil Karlson’s 1952 film noir Kansas City Confidential became unfairly lumped into B-grade bracket, a disservice considering the title’s odd narrative and eventual influence on contemporary filmmakers. Karlson, who would eventually turn to mainstream efforts starring the likes of Dean Martin and Elvis Presley in the 1960s and 1970s, contributed several enjoyable minor noir efforts in the 1950s. These would include 1952’s Scandal Sheet with Donna Reed and Broderick Crawford, Kim Novak casino heist effort 5 Against the House, and that same year’s Tight Spot with a peculiar role for Ginger Rogers. But none have enjoyed the staying power of this particular heist drama, now restored with its most accomplished transfer yet.
Kansas City delivery man Joe Rolfe (John Payne) is at the wrong place at the wrong time when he’s nabbed by the cops as the driver of a heist involving...
Kansas City delivery man Joe Rolfe (John Payne) is at the wrong place at the wrong time when he’s nabbed by the cops as the driver of a heist involving...
- 2/2/2016
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
As a supplement to our Recommended Discs weekly feature, Peter Labuza regularly highlights notable recent home-video releases with expanded reviews. See this week’s selections below.
Speedy (Criterion)
Harold Lloyd’s mastery of comic timing comes through his respect for environment. While other slapsticians bent reality into a joke, Lloyd’s joke is blending himself into the cruelty of reality. Speedy — his final silent feature — brought him to the streets of New York City to put his Glasses Character into the bustling metropolis, attempting to hold a job and save a fledgling horse-drawn trolley business from corporate conspiracy. Lloyd’s natural comic timing — less mannered than both Keaton and Chaplin — makes him just odd enough to pratfall around the streets with his one-track (or one-baseball diamond) mind, managing to be overly polite and overly clueless at the same time. When he attempts to get a trolley seat for his gal on a crowded car,...
Speedy (Criterion)
Harold Lloyd’s mastery of comic timing comes through his respect for environment. While other slapsticians bent reality into a joke, Lloyd’s joke is blending himself into the cruelty of reality. Speedy — his final silent feature — brought him to the streets of New York City to put his Glasses Character into the bustling metropolis, attempting to hold a job and save a fledgling horse-drawn trolley business from corporate conspiracy. Lloyd’s natural comic timing — less mannered than both Keaton and Chaplin — makes him just odd enough to pratfall around the streets with his one-track (or one-baseball diamond) mind, managing to be overly polite and overly clueless at the same time. When he attempts to get a trolley seat for his gal on a crowded car,...
- 1/14/2016
- by Peter Labuza
- The Film Stage
Constance Cummings in 'Night After Night.' Constance Cummings: Working with Frank Capra and Mae West (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Actress Went from Harold Lloyd to Eugene O'Neill.”) Back at Columbia, Harry Cohn didn't do a very good job at making Constance Cummings feel important. By the end of 1932, Columbia and its sweet ingenue found themselves in court, fighting bitterly over stipulations in her contract. According to the actress and lawyer's daughter, Columbia had failed to notify her that they were picking up her option. Therefore, she was a free agent, able to offer her services wherever she pleased. Harry Cohn felt otherwise, claiming that his contract player had waived such a notice. The battle would spill over into 1933. On the positive side, in addition to Movie Crazy 1932 provided Cummings with three other notable Hollywood movies: Washington Merry-Go-Round, American Madness, and Night After Night. 'Washington Merry-Go-Round...
- 11/5/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
We've already got a fine domestic disc with both versions of John Ford's fine Henry Fonda western. This Region B UK release duplicates that arrangement with different extras, and throws in a fine HD transfer of an earlier Allan Dwan version of the same story -- with strong similarities -- called Frontier Marshal. It stars Randolph Scott, Nancy Kelly, Cesar Romero and Binnie Barnes and it's very good. My Darling Clementine + Frontier Marshal Region B Blu-ray Arrow Academy (UK) 1946 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 97 + 103 min. (two versions) / Street Date August 17, 2015, 2014 / Amazon UK / £19.99 Starring Henry Fonda, Linda Darnell, Victor Mature, Cathy Downs, Walter Brennan, Tim Holt, Ward Bond, Alan Mowbray, John Ireland, Roy Roberts, Jane Darwell, Grant Withers, J. Farrell MacDonald, Russell Simpson. Cinematography Joe MacDonald Art Direction James Basevi, Lyle Wheeler Film Editor Dorothy Spencer Original Music Cyril Mockridge Written by Samuel G. Engel, Sam Hellman, Winston Miller Produced by Samuel G. Engel,...
- 10/27/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
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