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492,639 | 3,280,905 | 29,811 | 8 | No One Can , But the Drummer Man ! | The argument is always going to pursue Hitchcock's students and fans . Were the films he made in England from 1934 to 1939 his best films ( specifically THE 39 STEPS and THE LADY VANISHES ) or were the films he made in Hollywood from STRANGERS ON A TRAIN through THE BIRDS his masterworks . I think most Americans favor ... |
493,351 | 3,280,905 | 52,902 | 8 | John Ford's Civil War | John Ford probably did more to glorify the old American Cavalry of the 19th Century than any other major Hollywood Director . But while the Civil War is an element that keeps turning up in his movies , he never actually did do the Civil War film he wanted to do - a biography of the career of Ulysses Grant . In his care... |
491,879 | 3,280,905 | 50,749 | 8 | The Problems of Dealing with Blackmail | This film solidified Peter Sellers ' stardom as a comic actor of the first rank . He had appeared in other films prior to it , but THE LADYKILLERS was the only one prior to this that showed him to any advantage , as an inept " teddy boy " type . Here he is " Wee Sonny MacGregor " a popular young entertainer on televisi... |
492,089 | 3,280,905 | 33,473 | 8 | When the Law Avenges the Dead | Last night they showed this short from the " CRIME DOES NOT PAY " series on Turner Classic Movies , just before STRANGERS WHEN WE MEET . So I was able to watch it before the feature ( which would have been what I would have experienced when going to the movies in the 1940s or 1960s , of watching the short subject befor... |
492,991 | 3,280,905 | 33,477 | 8 | Above Average Comedy of People Finding Each Other | This is not the greatest comedy of it's period , but it is not one that fails to amuse the audience . In fact parts of it , by their sweetness , remind one of a better film of the future . But more of that later . COME LIVE WITH ME deals with a man with a " modern " view of marriage . Mr . Barton Kendrick ( Ian Hunter ... |
492,373 | 3,280,905 | 45,464 | 8 | Hans ' greatest acting role , and Dr . Seuss's politics | Hans Conried was a marvelous character actor , usually in comedy parts . He was possibly the first non-regular to appear on a popular television series ( " Make Room For Daddy " - later " The Danny Thomas Show " ) whose appearances were so welcomed that he became a leading regular to the extent that he stayed for the e... |
492,500 | 3,280,905 | 57,254 | 8 | Above Average Mystery with a gimmick | This is one of those mysteries where a talented amateur ( George C . Scott ) slowly unravels what the police ( despite having all the resources ) can't seem to figure out . Anthony Gethryn is a friend of the family of the Eark of Glenyre ( Colin Brook ) . One of the cousins of the Earl's current heir ( his grandson ) i... |
492,049 | 3,280,905 | 514,493 | 8 | Who Will Get the Reward ? | In this episode of the popular series , the basic story plot deals with a wealthy woman ( Hillary Pritchard ) who is in Grace Brothers and discovers that she has dropped a valuable jewel in the store . She offers a large reward . Mr . Rumbold ( Nicholas Smith ) tries ( in his own way - with his own agenda ) to organize... |
493,318 | 3,280,905 | 37,859 | 8 | What did she think she really saw ? | Deanna Durbin had one of the best singing voices in movies in the 1940s , and a pleasing personality . She did make some good films like " It Started With Eve " and " Can't Help Singing " , but most of her films have gone into a kind of eclipse which is hard to understand . Her one time film partner Judy Garland ( in t... |
493,089 | 3,280,905 | 89,239 | 8 | A Corrupt Attorney's Mind At Work | Although it seems a little confusing this film ( by " Columbo " Creators Levinson and Link ) is extremely clever at watching the activities - for most of the film - of the active mind of the protagonist . I've explained in reviewing one of the " Columbo " movies that the genesis of that type of mystery plot goes back t... |
493,025 | 3,280,905 | 50,709 | 8 | The best of the fuller versions of Les Miserables . | In the middle 1950s two film versions of Hugo's best remembered novels appeared and disappeared very quickly in movie houses . This French version of " Les Miserables " was one . The other was a French / Italian version of " Notre-Dame De Paris / The Hunchback of Notre-Dame " . That one starred Anthony Quinn as Quasimo... |
493,077 | 3,280,905 | 25,321 | 8 | A Little Bear Learns To Heed Warnings | This little cartoon is basically very charming . It is about a small bear who is enjoying the last days of summer , when he and the other animals are made aware by the arrival of Jack Frost that winter is on the way . Frost , when not painting the autumnal colors , warns everyone that they should prepare for the total ... |
492,015 | 3,280,905 | 586,319 | 8 | A Final Farewell | It was shown in 1959 , and at that time all of them seemed reasonably healthy , but there was an atmosphere ( at least from the point of view of the public ) that this was it . THE INCREDIBLE JEWEL ROBBERY can be seen as the first " short subject " Marx Brother film made since the 1930s , or as their last get together ... |
492,548 | 3,280,905 | 22,790 | 8 | In the days of the three crooning sensations . | This is an amusing old cartoon I saw twenty or so years ago . An Indian tribe has a problem - the woman all love Bing Crosby , Rudy Vallee , and Ross Columbo ( three of the four leading crooners of the 1920s into the 1940s , with Al Jolson probably being the fourth ) . Now , some seventy seven years later , the cartoon... |
492,742 | 3,280,905 | 185,578 | 8 | Baseball and that Treasurer's Report | Robert Benchley had been a critic for the old Life Magazine ( not the one published by Henry Luce , but an earlier humor magazine ) of the New York Theatre scene . He was a good critic , sometimes showing his real dismay with a play by giving capsule descriptions ( of the long running comedy " ABIE'S IRISH ROSE " , Ben... |
492,402 | 3,280,905 | 529,880 | 8 | Another sample of Bonanza Humor at it's best . | They were repeating this 1964 episode of Bonanza yesterday , wherein the comedy is again centered on Hoss with Adam and Little Joe just entering in on the sidelines . In an earlier episode , Arthur Hunnicutt portrayed Obie , a sometime mountain man and sometime prospector who got into an adventure with Hoss . Like all ... |
491,761 | 3,280,905 | 64,117 | 8 | Goldie's Oscar , and Ingrid's second look at an " Indiscreet " plot | Goldie Hawn , in 1969 , was best known for playing in television comedy shows - in particular ROWAN AND MARTIN'S LAUGH IN , where she was the giggly cookie young blond . She did make movies before CACTUS FLOWER , the most notable being a Walt Disney feature , THE ONE AND ONLY GENUINE , ORIGINAL FAMILY BAND . But CACTUS... |
493,328 | 3,280,905 | 452,594 | 8 | An adult film with comic edges | This movie is going to enter the area of Hollywood Legend because of the background circumstances that mirror it's theme . I am referring to how Jennifer Aniston's marriage to Brad Pitt collapsed ( apparently ) after the latter made the film MR . AND MRS . SMITH with Angelina Jolie , and Pitt and Jolie's subsequent rom... |
492,605 | 3,280,905 | 84,494 | 8 | Bette as she ages | As less and less opportunities arose for Bette Davis to make motion pictures in the 1970s and 1980s in lead roles , she appeared on more and more television films . A PIANO FOR MRS . CIMINO was one of these . The film was about a widow who was considered too old to run her husband's music store by her family . Davis ga... |
492,730 | 3,280,905 | 36,348 | 8 | Who Had It ? . . . . | Although it seems a little long , at times , SHERLOCK HOLMES FACES DEATH is one of the best of the modern Holmes stories starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce . The plot for a change actually is twisty enough for one to wonder who is the killer . The revelation is a bit more of a surprise than many of the other stori... |
492,441 | 3,280,905 | 51,516 | 8 | You Gotta Have Heart ! | This musical , when revived about a decade ago with Jerry Lewis as Applegate , was referred to as a fable for the Eisenhower Years . It is set in a faintly comfortable period ( once the McCarthyite Persecutions were finished ) , because the concept of this musical was the preoccupation of the American public with the n... |
493,353 | 3,280,905 | 44,954 | 8 | Dangerous Train Ride | This is one of those " B-feature " film gems that are frequently more lasting and popular than " A-features " that were overproduced . It is about a woman , a witness to the murder of her husband ( a gangster ) , by several more important gangsters . She has been found in Chicago , and she has to be brought back to Los... |
493,314 | 3,280,905 | 73,628 | 8 | Good dramatization of one of the great political rivalries of the 19th Century | When Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 Republican Nomination for the Presidency , most Americans must have been surprised . Lincoln had served in the Illinois State Assembly in the 1830s and 1840s , but had only served one term in a national level job . From 1847 to 1849 Lincoln held the job of Congressman from his town of ... |
493,022 | 3,280,905 | 45,030 | 8 | A Good Adaptation | Although he wrote " Sketches By Boz " ( hence his lifelong nickname ) before this novel , " Pickwick Papers " was the work which grounded Dickens reputation . His third book " Oliver Twist " cemented it - by showing him a perceptive social critic and serious ( rather than comic ) novelist . George Orwell , in his essay... |
492,879 | 3,280,905 | 31,505 | 8 | Hitch , History , Laughton , and Du Maurier | In the early 1930s Alfred Hitchcock did a historic costume movie called WALTZES FROM VIENNA about the Strauss Family . He obviously never enjoyed such films ( he never tried musicals or pseudo-biographies again ) . But it was the first of three attempts he made to do a historic film . While none were total disasters , ... |
491,816 | 3,280,905 | 37,939 | 8 | Higher . . . HIGHER . . . . No lower . . . . LOWER . | THE NAUGHTY NINETIES is one of those films of Abbott & Costello that is a favorite with their fans for the skits that are in them : the plot about the trio of gamblers plotting to take the showboat away from good old Captain Sam ( Henry Travers ) is tolerable , because it can be ignored . We like the old Captain , but ... |
493,244 | 3,280,905 | 81,377 | 8 | Mark Twain's Civil War | This film was part of a series put on Channel 13 in 1980 - 1982 or so of movies based on stories or novels by Mark Twain . These included THE INNOCENCE ABROAD , THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER , THE MAN WHO CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG , and LIFE ON THE MISSISSIPPI . The critics , on the whole , were not enthralled by these films , fe... |
492,541 | 3,280,905 | 36,252 | 8 | The Beginning of the End of the Image of German Military Efficiency | As pointed out on the other comments on this thread , I WAS A CRIMINAL ( a . k . a . PASSPORT TO HEAVEN and CAPTAIN FROM KOEPENICK ) used to be shown fairly frequently on television . But that was in the 1950s and 1960s . By 2006 it has vanished from the face of television and movie screens . This is a pity , as not on... |
492,267 | 3,280,905 | 96,535 | 8 | Television tackling Verne | This is the 1989 miniseries with Pierce Brosnan and Eric Idle that retold the story of the 1872 Jules Verne novel that was the subject of the 1956 Mike Todd film that won the Oscar for Best Picture that year . The 1956 film is a little better than this because of Todd's showmanship and the work of Cantaflas and Robert ... |
493,221 | 3,280,905 | 40,087 | 8 | Arthur Miller's First Stage Success | Most American theater lovers think that greatness descended upon Arthur Miller in 1947 with his great play THE DEATH OF A SALESMAN . It certainly is the play that people remember above all his work , even such later classics as THE CRUCIBLE and A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE . But as a matter of fact , just like THE GLASS MENA... |
492,349 | 3,280,905 | 55,383 | 8 | A Blow For Civility and Co-existence | It is not the greatest satire of its time ( that would be DR . STRANGELOVE ) , but Peter Ustinov's ROMANOFF AND JULIET is a worthy film on its own right . It is based on a successful West End comedy by Ustinof . He plays the President of Concordia , a country in Europe like " the Grand Duchy of Fenwick " in the contemp... |
491,880 | 3,280,905 | 34,092 | 8 | A Forgotten , Bittersweet Love Story | This is a very nice little movie that showed Claudette Colbert and John Payne to great advantage as two young teachers who , in 1916 , meet in a small mid-western town , teaching at a high school . They fall in love , and we watch the romance blossom into a marriage - the entire effect helped by the nostalgia of a by-g... |
492,094 | 3,280,905 | 36,277 | 8 | I liked the unseen aide that the hero tipped at the door | There is something pathetic about how World War II hurt the institution of monarchy throughout Europe ( and nearly Japan as well ) . In Western Europe most of the monarchs fled the onslaught of the Nazi Blitzkrieg , the most notable exceptions being the rulers of Denmark and Belgium . But it is instructive to remember ... |
493,165 | 3,280,905 | 58,230 | 8 | A Charming Kid's Film from the 1960s . | In my neck of the woods in Queens is the facade of a building that once was quite important - the R . K . O . Keith in Flushing on Northern Blvd . , in New York . The theater was originally a vaudeville house where people like Judy Garland once performed . Then it was a movie house . And it was there that I saw this fi... |
492,141 | 3,280,905 | 221,180 | 8 | A Silent Patriotic Short - And the oldest film with Bushman I've Seen | I saw this short in the last year around July 4th . It is the type of film that is best seen at the time of the more patriotic holidays ( either Independence Day , Veteran's Day , Memorial Day , or even flag day - especially as Betsy Ross ( Enid Bennett ) is a central character . But to me my interest was finally seein... |
492,887 | 3,280,905 | 458,477 | 8 | Lazslo's Film Becomes a Television version of a Broadway Musical | Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock composed the scores of a number of successful musical . In the 1970s they did this musical , based on Miklos Lazslo's PERFUMERIE , which Ernst Lubitsch turned into THE SHOP AROUND THE CORNER , and which had been made into the musical film IN THE GOOD OLD SUMMERTIME . Called SHE LOVES ME ,... |
491,846 | 3,280,905 | 58,212 | 8 | When Life Imitates Cartoon Art | This was the last of the three comedies that Jack Lemmon made in the middle 1960s that he hated . Like GOOD NEIGHBOR SAM ( and not like the abysmal UNDER THE YUM YUM TREE ) HOW TO MURDER YOUR WIFE had a clever script and good production . Lemmon played a successful cartoonist who carefully scripts and photos the scenes... |
491,637 | 3,280,905 | 64,247 | 8 | Another visit to " Vulgaria " courtesy of Woody Allan | Woody Allan wrote DON'T DRINK THE WATER in the late 1960s , and it had a nice run on Broadway . It became the first of his plays to make it to the big screen , though the second ( PLAY IT AGAIN SAM ) was a better work . A later tragic-comic piece , THE FLOATING LIGHT BULB , has not made it as yet . The story is set in ... |
493,315 | 3,280,905 | 483,223 | 8 | Great Archival Film Long Unseen - but propaganda to put it mildly | I have to give this series , broadcast in 1978 , an " 8 " - almost a " 9 " because of it's remarkable televising of long unseen Russian newsreel and movie photography of the war effort on the Eastern Front from 1941 through 1945 . In a sense the release of this material in 1978 was a kind of harbinger of the release of... |
493,319 | 3,280,905 | 634,302 | 8 | Brain Washing and It's Antidote | Whatever the American public thought ( if it thought at all ) about the Korean War , one aspect of it angered us : rumors of harsh treatment by North Korean officers of our officers and men with the intention of breaking them down to reveal military information in violation of the Geneva Convention . Of course , at the... |
492,769 | 3,280,905 | 27,345 | 8 | A Fictionalization of a Tragedy | This 1936 film was the only movie about the Anglo-Irish War of Liberation ( 1916 - 1922 ) that centered on a character based on Michael Collins prior to the 1996 movie called MICHAEL COLLINS . Why it took so long to outwardly make a major film about the Irish hero is a matter of mystery to me . The best reason is that ... |
492,613 | 3,280,905 | 81,163 | 8 | An Above Average " Mrs . Marple " Story , with a dash of Tennyson thrown in | It has been noted in several of the reviews on this thread , THE MIRROR CRACK'D is notable as the last film of real importance for Kim Novak , one of the last good films of Elizabeth Taylor , and an above-average retelling of one of Agatha Christie's mystery stories about Mrs . Marple of St . Mary's Mead . With a suppo... |
493,018 | 3,280,905 | 34,277 | 8 | Glory To The Strains of " Garryowen " | This is a wonderful film as a film - it gets an . As a filmed piece of accurate history . . . one wishes to be more loving , but it is a . And I think I am actually being very charitable . What was he like - that man of horse and saber who was the youngest " boy " general in the Union Army of the American Civil War , a... |
491,611 | 3,280,905 | 42,994 | 8 | So Who Cares About Conventions ? | I like this film . It has gotten a bad reputation due to Hitchcock's daring to break another film convention about the truth of a flashback . Hitchcock had already broken other conventions over the years , some being of a technical variety ( the nine minute uncut takes on ROPE for instance ) . Here the film begins with... |
492,778 | 3,280,905 | 29,440 | 8 | Sam Clemens Looks At King Eddie VI | Mark Twain was a man who sometimes could not get a notion out of his head . He loved the issue of twins and switching births . It pervades much of his fiction , and few seem to comment on it . In one of his early sketches he tells an inquisitive reporter that the tragedy of his life was the strange death of his twin - ... |
491,848 | 3,280,905 | 58,153 | 8 | A Funny Movie It's Star Never Liked | GOOD NEIGHBOR SAM was one of three films from the middle 1960s that Jack Lemmon detested . After making THE DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES and THE APARTMENT Lemmon felt he was finally being recognized as a fine dramatic actor , and suddenly he was in this film , UNDER THE YUM YUM TREE , and HOW TO MURDER YOUR WIFE . He felt th... |
492,901 | 3,280,905 | 44,916 | 8 | If one hundred monkeys typed on one hundred typewriters for forty years . . . | Basically this nice little comedy by Howard Hawks is based on the urban legend that I used in the summary line : If you put a certain number of monkeys in front of type writers , for a long period of time , eventually you are going to get the complete works of Shakespeare , the King James Bible , War and Peace , Little... |
493,096 | 3,280,905 | 104,070 | 8 | As Bad As Jonathan Swift Suggested ? | This amusing film is based on a premise that we all toy with in our wish fulfillment moments : wouldn't it be wonderful if we lived forever , and retained our best youthful appearance through it all . Call it the " Dorian Gray " wish , from Wilde's novel . It sounds great , but writers have been toying with immortality... |
493,392 | 3,280,905 | 46,807 | 8 | The Heather On the Hill | This Vincent Minelli musical is usually considered a flop , which is unfair . Gene Kelly wanted to shoot it on site in Scotland ( where Brigadoon is set ) , but it was vetoed as too expensive . So Minelli had to create a magical , 18th Century Scottish village on a studio set . He also was using cinema scope for the fi... |
491,889 | 3,280,905 | 529,710 | 8 | Our Favorite " Native Born " American Emperor | Who was Joshua Norton ? If you are from San Francisco , California , you know the answer to this . He was the Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico , and the first citizen of the Golden Gate City from the 1860s to his death in 1880 . No , I am not crazy when I call him Emperor . Joshua Norton was a wealt... |
493,423 | 3,280,905 | 762,114 | 8 | Were those two babies drinking Mai-tais ? | This film ( which I saw on Saturday ) has been trashed by the critics - including several on this thread . Why it has been is beyond me . The purpose of the film was to entertain the public during the summer , and it succeeds at that . But for some unknown reason it doesn't have the weight and gravity a lot of people e... |
492,257 | 3,280,905 | 96,668 | 8 | In Memoriam : H . K . - 1927 to 2008 | How does one appreciate one of televisions best comedians who never succeeded in the lead role of a comedy series ? Harvey Korman was always a positive element in any comic ( and some dramatic ) shows and films he appeared in . From his days as " Gazoo " in " The Flintstones " to his first appearance in weekly variety ... |
493,056 | 3,280,905 | 82,517 | 8 | I'm Still Awaiting Part II and " Hitler on Ice " | Mel Brooks did not invent the comedy spoof movie , but his best work ( " Blazing Saddles " , " Young Frankenstein " , " Dracula , Dead And Loving It " , and " High Anxiety " ) certainly make the most of it - even if some of it gets rather too dirty ( literally dirty - " caca " dirty ) . " History Of The World " is a fu... |
493,005 | 3,280,905 | 25,094 | 8 | My Lover's Overhead . . . . | This film appeared more frequently on Channel 13 in the late 1980s than it does today . I'm glad it has been transferred to DVD , and I hope to find it one day . The film was based on a musical comedy of the same name that was composed by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart but produced in London . It starred the rising mu... |
492,803 | 3,280,905 | 49,034 | 8 | Sweet Little Comedy About the Power of Babies | This was a remake of the Ginger Rogers ' comedy BACHELOR MOTHER and follows the same plot with the addition of music and dance numbers . Ironically Rogers could have handled those quite well , but after she stopped making films with Fred Astaire she wanted to do films emphasizing acting , not her musical abilities . It... |
492,791 | 3,280,905 | 597,577 | 8 | Can Paladin be fooled ever ? | In a dry period of his career ( we see Paladin - Richard Boone - talking to Hey Boy - Kam Tong - in the Palace Hotel in San Francisco asking if anything of interest for him occurred , and being told that there has been a major earthquake in China and a steamboat explosion on the Mississippi ) Paladin gets invited to ac... |
491,629 | 3,280,905 | 25,586 | 8 | Bette Finds Stardom in a Slut | I happen to like Leslie Howard , in his better films . Yet , for some reason , his performance in OF HUMAN BONDAGE never has moved me tremendously . I first saw the film on my college campus in 1972 and the reviewer in the college newspaper made the comment that in the 1930s and 1940s Howard played the roles supposedly... |
492,681 | 3,280,905 | 75,015 | 8 | Clever Little Thriller - A " What Is Going On " Mystery | This film ( which was remade in 1986 ) is a very clever little crime drama that keeps the viewer unbalanced until the end . James Franciscus is a newlywed who is on vacation - and the situation seems normal , but he and his wife have an argument . The next day she is missing and Franciscus goes to the police ( Jack Klu... |
492,711 | 3,280,905 | 53,690 | 8 | Gigi and the Rat Packers meet Cole Porter | After his greatest stage success ( KISS ME KATE ) Cole Porter entered the last decade and a half of his life with a track record of hit and miss musicals . It was not that he lost his abilities to compose great songs . It was that not everything he touched turned to gold . The " gold " of this decade was his music for ... |
492,915 | 3,280,905 | 44,713 | 8 | A Curiously Acceptable Anti - Soviet Short Subject | I caught this short film on the Turner Classic network on Wednesday , September 20 , 2006 from 7 : 30 - 8 : 00 P . M . Coming out in 1952 , I was figuring out that it would be far from positive about the Soviet Union or it's policies . This turned out to be quite true , but it's attack is a fair one . The opportunism o... |
492,937 | 3,280,905 | 33,874 | 8 | Made Without Calf's Foot Jelly | The recent death of John Raitt ( " Who that ? " ) reminds film watchers of how many terrific performances from Broadway or London's West End were permanently lost because of " brilliant " Hollywood casting decisions . Raitt , one of Broadway's best dramatic singers , was the original Billy Bigalow in " Carousel " , but... |
491,750 | 3,280,905 | 685,630 | 8 | The odd mysteries of Wisteria Lodge | You will probably be able to answer these questions rather quickly . In the Conan Doyle " Holmes Canon " , what is the only story : a ) that is dated in the period when Holmes was supposedly dead in the Reichenbach Falls ? b ) that has a police detective who is actually Holmes equal ( for a change ) in figuring out wha... |
492,903 | 3,280,905 | 22,550 | 8 | Hidden by a glitzier classic film | Turner Classic Film network was showing several " before the Hays Code " films from the 1930s last night , and I was able to watch this 1931 version of the Robert Sherwood play WATERLOO BRIDGE . Actually this version is closer to the original , written with the background of World War I in mind , than the classic 1940 ... |
492,594 | 3,280,905 | 59,980 | 8 | Red Buttons attempt at a television come-back . | I was twelve years old , and I recall watching this show on television when I visited my grandparents . It was a cleverly written piece of fluff about how the U . S . government's spy agency ( headed by Fred Clark ) has been following a notorious spy and is about to spring a trap on him . What happens to the spy was sh... |
493,323 | 3,280,905 | 529,624 | 8 | A Doctor Recovers His Nerve | A lot of first rate performers showed up on BONANZA in it's long television reign . One of the best was Michael Rennie , in this particular episode . He plays a man on a wagon train that Hoss ( Dan Blocker ) is attached to . Rennie's character goes by the name " Professor Poppy " , and is very nice but somewhat reticen... |
493,274 | 3,280,905 | 42,522 | 8 | The Case of the Curious Shared Plot line Movies | 1950 was a great year for films , but for some reason two fine ones came out that had the same plot line ( with variations ) set in two different parts of the world . These were CRISIS and STATE SECRET . CRISIS was set in Latin America , in a country run by a dictator and his cronies , similar to the Perons in Argentin... |
492,256 | 3,280,905 | 77,279 | 8 | The Comedians Who Saved Universal | It's amazing to me that this film got such rough going-over by so many of the critics on the thread . While BUD AND LOU was not one of the classic films of all time , it was far better than its critics here make it out to be , including the unexpectedly good casting of Buddy Hackett and Harvey Korman as Lou Costello an... |
492,390 | 3,280,905 | 25,520 | 8 | The Boulevard of Broken Dreams | This is one of those movies that are somewhat better than they deserve to be - not great but reasonably entertaining . Franchot Tone is a composer of popular music working for impresario Tullio Carminati . Tone is married to Constance Bennett , who was once part of a singing duet that was very successful . He wants Con... |
493,164 | 3,280,905 | 27,438 | 8 | A Rousing Piece of Pseudo-History | As a follow up to CAPTAIN BLOOD , Errol Flynn's adventure spectacle THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE is an exciting , well made film . It has a good cast , including Olivia De Haviland as Flynn's ( Major Geoffrey Vickers ) love interest ( Elsa Campbell ) , and supported by Henry Stevenson ( Sir Charles Macefield ) , Nig... |
492,111 | 3,280,905 | 59,956 | 8 | What that Revolution really needed were two good female revolutionaries | This was an amusing film , which was the first movie that I saw starring either Bridget Bardot or Jeanne Moreau . I actually saw it on a double bill back in 1965 . It is of interest because it brings up a matter that American films about Mexico's Revolution ( or that of the other Latin American Countries ) rarely touch... |
491,881 | 3,280,905 | 40,369 | 8 | A Martinet and his Mistakes | Henry Fonda rarely played villains . It is usual to think of him as a decent person trying to maintain decency , even in those films where he was technically a criminal ( YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE , JESSE JAMES , THE RETURN OF FRANK JAMES ) . But I would guess that with this 1948 film he began to be willing to play far less s... |
493,007 | 3,280,905 | 25,493 | 8 | Lehar , Lorenz , and the " Lubitsch Touch " | Ernst Lubitsch directed some of the sweetest and funniest sex comedies of the 1930s and 1940s . He was fortunate enough to do three films with Maurice Chevalier and Jeannette MacDonald . They are all charming , but the last one may be the best . Here he took the best known operetta of Franz Lehar and turned it into a s... |
492,332 | 3,280,905 | 57,997 | 8 | No Good - Bad Turn Goes Unpunished | Bette Davis essayed twin sisters twice . The first was A STOLEN LIFE , one of her last good Warner Brother films in the late 1940s , wherein the good sister watches helplessly while her bad sister steals Glenn Ford from her , but she gets a second chance at Glenn when the bad sister is killed in an accident and the goo... |
491,658 | 3,280,905 | 28,207 | 9 | When I'm Calling You . . . | It is rightfully considered kitch now , but it is effective kitch because of its two stars ( two-and-a-half actually - more later ) , and the singing and background . ROSE-MARIE is set in modern times ( unlike MAYTIME and NAUGHTY MARIETTA and BITTERSWEET ) . Of the major successes of MacDonald and Eddy only SWEETHEARTS... |
491,598 | 3,280,905 | 50,631 | 9 | Kay Kendall and the other Ladies In Waiting . . . For the King | LES GIRLS is the forgotten musical gem of the last great splurge of MGM musicals in the 1950s . It's reception ( judging from the other comments here ) is less than overly enthusiastic , due to the script . LES GIRLS is possibly the most philosophical of the MGM musicals , because it tackles an immortal issue of mankin... |
491,851 | 3,280,905 | 26,266 | 9 | A Good Version of a Classic | This version of David COPPERFIELD is quite a good one , in that it does trim the 800 plus page novel down to reasonable coherence . There are some characters that one misses , but they are understandably cut due to length considerations . While Steerforth and his betrayal of the Peggoty Family is in the film ( includin... |
493,118 | 3,280,905 | 41,735 | 9 | Ann Does Claude Wrong With Trevor | I think that most people will admit that Claude Rains was one of those character actors who transcended their lack of handsome features ( or likable features ) to be a real movie star - even though most of their roles were types involved in the plot for better or ill . He is in that select group with Basil Rathbone , C... |
492,849 | 3,280,905 | 24,034 | 9 | The Travails of Julian Marsh | This is a fun film , because of it's cast of first rate character actors , and the various Busby Berkeley choreographed song and dance numbers . My favorite is the " Shuffling Off to Buffalo " number , but the concluding " FORTY SECOND STREET " number was first rate too . There is little additionally to add to a discus... |
493,064 | 3,280,905 | 24,055 | 9 | Ah Those Eccentric Egyptologists ! | THE GHOUL is one of those films that are rediscovered after being missing for years , and turn out to be worthwhile ( something of a rarity ) . It has a first rate cast of character actors ( including two future knights ) and a good " nest of vipers " plot . And I find it pleasant for bringing in a favorite topic to me... |
492,706 | 3,280,905 | 32,671 | 9 | Ginger's Oscar and a worthy one . | Although a little dated today , KITTY FOYLE actually stands up well . It was based on a best selling novel by Christopher Morley . Morley wrote other novels ( PARNASSUS ON WHEELS is about a bookmobile and the adventures of its owners ) , but is best recalled for this novella and for helping to found the American Sherlo... |
492,699 | 3,280,905 | 52,713 | 9 | Who Killed Sugar Torch . . . and does it really matter ? | Sam Fuller is one of the few directors who improves when one sees his movies several times . Yeah , I know that his reputation is that of a director who enjoyed sensationalism too much , but he also knew how to use sensationalism like a spice in a recipe - not too much of it in all situations ( the madhouse in SHOCK CO... |
493,171 | 3,280,905 | 35,114 | 9 | Veidt as Anti - Nazi Hero | Conrad Veidt's career in European ( and American ) film from 1919 - 1939 was one as a notable star . He had played Cesar the Sonabulist in THE CABINET OF DR . CALIGARI in 1919 , and been a star ever since . In the silent film period it was easy for him to have an international audience as Gwynplaine in THE MAN WHO LAUG... |
491,957 | 3,280,905 | 75,882 | 9 | Jourdan as the Evil Count | I have a problem with the classic horror story " Dracula " . It is , without a doubt , one of the best researched horror stories of all time - everything we generally know about vampires comes out of it's pages , because Abraham " Bram " Stoker spent years researching it before it was written and published in 1897 . St... |
491,902 | 3,280,905 | 91,187 | 9 | Our Forgotten Mini-War of 1983 | The Granada Incursion is recalled like an afterthought today . If people recall any military affairs of the Reagan White House they most likely recall the Iran - Contra Affair ( and it's star turn by Col . Oliver North ) or the tragedy of the Marine Barracks suicide bomb in Lebanon . Granada was a brief event - almost ... |
492,394 | 3,280,905 | 61,385 | 9 | Good mix of comedy from Neil for Robert and Jane | BAREFOOT IN THE PARK takes Neil Simon's regular plot of his main characters learning to live in an apartment together - but here uses a normal situation . Instead of two people of the same sex ( as in THE ODD COUPLE ) it is a young married couple . Reputedly Simon was basing the situation of Paul and Corrie Bratter ( R... |
493,101 | 3,280,905 | 43,792 | 9 | Mitchell Leisin's last good film . | It is not as philosophical as DEATH TAKES A HOLIDAY or as amusing as MIDNIGHT or EASY LIVING or as well done as an historical film KITTY , but THE MATING SEASON represents the last time that Mitchell Leisin got a good film with at least one first rate performance in it - that of the fourth lead , Thelma Ritter . Her ro... |
492,516 | 3,280,905 | 41,866 | 9 | Never Apologize | There is an ironic point about the production of SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON immediately after FORT APACHE . Most critics agree that Col . Owen Thursday , the martinet commander , is based on General George Armstrong Custer , and that the massacre of his command due to his own pig headedness is the battle of the Little Bi... |
493,206 | 3,280,905 | 45,911 | 9 | How to Properly Use 3 - | In the history of motion pictures only two ideas ( as far as I know ) failed to catch on in improving the movies we see . One is the laughable " Aroma-vision " that was tried out in the late 1950s with a film that Peter Lorre and Desmond Elliot made called SCENT OF MYSTERY . People just don't like certain odors that ca... |
491,923 | 3,280,905 | 266,308 | 9 | A Look at Paranoia Shattering Trust | I finally was able to see this entire film today . Based on a modern best seller from Japan it has been seen as a critique of Japanese society , the modern U . S . " empire " , and fascism . One can see the military hardware and trained soldiers around remind one of the modern American Army , but that's about it ( as f... |
492,616 | 3,280,905 | 37,236 | 9 | Gremlins again - this time on our side . | This was the second of three Warner Brothers , anti-Hitler cartoons that were broadcast yesterday on the Turner Classic Film Network's " Cartoon Alley " . Hitler is upset that all attempts to bomb Moscow have met with disaster , so he announces at the start that he will fly a special plane to hit the city . He announce... |
493,191 | 3,280,905 | 54,701 | 9 | A Good Follow - Up to BLOOD ON THE SUN | Carol Baker and James Shigata are good highly capable performers , but they tended to peak early in the 1950s and 1960s . However , they both did very well in telling this true story about Gwen , an American from Tennessee , met , fell in love with , and married " Teri " a Japanese diplomat in Washington , and how the ... |
492,406 | 3,280,905 | 91,605 | 9 | Movies on medieval theological problems and history fail in Peoria | For the last three years we have been under the effect of the novel THE DA VINCI CODE , which swept the world's best seller lists , and then was finally turned into a film . It dealt with the so called secret writings of coded messages that are to be found in the works of Leonardo Da Vinci , and which deals with a hidd... |
492,947 | 3,280,905 | 72,431 | 9 | All You Need Is Love . . . . | It is not as good as BLAZING SADDLES or THE PRODUCERS or two other Brooks movies that I am fond of : THE TWELVE CHAIRS and Dracula : DEAD AND LOVING IT . But YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN is in Mel Brooks ' best films , possibly because for all it's puns , jokes , spoofs , and fun it actually takes a moment to invert the actual n... |
492,942 | 3,280,905 | 39,169 | 9 | A great comedy all around - and Rudy Vallee's most unlikeable character | This film is a rich one . Cary Grant is a charming artist who is always finding himself pulled into court by trouble he never intended to cause . Trouble finds Grant everywhere , because he is a magnet to women , and men get jealous . He is brought to court for just such an occurrence , and low and behold the judge is ... |
492,170 | 3,280,905 | 34,862 | 9 | Good Crosby - Astaire - Berlin Musical , but leaves an unpleasant flavor in one's mouth . | It seems natural that Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby should have ended up in at least one musical together . They were able to actually appear in two films together ( " Holiday Inn " and " Blue Skies " ) and only missed out on a third film in the 1950s that became " White Christmas " with Danny Kaye in the Astaire part .... |
492,703 | 3,280,905 | 43,590 | 9 | The Japanese Americans on the Home Front and Battlefront . | It is an interesting coincidence of television programing that within three days of this week ( Thursday to Saturday , June 18 to 20th , 2008 ) I saw two films regarding the problems of Americans and Japanese intermingling in the period World War II that I have long known of but had never before been in a position to v... |
492,041 | 3,280,905 | 296,973 | 9 | From the man who gave us Peter Pan | James Barrie's literary fame has never disappeared , but it has shrunk terribly . Although of late this seems to be changing , in reality it is still grounded on one work of his . He wrote the novel and then the play PETER PAN , immortalizing Peter , Wendy , her brothers , the lost boys , Captain Cook , Smee , the pira... |
493,404 | 3,280,905 | 106,673 | 9 | The Plot To Control The White House | In 1939 Akim Tamiroff , Lloyd Nolan , Patricia Morrison , Mary Boland , Robert Warwick , and George Zucco , appeared in a film called THE MAGNIFICENT FRAUD . It was about a political murder in a Latin American country , and how an actor is forced to replace the murdered President to save the country in the middle of cr... |
493,161 | 3,280,905 | 63,348 | 9 | From Head To Toe I'm A Gentleman ! | I saw this with my family in Forest Hills in 1968 , and I recall how at the time the film was advertised as Bert Lahr's last great performance because he was supposed to have a major role in this valentine to the late , great days of the Burlesque shows that Lahr came out of . It's true he appears in the film , and tha... |
492,859 | 3,280,905 | 41,622 | 9 | The Shortage of Rubber in 1942 | This movie is about how close the U . S . war effort ( and it's " arsenal of Democracy " image ) came to faltering in 1942 . The U . S . has been blessed with many natural resources that other country's don't have . Oil for example , or iron ore and steel . Or even huge forests of trees . But we are not a nation with h... |
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