Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 31, 2016

I don't tend to gravitate towards westerns, but I'm always game for John Ford's take on the genre. In films like She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), now available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive, he invests the grit and grime of the open country with a kind of poetry that...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 26, 2016

Every Frenchman Has One Olivia de Havilland Crown Archetype (2016 reissue) What does every Frenchman have? I wouldn't dream of spoiling the surprise for you. Suffice to say, it isn't as sexy as you might think. In reading the recent reissue of Olivia de Havilland's 1961 memoir of adjusting to...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 24, 2016

It's 1957 and the era of big musicals is ending, but Silk Stockings doesn't feel like a dying gasp. It is a slick, colorful and expertly executed production. Now available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive, it isn't likely to top the favorites list of many musical fans, but with Fred...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 19, 2016

A Thousand Cuts: The Bizarre Underground World of Collectors and Dealers Who Saved the Movies Dennis Bartok and Jeff Joseph University Press of Mississippi, 2016 It's remarkable that 35mm film has lasted as a medium for more than one hundred years when you think of all the entertainment formats tha   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 17, 2016

A Cry in the Night (1956) is an unusual thriller, standard in construction, but uncommonly warm with compassion. Now available on DVD from Warner Archive, this efficiently-paced production of Alan Ladd's Jaguar Productions marks an interesting transition for its stars, Raymond Burr and Natalie Wood.   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 12, 2016

With the release of To Have and Have Not (1944), all four of the films Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart made together are now available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive. I've never been able to convince myself to pay much attention to the plot of To Have and Have Not....   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 10, 2016

Dalton Trumbo: Blacklisted Hollywood Radical Larry Ceplair and Christopher Trumbo University Press of Kentucky, 2015 Screenwriter and novelist Dalton Trumbo is most famous for the eleven years he spent on an unofficial Hollywood blacklist, as one of the notorious Hollywood Ten, a group of movie in   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on August 4, 2016

As a Kay Francis and Deanna Durbin completist, I was delighted to see the pair starring in the recent Warner Archive release of It's a Date (1940), which is making its DVD debut. The first of four films Durbin would make with director William Seiter at Universal Studios, it's a...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 29, 2016

Shadow of a Doubt (1943) stars Teresa Wright and Macdonald Carey are reunited a decade later in the thriller Count the Hours (1953), now available on DVD from Warner Archive. When an intruder murders a farmer and his housekeeper, his handyman George Braden (John Craven) is wrongfully accused of the   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 28, 2016

The Real James Dean: Intimate Memories from Those Who Knew Him Best Peter L. Winkler, Ed. Chicago Review Press, 2016 In his six years in Los Angeles and New York, James Dean packed in several decades-worth of living. Many who knew him would comment on his morbid world view and...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 26, 2016

With an off-kilter jazzy score, hapless young anti-heroes and a slightly sensational edge, Stakeout on Dope Street (1958) is a classic Roger Corman production. The music and slick photography are the strongest elements of this teen crime and drug flick. Now available on DVD from Warner Archive, it i   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 14, 2016

Joseph Cotten is master and teacher and George Hamilton is the protégée jewel thief in this cheerful caper comedy, now available on DVD from Warner Archive. The pair are notorious as Ace of Diamonds and Jack of Diamonds respectively; in public life the Jack is known as Jeffrey Hill. In...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 10, 2016

This post is my entry in the Hot and Bothered: The Films of 1932 Blogathon, hosted by Once Upon a Screen and CineMaven's Essays from the Couch. A lot of great films are being covered, so go check out the rest! Gold-digging, boyfriend stealing, drinking all night and yes, dress...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on July 8, 2016

The four film partnership between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall worked because the growing affection they felt for each other off-screen translated so well to the characters they played. That love is most evident in Dark Passage (1947), which despite all its bitterness and hard edges is also an   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 23, 2016

Early on I wondered what I was in for when watching MGM's 1959 Technicolor take on the Tarzan story. The bongo drums and blaring horns over the opening credits (composed by West coast jazz musician Shorty Rogers) belonged in a drama about teenage delinquents, making me unsure what effect the...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 21, 2016

Tad was serious about his career, but he never took himself that seriously. -John Waters Blonde, handsome, boyish, and without a hint of being on the make, it's no wonder that Tab Hunter inspired swoons in his heartthrob heyday. The actor and singer had a bumpy ride in the entertainment...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 18, 2016

The result of super-ant efficiency While I was at the park one day with my daughter, we found a black column of ants racing along the top of a stone ledge. There was hundreds of them. If you let your eyes blur a little, they looked like a single pulsing...   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 13, 2016

Following The Wrong Man (1956) and I Confess (1953), Warner Archive has released yet another Alfred Hitchcock film, Suspicion (1941), on Blu-ray. This film has the distinction of containing the only performance in one of the director's films to win an Academy Award. Leading lady Joan Fontaine took h   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 11, 2016

The General (1926) has endured as one of Buster Keaton's greatest features, because it perfectly balances the wit and physical abilities of his stone-faced hero. Today a near capacity crowd enjoyed a 4K restoration at the Egyptian Theater, with a new symphonic score from Studio Ghibli composer Joe H   read more

Classic Movies Posted by KC on June 10, 2016

Susan Slept Here features narration by an Oscar statue. The golden guy sounds just like I imagined he would: cheerful, uptight and betraying the vulnerability of a nude figure. The idea could be unbearably corny, but there's something pliable about the world of Frank Tashlin; Wile E. Coyote could sh   read more