MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on May 11, 2012

Welcome to the next installment of Name that Movie Poster. Can you guess what movie the poster advertised despite my having concealed its title and key players’ names? If you cannot guess off the bat, tell me the quiz is too hard and I’ll give you a hint. To see if...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on May 10, 2012

Limelight (1953)      Charlie Chaplin‘s was nearing the end of his career when in 1953 he made a drama that could almost be considered semi-autobiographical in nature had the actor’s box office prowess not remained so strong. Limelight is about an aging stage comedian who in 1914 London   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on May 2, 2012

Sins of the Children (1930)      The advent of sound sent Hollywood producers running to Broadway to find some actors who could actually speak coherently enough for film audiences. During this raid on the stage, MGM found Louis Mann and created a vehicle to movie stardom for him through Sins...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on April 18, 2012

4 for Texas (1963)      Immediately upon it’s opening, 4 for Texas informs us that Charles Bronson‘s character is the villain and characters named Zack and Joe are the good guys, a fact that is easy to forget as we stumble through a sloppy story in which Rat Packers Dean...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on April 16, 2012

The Lady in Question (1940)      The Lady in Question is certainly a unique story, although one that sings in large part because of its main character while all others play second fiddle. Brian Aherne –who with mustache and bushy eyebrows looks nothing like his visage in the poster for this m   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on April 13, 2012

Unless you are a movie-as-an-artform type of fan, the editing in a movie often escapes us. In most cases, all of those cuts are meant to be invisible, at times subliminally conveying a message without us realizing it. And although cameramen might painstakingly struggle to film a scene in one long t   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on April 12, 2012

Indiscreet (1958)      I recently commented to a friend after seeing This Means War in the theater that it is interesting/good to see movies that portray single men and women who are beyond their 20s finding love and marriage, in some cases for the first time. In fact, with stars...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on April 11, 2012

The Ice Follies of 1939       If the idea of Joan Crawford and Jimmy Stewart as ice-skating pros excites you, The Ice Follies of 1939 will disappoint you. Despite their characters’ professed careers, the actors do not really do as much on the ice as their body doubles do, nor...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on March 23, 2012

Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) A reporter character in Judgement at Nuremberg says he could not give away a story about the Nuremberg Nazi war crime trials in 1948 because America had moved on from the war and was no longer interested. If Americans were not interested in the trials then,...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on March 20, 2012

Mogambo (1953)      Twenty-one years after Clark Gable made the exotically set romantic triangle drama Red Dust, he made it again. Gable’s rubber plantation owner in Indochina moves to Africa to a job in exotic animal sales for Mogambo. Replace Jean Harlow‘s slutty prostitute with Ava G   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on March 15, 2012

Welcome to the next installment of Name that Movie Poster. Can you guess what movie the poster advertised despite my having concealed its title and key players’ names? If you cannot guess off the bat, tell me the quiz is too hard and I’ll give you a hint. To see if...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on March 13, 2012

Dead Ringer (1964)      In the midst of her Baby Jane/Sweet Charlotte phase of psycho old lady characters, Bette Davis revisited her experience playing a twin, but this time with even darker intentions than her characters in A Stolen Life had. Dead Ringer would ultimately be a movie Davis described   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on March 12, 2012

Sadie McKee (1934)      When you have watched enough movies from the ’30s and/or ’40s, you start to notice a lot of trends, especially in the romantic genre, and the plots start to blur together. You could also say the same of some Joan Crawford movies as she went through...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 27, 2012

Pressure Point (1962)      I have sort of jumped from one end of the spectrum to the other with regards to my new exposure to Bobby Darin‘s acting work. The light-hearted rom-com That Funny Feeling could not be more different from the dark and dramatic Pressure Point. Darin never won...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 24, 2012

Welcome to the next installment of Name that Movie Poster. Can you guess what movie the poster advertised despite my having concealed its title and key players’ names? If you cannot guess off the bat, tell me the quiz is too hard and I’ll give you a hint. To see if...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 22, 2012

     Gary Cooper was a wonderfully diverse actor. He could just as easily play the confident and tough lawman, lover or soldier as he could let Director Frank Capra break him down into an apologetic everyman. That is how we find him in Meet John Doe, a movie that also...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 17, 2012

Ninotchka (1939)      It is possible that still to this day I would not have seen Ninotchka had it not been for its appearance on one of those lists of the best movies ever made or movies you have to see. I bought it as part of a Greta Garbo...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 16, 2012

Hard Luck (1921) Hard Luck is a Buster Keaton gem released by Metro in 1921 before it became one of the Ms in MGM. The short-subject flick was lost for about 60 years before it was refurbished although not in its entirety, depending on the source of your version. Buster...   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 14, 2012

Adam's Rib (1949)      No one could have better played a powerful career woman in a devoted marriage better than Katharine Hepburn, and no one could have better held his ground as the spouse opposite that star than Spencer Tracy. Audiences loved seeing Hepburn and Tracy on the screen together,   read more

MacGuffin Movies Posted by RBuccicone on February 13, 2012

Pigskin Parade (1936)      On the whole, there is nothing particularly notable about Pigskin Parade and its plot. The movie, nevertheless can be distinguished as earning a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination and being Judy Garland‘s feature film debut. Although the young woman had appeared   read more