Shadows of Russia: Communism on TCM

Greta Garbo, Melvyn Douglas in Ninotchka (top); Barbra Streisand, Robert Redford in The Way We Were (bottom)

From the Romanovs’ last stand to Warren Beatty’s first solo directorial effort: On every Wednesday in January 2010, Turner Classic Movies will present the 20-film festival "Shadows of Russia," a showcase of Hollywood movies portraying Russia (and/or the Soviet Union) and the sociopolitical reverberations of Communism throughout the 20th century.
Among the scheduled films are classics such as Ninotchka, The Manchurian Candidate, and Reds, in addition to lesser-known fare like Counter-Attack, I Was a Communist for the FBI, and The Strawberry Statement. Get ready for some laughs and a few tears — mostly laughs. And mostly of the unintended kind.
I must red-facedly [...]

Fredric March on TCM

Carole Lombard, Fredric March in a Nothing Sacred publicity shot.

Fredric March has his "Summer Under the Stars" day on Monday, Aug. 24.
Turner Classic Movies will present 13 Fredric March films, including the TCM premiere of Richard Boleslawski’s Academy Award-nominated Les Miserables (1935), a handsome — if dramatically stale — adaptation of Victor Hugo’s classic novel that pits March’s bread-thief Jean Valjean against Charles Laughton’s law-enforcing sociopath Inspector Javert.
Among the other Fredric March must-sees that day are:
Produced by David O. Selznick, William Wellman’s 1937 version of A Star Is Born features Janet Gaynor the actress doing a delicious impersonation of Janet Gaynor the persona, here named Esther Blodgett (and later renamed Vicki Lester), an ambitious but [...]

Greta Garbo’s NINOTCHKA Screening

Ernst Lubitsch’s delightful Ninotchka, starring Greta Garbo and Melvyn Douglas, will be screened as the next feature in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ series "Hollywood’s Greatest Year: The Best Picture Nominees of 1939” on Monday, July 13, at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
The evening will begin at 7 p.m., with the ninth chapter of the 1939 serial Buck Rogers, starring Buster Crabbe and Constance Moore, and the animated short The Autograph Hound, featuring Donald Duck.

In Ninotchka, Garbo (above, with Lubitsch) plays a Russian agent out to retrieve three other agents who have been corrupted by the decadent lights of Paris. While in [...]

WUTHERING HEIGHTS Screening

The 1939 Best Picture nominee Wuthering Heights, directed by William Wyler, and starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier, will be the next feature in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ series “Hollywood’s Greatest Year: The Best Picture Nominees of 1939.” The Wuthering Heights screening will take place on Monday, June 8, at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
Starting at 7 p.m., the feature will be preceded by the fourth chapter of the 1939 serial Buck Rogers, starring Buster Crabbe and Constance Moore, and the animated short The Pointer, starring Mickey Mouse and Pluto.
According to Samuel Goldwyn biographer A. Scott Berg, Wuthering Heights was the producer’s favorite among his films. [...]

QUEEN CHRISTINA – Greta Garbo, John Gilbert

Queen Christina (1933)
Direction: Rouben Mamoulian
Screenplay: H. M. Harwood and S. N. Behrman
Cast: Greta Garbo, John Gilbert, Ian Keith, Lewis Stone, Elizabeth Young, C. Aubrey Smith, Reginald Owen, David Torrence
 

 

One of the most ambitious productions of the early 1930s, Queen Christina remains surprisingly modern in its execution thanks in large part to Rouben Mamoulian’s assured hand. Those looking for historical accuracy in the film, however, will be greatly disappointed, for credited screenwriters H. M. Harwood and S. N. Behrman kept themselves busy concocting a highly fictionalized version of the Swedish queen; one who experiences an all-consuming and ultimately tragic love affair with a Spanish envoy. (Garbo biographer Mark Vieira explains [see below] that credited screenwriter — and close Garbo friend [...]

Best Films – 1941

Orson Welles in Citizen Kane
FILM
Cheers for Miss Bishop
d: Tay Garnett; scr: Sheridan Gibney, Adelaide Heilbron
Citizen Kane
d: Orson Welles; scr: Herman J. Mankiewicz, Orson Welles
The Devil and Miss Jones
d: Sam Wood; scr: Norman Krasna
Dumbo
d: Ben Sharpsteen; scr: Joe Grant, Dick Huemer and others
The Great Lie
d: Edmund Goulding; scr: Lenore J. Coffee
Here Comes Mr. Jordan
d: Alexander Hall; scr: Seton I. Miller, Sidney Buchman
The Lady Eve
d, scr: Preston Sturges
The Little Foxes
d: William Wyler; scr: Lillian Hellman
Manpower
d: Raoul Walsh; scr: Richard Macauley, Jerry Wald
The Sea Wolf
d: Michael Curtiz; scr: Robert Rossen
 

Sara Allgood, Roddy McDowall in How Green Was My Valley
CHECK THESE OUT
La Fille du puisatier / The Well-Digger’s Daughter
d, scr: Marcel Pagnol
How Green Was My Valley
d: John Ford; scr: Philip Dunne
Meet John Doe
d: [...]

Best Films – 1939

The Rules of the Game by Jean Renoir
FILM
Gone with the Wind
d: Victor Fleming; scr: Sidney Howard
Le Jour se lève / Daybreak
d: Marcel Carné; scr: Jacques Viot, Jacques Prévert
Midnight
d: Mitchell Leisen; scr: Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
d: Frank Capra; scr: Sidney Buchman
Ninotchka
d: Ernst Lubitsch; scr: Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, Walter Reisch
The Old Maid
d: Edmund Goulding; scr: Casey Robinson
The Rains Came
d: Clarence Brown; scr: Philip Dunne, Julien Josephson
La Règle du jeu / The Rules of the Game
d: Jean Renoir; scr: Jean Renoir, Carl Koch
The Roaring Twenties
d: Raoul Walsh; scr: Jerry Wald, Richard Macaulay, Robert Rossen
The Women
d: George Cukor; scr: Anita Loos, Jane Murfin
Wuthering Heights
d: William Wyler; scr: Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur
 
CHECK [...]

Best Films – 1937

Robert Taylor, Greta Garbo in Camille
FILM
The Awful Truth
d, scr: Leo McCarey
Camille
d: George Cukor; scr: Frances Marion, James Hilton, Zoe Akins
The Hurricane
d: John Ford; scr: Dudley Nichols, Oliver H. P. Garrett
The Last of Mrs. Cheyney
d: Richard Boleslawski; scr: Leon Gordon, Samson Raphaelson, Monckton Hoffe
Lost Horizon
d: Frank Capra; scr: Robert Riskin
Night Must Fall
d: Richard Thorpe; scr: John Van Druten
Les Perles de la couronne / Pearls of the Crown
d: Sacha Guitry, Christian-Jacque; scr: Sacha Guitry
The Prisoner of Zenda
d: John Cromwell; scr: Wells Root, John G. Balderstone, Donald Ogden Stewart
Quality Street
d: George Stevens; scr: Mortimer Offner, Allan Scott
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
d: David Hand; scr: Ted Sears, Richard Creedon and others
A Star Is Born
d: William A. Wellman; scr: Dorothy Parker, [...]

Best Films – 1935

Jean Harlow, Wallace Beery, Clark Gable in China Seas
FILM
Alice Adams
d: George Stevens; scr: Dorothy Yost, Mortimer Offner
China Seas
d: Tay Garnett; scr: Jules Furthman, James K. McGuinness
The Gay Deception
d: William Wyler; scr: Stephen Avery, Don Hartman
A Tale of Two Cities
d: Jack Conway; scr: W. P. Lipscomb, S. N. Behrman
The Whole Town’s Talking
d: John Ford; scr: Jo Swerling, Robert Riskin
 

Chico Marx, Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Allan Jones in A Night at the Opera
CHECK THESE OUT
Broadway Melody of 1936
d: Roy Del Ruth; scr: Jack McGowan, Sid Silvers
Lives of a Bengal Lancer
d: Henry Hathaway; scr: Waldemar Young, John L. Balderston, Achmed Abdullah
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
d: Max Reinhardt, William Dieterle; scr: Charles Kenyon, Mary C. McCall Jr.
A Night at the Opera
d: Sam [...]

Best Films – 1933

Greta Garbo in Queen Christina
FILM
Baby Face
d: Alfred E. Green; scr: Gene Markey, Kathryn Scola
The Barbarian
d: Sam Wood; scr: Anita Loos, Elmer Harris
Dinner at 8
d: George Cukor; scr: Frances Marion, Herman J. Mankiewicz, Donald Ogden Stewart
Gold Diggers of 1933
d: Mervyn LeRoy; scr: Erwin Gelsey, James Seymour, David Boehm, Ben Markson
I’m No Angel
d: Wesley Ruggles; scr: Mae West
The Kennel Murder Case
d: Michael Curtiz; scr: Robert Presnell, Robert N. Lee, Peter Milne
King Kong
d: Ernest B. Schoedsack, Merian C. Cooper; scr: James Ashmore Creelman, Ruth Rose
The Mystery of the Wax Museum
d: Michael Curtiz; scr: Don Mullaly, Carl Erickson
Queen Christina
d: Rouben Mamoulian; scr: H. M. Harwood, S. N. Behrman
 

Nils Asther, Barbara Stanwyck in The Bitter Tea of [...]

Best Films – 1931

Willi Fritsch and Lilian Harvey in Congress Dances
FILM
À nous la liberté / Liberty for Us
d, scr: René Clair
City Streets
d: Rouben Mamoulian; scr: Max Marcin, Oliver H. P. Garrett, Dashiell Hammett
Daybreak
d: Jacques Feyder; scr: Ruth Cummings, Cyril Hume, Zelda Sears
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
d: Rouben Mamoulian; scr: Samuel Hoffenstein, Percy Heath
Five Star Final
d: Mervyn LeRoy; scr: Robert Lord, Byron Morgan
Der Kongreß tanzt / Congress Dances
d: Erik Charell; scr: Norbert Falk, Robert Liebmann
The Maltese Falcon / Dangerous Female
d: Roy del Ruth; scr: Maude Fulton, Lucien Hubbard, Brown Holmes
The New Adventures of Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford
d: Sam Wood; scr: Charles MacArthur
The Public Enemy
d: William A. Wellman; scr: Kubec F. Glasmon, [...]

Best Films – 1930

Made at the dawn of the sound era, All Quiet on the Western Front remains the best war film ever made. Despite some brave (and not so brave) attempts by other filmmakers ever since, no other motion picture I’ve seen has captured the horrors of war with the honesty and the poignancy of Lewis Milestone’s rendition of Erich Maria Remarque’s pacifist novel. Lew Ayres plays the young, idealistic soldier who soon discovers that war has nothing to do with either honor or glory.
 
FILM
All Quiet on the Western Front
d: Lewis Milestone; scr: Maxwell Anderson, Del Andrews, George Abbott
The Bishop Murder Case
d: Nick Grindé, David Burton; scr: Lenore J. Coffee
Going Wild
d: William [...]

Best Films – 1928

Evelyn Brent, Emil Jannings in The Last Command
FILM
The Crowd
d: King Vidor; scr: King Vidor, James V. A. Weaver; titles: Joseph W. Farnham
The Docks of New York
d: Josef von Sternberg; scr: Jules Furthman; titles: Julian Johnson
The Last Command
d: Josef von Sternberg; scr: John F. Goodrich; titles: Herman J. Mankiewicz
Sadie Thompson
d & scr: Raoul Walsh; titles: C. Gardner Sullivan
Street Angel
d: Frank Borzage; scr: Marion Orth, Philip Klein & Henry Roberts Symonds; titles: H. H. Caldwell & Katherine Hilliker
The Wind
d: Victor Sjöström; scr: Frances Marion
 

L’Argent by Marcel L’Herbier
CHECK THESE OUT
L’Argent
d: Marcel L’Herbier; scr: Marcel L’Herbier & Arthur Bernède
The Patsy
d: King Vidor; scr: Agnes Christine Johnson; titles: Ralph Spence
Show People
d: King Vidor; scr: Laurence Stallings & Agnes Christine Johnson; titles: Ralph [...]

HOLLYWOOD DREAMS MADE REAL: IRVING THALBERG AND THE RISE OF M-G-M – Q&A with Mark Vieira

Author and photographer Mark A. Vieira (right), who’s been a friend for a number of years, has recently written no less than two books on Irving G. Thalberg, the young MGM mogul whose high-quality productions earned him both a reputation as Hollywood’s "Boy Wonder" and a special place in Oscar history as the name attached to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences‘ Memorial Award given to “creative producers whose bodies of work reflect a consistently high quality of motion picture production.” Thalberg even inspired a F. Scott Fitzgerald novel, the unfinished The Last Tycoon.
Now, Mark’s two books may cover the same ground in terms of subject matter, but they’re radically different in terms of approach to same:
Hollywood [...]

Rouben Mamoulian Retrospective at Film Forum

"Mamoulian," a complete retrospective of Hollywood director Rouben Mamoulian (1897-1987), one of cinema’s greatest stylists and innovators, will run at the Film Forum from Friday, September 7 through Tuesday, September 18.
As per the Film Forum’s press release, Mamoulian was born in Tbilisi, Georgia, to an Armenian family. He worked at the Moscow Art Theater while attending university, and, following a chance meeting with industrialist/philanthropist George Eastman (founder of the Kodak film company) he moved to Rochester, New York, to direct plays.
Shortly thereafter he was on Broadway, directing Dorothy and Dubose Heyward’s Porgy, which became the basis for George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, a musical that Mamoulian would also direct. [See Porgy and Bess screening in New York.]
That initial [...]

George Cukor’s Oscar Nominated Actors

George Cukor
21 Acting Nominations
(s) supporting category
(*) Academy Award winner
George Cukor: Top Oscar Directors for Actors
 
1930-31
Fredric March The Royal Family of Broadway (co-directed with Cyril Gardner)
 

1936
Norma Shearer Romeo and Juliet
Basil Rathbone (s) Romeo and Juliet
 
1937

Greta Garbo (above, with Robert Taylor) Camille
 
1940

James Stewart The Philadelphia Story *
Katharine Hepburn (above, with Stewart and Cary Grant) The Philadelphia Story
Ruth Hussey (s) The Philadelphia Story
 
1944

Charles Boyer Gaslight
Ingrid Bergman Gaslight *
Angela Lansbury (s) Gaslight
 
1947
Ronald Colman A Double Life *
 
1949
Deborah Kerr Edward, My Son
 
1950
Judy Holliday Born Yesterday *
 
1954

James Mason A Star Is Born
Judy Garland A Star Is Born
 
1957
Anthony Quinn Wild Is the Wind
Anna Magnani Wild Is the Wind
 
1964

Rex Harrison (above, with Audrey Hepburn) My Fair Lady *
Stanley Holloway (s) My Fair Lady
Gladys Cooper (s) [...]