Festival of Preservation 2009: Joan Bennett, Michael Redgrave, William Powell, Fay Wray, William Desmond Taylor
Tonight at 7:30 pm at UCLA’s Festival of Preservation you’ll be able to catch a screening of Fritz Lang’s unfairly neglected Secret Beyond the Door (above), a 1947 noirish psychological melodrama starring Joan Bennett as woman married to Michael Redgrave, whom she suspects is out to kill her (possibly for her money).
Unlike Alfred Hitchcock’s Suspicion (1941) and George Cukor’s similarly themed Gaslight (1944), Secret Beyond the Door boasts a highly stylized Gothic feel that makes the viewer feel just as off-kilter as both the heroine and the hero. Stanley Cortez, who also shot Orson Welles‘ The Magnificent Ambersons, was the cinematographer.
Tomorrow, Sunday, April 5, at 7pm, the Festival of Preservation will feature two rarities from the 1910s: Lena Rivers, a [...]
by Andre Soares | April 4, 2009
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Tags: Amos 'n Andy, Bigamy, Check and Double Check, Classic Movies, Fay Wray, Festival of Preservation, Film Festivals, Film Noir, Film Preservation, Fritz Lang, He Fell in Love with His Wife, Helen Kane, Irene Rich, Joan Bennett, Lena Rivers, Los Angeles Screenings, Michael Redgrave, Musicals, Phillips Holmes, Pointed Heels, Production Code, Secret Beyond the Door, Silent Films, Stanley Cortez, William Desmond Taylor, William Powell
Jean Parker
Actress Jean Parker died on Nov. 30 following a stroke. She was 90.
Parker is perhaps best remembered as one of the four sisters — Katharine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, and Frances Dee were the other three (above, with Spring Byington’s Marmee) — in the George Cukor-directed 1933 version of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. Although never a major star, Parker’s film career lasted more than two decades.
Much information about Jean Parker’s early years differs according to the source. She was born either Lois Mae Green (as per an IMDb bio apparently written by her son) or Louise Stephanie Zelinska (as per the Associated Press obit) in either Deer Lodge or Butte, Montana, on most probably August 11, 1915 [...]
by Andre Soares | December 11, 2005
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Tags: Classic Movies, Jean Parker, Joan Bennett, Katharine Hepburn, Lady for a Day, Little Women, May Robson, Sequoia, The Ghost Goes West, The Gunfighter
Best Films – 1948
Joan Fontaine, Louis Jourdan in Letter from an Unknown Woman
FILM
Anna Karenina
d: Julien Duvivier; scr: Jean Anouilh, Guy Morgan, Julien Duvivier
Cry of the City
d: Robert Siodmak; scr: Richard Murphy
Johnny Belinda
d: Jean Negulesco; scr: Irmgard von Cube, Allen Vincent
Key Largo
d: John Huston; scr: Richard Brooks, John Huston
Ladri di biciclette / The Bicycle Thief
d: Vittorio De Sica; scr: Oreste Biancoli, Suso Cecchi D’Amico, Vittorio De Sica, Adolfo Franci, Gherardo Gherardi, Gerardo Guerrieri, Cesare Zavattini
Letter from an Unknown Woman
d: Max Ophüls; scr: Howard Koch
Portrait of Jennie
d: William Dieterle; scr: Peter Berneis, Paul Osborn, Leonard Berrovici
State of the Union
d: Frank Capra; scr: Anthony Veiller, Myles Connolly
The Winslow Boy
d: Anthony Asquith; scr: Terence Rattigan, Anatole de Grunwald
Joan [...]
by Andre Soares | August 31, 2004
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Tags: A Foreign Affair, Adolfo Franci, Alec Guinness, Alessandro Cicognini, Allen Vincent, Anatole de Grunwald, Anatole Litvak, Angela Lansbury, Anna Karenina, Anthony Asquith, Anthony Veiller, Barbara Stanwyck, Best Films, Billy Wilder, Cary Grant, Cecil Parker, Cedric Hardwicke, Celeste Holm, Cesare Zavattini, Charles Bickford, Charles Brackett, Charles Frend, Charles Lawton Jr., Claire Trevor, Classic Movies, Cry of the City, Daniele Amfitheatrof, David Wechsler, Desmond Dickinson, DeWitt Bodeen, Edith Evanston, Edward G. Robinson, Elsa Lanchester, Enzo Staiola, Ethel Barrymore, Frank Capra, Franz Planer, Fred Zinnemann, Fritz Lang, George Sidney, George Stevens, Gerardo Guerrieri, Gherardo Gherardi, Guy Morgan, H. C. Potter, Hamlet, Henri Alekan, Hope Emerson, Howard Koch, I Remember Mama, Irene Dunne, Irmgard von Cube, Ivan Jandl, Jane Wyman, Jean Anouilh, Jean Arthur, Jean Negulesco, Jennifer Jones, Joan Bennett, Joan Fontaine, John Farrow, John Huston, John Ireland, Johnny Belinda, Jonathan Latimer, Joseph Cotten, Joseph H. August, Julien Duvivier, Karl Freund, Katharine Hepburn, Key Largo, Kiss the Blood off My Hands, Ladri di biciclette, Lamberto Maggiorani, Leonard Berrovici, Letter from an Unknown Woman, Lionel Barrymore, Lucille Fletcher, Marlene Dietrich, Max Ophüls, Melvin Frank, Melvyn Douglas, Michèle Morgan, Mildred Natwick, Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, Myles Connolly, Norman Panama, Oliver Twist, Oreste Biancoli, Orson Welles, Paul Osborn, Peter Berneis, Portrait of Jennie, Quartet, Ralph Richardson, Red River, Richard Breen, Richard Brooks, Richard Leacock, Richard Murphy, Richard Schweizer, Rita Hayworth, Robert Ardrey, Robert Donat, Robert Planck, Robert Siodmak, Russell Metty, Scott of the Antarctic, Secret Beyond the Door, Silvia Richards, Sonia Dresdel, Sorry Wrong Number, Spencer Tracy, Stanley Cortez, State of the Union, Suso Cecchi D'Amico, Terence Rattigan, The Bicycle Thief, The Big Clock, The Fallen Idol, The Kissing Bandit, The Lady from Shanghai, The Louisiana Story, The Search, The Snake Pit, The Three Musketeers, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The Winslow Boy, Thomas Gomez, Vittorio De Sica, Vivien Leigh, Walter Huston, William Dieterle
