Lana Turner in IMITATION OF LIFE Screening
Karen Dicker, Juanita Moore, Terry Burnham, and Lana Turner in Imitation of Life
Douglas Sirk’s classic melodrama Imitation of Life, starring Lana Turner, will have its 50th anniversary celebrated with a screening of a recently struck print at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills on Friday, August 21, at 7:30 p.m.
Hosted by film critic Stephen Farber, the Imitation of Life screening will feature an onstage discussion with Oscar-nominated (supporting) actresses Susan Kohner and Juanita Moore, conducted by Kohner’s sons, filmmakers Paul and Chris Weitz. The print, which is part of the Academy Film Archive collection, was made from the Universal Pictures restoration.
Sandra Dee, Lana Turner
Douglas Sirk’s reputation has gained some belated recognition in [...]
by Andre Soares | July 30, 2009
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Tags: Classic Movies, Douglas Sirk, Imitation of Life, John Gavin, Juanita Moore, Lana Turner, Los Angeles Screenings, Melodrama, Oscar 1959, Russell Metty, Sandra Dee, Susan Kohner, Three-Star Movies, Three-Star Oscar Movies
Bette Davis’ DARK VICTORY Screening
The Bette Davis vehicle and 1939 Best Picture nominee Dark Victory 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, June 15, at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
Beginning at 7 p.m., the feature will be preceded by the fifth chapter of the 1939 serial Buck Rogers, starring Buster Crabbe and Constance Moore, and the Warner Bros. cartoon Dangerous Dan McFoo, directed by Tex Avery.
Adapted by Casey Robinson from a play by George Emerson Brewer Jr. and Bertram Bloch, Dark Victory is one of Bette Davis’ [...]
by Andre Soares | June 10, 2009
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Tags: Academy Awards, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Bette Davis, Buck Rogers, Buster Crabbe, Casey Robinson, Classic Movies, Constance Moore, Dangerous, Dangerous Dan McFoo, Dark Victory, Edmund Goulding, Ernest Haller, George Brent, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Gone with the Wind, Hollywood’s Greatest Year: The Best Picture Nominees of 1939, Humphrey Bogart, Jezebel, Los Angeles Screenings, Max Steiner, Melodrama, Now Voyager, Oscar 1939, Oscar Movies, Ronald Reagan, Tallulah Bankhead, Tex Avery, That Certain Woman, The Old Maid, Vivien Leigh, Warner Bros.
Cannes 2009: Pedro Almodóvar’s BROKEN EMBRACES
Broken Embraces: Pedro Almodóvar on the set (top); Penélope Cruz as the heroine (bottom).
In the mystery-melodrama, a director and his female star begin a passionate love affair that leads to all sorts of trouble.
Wendy Ide in The [London] Times:
"Certainly, it is unmistakably an Almodovar film. Nobody else does richly-textured melodrama quite like him; nobody else can encourage such overwrought performances without unbalancing the film; nobody else shoots Penélope Cruz with a reverence which borders on fan-worship. But what’s missing here is the warmth and emotional honesty that infuses Almodovar’s most successful features. What’s missing is, arguably, Almodovar himself."
***
Eric Kohn in indieWIRE:
"Pedro Almodovar offers nothing new in his [...]
by Massimo David | May 20, 2009
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Tags: Broken Embraces, Cannes 2009, Cannes Film Festival, Eric Kohn, Film Festivals, Gay Interest, indieWIRE, Kirk Honeycutt, Los Abrazos rotos, Melodrama, Mystery Movies, Pedro Almodóvar, Penélope Cruz, The Hollywood Reporter, Thomas Sotinel, Wendy Ide, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
TESS OF THE STORM COUNTRY – Mary Pickford
Tess of the Storm Country (1914)
Direction: Edwin S. Porter
Screenplay: B. P. Schulberg; from Grace Miller White’s novel
Cast: Mary Pickford, Harold Lockwood, Olive Carey (as Olive Golden), David Hartford, Louise Dunlap
Directed by Edwin S. Porter (of The Great Train Robbery fame), the 1914 version of Tess of the Storm Country is both technically primitive and thematically saccharine. However, this shamelessly manipulative melodrama about a bratty waif who manages to save her father from prison and to marry a rich, good-looking guy boasts a solid comic performance by Mary Pickford, at the time probably the most popular film performer in the world. Pickford is so good, in fact, that she succeeds in making the maudlin material at worst bearable [...]
by Andre Soares | March 22, 2009
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Tags: Classic Movies, Edwin S. Porter, Film Reviews, Harold Lockwood, Mary Pickford, Melodrama, Olive Carey, Silent Films, Tess of the Storm Country
