#100 films of 1952

[project1939]

Day 44- Film: Don’t Bother to Knock 

Release date: July 18th , 1952.

Studio: 20th Century Fox 

Genre: Noir 

Director: Roy Ward Baker 

Producer: Julian Blaustein 

Actors: Richard Widmark, Marilyn Monroe 

Plot Summary: Pilot Jed checks into a hotel where his estranged girlfriend Lyn works as a lounge singer, hoping to win her back. She spurns his advances, but when he goes back up to his room, he sees a beautiful woman named Nell across the courtyard. He calls her, eventually going to her room, where they drink and flirt. But some strange things are happening, and Jed slowly discovers something isn’t right with Nell. 

My Rating (out of five stars): ***½  

Overall, I enjoyed this film. It was short and pacey with its mysteries and suspense. It was not a glamorized or sentimental film at all, it was a typical edgy and cynical noir. Widmark and Monroe were both highly effective and helped elevate the material. 

The Good: 

The unsentimental realism. Like many noirs, no one was really a hero. Everyone was flawed, and the world they inhabited was flawed. It didn't try to shove sentimentality into a story it didn’t belong in. 

The lack of any non-diegetic sound. Like The Narrow Margin, this film had no scored soundtrack. The only sounds we heard came from the environment in the film. In The Narrow Margin it was the sounds of the train, in this movie, it was the sounds of the hotel, particularly the bar-room music. To me, all the ambient sound makes things much more dramatic.

The short space of time the plot took place in. It was basically just a few hours of one evening. I love the detail that movies like this are able to show when they aren’t moving from day to day and scene to scene at lightning speed. 

Monroe getting to really act and not just play a ditzy character. It’s nice to see her play these non-glamourous non-ditzy roles. She certainly wasn’t just sexy eye-candy in this. I wish she had gotten to do more roles like it. 

 Richard Widmark’s unlikability. He was so good at playing a pretty unlikeable guy, and I appreciated it. 

The way the mystery slowly unfolded. The film didn’t spoon-feed us information about Nell or Jed. I enjoyed piecing things together slowly as the film went on. 

Nice little noir details. I enjoyed the colorful details like the lady selling photographs in the bar, the speakers on the wall in the rooms that you could tune to the radio or the hotel bar, the patient bartender, the lady with the uncooperative Dalmatian, the nosy old couple who lived at the hotel...  

Anne Bancroft as Lyn. I didn't recognize it was Bancroft at first, but she was really interesting in this. I liked the character Lyn, although I didn’t always like her style of singing. 

Thurston Howell again! This is the third movie that he has showed up in now for 1952! (And Alan Hale, Jr. who played Skipper was in the Westinghouse movie tonight!) 

The Bad: 

The ending with Monroe was a little melodramatic. I wished it had reeled itself in just a bit. 

The reunion with Jed and Lyn. It kinda made me mad. She deserved better! It seems like there’s a trend in a lot of media from this time where the message to women is, “He’s not that bad! Maybe he was an asshole or treated you crappy... but he says he loves you now! Don’t be so choosy! He’s at least somewhat decent, so come on, take him!” 

#project1952 #1952 #project1952 day 44 #100 films of 1952

[oglegoggle]

False glamor and true evil of the music industry/Hollywood/show biz in general but uhhhhhh I wish I could give Elvis a hug

#this is goggles #can’t stop Thinkin about Elvis I feel like a little kid again #but this time I’ve done more than just listen to the jams and watch the films #that man had a pretty fucked up life but he never stopped being Wierd at his core and honestly #it’s hearting to know that other Weirdos have always been out there and always will be and they can indeed be celebrated for their Weirdness #It makes sense why Elvis impersonators even to this day are uhhhhh Like That #I’ve impersonated Elvis I’ve been friends with impersonators I follow a few in their careers #Elvis stans run extremely neurodivergent #he was a weird guy and even still his memory speaks to the other weird guys who are like him #idk dudes I’m really emotional reading Elvis & Me by Priscilla #he was very abused and he reacted in a lot of weird ways he was bad at communication and he wasn’t taken seriously when he hurt #he took advantage of songs his black friends wrote and didn’t share the royalties like he should’ve and he was weird af with 14yo Priscilla #he was trapped in a financial hellscape he wanted desperately to escape but couldn’t because of the predatory behavior of those around him #he loved and trusted them and he knew they were hurting him and that tore him to pieces but he was still so loyal #he was funny and into weird hobbies and a little bit genderfucky and both sexy and awkward and he was shy and had a nervous tic onstage #I love him genuinely and dearly he was so multifaceted and just Incredible #lmfao my own autism is 100% engaged when I think of him #I look at him and I understand that we’re the same and because we are I can be Incredible too #Tho I’m not gonna fool around with teenagers or screw my friends out of the dues they’re owed for their work #It’s not 1952 anymore we culturally recognize that that shit ain’t right these days #I can lead a life dedicated to the pursuit of fun and joy like Elvis #I can wear whatever tf I want no matter how garish or tacky like Elvis #I can be beloved for my bold and uninhibited personality no matter how weird like Elvis #And I can dress up like Elvis lmfao

[joshuasumter]

You're not going to believe this! The Disney 100-year Anniversary crossover short, Once Upon A Studio, is coming! 100 years of stories, 100 years of magic, 100 years of Disney! It's like Disney's House of Mouse all over again, with a hint of Night at the Museum. I've been waiting for this all my life, I'm so excited! (Also gets you and some people hoping for a House of Mouse revival/reboot on Disney+, or maybe a mini-series inspired by this short) Featuring 543 characters from over 85 Disney films and shorts, the following list features those that are only from Walt Disney Productions (1937–1985), Walt Disney Feature Animation Studios (1986–2007), and Walt Disney Animation Studios (2007-present).

Films

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Pinocchio 

Fantasia 

The Reluctant Dragon

Dumbo 

Bambi 

Saludos Amigos

Victory Through the Air

The Three Caballeros 

Make Mine Music 

Song of the South 

Fun and Fancy Free 

Melody Time 

So Dear to My Heart 

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad

Cinderella (1-3)

Alice in Wonderland 

Peter Pan (1-2)

Lady and the Tramp (1-2)

Sleeping Beauty 

101 Dalmatians (1-2)

The Sword in the Stone 

Mary Poppins 

The Jungle Book (1-2)

The Aristocats 

Bedknobs and Broomsticks 

Robin Hood 

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh 

The Rescuers

Pete's Dragon

The Fox and the Hound (1-2)

The Black Cauldron 

The Great Mouse Detective 

Oliver & Company 

The Little Mermaid (1-3)

The Rescuers: Down Under

Beauty and the Beast (1-3)

Aladdin (1-3)

The Lion King (1-3)

Pocahontas (1-2)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1-2)

Hercules 

Mulan (1-2)

Tarzan (1-2, Tarzan & Jane)

Fantasia 2000 

Dinosaur 

The Emperor's New Groove (1-2: Kronk's New Groove)

Atlantis: The Lost Empire (1-2: Milo's Return)

Lilo & Stitch (1-2: Stitch has a Glitch)

Treasure Planet 

Brother Bear (1-2)

Home of the Range  

Chicken Little 

Meet the Robinsons  

Bolt 

The Princess and the Frog 

Tangled 

Winnie the Pooh

Wreck-It Ralph

Frozen

Big Hero 6 

Zootopia 

Moana 

Ralph Breaks the Internet

Frozen 2

Raya and the Last Dragon 

Encanto  

Strange World 

Wish 

Shorts

Oswald the Lucky Rabbit in "Trolley Troubles"

Mickey Mouse in "Steamboat Willie"

Silly Symphony (Three Pigs, Big Bad Wolf)

Donald Duck

Goofy

Pluto

Figaro 

Chip n' Dale

Adventures in Music

Humphrey the Bear

John Henry (Disney's American Legends)

Ballad of Nessie

Paperman

Ben and Me (1953)

Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom (1953)

Lambert the Sleepish Lion (1952)

*Roger Rabbit, made by Richard Williams's studio in England, and Enchanted, made by Tony Baxter, will not appear in this short because they don't belong to WDAS. 69 + 16 = 85!

#once upon a studio #disney #disney 100 #disney 100 years of wonder #once upon a studio disney #disney once upon a studio

[20th-century-man]

how do you keep your blog from getting labeled as explicit by tumblr?

Well, in my personal view, it's not really "explicit", is it?

But the real answer is even simpler. And, at the same time, impossibly complex.

The real answer is that I do not know why my tumblr has not been labeled "explicit".

Just as I do not know why certain posts are being forced to have a "Community Label".

Just as I do not know why certain long-standing, well-regarded tumblrs are being terminated, without explanation and, in my opinion, without cause.

The reasons I do not know why these things are happening or not happening are:

Because there is NO transparency in tumblr's processes of enforcing its policies;

There is NO consistency in how these policies are enforced;

There are NO explanations provided when these policies are acted upon;

And there is NO clarity in the processes or in the policies themselves.

Recently, several of my posts have been required to have labels and I cannot, for the life of me, understand why:

A post of Tina Turner onstage wearing a costume that covers her from head to toe;

A post of Marilyn Monroe (from a 1952 photo shoot for LIFE magazine!) where she is wearing a negligee and a pair of huge 1950's panties and nothing is revealed at all;

A post of Jim Brown and Raquel Welch for the 1969 film 100 Rifles; they are embracing, it might be implied that Miss Welch is nude (but nothing but her back can be seen):

A post of Jennifer Aniston where she is nude but all that can be seen are arms and legs;

Several posts of vintage pin up illustrations where there is no nudity at all - the women illustrated are clothed and not engaged in anything provocative.

I have appealed these - some appeals have been granted, others have not, others are still pending. This process is not only unexplained and inconsistent with the "policy", it also takes forever.

So I do not know why my tumblr has not been labeled "explicit". It would not surprise me if it suddenly was. It would also not surprise me, given recent events, if it was suddenly terminated.

My tumblr will be 11 years old this September. It has more than 22,500 posts. It has a lot of followers. It generates over 60,000 notes each month, nearly 5 million since I started it. Whether any of that has any effect, I do not know.

And that not knowing has become a problem for me. I am actively exploring other venues for sharing my 250,000+ image collection.

I do not like the uncertainty here and I do not like what tumblr is becoming.

#tumblr #Is Elon Musk running this place now?

[best-movie-ever-tournament]

The Wizard of Oz:

The tale of a young girl and her little dog who winds up in a fantasy land, meeting all sorts of wild and unlikely friends along the way to getting back home. This film is a classic for a reason. The music, the characters, the production, everything is so spot-on perfect and has become such an engrained part of cinema that I almost think people can take it for granted sometimes. I love this film and the fact that it is 100% sincere in it's passion for creating a fantasy world. Not a single ironic or mean bone in this whole film, it's committed to embracing the joy that can come from cinema.

It's famous for its segueing from black and white to colour when Dorothy enters Oz, but honestly? I think it deserves a place in the tournament based solely on the fantastic look of the flying monkeys. Absolutely iconic, so much more terrifying than anything they could do with CGI today.

Singin' in the rain:

One of the best musical comedies, full stop. Even as a child, I loved the delicious comeuppance at the ending so much I'd run into the room my mom was watching it in just to see that part. My brother hates musicals and he can still quote the mic testing scene with Lina. And the relationship between the main three characters? The good morning song? Cosmo in general? Unrivaled.

#tournament poll #best movies tournament #singin' in the rain #the wizard of oz

[whitewaterpaper]

Denna månad läste jag ut en klassiker av böcker: Hajen, och detta firades med att sedan se om Steven Spielbergs klassiska adaption av romanen. När jag såg att det var PÅ MÅNADEN 10 år sedan jag såg den sist, då i samband med Hajfesten 🦈 på SFN, visste vore det kul att se om filmerna vi såg då?

100 Million BC (2008) [👍🔁]

Astérix & Obélix: I drakens rike / Astérix & Obélix: L'Empire du Milieu (2023) [👍]

Cape Town Affair, the (1967) [👎] En spionfilm där man får för sig att en film inte behöver något mer än en banal spionintrig för att bära sig och vara spännande.

Cruel Jaws (1995) [👎🔁🦈]

Hajen 2 / Jaws 2 (1978) [🔁🦈]

Hajen 3 / Jaws 3-D (1983) [👍🔁🦈] Antagligen den av uppföljarna jag tycker mest om.

Hajen 4 / Jaws: The Revenge (1987) [👎🔁🦈] En dikeskörning av episka mått...

Hajen / Jaws (1975) [👍🔁🦈]

Jack och Bönstjälken / Jack and the Beanstalk (1952) [👍] Tror det här var min första konakt med Abbot & Costello, över förväntan bra med en intressant take på den klassiska sagan.

Jättehajen: Vindsurfarnas Skräck / L'ultimo Squalo (1981) [🔁🦈]

Mortal Engines (2018) [👍🔁]

Ännu en omtitt för att jag läst boken. En del ändringar från boken, men ändå en rakt igenom bra film.

Once Upon a Crime / Akazukin, tabi no tochu de shitai to deau (2023) [👍] Japanskt sagoäventyr där Rödluvan träffar Askungen och dras in i ett mordmysterium. Kul koncept, har sina hål i storyn men bröderna Grimm filtrerat genom ett japanskt öga är sannerligen en intressant upplevelse.

Pirates of Capri, the / I Pirati di Capri (1949) [__]

Rid i natt! (1942) [__] Stolpig svensk film, lite småtrist berättad och en intrig vi känner igen från många andra filmer.

Träskmannen / Swamp Thing (1982) [__]

Up from the Depths (1979) [🔁🦈] aka "Jättegäddan Anfaller".

Herrej-vlar vad jag sett om filmer denna månad. Kul.

Den japanska "Once Upon A Crime" kanske kan vara lite extra sevärd denna månad, trots att den kanske inte är perfekt.

#senast sedda filmer #månadens filmer #100 Million BC #Astérix & Obélix: I drakens rike #Astérix & Obélix: L'Empire du Milieu #Asterix & Obelix: I drakens rike #Asterix & Obelix: L'Empire du Milieu #the Cape Town Affair #Cruel Jaws #Hajen 2 #Jaws 2 #Hajen 3 #Jaws 3-D #Hajen 4 #Jaws: The Revenge #Hajen #Jaws #Jack och Bönstjälken #Jack and the Beanstalk #Jättehajen: Vindsurfarnas Skräck #L'ultimo Squalo #Mortal Engines #Once Upon a Crime #Akazukin tabi no tochu de shitai to deau #the Pirates of Capri' #I Pirati di Capri #Rid i natt! #Träskmannen #Swamp Thing #Up from the Depths

[gone2soon-rip]

GLYNIS JOHNS (1923-Died January 4th 2024,at 100).British actress, dancer, musician and singer. In a career spanning eight decades on stage and screen, Johns appeared in more than 60 films and 30 plays. She received various accolades throughout her career, including a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award as well as nominations for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Laurence Olivier Award. She is widely considered to have been one of the last surviving major stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood and classical years of British cinema.

Johns was born in Pretoria, South Africa, the daughter of Welsh actor Mervyn Johns. She appeared on stage from a young age and was typecast as a stage dancer from early adolescence, making her screen debut in South Riding (1938). She rose to prominence in the 1940s following her role as Anna in the war drama film 49th Parallel (1941), for which she won a National Board of Review Award for Best Acting, and starring roles in Miranda (1948) and Third Time Lucky (1949). Following No Highway in the Sky (1951), a joint British-American production, Johns took on increasingly more roles in the United States and elsewhere. She made her television and Broadway debuts in 1952 and took on starring roles in such films as The Sword and the Rose (1953), The Weak and the Wicked (1954), Mad About Men (1954), The Court Jester (1955), The Sundowners (1960), The Cabinet of Caligari (1962), The Chapman Report (1962), and Under Milk Wood (1972). On television, she starred in her own sitcom Glynis (1963).

Renowned for the breathy quality of her husky voice,Johns sang songs written specifically for her both on screen and stage, including "Sister Suffragette", written by the Sherman Brothers for Disney's Mary Poppins (1964), in which she played Winifred Banks and for which she received a Laurel Award, and "Send In the Clowns", composed by Stephen Sondheim for Broadway's A Little Night Music (1973), in which she originated the role of Desiree Armfeldt and for which she received a Tony Award and Drama Desk Award.Glynis Johns - Wikipedia

#Glynis Johns #British Actresses #English Actresses #Actresses #Mary Poppins #The Sword and the Rose #A Little Light Music #Notable deaths in January 2024 #Notable Deaths in 2024

[videli-jste-tento-film]

tumblr viděl 100 filmů! aneb 25. statistika

Princezna se zlatou hvězdou (1959) : vidělo 97,6 %, nezná 0 %

Tři oříšky pro Popelku (1973) : vidělo 95,9 %, nezná 0 %

Pyšná princezna (1952) : vidělo 94,3 %, nezná 0 %

S čerty nejsou žerty (1985) : vidělo 93,9 %, nezná 1,2 %

Noc na Karlštejně (1974) : vidělo 92 %, nezná 1,3 %

Lotrando a Zubejda (1997) : vidělo 91,5 %, nezná 1,2 %

Princ a Večernice (1979) : vidělo 91,3 %, nezná 1,4 %

Ať žijí duchové (1977) : vidělo 90,8 %, nezná 5,3 %

Princezna ze mlejna (1994) : vidělo 90,7 %, nezná 1,3 % N

Anděl Páně (2005) : vidělo 88,4 %, nezná 1,1 %

náhodné poznatky: speciální faktoidní edice

zastoupení filmů podle dekády je takovéhle:

Nejvíce známých filmů pochází z osmdesátých let, pak následují sedmdesátky a za nimi s drobným odstupem roky 2000–2009; stále existují dvě dekády, z kterých nikdo nic neviděl, a uboze jsou na tom nové filmy, které obvykle znáte, ale nesledujete je (ten jediný spatřený film je štědrovečerní pohádka); zdaleka nejpopulárnější dekáda jsou ovšem léta padesátá, kde jde sice jen o 11 filmů, to ale představuje hned 73 % ze všech filmů z této dekády, o kterých se hlasovalo – asi budu muset dát do pranice něco budovatelského, aby se to vyrovnalo

nejúspěšnějšími roky z pohledu kultovnosti jejich filmů jsou 1977 a 1980 (po pěti filmech), jinak je to poměrně vyrovnané

jediná dekáda, kde jsme kolektivně viděli aspoň jeden film z každého roku, jsou nulté roky, jinak se to žádnému desetiletí nepovedlo, ale osmdesátky se blíží (schází už jen 1988!)

průměrný počet hlasů je (zaokrouhleně) 76, což je více než u všech filmů dohromady (70) i u neznámých filmů (64)

stejně jako u stovky neznámých filmů jsem si dovolila něco o žánru:

Celkem nepřekvapivě jsou top 3 žánry komedie (64), pohádka (40) a rodinný film (17) – pro srovnání u 100 neznámých filmů šlo o komedii (57), drama (39) a pohádku (9) – jsme prostě veselý národ; stejně jako minule předestírám, že jde o žánry z ČSFD, někdy značně pochybné.

a závěrem statistika dle režisérů (hvězdičkou jsou označeni ti, kteří figurují také v žebříčku neznámých filmů, kurzívou pak ženy):

10 filmů: Zdeněk Troška*

8 filmů: Václav Vorlíček*

7 filmů: Oldřich Lipský*

5 filmů: Martin Frič*, Karel Janák*

4 filmy: Bořivoj Zeman*, Jiří Menzel*, Jan Svěrák

3 filmy: Marie Poledňáková, Ladislav Smoljak*

2 filmy: Karel Zeman, Zdeněk Podskalský*, Karel Smyczek, Jiří Strach*, Vlasta Janečková, Jan Hřebejk, F. A. Brabec*, Věra Plívová-Šimková*, Dušan Klein*, Karel Steklý, Juraj Herz*, Václav Gajer

1 film: Hynek Bočan, Jiří Adamec, Jiří Vejdělek, Eduard Hofman, Filip Renč*, Josef Mach, Ivo Macharáček, Vladimír Karlík, Antonín Moskalyk, Vlasta Pospíšilová + Aurel Klimt*, Roman Vávra, Ludvík Ráža, Zdeněk Zelenka, Jiří Věrčák, Peter Bebjak, Miloslav Šmídmajer*, Ondřej Trojan*, Antonín Kachlík, Zdeněk Sirový*, Milan Cieslar*, Petr Nikolaev*, Ivo Novák*, Jindřich Polák*

ve srovnání s režiséry neznámých filmů je tu patrný jistý monopol a musím vám říct, že ten Troška na mě skočil totálně nečekán a ze zálohy

Tož. Stačilo by. Uvidíme se opět, až uvidíte nebo neuvidíte nějaké filmy. Celý žebříček viděných filmů najdete pod perexem. Mějte se fanfárově.

Princezna se zlatou hvězdou (1959)

Tři oříšky pro Popelku (1973)

Pyšná princezna (1952)

S čerty nejsou žerty (1985)

Noc na Karlštejně (1974)

Lotrando a Zubejda (1997)

Princ a Večernice (1979)

Ať žijí duchové (1977)

Princezna ze mlejna (1994) N

Anděl Páně (2005)

S tebou mě baví svět (1982)

Jak utopit dr. Mráčka aneb Konec vodníků v Čechách (1974)

Tři veteráni (1983)

Šíleně smutná princezna (1968)

Marečku, podejte mi pero! (1976)

Anděl Páně 2 (2016)

Jak dostat tatínka do polepšovny (1978)

Jak vytrhnout velrybě stoličku (1977)

Princezna ze mlejna 2 (2000) N

Princové jsou na draka (1980)

Zlatovláska (1973)

Císařův pekař - Pekařův císař (1951)

Pelíšky (1999)

Adéla ještě nevečeřela (1978)

Jak se budí princezny (1977)

Honza málem králem (1977)

Dívka na koštěti (1971)

Limonádový Joe aneb Koňská opera (1964)

Účastníci zájezdu (2006)

Stvoření světa (1957)

O princezně Jasněnce a létajícím ševci (1987) N

Jára Cimrman ležící, spící (1983)

Na samotě u lesa (1976)

Rebelové (2001)

Vesničko má středisková (1985)

Z pekla štěstí (1999)

Vrchní, prchni (1980)

Hrátky s čertem (1957)

Tajemství staré bambitky (2011)

Slunce, seno, jahody (1984)

Slunce, seno a pár facek (1989)

Sněženky a machři (1982) N

Kytice (2000)

O princezně, která ráčkovala (1986)

Obecná škola (1991)

Cesta do pravěku (1955)

Třetí princ (1982)

Slunce, seno, erotika (1991)

Postřižiny (1980)

Nejkrásnější hádanka (2008)

Kameňák (2003)

Páni kluci (1975)

Fimfárum Jana Wericha (2002)

Dařbuján a Pandrhola (1959)

Popelka (1969)

Kolja (1996)

Kuky se vrací (2010)

Snowboarďáci (2004)

Jezerní královna (1998) N

Čert ví proč (2003)

Tajemství hradu v Karpatech (1981)

Jak básníci přicházejí o iluze (1984)

Sedmero krkavců (1993)

Dobrý voják Švejk (1956)

Což takhle dát si špenát (1977)

Korunní princ (2015) N

Rafťáci (2006)

Kouzla králů (2008)

Škola základ života (1938)

Krakonoš a lyžníci (1980)

Saturnin (1994)

Poslušně hlásím (1957)

Slavnosti sněženek (1983)

Krakonošovo tajemství (2022)

Vratné lahve (2007)

Jak svět přichází o básníky (1982)

Probudím se včera (2012)

Jáchyme, hoď ho do stroje! (1974)

Spalovač mrtvol (1968)

Občanský průkaz (2010)

Princ Bajaja (1974)

Černí baroni (1992)

Dešťová víla (2010)

Princezna a půl království (2019) N

Pupendo (2003)

Panna a netvor (1978)

Báječná léta pod psa (1997)

Léto s kovbojem (1983)

Z pekla štěstí 2 (2001) N

Rozpuštěný a vypuštěný (1984)

Trhák (1980)

Pod Jezevčí skálou (1978) N

Anděl na horách (1955)

Ať žijí rytíři (2009)

Kačenka a strašidla (1992)

Máj (2008)

Vynález zkázy (1958)

Král sokolů (2000)

Na pytlácké stezce (1979) N

Kristián (1939)

#statistiky #viděli #český film #slovenský film

[filmnoirfoundation]

FNF Donation Drive Giveaway!

For a chance to win a copy of NOIR CITY Annual 14 (new for 2022) donate $20 or more to the FNF between now and December 29.  Your name will be entered in a random drawing. Two winners will receive the Annual which features the best articles from the 2021 issues of the NOIR CITY Magazine.

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Everyone who donates $20 or more and signs up on our e-mail list, will automatically receive the digital version of NOIR CITY e-magazine for a year! From the striking cover art and story celebrating Veronica Lake's centenary to Eddie Muller’s memorial tribute to novelist and close friend Jim Nisbet, and many great articles in-between, our new issue is a vivid and multi-faceted collection exploring noir both contemporary and classic.

 Already a NOIR CITY subscriber? We have drawings for you too!

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For $100+ donations, a winner in a random drawing will receive the Argentine collection of FNF restorations on Blu-ray/DVD from Flicker Alley: The Beast Must Die (1952), El vampiro negro (1953), and The Bitter Stems (1956) — all with FNF-produced special features. All $100+ donations already received in the month of December will qualify for this offer.

For $175+ donations, a winner in a random drawing will receive a 1st edition (NEW — not used) of Mark Fertig's book The 101 Best Film Noir Posters from the 1940s — 1950s, plus three FNF restorations on Blu‑ray/DVD from Flicker Alley: Repeat Performance (1947), Trapped (1949), and our latest release El vampiro negro (1953) — all with FNF-produced special features. And, we'll include two new 2023 Suffering … with style NOIR CITY t-shirts in the requested sizes. All $175+ donations already received in the month of December will qualify for this offer.

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[paralleljulieverse]

‘Who is queen of all the garden?’: 70th anniversary of The Rose of Baghdad (UK version) Christmastime 1952/53

Ask almost anyone the name of Julie Andrews’ first film and the automatic response will be: “why,  Mary Poppins...of course!” It’s part of Hollywood folklore that, having been passed over by Jack Warner for the film adaptation of My Fair Lady because she wasn’t a ‘proven movie star’, Andrews was offered the title role of the magical nanny in Walt Disney’s classic 1964 screen musical. It earned Andrews a Best Actress Oscar straight off the bat and catapulted her to international stardom as Hollywood’s musical sweetheart. Her film debut in Mary Poppins has even been a question in the ’easy’ category on Jeopardy!  (Answered correctly, natch, for $100 by Steven Meyer, an attorney from Middletown, Connecticut). 

But, with all due respect to Alex Trebek and general knowledge mavens everywhere, Julie's very first film actually came out more than a decade before Mary Poppins. In 1952, when the young star was just 16 going on 17, she was cast to voice the lead character of Princess Zeila in the UK version of the Italian animated film, The Rose of Baghdad. 

It’s an easily overlooked part of Andrews’ oeuvre, figured, if at all, as a minor footnote to her later Broadway and Hollywood career. But The Rose of Baghdad was a not insignificant stepping stone in Andrews’ rise to stardom and one, moreover, that prefigures important aspects of her later screen image. So, on the 70th anniversary of the film’s British release, it is timely to look back briefly at The Rose of Baghdad.

La rosa italiana

Produced and directed by Anton Gino Domeneghini, The Rose of Bagdad -- or, in its original title, La rosa di Bagdad -- was the first feature-length animation ever made in Italy and also the country’s first Technicolor production. As such, it commands a prominent position in Italian film history (Bellano 2016; Bendazzi 2020).

La rosa di Bagdad was a real passion project for Domeneghini, a commercial artist and businessman with a successful advertising company, IMA, headquartered in Milan. During the 30s, Domeneghini’s firm handled the Italian marketing for many major international clients including Coca-Cola, Coty, and Gillette (Bendazzi: 23). With the outbreak of WW2, the advertising industry in Italy was effectively shut down. In an effort to keep his company afloat, Domeneghini rebranded as a film production company, IMA Films. 

Inspired by the success of animated features from the US such as Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937) and the Fleischer Brothers’ Gullivers Travels (1939), Domeneghini decided to produce an Italian animated film that could emulate the crowd-pleasing dimensions of American imports but with a distinct Italian sensibility (Fiecconi: 13-14). He threw himself heart and soul into the endeavour.

Based on an original idea developed from various stories Domeneghini had enjoyed as a boy, La rosa di Bagdad was conceived as an orientalist fairytale pastiche. The plot was patterned loosely after the Arabian Nights, complete with an Aladdin-style boy minstrel, a mystical genie, tyrannical sorcerer, and a golden-voiced princess. But it was embroidered with a host of other elements from assorted folktales and pop cultural texts.

To oversee the production, Domeneghini handpicked a core creative team including a pair of stage designers from La Scala, Nicola Benois and Mario Zampini, and a trio of head artists: animator Gustavo Petronio, caricaturist Angelo Bioletto, and illustrator Libico Maraja (Bendazzi: 23). They helped craft the film’s distinctive aesthetic with its striking blend of comic character-based animation and figurative exoticism of the Italian Orientalist School of painters such as Mariani, Simonetti, and Rosati (Fiecconi: 17). 

Music was crucial to Domeneghini’s vision for the film. Fiecconi (2018) asserts that “the original creative part of the movie lies in the musical moments where the film seemed to celebrate the Italian opera” (17). Domeneghini commissioned the celebrated Milanese composer, Riccardo Pick-Mangiagalli, to write the film’s musical score. It would be the composer’s last complete work before his untimely death at age 66 in early-1949 and it has been described as something of “a summa of Pick-Mangiagalli’s art” (Bellano: 34). Combining Hollywood-style romantic underscoring with Italian and Viennese classicism, Pick-Mangiagalli composed a broadly operatic score replete with arias, waltzes, and orientalist nocturnes. 

Given the difficulties of wartime, the production process for La rosa was long and arduous and the film took over seven years to complete. At various stages, more than a hundred production staff worked on the film, including forty-seven animators, twenty-five ‘in-betweeners’, forty-four inkers and painters, five background artists, and an assortment of technicians and administrative assistants (Bendazzi: 25). Colour processing was initially done using the German Agfacolor system but it produced a greenish tint that was not to Domeneghini’s liking. So after the war, he took the film to the UK where it was reshot in Technicolor at Anson Dyer’s Stratford Abbey Studios in Stroud (Bendazzi: 24).

La Rosa di Bagdad finally premiered in 1949 at the Venice Film Festival where it won the Grand Prix in the Films for Youth category. The following year, the film was given a general public release in Italy. Leveraging his professional training as an ad man, Domeneghini crafted an extensive marketing and merchandising campaign for the film that was unprecedented at the time (Bendazzi: 30). It helped secure decent, if not spectacular, commercial returns for the film in Italy and encouraged Domengheni to shop his film abroad to other markets in Europe (Ugolotti: 8). 

The English Rose 

It was in this context that a distribution deal was brokered in early-1951 with Grand National Pictures in the UK to release La Rosa di Bagdad to the British market (’Many countries’: 20). Not to be confused with the short-lived US Poverty Row studio whose name -- and, even more confoundingly, logo -- it adopted, Grand Pictures was an independent British production-distribution company established in 1938 by producer Maurice J. Wilson. While it produced a few titles of its own, Grand National was predominantly geared to film distribution with an accent on imported product from the Continent and Commonwealth countries (McFarlane & Slide: 301).

Retitled The Rose of Baghdad, the film was part of an ambitious suite of twenty-six films slated for distribution by Grand National to British theatres in 1952, the company’s “biggest ever release programme” (’Grand National’: 16). The screenplay and musical lyrics were translated into English by Nina and Tony Maguire, and a completely new soundtrack was recorded at the celebrated De Lane Lea Processes studio in London (Massey 2015). 

To do the voicework for the English-language version, Grand National assembled a roster of diverse British talent from across the fields of theatre, radio and film. The distinguished BBC actor Howard Marion-Crawford lent his sonorous baritone to the role of the narrator. RADA graduate and popular radio comedienne, Patricia Hayes voiced Amin, the teenage minstrel. Celebrated stage and film star, Arthur Young voiced the kindly Caliph, while rising TV actor Stephen Jack provided a suitably menacing Sheikh Jafar. 

The biggest and most publicised name in the line-up, however, was Julie Andrews 'enacting’ the role of Princess Zeila. Much was made of Julie’s casting, and she was the only member of the British cast to be given named billing on the film’s poster and associated marketing materials. Scene-for-scene, her role wasn’t necessarily the biggest. Other characters have more lines and more action. But, as the symbolic “rose” of the film’s title and the focus of narrative attention, Julie as Princess Zeila had to carry much of the film's emotional weight. 

And, musically, Princess Zeila certainly dominates proceedings. Her character is meant to posses a golden voice of rare enchantment and the film showcases her virtuosic singing in several key scenes. As mentioned earlier, composer Riccardo Pick-Mangiagalli imbued the score with a strong operatic flavour and this is nowhere more apparent than in the three coloratura arias that he penned for Zeila: “Song of the Bee”, “Sunset Prayer” and the “Flower Song”. In the original Italian release, the part of Zeila was sung by Beatrice Preziosa, an opera soprano of some note who performed widely in the era with the RAI and had even sung opposite Gigli (Bellano: 35).

In her 2008 memoirs, Julie recalls the challenge of recording the Pick-Mangiagalli score:

“I had a coloratura voice, but these songs were so freakishly high that, though I managed them, there were some words that I struggled with in the upper register. I wasn’t terribly satisfied with the result. I didn’t think I had sung my best. But I remember seeing the film and thinking that the animation was beautiful. I’m pleased now that I did the work, for since then I don’t recall ever tackling such high technical material” (Andrews: 143-44).

The Rose opens

The British version of The Rose of Baghdad had its first public screenings in September of 1952 at a series of trade events organised by Grand National to market the picture to prospective exhibitors. The first such screening was on 16 September at Studio One in Oxford Street, London, followed by: 17 September at the Olympia in Cardiff; 19 September at the Scala in Birmingham;  22 September at the Cinema House in Sheffield; 23 September at the Tower in Leeds; 25 September at the Theatre Royal in Manchester; and 26 September at the Scala in Liverpool  (’London and provincial’: 32; ’Trade show’: 14). 

In promoting the film, Grand National pitched The Rose of Baghdad as wholesome family fare perfect for children’s matinees and double features. “A fascinating cartoon to enchant audiences of all ages” was the campaign catchline. They especially plugged the film’s potential as a seasonal attraction with full-page adverts in trade publications that billed it as the “showman’s picture for Christmastide”.

One of the film’s first UK reviews came out of these early trade screenings with Peter Davalle of the Welsh-based Western Mail newspaper filing a fulsome report:

“Ambitious in scale as anything that Disney has conceived...it has very right to demand the same intensity of judgement conferred on the Hollywood product. I have little but praise for it and I hope my enthusiasm will infect one of the country’s cinema circuit chiefs to the extent of giving it the showing it deserves” (Davalle: 4).

Ultimately, the film was unable to secure an exhibition deal with a major cinema chain. Instead, it was given a patchwork release at various independent and/or unaffiliated theatres across the country. 

The Tatler theatre in Birmingham proudly billed its 14 December opening of The Rose of Baghdad as the film’s “first showing in England”. Archive research, however, evidences that it opened the same day at several other provincial theatres such as the Classic in Walsall (’Next week’: 10).  Other notable early openings included the Alexandra Theatre in Coventry on 22 December -- the day before Julie premiered in the Christmas panto, Jack and the Beanstalk at the Coventry Hippodrome -- and the News Theatre in Liverpool and the Castle in Swansea on 29 December.

The film’s initial London release was at the Tatler in Charing Cross Road where it had a charity matinee premiere on 28 December sponsored by the West End Central Police with 470 children in the audience from the Police Orphanage (’Pre-release’: 119). The film then continued a chequerboard rollout across the UK throughout early-1953 with concentrated bursts around school holiday periods.

Because of the fitful nature of the film’s release pattern, The Rose of Baghdad didn’t attract sustained critical attention, though there were short reviews in various newspapers and publications. The critical response was lukewarm with reviewers finding the film pleasant, if lacking in technical polish. Most praised the English soundtrack with generally kind words for Julie:

The Times: “This Italian cartoon, ‘dubbed’ into English, proves once again how much more happy and at home the medium is with animals than with human beings. Mr. Walt Disney never did anything better than Bambi, which was given entirely over to the beasts and birds of the forest, and the Princess Zeila, the rose of Baghdad, proves just as unsatisfactory a figure as Snow White and Cinderella. The fault is that not of Miss Julie Andrews, who speaks and sings the part; it seems inherent in the medium itself...The Rose of Baghdad is not, however, without some delightful incidentals (’Entertainments’: 9).

The Observer:  “Intelligently dubbed English version of full-length Italian cartoon...Nice use of crowds and minarets; one or two brilliant shots...; variably jerky animation; trite comedy; chocolate box princess...Not at all bad, a little too foreign to be cosy” (Lejeune: 6).

Picturegoer: “Charm stamps this full-length Italian cartoon, dubbed in English. Technically, it hardly bears comparison with the best of Disney. But it has genuine freshness and some appealing character studies...There is a delicate, very un-jivey musical score, and Julie Andrews sings attractively for the princess” (Collier: 17).

Photoplay: “The under 20′s and the over 50′s will love this one...Young B.B.C. star Julie Andrews ‘enacts’ the role of the Princess and sings three of the film’s seven tuneful songs....Yes, you’ll love this -- make it a must” (Allsop: 43).

Kinematograph Weekly: “Refreshing, disarmingly ingenuous Technicolor Arabian Nights-type fantasy, expressed in cartoon form. Made in Italy and expertly dubbed here...It hasn’t the fluid continuity nor flawless detail of Walt Disney’s masterpieces, but even so its many charming and novel characters come to life and atmosphere heightened by tuneful songs, is enchanting” (’Late review’: 7).

Picture Show & Film Pictorial: “Such a charming mixture of heroics,  villainy and romance should not be missed, and although the animation is not as good as first-class American cartoons, the colour and the songs are delightful” (’New Release’: 10).

The Birmingham Post: “[A]n Italian cartoon in colour which equals Disney in artistic invention though not in smooth animation...Fancy flies high but always it takes us with it. Much of the colour work is beautiful...The characters remain always between the covers of the story book, but within their limited living rom they are a  gay and enterprising company” (T.C.K.: 4).

Coventry Evening Telegraph: “It would be difficult to find a more delightful fantasy for Christmas entertainment than “The Rose of Baghdad” (Alexandra) -- the new Italian full-length cartoon. Until recently, Hollywood held an unbreakable monopoly in this field of coloured picture making. Now we have the opportunity to see a new and refreshing approach to the subject...All dialogue has been English-dubbed and appropriately enough Julie Andrews, who opens in Coventry pantomime tonight, sings and speaks the part of the little princess Zeila” (Our Film Critic: 4).

Faded Rose 

The Rose of Baghdad continued to pop up at various British theatres across 1953 and was even screening as a second feature at children’s matinees into 1954 and 55. In 1958, the film had a special Christmas TV broadcast in Australia where much was made of the fact that it featured Julie Andrews who was riding high at the time on the success of My Fair Lady (’Voice’: 15).

Ironically, the film would receive its most high profile release many years later in 1967 when a minor US film distributor, Trans-National Film Corp, secured North American exhibition rights for the property. Trans-National was one of a series of companies set up by Laurence “Larry” Joachim who would find modest success in later years as a distributor of martial arts films. With a background in TV gameshows, Joachim was known for his aggressive marketing strategies and he was very “hands on for the theatrical campaigns and art work for all the movies with which he was involved” (’Larry Joachim’ 2014).

In an effort to capitalise on Julie’s sudden film superstardom in the mid-60s, Joachim tried to sell The Rose of Baghdad as a ‘new’ Julie Andrews musical. He gave it a new title as The Singing Princess and marketed it with the dubious tagline: “It’s joy, it’s magic, it’s Julie Andrews”. He even billed the film as made in ‘Fantasticolor’, an entirely fictitious process. 

Registered with the Library of Congress in April 1967, The Singing Princess wasn’t released to the public till November of that year, likely to coincide with the holidays (Library of Congress: 121). It opened with a series of ‘children’s matinees’ at over 60 venues in New York before rolling out to other theatres across the US (’Children’s show’: 105).

It’s not clear if Joachim had access to the original UK source elements or if he just used a standard release print, but release copies of The Singing Princess were decidedly sub-par. They were marred by artefacts, colours were muddied and the soundtrack was prone to distortion. Moreover, by 1967, the film was hugely dated with old-fashioned production values and glaringly anachronistic elements. Joachim even had to edit a few sensitive scenes which were either too graphic or impolitic for the times.

The Singing Princess was not well received. Indicative of the dim response is this New York Times review summarily titled, ‘Feeble Princess’:

“The Singing Princess has joined the parade of foreign-made movies that turn up on weekend movies, most of them only fair and some of them incredibly awful...Parents would do well to read the smaller print in the ads...for the picture stars ‘the magic voice of Julie Andrews’ and emphatically not the lady’s magical presence....As an hour-length, fairy-tale cartoon of Old Baghdad the film is feeble entertainment compared with the technical wizardry and dazzling palettes of Walt Disney and others. It is possibly best suited for very small toddlers who may never have watched a cartoon on a theater-size screen. The distributor said that the film was made years ago in Italy and later dubbed into English in London, where apparently a very youthful Miss Andrews was recruited to sing three very so-so tunes. Those pristine, silvery tones certainly sounded like her on Saturday, but in the diction department she could have learned a thing or two from the Andrews Sisters. As a matter of fact, while London was revamping Old Baghdad, Italian-style, it might have been a good idea to set it swinging” (Thompson: 63).

The hatchet-job US release of The Singing Princess is the English-language version that has largely circulated since. In the intervening years, it has been given several TV, video and DVD releases of varying degrees of technical quality. None of which have helped the film’s reputation.

Not surprisingly, the film has enjoyed rather more favourable treatment in Italy. To mark the 60th anniversary of the original Italian release in 2009, La rosa di Bagdad was carefully restored and reissued on Blu-Ray. There have been some recent attempts to couple these restored visuals with the existing Singing Princess soundtrack, but it would be nice to see a properly remastered English-language version, ideally from the original audio elements if they still exist.

Heirloom Rose

Although it was never a major entry in the Julie Andrews canon, The Rose of Baghdad is not without critical significance. Not only was it Julie’s first foray into film-making, but it was also an early instance of the animation voice-work that would become a major part of her latter day professional output with recent efforts such as the Shrek and Despicable Me series. 

In addition, Princess Zeila signals an early entry in the long line of royal characters that would come to inform the evolving Julie Andrews star image. By 1952, Julie was already a dab hand at playing princesses, having donned crowns several times both on stage and in song. She would proceed to ever more celebrated royal character parts from Cinderella and Guinevere in Camelot to Queen Clarisse in The Princess Dairies and Queen Lillian in the aforementioned Shrek films. 

Ultimately, though, the principal historical significance of The Rose of Baghdad lies in its status as one of the few recorded examples we have from Julie’s early juvenile career in Britain. She worked assiduously in these early years, giving hundreds, if not thousands, of performances on stage, radio, and television. Sadly, other than a few 78 recordings and the odd surviving radio programme, very little of that early work remains. One lives in hope that more material may surface in coming years. In the meantime, The Rose of Baghdad offers a tantalising glimpse back into this fascinating early period when Julie was ‘Britain’s youngest singing star’.

References:

Allsop, Kathleen (1953). ‘Photoplay’s guide to the films: Rose of Baghdad.’ Photoplay. 4(1) January: p. 43.

Andrews, Julie (2008). Home: A memoir of my early years. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.

Bellano, Marco (2016). ‘“I fratelli Dinamite” e “La rosa di Bagdad”, l'Italia e la musica’. In: Scrittore, R. (Ed.). Passioni animate. Quaderno di studi sul cinema d'animazione italiano, Milan : 19-52.

Bendazzi, Giannalberto (2020). A moving subject. Boca Raton: CRC Press.

‘Children’s show’ (1967). Daily News. 8 November: p. 105.

Collier, Lionel. (1953). ‘Talking of films: “The Rose of Baghdad”.’ Picturegoer. 25(929): pp. 17-18.

Davalle, Peter C. (1952). ‘Film notes: Italy treads Disney trail.’ Western Mail and South Wales News. 20 September: p. 4.

‘Entertainment: Film Of Botany Bay. (1952). The Times, 29 December p. 9. 

Fiecconi, Federico (2018). ‘L’arte preziosa della Rosa / The Precious art of the Rose’. In Gradelle, D. (Ed.). La rosa di Bagdad: Un tesoro ritrovato. Parma: Urania Casa d’Aste: pp. 6-11.

‘Grand National offers ten British.’ (1952). Kinematograph Weekly. 1 May: p. 16.

‘Larry Joachim, distributor of kung du films, dies at 88.’ (2014). Variety. 2 January.

‘Late review: The Rose of Baghdad.’ (1952). Kinematograph Weekly. 18 December: p. 7.

Lejeune, C.A. (1952). ‘At the films: Dan’s Anderson.’ The Observer. 21 December: p. 6.

Library of Congress (1967). Catalog of copyright entries: Works of art. 21(7-11A), January-June. 

‘London and provincial trade screenings.’ Kinematograph Weekly. 11 September: p. 32-34.

‘Many countries covered in big Grand National List’ (1951). Kinematograph Weekly. 1 February: p. 20.

Massey, Howard (2015). The great British recording studios. London: Hal Leonard Publishing.

McFarlane, Brian, & Slide, Anthony. (2013). The encyclopedia of British film. 4th Edn. Manchester University Press.

‘Next week’s cinema shows.’ (1952). The Walsall Observer. 12 December: p. 10.

‘New Releases: Rose of Baghdad’ (1952). Picture Show and Film Pictorial. 59(1361). 20 December: p.10.

Our Film Critic (1952). ‘Seasonable fantasy.’ Coventry Evening Telegraph. 23 December, p. 4.

‘Pre-releases and release dates.’ (1952). Kinematograph Weekly. 18 December: p. 119.

‘Rose of Baghdad.’ (1952). 

T.C.K. (1952). ‘Cinema shows in Birmingham: Italian cartoon.’ The Birmingham Post. 17 December: p. 4.

Thompson, Howard (1967). ‘Screen: Feeble princess.’ The New York Times. 13 November: p. 63.

‘Trade show news: colour cartoon feature.’ (1952). Kinematograph Weekly. 11 September: p. 14. 

Ugolotti, Carlo (2018). ‘La rosa di Bagdad: il folle sogno di Anton Gino Domeneghini / The Rose of Bagdad: the mad dream of Anton Gino Domeneghini.’ In Gradelle, D. (Ed.). La rosa di Bagdad: Un tesoro ritrovato. Parma: Urania Casa d’Aste: pp. 12-21.

‘Voice of Julie Andrews.’ (1958). The Sydney Morning Herald. 8 December: p. 15.

Copyright © Brett Farmer 2023

#julie andrews #the rose of baghdad #la rosa di bagdad #anton gino domeneghini #the singing princess #princess zeila #italian cinema #british film #1952 #film history #classic film

[voluptuarian]

An expansion for my 365(ish) Days watch list featuring 100+ more movies from 100+ years of film, offering increasingly obscure titles and focus on world cinema.

The link above goes to the Letterboxd list, while the text list can be found below the cut. Happy viewing!

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

Un Chiene Andalou (1929)

Bambi (1942)

Ivan the Terrible pt. I and II (1944, 1958)

Alice in Wonderland (1951)

The White Reindeer (1952)

House of Wax (1953)

Carmen Jones (1954)

Night of the Hunter (1955)

Sayonara (1957)

Elevator to the Gallows (1958)

The Innocents (1961)

Carnival of Souls (1962)

The Leopard (1963)

The Great Escape (1963)

The Ipcress File (1965)

Persona (1966)

Le Samouraï (1967)

Witchfinder General (1968)

The Lion in Winter (1968)

La Piscine (1969)

The Color of Pomegranates (1969)

Satyricon (1969)

Midnight Cowboy (1969)

Donkey Skin (1970)

Don't Deliver Us From Evil (1971)

Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972)

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)

Immoral Tales (1973)

Penda's Fen (1974)

Murder on the Orient Express (1974)

Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Salo (1975)

Hedgehog in the Fog (1975)

The Mirror (1975)

Marie Poupee (1976)

In the Realm of the Senses (1976)

The Black Stallion (1979)

The Blue Lagoon (1980)

Heavy Metal (1981)

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Son of the White Mare (1981)

The Nine-Colored Deer (1981)

Evil Dead trilogy (1981- )

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osbourne (1981)

Possession (1981)

The Return of Martin Guerre (1982)

The Living Dead Girl/La Morte Vivante (1982)

Top Gun (1986)

Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

Jean de Florette/Manon of the Spring (1986- )

Maurice (1987)

Hellraiser (1987)

Dirty Dancing (1987)

Jan Švankmajer's Alice (1988)

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

Heathers (1988)

Tetsuo: The Iron Man and Tetsuo II: The Body Hammer (1989, 1992)

The Juniper Tree (1990)

Daughters of the Dust (1991)

My Own Private Idaho (1991)

The Lover (1992)

Like Water for Chocolate (1992)

The Scent of Green Papaya (1993)

Sankofa (1993)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

La Reine Margot (1994)

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994)

The Usual Suspects (1995)

Empire Records (1995)

To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995)

Hackers (1995)

The Watermelon Woman (1996)

Event Horizon (1997)

Starship Troopers (1997)

Kirikou and the Sorceress (1998)

The Virgin Suicides (1999)

Chocolat (2000)

Pitch Black (2000)

American Psycho (2000)

Memento (2000)

Ghost World (2001)

Irreversible (2002)

Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001)

Russian Ark (2002)

Hero (2002)

A Tale of Two Sisters (2003)

Kung Fu Hustle (2004)

Blood Tea and Red String (2006)

Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)

Mongol (2007)

Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008)

Thirst (2009)

Never Let Me Go (2010)

Kick-Ass (2010)

American Mary (2012)

Skyfall (2012)

The Lobster (2015)

Kubo and the Two Strings (2016)

Loving Vincent (2017)

Annihilation (2018)

Mandy (2018)

Mad God (2021)

Hatching (2022)

#letterboxd #SAG-AFTRA strike #writer's strike #actor's strike #movies #film history

[project1939]

Day 25- Film: Macao 

Release date: April 30th 

Studio: RKO 

Genre: Adventure Noir 

Director: Josef von Sternberg, Nicholas Ray 

Producer: Howard Hughes, Samuel Bischoff, Alex Gottlieb 

Actors: Robert Mitchum, Jane Russell, William Bendix, Gloria Grahame 

Plot Summary: Three American strangers with mysterious pasts end up on the island of Macao, just off the coast from Hong Kong. An American criminal who runs a casino there keeps his eyes on all three of them. Is one of them the Law coming after him? 

My Rating (out of 5 stars): *** 

When this film began, I thought, “The style really reminds me of Shanghai Express.” Then I saw von Sternberg’s name come on the screen and it made total sense! Unfortunately, this film does not live up to that earlier masterpiece. It’s another film in this project where a lot of elements are there to create something great, but it is ultimately just missing something. It was still generally an enjoyable movie, though, even if it was not great. 

The Good: 

Some of the Shanghai Express style. Von Sternberg can create a palpable mood/backdrop of exoticism in his films, and this has some of that. It’s also in an exotic locale where there are many different cultures coexisting together: Chinese, Portuguese, American, Japanese, etc. 

The way the mystery about who these people are unravels slowly as we learn more about their pasts. And the fact that the mystery is never totally solved.  

Jane Russell. She was subjected to constant catcalls and objectification by men, so I want to be very aware of that. Suffice it to say, she is stunning. She may not be the world’s greatest actor or singer, but you still want to drink in every opportunity to look at her. 

The plot was efficient and well-paced. At under 90 minutes, there was no time for it to get bloated and mind-numbing. 

The Bad: 

The characters weren’t developed much beyond the surface. 

Everybody looked so heavy-lidded, like they were so relaxed (jaded?) they could barely keep their eyes open. Russell, Mitchum, Grahame, and Dexter... they all had this. Was this a specific direction from von Sternberg? There is the famous story of him telling the cast of Shanghai Express to speak in monotone to mimic the train. Was this a similar kind of case? I can’t say I disliked it, exactly, but it could be distracting. 

It was hard not to compare it to von Sternberg’s more famous films with Marlene Dietrich. She is a seductive sex symbol like Russell, but Dietrich has a lot more charisma and skill as an actress. She knows how to walk into a room and make a bomb go off. It’s more than just her looks that achieve this. You always get this sparkle and sense of a full and complex person under the surface. Russell just doesn’t have this quality. Dietrich is never heavy-lidded! 

#project1952 #1952 #project1952 day 25 #100 films of 1952

[toshootforthestars]

From the report by Chris Lee, posted 24 June 2023:

Multiple Across the Spider-Verse crew members — ranging from artists to production executives who have worked anywhere from five to a dozen years in the animation business — describe the process of making the the $150 million Sony project as uniquely arduous, involving a relentless kind of revisionism that compelled approximately 100 artists to flee the movie before its completion. Four of these crew members agreed to speak pseudonymously about the sprint to finish the movie three years into the sequel’s development and production, a period whose franticness they attribute to Lord’s management style — in particular, his seeming inability to conceptualize 3-D animation during the early planning stages and his preference to edit fully rendered work instead.

.....

Sony executives dispute these claims about Lord’s management style, including his alleged insistence on approving every sequence in the film, describing feature animation as a generally “iterative process.” According to Amy Pascal, the former Sony Pictures Entertainment chairperson who produced the three most recent live-action Spider-Man movies as well as both Into and Across the Spider-Verse, “over a thousand” artists and techs worked on Across the Spider-Verse alone, tasked with scripting, storyboarding, animating, editing, and visually enhancing the film. So it’s unsurprising, she says, that as many as 100 of the Across the Spider-Verse film crew would choose to depart the grueling project, which Pascal admits involved major overhauls to both the narrative and visuals, along the way. Michelle Grady, the executive vice-president and general manager of Sony Pictures Imageworks, agrees, claiming that Lord is not to blame for the delays. He, as the main messenger for editorial changes coming from the three co-directors, executive producers, Miller, and the studio, is instead a convenient target for worker ire. “It really does happen on every film,” she says of the revisions. “Truly, honestly, it can be a little bit frustrating, but we always try to explain that this is the process.” “One of the things about animation that makes it such a wonderful thing to work on is that you get to keep going until the story is right,” adds Pascal. “If the story isn’t right, you have to keep going until it is.” To the workers who felt demoralized by having to revise final renders five times in a row, the Spider-Verse producer says, “I guess, Welcome to making a movie.” Grady says the sources who spoke to Vulture are not representative of the majority of crew on Spider-Verse 2, who she says found the production process difficult yet “extraordinarily rewarding.” But our sources’ concerns amplify those of the Animation Guild, a 6,000-member branch of Hollywood’s below-the-line union IATSE, established in 1952 to ensure equitable employment practices within a once-sleepy industry that has become a multibillion-dollar powerhouse since the animation explosion of the 1990s. A half-century ago, there were around 1,000 animators working in Hollywood, around half of them just for Disney. In 2023, no data exists for the number of artists, digital compositors, and effects specialists working across the globe, but their ranks have grown exponentially to meet the metastasizing demand for animated fare. Like organizers within the VFX and gaming worlds (which often overlap with each other and with animation), TAG hopes to formally obtain a seat at the bargaining table of an industry that is increasingly reliant on animation talent but that has historically treated its artists and technicians as gig workers, According to TAG, the guild recently renegotiated an agreement with Sony Pictures Animation and achieved increases to minimum wages for pre-production staff. However, Sony Pictures Imageworks, which despite its corporate affiliation is an independent vendor contracted by Sony Pictures Animation to do the physical animation on Across the Spider-Verse, remains a non-union studio. “Having spent time in the lower ranks of the visual effects industry,” says Steve Kaplan, business representative for TAG, “I am intimately familiar with how different those workplaces can be."

#sony #sony pictures imagaworks #sony pictures animation #into the spider verse #spiderverse #spiderman #hollywood sucks #news #vfx animation #new york magazine #chris lee

[dweemeister]

Babes in Arms (1939)

When did the “theater kid” stereotype become a term of dismissal? Through my secondary school days (and this goes for those in secondary education at the present time, too), the theater kid designation was always derisive, to denote classmates too obsessed with musical theater and often keeping to their own clique. Being an orch dork myself in those days, I found myself in an awkward middle ground: understanding fully a theater kid’s love of musical theater, yet a bit intimidated by their devotion to the medium.

The above is a circuitous way to ironically note that I have never been uncomfortable with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s (MGM) hey-kids-let’s-put-on-a-show musicals of the 1930s and ‘40s. Central to that subgenre of musical at MGM were Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney – both embodying, in most of their ten joint movie appearances from 1937-1948, the traits identifiable to anyone who understands how theater kids behave. Their movie musical collaborations contain no narratives of note, just sheer musical and choreographic virtuosity that holds up more than eighty years later. Babes in Arms, directed by Busby Berkeley, is the first of Berkeley’s unofficial “Backyard Musical” series starring Garland and Rooney – later followed by Strike Up the Band (1940) and Babes on Broadway (1941). Having seen only the middle film of that trilogy before, Babes in Arms is the weaker of the two I have completed. But for a roughly ninety-minute romp with puffed-up adolescent drama and a modest budget, Babes in Arms is decent value for those interested in movie musicals and the filmographies of those involved.

It is 1921 somewhere in America. Vaudeville patriarch Joe Moran (Charles Winninger) announces the birth of his only child, a son. Fatefully, his son is literally born on stage. Fast forward to the late 1930s and we find Joe’s son, Mickey (Mickey Rooney) teaming up with girlfriend Patsy Barton (Judy Garland; whose character comes from a different vaudeville family) to sell one of his songs to a music publishing company. He’s on piano; she’s the singer as they perform “Good Morning” (yes, that same song Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, and Donald O’Connor hoofed so magnificently to in 1952’s Singin’ in the Rain). The publishers unsurprisingly purchase Mickey’s song. $100 (more than $2,000 in 2022’s USD) in hand, Mickey returns home to his parents but is aghast to learn that his parents – who left the vaudeville circuit shortly after the 1927 introduction of synchronized sound in movies – are heading back on tour without him. To convince his parents to bring him along, he and Patsy piece together a plan that any spurned child might pursue: to put on a show with the other musically talented kids in the community (deeming themselves the “Babes in Arms”).

Teenage drama ensues including an unnecessary physical assault, a preventable love triangle, and an unfortunate decision to use blackface (more on this later). The cast also includes Grace Hayes as matriarch Florrie Moran, Margaret Hamilton as busybody Martha Steele, Rand Brooks as Martha’s nephew, Guy Kibbee as a judge, and June Preisser as the third side of the aforementioned love triangle with an unfortunate nickname. Betty Jaynes plays Mickey Rooney’s elder sister while Douglas McPhail plays Don Brice, one of the older kids with an underutilized baritone.

Babes in Arms is technically based on composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenz Hart’s 1937 stage musical of the same name. And though Rodgers and Hart are credited, this film adaptation resembles little of their original work, with only two songs from the stage musical retained for this movie. “The Lady Is a Tramp” appears only in the score, while the title song and “Where or When”. “Babes in Arms” appears as Mickey Rooney rounds up the neighborhood teenagers to march militarily down the roads – crates and (gulp) torches in hand. With even brief quotations of “Ride of the Valkyries” from Wagner’s Die Walküre in the song (2:53 in provided video), these kids, however well-dressed, might be taking on their newest task too exuberantly. “Where or When”, a ballad that few ever seem to mention, is sung beautifully by Douglas McPhail and Betty Jaynes; the inclusion of the little children on their one-quarter or half-sized string instruments is a charming touch. Garland briefly sings “Where or When” too, and one just wishes she could carry the song to its conclusion.

Among the MGM musical entries, most will recognize “Good Morning” (music by Nacio Herb Brown, lyrics by Arthur Freed) during Rooney and Garland’s attempt to sell the former’s song to the publishing agency. This original rendition of “Good Morning” does not have the choreographic mastery as seen in Singin’ in the Rain, but it certainly establishes that easygoing dynamic audiences would see often between Garland and Rooney.

By the time the film hits the stage show that concludes Babes in Arms, Mickey, Judy, and company will have sung quite the gamut of musical numbers. Separating themselves from most of the soundtrack are “Daddy Was a Minstrel Man” and “God’s Country”. The former (music and lyrics by Roger Edens) opens the stage show and is the first part of a sequence where both Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney don blackface. Blackface, which originated from American minstrel shows in the early nineteenth century, is a theatrical device in which a typically non-black person wears makeup to portray a happy-go-lucky caricature of a black person. This offensive practice predates cinema and serves no useful performative or cinematic purpose – a non-black performer can pay homage to black culture without perpetuating stereotypes, such as applying blackface. Unfortunately, both Garland and Rooney would be in blackface again in the last film of the Backyard Musical trilogy, Babes on Broadway. For some, “Daddy Was a Minstrel Man” and the following song, “I’m Just Wild About Harry” (a 1921 number with music by Eubie Blake and lyrics by Noble Sissle), will be distracting, to say the least. Together, they smash the picture of teenage innocence that (mostly) courses through Babes in Arms.

“God’s Country” is unabashed American flag-waving that proclaims the U.S. as a divinely dynamic nation. Briefly quoting the melody from “Yankee Doodle”, the song – considering that the United States was, at this time, a mostly insular nation that would rather not be involved with the mounting tensions in Europe and Asia – offers some curious lyrics, such as celebrating American freedom with this:

A hundred million rooters can’t be wrong, So give a hand, give a hand, Give a cheer for your land, Where smiles are broader, freedom greater. Every man is his own dictator.

Even more surprising lyrics appear shortly after that lightly rib the soon-to-be Axis nations:

We’ve got no Duce; We’ve got no Führer. But we’ve got Garbo and Norma Shearer.

Got no goose step; But we’ve got a Suzie Q step Here in God’s country!

For a movie made before and released after Nazi Germany’s invasion of Poland, this is as strong a criticism as one might expect from a major Hollywood movie at this juncture. Through most of the 1930s, every major Hollywood studio except Warner Bros. heeded the demands and threats of Los Angeles-based Nazi Germany diplomat Georg Gyssling, who suggested edits on certain screenplays to root out any critique of Germany and Nazism. This cinematic appeasement was sweeping, but it appears that Gyssling and his associates missed a small detail in Babes in Arms.

Other than the wall-to-wall soundtrack, the main attraction for Babes in Arms are its two co-stars. Still teenagers, Rooney and Garland were given an adult’s workload. Including both feature films and shorts, Babes in Arms was Mickey Rooney’s ninety-sixth of ninety-eight films of the 1930s. Somehow, Rooney, already one of MGM’s brightest lights thanks to the Andy Hardy series (1937-1958), is abundantly manic and tireless here in his first movie musical. Even in comparison to the exhaustingly hyperactive of mainstream American filmmaking, Rooney’s enthusiasm almost leaps off the screen. For her part, Judy Garland was not a household name yet when she trotted in front of the camera to film Babes in Arms. Her performance is not quite assured here, and any hint of believable romance between her and Mickey Rooney is spotty more often than not in part due to a sloppy screenplay. By the time of the film’s release, The Wizard of Oz (1939) had already been out in theaters for more than a month. History correctly regards The Wizard of Oz as an essential film, but Babes in Arms grossed more at the box office in 1939. Babes in Arms cemented a career 1939 for Judy Garland, which, just before the film’s premiere, also saw her lay her hands and feet in the cement at Grauman’s Chinese Theater.

Director Busby Berkeley (choreographer on 1933’s 42nd Street and Gold Diggers of 1933) made a name for outlandish mass choreography, but his choreographic style fell out of fashion by the end of the 1930s. Babes in Arms is pedestrian work from the master visualist, but it also marks the beginning of lyricist Arthur Freed’s (1943’s Cabin in the Sky, 1951’s An American in Paris) career as an MGM producer. Within the MGM hierarchy, the “Freed unit” was an assemblage, under Freed’s leadership, of actors (many of whom were principally stage actors before signing up with MGM), composers and lyricists, writers, and directors with the express purpose of crafting movie musicals with little executive interference. Babes in Arms does not yet quite contain that artistic freedom of an Arthur Freed musical, but many of the personnel in front of and behind the camera would become key contributors to the Freed unit.

As manufactured and predictable as much of Babes in Arms’ drama might be, I find it still quite watchable. Several statements from Mickey Rooney decades after completing this film perhaps explain why. In any case that the Backyard Musical trilogy comes up in a Mickey Rooney interview, Rooney usually noted how semiautobiographical these films were for himself and Garland. Both came from vaudevillian families; public performance as natural to them as breathing. Garland and Rooney spent much of their lives on a stage – theater kids, if you will – and derived profound happiness from performance. Even when surrounded by disagreeable, perhaps abusive, persons while making these movies (there are indications that Berkeley was difficult towards Garland, who was already enduring MGM head Louis B. Mayer’s cruel barbs regarding her physical appearance), that desire to embolden and transport others remains.

Babes in Arms might not be to the liking of those who still disdain theater kids, nor any of the Backyard Musicals. For others like yours truly, who appreciate the musicality and energy on display but never quite belonged to either extreme, Babes in Arms is lighthearted entertainment, flawed in execution, honestly acted.

My rating: 6/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found in the “Ratings system” page on my blog (as of July 1, 2020, tumblr is not permitting certain posts with links to appear on tag pages, so I cannot provide the URL).

For more of my reviews tagged “My Movie Odyssey”, check out the tag of the same name on my blog.

#Babes in Arms #Busby Berkeley #Mickey Rooney #Judy Garland #Charles Winninger #Guy Kibbee #June Preisser #Margaret Hamilton #Jack McGowan #Betty Jaynes #Douglas McPhail #Kay Van Riper #Richard Rodgers #Lorenz Hart #Arthur Freed #Nacio Herb Brown #Roger Edens #TCM #My Movie Odyssey

[mariacallous]

It was heralded by Le Monde in 1976 as “the first masterpiece of the feminine in the history of cinema”. Nearly 50 years later, Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles has become the first feature by a female film-maker to be named the “greatest film of all time” by Sight and Sound, the magazine of the British Film Institute (BFI).

Akerman’s 70s classic, which follows the meticulous daily routine of a middle-aged widow over the course of three days – including having sex with male clients for her own and her son’s subsistence – topped the decennial poll this year for the magazine, pushing Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo to second place and Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane to third.

The Belgian film-maker was 25 when she shot the experimental, groundbreaking film starring Delphine Seyrig in the main role, and it has since become a cult classic – provoking years of analysis and debate.

“Jeanne Dielman challenged the status quo when it was released in 1975 and continues to do so today,” said Mike Williams, the editor of the Sight and Sound, which has conducted the poll every decade since 1952.

“It’s a landmark feminist film, and its position at the top of the list is emblematic of better representation in the top 100 for women film-makers.”

Dielman leapfrogged from 36th place in 2012. Williams said the film’s success was a reminder that there was “a world of underseen and underappreciated gems out there to be discovered”, and he emphasised the importance of repertory cinemas and home entertainment distributors in spotlighting undervalued films.

In fourth place this year came Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story, while three new films have made it into the top 10, including Wong Kar-Wai’s In the Mood for Love in fifth place (up from 24th in 2012), Claire Denis’s Beau Travail at No 7 (up from 78th in 2012) and David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive in eighth place (up from 28th).

The survey was its most ambitious to date this year, with more than 1,600 of the most influential international film critics, academics, distributors, writers, curators, archivists and programmers voting – almost double the number of participants in 2012. It is an eagerly anticipated moment within the global film community, representing a litmus test for where film culture stands.

In 2012, Vertigo took the No 1 spot from Citizen Kane, which had held it for 50 years. That year, Jeanne Dielman and Beau Travail were the only female film-makers’ films in the top 100. But this year’s poll features 11 films by female film-makers in the top 100, and four in the top 20.

Furthermore, in 2012 there was one film by a Black film-maker listed in the top 100 – Djibril Diop Mambéty’s Touki Bouki, at No 93. In 2022 there are seven titles in the top 100 by prominent Black film-makers. Touki Bouki has climbed to 67th place, with new entries including Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing in 24th place, Barry Jenkins’ Academy award-winning Moonlight in joint 60th place, and Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Ousmane Sembène’s Black Girl jointly at No 95.

Jason Wood, the BFI’s executive director of public programmes and audiences, said: “As well as being a compelling list, one of the most important elements is that it shakes a fist at the established order. Canons should be challenged and interrogated and as part of the BFI’s remit to not only revisit film history but to also reframe it, it’s so satisfying to see a list that feels quite radical in its sense of diversity and inclusion.”

Laura Mulvey, a professor of film studies at Birkbeck, University of London, said the success of Jeanne Dielman – a film that closely adhered to the female perspective –signalled a shift in critical taste. “One might say that it felt as though there was a before and an after Jeanne Dielman, just as there had been a before and after Citizen Kane.”

Meanwhile, in a separate directors’ poll, a record 480 film-makers from around the world, including Jenkins, Martin Scorsese, Sofia Coppola, Bong Joon-ho , Lynne Ramsay and Mike Leigh, voted Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey the greatest film of all time. Citizen Kane was at No 2, and Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather was placed at No 3.

Sight and Sound’s top 20 greatest films of all time

1. Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman, 1975) 2. Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958) 3. Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941) 4. Tokyo Story (Yasujiro Ozu, 1953) 5. In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar-Wai, 2001) 6. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968) 7. Beau Travail (Claire Denis, 1998) 8. Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001) 9. Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929) 10. Singin’ in the Rain (Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly, 1951) 11. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (FW Murnau, 1927) 12. The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972) 13. La Règle du jeu (Jean Renoir, 1939) 14. Cléo from 5 to 7 (Agnès Varda, 1962) 15. The Searchers (John Ford, 1956) 16. Meshes of the Afternoon (Maya Deren and Alexander Hammid, 1943) 17. Close-Up (Abbas Kiarostami, 1989) 18. Persona (Ingmar Bergman, 1966) 19. Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979) 20. Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa, 1954)

[introvertguide]

Well, after almost 4 years of watching films, the group and I finally made it through all 100 films. Besides just watching the films, this project also included one hundred reviews that ranged between 1000 and 3000 words each, one hundred short introductions for each film, and 138 movie related side posts. In total, it accounts for a little over 300,000 words and over 400 double-spaced pages describing all the movies on the list. It has been quite the journey and helped me keep my sanity during a rather rough time for world. I still would like to review movies and learn about filmmaking, but I think I am done with this AFI list for a while. Below are all the movies in the order that I saw them, along with the year they were released, the AFI ranking from the 10th anniversary list, and the day that I watched the film. It has really been a pleasure.

1 Blade Runner 1982 #97 8/15/18 2 Raging Bull 1980 #4 8/24/18 3 Jaws 1975 #56 8/26/18 4 To Kill a Mockingbird 1962 #25 9/1/18 5 The Searchers 1956 #12 9/10/18 6 Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans 1927 #82 9/15/18 7 Unforgiven 1992 #68 9/21/18 8 Double Indemnity 1944 #29 9/24/18 9 The Godfather 1972 #2 9/30/18 10 Raiders of the Lost Ark 1981 #66 10/4/18 11 Annie Hall 1977 #35 10/8/18 12 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest 1975 #32 10/13/18 13 12 Angry Men 1957 #87 10/18/18 14 Psycho 1960 #14 10/25/18 15 Cabaret 1972 #63 11/10/18 16 Last Picture Show 1971 #95 11/22/18 17 Godfather 2 1974 #32 11/30/18 18 Ben-Hur 1959 #100 12/10/18 19 It's a Wonderful Life 1946 #20 12/27/18 20 Snow White 1937 #34 1/7/19 21 In the Heat of the Night 1967 #75 1/12/19 22 Sophie's Choice 1982 #91 2/2/19 23 The Philadelphia Story 1940 #44 2/11/19 24 The Sixth Sense 1999 #89 2/19/19 25 West Side Story 1961 #51 2/22/19 26 ET 1982 #24 3/22/19 27 A Night at the Opera 1935 #85 4/18/19 28 Apocalypse Now 1979 #30 6/24/19 29 Swing Time 1936 #90 7/5/19 30 Yankee Doodle Dandy 1942 #98 7/21/19 31 Rear Window 1954 #54 7/28/19 32 All About Eve 1950 #28 8/29/19 33 The General 1926 #18 9/13/19 34 Tootsie 1982 #69 10/1/19 35 Rocky 1976 #57 10/12/19 36 Shane 1953 #45 10/30/19 37 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf 1966 #67 11/14/19 38 Sunset Boulevard 1950 #16 11/28/19 39 Vertigo 1958 #9 12/15/19 40 Singin in the Rain 1953 #5 1/15/20 41 Nashville 1975 #59 1/25/20 42 Bringing Up Baby 1938 #88 2/2/20 43 Midnight Cowboy 1969 #43 2/6/20 44 Spartacus 1960 #81 3/7/20 45 Network 1976 #64 3/11/20 46 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid 1969 #73 3/23/20 47 Sullivan's Travels 1941 #61 4/11/20 48 On the Waterfront 1953 #19 4/25/20 49 Lord of the Rings 2001 #50 5/8/20 50 All the President's Men 1976 #77 5/12/20 51 Casablanca 1942 #3 5/17/20 52 North by Northwest 1959 #55 5/25/20 53 The Gold Rush 1925 #58 6/4/20 54 Toy Story 1995 #99 6/20/20 55 The French Connection 1971 #93 7/11/20 56 City Lights 1931 #11 7/25/20 57 Some Like it Hot 1959 #22 8/8/20 58 Gone with the Wind 1939 #6 8/30/20 59 Goodfellas 1990 #92 9/19/20 60 High Noon 1952 #27 9/30/20 61 King Kong 1933 #41 10/12/20 62 The Silence of the Lambs 1991 #74 10/25/20 63 The Bridge on the River Kwai 1957 #36 10/30/20 64 The Graduate 1967 #17 11/18/20 65 Wizard of Oz 1939 #10 12/22/20 66 The Apartment 1960 #80 12/26/20 67 Intolerance 1916 #49 1/3/21 68 MASH 1970 #54 1/20/21 69 Dr Strangelove 1964 #39 1/25/21 70 Saving Private Ryan 1998 #71 2/11/21 71 Do the Right Thing 1989 #96 2/24/21 72 Pulp Fiction 1994 #94 3/7/21 73 A Clockwork Orange 1971 #70 3/19/21 74 Chinatown 1974 #21 3/25/21 75 The Sound of Music 1965 #40 4/10/21 76 Duck Soup 1933 #60 4/15/21 77 Easy Rider 1969 #84 4/23/21 78 Star Wars 1977 #13 5/4/21 79 The Maltese Falcon 1941 #31 5/10/21 80 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre 1948 #38 5/19/21 81 African Queen 1951 #65 5/26/21 82 Lawrence of Arabia 1962 #7 6/1/21 83 Bonnie and Clyde 1967 #42 6/6/21 84 Schindler's List 1993 #8 6/26/21 85 Modern Times 1936 #78 7/19/21 86 The Best Years of Our Lives 1946 #37 8/8/21 87 Taxi Driver 1976 #52 10/13/21 88 Mr. Smith Goes to Washington 1939 #26 10/29/21 89 The Shawshank Redemption 1994 #72 11/13/21 90 American Graffiti 1973 #62 12/8/21 91 A Streetcar Named Desire 1951 #47 12/13/21 92 The Wild Bunch 1969 #79 12/26/21 93 Titanic 1997 #83 2/1/22 94 It Happened One Night 1934 #46 2/15/22 95 The Deer Hunter 1978 #53 3/25/22 96 2001: A Space Odyssey 1968 #15 4/22/22 97 Forrest Gump 1994 #76 5/1/22 98 Platoon 1986 #86 5/11/22 99 The Grapes of Wrath 1940 #23 6/1/22 100 Citizen Kane 1941 #1 6/26/22

If you look at the archive for this blog, you can find reviews of every one of these films along with side essays about the characters and the production surrounding the films. Feel free to ask questions, because I know the whole list quite well at this point.

#introvert #introverts #movie project #great movies #top 100 list #films #psychology #film review