I actually saw The Front Page at the theatre in Buenos Aires when it came out. I really enjoy Billy Wilder films too.

Opposite of Altman, very controlled.

HEADS UP ALL WWII AFFICIONADOS!!

Starting on Sunday, March 27 (not sure of the time, check your local schedules), HBO will present a 10-part mini-series: The Pacific. It is all about the Pacific theatre, and all the incidents pertaining to it.
It is a joint-production effort between Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. Those of you who are fans of WWII history, will love this. Just thought you might want to know.

Thank you! That's so cool! Can't wait.

I don't know why I used to term 'Gothic' because it really isn't. And only 'Noirish' in the black & white cinematography...but as you said, if plot isn't a primary concern, you will love this film for the atmospheric ambiance, the sets and the costumes. I too love and appreciate all these things about film - I am always checking out who the set and costume designers are in a film. However, unlike you, I want a good plot as well - it has to hold my interest, otherwise all the other accoutrements are not enough to satisfy me. But when a film has all these aspects - wow!! what an experience to engage most of the senses!!

I'm curious...why does Louis Jordan crack you up? He has never done anything comedic to my knowledge, unless I've missed some of his movies. He was more the leading man - he was extremely handsome. Did you see him in his debut film 'The Paradine Case' (1947)? An Alfred Hitchcock film, starring Gregogy Peck, Ann Todd, Charles Laughton, Ethel Barrymore, Leo G. Carroll, Louis Jordan, and as Mrs. Paradine - the elusive Italian beauty Alida Valli - better known as just 'Alida'. Great film. If you haven't seen it, try and do. As usual, if it's a Hitchcock film, you can't go wrong.

No honey, she's known as just Valli She didn't do a lot i know. Paradine Case is one of my favorites, too. I guess you know that.

Robert Altman did different things. I'm not really a fan, sort of like Stanley Kramer. They both did good things, I'm just not a real big fan of most of their things. See ya at the movies, comrades...

Atmospheric ambiance! I am there. :)

I do care about the plot, but it is not my main thing. I look at it from more of a Director and sometimes Producer angle....or as art.

I'm a huge Hitchcock fan, I studied him in college too. :)

Jordan? I don't know, maybe his facial expressions seem exagerated for me. When I see him, I can't help but giggle.


I like how Altman controlled every detail of the set, but let the actors do whatever...exactly the opposite of Hitchcock or Billy Wilder.

and...

Comrades makes me smile. :)

You know, actually Cecile DeMille was the same way. He was known for epics and controlled his story. But he expected actors to know what they were doing, so he was known not to really direct the acting.

I have not watched anything of his since college and I did not really study him. Perhaps this Spring. :)

You're absolutely right, snookums!! It was 'Valli' - my thinking is getting dyslexic in my old age! Thanks for correcting me. I also love The Paradine Case - there's just something about that film...can't put my finger on it - the music, the sets, Peck's facination with Valli...I don't know, but I always watch it when it's on. I have a copy of it on tape, but it's not a very good one. If it's on dvd, I may just buy it. I'll check Amazon.com, I get most of my dvd 'deals' on there. I've got to re-purchase Brief Encounter (you know that's my favorite film, Ol' Jet). The copy I had cracked. :(

I'm with you on Kubric - I always disliked 2001: A Space Odyssy, and never understood what all the hoopla was about...I quite never 'got it'.

As for Altman, I'm not sure I know his films...

Giggle? That's so odd...oh well. Whenever I see him, I swoon!
John Saxon had the same affect on me, tho he never did anything of great importance that I can remember. Oh, and Hawaiian-born James Shigeta - of Japanese ancestry - (Bride to the Sun - 1961) what a beautiful man! I guess I lean toward the 'dark & handsome' types, huh? Ok, now I'm rambling, lol

[QUOTE=apocalipstic;61449]
Jordan? I don't know, maybe his facial expressions seem exagerated for me. When I see him, I can't help but giggle.
QUOTE]

Has anyone read The Alienist by Caleb Carr? What a fabulous movie that would make, and I'm wondering why someone hasn't 'jumped' on that one!! It's the story of an 'alienist' (old term for psychiatrist/psychoanalyst), and how he forms a band of 'sleuths' to investigate, track down, and capture the first known serial killer in old circa 1880's New York City. It is a facsinating and riviting tale, and if well executed, I think would be a block-buster. I am tempted to write Scorsese - it's just his kind of story!! He has the finnese (see The Age of Innocence), and the violent grittiness (see Raging Bull) to pull it off magnificently!!!

I would love to hear your comments/impressions of this story if you've read the book, and if you were casting it, who you'd pick - I personally see Daniel Day Lewis, or perhaps Jerramy Irons as Lazslo Krietzler (the alienist). If you haven't read this, you should - you will never forget it. It is a grizly and gritty tale that is a sure page-turner - you won't be able to put it down!! Young boy prostitute's dismembered bodies are turning up all over the city, and the police don't have a clue as to how to start solving these crimes. Steps in Dr. Krietzler and his unorthodox methods of solving the crimes - first indication of forensic science and it's methodology.

On TCM Tonight - all times EST

5:30pm - On the Beach: Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astair, Anthony Perkins

8:00pm - A Streetcar Named Desire

10:15: Somebody Up There Likes Me

For the Nightowls

12:15am - Saturday Night Fever (yet again!! *groan*)

2:30am - Blackboard Jungle

4:15am - The Killers: Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner

Thanks!! i didn't know that. i will check it out. i just read an article in The New Yorker about a journalist who covered the B-29 firebombing raids of Japan that preceded the nuclear strike. i had never heard about them. It was fascinating stuff. It also makes you think that the nuclear strike was not necessary if these runs could wreak this much damage.

[quote=cinderella;61708]Giggle? That's so odd...oh well. Whenever I see him, I swoon!
John Saxon had the same affect on me, tho he never did anything of great importance that I can remember. Oh, and Hawaiian-born James Shigeta - of Japanese ancestry - (Bride to the Sun - 1961) what a beautiful man! I guess I lean toward the 'dark & handsome' types, huh? Ok, now I'm rambling, lol

they have the same effect on me being the gay man that i am, giggle. maybe we can talk shoes sometime, carmen. we'll do lunch. my pic is john gavin out of those hunky 50s types.

Louis Jordan actually cracks me up. He reminds me of Pepe LePew.

i am just catching up on this thread. But i am not a noir fan. i love the melodramas. Some of them are NOT good films, but i love them all.

Giant -- it really is a melodrama
All That Heaven Allows
Written on the Wind
Magnificent Obsession
All About Eve
The Best Years of Our Lives
Black Narcissus
The Long, Hot Summer

the best years of our lives in NOT a melodrama. it's a post war docu-drama by Wyler who did it as an account of the plight of returning servicemen and a changing America at the time. there's nothig melodramatic about it. it's also my favorite movie of all time and one of the best ever made IMO with 9 Oscars in 1946.

I have always loved its unpretentiousness in its characters and story. It's an honest account of the times and a no frills approach to the subject matter. To me, it's about men, soldiers and their point of view. As a transgendered man, I get that and I like that a lot.

google melodrama and the title. You'll see a lot of people refer to it this way. Melodramas don't have to be weepies or have to portray exaggerated emotion or be full of stereotyped characters. They usually are sentimental. They are about relationships and emotions generally. They often focus on domestic life or work relationships. And there is often a social critique element. They CAN be realistic.

The Alienist good book. Although I read it years ago, I still remember the storyline and great writing. I think it would be a good film. As for the leads, I'd have to reread it to get a sense of who could be in it. Thanks for reminding me of the book, I'll have to pick it up again.

its not a melodrama, its a docudrama

No, it is not. A docudrama is a reenactment of actual events. The screenplay for The Best Years of Our Lives was based on a novel in verse called Glory for Me.

actual events were chronicled in the genre of the times, the plight of servicemen based on the actual lives of servicemen who came home to joblessness, disruptive homes, infidelity and displacement. Robert Sherwood wrote it that way for the purpose of honoring and empathizing with men who had served their country only to come to a change in the home front and American attitudes. Wyler's intent was to chronicle and depict the way American servicemen were treated after the war in addition to depicting how the war had changed America. Those are facts and that's a docu-drama if there ever was one. But you can think what ever want, I'm not interested in arguing with you. And I'm not going to continue debating with you because I didn't open this as a debate thread.

Docudramas are not based on representative events but on actual events as they transpired, for example the raid on Entebbe. The filler in docudramas is just dialogue no one knows about. Sometimes liberties are taken with timelines for the sake of entertainment value, but they are based on actual events with real people and supposedly pretty much as they occurred. The characters in Best Years of Our Lives are fictional.

There is a dictionary of film genres online, or there used to be. i sent students to it when i taught American Film Genres years ago at The University of Michigan.

i am not debating you at all. This is the accepted definition.

Ah, now I understand why you don't like Marilyn!! lol

[quote=Ol' Jet;61812]

Again, I don't care. it is based on the lives of real servicemen who came home and faced challenges that were real and existed, post war. And I would suggest that if, in film studies it is regarded as a melodrama, they change that definition because it conveys and depicts the life and times of post-war America. Frankly, I don't care if this movie is a docudrama a melodrama or a black comedy. I could care less, what's it's classified as because this movie doesn't speak to me as a film. It speaks to me as transman; and it's close to my heart as WWII hobbyist, a history buff, and the fact that it's sensitive socially and consciously from guys and film makers who were in the war and who cared enough about servicemen facing new challenges. I don't have to accept any other definition for these reasons which are good enough for me.

Pepe LePew!!! *Gasp* I am shocked!!! I swear, I never see anything comic about this man, but I'll bet you'll have an influence on my reaction next time I see him - I'll remember your comments, and by mental suggestion, God forbid - I'll giggle too!!! Oh, you two are baaaad!!!

Good choices Martina, but I would agree, most would fall under the 'melodrama' genre...

This film by any other name, category, what-have-you, speaks to my heart as well. I love it, and I think it's one of the best films of this post-war, hero-coming-home-to-face-the-realities-of-life-back-home genre ever made.
Whenever it's on I will watch it. It always makes my eyes well up. I love the down-home sensitivity of it.

I do too comrade. There's just something about that era.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJP3ZzOpt6k"]YouTube- William Wyler Interview with daughter Catherine Wyler[/ame]

Funny Girl (1968)
How to Steal a Million (1966)
The Collector (1965)
The Children's Hour (1961)
Ben-Hur (1959)
The Big Country (1958)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
The Desperate Hours (1955)
Roman Holiday (1953)
Carrie (1952)
Detective Story (1951)
The Heiress (1949)
Thunderbolt (1947) (as Lt Col William Wyler)
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
The Fighting Lady (1944) (uncredited)
The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress (1944)
Mrs. Miniver (1942)
The Little Foxes (1941)
The Letter (1940)
The Westerner (1940)
Wuthering Heights (1939)
Jezebel (1938)

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7gBpkp3aHA"]YouTube- To Sir With Love by Lulu and Dance by Sydney Poitier[/ame]

Hey, Ol' Jet, did you catch the Warner Brothers documentary tonight? Unfortunately, I caught it midstream, but it was very interesting and insightful. Boy, that Jack L. was something, wasn't he? Not a very nice guy...however, I did like what they said about Harry, he was an altruistic human being in touch with life and people. I know I would have liked him alot - Jack, maybe not so much...

I didn't get to see it; still in the middle of a workout watching a movie on my 'puter. but i know jack was a shit. He and battling Betty , you know...

Battling Betty? Not sure what you mean by that? Lauren Bacall problem? Or could you have possibly been referring to Bette Davis? We know she did her best, but lost. However, Miss deHaviland tried her hand and won! But, I'm sure you know all of that...

Ok. The Jazz Singer is now on TCM. I've never seen it so I think I'll give it a shot. Supposedly a 'landmark' film, introducing sound, or did it really?

Bette, sorry. have fun

Sorry, not having much fun at all. Have the ol' jazz singer in the living room, but I'm way in the back of the house where the computer is...
I'm lonesome, and wanting company - slim pickins just about now...

Sorry to ruin Jordan for you, but glad you will think of us next time you see him :)

Some wonderful films there, I especially enjoy Jezebel and The Children's Hour.

I used to get his name and Billy Wilder's mixed up.

I LOVE that movie! :)

Nah, you didn't ruin Louis for me...

Yanno, I always get their names mixed up too, because they're so similar. I just keep reminding myself that it was Wyler Bette Davis had an affair with! It's so much easier for me to remember things when there's a scandal attached to it. lol

I too love the list of Wyler's films you have here, Ol' Jet. I'd be hard put to pick a favorite, but if I needed to, I think it would be The Little Foxes...I have never seen such evil portrayed as the scene where Herbert Marshall is crawling up the stairs trying to get to his heart medicine, while Bette listens without turning to look at his desperate climb - it's all in her eyes!!! Unbelievable!!! That is the most riveting performance without dialogue I've ever seen!!

I love a good scandal too! Thank you!

:lips: