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• Director
• William Keighley
• Writers
• Richard Macaulay(original screenplay)
• Jerry Wald(original screenplay)
• Stars
• James Cagney
• Ann Sheridan
• Pat O'Brien

Torrid Zone star James Cagney once described the film as "The Front Page among the bananas." Indeed, the screenplay diligently follows the Front Page plot device of a tough boss (Pat O'Brien) pulling every underhanded trick in the book to keep his top man (Cagney) from quitting. This time the setting is a Central American plantation owned by O'Brien, which supervisor Cagney would dearly love to leave behind. Complicating the plot is a nightclub singer (Anne Sheridan) over whom O'Brien and Tracy do battle; a bored married woman (Helen Vinson) with eyes for Cagney; and a gang of Latino bandits, led by George Tobias (providing comic relief). What Torrid Zone lacked in originality it made up for in sheer energy.

• Director
• Rowland V. Lee
• Writer
• Robert N. Lee(original screen play)
• Stars
• Basil Rathbone
• Boris Karloff
• Barbara O'Neil

Basil Rathbone's real-life son, John Rodion, has his head chopped off early on in this historical melodrama often mistakenly referred to as a horror film. Yes, a second-billed Boris Karloff does stomp about on a club-foot as the Duke of Glouchester's chief executioner, Mord, but Karloff's presence is really more colorful than horrifying. Rathbone is the main villain here, as the Duke of Glouchester, the deformed second brother of Edward IV (Ian Hunter), whose throne he covets. But before he can place himself on that exalted chair, there are quite a few relatives and pretenders to be rid off. The exiled Prince of Wales (G.P. Huntley) is dispatched during a battle, and his father, the feeble-minded Plantagenet King Henry VI (Miles Mander), who steadfastly refuses to gracefully die of old age, is murdered by Mord. Half-brother Clarence (Vincent Price), meanwhile, is drowned very picturesquely in a vat of Malmsey wine and when Edward IV dies of natural causes, only his two young sons remain. To the horror of Queen Elizabeth (Barbara O'Neil), Glouchester is named their protector -- which of course means that Mord the executioner will be working overtime once again. But the evil duke, now Richard III, has not counted on the heroic John Wyatt (John Sutton), who, by looting the treasury, is able to bring back from exile in France yet another pretender, Henry Tudor (Ralph Forbes). The latter's invasion proves victorious at the famous battle of Bosworth Field and the brutal reign of Richard II, and his executioner, comes to an end.

• Director
• Ray Enright
• Writers
• Norman Houston(screen play)
• Gene Lewis(screen play)
• William Corcoran(based on the novel by)
• Stars
• Randolph Scott
• Robert Ryan
• Anne Jeffreys

Quick-draw legend Bat Masterson is summoned to Kansas to end a small-town feud between local farmers and criminal ranch owners in this western starring Randolph Scott.

• Director
• Jim Amatulli
• Writers
• Jim Amatulli
• Lee Watters
• Stars
• Virginia Madsen
• Rick Rossovich
• Eddie Mills

A romance between a home-security saleswoman and a scheming art-gallery owner leads to a diabolical art theft scheme in this romantic crime drama from first-time director Jim Amatulli. Emma (Virginia Madsen) knows a thing or two about home security and rightly so given that she's the police chief's daughter. When Emma makes the acquaintance of local art-gallery owner Bret (Rick Rossovich), the pair discover that their passion for each other is only exceeded by their love of art. As the thrill-seeking pair hatch a foolproof scheme to steal the paintings from Emma's unappreciative clients, their plan quickly unravels leading them to wonder if their lofty dreams are truly worth the price they may have to pay if caught in the act.

• Director
• Ivan Dixon
• Writer
• John D.F. Black
• Stars
• Robert Hooks
• Paul Winfield
• Ralph Waite

An inner-city point man is on the run from both the cops and the crooks in this streetwise blaxpolitation drama. T (Robert Hooks) is a combination pool shark, private detective, and all-purpose ghetto fixer who operates out of a billiards parlor in South Central Los Angeles. T has done well for himself -- he drives a fancy new car, wears expensive suits, and lives in an upscale apartment -- but he also looks out for folks on the block, and knows how to tell the good guys from the bad guys on either side of the law. T is approached by Chalky (Paul Winfield) and his partner, Pete (Ralph Waite), who run a floating dice game in the neighborhood. Chalky tells T they've been ripped off by a band of thieves several nights running, and they want him to find out who the masked stick-up men are. T is willing to do the job for the right price, but it turns out Chalky and Pete are trying to take down rival crime kingpin Big (Julius Harris), and when one of Big's underlings turns up dead, T is blamed for the crime by both Big and corrupt police captain Joe Marx (Bill Smithers). Trouble Man also stars Paula Kelly's as T's love interest, and features an original score by Marvin Gaye.

• Directors
• William C. McGann
• Alan Crosland(uncredited)
• Writers
• Erle Stanley Gardner(story)
• F. Hugh Herbert(screen play)
• Stars
• Ricardo Cortez
• June Travis
• Jane Bryan

Warner Bros.' "Perry Mason" series quietly slipped from the "A" to the "B" category with this adaptation of Erle Stanley Gardner's The Case of the Caretaker's Cat. Ricardo Cortez and June Travis take over from Warren William and Claire Dodd as criminal attorney Perry Mason and his faithful secretary Della Street. Though the characters had been married in Case of the Velvet Claws, they're unattached again here, though Della is still hoping. This time there are three murders, all connected with a hectic treasure hunt and a screeching feline (grey, not black!) Throwing an added spanner into the works is the fact that one of the murders is a phony, designed to permit a millionaire from escaping his responsibilities. Case of the Black Cat was later redone as an hour-long episode of the Perry Mason TV series.

• Director
• Mervyn LeRoy
• Writers
• Erwin Gelsey(screenplay)
• James Seymour(screenplay)
• David Boehm(dialogue)
• Stars
• Warren William
• Joan Blondell
• Aline MacMahon

The second talkie version of the Avery Hopwood's theatrical war-horse The Golddiggers of Broadway, Gold Diggers of 1933 was the second of three back-to-back 1933 Warner Bros. musicals benefiting from the genius of Busby Berkeley. The basic plot is retained from the Hopwood play: Showgirls Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler and Aline McMahon attempt to find financial backing for the new show planned by producer Ned Sparks. Songwriter Dick Powell, an incognito man of wealth, offers to put up the money, a fact that brings down the wrath of his older brother Warren William, who despises show folk. Attempting to buy off the three girls, William is placed in a compromising position by the crafty Blondell and is compelled to bankroll the musical himself. The oddest aspect of Gold Diggers of 1933 is the fact that the mood of the songs is wildly at variance with the plot. The film begins with dozens of chorus girls (led by Ginger Rogers) happily chirping "We're In the Money", a rehearsal number interrupted when the finance men burst in to claim the sets and props from the impoverished troupe. At the end, when everyone is genuinely in the money, the troupe stages a downbeat "Brother Can You Spare A Dime"-style production number, "Remember My Forgotten Man"--and it is on this doleful indictment of the Depression that the film fades out! Other Berkeley-staged musical highlights include "Pettin' in the Park" (yes, that salacious little baby really is Billy Barty) and the neon-dominated "Shadow Waltz", all written by the prolific Harry Warren and Al Dubin. As spectacular as Gold Diggers of 1933 was, it would be topped by the last of Berkeley's 1933 trilogy, Footlight Parade.

• Director
• D. Ross Lederman
• Writers
• Scott Darling(original screenplay)
• Erna Lazarus(original screenplay)
• Stars
• Jeffrey Lynn
• Jane Wyman
• Edward Everett Horton

Possibly inspired by Universal's The Invisible Woman, Warner Bros.' The Body Disappears is an agreeably daffy comedy with science-fiction undertones. Passing out from overindulgence during his engagement party, young millionaire Peter De Haven is placed on a slab in a college dissecting room by his prankish friends. Before Peter can awaken, he is inadvertently kidnapped by eccentric Professor Shotsbury (Edward Everett Horton), who needs a "dead body" upon which to test his new life-restoring serum. Shotsbury's miracle drug succeeds only in making Peter invisible, leading to all manner of looney complications. Before the film's 72 minutes are over, Peter has discovered that his "loving" fiancee Christine Lunceford (Margerite Chapman) is merely a gold-digger, Prof. Shotsbury has been locked up in the nuthouse, and Shotsbury's perky daughter Joan (Jane Wyman) has become invisible himself, implictly cavorting about naked with no one any the wiser. Still fresh and funny after nearly six decades, The Body Disappears is sometimes shown on TV minus the "scared-rabbit" comedy routines of black actor Willie Best.

• Directors
• Curtis Bernhardt
• Busby Berkeley(uncredited)
• Writers
• François Campaux(story)
• Norman Corwin
• Stars
• Jane Wyman
• Charles Laughton
• Joan Blondell

The Blue Veil was the single most successful effort from the production team of Jerry Wald and Norman Krasna. Jane Wyman pulls out all the emotional stops as a young Frenchwoman named Louise, who, after losing her husband and child in WW I, devotes the rest of her life to selflessly caring for other people's children. In true "woman's story" fashion, Louise ages and ages beautifully, sacrificing all for the sake of others. On the brink of destitution, she is rescued by her former charges, all nicely grown up and boundlessly grateful. A remake of the French Le Voile Bleu, The Blue Veil was adapted for the American screen by radio's Norman Corwin. The sterling supporting cast includes Charles Laughton as a widowed manufacturer, Joan Blondell as a blowsy actress, Natalie Wood as Blondell's neglected daughter, and Richard Carlson, Audrey Totter, Agnes Moorehead and Don Taylor.

• Director
• Benjamin Stoloff
• Writers
• Seton I. Miller(screenplay)
• Gelett Burgess(novel "Two O'Clock Courage")
• Willis Goldbeck(screenplay)
• Stars
• Walter Abel
• Margot Grahame
• Wallace Ford

Wandering around in the darkness, an amnesiac (Walter Abel) can't shake the feeling that he's murdered someone. When it develops that a prominent (if somewhat shifty) theatrical producer has been killed, our hero thinks that he's guilty. But unemployed actress Marie Smith (Margot Grahame) isn't completely convinced, so she helps him reconstruct the clues and -- hopefully -- track down the real killer. Walter Abel and Margot Grahame are more felicitously teamed here than they'd been as D'Artagnan and Milady de Winter in the previous season's Three Musketeers. Based on a novel by Gelett Burgess, Two in the Dark was remade in 1945 as Two O'Clock Courage (the book's original title).

• Director
• Anthony Mann
• Writers
• Olive Cooper(screenplay)
• Lawrence Kimble(screenplay)
• Wayne Whittaker(story "Chicago Lulu")
• Stars
• Frances Langford
• Ralph Edwards
• Russell Wade

In this WW II romance, a small-time nightclub singer who works in a little Manhattan nightclub has a one-night stand with a handsome fly-boy. The next day, the B-29 pilot is sent to the Pacific and once there, his crew mischievously paints the picture of the singer upon his plane with the words "The Bamboo Blonde" beneath it. The pilot takes off to become one of the most fearsome fighters of the war, earning himself considerable renown back home. Ever the entrepreneur, the nightclub owner sees a chance to make big bucks off of the singer. He succeeds and she becomes famous. Later the pilot returns, but though he wants to be with his Bamboo Blonde he cannot for he is engaged to another -- at least for the moment.

• Director
• Hanif Kureishi
• Writer
• Hanif Kureishi
• Stars
• Justin Chadwick
• Steven Mackintosh
• Fiona Shaw

Screenwriter Hanif Kureishi marked his directorial debut in this slice-of-life chronicle about a collection of drug-dealing slackers in London. Centering on a band of delinquents calling themselves "the posse," the group is led by an ambitious male hustler named Muffdiver (Steven Mackintosh). His friend, Mr. Clint Eastwood (Justin Chadwick), begins to wonder about Muffdiver when he announces that he will no longer sell drugs for the gang. But soon Clint is wondering about himself, and after being beaten and stripped naked, he decides to go legitimate and look for a real job. He applies to a chic restaurant for a job as a waiter. The owner, Hemingway (Brad Dourif), promises to hire him if he comes back to the restaurant wearing a good pair of shoes. Obsessed with landing the job, he tries any way he can to get the pair of shoes. Impressed by the efforts of Clint and Muffdiver to get normal jobs, Sylvie (Emer McCourt), a drug addict who lives with the two, is inspired to leave the street life behind herself and pursue a more ordinary vocation.

• Director
• Norman Jewison
• Writers
• Sholom Aleichem(adapted from stories)
• Arnold Perl(adapted from Sholem Aleichem stories by special arrangement with)
• Joseph Stein(stageplay by)
• Stars
• Topol
• Norma Crane
• Leonard Frey

Norman Jewison's adaptation of the long-running Broadway musical is set in the Ukranian ghetto village of Anatevka (the film was actually lensed in Yugoslavia). Israeli actor Topol repeats his London stage role as Tevye the milkman, whose equilibrium is constantly being challenged by his poverty, the prejudicial attitudes of non-Jews, and the romantic entanglements of his five daughters. Whenever the weight of the world becomes too much for him, Tevye carries on lengthy conversations with God, who does not answer but is at least more willing to listen than the milkman's remonstrative wife Golde. After arranging a marriage between his oldest daughter Tzeitel and wealthy butcher Lazar Wolf, Tevye is forced to do some quick rearranging when the girl falls in love with poor tailor Motel Kamzoil. Fancying himself more broad-minded than his gentile oppressors, Tevye cannot accept the notion that his other daughter Chava would want to marry Fyedka, a non-Jew. And after shouting the praises of "tradition," Tevye must change his tune-and his entire life-when he and his neighbors are forced out of Anatevka by the Czar's minions. Topol's co-stars include Norma Crane as Golde, Yiddish theater legend Molly Picon as Yente the matchmaker, and Leonard Frey as Motel.

• Directors
• Jack Woods
• Dennis Muren(uncredited)
• Mark Thomas McGee(co-director)
• Writers
• Mark Thomas McGee(based on story by)
• Jack Woods
• Stars
• Edward Connell
• Barbara Hewitt
• Frank Bonner

Four teens head into a forest in search of a long-lost scientist (played by science fiction novelist Fritz Leiber). Monitoring the kids' every move is a forest ranger (Jack Woods), who is in reality the ancient demon god Asmodeus. When the kids come across a precious book of incantations, the ranger conjures up an intimidating variety of horrible monsters and nightmarish visions, the better to retrieve the volume. The man responsible for the special effects in Equinox is Dennis Muren, who began the film as a nonprofessional 16-millimeter project in 1967. The picture was completed by director Edward Connell, using the same cast throughout (the actors' ages noticeably fluctuate from scene to scene). Long a Late Late Show staple, Equinox in time garnered a cult following, and later appeared on video under the title The Beast.

• Director
• Mitchell Leisen
• Writers
• Charles Brackett(screenplay)
• Billy Wilder(screenplay)
• Edwin Justus Mayer(based on a story by)
• Stars
• Claudette Colbert
• Don Ameche
• John Barrymore

Paramount's screwball comedy Midnight is the first collaboration between director Mitchell Leisen and screenwriting duo Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder. The film merges Brackett and Wilder's early emphasis on repartee and masquerade with ex-costume designer Leisen's flair for high style and sophistication. American Eve Peabody (Claudette Colbert), a wily ex-showgirl, must impersonate Hungarian royalty in order to infiltrate the Parisian jet set. Midnight begins during a midnight rainstorm as Eve arrives penniless at Paris' Gare de L'Est, owning only the gold lamé gown on her back. She attracts the attention of Hungarian cab driver, Tibor Czerny (Don Ameche), but walks out on their budding romance; Eve will no longer make the mistake of dating for love rather than money. Instead, she finds shelter from the downpour by crashing a socialite's late-night soirée using a pawnticket and a pseudonym, the Baroness Czerny (the cab driver's surname). There, Eve meets aristocrat Georges Flammarion (John Barrymore), who entices her with a place in society if she agrees to remain disguised as the Baroness and seduce his wife's playboy lover. Meanwhile, Tibor Czerny has not given up his search for Eve. When he locates her whereabouts and discovers the fact that she is using his name, Tibor also travels to the Flammarion estate -- to win back Eve, and to pose as her husband, the Baron. What ensues is quintessential screwball comedy, full of deception, love, quadruple entendre, and outright farce. Midnight remains Leisen's most heralded directorial effort, as well as one of Brackett and Wilder's earliest successes.

• Director
• Edward Dmytryk
• Writers
• John Paxton(screenplay)
• Richard Brooks(adapted from a novel by)
• Stars
• Robert Young
• Robert Mitchum
• Robert Ryan

This drama was one of the first major-studio efforts to confront anti-Semitism (beating the Oscar-winning Gentleman's Agreement by several months), and it features a standout performance from Robert Ryan as a bigoted soldier on the run. Monty Montogomery (Ryan) is a violent and unstable soldier who, while out on a pass, goes on a drinking spree with three buddies, Floyd (Steve Brodie), Arthur (George A. Cooper), and Leroy (William Phipps). While boozing it up in a tavern, the four men meet Joseph Samuels (Sam Levene), and end up at his apartment for a party. Monty, however, has a fierce hatred of Jews, and he later goes into a drunken rage in which he beats Joseph to death. Monty's friends can barely remember the incident through their liquor-shrouded memories, but they recall just enough to make themselves scarce when police detective Capt. Finlay (Robert Young) begins making the rounds looking for information on Joseph's murder. Sgt. Kelly (Robert Mitchum), a soldier who knows the four men, begins to suspect that something is up, and he works with Leroy's wife and Finlay to help ferret out the killer in his ranks, while Monty kills Floyd when he becomes convinced that he's going to talk to the authorities. While director Edward Dmytryk showed real bravery in bringing this story to the screen, it had greater repercussions than he might have expected; the film's controversial themes led to Dmytryk's denunciation by the House Un-American Activities Committee during the McCarthy-era investigations of the 1950s. Luckily, unlike other filmmakers who suffered similar accusations by HUAC, Dmytryk continued to work steadily through the '50s and '60s.

• Director
• Stuart Rosenberg
• Writers
• Donn Pearce(screenplay)
• Frank Pierson(screenplay)
• Hal Dresner(uncredited)
• Stars
• Paul Newman
• George Kennedy
• Strother Martin

Paul Newman was nominated for an Oscar and George Kennedy received one for his work in this allegorical prison drama. Luke Jackson (Paul Newman) is sentenced to a stretch on a southern chain gang after he's arrested for drunkenly decapitating parking meters. While the avowed ambition of the captain (Strother Martin) is for each prisoner to "get their mind right," it soon becomes obvious that Luke is not about to kowtow to anybody. When challenged to a fistfight by fellow inmate Dragline (George Kennedy), Luke simply refuses to give up, even though he's brutally beaten. Luke knows how to win at poker, even with bad cards, by using his smarts and playing it cool. Luke also figures out a way for the men to get their work done in half the usual time, giving them the afternoon off. Finally, when Luke finds out his mother has died, he plots his escape; when he's caught, he simply escapes again. Soon, Luke becomes a symbol of hope and resilience to the other men in the prison camp -- and a symbol of rebelliousness that must be stamped out to the guards and the captain. Along with stellar performances by Newman, Kennedy, and Martin, Cool Hand Luke features a superb supporting cast, including Ralph Waite, Harry Dean Stanton, Dennis Hopper, Wayne Rogers, and Joe Don Baker as members of the chain gang.

• Director
• George Marshall
• Writers
• Melvin Frank(screenplay)
• Norman Panama(screenplay)
• Booth Tarkington(based on the novel by)
• Stars
• Bob Hope
• Joan Caulfield
• Patric Knowles

Monsieur Beaucaire, Booth Tarkington's novel about an 18th-century French barber who poses as a swashbuckling aristocrat, was the surprising source for this Grade-A Bob Hope comedy. While in the original novel the tonsorial hero pretended to be someone he wasn't by choice, in this 1946 film Hope is coerced into posturing as a nobleman on the threat of death. It's "out of the frying pan" time here, since Hope will be a target for execution the moment he weds a Spanish princess in place of genuine noble Patric Knowles. Bob's actions will prevent a war between Spain and France, but it's likely he won't be around to celebrate the Peace. Hiding his cowardice by cracking wise at every opportunity, Hope manages to save both the day and himself; he even rescues Joseph Schildkraut, the film's nominal villain, from the guillotine. The female contingent is represented by Joan Caulfield as Bob's covetous girl friend, Marjorie Reynolds as a princess, and Hillary Brooke as a haughty schemer (who is given her just desserts in an early slapstick set-piece). Woody Allen has long expressed his affection for Monsieur Beaucaire, an affection made doubly obvious in "homage" fashion by Allen's 1975 costume comedy Love and Death.

• Director
• Frank Tuttle
• Writers
• Albert Maltz(screen play)
• W.R. Burnett(screen play)
• Graham Greene(based on the novel by)
• Stars
• Alan Ladd
• Veronica Lake
• Robert Preston

Though billed fourth in This Gun For Hire, Alan Ladd was catapulted to stardom in the role of Phillip Raven, a ruthless professional killer with a long-suppressed streak of decency. After successfully pulling off his latest murder, Raven reports to his boss, effeminate fifth columnist Willard Gates (Laird Cregar). He collects his $1000 fee, only to discover later that Gates has double-crossed him with marked bills. This was done at the behest of Gates' boss, crooked business executive Alvin Bewster (Tully Marshall), who wants no loose ends left around to connect him with a plot to sell poison gas to the Axis. As Raven ducks and dodges the police, detective Michael Crane (Robert Preston) is hot on the trail of Bewster and Gates. Crane talks his girlfriend, nightclub singer-musician Ellen Graham (Veronica Lake), into taking a job at Gates' nightclub. While on the train to the club, Ellen makes the acquaintance of the escaping Raven. Gates boards the train, spots Ellen innocently sitting next to Raven, and assumes that the two are in cahoots. Later, Gates kidnaps Ellen and spirits her away to his mansion, intending to do away with her the first chance he gets. Instead, Raven, still seeking revenge for being set up, bursts into the mansion in search of Gates. Having previously been impressed by Ellen's kindness, he rescues her, though he intends using her as hostage should the police catch up with him. As they hide out together in the rail yards, Ellen and Raven get to know each other. Learning of Raven's miserable, abusive childhood, Ellen tries to chip away his murderous veneer, hoping to reform him. But when the cops arrive, Raven reverts to his instincts, shooting his way out of his hiding place. As Crane escorts Ellen out of harm's way, Raven rushes towards a bloody showdown with Bewster and Gates. Based on Graham Greene's A Gun For Sale, This Gun For Hire was remade in 1958 as Short Cut to Hell, then again under the original title as a 1990 made-for-TV film.

• Director
• Frank Borzage
• Writers
• Anthony Veiller(screenplay)
• Sheridan Gibney(screenplay)
• Lloyd C. Douglas(based on the novel by)
• Stars
• Dorothy Lamour
• Akim Tamiroff
• John Howard

Idealism vs. Practicality is the Disputed Passage in this lavishly mounted soap opera. Based on a novel by Lloyd C. Douglas (The Robe, Magnificent Obsession) the film stars John Howard as young medical student John Wesley Beaven. In the course of his education, Beaven is torn between two philosophies: the cold pragmatism of Dr. Forster (Akim Tamiroff) and the humanistic attitudes of kindly Dr. Cunningham (William Collier Sr.), who of course is author Douglas' alter ego. The crisis within Beaven comes to a head when he must choose between his career and his impending marriage to Audrey Hilton (Dorothy Lamour). A literally explosive climax in war-torn China brings the story to a logical and satisfying solution. Kudos again to director Frank Borzage for bringing warmth and credibility to the most sloppily sentimental of storylines.

• Director
• Jack Hill
• Writer
• Jack Hill
• Stars
• Pam Grier
• Booker Bradshaw
• Robert DoQui

Writer-director Jack Hill (Spider Baby, Switchblade Sisters) managed to beat Death Wish to the screens by a year with this violent tale of a citizen touched by crime and deciding to fight back. Her little 11-year old sister is a hopeless addict, the police can't help, and poor Nurse "Coffy" Coffin (Pam Grier) has no choice but to take the law into her own hands. Posing as a Jamaican prostitute, Coffy infiltrates the lairs of pimp King George (Robert DoQui) and kingpin pusher Vitroni (Allan Arbus). Eventually, after her childhood sweetheart is beaten into a coma and she finds out her politician-lover (Booker Bradshaw) is involved, Coffy kills everyone with a shotgun. However, by having a black woman named Coffy get injected with a sugar mixture (the crooks think it's heroin), one can only imagine the filmmakers cackling about Coffy with cream and sugar. In fact, the original ad line promised "Coffy...she'll cream you!"

• Director
• Mitchell Leisen
• Writers
• Preston Sturges(screenplay)
• Vera Caspary(based on a story by)
• Stars
• Jean Arthur
• Edward Arnold
• Ray Milland

Financier J.B. Ball (Edward Arnold) -- known in the press as "the Bull of Broad Street" -- may be one of the wealthiest investment bankers in the country, but he also knows the value of a dollar. And when his wife (Mary Nash) spends 50,000 of them on a sable coat, he is driven into such a fury in the ensuing argument on the roof of their Fifth Avenue townhouse, that he throws the coat into the street -- where it promptly lands on the head of Mary Smith (Jean Arthur), a clerk-typist on her way to work, riding on the upper deck of a double-decker bus, ruining her hat in the process. She jumps off the bus to try to return the coat, but Ball insists that she keep it. What she really needs, however, is not a 50,000-dollar sable coat so much as a ride to work -- as she doesn't even have a dime for bus fare -- and perhaps a new hat. Ball obliges, taking her to one of the top clothing stores in New York, buying her an expensive fur hat to go with the coat, and then dropping her at work in his limo. Her superiors, seeing her decked out in a sable coat and a new hat, and getting out of the chauffeured car, conclude that Mary is a kept woman, and, therefore, unfit to work for the boys magazine where she is employed, and they fire her. Now out of work and virtually broke, she seems to have become a victim of random fate, but suddenly the scales start to tip the other way from the very same misunderstanding that got her fired. Having been seen in the company of J.B. Ball -- whose name she didn't even get -- she is rumored to be his mistress; the prissy clothing store proprietor (Franklin Pangborn) spreads this story, and that turns Mary into the object of attention for Mr. Louis Louis (Luis Alberni), the owner of a failed luxury hotel on which Ball's bank holds the mortgage, and is about to foreclose. For reasons that she can't begin to understand, since there is nothing going on between her and J.B. Ball (whose name she doesn't even know), or between her and anyone, Louis moves her into the most luxurious suite in his hotel for a dollar a day, asking her only to inform "that certain someone" of how she loves living there. Mary has no idea of who "that certain someone" is, or what Louis is talking about, but she needs a place to live, and Louis is insistent. She still needs to eat, and, while trying to get a meal at the automat, she crosses paths with a handsome, well-meaning, but inept waiter (Ray Milland), who gets fired for helping her. She takes him into her suite so he has a place to stay, and the two fall in love in the course of finding out about each other. She knows that he is John Ball Jr., but doesn't realize that he is the son of J.B. Ball, trying to make it on his own, nor does she yet realize who J.B. Ball is, in terms of being the man who gave her the coat and the new hat, or one of the wealthiest men in the country. But after the elder Ball spends an innocent night at the Hotel Louis, a gossip columnist named "Wallace Whistling" (William Demarest) prints that he is keeping a woman at the hotel, and suddenly the Hotel Louis, perceived as a fashionable playground for the upper-crust, is filled with guests. This multiple case of mistaken identity plunges through two or three new layers, eventually bringing about an impending stock market crash to rival 1929, before Mary discovers who her would-be benefactor and her would-be fiancé are. She bails them out of the jam that they're in, also restoring the Ball's marriage, her own reputation, and her romance with Ball's son in the process.

• Director
• Richard Wallace
• Writers
• Joseph Anthony(screenplay)
• Paul Gallico(based on the story by)
• Stars
• Joan Bennett
• Cary Grant
• George Bancroft

In this newspaper farce, an editor loses his voice and his job after he tires of being tormented by the practical jokes of one of two reporters. The joker ends up the new editor. Soon after taking the job, his personality changes dramatically and soon he has become a pompous and excessively harsh taskmaster. His former partner is so disgusted that she decides to leave and marry a stodgy writer of inspirational books. The new editor loves his partner and tries to get her back. When he fails, he begins drinking heavily and wondering what kind of wedding gift he should get her. Knowing that she likes the excitement of police and fire calls, he insures that her wedding will be unforgettable by having fire engines, police cars, and hearses show up to the nuptials. In the end, the editor drives a wagon from the local loony bin into the ceremony and kidnaps her. Romance ensues and eventually the two are married.

• Directors
• Charles Vidor
• John Huston(uncredited)
• Writers
• Ben Hecht(screenplay)
• Ernest Hemingway(novel)
• Laurence Stallings(play)
• Stars
• Rock Hudson
• Jennifer Jones
• Vittorio De Sica

Farewell to Arms is the second film version of Ernest Hemingway's World War One novel--and also the last film produced by David O. Selznick (Gone with the Wind). Rock Hudson plays an American serving in the Italian Army during the "War to End All Wars". Jennifer Jones is his lover, a Red cross nurse. They have a torrid affair, which results in Jones' pregnancy. As the months pass, Hudson and Jones lose contact with one another, and Jones believes that Hudson has forgotten her. But a battle-weary Hudson finally makes it to Switzerland, where Jones is hospitalized. The baby is stillborn, and Jones dies shortly afterward, murmuring that her death is "a dirty trick." Filmed on a simpler scale in 1932 (with Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes starring), A Farewell to Arms was blown all out of proportion to "epic" stature for the 1957 remake--so much so that its original director, John Huston, quit the film in disgust. Still, the basic love story is touchingly enacted by Rock Hudson and Jennifer Jones.

• Director
• John Herzfeld
• Writers
• Tom Schulman(story)
• Mel Frohman(story)
• Stars
• Brian Dennehy
• Ron Silver
• Anthony Valentine

Made for television, A Father's Revenge stars Brian Dennehy as a high school basketball coach. When terrorists pull off a political kidnapping in West Germany, Dennehy's stewardess wife Joanna Cassidy is among the hostages. Fed up with the apparent foot-dragging of the authorities, Dennehy takes personal action in effecting Joanna's rescue. He hires Ron Silver's band of mercenaries, then heads to Germany to bring back his wife himself. Credibility is stretched to the limit at times, but the three stars are at their peak.

• Director
• Edgar Selwyn
• Writers
• Becky Gardiner(dialogue by)
• Joseph Farnham(dialogue by)
• Stars
• Robert Montgomery
• Anita Page
• June Walker

War Nurse was based on the anonymous memoirs of an American nurse who served with the French Army during WWI. Since the nurse's recollections included several sexual episodes, the book gained a degree of notoriety, and it was assumed that the material was too "hot" to be adapted to film. But MGM scriveners Becky Gardiner and Joe Farnham managed to retain the spirit of the original novel while still remaining safely within the boundaries of Hollywood censorship. Broadway actress June Walker starred as the title character, here named Babs, whose many romances are crystallized into a single passionate affair with downed aviator Wally (Robert Montgomery) and a less-serious entanglement with a married officer named Robin (Robert Ames). Perhaps to atone for the "sins" of the original novelist, Anita Page appears as Babs' friend Joy, who comes to a sad end after being betrayed by Robin, who likewise dies an unpleasant death. War Nurse failed to make back its $600,000 budget, whereupon June Walker, who wasn't too keen on movies anyway, returned to the stage.

• Director
• Jerry P. Jacobs
• Writers
• Sean McGinly(story)
• Tripp Reed
• Brian Rudnick(story)
• Stars
• Dorian Harewood
• Ray Wise
• Roy Scheider

When Redwood Federal Penitentiary closes, there are going to be several hundred prisoners looking for a new home. Several of the most dangerous, all killers, will be transported by train to Santa Ana, a new high tech prison for the worst of the worst. Included in this transfer are: -Ian Kelly, explosions expert who has set off terrorist bombings worldwide.

• Director
• Marion Gering
• Writers
• Harry Hervey(story)
• Maurice Larrouy(novel "Sirenes et Tritons")
• Benn W. Levy(screenplay)
• Stars
• Tallulah Bankhead
• Gary Cooper
• Charles Laughton

A mentally unstable naval officer goes mad with jealousy when his wife's recent lover shows up as a lieutenant on the submarine he commands. It is the smell of cheap perfume that arouses the husband's suspicions, and he plans to confront the lieutenant in the sub. The wife follows him there, knowing very well that while in a jealous rage her husband cannot be responsible for his actions. Her husband catches her and locks her in his cabin then deftly steers the sub towards a freighter. Just before the ships collide, he forces the lieutenant to take the controls. It is a terrible crash and the sub sinks, stone-like, towards the bottom. Even as they go down, the cuckoo commander insists the lieutenant is to blame for the tragedy. Meanwhile the woman successfully convinces the remaining crew members of her husband's lunacy, they accept the orders of their new commander, the lieutenant, and escape together just in the nick of time.

• Director
• Léonide Moguy
• Writers
• Philip MacDonald(original screenplay)
• Herbert J. Biberman(original screenplay)
• Stars
• George Sanders
• Virginia Bruce
• Lenore Aubert

Exiled from his own country during WW2, French filmmaker Leonide Moguy worked briefly in Hollywood, where he directed the patriotic thriller Action in Arabia. George Sanders stars as Gordon, an American newspaperman at large in Damascus. When a colleague is murdered, Sanders wants to find out why. He is helped along by glamourous secret agent Yvonne (Virginia Bruce), who is on the trail of a group of Nazi saboteurs. It turns out that the murder is tied in with a plan to destroy the Suez Canal in the name of Der Fuehrer. Though economically produced, Action in Arabia benefits from several rather spectacular-looking scenes of desert combat-most of these lifted from a never-finished 1933 filmed biography of Lawrence of Arabia.

• Director
• Peter Godfrey
• Writers
• Charles Hoffman(screenplay)
• Edith Kneipple Roberts(from a novel by)
• Stars
• Ronald Reagan
• Shirley Temple
• Rory Calhoun

A young girl is adopted into a small town family, but instead of finding happiness, she finds her life a living nightmare due to neighbors' constant speculation as to he father's identity. The scuttlebutt is that she is the illegitimate daughter of a prominent lawyer and former resident (Ronald Reagan). The girl (Shirley Temple in her first role as a teen) becomes especially sensitive to the gossip after she hits adolescence. The backbiting gets so bad, that she loses her first boyfriend. Matters become more explosive when the lawyer returns from Washington D.C. and begins a romance with the girl's favorite teacher. He also finds the troubled girl intriguing but does not realize this until the despondent youth attempts to commit suicide.

• Director
• Leigh Jason
• Writers
• W. Carey Wonderly(story "Viennese Charmer" in Young's Magazine)
• Jane Murfin(story)
• Joseph Fields(adaptation)
• Stars
• Lily Pons
• Jack Oakie
• Gene Raymond

This light-hearted musical romance follows the exploits of Nikki Martin (Lily Pons), a beautiful French opera star who stows away on an ocean liner in hopes of escaping her jealous fiancee. Once aboard, she joins an American swing band and falls in love with its leader (Gene Raymond), who, after hearing her sing, eventually comes to reciprocate her feelings. That Girl From Paris received an Academy Award Nomination for Best Sound, and includes musical highlights such as, "Seal It With a Kiss," "The Blue Danube," "Una Voce Poco Fa," and "The Call to Arms." Directed by Leigh Jason, this movie also features actors Mischa Auer, Frank Jenks, Lucille Ball and Jack Oakie.

• Director
• Tom Graeff
• Writer
• Tom Graeff
• Stars
• David Love
• Dawn Bender
• Bryan Grant

This off-the-wall, low-budget sci-fi film was written, produced, directed, edited, photographed, and acted (one role) by Tom Graeff. The unlikely story concerns a spaceship that lands on Earth from somewhere a lot less accommodating. On board are the space aliens' grazing animals, the gorgons. These are huge, crab-like monsters that quickly balloon up to a gigantic size and then proceed to devour any humans in sight. Soon the space aliens are split between the loner who would rather forget the gorgons and just stay here, and his two evil opponents. The single good guy appears to be the only hope for saving the people of the earth from turning into a snack food.

• Directors
• James V. Kern
• Raoul Walsh(uncredited)
• Writer
• Stephen Longstreet(novel)
• Stars
• Ronald Reagan
• Alexis Smith
• Zachary Scott

Veterinarian Ronald Reagan contracts anthrax from treating diseased cows in this horsey melodrama from Warner Bros. In fact, Reagan's dutiful Dr. Larry Hanrahan is so busy with the cows that he completely ignores a summons from lady horse breeder Rory Teller (Alexis Smith) to treat her prize-winning stallion. Rory is pretty peeved over what she perceives as a slight and briefly, ever so briefly, contemplates accepting a proposal of marriage from smooth-talking author Stephen Purcell (Zachary Scott). Until, that is, the seriousness of Larry's condition finally forces her to take a drastic measure: to treat the dying vet with the same serum he had used on the cattle. According to some reports, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall were scheduled to star in Stallion Road as a follow-up to the hugely successful The Big Sleep (1946). Rather than appear in what they rightfully considered a Grade-B production, they chose to go on suspension.

• Director
• Busby Berkeley
• Writers
• Tom Buckingham(screen play)
• Pat C. Flick(screen play)
• Robert Lord(story)
• Stars
• Dick Powell
• Joan Blondell
• Warren William

Stage Struck is one of the least known of Busby Berkeley's Warner Bros. musicals, chiefly because there are no major production numbers. The plot is that old saw about young, unknown hopefuls who put on a Big Show and become overnight stars. Alas, the magic didn't work for leading lady Jeanne Madden, who disappeared from films shortly after this brief bid for fame. The film's highlight is a satirical number by the Yacht Club Boys, a "nut" singing group best described as the Gentile Ritz Brothers. The songs for Stage Struck were written by E. Y. Harburg and Harold Arlen, whose talents would be displayed to better advantage in 1939's Wizard of Oz.

• Director
• John Francis Dillon(uncredited)
• Writers
• Owen Davis(adapted from: the musical play by)
• Jimmy Starr(screen version)
• Stars
• Lawrence Gray
• Alexander Gray
• Bernice Claire

In this frothy musical, a lovely young woman is wooed by two men. One of them meets her father's approval so it is only natural that she attempt to elope with the other. Fortunately the good guy catches up with them before it is too late. Songs include: "Spring Is Here in Person," "I Married an Angel," "Yours Sincerely," "Rich Man, Poor Man," "Baby's Awake Now," "With a Song in My Heart" (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart), "Cryin' for the Carolines," "Have a Little Faith In Me," "Bad Baby," and "How Shall I Tell?" (Sam Lewis, Joe Young, Harry Warren).

• Director
• Robert Wise
• Writers
• Edna Ferber(novel)
• John Twist(screen play)
• Stars
• Jane Wyman
• Sterling Hayden
• Nancy Olson

This 1953 tear-jerker is the third film version of the Edna Ferber novel So Big. Stepping into the role previously essayed by Colleen Moore and Barbara Stanwyck, Jane Wyman plays Selina, a girl of wealth who comes to a Dutch community outside Chicago as a schoolteacher. Here Selina falls in love with poor but big-hearted truck farmer Pervus DeJong (Sterling Hayden). When Pervus dies, Selina is left a widow with a small son and little else to her name. Through grit and perseverance, Selina single-handedly raises the boy, who grows up to be architect Dirk DeJong (Steve Forrest). Taking a cue from his self-sacrificing mother, Dirk devotes himself to creativity rather than money-grubbing while pursuing his profession. Meticulously produced, So Big is one of the better "saga" soapers of the 1950s, with Jane Wyman repeating her "aging" process from 1951's The Blue Veil.

• Director
• Dudley Nichols
• Writers
• Dudley Nichols(screen play)
• Alexander Knox(screen play)
• Mary Eunice McCarthy(screen play)
• Stars
• Rosalind Russell
• Alexander Knox
• Dean Jagger

We prefer Rosalind Russell when she's making us laugh; judging by such films as Mourning Becomes Electra and The Velvet Touch, Russell preferred herself in heavy dramatics. In Sister Kenny, Rosalind Russell is all grim determination and pursed lips as Elizabeth Kenny, tireless battler of infantile paralysis. It is in the Australian outback that nurse Kenny first confronts the debilitating illness. Forsaking her private life (as well as any romantic entanglements), Kenny battles with the medical establishment in order to bring her radical theories towards conquering the disease to the public. Her ultimate triumph is solidified upon the formation of Minneapolis' Kenny Institute. Based on Elizabeth Kenny's autobiography, A solid piece of film craftsmanship, Sister Kenny was the sort of glossy prestige picture that always made Hollywood look good in the eyes of its staunchest critics; it was also the sort of picture that almost invariably lost a fortune at the box office (Sister Kenny took a bath to the tune of $660,000).

• Director
• A. Edward Sutherland
• Writers
• Charles Belden(idea)
• Erwin Gelsey(story)
• Charles E. Roberts(story)
• Stars
• Bert Lahr
• June Havoc
• Buddy Ebsen

How could anyone resist a 1940s film starring Bert Lahr, June Havoc, Buddy Ebsen and Patsy Kelly-even a film as relentlessly silly as RKO Radio's Sing Your Worries Away? Lahr is cast as zany songwriter Chow Brewster, the sweetheart of cigarette girl Carol (Dorothy Lovett). Unbeknownst to eveyone but gangster Smiley Clark (Sam Levene), Carol has fallen heir to three million dollars. Clark intends to worry Brewster into committing suicide, then claim Carol as his bride. Things get hairy when feckless Tommy Jones (Buddy Ebsen) is accused of Brewster's death-this despite the fact that Brewster is alive and (sort of) well. The film moves bumpily but hilariously to a wild climax in which Brewster and Jones desperately try to escape being ground up in an ice-making machine! Patsy Kelly does her usual loud overacting, while June Havoc is amusingly cast as a stripteaser (the real-life profession of Havoc's celebrated sister Gypsy Rose Lee). Sing Your Worries Away is a partial remake of the 1935 RKO Radio comedy To Beat the Band, which made even less sense than the 1942 film.

• Director
• Benjamin Stoloff
• Writers
• Frank Wead(story and screenplay)
• John Twist(story and screenplay)
• P.J. Wolfson(story and screenplay)
• Stars
• Victor McLaglen
• Preston Foster
• Ida Lupino

In this actioner, a tough Coast Guard officer endeavors to marry his lovely daughter to a handsome sailor. The trouble is, she is already in love with another rambunctious and contentious Coast Guardian. To stop the romance, the officer transfers the young man to his command and hopes that he will squeeze the wildness from him by assigning him to a dangerous dynamiting operation. Unfortunately, things go awry and the handsome sailor is relegated to Davy Jones' locker. Fortunately, that leaves the burly brawler free to marry his love.

• Director
• Sam Wood
• Writers
• Casey Robinson(screen play)
• Edna Ferber(novel)
• Stars
• Gary Cooper
• Ingrid Bergman
• Flora Robson

Ingrid Bergman and Gary Cooper paired off again after For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943) with this overwrought melodrama based on the romance novel by Edna Ferber. Bergman plays Clio Dulaine, a beautiful half-Creole woman whose return to 1875 New Orleans from Paris creates a stir. Born out of wedlock, Clio's mother was a local woman who became pregnant by a wealthy, married landowner. Scandalized, his wife and family set about humiliating Clio's mother and even paid for Clio's voyage to France in an effort to get rid of the girl. Now Clio returns with a dwarf, Cupidon (Jerry Austin), and a maid, Angelique (Florence Robson) in her entourage. At the docks, Clio meets a handsome gambler from Texas, Colonel Clint Maroon (Cooper) and is smitten. To Clio's delight, their blossoming romance inspires calumny, but Maroon soon realizes that Clio is a gold digger. He departs for Saratoga Springs, where he is working on a venture involving the railroad. Clio follows him there, bent on marrying either Clint or his business partner, Bart Van Steed (John Warburton). Saratoga Trunk (1945) was exhibited to servicemen overseas in WWII for two years before it was released to the general public.

• Directors
• David Butler
• Robert Florey(uncredited)
• Raoul Walsh(uncredited)
• Writers
• Alan Le May(screenplay)
• W.R. Burnett(screenplay)
• Stars
• Errol Flynn
• Alexis Smith
• S.Z. Sakall

In his final epic Western, Errol Flynn plays cattleman Clay Hardin, who, on a trek south of the border, has discovered that San Antonio saloon proprietor Roy Stuart (Paul Kelly) is actually a cattle rustler of major proportions. Determined to bring Stuart to justice, Clay runs into difficulties when he mistakes feted chanteuse Jeanne Starr (Alexis Smith) for being on the saloon owner's payroll. Meanwhile, Stuart's French-accented partner, and enemy, Legare (Victor Francen), uses the taut situation to benefit himself. Then Clay's longtime friend, Charlie Bell (John Litel), is brutally slain and Jeanne's manager, Sacha Bozic (S.Z. Sakall) is forced to skip town, Bozic, unbeknownst to Clay, having witnessed the murder. The real killer is eventually forced to confess and San Antonio erupts in a climactic gun battle that culminates in a shootout at the historic Alamo. With Hungarian actor Sakall providing some much-needed comedy relief, Alexis Smith, Doodles Weaver, and a chorus perform a few songs, including: Ray Heindorf, M.K. Jerome, and Ted Koehler's "Some Sunday Morning"; "Put Your Little Foot Right Out," by Larry Spier; and Jack Scholl and Charles Kisco's "Somewhere in Monterey." According to some reports, both Raoul Walsh and Robert Florey directed a few additional scenes.