John Anderson plays an African-American Vietnam vet who returns to LA after his hitch is up. Anderson can't adjust to the iniquities of civilian life, and soon he becomes involved in minor crimes. The film explores the protagonist's rapidly disintegrating relationships with friends, family and law enforcement officials. One of the few constants in Anderson's life is his grandmother, who tries to help him understand his place in the scheme of things. Ashes and Embers represents the American film debut of Ethiopian-born director Haile Gerima.

In this chiller, a trio of heroes must enter a black Southwestern cave and destroy an entire colony of plague-bearing bats, vampire bats. The story is based on a novel by Martin Cruz Smith.

An unexceptional spy drama by Andre De Toth, Man on a String is based on an autobiography by counterspy Boris Morros, here given the name of Boris Mitrov and played by Ernest Borgnine. Mitrov was born in Russia but had been a citizen of the U.S. for some time when he joins up with a Russian spy network. He is caught out by the CIA, and they offer him a deal: go to the USSR and spy for our side, or else. Boris' boss is Bob Avery (the handsome Kerwin Mathews) and Colleen Dewhurst is Helen Benson, the lone female in the story. Clichéd dialogue aside, the scenes shot in Moscow and Berlin add convincing realism to the action.

Marking the directorial debut of Adam McKay, former head writer for Saturday Night Live and founder of the Upright Citizen's Brigade, Anchorman is set during the 1970s and stars Will Ferrell as Ron Burgundy, San Diego's top-rated news anchorman. While Burgundy is outwardly willing to adjust to the idea of females in the workplace -- even outside of secretarial positions -- he certainly doesn't want his own job challenged. Keeping that in mind, it's no wonder that the arrival of Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate), an aspiring newswoman, is, in Ron's eyes, not the studio's most welcome addition. After Veronica pays her dues covering so-called female-oriented fluff pieces (think cat fashion shows and cooking segments), the ambitious Veronica sets her eyes on the news desk; more specifically, on Ron's seat behind it. Not unpredictably, Ron doesn't take the threat lightly, and it isn't long before the rival newscasters are engaged in a very personal battle of the sexes. Anchorman was co-written by Ferrell, and features supporting performances from David Koechner, Steve Carrell, Paul Rudd, Tara Subkoff, and Maya Rudolph.

Cecil B. DeMille's much-maligned cinemadaptation of Arthur Schnitzler's The Affairs of Anatol holds up better than its reputation suggests. Wallace Reid stars as New York socialite Anatol DeWitt Spencer, who after only a few day's marriage has become bored with his new bride Vivian (Gloria Swanson). In search of new romantic vistas, Anatole takes up his old flame Emilie (Wanda Hawley), who repays the "favor" by two-timing him. Briefly returning to his wife, Anatole attempts another extramarital adventure with Annie Elliot (Agnes Ayres), whose tear-stained tales of a tragic life are but a subterfuge to disguise her larcenous streak. Finally, Anatole dallies with Satan Synne (Bebe Daniels), "the wickedest woman in New York"-who turns out to be a virtuous housewife, hoping to raise money for her seriously ill husband. At long last, Anatole decides that he's better off with Vivian, who by now has grown tired of him. In reviewing The Affairs of Anatol, Photoplay magazine said laconically "Cecil B. DeMille, not Arthur Schnitzler. We leave it to you which gentleman has pleased our public more."

Lucille Ball is an American taxi-dancer living in London whose roommate has disappeared. The missing girl had left to answer a job offer in the "personal" column of the Times...just like several other women who've vanished without a trace. Scotland Yard detective George Zucco suggests that Ball answer the personals herself in hopes trapping the killer. She crosses the paths of several eccentrics, including deranged artist Boris Karloff, who for a brief time is the prime suspect. The actual culprit, a sex murderer, is the least likely and most helpful of Ball's contacts -- a fact that she learns almost too late.

Told in flashback, Affair with a Stranger recounts the deteriorating marriage of playwright Victor Mature and model Jean Simmons. The union is strained by the death of Jean's baby and the pressure of Victor's career. A scheming actress (Monica Lewis) makes a play for Mature, leading Jean to file for divorce. The couple is brought back together by the adoption of a baby (the "stranger" of the title). Affair with a Stranger is unabashed soap opera, made plausible by the sensitive performance of Jean Simmons.

A construction-company owner (Adrian Grenier) must rescue his brother (Johnathon Schaech), a petty crook, after he is abducted by a vicious mobster (Nicolas Cage). He is aided in his quest by a police detective and longtime friend (John Cusack).

While younger, handsomer actors were off fighting WW2, pudgy, middle-aged James Dunn suddenly found himself playing leading roles again. In Leave It to the Irish, Dunn is cast as private investigator Terry Moran, with Wanda McKay as his peppery assistant Nora O'Brien. The Hibernian hero and heroine join forces to solve the murder of a wealthy furrier. Alas, the trail of evidence leads to Terry as the most likely suspect, compelling Nora to simultaneously solve the case and clear her boss. Practically the only character in Leave It to the Irish who isn't Irish is principal villain Maletti, played by Jack LaRue.

The standard "four horny guys" conceit of the typical teen comedy gets a change-up in this independent sex farce. Jarod (Jonathan Chase), Griff (Mitch Morris), Nico (Jonah Blechman), and Andy (Michael Carbonaro) are four close friends who are soon to graduate from high school, and at the end of the summer they'll go their separate ways as they go away to college. All four of them have something else in common -- they're virgins, and have made a pledge to one another to finally go all the way by Labor Day. Oh, did we mention these guys all happen to be gay? Griff devotes nearly every waking hour to improving his butt, Nico is the stereotypical flaming movie buff, Jarod is a jock worried about the size of his sporting equipment, and Andy has a bad habit of swiping vegetables from his mom's garden for purposes other than making a salad. With the help of their lesbian pal Muffler (Ashlie Atkinson), the guys go on the prowl looking for Mr. Right (or Mr. Right Now), with plenty of sexy, strange, and just plain gross hi-jinks along the way. Another Gay Movie includes cameo appearances from Scott Thompson, Graham Norton, Richard Hatch, and John Epperson (aka Lypsinka).

At Vesterbros Torv in Copenhagen, Olsen has his newspaper kiosk. Here comes high and low in society: Homeless, a district attorney with pain in marriage, a barmaid and a writer. They all fight with theirs, while Olsen's good heart makes him interfere in everything he can.

Director John Landis put himself on the map with this low-budget, fabulously successful comedy, which made a then-astounding 62 million dollars and started a slew of careers for its cast in the process. National Lampoon's Animal House is set in 1962 on the campus of Faber College in Faber, PA. The first glimpse we get of the campus is the statue of its founder Emil Faber, on the base of which is inscribed the motto, "Knowledge Is Good." Incoming freshmen Larry "Pinto" Kroger (Tom Hulce) and Kent "Flounder" Dorfman (Stephen Furst) find themselves rejected by the pretentious Omega fraternity, and instead pledge to Delta House. The Deltas are a motley fraternity of rejects and maladjusted undergraduates (some approaching their late twenties) whose main goal -- seemingly accomplished in part by their mere presence on campus -- is disrupting the staid, peaceful, rigidly orthodox, and totally hypocritical social order of the school, as represented by the Omegas and the college's dean, Vernon Wormer (John Vernon). Dean Wormer decides that this is the year he's going to get the Deltas expelled and their chapter decertified; he places the fraternity on "double secret probation" and, with help from Omega president Greg Marmalard (James Daughton) and hard-nosed member Doug Neidermeyer (Mark Metcalf), starts looking for any pretext on which to bring the members of the Delta fraternity up on charges. The Deltas, oblivious to the danger they're in, are having a great time, steeped in irreverence, mild debauchery, and occasional drunkenness, led by seniors Otter (Tim Matheson), Hoover (James Widdoes), D-Day (Bruce McGill), Boon (Peter Riegert), and pledge master John "Bluto" Blutarsky (John Belushi). They're given enough rope to hang themselves, but even then manage to get into comical misadventures on a road trip (where they arrange an assignation with a group of young ladies from Emily Dickinson University). Finally, they are thrown out of school, and, as a result, stripped of their student deferments (and, thus, eligible for the draft). They decide to commit one last, utterly senseless (and screamingly funny) slapstick act of rebellion, making a shambles of the university's annual homecoming parade, and, in the process, getting revenge on the dean, the Omegas, and everyone else who has ever gone against them.

Steve McQueen is ideally cast as a champion race car driver, participating in the famed 24-hour race headquartered in Le Mans, France. Though dedicated to Going for the Gold, McQueen finds time to romance widowed Elga Andersen. The dramatic angle to this plot wrinkle is that McQueen may well have been responsible for the death of Andersen's husband during a previous car pile-up. Director John Sturges, who'd previously helmed Steve McQueen's legendary motorcycle chase scenes in The Great Escape, was originally slated to direct Le Mans, but withdrew from the project; it was then taken over by Lee H. Katzin of The Phynx.

Awkward teenager George LeMain (John Drew Barrymore, credited as John Barrymore Jr.) is given a small birthday party by his widowed father Andy (Preston Foster) at his bar. He is puzzled that his father's longtime girlfriend, Frances, is not there, but neither Andy nor Flanagan (Howland Chamberlain), bartender and George's surrogate mother, will say why. George is embarrassed when he is unable to blow out all the candles on his cake, but that's nothing compared to the humiliation to come when sportswriter Al Judge (Howard St. John) enters the tavern. Judge orders the elder LeMain to remove his shirt ("Show me some skin," he demands) and get down on all fours. Andy meekly offers no resistance when Judge brutally canes him. Enraged at both Judge and his father, George takes a gun from the cash register and goes off into the night to settle the score. His first stop is the fights, where after getting conned out of his money, he meets Lloyd Cooper (Philip Bourneuf), an alcoholic college professor who later introduces him to his girlfriend Julie Rostina (Dorothy Comingore) and her sister Marion (Joan Lorring). Although George and Marion hit it off, she tells him he is too young for her. Resuming his hunt, George finally comes face to face with Judge and learns that Frances, who was Judge's sister, had killed herself because Andy refused to marry her. Confused, George drops his gun and starts to leave. However, when Judge picks it up and turns the tables on him, George struggles for the gun, shoots Judge, and runs back into the night. When he gets home, he confronts his father with Judge's story. He learns not only that it's true, but also that his mother is not dead but had run off with another man. Joseph Losey's The Big Night functions largely as a perverse coming-of-age tale in which the price George pays for growing up is disillusionment with his emasculated father. Armed with this knowledge and a stronger sense of his abilities, George may now be better equipped to navigate the rejections, humiliations, and sadomasochistic relationships of his noirish world.

John Farrow's movie adaptation of Kenneth Fearing's The Big Clock, based on a screenplay by Jonathan Latimer (and produced by future James Bond screenwriter Richard Maibaum), is a near-perfect match for the book, telling in generally superb visual style a tale set against the backdrop of upscale 1940s New York and offering an early (but accurate) depiction of the modern media industry. Told in the back-to-front fashion typical of film noir, it opens with George Stroud (Ray Milland) trapped, his life in danger, his survival measured in the minute-by-minute movements of the huge central clock of the office building where he's hiding. In flashback we learn that Stroud works for media baron Earl Janoth (Charles Laughton), loosely based on Henry Luce, as the editor of Crimeways magazine. Janoth is a manipulative, self-centered megalomaniac with various obsessions, including clocks; among other manifestations of the latter fixation, the skyscraper housing his empire's headquarters has as one of its central features a huge clock that reads out the time around the world down to the second. Twenty-four hours earlier, on the eve of a combined honeymoon/vacation with his wife, Georgia (Maureen O'Sullivan), that has been put off for seven years, Stroud was ordered by Janoth to cancel the trip in order to work on a special project, and he resigned. As the narrative picks up speed, in his depression, Stroud misses the train his wife is on and crosses paths with Pauline York (Rita Johnson), a former model for Janoth's Styleways magazine, who is also Janoth's very unhappy mistress, and the two commiserate by getting drunk together in a night on the town. While hurriedly leaving Pauline's apartment, he glimpses Janoth entering. Janoth and York quarrel, and the publisher kills her in a jealous rage, using a sundial that she and Stroud picked up the night before while wandering around in their revels. Janoth and his general manager, Steve Hagen (George Macready), contrive to pin the murder on the man that Janoth glimpsed leaving York's apartment, whom he thinks was named Jefferson Randolph -- the name Stroud was drunkenly bandying about the night before. He gets Stroud back to Crimeways to lead the magazine's investigators in hunting down "Jefferson Randolph," never realizing that this was Stroud. And Stroud has no choice but to return, desperately trying to gather evidence against Janoth and, in turn, prevent the clues gathered by the Crimeways staff from leading back to him. The two play this clever, disjointed game of cat-and-mouse, Janoth and Hagen planting evidence that will hang "Randolph" (and justify his being shot while trying to escape), while Stroud, knowing what they don't about how close the man they seek to destroy is, arranges to obscure those clues and, in a comical twist, sends the least capable reporters and investigators to follow up on the most substantial clues. Janoth sometimes seems to be unraveling at the frustrating pace and lack of conclusion to the hunt, but Stroud can't escape the inevitable, or the moments of weakness caused by fear and his own guilt over his near-unfaithfulness to his wife or the inscrutable gaze of Janoth's mute bodyguard Bill Womack (Harry Morgan), a stone-cold killer dedicated to protecting his employer. The trail of proof and guilt winds ever tighter around both men, taking some odd twists courtesy of the eccentric artist (Elsa Lanchester) who has seen the suspect. Milland is perfect in the role of the hapless Stroud, and Laughton is brilliant as the vain, self-centered Janoth, but George Macready is equally good as Hagen, his smooth, upper-crust Waspy smarminess making one's skin crawl. Also worth noting is Harry Morgan's sinister, silent performance as Womack, and sharp-eyed viewers will also recognize such performers as Douglas Spencer, Noel Neill (especially memorable as a tart-tongued elevator operator), Margaret Field (Sally's mother), Ruth Roman, and Lane Chandler in small roles. Additionally, the Janoth Publications building where most of the action takes place is almost a cast member in itself, an art deco wonder, especially the room housing the clock mechanism and the lobby and vestibules, all loosely inspired by such structures as the Empire State Building and the real-life Daily News headquarters on East 42nd Street. This film was later remade as No Way Out.

The Iron Major is the saga of WW1 hero-cum-football coach Frank Cavanaugh, played with his usual no-nonsense professionalism by Pat O'Brien. Leaving home and hearth behind to serve his country in the Great War, Cavanaugh goes on to lead the Dartmouth, Boston College and Fordham football teams to victory. His credo throughout is "Love of God?Love of Country?Love of Family"-inspiriational words indeed in war-torn 1943. Based on the memoirs of Cavanaugh's wife Florence (played in the film by Ruth Warrick), The Iron Major suffers from repetition and overkill. But, as Humphrey Bogart once said in an unrelated interview, "Pat O'Brien was good? Pat was always good."

The Widow from Chicago is Polly Henderson (Alice White) -- only she isn't really a widow and in fact has never been married. It's like this: Polly's police-detective brother Jimmy (Harold Goodwin), hoping to get the goods on the criminal gang run by vice lord Dominic (Edward G. Robinson), impersonates Chicago gangster Swifty Dorgan (Neil Hamilton), who is missing and presumed dead. While posing as Swifty, Jimmy is gunned down by a rival gang, right before Polly's eyes. Hoping to exact revenge, Polly pretends to be Swifty's widow and in this guise lands a job at Dominic's nightclub. And then -- get ready for the BIG SURPRISE! -- the real Swifty Dorgan shows up. Only the energetic performance by Edward G. Robinson makes this Byzantine-plotted crime yarn worth sitting through.

The Steel Jungle is the prison where most of this film takes place. Perry Lopez heads the cast as two-bit bookie Ed Novak, who goes to jail rather than squeal on his Syndicate higher-ups. Novak's silence exacts a toll on his wife Frances (Beverly Garland), who is expecting a child. The longer he remains in prison, the more Novak becomes aware that the mob has deserted him--and the more he's willing to spill what he knows. Fellow prisoner Steve Marlin (Ted De Corsia) intends to see that Novak keeps his mouth shut permananently. Produced independently, The Steel Jungle was distributed by Warner Bros.

The very first Disney feature to include live-action footage, this behind-the-scenes documentary about the studio's animation process includes the cartoon short of the title, which in later years was often exhibited separately from this film. Robert Benchley stars as himself, a visitor to the Disney lot, where he intends to pitch an animated version of the children's fairy tale The Reluctant Dragon by Kenneth Grahame to Walt Disney himself. Benchley wanders away from his studio-appointed guide and tours the facilities himself, where he sees various new cartoons in the process of being storyboarded, including a Baby Weems short. Benchley also meets Clarence Nash, the voice of Donald Duck, and a young animator (played by Alan Ladd) before being corralled to Disney's screening room, where he is shown the company's new short, none other than The Reluctant Dragon.

In 1882, Mark Twain published a delightful fairy tale "for young people of all ages"; 45 years later, Warner Bros., inspired by the real-life coronation of Edward VII, created a lavish screen version starring radio favorites Billy and Bobby Mauch in the title roles and Errol Flynn as their dashing savior. As Jane Seymour (Helen Valkis), consort of King Henry VIII (Montagu Love), gives birth to the heir to the throne, the later Edward VI (Bobby Mauch), Tom Canty (Billy Mauch) is born in the nearby slums. Years later, as King Henry is near death, providence brings the two together and they discover that they share a striking resemblance. Having changed clothes with Tom during play, Edward Tudor is mistaken for a pauper by the Captain of the Guard (Alan Hale) and evicted from the palace. In contrast, Tom is believed to be the Prince of Wales by all of sundry and, when protesting, is treated as mentally unsound. Only the Earl of Hertford (Claude Rains), the king's scheming advisor, realizes the truth but keeps quiet to further his own career. With a price on his head, the real Edward lives the life of a pauper among the thieves and beggars of London, befriended only by Miles Hendon (Flynn), whom he, to Miles' great amusement, creates an earl. But despite his skepticism, Miles is right there to rescue Edward from the murderous Captain of the Guard and return him to the palace just as Tom is about to be crowned king. Proving his true identity by locating the missing Seal of England, Edward is restored to the throne and Hertford is banished from the realm. Miles is recognized for his bravery and Tom is made a ward of the king for life.

A scientist trying to better mankind nearly destroys the world as we know it in this sci-fi thriller. Dr. Stephen Sorensen (Dana Andrews) is doing research in geo-thermal energy; he's convinced that if men can find a way to drill through the earth's outer crust into the molten magma near the center, the heat can be harnessed and used to warm dwellings around the world. His assistant, Ted Rampion (Kieron Moore), is skeptical about this idea and believes that there could be dire consequences, but Sorensen boldly moves ahead with his plan, prodded by his secret knowledge that he suffers from a terminal illness and might not live long enough to undergo a longer testing period. However, Rampion's fears soon prove well founded when Sorensen's drilling causes a large crack in the earth which begins to rapidly expand, threatening to split the world in two with disastrous consequences. Crack in the World was praised on initial release for its intelligent approach and solid special effects work.

Don Siegel's only war film and unfortunately his only teaming with Steve McQueen, an actor whose rebellious persona jibed well with the director's vision, it puts the star in the familiar role of antihero. His character, Reese, is an embittered G.I. who has just been sent back to join his war-weary unit holding down a position opposite a pillbox on the Siegfried Line in Belgium. Recently demoted back to private from staff sergeant for drinking, he chafes under all authority, and is a pariah to fellow grunts, despite their awareness of his extraordinary courage in battle. A natural leader, he persuades his sergeant (Harry Guardino) to implement a plan he's formulated to keep the Germans at bay by making them believe that the small outfit is larger than it is. While this is temporarily effective, Reese knows that it's only a matter of time before the enemy discovers the truth, and takes it on his own authority to lead an attack on the well-defended pillbox, although his unit has been assigned only to hold their ground.

The Nurse's Secret is a low-budget remake of Miss Pinkerton (1932), which in turn was based on a play by Mary Roberts Rinehart. Nurse Ruth Adams (Lee Patrick) is on the premises when two people die of what seem to be natural causes. Ruth suspects that they've been murdered, as does her detective boyfriend Tom Patten (Regis Toomey). Snooping around on her own, Ruth uncovers a deucedly clever insurance scam-and, as expected, nearly ends up a victim herself. The pre-Production Code candor of Miss Pinkerton has been toned down considerably in The Nurse's Secret, but the basic premise is still a workable one.

The Murder of Dr. Harrigan is based on a "Nurse Sarah Keats" mystery novel by Mignon Eberhardt. The middle-aged protagonist of the novel has been transformed into pretty, young nurse Sally Keating (Kay Linaker), in love with handsome doctor George Lambert (Ricardo Cortez). The founder of the hospital where Sally works disappears while en route to the operating room. Not long afterward, chief surgeon Dr Harrigan (John Eldredge) is mysteriously murdered by?whom? The key to the mystery is the formula for a revolutionary new anesthetic -- and there's plenty of suspects (including the perennial Mary Astor), motive and opportunity. Nurse Keating does a little mental "bypass surgery" on the police and figures out the mystery herself.

Whatever the "miracle" is in this story, set back in the 19th century, it tends to be buried underneath the multiple romances of the heroine Teresa (Carroll Baker), a woman who leaves the convent to find one specific man. Teresa falls in love with Michael (Roger Moore) a dashing Englishman in the British army that is fighting Napoleon in Spain. She opts for leaving the cloister to find her love. Meanwhile, during her absence, a statue of the Virgin Mary comes to life and takes her place in the convent, hence the "miracle" of the title. Along her journey, Teresa meets and eventually marries a handsome gypsy (Vittorio Gassman) who comes to an unhappy end. Widowed and grieving, young Teresa next becomes enamored of a bullfighter (Gustavo Rojo) whose luck in the ring ends tragically one day. At this point, it would seem the cloister was a better offer, but Teresa continues in her journey to find Michael.