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• Director
• George Marshall
• Writers
• Charles Lederer(screenplay)
• Valentine Davies(story)
• Stars
• Glenn Ford
• Debbie Reynolds
• Eva Gabor

George Marshall directed this mild sex comedy about a showgirl who marries a U.S. Air Force sergeant and puts his love to the test by decreeing her body off-limits to him for a 30-day period (usually something built up to in the course of a marriage over a period of years). Debbie Reynolds plays Maggie Putnam, a vivacious showgirl who dreams of marrying a rich man. Instead, in an impulsive move, she marries Sgt. Joe Fitzpatrick (Glenn Ford), a penniless Air Force sergeant who wins a $40,000 car. He is assigned to a new post in Spain, and the two lovebirds pack up for Europe. Unfortunately for Joe's libido, Maggie initiates the aforementioned test, and Joe, laughingly at first, agrees to go along with it -- reasoning that it is lonely in Spain without the bull.

• Director
• Jack Smight
• Writers
• Robert Carrington
• Jane-Howard Hammerstein
• Stars
• Warren Beatty
• Susannah York
• Clive Revill

A cardsharp comes up with the ultimate system for beating the casinos at their own game in this high-style caper comedy. Barney Lincoln (Warren Beatty) is a footloose playboy with a taste for gambling and an ingenious scheme for winning at the leading casinos in Europe. Barney discovers that nearly all of the major gambling houses use playing cards manufactured by the same company; by breaking into their plant and subtly altering the printing plates, he's able to mark the cards with a code only he can read, and he is soon pulling in record winnings across the continent. However, Barney's secret is discovered by his girlfriend Angel McGinnis (Suzannah York), a successful fashion designer, which might not be a problem if her father, "Manny" McGinnis (Clive Revill) weren't a top inspector at Scotland Yard. Manny approaches Barney and makes him a deal -- he won't reveal his secret about the cards if Barney will help him catch Harry Dominion (Eric Porter), a high-level international drug trafficker. Unfortunately, Barney's sleuthing goes awry after a certain amount of initial success, and when Harry gets wind of what he's been doing, he retaliates by kidnapping Angel and demanding repayment of his loss of sales. Jane Birkin makes her screen debut in this film, appropriately enough as a character named "Exquisite Thing."

• Director
• Alan J. Pakula
• Writer
• Alvin Sargent
• Stars
• Maggie Smith
• Timothy Bottoms
• Don Jaime de Mora y Aragón

Filmed in 1971 under the title The Widower, Love and Pain and the Whole Damn Thing finally reached the screen in 1973. Set in Spain, the film stars Timothy Bottoms as the aimless son of doctor Charles Baxter. While bicycling through the Spanish countryside, Charles makes the acquaintance of much-older Lila (Maggie Smith.) He falls in love with her, but she is resistant. Eventually touched by Charles' clumsy sincerity, Lila invites him to bed. The film then wanders into Love Story territory when Lila is afflicted by a terminal illness. Director Alan J. Pakula completed Love and Pain and the Whole Damn Thing during the "cooling off" period between his more famous Klute (1971) and The Parallax View (1974).

• Director
• Fritz Lang
• Writers
• Thea von Harbou(script)
• Fritz Lang(script)
• Egon Jacobsohn(article)
• Stars
• Peter Lorre
• Ellen Widmann
• Inge Landgut

Fritz Lang's classic early talkie crime melodrama is set in 1931 Berlin. The police are anxious to capture an elusive child murderer (Peter Lorre), and they begin rounding up every criminal in town. The underworld leaders decide to take the heat off their activities by catching the child killer themselves. Once the killer is fingered, he is marked with the letter "M" chalked on his back. He is tracked down and captured by the combined forces of the Berlin criminal community, who put him on trial for his life in a kangaroo court. The killer pleads for mercy, whining that he can't control his homicidal instincts. The police close in and rescue the killer from the underworld so that he can stand trial again in "respectable" circumstances. Some prints of the film end with a caution to the audience to watch after their children more carefully. Filmed in Germany, M was the film that solidified Fritz Lang's reputation with American audiences, and it also made a star out of Peter Lorre (previously a specialist in comedy roles!). M was remade by Hollywood in 1951, with David Wayne giving a serviceable performance as the killer.

• Director
• Fritz Lang
• Writers
• Geoffrey Household(novel "Rogue Male")
• Dudley Nichols(screenplay)
• Lamar Trotti(contract writer)
• Stars
• Walter Pidgeon
• Joan Bennett
• George Sanders

A hunter finds himself in a world of danger when he decides to stalk Adolf Hitler in this taut WWII thriller. Capt. Thorndike (Walter Pidgeon) is an expert big-game hunter from England. While hunting in Bavaria, he happens upon Hitler's Berchtesgaden estate and spots the Fuhrer; he has his rifle in tow, and he toys with the idea of firing at the dictator, even raising the unloaded weapon, putting Hitler in the crosshairs, and pulling the trigger to make the gun click. Unfortunately, this draws the attention of Maj. Quive-Smith (George Sanders), a Gestapo leader assigned to guard the Führer, who promptly apprehends Thorndike, drags him off and attempts to force him to sign a confession. When he refuses, he's brutally beaten and dumped into a hole in the woods, and must climb out and make his way to safety, by hiding as a stowaway on a Danish steamer. The poor fellow then runs afoul of the menacing Mr. Jones (John Carradine), who steals his passport and identity. By the time Thorndike returns to London, the hunter has become the hunted, with Gestapo agents combing the streets looking for the would-be assassin. Man Hunt was directed by Fritz Lang, the great German director who fled to Paris in 1933 rather than accept a commission from Joseph Goebbels to make Nazi propaganda films. He came to America the following year.

• Director
• Martin Scorsese
• Writers
• Martin Scorsese(screenplay)
• Mardik Martin(screenplay)
• Stars
• Robert De Niro
• Harvey Keitel
• David Proval

You don't make up for your sins in church; you do it in the streets; you do it at home. The rest is bulls--t, and you know it." Returning to the autobiographical milieu of his 1968 debut Who's That Knocking at My Door? for his third feature, Martin Scorsese examined the daily struggles of a wannabe hood to keep his morals straight on the streets of Little Italy. Driven equally by his wish to become a respectable gangster like his uncle (Cesare Danova) and his desire to live his life like St. Francis, Charlie (Harvey Keitel) takes on his energetically unhinged friend Johnny Boy (Robert De Niro) as his own personal penance, intervening to get Johnny Boy to pay off a debt to the local loan shark Michael (Richard Romanus). Despite his promises to his epileptic girlfriend Teresa (Amy Robinson) that they will move out of Little Italy once he strengthens his position in his uncle's world, Charlie's involvement with Johnny Boy further ensnares him in the neighborhood. When Johnny Boy decides to mouth off to Michael rather than pay him, Charlie, Johnny Boy, and Teresa try to flee Michael's murderous anger (and an assassin played by Scorsese), forcing Charlie to realize that the rules of the streets do not mesh with absolution. Whereas fellow "film school generation" director Francis Ford Coppola transformed the Hollywood gangster movie into metaphorical epics about the Mafia and capitalism in The Godfather (1972) and The Godfather Part II (1974), Scorsese revised the genre in the opposite direction, focusing on the gritty minutiae of daily life and drawing from personal memory. Combining documentary-style realism (even though most of the film was shot in L.A.); kinetic editing and camera movement; and expressionistic lighting, angles, and film speed, Scorsese presents an intimate picture of the trivial incidents and latent violence of Charlie's and Johnny Boy's world, naturalistically unfolding their experiences rather than simply explaining what motivates them. They lead a claustrophobic, petty existence that Scorsese and screenwriter Mardik Martin witnessed growing up in Little Italy, complete with a soundtrack of hit songs like "Be My Baby" and "Jumping Jack Flash" that had poured out of neighborhood radios. Mean Streets opened at the New York Film Festival to excellent notices and played strongly in New York but failed to duplicate that level of business elsewhere. Even so, Mean Streets established Scorsese and De Niro as formidable young talents and marked the beginning of a long-running and fertile collaboration that continued in such films as Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), and Goodfellas (1990). Scorsese's exceptional grasp of the texture of day-to-day life, the rhythm and cadences of street talk, and cinema's visual and aural possibilities makes Mean Streets one of the pivotal films of the 1970s, as well as of Scorsese's career, and an influence on such future filmmakers as Spike Lee and Quentin Tarantino, among many others.

• Director
• Rudolph Maté
• Writer
• Ben Hecht(novel)
• Stars
• Jane Wyman
• Van Johnson
• Peggie Castle

The fate that brings lovers together can easily tear them apart as can be seen in this sentimental tragedy that centers on an ordinary-looking secretary's (Jane Wyman) lonely life. Other than working and spending some free time with a spinster (Eileen Heckart), who is her best friend, the woman devotes most of her time attempting to cheer up her deeply depressed, eternally grieving mother, who has never recovered from her husband's leaving her. One day the secretary is in Central Park when a cloudburst occurs and she ends up meeting a handsome young soldier from Tennessee (Van Johnson). Although they couldn't be more different, they fall deeply in love. Unfortunately, he goes overseas and gets killed. The poor secretary nearly falls apart both mentally and physically. She seems near death when one day she is walking near St. Patrick's Cathedral when a second miracle occurs, giving her the will to live again.

• Director
• William Nigh
• Writers
• Maurice Vernon(from the 1913 play by)
• Harold Owen(from the 1913 play by)
• Lotta Woods(titles)
• Stars
• Lon Chaney
• Louise Dresser
• Renée Adorée

Previously filmed in England in 1919, the barnstorming Harry Maurice Vernon-Harold Owen play Mr.Wu re-emerged as a Lon Chaney Sr. vehicle in 1927. Chaney essays a dual role, as the titular Wu and Wu's honorable grandfather. After a lengthy prologue, it is established that Wu is a powerful, ruthless Chinese aristocrat who will stop at nothing to defend his daughter Nang Ping's (Renee Adoree) honor. When Nang Ping is seduced and abandoned by wealthy Briton Basil Gregory (Ralph Forbes), Wu begins plotting a horrible revenge, beginning with the killing of his own daughter (who goes to her fate with stoic resignation). He then captures Gregory's mother (Louise Dresser) and sister (Gertrude Olmstead), then forces Basil to watch as he prepares to subject the two women to unspeakable tortures. Wu is ultimately killed by Basil's mother, bringing this bizarre exercise in chinoiserie to a grim conclusion.

• Director
• John English
• Writers
• Gerald Geraghty(screenplay)
• Alan James(story)
• Stars
• Gene Autry
• Champion
• Sheila Ryan

Though the hit song "Mule Train" is most closely associated with Frankie Laine, it was Gene Autry who first sang the tune on film, in a picture titled ... what else? .... Mule Train. This time, Autry plays a federal marshal who comes to the aid of a grizzled old prospector who has been framed for murder. The villain, Sam Brady (Robert Livingston), wants to appropriate the prospector's land, and he isn't particular as to how he achieves that goal. Leading lady Sheila Ryan plays a female sheriff who is on Brady's side at first, but who later realigns herself with Autry. Ryan later became the wife of Pat Buttram, who also appears in Mule Train in his usual role as Gene Autry's comical sidekick.

• Director
• Edwin L. Marin
• Writers
• Jonathan Latimer(screen play)
• Frank Fenton(story)
• Rowland Brown(story)
• Stars
• George Raft
• Lynn Bari
• Virginia Huston

The moody mystery melodrama Nocturne was produced by longtime Alfred Hitchcock associate Joan Harrison. The film wastes no time getting started, with a caddish Hollywood composer (Edward Ashley) dropping dead right after the opening credits. The police think it's a suicide, but maverick lieutenent Joe Warne (George Raft) suspects foul play. Checking around, Warne discovers that the dead man had broken at least ten female hearts in the past few years, providing a motive for murder for all ten. The principal suspect is Frances Ransom (Lynn Bari), who may or may not have been avenging her sister, nightclub thrush Carol Page (Virginia Huston). Pursuing the case with such dogged diligence that he's eventually tossed off the police force, Warne nonetheless refuses to give up, and by film's end he has collared the murderer. It wouldn't be fair to reveal the killer's identity, except to note that the actor in question went on to quite a different career at Universal Pictures. Like the previous RKO George Raft vehicle Johnny Angel, Nocturne was a box-office bonanza, posting a then-impressive profit of $568,000.

• Director
• Lindsay Anderson
• Writers
• David Sherwin(screenplay)
• Malcolm McDowell(based on an original idea by)
• Stars
• Malcolm McDowell
• Ralph Richardson
• Rachel Roberts

One man's dreams of success take him on a Byzantine journey through the various stations of the British class system in this politically charged black comedy from director Lindsay Anderson. Mick Travis (Malcolm McDowell) is an ambitious young man who is looking to get his foot on the first rung of the ladder of success by landing a job as a salesman. After the death of Imperial Coffee's leading drummer in the North, Travis' charm and enthusiasm so impresses manager Mr. Duff (Arthur Lowe) that he's given the job, and after some coaching from Gloria Rowe (Rachel Roberts), Travis sets out to find his fortune in the coffee trade. Travis' desire for success quickly sets him on a curious odyssey in which he happens upon a secret sex club for businessmen, finds himself the subject of random seductions by lonely women, is captured and tortured by military intelligence agents, submits to medical experiments at a bizarre private clinic, hitches a ride with a traveling rock band led by former Animals keyboardist Alan Price, falls in love with a beautiful young bohemian named Patricia (Helen Mirren), goes to work for her father (Ralph Richardson), who happens to be a singularly corrupt political figure, and eventually lands in prison after he's implicated in a deal to sell chemical weapons to the Third World. As Mick's strange tale progresses, we periodically visit Price and his band in the recording studio or rehearsal hall, as they work on songs which serve as both mirror and counterpoint for Travis' progress. O Lucky Man! was the second film in which Malcolm McDowell would portray Mick Travis for director Lindsay Anderson, following If..., and preceding Britannia Hospital; the film's surreal undercurrent was reinforced by the casting, in which nearly all of the principal actors play two or three roles.

• Director
• Robert Z. Leonard
• Writers
• P.G. Wodehouse(novel)
• Charles Brackett
• Edwin H. Knopf
• Stars
• Robert Montgomery
• Frank Morgan
• Madge Evans

British humorist P. G. Wodehouse wrote the story upon which Piccadilly Jim was based. Frank Morgan and Robert Montgomery play a well-to-do father and son, who find themselves rivals in love. The object of their affection is Madge Evans, who likes them both but favors the son. Everything could have been wrapped up in eight reels, but MGM had a mania about lengthy running times, so Piccadilly Jim lumbers on at 100 minutes. Fortunately, such accomplished farceurs as Billie Burke, Robert Benchley and Eric Blore are around to pep up the dull spots.

• Director
• Ray Enright
• Writers
• John Monks Jr.(original screen play)
• Fred F. Finklehoffe(original screen play)
• Earl Baldwin(contributor to dialogue and screenplay constuction)
• Stars
• Priscilla Lane
• Wayne Morris
• Jane Bryan

This comedy is the sequel of Brother Rat. The film begins with the three original protagonists after their graduation from the Virginia Military Institute. One of them has just applied for a job as the academy's baseball coach and the others come to assist him. Mayhem ensues; especially after the two well-meaning friends steal the would-be coach's baby and put it aboard a plane headed for Peru. The babe finally comes back and the ensuing publicity gets the coach his dream job. Meanwhile, the other two finally get the girls of their dreams.

• Director
• William Keighley
• Writers
• Richard Macaulay(screen play)
• Jerry Wald(screen play)
• John Monks Jr.(from the play by)
• Stars
• Priscilla Lane
• Wayne Morris
• Johnnie Davis

In this lively comedy, three young hell-raisers enroll in the Virginia Military Institute and have a hard time staying out of trouble.

• Director
• Joseph Santley
• Writers
• Aladar Laszlo(original story)
• Charles Kaufman(screenplay)
• Paul Yawitz(screenplay)
• Stars
• Joan Fontaine
• Derrick De Marney
• Cecil Kellaway

In this romantic comedy a millionaire must somehow dissuade his daughter from marrying a money-grubbing social-climber. In desperation he offers to back the show of a beautiful starlet--provided she break his daughter's heart. Things don't go exactly as planned, but a lot of fun is had along the way.

• Director
• Tim Whelan
• Writers
• Jack Natteford(original screenplay)
• Luci Ward(original screenplay)
• Clarence Upson Young(additional sequences)
• Stars
• Randolph Scott
• Ann Richards
• George 'Gabby' Hayes

In this is '40s western a U.S. marshal chases a band of big-name bandits into no-man's territory (land outside of U.S. government jurisdiction) as he's trying to locate his little brother. He ends up facing off with none other than the James Boys, the Daltons and other notorious fellows. Badman's Territory proved so successful that the formula was repeated several times by RKO and other studios.

• Director
• Lew Landers
• Writer
• Clarence Upson Young(story)
• Stars
• Robert Barrat
• Noah Beery Jr.
• Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams

Bad Lands is a remake of John Ford's The Lost Patrol, with the locale changed from the Mesopotamian to the Arizona desert. The year is 1875: A posse headed by sheriff Robert Barrat is held at bay by Apache warriors. Following the pattern established by the Ford film, the posse members are decimated one by one, until only Barrat is left. Not content with merely changing the location and time-frame, scriptwriter Clarence Upson Young added a subplot involving a much-coveted vein of silver ore. This contrivance aside, Bad Lands is a worthy revision of the original Lost Patrol, though not quite as good as such later WW2 variations as Bataan and Sahara.

• Director
• Ray Enright
• Writers
• Warren Duff(screen play)
• Adela Rogers St. Johns(from a story by: Cosmopolitan Magazine)
• Seton I. Miller(additional dialogue)
• Stars
• Pat O'Brien
• Joan Blondell
• Margaret Lindsay

In this newsroom drama, a tabloid's ace reporter's investigations lead to a chorine's conviction for murdering her husband. The trouble begins when the reporter digs a little deeper and realizes that the showgirl is really innocent. Now, despite the objections of her editor, the reporter must hurry to keep the dancer off of death row.

• Director
• William Keighley
• Writers
• Sinclair Lewis(novel)
• Mary C. McCall Jr.(screenplay)
• Tom Reed(adaptation)
• Stars
• Aline MacMahon
• Guy Kibbee
• Claire Dodd

Warner Bros. grabbed up the rights to Babbitt, Sinclair Lewis' satirical novel of middle America, soon after publication in 1922, and it was first filmed in 1924 by Harry Beaumont as a silent (with Willard Lewis, Mary Alden, and Carmel Myers). A decade later William Keighley brought it to the screen with Guy Kibbee in the role of George Babbitt. A small town real estate broker who is too stupid and unimaginative to do anything terribly wrong or dishonest, Babbitt has lived a dull, staid, middle-class life -- until a little bit of recognition from his local loadge and the cajoling of a couple of crooked politicians get him roped into a plot to swindle the city. Suddenly Babbitt's life is poised on a slippery slope, as he falls into an unwise (though basically innocent) flirtation with a young woman (Claire Dodd) during his wife's extended absence. And that quickly leaves him vulnerable to a blackmail effort, and it soon looks as though his whole life may be falling down around him. Fortunately, Mrs. Babbitt (the incomparable Aline MacMahon) can think on her feet, and proves to be made of sterner stuff than her husband in an exciting, twist-laden finale.

• Director
• John Cromwell
• Writers
• Robert E. Sherwood(by)
• Grover Jones(adaptation)
• Stars
• Raymond Massey
• Gene Lockhart
• Ruth Gordon

Raymond Massey plays Abe Lincoln in this moving adaptation of Robert Sherwood's Pulitzer Prize-winning play. Expanded a bit for cinematic purposes, the film traces Lincoln's progress from his days of scrambling for a living as a woodsman, to his courtship of the tragic Ann Rutledge (Mary Howard) and then the mercurial Mary Todd (Ruth Gordon), to the formative years of his law practice, to his debates with Stephen Douglas (Gene Lockhart), and finally to his election as President of the soon-to-be-divided United States in 1860. Latter-day critics have complained about Massey's stolidity in his signature role, but even the most stone-hearted viewer will be moved by such scenes as Lincoln riding through the ruins of what once was the village of Salem; Abe's heated election-eve quarrel with his spiteful wife Mary; and his climactic speech from the observation car of the train that will carry him to Washington...and immortality. Abe Lincoln at Illinois turned out to be a succes d'estime for its producer Max Gordon and its studio (RKO), taking a bath to the tune of $750,000. Its failure moved one Hollywood wise-guy to collar Gordon at a party and say, "I can't understand it, Max. Lincoln was so kind to everybody but you."

• Director
• Jack Conway
• Writers
• Malcolm Stuart Boylan(screen play)
• Walter Ferris(screen play)
• George Oppenheimer(screen play)
• Stars
• Robert Taylor
• Vivien Leigh
• Lionel Barrymore

A Yank at Oxford was filmed in England at MGM's "sister studio", Elstree. Robert Taylor plays Lee Sheridan, an arrogant young American scholar/athlete who intends to show the "Brits" a thing or two while attending Oxford University. His abrasive attitude grates against the Oxonian students, who retaliate by subjecting Sheridan to a rather humiliating hazing. Romance enters the picture in the form of Molly Beaumont (Maureen O'Sullivan), the sister of Sheridan's chief academic rival Paul Beaumont (Griffith Jones). When Paul faces disgrace over a breach of student ethics, Sheridan nobly shoulders the blame, simultaneously endangering his own future at Oxford and proving that he's really a "right guy" underneath. All is forgiven during the annual rowing competition against Cambridge, with Sheridan coming through in jolly good fashion. Cast as campus vamp Elsa Craddock is the stunningly beautiful Vivien Leigh, still two years away from Gone With the Wind. A Yank at Oxford was remade in 1984 as Oxford Blues, and mercilessly lampooned by Laurel & Hardy in 1940's A Chump at Oxford.

• Director
• Mervyn LeRoy
• Writer
• Leonard Spigelgass(play)
• Stars
• Rosalind Russell
• Alec Guinness
• Ray Danton

This standard love story adapted by Leonard Spigelgass from his stage play was acclaimed when it was released for probing into the nature of prejudice. Rosalind Russell plays Mrs. Jacoby, a Jewish widow living in Brooklyn whose daughter Alice (Madlyn Rhue) is married to Jerome (Ray Danton), a U.S. diplomat newly assigned to Japan. Because of Jerome's new post, Mrs. Jacoby decides to visit the land of the rising sun, and once there, she meets Koichi Asano (Alec Guinness). Asano is a suave, sophisticated, and wealthy man with an aesthetically impressive Tokyo home. After the two meet, love starts to blossom. This was one of the rare '60s films geared to the older set but it is significant that even during this period Hollywood still chose to cast a white actor (albeit Alec Guinness!) in the role of Asano.

• Director
• George Cukor
• Writer
• Isobel Lennart
• Stars
• Lana Turner
• Ray Milland
• Tom Ewell

Lana Turner stars as an ambitious model who seeks her fortune in New York City. She is befriended by over-the-hill cover-girl Ann Dvorak, whose performance carries the story until she commits suicide twenty minutes into the film. Turner promises herself that she won't end up burned out like Dvorak, but as her fame grows, she is inexorably drawn into the hectic social whirl that sealed Dvorak's doom. Enjoying the favors of wealthy Ray Milland, Turner seeks out Milland's wife (Margaret Phillips), hoping to convince the woman to give up her husband. When she meets the crippled Mrs. Milland, Turner is made painfully aware of the length and breadth of the woman's love for her husband. Turner pulls out of the relationship, and we are encouraged to believe that hers will be a much happier and more fulfilling life than that of the unfortunate Ann Dvorak (ironically, in real life Ann Dvorak's final days were relatively contented ones, while Lana Turner spent her twilight years wondering where the looks, the men and the money had gone). Though not so noted in the credits, A Life of Her Own was inspired by The Abiding Vision, a novel by Rebecca West. Bronislau Kaper's musical score was later recycled for the 1951 MGM romantic drama Invitation.

• Director
• Delmer Daves
• Writers
• Everett Freeman(story "Cleopatra Arms")
• Devery Freeman(story "Cleopatra Arms")
• Harry Kurnitz(written for the screen by)
• Stars
• David Niven
• Jane Wyman
• Victor Moore

A Kiss in the Dark opens with a shot of Jane Wyman in a two-piece bathing suit. Alas, the dictates of cinematic construction demand that some sort of plot must follow this promising beginning. Wyman plays model Polly Haines, one of several mildly eccentric tenants in an apartment building owned by neurotic concert pianist Eric Phillips (David Niven). Requiring absolute peace and quiet, Eric intends to evict his tenants and thereby have the building all to himself. Soon, however, he is won over by the apartment dwellers, who in their own various ways are as high-strung as the musician. He also falls in love with Polly, just as expected. The supporting cast of Kiss in the Dark is peopled by such expert farceurs as Victor Moore, Broderick Crawford, Wayne Morris, Joseph Buloff, and Curt Bois. Making her final screen appearance is Maria Ouspenskaya as the building's resident "earth mother."

• Director
• Clarence Brown
• Writers
• Adela Rogers St. Johns(from the book by)
• Becky Gardiner(adaptation)
• Philip Dunning(uncredited)
• Stars
• Norma Shearer
• Leslie Howard
• Lionel Barrymore

In this Academy Award-winning film, Stephen Ashe (Lionel Barrymore) is a hotshot Californian lawyer from a well-to-do family, whose main failing is his indulgence in alcohol. After winning a case for mobster Ace Wilfong (Clark Gable), Stephen brings his client along to a party at his parents' house for a little celebrating. However, when they arrive at their destination, Ace manages to steal the heart of Stephen's wild daughter, Jan (Norma Shearer), and the two run off together, much to the family's dismay. Stephen struggles to win his foolhardy daughter back from the clutches of her lowlife boyfriend, as she defies her father at every turn.

• Director
• Alexander Mackendrick
• Writers
• W.H. Canaway(novel)
• Denis Cannan
• Stars
• Edward G. Robinson
• Fergus McClelland
• Constance Cummings

Released in the US as A Boy Ten Feet Tall, Sammy Going South is a rugged youngster's-eye-view adventure set in South Africa. 10-year-old orphan Sammy (Fergus McClelland), who resides in Port Said, tries to locate his only relative, who lives 5000 miles away across the desert in Durban. After the death of his first guide, an erstwhile peddler, Sammy is rescued by a wealthy tourist (Constance Cummings). Not anxious to return to Port Said, Sammy escapes his benefactress and links up with a crafty old hunter/diamond smuggler (Edward G. Robinson), whose life is saved by the boy. When the police search for Sammy, they arrest the old man, who has been a fugitive for years. When Sammy is finally united with his Aunt (Zena Walker), he learns that the old smuggler has willed him his fortune. Released in the US at 88 minutes, Sammy Going South was restored to its full 118 minutes for television.

• Director
• Lloyd Bacon
• Writers
• Herbert Fields(based on the play by)
• E. Ray Goetz(based on the play by)
• Cole Porter(based on the play by)
• Stars
• Ole Olsen
• Chic Johnson
• William Gaxton

Cole Porter's Broadway musical 50 Million Frenchmen was brought to the screen in 1931 with one minor alteration -- all of the music was removed! Set in Paris, the story concerns the exploits of wealthy Jack Forbes (William Gaxton), who bets his friend Michael Cummings (John Halliday) that he can woo and win Looloo Carroll (Claudia Dell) without using any of his money or connections. Cummings hires Simon and Peter (Ole Olsen and Chic Johnson), a pair of erstwhile detectives, to make sure that Forbes doesn't win his bet. Instead, Simon and Peter befriend our hero and decide to help him out. Olsen & Johnson have all the best material, notably an early double-entendre encounter with randy American tourist Helen Broderick and a scene in which Olsen impersonates mind-reading fakir Bela Lugosi (who loses his clothes in the process!) The finale is right out of Harold Lloyd, with the comedians being chased by every law officer in Gay Paree. Evidently, the Cole Porter songs had been filmed for 50 Million Frenchmen, but were cut from the final print just before release: William Gaxton keeps building up to singing You Do Something for Me but never quite gets there (Warner Bros. later utilized the Porter score in Paree! Paree!, a 2-reel remake of Frenchmen starring Bob Hope). Originally released in Technicolor, 50 Million Frenchmen is presently available only in black and white.

• Director
• Robert Aldrich
• Writers
• Teddi Sherman
• Robert Aldrich
• W.R. Burnett(uncredited)
• Stars
• Frank Sinatra
• Dean Martin
• Anita Ekberg

In 4 for Texas, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin star as Zack Thomas and Joe Jarrett, a pair of rival mountebanks who spend most of the film battling over who will control the gambling and wenching in 1870 Galveston. Though they'd as soon cut each other's throats than cooperate, Zack and Joe are forced to unite against a pair of common enemies: crooked banker Harvey Burden (played by Victor Buono, a favorite of director Robert Aldrich) and cold-blooded outlaw/hired-gun Matson (Charles Bronson, virtually the only person in the film who takes his role seriously). The heroes also battle over the affections of well-endowed heroines Elya Carlson (Anita Ekberg) and Maxine Richter (Ursula Andress), both of whom are sharp-witted businesswomen who match Zack and Joe scam for scam. The Three Stooges show up for a moment, in which they repeat their "point to the right" and "State of Texas" routines, and get into a fracas with feisty little old lady Jesslyn Fax. Also making guest appearances are Arthur Godfrey and Teddy Buckner and His All Stars.

• Director
• Michael Curtiz
• Writers
• Lewis E. Lawes(book "Twenty Thousand Years in Sing Sing")
• Wilson Mizner(screen play)
• Brown Holmes(screen play)
• Stars
• Spencer Tracy
• Bette Davis
• Arthur Byron

Sent to Sing Sing prison, influential crook Tom Connors (Spencer Tracy) is unregenerate and refuses to adhere to the rules. While in solitary confinement, Connors reconsiders his attitude. Thanks to the correctional facility's compassionate warden (Arthur Byron), he becomes a model prisoner, even refusing to participate in a jailbreak. The warden sets up a special program permitting selected prisoners a degree of freedom and even suggests allowing an occasional furlough. When Connors' girlfriend Fay (Bette Davis) is hurt in an auto accident, he is given a 24 hour pass to visit her. It's a test case--if he doesn't return, the warden will be discredited and replaced. While on the "outside," Connors learns that his old rival (Louis Calhern) was responsible for his girl's injuries. Fay shoots the rival, who in turn fingers Connors as the one responsible; the convict thus risks execution upon returning to the arms of the law. Based on the book by real-life Sing Sing warden Lewis E. Lawes, 20,000 Years in Sing Sing was remade in 1940 as Castle on the Hudson.

• Director
• Anthony Mann
• Writers
• Robert E. Kent(screen play by)
• Gordon Kahn(additional dialogue by)
• Gelett Burgess(based upon the story by)
• Stars
• Tom Conway
• Ann Rutherford
• Richard Lane

In this drama, an amnesiac awakens and finds himself accused of murder. Fortunately, a female cabbie helps prove his innocence. Things look bleak until a bullet wound helps him regain his memory and he can prove he didn't kill anyone.

• Director
• George Abbott
• Writers
• John Twist(screen play)
• George Marion Jr.(book of musical play)
• Stars
• Lucille Ball
• Richard Carlson
• Ann Miller

Now immortalized as the film on which Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz met, Too Many Girls is a faithful adaptation of the Richard Rodgers-Lorenz Hart-George Abbott Broadway musical hit. The light-as-a-feather plotline finds four football players hired to escort dizzy heiress Connie Casey (Lucille Ball) when she goes off to attend a southwestern college. The girls far outnumber the boys on campus, which is sheer ambrosia for the four "protectors": Clint Kelly (Richard Carlson), Jojo Jordan (Eddie Bracken), Cuban exchange student Manuelito (Desi Arnaz) and Al Terwilliger (Hal LeRoy). The order of billing should indicate who ends up romancing the icy Connie, but the other boys don't go home empty-handed either, not with such cuties as Pepe (Ann Miller) and Eileen (Frances Langford) around. As was customary in collegiate musicals of the era, the whole thing ends with the Big Football Game, with the four heroes emerging triumphant. It doesn't take a microscope to spot a young Van Johnson among the chorus boys, especially since he shows up on-screen even before the opening credits!

• Director
• Peter Godfrey
• Writers
• Stephen Morehouse Avery(screenplay)
• Wilkie Collins(novel "The Woman in White")
• Stars
• Alexis Smith
• Eleanor Parker
• Sydney Greenstreet

The Woman in White attempts to translate the archaic prose of 19th century gothic-mystery writer Wilkie Collins to the medium of film. Gig Young plays a 19th century painter who, while en route to a country estate, encounters a strange, ethereal young lady (Eleanor Parker) who both begs his help and insists that he keep their meeting a secret. He will meet the girl again at several crucial junctures -- though she will fail to recognize him. The painter has unknowingly stumbled upon a scheme by the diabolical Count Fosco (Sydney Greenstreet) to claim an inheritance on behalf of a dissipated nobleman (John Emery); the plan involves a marriage of convenience to the hapless lady of the house (Alexis Smith), blackmail, hidden siblings, and the suppression of a dark family secret involving Fosco's neurotic wife (Agnes Moorehead). The full plotline is far too labyrinthine to go into detail here -- in fact, it can barely be followed in the film itself. While The Woman in White suffers from excess verbiage, the film is at its best in its shadowy, nocturnal "conspiracy" set pieces and in the scenes with timorous aristocrat John Abbott, to whom every raised voice is a threat to his fragile health. And keep an eye on Sidney Greenstreet's pet monkey, Iago, easily the most well-adjusted character in the film.

• Director
• John Ford
• Writers
• John Lee Mahin(written for the screen by)
• Martin Rackin(written for the screen by)
• Harold Sinclair(from the novel by)
• Stars
• John Wayne
• William Holden
• Constance Towers

Based on an actual Civil War mission, Colonel Marlowe (John Wayne) and Major Kendall (William Holden) are ordered by General Grant to take three regiments 300 miles into enemy territory. They must destroy the railroad line between Newton Station and Vicksburg in hopes of choking off supplies to the South. Marlowe encounters a Southern belle loyal to the enemy, and keeps her in sight throughout the journey so she can't warn the Confederates. Kendall, a Northern surgeon, and the crusty Marlowe have their differences along the way. Action, romance and gory battlefield surgery accompany the army as the mission is completed. John Ford directed this film based on a novel by Harold Sinclair.

• Director
• William A. Wellman
• Writer
• Ernest K. Gann(screenplay)
• Stars
• John Wayne
• Claire Trevor
• Laraine Day

For The High and the Mighty, director William Wellman made a point of using Cinemascope to heighten the dramatic content of a confined screen space -- in this instance, the cockpit of a plane in flight. Copilot Dan Roman (John Wayne) seems a lot more in control of things than Captain John Sullivan (Robert Stack) when the plane loses an engine during a flight from Honolulu to San Francisco. Wellman crosscuts from the tension in the cockpit to the various subplots involving the plane's passengers, among them May Holst (Claire Trevor), Lydia Rice (Laraine Day), Howard Rice (John Howard), Sally McKee (Jan Sterling), Ed Joseph (Phil Harris), and Humphrey Agnew (Sidney Blackmer) (as a character named Humphrey Agnew -- a remarkable prescient cognomen given the future of the U.S. vice presidency!). Adapted by Ernest K. Gann from his best-selling novel, The High and the Mighty was one of the first (and most profitable) entries in the "terror in the sky" genre. Its theme music, written by Dimitri Tiomkin and whistled incessantly by John Wayne in the film, would later become a best-selling hit throughout the world.

• Director
• Steve Lustgarten
• Writers
• Nicole Harrison
• Jay Horenstein
• Steve Lustgarten
• Stars
• Jay Horenstein
• Nicole Harrison
• Hester Schell

In this student film about lust and repression, a dour, unsympathetic man in his early 30s or so (Jay Horenstein) works as a photographer's assistant, though he aspires to be a professional photographer himself. He shows no interest in the models that go through the studio, or in the photographer's wife who is interested in him. Instead, he spends his time surreptitiously snapping photos of a young teenage girl who lives next door. Eventually, the young girl cajoles him into going to the seashore with her -- and in a graphic later sequence, their relationship becomes brutally sexual. Given that the identity of the girl is never fully clarified (is she related to the man?), the scene is all the more disturbing. Criss-crossed with failings that are common to amateur productions -- such as sequences that go on too long, slow and/or uneven pacing, and flaws in the acting -- this low-budget film still faces up to the issue of sexual taboos and attempts a story that is more than skin deep.

• Director
• Vincent Sherman
• Writers
• Ranald MacDougall(screen play by)
• John Patrick(from the stage play by)
• Stars
• Ronald Reagan
• Patricia Neal
• Richard Todd

Richard Todd plays an insufferable Scots soldier confined to a World War II military hospital. Ronald Reagan is an all-American patient who befriends the headstrong Scotsman, while Patricia Neal is the compassionate nurse. Gradually the patients grow begrudgingly fond of Todd, and when it is learned that he is suffering from a fatal illness, everyone involved tries to keep his true condition a secret from him. Todd inadvertently discovers the truth, and violently turns against his new buddies. But before the fade-out, friendship wins out over bitterness and self-pity. Filmed in England, Hasty Heart is based on the stage play by John Patrick.

On an escort ("ramrod") of bombers to Emden, Germany, by P-47's of the 8th Air Force. Shows planning of the mission. Planes are prepared and pilots are briefed. Combat scenes show fighters downing German planes. This historical recording from the National Archives may contain variations in audio and video quality based on the limitations of the original source material.

• Directors
• Julien Duvivier
• Victor Fleming(uncredited)
• Josef von Sternberg(uncredited)
• Writers
• Gottfried Reinhardt(original story)
• Samuel Hoffenstein(screen play)
• Walter Reisch(screen play)
• Stars
• Luise Rainer
• Fernand Gravey
• Miliza Korjus

The Great Waltz was the first of two films bearing the same title which told the life story of Austrian "Waltz King" Johann Strauss. European singing sensation Fernard Gravet stars as Strauss, while MGM's two-time Oscar winner Luise Rainer is top-billed as Poldi Vogelhuber. Poldi is the wife of Strauss, but she is forced to sit and sulk as her husband carries on a lengthy affair with opera singer Milza Korjus (in her only American film). Husband and wife mend their differences shortly before being introduced to the court of Emperor Franz Josef. The scene everyone remembers is the one in which Gravet and Korjus improvise "The Tales of the Vienna Woods" while taking a buggy ride in the country. It's as corny as all get out, but never fails to earn applause when seen today. Dmitri Tiomkin was given the unenviable task of adapting the original Strauss tunes to conform with the concept of the film, while an uncredited Josef Von Sternberg assisted official director Julien Duvuvier in several crucial scenes. The 1972 The Great Waltz, which starred Horst Buchholtz, is generally conceded to be a disaster.

• Director
• Mel Ferrer
• Writers
• Lionel Houser(screen play)
• Jack Leonard(story)
• James O'Hanlon(story)
• Stars
• Claudette Colbert
• Robert Ryan
• Jane Cowl

The Secret Fury works best if one is willing to suspend one's disbelief from the outset. Claudette Colbert stars as Ellen, a famed concert pianist who, on the day of her wedding, is accosted by a stranger who insists that she's already married to someone else. Ellen is willing to laugh this off, until the stranger produces witnesses, records and the justice of the piece. Has Ellen lost her mind, or is she merely the victim of an elaborate scam. With the help of fiancé David (Robert Ryan), Our Heroine begins her own investigation -- and ends up accused of murder and shunted off to a mental institution. And the story isn't over yet! Featured in a pivotal role is future I Love Lucy co-star Vivian Vance, who'd previously worked in an L.A. theatre company with Secret Fury-director Mel Ferrer. For reasons best known to himself, Willard Parker, a fairly well-known film actor in 1950, appears unbilled.

• Director
• Jean Negulesco
• Writers
• Frank Gruber(screenplay)
• Eric Ambler(novel "A Coffin for Dimitrios")
• Stars
• Peter Lorre
• Sydney Greenstreet
• Zachary Scott

Zachary Scott made his screen debut in this clever bit of film noir that has gained a cult reputation in recent years. Dutch mystery novelist Cornelius Leyden (Peter Lorre) is travelling through Istanbul when he meets Col. Haki (Kurt Katch), head of the secret police and a big fan of Leyden's work. He offers to tell Leyden about Dimitrios Makropoulos (Zachary Scott), a notorious criminal whose body was just found washed up on the beach. It seems that Makropoulos was involved in nearly every sort of lawless act imaginable, from murder and blackmail to espionage and political assassination. Fascinated, Leyden decides that Makropoulos would be a fine subject for his next book, and he begins researching his life, beginning with Haki's dossier on the criminal. Leyden's research takes him through much of Europe; while en route by rail to Sofia, he meets a large man with an ingratiating chuckle, Mr. Peters (Sydney Greenstreet), who informs Leyden that "There is not enough kindness in the world," and tells him of a good hotel in town. Grateful for the advice, Leyden checks in, only to later find Peters ransacking his room and holding him at gunpoint; it seems that Peters had business with Makropoulos, and he isn't entirely convinced that the master criminal is dead -- especially since his body was found with shabby clothes and no money, and the police in Istanbul had never actually seen a photo of Makropoulos. Based on a novel by Eric Ambler, The Mask of Dimitrios also features Faye Emerson, who was in the news at the time, as she had just wed the son of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

• Directors
• Nicholas Ray
• Robert Parrish(uncredited)
• Writers
• Horace McCoy(written for the screen by)
• David Dortort(written for the screen by)
• Claude Stanush(suggested by a story by)
• Stars
• Susan Hayward
• Robert Mitchum
• Arthur Kennedy

The titular Lusty Men are rodeo riders in this modern-day western, assembled with a touch of the offbeat by director Nicholas Ray. Former rodeo star Robert Mitchum, disabled by a series of accidents, hobbles back to his Oklahoma hometown in hopes of replenishing his bank account. Aspiring bronco-buster Arthur Kennedy hires Mitchum to train him for an upcoming rodeo, promising that they'll split the winnings. It doesn't take a crystal ball to predict that Mitchum will soon fall hard for Kennedy's wife Susan Hayward; she can take Mitchum or leave him, but decides to take him so that he'll continue to train Kennedy. After a falling out, Mitchum quits his job and enters the rodeo himself, hoping to win the prize from the arrogant Kennedy. He proves he still has what it takes, but does so at the price of his life. The Lusty Men was co-adapted by one-time cowboy David Dotort from a Life magazine story by Claude Stannish.

• Director
• Irving Rapper
• Writers
• Lenore J. Coffee(screen play)
• Stephen Longstreet(novel)
• Stars
• Barbara Stanwyck
• George Brent
• Geraldine Fitzgerald

In this grim melodrama, Barbara Stanwyck plays the eldest of three wealthy sisters who become orphans when their father dies in France. Threatened with the danger of losing the opulent family home, Big Sister makes a grand sacrifice and secretly marries a real estate developer so she can inherit her aunt's fortune. A few years later, she learns that he is after the family estate and wants to tear it down so she leaves him and tries to stop him. More time passes and the husband ends up taking her to court when he learns that she has borne him a son without telling him. The part of "Gig Young" was played by actor Byron Barr who later assumed the name before he became famous.