clore

No, dated doesn't have to be a negative connotation. I'll give you an example - the other day, house bound because of Irene, my 23-year-old son and I watched the John Carpenter version of THE THING. As we were about halfway through the film, he mentioned to me that the suspense and the anxiety were coming through the situations depicted, not manipulated by the use of the Waring blender editing that films today present. I said to him this is because the prevailing thought is that people his age, raised on video games and MTV, are thought to be brain deficient and can't follow a straight-forward narrative. As it turned out at the end, he wanted to borrow the DVD to show his friends. I told him though that I was setting him up, that now he was going to have to watch the Hawks version of the film but that I'm sure that he will like that one on its own merits. I shudder what today's generation is going to think when they see a movie in full Technicolor, rather than the gun metal gray and amber tinted movies that prevail these days. Maybe they'll think it old-fashioned because it looks like real life.

I have to agree with you Arturo and overall if we're going to start labeling films as being dated, we're going to have a lot of such comments about nearly every film on the schedule. Let's face it, if we're going to worry about how today's audience is going to perceive it, then a lot of them aren't even going to get past seeing the production company logo in black-and-white. Right there the film is dated. Let's take BLACKBOARD JUNGLE as an example - it starts off with an ancient rock song that was already nearly a decade old when I first saw the film. What this movie needs is some hip hop. Then we get this teacher with a crew cut - Holy Eisenhower, how retro is that? What about that fool who brings in his collection of records? Forget that he just got beat up by some of his students and he's bringing in his prized collection and subjecting them to likely destruction - how stupid is that? How is anyone today going to relate to that when a teacher today would be smart enough to leave his originals at home and bring in the music in some digital form which would save his having to see his records being used as frisbees. Abnd what about that tremendous tape recorder that Daddy-O uses in class? You need to be a weight lifter to carry that thing around. They must have found that next to some dinosaur bones. Then someone starts sending letters to the teacher's wife by snail mail - how many high schoolers today ever fixed a stamp to an envelope? What about that scene with the one kid charging with a flag pole - the flag has 48 stars on it, that really dates the film, doesn't it? How come Artie West is calling Mrs. Daddy-O from a pay phone - didn't they have cell phones back then? There is such a thing as being dated in the right ways. Movies shouldn't have to come with expiration dates. Granted, I would not expect a 1931 film to look like a film made in the present day, but I can within the context of comparing two films from the same year say that one is more cinematic than the other.

I don't think this film holds up as well as it should. The scenes involving the radio program are very dated There was a late-80s made-for-TV remake that used practically the same speech but substituted the word "television" for "radio." One might as well complain that the problem with the movie is it's dated because today one or all of the women would have called Addie Ross or their respective husband on a cell phone and have gotten to solve the mystery in about ten minutes. It wasn't the radio speech, it was the woody wagon that really dated it. Oh, and that big slate record that Addie sent to George. That really dates it compared to the size of a CD and CDs don't break as easily either.

Here, all the stars were just speaking their own native languages on the set. Delon and Cardinale were speaking French, with Lancaster speaking English. Oh I realize that. But I get a certain comfort in watching it and thinking that Visconti conceptualized his film in one language - his own. It is after all a film set in his native country, it's not some spaghetti western where a director might well be thinking in terms of things "borrowed" from earlier American westerns. However, for international distribution of either this or some sagebrush saga, the mulch-national cast is almost a must. Certainly for THE LEOPARD it was as this was an expensive production. To get Fox to put up three million, a marquee name had to be up there.

He's dubbed. But I gues it's only proper that we get the film as Visconti intended, not as was intended for English-speaking audiences.

I'm more excited that both THE FLAME AND THE ARROW and THE CRIMSON PIRATE are airing in September. I haven't seen either in years.

Can a player primarily associated with Universal be SOTM? Boris Karloff in October 2003 should qualify, but that's about the only one in 17 years. May 1994: Greta Garbo June 1994: Glenn Ford July 1994: Greer Garson Aug.1994: Edward G. Robinson Sept.1994: Barbara Stanwyck Oct.1994: Angela Lansbury Nov.1994 John Garfield Dec.1994: Best of ‘94 Jan.1995: Esther Williams Feb.1995: Ronald Reagan Mar.1995: TCM Salutes the Oscars Apr.1995: Doris Day May 1995: Myrna Loy June 1995: Errol Flynn July 1995: Gene Kelly Aug.1995: Paul Muni Sept.1995: Jane Powell Oct.1995: Clark Gable Nov.1995: The Barrymores Dec.1995: Best of ‘95 Jan.1996: Deborah Kerr Feb.1996: Robert Young Mar.1996: 31 Days of Oscar April 1996: Irene Dunne May 1996: James Stewart June 1996: Rosalind Russell July 1996: Fred Astaire Aug.1996: Ann Sheridan Sept.1996: Van Johnson Oct.1996: Kathryn Grayson Nov.1996: Robert Mitchum Dec.1996: Best of ‘96 Jan.97: Humphrey Bogart Feb.97: Eleanor Parker Mar.97: 31 Days of Oscar Apr.97: Ava Gardner May 97: George Brent June 97: June Allyson July 97: John and Walter Huston (also Director of the Month) Aug.97: Cary Grant Sept.97: Ida Lupino Oct.97: Walter Pidgeon Nov.97: Katharine Hepburn Dec.97: Best of ‘97 Jan.1998: Lana Turner Feb.1998: Charlton Heston Mar.1998:31 Days of Oscar April 1998: Red Skelton May 1998: Olivia de Havilland June 1998: James Cagney July 1998: Lucille Ball August 1998: Joan Crawford Sept.1998: John Wayne Oct.1998: Cyd Charisse Nov.1998: Claude Rains Dec.1998: Best of ‘98 Jan.1999: Elizabeth Taylor Feb.1999: William Powell March 1999: 31 Days of Oscar April 1999: Dennis Morgan May 1999: Bette Davis June 1999: Mickey Rooney July1999: Natalie Wood August 1999: Peter Sellers Sept.1999: Norma Shearer Oct. 1999: Gregory Peck Nov. 1999: Ginger Rogers Dec. 1999: Burt Lancaster Jan. 2000: Debbie Reynolds Feb. 2000: Robert Ryan March 2000: 31 Days of Oscars April 2000: Spencer Tracy May 2000: Alexis Smith June 2000:Wallace Beery July 2000: Judy Garland August 2000: film debuts Sept 2000: Jane Wyman October 2000: Dick Powell Nov 2000: Frank Sinatra Dec. 2000: Lauren Bacall Jan. 2001: Elvis Presley Feb.2001: Jean Hagen March 2001: 31 Days of Oscar Apr.2001: Knighted Actors May 2001: Jean Harlow June 2001: W.C. Fields July 2001: Ann Sothern Aug.2001: James Garner Sept. 2001: Robert Taylor Oct. 2001: Lana Turner Nov.2001: Glenn Ford Dec.2001: The Marx Brothers Jan. 2002: Marlene Dietrich Feb. 2002: Kirk Douglas March 2002: 31 Days of Oscar April 2002: Barbara Stanwyck May 2002: Edward G. Robinson June 2002: Greta Garbo July 2002: Sidney Poitier Aug. 2002: Joan Crawford Sept. 2002: Van Heflin Oct. 2002: Final films Nov. 2002: Shelly Winters Dec. 2002: Montgomery Clift Jan. 2003: Doris Day Feb. 2003: John Garfield Mar. 2003: 31 Days of Oscar Apr. 2003: Harold Lloyd May 2003: Olivia de Havilland June 2003: TV Actors in Films July 2003: Lee Marvin Aug. 2003: 1st Summer Under the Stars Sept. 2003: James Mason Oct. 2003: Boris Karloff Nov. 2003: Shirley MacLaine Dec. 2003: David Niven Jan. 2004: Katherine Hepburn Feb.2004: 31 Days of Oscar Mar.2004: Charles Chaplin Apr. 2004: Judy Garland May 2004: Greer Garson June 2004: Cary Grant July 2004: Stars That Died Before Their Time Aug.2004: 2nd Summer Under the Stars Sept.2004: Myrna Loy Oct. 2004: Peter Lorre Nov.2004: Clark Gable Dec. 2004: James Stewart Jan.2005: Canadian Actors Feb. 2005: 31 Days of Oscar Mar. 2005: Claudette Colbert Apr. 2005: Errol Flynn May 2005: Orson Welles June 2005: Ingrid Bergman July 2005: Audrey Hepburn Aug. 2005: 3rd Summer Under the Stars Sept.2005: Greta Garbo Oct.2005: Robert Mitchum Nov.2005: Joan Fontaine Dec. 2005: Bing Crosby Jan. 2006: Robert Montgomery Feb.2006: 31 Days of Oscar Mar.2006: Nelson Eddy & Jeanette MacDonald Apr.2006: Deborah Kerr May 2006: Bette Davis June 2006: Anthony Quinn July 2006: Elizabeth Taylor Aug.2006: 4th Summer Under the Stars Sept.2006: William Holden Oct.2006: Child Stars Nov.2006: Lucille Ball Dec. 2006: Gary Cooper Jan.2007: Jean Arthur Feb.2007: 31 Days of Oscar Mar.2007: Gene Kelly Apr.2007: Rita Hayworth May 2007: John Wayne and Katherine Hepburn June 2007: Ida Lupino July 2007: Randolph Scott Aug.2007: 5th Summer Under the Stars Sept.2007: A Star is Born (starmaking/breakthrough performances) Oct.2007: Henry Fonda Nov.2007: Guest Programmer Month Dec.2007: Irene Dunne Jan.2008: James Cagney Feb.2008: 31 Days of Oscar Mar.2008: Acting Dynasties Apr.2008: Hedy Lamarr May 2008: Frank Sinatra June 2008: Sophia Loren July 2008: Rosalind Russell Aug.2008: 6th annual Summer Under the Stars Sept.2008: Kay Francis Oct.2008: Carole Lombard Nov.2008: Charles Laughton Dec. 2008: Joseph Cotton Jan. 2009: Jack Lemmon Feb. 2009: 31 Days of Oscar Mar. 2009: Ronald Reagan April 2009: Funny Ladies and 15th Anniversary May 2009: Sean Connery June 2009: Great Directors July 2009: Stewart Granger August 2009: Summer Under the Stars Sept. 2009: Claude Rains Oct. 2009: Leslie Caron Nov. 2009: Grace Kelly Dec. 2009: Humphrey Bogart Jan. 2010: “The Method” Feb. 2010: 31 Days of Oscar March 2010: Ginger Rogers April 2010: Robert Taylor May 2010: Donna Reed June 2010: Natalie Wood July 2010: Gregory Peck August 2010: SUTS Sept. 2010: Vivien Leigh Oct. 2010: Fredric March Nov. 2010: Ava Gardner Dec. 2010: Mickey Rooney Jan. 2011: Peter Sellers Feb. 2011: 31 Days of Oscar March 2011: Jean Harlow April 2011: Ray Milland May 2011: Esther Williams June 2011: Jean Simmons July 2011: Singing cowboys August 2011 SUTS

When Grace Kelly was SOTM they had only 11 films to work with so they padded it out with at least two TV dramas and a short about her wedding.

Incidentally, Howard Hawks directed two unrelated films called "The Road To Glory" -- one a silent in 1926 (starring May McAvoy, later of "The Jazz Singer" fame; a teenaged Carole Lombard also had a small role, eight years before her triumph with Hawks in "Twentieth Century"), the other an adventure film in 1936. Following up on that line of facts, actress Jacqueline Obradors appeared in a film titled CROSSING OVER in 1996 and another unrelated film of the same title in 2009.

......and to yet another new level. If you can't think of any more, I'll bet there AREN'T any more. Lon Chaney, Jr. played in two versions of TEN FATHOMS DEEP, but in the first he was the hero and in the second one he was the villain.

The 1931 film

About what year could Columbia be said to have departed "poverty row" and joined the majors? You ask a good question. Personally, I believe that the studio is a victim of being given almost no credit at all. Even the other night in his intro to SAHARA, they had Ben describing the studio as just about being slightly ahead of PRC and Monogram. It was a bit inaccurate. While many think of it as being a case of Capra alone bringing them recognition in the 30s, Hawks, Ford, Milestone, von Sternberg, Leo McCarey, Boleslawski and Stevens had all made at least one film each at the studio before the start of the war. Granted, the ratio of B films to A films was probably higher here than at MGM or Paramount, but I think that Columbia rose rather quickly to a position of respect. Their biggest handicap was the need to borrow stars from other studios, but that also indicates that they must have had something to trade. I would venture to say that historians would give the breakthrough point as being circa 1950, when films such as ALL THE KING'S MEN, BORN YESTERDAY, FROM HERE TO ETERNITY, THE CAINE MUTINY, ON THE WATERFRONT and PICNIC all showed up in successive years (or almost consecutive) to win Oscar nominations and some wins. A few years later came THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI to validate the newfound status of the little engine that could.

When I see that Columbia logo bathed in glorious black&white and the film was from the '50's, I know it's gonna be good. Columbia had a great decade in the 50s, ladened with Oscar glory and numerous hits. They even finally managed to create their own stars in Lemmon, Holliday and Novak and still squeezed a few more films from Holden and Ford before they walked away. It was full speed ahead for Columbia who didn't have the problems of the other majors in shedding a theater chain or getting rid of aging contract players. I too have a fondness for the "run of the mill" B&W Columbia films of the period, THE KILLER THAT STALKED NEW YORK (a candidate for the best "B" film ever made), THE MOB, THE GLASS WALL, THE SNIPER and 711 OCEAN DRIVE are glorious and still to come were Budd Boetticher and Ray Harryhausen.

Charles Vidor took Cohn to court and was claiming abuse. He cited the many instances that Cohn had used profanity toward him. Cohn's lawyers responded, offering dozens of ways in which Cohn used profanity to express good tidings and the judge called out "enough" after hearing a number of them. I've worked for people like that - and they weren't all males.

That bio has been updated and there are a few extra anecdotes in there now that weren't in there previously. I bought that book back in 1970 and a couple of years ago my sister found the revised copy in a Dollar Store and bought it for me. One new tidbit was that Cohn's mother never let him forget that he was born in an outhouse. Only she used a rougher term for it but the last six letters are the same. This was when the facilities were literally outside the house and more happened in there than Mother Cohn expected when she went in to do her business. Either he WAS cruder than most, or else we just haven't heard enough about the others.

I knew one - the man was stepfather to my best friend. They moved away and a couple of years later the man killed his wife and his own son. It was my friend who discovered the bodies and that haunted him for the next 25 years - he committed suicide on the anniversary of the burial of his mother. That happened to be my own wedding anniversary and he was best man. I used to repair phones in Little Italy and rubbed shoulders with a lot of wise guys - not that I know that any of them actually killed anyone. I had to fix the phone in Umberto's Clam House after Crazy Joe Gallo was killed there - you could see the bullet holes in the wall. It was the bullets that put the phone out of order.

It reminds me of some of the charming serial killers who go around the country killing young women. I hope that you don't know any of them personally. Then again Fred, you have made mention of various places that you have lived...

Leith comes from Cleveland, she just a Virginia by name.

Could it possibly be FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042472/

You're probably right. For that reason, I've often given Sony credit for issuing a pristine DVD copy of HIS GIRL FRIDAY when the market was already glutted with cheap PD copies.

Did he say that - I missed his opening. Still a bit of a curiosity as to why Zanuck would loan his son-in-law who had made about ten films for Fox already, to UA, along with four performers and the property rights. Maybe he just wanted the kid out of his hair. Perhaps Richard D. Zanuck was enough for DFZ to handle at this point.

I'm glad that you liked it.

When did Rondo Hatton pose for the new John Huston stamp?

Somewhere I read that Hitchcock insisted on it being that he had used VistaVision for his Paramount films REAR WINDOW and TO CATCH A THIEF. But that same source claimed it was the only MGM film in the process although the credits for HIGH SOCIETY claim otherwise. You just can't believe everything you read, so ignore the previous paragraph.

MGM even used VistaVision for a couple of films such as NORTH BY NORTHWEST and HIGH SOCIETY.