AndyM108

My only complaint about the movie is I would like to have seen a shot of "Steve's" face after "Jim" found his mom. <3 I agree that the one thing that would have improved the movie would have been to stretch out the ending for another half minute or so in order to savor the moment, but when you see the looks on the faces of Jim and his "mommy" it almost doesn't seem to matter than much. I watched it a second time after I began this thread, this time with my wife, and not only was she also blown away by the experience, to me it was ever better as an encore presentation. It's discoveries like this that make me go over the program guide like a gold prospector at least two or three times an issue, just to make sure I don't miss anything.

Thanks for posting the list, but brother, look at all the repeats. It'd be nice to see them broaden their definition of "Essentials" beyond movies we've seen a hundred times before. A few foreign or non-Chaplin / Lloyd / Keaton silent movies would be greatly appreciated. OTOH at least we're being spared Splendor in the Grass for what seems like the 10th time in the past two years, so I guess I should count my blessings. Thank God for the other 21 hours of the day, because it's not just "The Essentials"--- TCM prime time in general is fast becoming little more than 3 hours worth of Greatest Hits and No Surprises.

Has anyone else noticed: That it was ludicrous to cast two blond actresses as the daughters of Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson? That there was zero chemistry between Dennis Hopper and the actress playing his wife? The main thing I noticed about Giant is that the 23 year old Elizabeth Taylor was playing a very unconvincing grandmother, as well as playing a mother to a 19 year old actor. Barbara Stanwyck she ain't. If it hadn't been for James Dean ending his career with a bang, this movie would've been one of the all-time clinkers. It was a virtual Encyclopedia of Shopworn Stereotypes and Tiresome Cliches.

Its a tie: William Powell as Nick Charles and Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes ! Everyone else is second rate I'd definitely agree that those are the top two, but even though they're B-movies, I'll never get tired of Warren William's version of The Lone Wolf, or Chester Morris's Boston ****. The pizzaz is there, even if some of the plots are kind of pedestrian. Oland's Charlie Chan isn't too bad, either. There are plenty of other great ones, some of which have already been named, but I figure that half a dozen films in the same role is the minimum for consideration.

No, Jack Warner was a Democrat. I'll respond to that the easy way by simply quoting Jack Warner's wiki entry below. In addition, Steven J. Ross's Hollywood Left and Right: How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics refers to Harry and Jack Warner as "longtime Republicans" who "bolted" to FDR in 1932. He also notes that Warner joined Louis B. Mayer in putting out propaganda films in favor of the Republican candidate for California governor in 1934. And when someone asked him in 1968 what he thought of Ronald Reagan for president, he replied, "No, Jimmy Stewart (another Republican) for president, Ronald Reagan for his best friend" . Anyway, from the wiki: An ardent Republican, Jack Warner nevertheless supported Franklin D. Roosevelt in the early 1930s.^[[5]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-bw59-4] ^Later in the decade, he made common cause with opponents of Nazi Germany, overlooking ideological differences with those who held [leftist|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-wing_politics|Left-wing politics] political views.^[[7]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-bw68-6] ^In 1947, however, Warner served as a "friendly witness" for the [House Un-American Activities Committee|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_Un-American_Activities_Committee|House Un-American Activities Committee] (HUAC), thereby lending support to allegations of a "Red" infiltration of Hollywood.^[[8]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-bw377-8-7] ^Warner felt that Communists were responsible for the studio's month-long strike that occurred in the fall of 1946,^[[156]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-W273-155]^^[[157]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-thomas165-156]^[Alvah Bessie|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvah_Cecil_Bessie|Alvah Cecil Bessie], [Howard Koch|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Koch_%28screenwriter%29|Howard Koch (screenwriter)], [Ring Lardner Jr.|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_Lardner_Jr.|Ring Lardner Jr.], [John Howard Lawson|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Howard_Lawson|John Howard Lawson], [Albert Maltz|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Maltz|Albert Maltz], [Robert Rossen|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Rossen|Robert Rossen], [Dalton Trumbo|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalton_Trumbo|Dalton Trumbo], [Clifford Odets|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Odets|Clifford Odets], and [irwin Shaw|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irwin_Shaw|Irwin Shaw].^[[158]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-cepeng279-280-157] ^As one biographer observed, Warner "was furious when [Humphrey Bogart|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humphrey_Bogart|Humphrey Bogart], [Lauren Bacall|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauren_Bacall|Lauren Bacall], [Paul Henreid|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Henreid|Paul Henreid] and [John Huston|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Huston|John Huston] joined other members of the stellar [Committee for the First Amendment|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_the_First_Amendment|Committee for the First Amendment] in a flight to [Washington|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington,_D.C.|Washington, D.C.] to preach against the threat to free expression".^[[157]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-thomas165-156] ^Lester D. Friedman noted that Warner's response to the HUAC hearings was similar to other Jewish studio heads who "feared that a blanket equation of Communists with Jews would destroy them and their industry".^[[159]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-friedman141-158]^ and on his own initiative, he provided the names of a dozen screenwriters who were dismissed because of suspected Communist sympathies, a move that effectively destroyed their careers. Former studio employees named by Warner included Warner publicly supported Richard Nixon during the 1960 presidential election and paid for full-page ads in [The New York Times|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times|The New York Times] "to proclaim why Nixon should be elected".^[[160]|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Warner#cite_note-thomas237-159]

Did anyone watch that extraordinary Montgomery Clift movie ( The Search ) this morning and find it as moving as I did? I hesitate to make any comparisons to Germany: Year Zero or any of the other great neo-realist films of the postwar period, but I don't think I've ever seen a Hollywood movie set in Europe in the immediate aftermath of World War II that's ever rung so absolutely true a note. And while I have a congenital hatred for code-required Hollywood "happy endings", only a complete misanthrope couldn't have been brought to tears of joy by the final moments of this one. I noted that the Czech boy who played the leading role won a special juvenile award---and did he ever deserve it! Aline MacMahon---has there ever been a movie she didn't add a special dimension to? And it's not surprising that Montgomery Clift was as good as ever, but what a debut!

Andy, I am a little curious, but I'm not going to read this thread because I don't want to know their political affiliations. I discovered years ago that the more I read about classic actors' personal lives, the more that information interferes with my enjoyment of their films and the characters they play . Fred, To each his own, but if anything I like knowing little factoids like an actor's political beliefs, because it adds a dimension to their characters. I've always heard that "all actors were Democrats", but the more I've come to learn about Hollywood's golden age, the more I realize that this isn't the case at all. And in fact I'm kind of enjoying the discovery that some of my favorite actors like Barbara Stanwyck, Robert Montgomery, Robert Taylor, Sylvia Sidney and Richard Barthelmess were Republicans, because it helps break down my comfortable stereotypes. While at the same time, knowing that some of my other favorites like Robert Ryan, Richard Widmark and Ernest Borgnine were liberals reminded me that actors are just acting those roles they're playing. And BTW to Sprocket Man, Jack Warner was a Republican before and after Franklin D. Roosevelt. But then so were many other Americans---just look at the electoral maps of 1928 and 1952.

It seems funny to me, that since a majority of Hollywood actors (according to what is witnessed here) lean to the right, that the Screen Actors Guild, essentially a labor union, somehow took hold. It makes sense if you realize that in the early days the SAG was essentially a makeshift coalition between conservative actors (like Robert Montgomery) who looked upon it as a craft union, and liberal actors (like John Garfield) who wanted to broaden its scope into areas beyond Hollywood. It was only when these outside issues began to intrude that the SAG split in half along more traditional political lines.

Couldn't you just copy and set your original list in *Rich Text*, then color the names? That's what I did. Or you could *Bold *text one, Italic the other. I would've done that, except that with my Word program (which I copied here), I would've had to do this one name at a time. I can't just highlight a single column and bold it in toto . It's a quirk of Word that I've never been able to negate.

The list I was working from showed 48 for Willkie and 42 for Roosevelt. When I combined the list and made it alphabetical, one of them got omitted, but since both of the original columns were scrambled in my Word program, it was hard to find the missing name. Perhaps you can spot it. As to why the list broke down the way it did, what people tend to forget sometimes was the political influence that Louis B. Mayer had over his stable of actors. Look at the list with the correct answers provided, and I'm pretty sure you'll find a strong correlation between Republicans and MGM. And it should also be noted that this is only a list of public endorsements, not a comprehensive list of all actors. Take it for what it is, an interesting but hardly definitive overview of the Hollywood of 72 years ago. EDIT: The columns below got scrambled, but the *FIRST* column, from O'Brien to Huston, represents the Roosevelt backers, and the second and third columns, from Arden to Scott and Sheridan to Vidor, represent the Willkie backers. Needless to say, my formatting skills are nonexistent. h2. {color:blue}FOR ROOSEVELT {color:red}FOR WILLKIE *Pat O’Brien Eve Arden Ann Sheridan* *Walter Huston Edward Arnold Ann Sothern* *Robert Benchley Fred Astaire Preston Sturges* *Priscilla Lane Lionel Barrymore Mrs. Spencer Tracy* *Jane Wyman Richard Barthelmess Lee Tracy* *Frank Capra Wallace Beery King Vidor* *Katherine Hepburn Joan Blondell* *Henry Fonda Mrs. Humphrey Bogart* *Betty Grable Charles Coburn* *George Cukor Gary Cooper* *John Ford Broderick Crawford* *Rosemary Lane Donald Crisp* *Andy Devine Bing Crosby* *Thomas Mitchell Cecil B. DeMille* *Charles Bickford Walt Disney* *Humphrey Bogart Irene Dunne* *Melvyn Douglas Nelson Eddy* *Garson Kanin W.C. Fields* *Bud Schulberg Corinne Griffith* *Jerome Kern Margaret Hamilton* *James Cagney Hedda Hopper* *Stu Erwin Edward Everett Horton* *Rosalind Russell Allan Jones* *George Bancroft Guy Kibbee* *Claude Rains Harold Lloyd* *Eddie “Rochester” Anderson Fred MacMurray* *John Garfield Leo McCarey* *George Raft Joel McCrea* *Michael Curtiz Hattie McDaniel* *Dorothy Parker Zeppo Marx* *Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Adophe Menjou* *Dorothy Lamour Una Merkel* *Edward G. Robinson Ray Milland* *Miriam Hopkins Robert Montgomery* *William Wyler Dennis Morgan* *Billie Burke George Murphy* *Ira Gershwin Edna May Oliver* *Anita Loos Franklin Pangborn* *Dore Schary Mary Pickford* *Jack L. Warner, Jr. Dick Powell* *Billy Wilder William Powell* *John Huston Randolph Scott* Edited by: AndyM108 on Feb 7, 2012 9:40 AM

Well, obviously there was armed resistance in many countries, so you're talking about Hollywood, not real life. But armies with no conscience can generally control and suppress such resistance, especially when they've got such a big supply of collaborators and informants among the population. Personally, I find it funny that everyone in 90% of those silly American WWII movies made in the 1940's seems to speak perfectly unaccented U.S. English, but then that's why when I want to watch WWII movies that don't insult my intelligence, I generally go to Netflix and rent the far superior foreign ones.

TIME LIMIT (1957)...as director only...with Richard Widmark, Richard Basehart & Dolores Michaels That's the best movie of the entire month. Anyone who hasn't seen this extraordinary film should mark it on their calendar. Widmark and Basehart are perfectly cast, and the plot doesn't strike a single false note.

Not too bad, casablancalover. You got 43 right, 30 wrong, and 16 that you entered in either black or purple, which I didn't count. Your most blatant misses were Robert Montgomery (a long-time and fairly prominent Hollywood Republican), Dore Schary and Budd Schulberg (both vocal liberals), and Jack Warner, who actually was a Republican but stuck close to Roosevelt for business reasons. OTOH at least you didn't repeat the mistakes of the first person I gave this quiz to, who identified Leo McCarey (of My Son John fame), Adolphe Menjou (John Birch Society) and George Murphy (Ronald Reagan's later political mentor) as Democrats---ouch! In case it was merely my browser or my eyesight that made me view those 16 as black or purple, here they are again if you want to complete your "ballot": George Bancroft Joan Blondell Donald Crisp Cecil B. DeMille Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. W. C. Fields Ira Gershwin Betty Grable Corinne Griffith Margaret Hamilton Miriam Hopkins Zeppo Marx Thomas Mitchell Una Merkel Edna May Oliver Rosalind Russell One hint: Of these 16, there were 6 Roosevelt supporters and 10 Willkie backers.

Gotta go with football tomorrow. Two very good and closely matched teams in a rematch of the best Super Bowl ever, and besides, the TCM competition tomorrow night is less than stellar. Kind of a no-brainer this time around. Now if it were Louise Brooks or Jean Gabin going up against the Cowboys vs. the Bills or the Vikings vs. the Dolphins, I might see it a bit differently.

Recently I was browsing through an old political magazine, and I discovered a long list of Hollywood endorsements in the 1940 presidential election between Franklin D. Roosevelt (D) and Wendell Willkie ®. Below is the combined list of the Hollywood figures who were asked for their preferences. Okay, now try to separate the FDR supporters from the Willkie backers. Show your guesses by highlighting *the Dems in blue* and *the Republicans in red* . I have to admit that there are some of these I never could have guessed myself. Eddie "Rochester" Anderson Eve Arden Edward Arnold Fred Astaire George Bancroft Lionel Barrymore Richard Barthelmess Wallace Beery Robert Benchley Charles Bickford Joan Blondell Humphrey Bogart Mrs. Humphrey Bogart Billie Burke James Cagney Frank Capra Charles Coburn Gary Cooper Broderick Crawford Donald Crisp Bing Crosby George Cukor Michael Curtiz Andy Devine Melvyn Douglas Cecil B. DeMille Walt Disney Irene Dunne Nelson Eddy Stu Erwin Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. W. C. Fields Henry Fonda John Ford John Garfield Ira Gershwin Betty Grable Corinne Griffith Margaret Hamilton Katharine Hepburn Miriam Hopkins Hedda Hopper Edward Everett Horton Walter Huston Allan Jones Garson Kanin Jerome Kern Guy Kibbee Dorothy Lamour Priscilla Lane Rosemary Lane Harold Lloyd Anita Loos Fred MacMurray Zeppo Marx Leo McCarey Joel McCrea Hattie McDaniel Thomas Mitchell Adolphe Menjou Una Merkel Ray Milland Robert Montgomery Dennis Morgan George Murphy Pat O'Brien Edna May Oliver Franklin Pangborn Dorothy Parker Mary Pickford Dick Powell William Powell George Raft Claude Rains Edward G. Robinson Rosalind Russell Dore Schary Budd Schulberg Randolph Scott Ann Sheridan Ann Sothern Preston Sturges Mrs. Spencer Tracy Lee Tracy King Vidor Jack L. Warner, Jr. Billy Wilder William Wyler Jane Wyman

For a drama: The slowly rising steel helmet in The Steel Helmet http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/video/247273/Steel-Helmet-The-Movie-Clip-Opening-Zack.html For a musical: Ginger Rogers singing "We're in the Money" in Pig Latin in Gold Diggers of 1933

The only time I usually get nervous is when an overnight movie before 1965 has an RO introduction and the running time indicates that it'll end right at the time that the next film begins. I have an old fashioned DVD recorder and try to record everything manually, but if I can't be there to monitor it, and it looks as if it's going to overlap, I always assume that the second movie is going to start at least 2 minutes after the scheduled time, and I'll set the timer for the first movie to end one minute before that. And on the other end, on just about any film after 1965, you can safely cut the last few minutes without missing anything but those stupid scrolls that list the first 217 production assistants. I'm archival in my mentality, but not *that* archival . If something's got to give when I'm recording overnight, it's going to be Miz Streep's 4th assistant costume designer, not the opening scene. Bottom line is that I agree with those below who say that it's up to you to make the adjustments, even if it does get a bit frustrating when you see a midnight movie at 119 minutes followed by a 2:00 AM movie, and you don't really know how much RO's intro to the midnight show is going to push the transition over the line. Where are those sleep-inducing travel shorts when we really need them?

johnm_001, I appreciate your taking the time to explain your take on My Fair Lady , especially given your professional background. As I said, I'd never seen the stage version, and watching the film cold, I was taken by both Audrey and Harrison, not to mention the music. In terms of the cinematic production, I can't really say, because I seldom look at movies that way: I'm interested primarily in the story's general credibility (which doesn't really apply in a film like this, since the "plot" is little more than an enjoyable fantasy) and the projection of the actors' personalities onto their characters, which in this case I found spot-on. And in the case of musicals, of course, there's the music itself. Production values come into play only in a limited number of genres, primarily noirs and gangster movies. Oh, and here's my wild card: Like Audrey, my wife is a total free-spirited gamine , and every time I see either of them I'm reminded of the other. And even though this is the only Hepburn movie I actually enjoy other than Wait Until Dark , I can never really get too put off by anything she appears in. I hope you can understand this. (smile)

As several others have already pointed out, Davis and Tracy were part of the studio system, and it would be very difficult for comparable actors to emerge today. The closest comparisons that come to mind would be Judy Davis and Al Pacino, but it's a bit like comparing Sammy Baugh to Peyton Manning. IOW it's fun to talk about, but impossible to resolve in terms of any "ranking".

Okay, johnm001, thanks for the clarification. As I said, musicals in general leave me cold to begin with, and I have a hard time thinking of many I'd even watch more than once. CABARET - which took everything I diliked about the show, and amplified it for the film, while cutting the few bits I liked about the show. Not a Fosse fan, anyway. He holds the distinction for worst-choreographed musical number in a motion picture ("Once a Year Day", from PAJAMA GAME). Never has so much great dance music gone to such waste . I liked Cabaret for one reason: Minnelli and Joel Gray. The plot is a farce, that "Stag in the Meadow" scene is cringeworthy, and many of the songs are more out of Vegas than Weimar. But seeing Liza in her (very brief) prime is enough to keep it on my list. And Joel Gray's performance was one of the few that caught the real Weimar spirit. MY FAIR LADY - the complete embalming of the greatest stage experience of my life. The lines and songs may be the same, but in tone, texture and execution, the differences between the stage and screen, couldn't be more vasr. The only time I can recall a stage show having more scope than a motion picture! My very least favorite musical film, because its source is my absolute favorite musical . Never having seen the stage version, it's hard to compare them. I love the original Broadway soundtrack, and I can understand the yearning for the more authentic Julie Andrews Eliza. But Audrey is pure magic, and singing voice aside, she was born for this role. I admit I might feel differently if I'd been able to see the original play. GUYS AND DOLLS - anytime they play fast a furious with something so great, it's bound to fail. Studio-bound, replaceing great (award-winning) songs and lines with inferior ones, and horribly miscast ! This one barely made my list, and to be honest, it's mostly Stubby Kaye that did it. That, and the fact that I spent much of my misspent young adulthood in a Maryland pool room called Guys and Dolls, and I'm a *VERY* sentimental kinda fella. A STAR IS BORN - Other than Judy's vocals, and "Swanee", which is a wonderfully staged musical number, the film is torture, for me. I don't like a single character in it . Okay, here we're just occupying different planets. I can't think of a single moment in this entire movie I didn't like, right down to the "This is Mrs. Norman Maine" closing line. There's a very fine (and often subjective) line between honest sentiment and formula bathos, and IMO A Star Is Born never went over the edge. Garland was Garland at her best, Mason was wholly credible and suitably obnoxious, and Carson and Bickford were solid backups, as was Tommy Noonan in the part of Judy's ballast. In fact it's the only musical I can think up that actually succeeds as a serious drama. DIE 3-GROSCHEN-OPERA - While I can appreciate some of its production design, the film is neither good cinema nor good theater. Just something lost in translation . Another case of different taste and nothing more. Not being fluent in German, I like the original 1954 off-Broadway stage version the best of all, but I still liked this 1931 movie a lot more than I'd expected to, and it seems to improve with repeated viewings. OTOH I'm glad to see that the three Berkeleys were spared your wrath, since those are the three that I return to the most often. Of critics of 42nd Street , I can only say that it must have been tough on their mothers, not having any children....

Johnm001, now you're messing with my mind. Which five? Is it the four pre-codes plus Cabaret, or is it the five from the 50's and 60's? Or is it a mix? *NOBODY* can possibly dislike 42nd Street , but other than that, I can see where purely personal preference comes into play.

I listed my top 10 overall, Hollywood and comedies a few weeks ago. Here are my top 10 musicals and my favorite songs within each one, in no particular order after the first two. I'm not a fan of the genre, but there are always exceptions. A Star Is Born (Garland version / The Man Who Got Away) 42nd Street (You're Getting To Be A Habit With Me / 42nd Street) Footlight Parade (Shanghai Lil) Damn Yankees (You've Gotta Have Heart) My Fair Lady (I Could Have Danced All Night) Die 3-Groschen-Opera (Three Penny Opera, 1931 film / Pirate Jenny) Gold Diggers of 1933 (Remember My Forgotten Man) Singing in the Rain (Singing In The Rain) Cabaret (Willkommen) Guys and Dolls (Horse Right Here)

This may seem like a trivial complaint to non-sports fans, but I sure wish that TCM could have scheduled these relatively un-shown Lugosi movies at a time that didn't conflict with the final game of the NFL conference playoffs, which will probably end somewhere in the neighborhood of 10:00 pm. Eight o' clock tonight would have been a perfect time to show Splendor in the Grass or North by Northwest for about the 5000th time, rather than showing two early Lugosis that have seldom if ever been screened before.

Andy, you can't bring up the Nicholas brothers in this discussion. It isn't FAIR to Astair or Kelly. I mean, THOSE guys defied every law of physics possible!. The Nicholas Brothers were featured in a movie called Orchestra Wives that played on the Fox Movie Channel in December. If you've never seen it, be sure to check it out---they were on towards the end and completely stole the show. On a loosely related note, there's a great story about Billy Eckstine that I heard just after he'd passed back in 1993. Seems like Old Blue Eyes had looked in on one of Eckstine's concerts and let it be known to one of his managers that he'd "love to have a voice like that" , meaning a voice like Mr. B's. When the manager passed on Sinatra's compliment, Eckstine didn't miss a beat: "You tell that mother###### give me his money, and he can *have* my g*dd*m voice!"

Main point in Astaire's favor: In addition to being one of the best dancers this side of the Nicholas Brothers, he was the greatest cue artist that Hollywood has ever known, including Jackie Gleason. Don't let his "angelic" looks fool you. Main point in Kelly's favor: His performance in Singing in the Rain led us to our first sustained gander at Cyd Charisse's gams. The tiebreaker: Kelly resisted the reactionary tide of Hollywood politics in the 50's, while Astaire never said much about anything once he stepped outside the lot. Nothing wrong with that, but I gotta give Gene the edge here.