AndyM108

*1965* seems like a big falloff in quality from 1964, but maybe I just haven't been exposed to the best ones. Only the first 3 or 4 are really notable, and the last one is scraping the bottom of the barrel. 1. The Battle of Algiers 2. Red Beard 3. Darling 4. The Cincinnati Kid 5. Once a Thief 6. The Collector 7. Story of a Prostitute 8. Bunny Lake Is Missing 9. Inside Daisy Clover 10. The Train Underrated: Once a Thief Embarrassingly overrated: A Thousand Clowns Have to see: The Round-Up; Repulsion; Alphaville; Pierrot Le Fou; Yo Yo; Ship of Fools Best actor: Toshiro Mifune (Red Beard); Brahim Haggiag (The Battle of Algiers); Steve McQueen (The Cincinnati Kid) Best actress: Julie Christie (Darling) Best supporting actor: Jean Martin (The Battle of Algiers); Mohamed Ben Kassen (The Battle of Algiers); Edward G. Robinson (The Cincinnati Kid) Best supporting actress: Joan Blondell (The Cincinnati Kid) Total number of films viewed: About 20

Lots of terrific movies from *1964*. I can't think of any other year with as many Oscar-worthy performances by so many actresses. Of course none of my choices even got nominated (not even Audrey - - - good grief), but that's Hollywood for ya. 1. Nothing But a Man 2. One Potato, Two Potato 3. Band of Outsiders 4. Dead Ringer 5. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg 6. My Fair Lady 7. Where Love Has Gone 8. Diary of a Chambermaid 9. The Naked Kiss 10. Fate Is the Hunter Best of the rest: The Visit; Strait-Jacket; The Pawnbroker; Man in the Middle; Marnie; Seven Days in May; Dr. Strangelove; Signpost to Murder Underrated: One Potato, Two Potato; Dead Ringer; Where Love Has Gone Overrated: Zorba the Greek Have to see: Topkapi; The Pumpkin Eater; Kwaidan; I Am Cuba Best actor: Ivan Dixon (Nothing But a Man); Rex Harrison (My Fair Lady) Best actress: Barbara Barrie (One Potato, Two Potato); Anna Karina (Band of Outsiders); Audrey Hepburn (My Fair Lady); Susan Hayward (Dead Ringer); Catherine Deneuve (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg); Bette Davis (Dead Ringer); Jeanne Moreau (Diary of a Chambermaid); Constance Towers (The Naked Kiss); Tippi Hedren (Marnie); Ingrid Bergman (The Visit) (That's 10 if you're counting) Best supporting actor: Karl Malden (Dead Ringer) Best supporting actress: Bette Davis (Where Love Has Gone) Total number of films viewed: About 30 - 35

Many of you are probably aware of one of classic film's better blogs out there, Farran Nehme's "Self-Styled Siren". I catch up with it every few weeks, and just discovered this wonderful tribute to Juanita Moore that was posted on January 4th. Definitely worth reading for many reasons: http://selfstyledsiren.blogspot.com/2014/01/in-memoriam-juanita-moore-1914-2014.html

When I first got the FMC in May of 2010, I was seeing all kinds of films that rarely if ever show up on TCM: *Thieves' Highway; Call Her Savage; House of Bamboo; Whirlpool; I Wake Up Screaming; Vicki; Cry of the City; Murder, Inc., Breaking Away; My Cousin Vinnie; etc., etc.* In the first two years I got over 75 titles. In the last two years: About 10. Besides cutting down from 24 hours to 12 hours, all they now show are repeats of an ever-narrowing range of titles. I have no idea why they even keep it up.

I'd seen Phone Call From a Stranger in my pre-TCM days and had forgotten about it. But you're right, that was one of Davis's finest post-All About Eve performances, even if she didn't appear till right near the end of the movie. It's available on YouTube, but I still wish that TCM would show it again one of these years. Too bad that it was produced by Fox. BTW speaking of Fox, what's up with the Fox Movie Channel schedule? I can't find it anywhere on its website; it only shows the listings for their commercial-strewn later movies that show from 3:00 PM to 3:00 AM.

Aside from King Vidor's Applause, McKinney has been shown on TCM frequently in the past in a 1932 musical short, Pie, Pie Blackbird, in which she's a bit of a knockout, with a great jazzy singing voice and sexy glamour to spare. In Dorothy Mackail's Safe In Hell, McKinney also has a fairly visible role as the hotel operator in Mackail's Caribbean hideaway. TCM showed that movie twice in 2011, but not since then.

*1963* is pretty weak tea once you get past the top 10, though there are others that I haven't seen that might make the list 1. High and Low (Strong candidate for all time top 10) 2. Bay of Angels 3. I Could Go On Singing 4. Twilight of Honor 5. Shock Corridor 6. Crisis (A documentary on George Wallace at the schoolhouse door) 7. The Cardinal 8. The Birds 9. Lord of the Flies 10. A Child Is Waiting Underrated: Bay of Angels; I Could Go On Singing Have to see: 8 1/2; The V.I.P.'s; Contempt; The Running Man; Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow Best actor: Toshiro Mifune (High and Low) Best actress: Jeanne Moreau (Bay of Angels) Total number of films seen: About 20

The Hustler. I had that movie on my "Best of the rest" for 1961, and I had George C. Scott as the best supporting actor of the year. But having spent a good part of my past 50 years in pool rooms, from that perspective once you get past the Scott and Gleason characters, the movie's virtues are minimal, beginning with the fact that Paul Newman's pool shooting reminds me of Gary Cooper's ballplaying in The Pride of the Yankees.

1----REAR WINDOW 2----SEPARATE TABLES 3-----MARTY 4-----WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION 5-----12 ANGRY MEN 6------ANATOMY OF A MURDER 7-----THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL 8-----THE CATERED AFFAIR 9-----SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS 10----STRANGERS ON A TRAIN The only one that should raise any eyebrows is THE CATERED AFFAIR, which I feel is very, yes, underrated. I only had your #4 and #7 on my Top 12 list below, and yet there's not a single film on your list which at some point I might not have considered a candidate for a Top 10 movie of the decade. When you take the 1950's as a whole, that was one extraordinary decade for Hollywood - - - not to mention for all those foreign studios whose films we didn't list.

TCM will keep showing it until people can read Leo G. Carroll's lips and figure out what he is saying to Cary Grant at the airport. I always thought the key word was "plastics," and the other stuff was just white noise.

My overall top 12 movies of the 50's, with foreign titles excluded: 1. All About Eve (1950) 2. Vertigo (1958) 3. A Star Is Born (1954) 4. Time Limit (1957) 5. On The Waterfront (1954) 6. The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) 7. House of Bamboo (1955) 8. The Asphalt Jungle (1950) 9. Witness For The Prosecution (1957) 10. Kiss Me Deadly (1955) 11. Sudden Fear (1952) 12. The Big Heat (1953) Best of the rest (alphabetical order): Anna Lucasta (1959) Cry Danger (1951); Dial M For Murder (1954); Executive Suite (1954); Footsteps in the Fog (1955); The Light Touch (1952); The Night Holds Terror (1955); Three Came Home (1950); Trial (1955); While The City Sleeps (1956); The Young Philadelphians (1959) Most underrated movie of the decade: Time Limit. The court martial hearing's denouement makes the whole setup and finale in The Caine Mutiny seem like a simplistic first grade cartoon by comparison. Best actor: James Stewart (Vertigo); Marlon Brando (On the Waterfront); Kirk Douglas (The Bad and the Beautiful) Best actress: Bette Davis (All About Eve); Judy Garland (A Star Is Born); Kim Novak (Vertigo) Best supporting actor: George Sanders (All About Eve) Best supporting actress: Gloria Grahame (The Big Heat) The 1950's were a transitional decade, but IMO its best movies stack up equally to those of any other ten year period. In fact, overall it may be the best decade of them all.

*1962* is another year where I haven't seen enough movies to make any sort of definitive list, but here's what I've got so far: 1. Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? 2. My Life to Live 3. Walk on the Wild Side 4. The Manchurian Candidate 5. Birdman of Alcatraz 6. Cape Fear 7. Requiem For a Heavyweight 8. Experiment in Terror 9. Jules and Jim 10. Madison Avenue Best of the rest: Days of Wine and Roses; House of Women Underrated: My Life to Live; Walk on the Wild Side Slightly overrated: To Kill a Mockingbird Vastly overrated: Lolita; Advise and Consent Overly long: Lawrence of Arabia Have to see: Kurotokage; I Compagni; Mondo Cane; Pressure Point Best actor: Burt Lancaster (The Birdman of Alcatraz) Best actress: Anna Karina (My Life to Live); Bette Davis (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?) Best supporting actor: Jackie Gleason (Requiem For a Heavyweight) Best supporting actress: Joan Crawford (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?); Barbara Stanwyck (Walk on the Wild Side) Best soundtrack and opening credits sequence ever: Walk on the Wild Side Total number of films viewed: About 30

For Maryland, it's no contest: *Tin Men,* the classic 1987 comedy about a blood feud between two Baltimore aluminum siding salesmen, set in 1963. It begins when one of them (Richard Dreyfuss) crashes his brand new Cadillac into a Cadillac driven by another "tin man" (Danny DeVito), and it escalates from there. It's like a much more elaborate version of Laurel & Hardy's Big Business, mixed with elements of DeVito's own War of the Roses and Larry David's Clear History. Barry Levinson's earlier Baltimore movie (Diner) usually gets all the raves, but Tin Men is infinitely funnier.

Continuing to *1961* 1. Scream of Fear 2. A Raisin in the Sun 3. A Fever in the Blood 4. Underworld U.S.A. 5. Town Without Pity 6. Five Minutes to Live 7. Judgment at Nuremburg 8. Cash on Demand 9. Ada 10. The Young Savages Best of the rest: The Misfits; The Hustler; Breakfast at Tiffany's; The Most Dangerous Man Alive; The Children's Hour Underrated: Scream of Fear; A Fever in the Blood; Ada Overrated: West Side Story (schmaltz and musicals are a deadly combination); Pocketful of Miracles (Glenn Ford, you're no Warren William) Have to see: Yojimbo; Il Posto; Paris Blues Best actor: Kirk Douglas (Town Without Pity) Best actress: Susan Strasberg (Scream of Fear) Best supporting actor: George C. Scott (The Hustler); Maximilian Schell (Judgment at Nuremberg) Best supporting actress: Claudia McNeil (A Raisin in the Sun) Total number of movies viewed: About 30

I've seen so few films from the 60's on up, I'm not sure how much these ratings mean, but since it's fun to make lists I'll keep it up. *1960* (revised; I'd mistakenly thought I'd listed Kapo in 1959) 1. Kapo 2. The Bad Sleep Well 3. Elmer Gantry 4. Cruel Story of Youth 5. Two Women 6. Inherit The Wind76. Murder, Inc. (another one TCM needs to get from Fox) 8. Twelve Hours to Kill (another Fox sleeper) 9. Psycho 10. Shoot the Piano Player Best of the rest: Sergeant Rutledge; Pay Or Die; The Last Voyage; Breathless Underrated: Kapo; Twelve Hours to Kill; Pay Or Die Overrated: Can't think of any Have to see: Rocco and His Brothers; Butterfield 8; The Magnificent Seven; The Sundowners; Our Man in Havana; Never on Sunday Best actor: Toshiro Mifune (The Bad Sleep Well); Burt Lancaster (Elmer Gantry); Tony Perkins (Psycho) Best actress: Susan Strasberg (Kapo) Best supporting actor: Peter Falk (Murder, Inc.) Best supporting actress: Janet Leigh (Psycho) Total number of films viewed: About 30 Edited by: AndyM108 on Jan 14, 2014 2:19 PM

Arturo, Thanks for clearing up the distinction between Maisie and Torchy/****. Since my memories of Ann Sothern are almost exclusively of her TV years (Private Secretary), I hadn't realized that Hollywood at one point had had higher ambitions for her on the Big Screen. With the other three leads under discussion (Rooney, Farrell and Morris), it's much easier to see where they stood in the chow line at the times they starred in their respective series.

The point I am trying to make is that if you are a strict Catholic family in America today, then you may adhere to guidelines that would be in keeping with Joe Breen's goals. Other people might consider it censorship, but not these families-- to them it is a highly sought after, acceptable moral compass. So in essence there is a code still in effect for these families (and probably families of other persuasions) today. It is enforced by Mom and Dad, or Uncle Bob and Aunt Susie-- and approved of by respected clergy and church officials. When you have this in place in your home, then you do not need an industry ratings system-- in fact, that may seem irrelevant and unreliable considering its vagueness. Again, no argument with any of that. If only the Church would have been similarly modest in its ambitions in the early 30's, rather than trying to force its standards upon the entire industry. As for today's rating system, I agree that it's totally vague and meaningless, given that I can't even remember the last time I saw a movie rated NC-17. I'd think that parents would probably find that Catholic list you mention to be more useful.

By the way, my aunt and I had a discussion recently about the old U.S. Catholic Archbishops website (now called the Catholic News Service) which still rates films to this day. Many families at her church log on to read specific reviews and commentary about the morality of new releases. http://www.catholicnews.com/movies.htm There does not need to be an official code or even a motion picture ratings system for people to still classify, label and refuse to see certain films based on potentially objectionable content. I couldn't agree more. I've got many informal "codes" of my own that prevent me from seeing mindless special effects movies where plot is a secondary concern. I've got a "code" that gives me a jaundiced view of movies that pander to generational conceits. (The Graduate) But all of these "codes" are purely personal. And though I applaud groups like the Catholic News Service which screen and *recommend* against movies that violate their sense of decency, I would denounce any efforts to take such recommendations and make them mandatory, especially to those outside their own self-selected group of believers. And that's what we had in the Breen years.

There is still a code today, an unwritten one, but it's there. Have we ever seen someone actually killed on screen in a modern film? Have we ever seen someone actually **** or **** in a modern film? Murder and excretion, among other taboo things, cannot be included in Hollywood films. They can be simulated-- watching an actor get shot by a round of blanks and fall to the floor and play dead; or an actor step up to a urinal and be filmed from the chest up, simulating the act of using the bathroom. But compare that relatively short list of taboo depictions with the the much longer list contained in the "Breen Code" I copied below. The fact that many informal taboos remain today doesn't mean that there weren't far more restrictive sets of forbidden subjects and depictions during the "Code Era". So in many ways, we are still bound be a code of morals in Hollywood film, and maybe it's a good thing. Obviously that's a matter of taste and not subject to any objective criteria. Undoubtedly the Breen code forced screenwriters to sharpen their G-rated pens, and you might say that as a result we had a Golden Age of screwball comedy. But, IMO the films of 1932 to mid-1934, taken as a whole, packed a far greater punch than those that came in the 10 years immediately following. But again, that all depends on what you're looking for in a movie, and there's no "right" answer or "wrong" answer to the question.

Here are some of the details of the 1930 Production Code (AKA the Hays Code), which was enforced with much more rigidity by Joseph Breen after July 1, 1934. I'll let people decide for themselves how much or how little this changed the content of movies after that date, and for several decades thereafter: *General Principles* *1. No picture shall be produced that will lower the moral standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin.* *2. Correct standards of life, subject only to the requirements of drama and entertainment, shall be presented.* *3. Law, natural or human, shall not be ridiculed, nor shall sympathy be created for its violation.* *Particular Applications* *I. Crimes Against the Law* These shall never be presented in such a way as to throw sympathy with the crime as against law and justice or to inspire others with a desire for imitation. *1. Murder* a. The technique of murder must be presented in a way that will not inspire imitation. b. Brutal killings are not to be presented in detail. *c. Revenge in modern times shall not be justified.* *2. Methods of Crime should not be explicitly presented.* a. Theft, robbery, safe-cracking, and dynamiting of trains, mines, buildings, etc., should not be detailed in method. b. Arson must subject to the same safeguards. c. The use of firearms should be restricted to the essentials. d. Methods of smuggling should not be presented. *3. Illegal drug traffic must never be presented.* 4. The use of liquor in American life, when not required by the plot or for proper characterization, will not be shown. *II. Sex* *The sanctity of the institution of marriage and the home shall be upheld. Pictures shall not infer that low forms of sex relationship are the accepted or common thing.* *1. Adultery, sometimes necessary plot material, must not be explicitly treated, or justified, or presented attractively.* *2. Scenes of Passion* *a. They should not be introduced when not essential to the plot.* *b. Excessive and lustful kissing, lustful embraces, suggestive postures and gestures, are not to be shown.* *c. In general passion should so be treated that these scenes do not stimulate the lower and baser element.* 3. Seduction or Rape a. They should never be more than suggested, and only when essential for the plot, and even then never shown by explicit method. b. They are never the proper subject for comedy. *4. Sex perversion or any inference to it is forbidden.* *5. White slavery shall not be treated.* *6. Miscegenation (sex relationships between the white and black races) is forbidden.* *7. Sex hygiene and venereal diseases are not subjects for motion pictures.* 8. Scenes of actual child birth, in fact or in silhouette, are never to be presented. 9. Children's sex organs are never to be exposed. *III. Vulgarity* *The treatment of low, disgusting, unpleasant, though not necessarily evil, subjects should always be subject to the dictates of good taste and a regard for the sensibilities of the audience.* *IV. Obscenity* *Obscenity in word, gesture, reference, song, joke, or by suggestion (even when likely to be understood only by part of the audience) is forbidden.* *V. Profanity* *Pointed profanity (this includes the words, God, Lord, Jesus, Christ - unless used reverently - Hell, S.O.B., damn, Gawd), or every other profane or vulgar expression however used, is forbidden.* *VI. Costume* *1. Complete nudity is never permitted. This includes nudity in fact or in silhouette, or any lecherous or licentious notice thereof by other characters in the picture.* 2. Undressing scenes should be avoided, and never used save where essential to the plot. 3. Indecent or undue exposure is forbidden. 4. Dancing or costumes intended to permit undue exposure or indecent movements in the dance are forbidden. VII. Dances *1. Dances suggesting or representing sexual actions or indecent passions are forbidden.* *2. Dances which emphasize indecent movements are to be regarded as obscene.* *VIII. Religion* *1. No film or episode may throw ridicule on any religious faith.* *2. Ministers of religion in their character as ministers of religion should not be used as comic characters or as villains.* 3. Ceremonies of any definite religion should be carefully and respectfully handled. IX. Locations *The treatment of bedrooms must be governed by good taste and delicacy.* X. National Feelings 1. The use of the Flag shall be consistently respectful. 2. The history, institutions, prominent people and citizenry of other nations shall be represented fairly. XI. Titles Salacious, indecent, or obscene titles shall not be used. *XII. Repellent Subjects* The following subjects must be treated within the careful limits of good taste: 1. Actual hangings or electrocutions as legal punishments for crime. 2. Third degree methods. 3. Brutality and possible gruesomeness. 4. Branding of people or animals. 5. Apparent cruelty to children or animals. 6. The sale of women, or a woman selling her virtue. 7. Surgical operations.

Andy, You keep comparing films from the early thirties to those made right after the code took affect. I am discussing precodes and postcodes, not precodes and early codes. I think you (and others) are giving the code too much emphasis, and power. It was a safety net, not the restrictive atmosphere that some people consider it. There is so much misinterpretation about the code, where does one truly begin. "Safety net?" That has to be the Euphemism of the Year. The truth is that with the coming of Joe Breen, the Catholic Church had an effective veto power over the content of Hollywood movies. If anyone seriously doubts this, I'd suggest reading two books by the film historian Thomas Doherty: - - - Pre-Code Hollywood: Sex, Immorality and Insurrection in American Cinema, 1930-1934 - - - Hollywood's Censor: Joseph I. Breen & The Production Code Administration It's right there in the well-documented record. Good God, in a movie like Baby Face, the filmmakers couldn't even depict Barbara Stanwyck being influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche, let alone cause multiple suicides and "get away" with it. Also, in the 1940 thread, you place great value on the noir output from later in that decade-- but those films did not exactly contain more realism. They were still artificially manipulated products of cinema. As are all films, but with the advent of noir there came to be a major genre that depicted the dark side of life in a far more realistic manner than it was prior to that. Obviously this varied from one film to the next, but the overall change in tone was clear. But even with noir, those endings nearly always wound up artificially "happy", or at least morally instructive. Code era realism could only go so far. And breaking the code does not lead to more realism either. In a perfect Hollywood world it should. But all this formalistic, less natural, use of special effects shows that realism is more alien to non-code filmmaking than ever before. Of course as you say, there are many reasons that the Platonic ideal of realism is violated by Hollywood, and the Code was only one of them. But imagine how insanely unrealistic films like Goodfellas would be if even only the language restrictions of the Breen Code were still being enforced in 1990. The absence of a Code doesn't guarantee total realism in movies, *but* the presence of a Code like Joe Breen's guarantees that many movies will be even more unrealistic than they otherwise would have been.

Still, BABY FACE (a precode) and WORKING GIRL (a post-code) do not look anything alike and they tell the same basic story. It really doesn't have anything to do with the code. It has to do with different generations of storytellers telling the same story differently. We try to say that the code changed movies, but even if there never was a code, the same themes would still have been explored and depicted differently. When it comes to the differences between movies made in 1931 to mid-1934 and those made in the years immediately after that, I think that the Breen squad made all the difference in the world. Generations of storytellers don't replace each other *that* quickly, and the overall society didn't suddenly clean up its act the way that the movies did. The Breen crackdown on "immoral" movies has been so thoroughly documented that it scarcely needs repeating. OTOH if you're talking about movies made in 1933 compared to movies made in 1988, then obviously the overriding factor *is* generational. But those post-1934 generations of screenwriters were in great part also influenced *by* the code, in that they had to figure out ways to work around it. Left to their own devices, it's extremely doubtful that they wouldn't have expressed themselves in much less restrained a manner. The point is that writers adapt themselves to the rules just as much as the rules eventually adapt themselves to the changing societal mores, and it often just gets down to the old question of the chicken and the egg.

1962 movies are so vastly different from those of 1972 that it could be different centuries. No other delineation of content has ever been so profound between decades - neither before nor since. Where the 30's flowing into 40's into 50's into 60's can be charted stylistically in a gentle evolutionary study - the difference between the 60's and the entire decade of the 70's was nothing less than revolutionary. I'd go even farther than that. I entered college (Duke) in 1962 and graduated in 1967. In 1962 blazers and oxfords were the standard dress for campus men, along with short hair, conservative politics and a campus newspaper that mainly covered student council meetings and campus concerts. By 1967 jeans were was the "uniform" of choice among both men and women, large numbers of students were fairly regular pot smokers, conservative politics was largely confined to the more southern-oriented fraternity houses, and the campus newspaper was in open revolt against the college administration. This trend accelerated much more by 1969 and 1970, but the real break was in 1967-68. And of course the films of that year (mostly dreadful IMO, but whatever) naturally reflected such tectonic shifts that were taking place to varying degrees all over the country.

*one could probably make the argument that pre-code films were also markedly different from those released after 1934 and when all films had to adhere to the M.P.P.C.* But-- are you ready for this?-- (index finger raised) pre-code and post-code films do not often resemble each other. Why is this? Probably because more than just the code itself, the films of the early 30s and late 60s are products of their respective eras. Not exclusively defined by the absence of restriction and censorship. There's also the point that there actually *was* a code prior to mid-1934 that most definitely *was* enforced in most every film we consider "pre-code". In shorthand terms, it was the Hays Code before mid-'34 and the "Breen" Code after that, even though strictly speaking it was the Hays Code that was still on the books. Not that there wasn't an enormous difference in tone and content between the Hays and "Breen" Codes, but there were three key plot elements that they nearly always had in common, each involving the ending: Previously "sinful" couples nearly always got married; the bad guys nearly always got punished; and the good guys mostly always get served a dose of justice in the form of a happy ending. Look at some of the most celebrated pre-code movies: In Baby Face, the mantrap Stanwyck repents at the end and goes back to nurse her husband back to health. In Wild Boys of the Road, a friendly judge vows to place a group of boxcar hoppers under non-punitive adult supervision. In the 1931 version of Possessed, Crawford miraculously makes an honest man out of Gable. In The Story of Temple Drake, Miriam Hopkins even more miraculously does a 180 in court and tells the truth for the first time in her life, to then be carried out of the room in the arms of her loving and loyal would-be beau. In fact, just about the only pre-codes I can think of that *don't* fit that bill are Jean Harlow's Red-Headed Woman and Paul Muni's I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang. In Red-Headed Woman, Harlow gets run out of the country by a group of indignant townspeople, furious at her for her slutty ways. And yet in the last scene, set in France, we see that she's nabbed a French sugar daddy, while cavorting with the same chauffeur (Charles Boyer) on the side whom she was slipping around with back in America. Talk about having her cake and eating it, too. And in the Muni movie, there's absolutely no vindication for the wronged hero, who vanishes into the night with the words "I STEAL!" But other than those two, it's often hard to tell the date of those early to mid- 30's movies if you just watch the last two minutes.

*So what would then be some examples of a programmer, as opposed to a B-movie? Where would films like the Torchy Blane or Boston **** series fit in? They certainly had name actors (Glenda Farrell; Chester Morris), but even though they're uniformly delightful, they have a distinctly "B-movie" flavor.* Film series, such as those mentioned here, could be either B movies or programmers, depending on the series or the studio. Both the Blane and **** series were B films. Others, such as the Maisie or Hardy films were programmers. In all instances, the appeal of these series was that the individual films could be made inexpensively, since many utilized standing sets. The last part I get, but I can't see what the difference would be between Torchy / **** and Maisie / Hardy. Or more precisely, between Torchy / **** and Maisie, since megachildstar Mickey Rooney was clearly bringing in more money to his studio than character actors like Farrell, Morris or Sothern. I suppose that Maisie might be elevated in stature by the one time presence of Robert Young, but for the most part the followups in that series pretty much involved a cast of no-names. Other than the Hardy and Sherlock Holmes series, the rest of them seem to be populated by actors and actresses whose best days were either behind them (Glenda, Richard Dix, etc.) or ahead of them (George Sanders). The whole set of distinctions seems kind of blurry, to say the least.