CaveGirl

Love that guy, Sepia! Such an everyman type. Thanks!

Those two were a laugh riot, Dargo!

The tv movie called "Helter Skelter" had Steve Railsback playing Manson and he did a good job playing Charlie. Except he wasn't as good a singer.

I also love them, Spence! Seems maybe one of his montages has color footage of W.C. Fields?

I've heard, Lawrence that for a small fee and a self-addressed stamped manila envelope, a selective list of poster names can be supplied that might explain why some other posters would want to delete their accounts. No names will have been changed to protect the guilty. Sergeant Josephine Friday

Nip, nothing like a green radium glow on the pate of a bald man to make him appear so alluring!

Tom, though I am more typically a devotee of the typical murder plot where a spouse kills a spouse, which is why I watch marathons on the ID channel, for this question I am going to be atypical and say my favorite film with "murder" in the title is "Murder Inc." I pick this film because it was the first film I ever saw with Peter Falk in it, and I remember as a kid thinking he reminded me so much of John Garfield, who I loved and missed. And I love Peter Falk just as much! The film is about a crime syndicate and also stars Stuart Whitman. Another distinction is having a performance by the incredibly snide and sarcastic Henry Morgan of "I've Got a Secret" and "What's My Line" fame. You want to talk about murder, I've always wondered who murdered his proboscis with such a bad nose job! If I had to pick a second film, it would be "Murder on the Blackboard" because if you want someone smart investigating a murder, then who would be better than Edna Mae Oliver, I ask you?

I recognize him too! It's Uncle Martin, from "My Favorite Martian" as played by Ray Walston! Nah, just kidding, but ya gotta admit they do resemble each other a bit...

I always liked in classic books when they would describe a female as a "quite handsome woman". It always brought to my mind the visage of someone like Judith Anderson. Your choices were good but if you can come up with even more obscure ones, that would be dandy.

All great choices, Stephan and you don't have to tout old Pretorius to me since I've always found his skeletal face to be the cat's meow, even if old Una O'Connor didn't. I guess the fact that he was in as Hollywood called it, a "lavender marriage" though, would have dampened my desires. Lorre as Doctor Gogol is just unearthly, and those scenes where his bald head is front and center and the cockatoo is flying around, really do look like outtakes from "Citizen Kane" as many have implied. The voice, the eyes, the general mien...all too creepy for words. Loved all "The Fly" manifestations, especially the Cronenberg one, but I will admit to being sentimentally attached to the original from the late 1950's, since I love Al [David] Hedison as Andre Delambre, which is such a romantic French name. And little Charles Herbert, is adorable as the kiddie. Now with the wife, Helene as played by Patricia Owen I sometimes get confused as to who she was married to, since I keep thinking about her role in the AHP episode called "The Crystal Trench" where she waits like a gadzillion years for her hubby to come up out of the frozen ice, because she thought he was the love of her life. And then well, she finds out that he was about as true to her as a certain president is to his spouses. Poor Patricia, always getting the short end of the stick with men, some of whom turn into a zillion fly atoms and end up flying around flowers while Vincent Price watches. Good teleportation theory, by the way!

So funny! That certainly does explain how the Lubitsch touch was manifest in films though since he could make even plumbing seem appealing.

Hey, Lawrence, never noticed till I looked at your thumbnail pic, how much Georges Melies looked like Jose Ferrer if he wore a mustache. Thanks!

Hard to believe with such a poetic lilt to his words, that he was heard to enjoy torturing rats, ain't it, Stephan?

Flavin was a quite handsome guy in Kong, and always had an authoritative air to him. Less film to his credit than Cosmo but Flavin had a real career with notable character parts and is part of the classic Hollywood period. As for Kong having some notables, Frank Reicher is always great as is Noble Johnson. I guess I just am more attuned to the backup characters in films, who seem to do the real work, more than the stars. I guess we need both though, so a little credit to the ones who support the stars is always pleasureable. Thanks!

Tom, I adore Bess Flowers. I always watch the end of AAE just to see her congratulate Eve on her Sarah Siddons award. She's everywhere, it's true and looking for her in one of her patented society lady roles is always enjoyable. My mother used to say she fit the mold of the term "dowager queen" type, but if I had picked a hubby in the film for Bess, I would have chosen perennial drunken boytoy, Jack Norton. I can just see Bess doing her best to pick him up from the ballroom floor as he blacks out for the third time or more. Great choice and thanks for participating!

Imagine you are part of the special counsel reviewing the mental stability of some of filmdom's maddest scientists. Just who who make the grade as being over the top and certifiable, and who would be allowed to continue in their quest to take over the world, find guinea pigs to experiment on or clone giant spiders that would threaten humanity, amongst other ventures? Now a certain person named Thesiger is one of my favorites, but I am going to first examine the case of noted scientist and generally all around creepy personage, Albert Dekker. In one of the best sci-fi films of the 1930's he portrayed Dr. Cyclops [aka Doctor Thorkel] who just for fun liked to miniaturize people to do his bidding. If you've seen John Hoyt in "Attack of the Puppet People" you've seen a much milder, teen drive-in version of some parts of the original tale, which is a lot creepier. Hoyt though an incredible actor just cannot match the malice of Albert Dekker, who always was freaky in almost anything like his amazing role in the cult classic "Among the Living". But I digress... So I will start the mental examinations by nominating Dekker as one of the maddest of the mad scientists on film. Who do you choose as your nominee to win top wackadoodle doctor of science? Oddly enough, about the only film I can think of where the scientist is not a nutjob, is "The Day the Earth Stood Still" where Sam Jaffe seemed reasonable and able minded and not a lunatic trying to take over the world.

Uh, I think I smell an enforced thread deletion coming up, Stephan.

This is very reminiscent [scent...get it?] of the Madeleines scene in Proust's ROTP, Stephan. He should have had an Odette Odorific Machine.

I remember that scene well and there seemed to be a small group of people who found it distasteful, probably due to the age gap. But oddly enough, I always thought Ruth Gordon looked and acted like a teenager, so thought it was the greatest romance since Errol Flynn and Beverly Aadland! Ruth Gordon could even make you like her as a Satanist working with Anton LaVey. Remember how she offered Rosemary the tea, after she was on to the plot about her hubby, Guy working with the satanic group to get the baby, and Ruth said something like "It's just Lipton tea, drink it!" Yep, a really nice Satanic lady for sure that only Ruth Gordon could bring to life. I don't actually believe in Satan, but if I did, I would want Ruth Gordon to be his earthly emissary.

Wouldn't you have loved to go out on the town with Bud Cort AND Groucho! That would have been a night to remember. Almost like the one you had with Jayne Mansfield!!!

Agreed, Beth! But as you say in terms of film history, and seeing the developments Griffith instituted like having multiple storylines coinciding or interesting camera work by folks like Billy Bitzer, we still do need to retain such films for viewing. Also to see early work by actors like Henry B. Walthall or Mae Marsh or Richard Barthelmess, Griffith's films are necessary. Thanks!

OMG! I worked with a guy who was totally into owning 16mm films from Blackhawk and particularly like David Wark's stuff. He'd have parties and show things like BOAN. We did a lot of drinking to get through some of those early gems with Lillian as a wandering waif. As for the old guy in IAWL, I wonder if he is mentioned in that book all about the film. I'll have to check my copy and see. Thanks, Sepia!

You kill me, Dargo! But that's still better than a few people here who would like to kill me literally.

Yeah! That does seem to be him. For years, in books I have and online no one seemed to know his identity. I hadn't thought about him for over ten or more years, but it seems the mystery is solved. I guess with the internet a lot more of these mysteries get a solution. Thanks so much, MovieCollector for finding out the latest and sharing it!

No, not the little people like Billy Barty or Harry Earles, though they have brought much to films also in their personages. I'm talking about all the often uncredited performers who make up the background of so many films. Where would John Wayne be in leading a cavalry if there were not men in the cavalry? How would Cary Grant and Errol Flynn and others have won the war, without all the soldiers and numerous enlistees in WWII they needed to command. How could you have Burt Lancaster on the trapeze without a nice audience below watching him risk his life? For that matter, how crummy would so many Hollywood parties in films look without a multitude of guests, some dancing, some drinking and with someone playing the piano? Therefore I say, give tribute where it is due. For me my favorite uncredited actor is someone named Cosmo Sardo. Can't remember when I first caught his act, but since then I look for him in films since he is as fun to find as Waldo. The guy has 437 credits. Being born in 1909 and dying in 1989, he had quite a long career in films and in his latter years also was appearing on many tv shows also. Cosmo [great name too and he was more sophisticated than Cosmo Topper in my mind] being almost always impeccably dressed in sartorial splendour [that's for Dargo!] was a natural to play Maitre D's, nightclub patrons, party guests, and the like. He must have been totally burnt out and an original member of AA due to all the time in movies he spent partying. But he also has played a shipboard guest, a pilot, a gambler, a convict and a barber which seems appropriate since he owned his own hair salon in Hollywood apparently. Some movies Cosmo was in were things like "Imitation of Life", "The Joker is Wild", where he was the Maitre D', "To Catch a Thief" where he was a Frenchman interestingly, a party guest in "Singin' in the Rain", a waiter in "All About Eve", the bartender in "In a Lonely Place", a theatre guest in the noir "Phantom Lady", a Lothario in "Love Me or Leave Me" and my favorite, a "man" in "Gilda", which was not much of a stretch. He also appeared in things like "Oceans 11", "North by Northwest", "The Hypnotic Eye" and "Tales of Terror" and even appeared as a Wine Society Member, which would seemingly make him a candidate for an all day film festival at TCM to promote their own fine wine club, in my opinion. Check out his photo online or at IMDB. By the way, Cosmo's first uncredited appearance was in "Power Dive" from 1941 where he played the 2nd bartender, so he did really advance in his roles ending up always as first bartender after that less than auspicious beginning. Name your favorite uncredited but highly used performer in films, if you would like to share. If not...go back to sleep!