lzcutter

As the Mods requested, for problems with the Upgrade go here: http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=158621&tstart=0

The Mods have asked that problems with the website since the upgrade be directed to the Tech Forums. There is a thread there called "Problems with the Upgrade" where the mods are tracking problems and providing updates. http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=158621&tstart=0

*Infinte 1, you are infinitely one amusing poster.* Araner, The employees at TCM and especially those who are part of this month's *Employee Picks* might not agree with you. As they all love films as much as we do, I doubt they like reading on a TCM message board that infinite1 feels they are incapable of talking about films they love. Unlike many who post every day about the films they love, he believes that these employees must be hired actors reading scripts to talk as passionately about film as they do. And we wonder why TCM staffers don't interact with us more here at TCM City. Who can blame them. Edited by: lzcutter

*Wow, Monica was fantastic!* FredC, I totally agree! One thing that some posters forget is that Robert O knows these people. Unlike Guest Programmers or Fan Programmers, they work with Robert O on a daily/monthly basis (depending on what department they are in). So, of course, they are going to be at ease with him. As you noted, they work for a broadcast network and many are very comfortable talking about film no matter if they are in behind the camera, behind a desk or in front of camera. One of the joys of Robert O is that he makes people feel comfortable while they talk about films with him. He is genuinely interested in what they have to say. Since they are comfortable around Robert O from working with him so closely, it's only normal that they are so great on camera with him. Of course there will be retakes, that's only natural and a part of any broadcast network that has a format like TCM. But, for many, it's probably more like an extended conversation with him that normally happens over lunch instead of in front of cameras.

As much as I love *Mockingbird*, I think *Sunset Blvd* might tie it in terms of opening credits.

*One of the closing shots Hitchcock considered was them driving across the Golden Gate Bridge with the bridge covered in birds.CGI would have been useful then....* Fredb, Hey, Handsome! Long time since last we talked. I've always heard that Hitch really wanted that ending but Universal said not only no, but h*** no. They thought it was too much of a downer and thought the audience needed to leave on a more upbeat scene than one that basically confirmed that the terror would continue.

*What is going on TCM? Is there anyone there actually working on this disaster of a website?* The mods are responding with updates in the Tech Forum where they repeatedly asked that people post (but not post a problem already in queue) the difficulties they are encountering. http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=158621&tstart=0

*When on a thread, and following a theme or a series of exchanges, I have several times tried to click on to the last page, and was unsuccessful. Is this happening to others, also?* Yes, a number of threads (especially those with a large number of posts in them) have pages missing. I mentioned in it a post yesterday in this thread but so far there has been no response despite the site being down for about six hours overnight.

Spence, The majority of new films were for last month's *31 Days of Oscar*. As for *The Godfather* and *Godfather II*, TCM was able to show the fillms in the summer of 2006, quite unexpectedly as it caused a last minute change in the schedule, and it appears to have been a one-time only broadcast as I don't recall either film being shown again.

Binky, Many of us had different experiences based on the type of pass we had. I had an Classic Pass last year: Sounds like many of you went last year. Would you mind answering some questions? *1) Did they screen each film, or host each panel, only once during the festival?* There were a few screenings that had encore screenings such as *Sunny Side Up* but the majority of films were only screened once. *2) How much time did you spend waiting for admittance to a screening or panel?* The longest wait in line I had was for *Singin' in the Rain* at the Egyptian. It was sold out and we stood in line for about an hour. All the other screenings I attended the 'waiting in line' time was less than a half hour. As for panels, the doors opened about a half hour before they started and there was plenty of seating at least for the ones upstairs. The talk with Norman Lloyd at Club TCM was filled but people were comfortable. *3) Did they admit you based on your type of pass?* Yes, those with Spotlight Tickets get admitted first. Things to keep in mind are the main house of the Chinese Theater seats about 1,500 and the main theater of the Egyptian seats less than 1,000. The two smaller theaters of the Chinese seat about 350 and 150 respectively. If I'm wrong about that, Kyle will correct me! I had no trouble getting into screenings so the type of pass I had didn't keep me out of any screening or panel. *4) Did they stagger the start times for each screening location, or did all films start at the same time?* There will plenty of hard choices to make as films start close together. As an example, I was able to hear Anjelica and Danny Huston talk to Robert O about *Treasure of Sierra Madre* but had to leave to catch a screening of another film. I was able to hear Eva Marie Saint and Martin Landau talk about *North by Northwest* but had to duck out to go to a panel. I'd wager this year will be no different. It's the nature of Film Festivals. *5) Were refreshments discounted at the theatres?* Not that I was aware of. *6) Could you buy a "refreshment pass" (something along the lines of drink cards one can pre-purchase on a cruise)?* Good question. I don't know the answer to that one. *7) Were all the screenings you attended full?* Not all of them but most of them were 3/4" full if not capacity. Many of us wrote about our experiences at the Festival here: http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=152883&tstart=25 Hope that helps!

*It seems like the only difference is that you can't go to the Club after 6 PM, if you purchase the "matinee" pass. Am I correct?* *If, so, what do you miss in the evening?* It's more than just access to Club TCM. The Matinee Pass is only good for events, panels and films that start before 6:00 pm. From the Festival website: DETAILS * Access to all film programs starting prior to 6pm at all festival venues Friday, April 29-Sunday, May 1 * Admission to Club TCM events and panels at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel until 6pm daily, Friday, April 29 - Sunday, May 1 * Commemorative festival program Movie Screenings typically begin at 9 in the morning and go into the night. Last year there were late-night screenings on both Friday and Saturday night. The closing party was held at Club TCM after the last screening and that was about 10:00 that Sunday night. From the sounds of the description of the Matinee Pass, you wouldn't be able to attend any films that begin after 6:00 pm and there will be plenty of evening films nor the closing night party. Last year that had a great band (hoping they are coming back) that played Club TCM on Saturday night and that definitely was after 6:00 pm. Plus, the whole meeting up with other film fans goes on all day and into the late hours of the night at Club TCM. *Where is the blasted schedule, anyway?* Last year, it was published towards the end of March so be patient. It's coming.

Irishqueen, The mods and the Web Team are very aware of the problems and how upset people are. They have asked that problems be posted in the Tech Forum in the "Problems with Upgrade" thread. The Email Reminders, the change in the schedule and various other issues have already been posted there by others. They are very aware of them. But, the Mods are using that thread to share information about the work the Web Team is doing. http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=158621&tstart=0

Irishqueen, The WebAdmins and the Web Team are very aware of the problems with the site and the WebAdmins have told us that they are working on the problem. For more info, see the Tech Forum (just below the Film Festival forum) and check out the "Problems with Upgrade" thread.

Walt Disney Studios 500 S. Buena Vista Vista Burbank When Walt envisioned a new state-of-the-art studio, he was in the midst of making of *Pinocchio*. He wanted his animators to have room to be productive. The robin's nest and warren like cubby-holes of the Hyperion Studios made Walt envision something much more modern. There were 51 acres in Burbank that seemed like the best place to build their new studio. Walt was involved in all aspects of the planning. From the lay-outs of the offices to the right chairs for the animators, all details went by Walt before they were approved. The Animators Building would be in the middle of the lot with the Ink and Paint and Camera buildings near by. In addition, there were Editing facilities and sound stages as well as post-production buildings for sound. Many of the buildings were linked by an underground tunnel and all the utility lines were underground, quite an innovation for 1940. Walt wanted the animators to have the northern light, considered the best kind of light. There was plenty of types of exercise, ping-pong tables, volleyball and horseshoes. *Fantasia* (screening at the Festival) and *Dumbo* were in production. *Fantasia* was Walt's attempt to blend animation with classical music and a special stereo system, Fantasound was designed to deliver the best quality sound for the soundtrack. The studio endured the bitter labor strike in the early 1940s that tore apart the friendly, family like atmosphere that the studio and employees had built. When the strike was finally resolved, Walt's attitude towards his employees had changed and he remained bitter about the strike. The military took over the studio when war was declared in 1941. With Lockheed in close proximity to the studio, the military sent troops to the studio to protect Lockheed. Walt and the studio went to work making training and propaganda films for the war effort. After the war, Disney branched out into live-action film and the backlot was filled with turn of the century homes as well as modern 1950s homes that served as homes to the Hardy Boys and the Shaggy Dog. It was here that Zorro (Guy Williams) kept the peace in the Southwest of yore, The Sound stages were kept busy. Stage 1 had housed the filming of the live-action sequences for *Fantasia*. Stage 2 was built in 1949 and Jack Webb utilized it for the filming of the first *Dragnet* series. With over 31,000 square feet, the stage also hosted *The Mickey Mouse Club* was also filmed on the stage utilizing sets designed by Harriet Burns and other designers. In 1954, Stage 3 was built to house the sets for *20,000 Leagues Under the Sea*. Stage 4 was built for *Darby O'Gill and the Little People*. The entrance to the Studio off of Buena Vista still offers a glimpse and taste of what the lot used to look like. From the 5/134 freeway, you can see the new Animation Building and the ABC Building. The new Animation Building has a giant Sorcerer's hat and has a faux Art Deco look to it. Where these buildings sit is where Walt first envisioned building a small theme park. Across the street from the Buena Vista entrance is St. Joseph's hospital. Walt donated a beautiful mural by one of his artists, Mary Blair, to the children's wing. Mary Blair, known for her use of color, is famous for the mural in Tomorrowland, the look of the interior of *small World* as well as her work on *Alice in Wonderland*, *Peter Pan* and *Three Caballeros*. When Walt took ill in the fall of 1966, he went to St. Joe's. He died at St. Joe's on Dec. 15th, 1966. To learn more about Walt's life and his movies, visit The Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco. Edited by: lzcutter for grammar

As Walt Disney has such a high profile at this year's Film Festival, I thought it would be nice to point out to Disney film fans some of the historic Disney sites: Walt Disney Studios 2719 Hyperion Street It was here that Walt Disney launched what became a movie empire. He had come from Kansas City, broke and fleeing bankruptcy. His brother Roy had encouraged him to come west and Walt, discouraged, took the train to Los Angeles. They started small with a small office front and in 1926 were able to take over a white Spanish Colonial building. Walt and company had been making *Oswald the Rabbit* cartoons for Charles Mintz and Universal. But, Mintz was paying Disney barely enough money to cover the costs of producing the successful cartoons and Disney was hoping to negotiate more money. He traveled back to New York when the contract was up with high hopes of more money for producing the cartoons. Instead, Mintz blindsided Walt by telling him that Mintz had hired away most of Walt's animators and that Disney would get less money for producing the *Oswald* cartoons, not more. Disney refused to sign and threatened to take Oswald to another distributor. Mintz then told Walt that he did not own the rights to Oswald, Universal did. Disney took the train back to Los Angeles and sent a telegram to Roy telling him not to worry, everything was okay. While on the train, Walt came up with idea for a new character a mouse named Mortimer. Walt's wife, Lillian, was not enamored of the name and suggested Mickey. The name stuck. Luckily for Walt, one of the animators that Mintz was unable to convince to leave Disney was the prolific Ub Iwerks. Thus, Mickey was born. It was here at Hyperion Studios that Walt decided that *Steamboat Willie* should have sync sound added to it. It was to debut but the premiere of *The Jazz Singer* revolutionized the movie business and Walt saw his future clearly. It took a couple of tries as the first music conductor thought he knew better and didn?t follow the music cues. Finally, Walt was able to get the score recorded properly and *Steamboat Willie* debuted to record crowds. *The Silly Symphonies* were born in this studio. Leonard Maltin will be curating a program of *Symphonies* during the film Festival. From *The Skeleton Dance* to *Flowers and Trees* and many Hollywood parodies in between, the *Symphonies* were the first cartoons to be filmed in Technicolor. In many ways, they blazed the trail for a dream Walt had. A dream called *Snow White*. It was to be the first feature length animated feature and it almost drove the studio under. Disney was a perfectionist and often work was done and redone. Gags were animated and then reworked. There was speculation that people wouldn?t sit through a cartoon of such length or that the colors would be so vivid they would hurt the viewers eyes after a prolonged time. Walt had hoped to make the film for $250,000. It was called ?Disney?s Folly? and there was a great deal of talk of how it would fail. Roy and Walt?s wife, Lillian, tried to talk Walt out of making the film. Walt was determined. He mortgaged his house but costs kept escalating. The Bank of America was providing the financial backing for the film and even the directors of the Bank were getting cold feet. Roy finally prevailed on Walt to show a rough cut to a friendly director. Walt was skeptical, worrying that the bank director wouldn?t be able to follow the story in rough form. All the worry was for naught. Though he sat silently through the screening and remained silent through the walk to the car, in the end he assured Walt that the BofA would continue to back the film and that it was going to be a box-office smash. *Snow White* debuted on Dec. 21st, 1937 at the old Carthay Circle Theater (a recreation of the theater exterior can be seen in *LA Confidential*) just before Christmas. All of Hollywood from Shirley Temple to Gary Cooper turned out for the splashy premiere. The film went wide on Feb. 4, 1938 and did boffo box-office as they say. The film went on to garner Walt a special Oscar presented to him by Shirley Temple. An award size Oscar and seven smaller ones was presented to Walt at the Oscar ceremony in 1939. The success of *Snow White* came at just the right moment for the Disney brothers. They were able to follow-up with *Pinocchio* and allowed Disney to dream of building a new studio in Burbank that would be not only state-of-the-art but allow his staff to grow. In 1940, Walt moved his studio to Burbank where it still is today. The Hyperion site is a historic site and has Cultural marker #163. L.A. You can see Walt?s special Oscar for *Snow White* (and many other treasures) at The Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco.

*In the first place, you have to be real naive if you think that all or even some of them are real employees of TCM.* Having met many who work at TCM, I can assure they are real employees. Posters who attended the Film Festival last year met a number of them and they will probably meet a few more this year. *Besides, as Fred wrote, they are following scripts themselves based on a tcmprogrammer prepared list of films that TCM was going to show anyway irrespective of whether or not their bogus "employees" would be "picking them".* Scott voiced an opinion about the movie that Fred doesn't agree with and rather than acknowledge their difference in opinion, Fred, instead, chose to write that TCM must have given Scott a script to read. That doesn't make it a fact. TCM does not need to supply them scripts. They are all quite capable of talking about movies on their own. TCM did not tell any of the Fan Programmers how to talk about the films or what we should say when we sat down with Robert O. We certainly weren't given scripts. We were encouraged, as all Guest Programmers are, to talk from our heart. *Real employees don't look or speak that good.* And yes, real people are as capable at being articulate about movies and their passion for them. That is proven everyday on these message boards. We are getting a chance to meet the people behind the network. They are film buffs, just like we are, and they are capable of talking about films, just the way we are. As for the Film Library, many of us have covered that subject ad-nauseum in other threads with you. Go back and read what has been written. There is no sense repeating the information when it can be found in other threads that you hijacked. Edited by: lzcutter

*Do you ever think that maybe TCM has a death-wish and WANTS to go the way of AMC?* *There aren't 100 people nationwide who are utilizing the audible narration currently DESTROYING "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre." TCM has been doing it all day. Why?* Ginger, Somehow or other, the SAP channel on your tv has been turned on. It is the Secondary Audio Channel and it is broadcasting the audio you are hearing. I am watching *Treasure* and am not hearing the descriptive audio you are. Here is the link from the Support page here at TCM: http://www.tcm.com/contact-tcm.html A few weeks ago, a few posters discovered that the problem was not with their SAP channel but that their cable company had messed up and was broadcasting the wrong audio channel. But the problem is not coming from TCM, otherwise, we would all be hearing the Descriptive Audio while watching *Treasure* and this board would be lit up like a Christmas tree. Hope that helps.

*Now Canadian viewers are left with a four hour gap this afternoon where there are no listings for movies playing between 1pm and 5pm EST.* Klint, You might want to check your browser. I checked the Canadian schedule for today and it displayed just fine using Firefox: http://www.tcm.com/schedule/canada/index.html?tz=est&sdate=2011-03-13

*We couldn't launch the Remind Me feature at this time on the Title Pages but we are working on that and it should be live shortly. No word on a date yet.* Peter, Forgive my ignorance, but are you referring to the "Remind Me" feature on the Daily/Monthly Schedule? If so, does that mean it will be moved up from its current position on the film listing in the expanded section? *Also, consideration is being made to adding Remind Me features to schedule search returns.* Are you referring to the "Remind Me" function for the database/search pages or something else? And why is the "Remind Me" function for the database/film search only under consideration and not being actively returned? Unless a person memorizes an entire month's schedule there is no way of knowing if a film is going to playing anytime in the next three months. To expect people to remember to watch a film that is on the schedule in three months is not very productive as that's not likely to happen. That's why the "Remind Me" function for the database/search is so important. It's great right now to know, for example, that *The Phenix Story* is going to be on in April but without a "Remind Me" button for the database page the chances that I am going to remember on my own to watch it SIX WEEKS from now are nil at best. And I missed it the last time it was on TCM and really want to see it. But I can't remember what I had for lunch last week let alone to watch a movie six weeks from now. 2. And is the Time Zone default on the Daily/Monthly schedule going to get changed so that it doesn't revert to the default of EST every time you go to the page? 3. And finally, are we going to be able to post images any time soon in the "General Discussion" forum because right now we can't. The old image code still works in all the other forums but not in the "General Discussion" forum.

Fedya, Not sure if it will help but you can set the number of posts per page and how you want to read threads (new to old or old to new) in your Control Panel, located above next to your PM box.

Pete, Thanks for the update. Any word on when the missing pages of certain threads will return- ie Kyle's Poster Gallery, Movie Rambles, Western Rambles and Mongo's Photo Gallery (Candids)? Kyle and Mongo have put a great deal of time into their threads finding posters and photos to share with the community over the years and the loss of pages in those threads is disappointing and disconcerting to all of us who read their threads daily. The Rambles threads contain lots of terrific movie reviews by the community and are a joy to read. To have any of these threads truncated because of the upgrade is disheartening and I hope the Web Team will work quickly to restore the missing pages. Please keep us in the loop as to the progress of restoring these missing pages. FYI: Kyle's Poster Gallery is in the Favorites Forum, Movie Rambles and Candids (Mongo's photo gallery) are in the Films and Filmmaker Forum and Western Rambles is in the Westerns Forum. Thanks!

I've got a history of the Chinese, the El Capitan and the Egyptian (with pics) in my Historic Hollywood Sites thread: http://forums.tcm.com/thread.jspa?threadID=152178&tstart=0

*So, with 85 million households, we pay TCM a total of 22,100,000 a month.* The last time I looked, all those households aren't posting here. Out of those 85 million households, less than 200 viewers post here at TCM City with any regularity each month. On any given month, the overall website gets more traffic than these message boards. We may be vocal, we may cranky and we may be rude, but the truth is we are a very small percentage of the overall number of viewers that TCM has. *I pay Directv about $20 extra a month to receive TCM on the second tier.* As for what you pay DirecTV each month, that doesn't increase the amount that goes to TCM.

He was a German screenwriter. If I recall the bonus feature material, there was a German film, non musical, about the Von Trapp family and Hurdalek was likely the writer of that film.

hey Bronxie, I don't mean to interrupt the "Nick" conversation but after watching *Stella Dallas* with the great Barbara Stanwyck, I have a question that I am hoping you can answer: Why, in 1930 films, are ringlets used as a way to denote a lower-class woman? Did Toni Home Permanent kits exist back then? Babs in *Stella Dallas* Bette in *Of Human Bondage* Edited by: lzcutter for Toni