Notícias

Tommy Dix, who starred as a young military school cadet opposite Lucille Ball in the 1943 MGM musical comedy Best Foot Forward after appearing in the Broadway original, has died. He was 101.

Dix, of Williamsburg, Virginia, died Jan. 15, his family announced. “He was, for those who knew him well, a living link with some of the great American personalities of the 20th century. He will be missed,” they said.

Dix was a popular baritone on network radio and had just made his Broadway debut in The Corn Is Green, starring Ethel Barrymore, when he was hired to play cadet Chuck Green in Best Foot Forward, directed by George Abbott and choreographed by Gene Kelly.

The Broadway musical, which bowed in October 1940 and ran for 326 performances, starred Rosemary Lane as Hollywood star Gale Joy, who accepts an out-of-the-blue invitation from Winsocki Military Academy student Bud Hooper (Gil Stratton) in Philadelphia to be...

Claude Jarman Jr., who received a Juvenile Academy Award for his heart-tugging performance as the boy who adopts an orphaned fawn in the 1946 MGM classic The Yearling, died Sunday. He was 90.

Jarman died in his sleep of natural causes at his Marin County home in Kentfield, California, his wife of 38 years, Katie, told THR’s Scott Feinberg.

In films released in 1949, Jarman starred with Jeanette MacDonald in the Lassie movie The Sun Comes Up, played the brother of a rancher on the run (Robert Sterling) in Roughshod and reteamed with Yearling director Clarence Brown to portray a youngster out to prove the innocence of a Black man in Intruder in the Dust, based on the William Faulkner novel and filmed in Oxford, Mississippi.

A year later, he played the son of a cavalry officer (John Wayne) in John Ford’s Rio Grande (1950).

Born on Sept. 27, 1934, Jarman was the 10-year-old son...

Teri Garr, beloved actress and comic of stage and screen, is dead at the age of 79. In the last decades of her life, she became an inspirational figure for those, like her, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, tirelessly working to raise awareness of the disease as a frequent speaker at the annual Race to Erase Ms events.

As much as as she inspired people in her last years, she made people smile and laugh throughout her four-decade career on stage and screen as one of the funniest actresses of her generation, in films such as “Young Frankenstein” and “Tootsie.” She was one of the harder-working people in show business, coming up via true bit parts: She was a background dancer in 1964 teen-focused concert film “The T.A.M.I. Show” and even played the Statue of Liberty in a stage production at Walt Disney World when it opened in 1971.

The park’s entertainment coordinator Forrest Bahruth,...

Jack Jones, the silky Grammy-winning crooner who had hits with “Lollipops and Roses,” “Wives and Lovers” and “The Impossible Dream” before inviting TV viewers to set a course for adventure on The Love Boat, has died. He was 86.

Jones died Wednesday night at Eisenhower Medical in Rancho Mirage, California, after a two-year battle with leukemia, his stepdaughter Nicole Whitty told The Hollywood Reporter.

Jones was born into a showbiz family. His mother, Irene Hervey, was an Emmy-nominated actress who spent more than 50 years in film and on television. His father, tenor Allan Jones, portrayed the romantic male lead in Show Boat (1936) and in the Marx Brothers’ A Night at the Opera (1935) and A Day at the Races (1937), and he managed a hit song of his own with “The Donkey Serenade.”

For eight seasons and more than 200 episodes of ABC’s The Love Boat starting in 1977, Jones extolled the virtues of...

If Hollywood truly suffers from a leadership malaise, as some charge, would the return of Monroe Stahr resuscitate the system? Filmmakers respect his judgment, stars his panache and investors his discipline, so Stahr’s return may ignite a new Irving Thalberg-like era.

Whoops — he’s not available.

The manic and manipulative hero of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Last Tycoon ruled MGM in its ‘30s heyday, but Stahr’s fictional reign was short-lived. So was Fitzgerald’s brilliant but never completed 1939 novel, which modeled Stahr after Thalberg.

Having achieved literary stardom with The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald’s decision to write a Hollywood novel, while simultaneously working as a script doctor, plunged the novelist into alcoholic paralysis. He never managed to finish his book and even his screenplays were unrealized.

The Last Tycoon briefly flickered back to life as a movie thanks to the great Elia Kazan, who cast Robert De Niro,...

Clark Gable's career spanned almost 40 years, and he appeared in over 60 films, establishing himself as a leading man in Hollywood. Gable's iconic performances in movies like "Gone With the Wind" and "It Happened One Night" solidified his status as one of the greatest actors of his time. From romantic comedies like "Teacher's Pet" to intense dramas like "Mutiny on the Bounty," Gable displayed his versatility as an actor and left a lasting mark on the film industry.

With a nickname like the King of Hollywood, it's really no surprise that actor Clark Gable has had some seriously impressive movie performances, however, the following ten movies are definitely his best. Clark Gable's career spanned for almost 40 years, and in that time, he appeared in more than 60 films. Plus, for 30 of those years, the actor was a certifiable leading man. Although Gable's last film was released in 1961, his name and...

It’s a nearly perfect tale of identity swaps and royal intrigues: Ronald Colman’s voice is velvet smooth as the poet-rogue François Villon, who uses his wits when dealing with Basil Rathbone’s (very strangely played) Louis XI. The real charm comes with lady-in-waiting Frances Dee (swoon) and the peasant firebrand Ellen Drew (double swoon). And don’t forget the sophisticated, semi-satirical screenplay by Preston Sturges. The refreshing Blu-ray discovery comes with a commentary by Julie Kirgo.

If I Were King

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1938 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 101 min. / Street Date February 7, 2023 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Ronald Colman, Basil Rathbone, Frances Dee, Ellen Drew, C.V. France, Henry Wilcoxon, Heather Thatcher, Stanley Ridges, Alma Lloyd, Sidney Toler, John Miljan, Montagu Love, May Beatty, Henry Brandon, Darryl Hickman.

Cinematography: Theodore Sparkuhl

Costumer: Edith Head

Art Directors: Hans Drier, John Goodman

Film Editor: Hugh Bennett

Visual Effects: Gordon Jennings

Original Music:...

Do you know when the first movie premiere in Hollywood history was held?

On Oct. 18. 1922 Sid Grauman opened his movie palace the Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Blvd. with superstar Douglas Fairbank’s latest swashbuckler “Robin Hood.” The red carpet was rolled out for Fairbanks, his wife Mary Pickford and their good friend (and partner in United Artists) Charlie Chaplin. It cost 5 to attend the premiere. And the movie, which was the top box office draw, played there exclusively for several months. The Egyptian cost 800,000 to build and took 18 months to complete for Grauman and real estate developer Charles E. Toberman. It is currently being renovated by Netflix in cooperation with the American Cinematheque.

“Robin Hood,” directed by Allan Dwan, was one of the most expensive movies of the silent era, costing just under 1 million. The castle was the biggest set ever made for a silent movie. Some scenes feature over 1,200 extras.

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Vintage magazines make a great collector’s item (or gift idea) for movie lovers, and anyone looking to capture that Old Hollywood aesthetic. But you don’t even have to leave the house to get your hands on these collectibles. If you’re not in the mood to visit a garage sale or thrift store, we put together a list of rare magazines that you can buy online.

From Photoplay to Movieland magazine, you might not be familiar with some of the publications listed but if you’re a fan of Hollywood’s Golden Era, then you’re likely to recognize some (if not all) of the screen legends captured on the covers,...

7 random things that happened on this day, March 8th, in showbiz history

1935 The Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy musical Naughty Marietta opens in theaters. It will go on the receive two Oscar nominations: Best Picture and Best Sound Recording. This is one of the first really old movies I ever saw in movie theaters as my parents occassionally took us to the local repertory theater (just a five minute drive away). The only memory I have of it is Jeanette MacDonald singing "Sweet Mystery of Life".  When I finally saw Young Frankenstein on cable or DVD many years later (I was very late to that movie) I laughed so hard at Madeline Kahn busting that song out while having sex with the Frankenstein monster. The scene is hilarious even without context, of course, but I had loved the song as a child which made the scene twice as funny. Mel Brooks...

MGM’s glamour factory hit heights of grandeur with this nostalgic disaster spectacle, which retains its power even as its pious sentimentality runs amuck. We don’t believe the characters but we believe the Stars: Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald and Spencer Tracy succeed with sheer personality. Best of all are the sensational special effects featuring the highly cinematic earthquake montage by Slavko Vorkapich and John Hoffman.

San Francisco

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1936 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 115 min. / Street Date February 16, 2021 / available through the WBshop / 21.99

Starring: Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald, Spencer Tracy, Jack Holt, Jessie Ralph, Ted Healy, Shirley Ross, Edgar Kennedy, Warren Hymer, Gertrude Astor, Vince Barnett, Tom Dugan, D.W. Griffith, James Murray, Robert J. Wilke.

Montages: Slavko Vorkapich, John Hoffman

Special Effects: James Basevi, Russell A. Cully, A. Arnold Gillespie, Loyal Griggs

Film Editor: Tom Held

Songs: Bronislau Kaper & Walter Jurmann (music), Gus Kahn (lyrics), Nacio Herb Brown

Written...

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“Melodrama, Music, And Mayhem”

By Raymond Benson

The 1936 Hollywood extravaganza, San Francisco, is a near-epic that attempts to place a melodramatic love triangle (or is it four-sided?—it seems to want to be that) in the context of the catastrophic 1906 earthquake that devastated San Francisco; thus, making the film a melodrama-disaster movie. Oh, but it has singing and dancing, too!—the flick spawned the title number that became one of the city’s official songs.

Helmed by the even-handed W. S. Van Dyke, one of the Golden Age’s most dependable directors, San Francisco reaches to be too many things. Granted, it is a motion picture that has its fans, especially a devoted following in its titular town. It was indeed nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award of its year; Van Dyke was also up for Best Director, and Spencer Tracy was...

“Well, there’s no law against an opera singer being slender, young and beautiful.”

Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy in San Francisco will be available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive February 16th. Ordering information can be found Here

Romantic drama combines with humor, star-power combines with lavish spectacle and the walls come tumbling down! This Academy Award-winning extravaganza’s street-splitting, brick-cascading, fire-raging recreation of the cataclysmic earthquake remains “one of the greatest action sequences in the history of the cinema, rivalling the chariot race in both Ben-Hurs”.

Clark Gable plays rakish Barbary Coast kingpin Blackie Norton. Jeanette MacDonald portrays a singer torn by her love for Blackie and her need to succeed among the operagoing elite. Earning the first of nine career Best Actor Oscar® nominations, Spencer Tracy is a priest who supplements spiritual advice with a mean right hook. He urges Blackie to change. But if love and religion can’t reform Blackie,...

The Notebook Primer introduces readers to some of the most important figures, films, genres, and movements in film history.Above: 42nd StreetWhile other genres undoubtedly advanced with the dawning of sound technology, the musical is likely the most indebted to the reverberations of this complementary process. More than that, though, the movie musical was fundamentally born with the surge of sound—it simply could not have existed otherwise. And since that time, the musical has indeed been a uniquely cinematic venture, less beholden to conventional narratives and often disposed to experimentations in color, location, camera mobility, production design, and special effects. Especially in its heyday, the so-called “Golden Age” lasting between the mid-1930s and late-‘50s, Hollywood musicals were an enrapturing experience, delighting audiences with spectacle, romance, athleticism, fine performances, and, of course, song and dance. Some of America’s brightest stars sparkled in the musical, while many of...

Does a musical have to have big dance numbers, glorious cinematography and stereophonic sound? I agree with a consensus of critics and fans that this 1932 pre-Code marvel is the best musical romance of all. Maurice Chevalier may be ‘nothing but a tailor’ yet he steals the heart of Jeanette MacDonald’s princess and shocks her titled, discriminating family. Forget MGM operetta saccharine and say hello to a sexed-up fling annotated with suggestive pre-Code dialogue and song lyrics. Some of the better naughty content is delivered by Myrna Loy, who was never as gloriously slinky-seductive. Isn’t it romantic?

Love Me Tonight

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1932 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 88 104, 96 min. / Street Date September 9, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Maurice Chevalier, Jeanette MacDonald, Charles Ruggles, Charles Butterworth, Myrna Loy, C. Aubrey Smith, Elizabeth Patterson, Ethel Griffies, Joseph Cawthorne, Robert Greig.

Cinematography: Victor Milner

Film Editor: William Shea

Original Music: John Leipold

Songs: Lorenz Hart,...

One of the best and most melodic of filmic transpositions from Broadway, James Whale’s beautifully directed movie showcases all-time great performances by Irene Dunne, Paul Robeson, Helen Morgan, Hattie McDaniel, and Charles Winninger. If you didn’t grow up with an awareness of this 1936 show, it’s because it was tossed in a vault and kept from view for more than forty years. Criterion’s new disc is a wonderful surprise that does the movie justice.

Show Boat

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1021

1936 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 113 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date March 31, 2020 / 39.95

Starring: Irene Dunne, Allan Jones, Charles Winninger, Paul Robeson, Helen Morgan, Helen Westley, Queenie Smith, Sammy White, Donald Cook, Hattie McDaniel, Arthur Hohl, Charles B. Middleton, J. Farrell MacDonald, Clarence Muse, Eddie “Rochester” Anderson.

Cinematography: John J. Mescall

Original Music: Jerome Kern and Lyrics Oscar Hammerstein II

Written by Oscar Hammerstein II from the...

One of the best and most melodic of filmic transpositions from Broadway, James Whale’s beautifully directed movie showcases all-time great performances by Irene Dunne, Paul Robeson, Helen Morgan, Hattie McDaniel, and Charles Winninger. If you didn’t grow up with an awareness of this 1936 show, it’s because it was tossed in a vault and kept from view for more than forty years. Criterion’s new disc is a wonderful surprise that does the movie justice.

Show Boat

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1021

1936 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 113 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date March 31, 2020 / 39.95

Starring: Irene Dunne, Allan Jones, Charles Winninger, Paul Robeson, Helen Morgan, Helen Westley, Queenie Smith, Sammy White, Donald Cook, Hattie McDaniel, Arthur Hohl, Charles B. Middleton, J. Farrell MacDonald, Clarence Muse, Eddie “Rochester” Anderson.

Cinematography: John J. Mescall

Original Music: Jerome Kern and Lyrics Oscar Hammerstein II

Written by Oscar Hammerstein II from the...

The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute Curator Jessica Regan on The Wizard of Oz, Judy Garland, Gilbert Adrian connection In Pursuit of Fashion The Sandy Schreier Collection: “Oh yes, in relation to the gingham bows that are on the kittens.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Costume designer Gilbert Adrian had longtime working relationships with some of the biggest stars on the silver screen, including Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer, Jean Harlow, Jeanette MacDonald, Katharine Hepburn and Joan Crawford. He created the ruby slippers and designed the gingham dress worn by Judy Garland as Dorothy in Victor Fleming’s The Wizard Of Oz.

Jessica Regan on working with Nathan Crowley and Shane Valentino: “They were looking at 1930s film set design and taking inspiration …” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Adrian designed Garbo’s clothes for 17 of her 24 American films and helped in making her a lasting icon of style. “She has created a type,...

In a wedding reception 90 years in the making, three pieces of a bejeweled costume worn by Jeanette MacDonald in the 1929 Ernst Lubitsch film The Love Parade were reunited on the Paramount lot, where the musical comedy was made.

About 200 invitees, including Nicola Lubitsch, the daughter of the director, were on hand at the Sherry Lansing Theatre on Saturday to gaze at the complete package — the gown, its 20-foot-long, 40-pound train and its tiara — and enjoy a screening of the film.

Private costume collector Greg Schreiner revealed to The Hollywood Reporter that he paid about $3,000 some ...

In a wedding reception 90 years in the making, three pieces of a bejeweled costume worn by Jeanette MacDonald in the 1929 Ernst Lubitsch film The Love Parade were reunited on the Paramount lot, where the musical comedy was made.

About 200 invitees, including Nicola Lubitsch, the daughter of the director, were on hand at the Sherry Lansing Theatre on Saturday to gaze at the complete package — the gown, its 20-foot-long, 40-pound train and its tiara — and enjoy a screening of the film.

Private costume collector Greg Schreiner revealed to The Hollywood Reporter that he paid about $3,000 some ...

Oscar-nominated English filmmaker Michael Radford has signed on to direct Sweethearts, an indie biopic set 1930s Hollywood about the love affair between movie stars and frequent on-screen co-stars Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. Eve Pomerance is producing the film under her Major Motion Pictures banner, alongside Bill Black of Jaba Films, Attit Shah’s Creation Entertainment, and Amanda Kiely.

MacDonald and Eddy were first paired in the 1935 W. S. Van Dyke-directed film Naughty Marietta, which was under MGM where MacDonald was signed to. The went on to star in eight films together. During the time, there was a struggle for MacDonald’s heart and soul between Eddy and MGM studio boss Louis B. Mayer who controlled her life and career.

Production is scheduled to begin later this year in Spain.

Radford first garnered mass attention with his 1984 film, Nineteen Eighty-Four, based George Orwell’s novel of the same title and...

'The Merry Widow' with Maurice Chevalier, Jeanette MacDonald and Minna Gombell under the direction of Ernst Lubitsch. Ernst Lubitsch movies: 'The Merry Widow,' 'Ninotchka' (See previous post: “Ernst Lubitsch Best Films: Passé Subtle 'Touch' in Age of Sledgehammer Filmmaking.”) Initially a project for Ramon Novarro – who for quite some time aspired to become an opera singer and who had a pleasant singing voice – The Merry Widow ultimately starred Maurice Chevalier, the hammiest film performer this side of Bob Hope, Jim Carrey, Adam Sandler – the list goes on and on. Generally speaking, “hammy” isn't my idea of effective film acting. For that reason, I usually find Chevalier a major handicap to his movies, especially during the early talkie era; he upsets their dramatic (or comedic) balance much like Jack Nicholson in Martin Scorsese's The Departed or Jerry Lewis in anything (excepting Scorsese's The King of Comedy...

Hal Roach looks on as technicians install Vitaphone equipment in his studio screening room, ca. 1928. (Click on the image to enlarge it.) 'A Century of Sound': Q&A with former UCLA Preservation Officer Robert Gitt about the evolution of film sound technology Long before multi-track Dolby stereo and digital sound technology, there were the Kinetophone and the Vitaphone systems – not to mention organ and piano players at movie houses. Much of that is discussed in A Century of Sound, which chronicles the evolution of film sound from the late 19th century to the mid-1970s. A Century of Sound has been split into two parts, with a third installment currently in the planning stages. They are: Vol. 1, “The Beginning, 1876-1932,” which came out on DVD in 2007. Vol. 2, “The Sound of Movies: 1933-1975,” which came out on Blu-ray in 2015. The third installment will bring the presentation into the 21st century.

Anne Hathaway: Oscar Host's Red Dress outshone Oscars' Red Carpet. Anne Hathaway Oscar host: Red dress one of countless outfits Blast from the Past: Pictured above is Oscar host Anne Hathaway sporting a blindingly bright white smile while on the 2011 Academy Awards' Red Carpet just outside the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. But wait. In the photo, Hathaway is wearing a blindingly bright red gown. Wasn't her dress of a metallic blue hue? Actually, no. It was beige (with patterns). Wait. Come to think of it, she actually wore a tux, not a dress. Or maybe it was all of the above. And more. How could that be? Well, the color, texture, format, and type of Anne Hathaway's outfits varied according to which 15 minutes of the Oscar telecast you watched on Sunday night, Feb. 27. Hathaway, a Best Actress nominee for Jonathan Demme's Rachel Getting Married in early...

(This is a review of the roadshow version of The Hateful Eight, which will be screening in true 70Mm in about 50 theaters across the country during the first two weeks after the movie’s release on Christmas Day. The same roadshow version will also screen in other venues digitally rather than on film. Before the roadshow engagement ends, a slightly shortened version, sans overture and intermission, will go into general release on December 31, so if you’re interested in seeing the roadshow version—and if you can, you should see it—read your newspaper or Internet theater listings carefully.)

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Once upon a time, not so very long ago, a friend and I had a friendly discussion online about what it was that made a story a “western.” It seemed to him that, beyond the usual interchangeable trappings of the genre-- six-shooters, ruthless bad guys, conflicted lawmen, a showdown on Main Street...

'Saint Joan': Constance Cummings as the George Bernard Shaw heroine. Constance Cummings on stage: From sex-change farce and Emma Bovary to Juliet and 'Saint Joan' (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Frank Capra, Mae West and Columbia Lawsuit.”) In the mid-1930s, Constance Cummings landed the title roles in two of husband Benn W. Levy's stage adaptations: Levy and Hubert Griffith's Young Madame Conti (1936), starring Cummings as a demimondaine who falls in love with a villainous character. She ends up killing him – or does she? Adapted from Bruno Frank's German-language original, Young Madame Conti was presented on both sides of the Atlantic; on Broadway, it had a brief run in spring 1937 at the Music Box Theatre. Based on the Gustave Flaubert novel, the Theatre Guild-produced Madame Bovary (1937) was staged in late fall at Broadway's Broadhurst Theatre. Referring to the London production of Young Madame Conti, The...

Constance Cummings in 'Night After Night.' Constance Cummings: Working with Frank Capra and Mae West (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Actress Went from Harold Lloyd to Eugene O'Neill.”) Back at Columbia, Harry Cohn didn't do a very good job at making Constance Cummings feel important. By the end of 1932, Columbia and its sweet ingenue found themselves in court, fighting bitterly over stipulations in her contract. According to the actress and lawyer's daughter, Columbia had failed to notify her that they were picking up her option. Therefore, she was a free agent, able to offer her services wherever she pleased. Harry Cohn felt otherwise, claiming that his contract player had waived such a notice. The battle would spill over into 1933. On the positive side, in addition to Movie Crazy 1932 provided Cummings with three other notable Hollywood movies: Washington Merry-Go-Round, American Madness, and Night After Night. 'Washington Merry-Go-Round...

The gaudy MGM musical bio gets one last go-round, gathering an all-star cast to illustrate the songbook of composer Sigmund Romberg. Gene Kelly dances with his brother Fred, and Cyd Charisse does a hot number with James Mitchell, while star José Ferrer goes on stage to perform with his wife Rosemary Clooney. Deep in My Heart Blu-ray Warner Archive Collection 1954 / Color / 1:37 flat Academy / 132 min. / Street Date November 10, 2015 / available through the WBshop / 17.95 Starring José Ferrer, Merle Oberon, Helen Traubel, Doe Avedon, Walter Pidgeon, Jim Backus, Rosemary Clooney, Gene Kelly, Fred Kelly, Jane Powell, Ann Miller, Cyd Charisse, Howard Keel, Vic Damone, Tony Martin, Joan Weldon, Fred Kelly, Russ Tamblyn. Susan Luckey, Robert Easton, Barrie Chase, Douglas Fowley. Cinematography George J. Folsey Film Editor Adrienne Fazan Original Music Alexander Courage, Adolph Deutsch Written by Leonard Spigelgass from a book by Elliott Arnold Produced by Roger Edens Directed by Stanley Donen

Reviewed...

Gary Cooper movies on TCM: Cooper at his best and at his weakest Gary Cooper is Turner Classic Movies' “Summer Under the Stars” star today, Aug. 30, '15. Unfortunately, TCM isn't showing any Cooper movie premiere – despite the fact that most of his Paramount movies of the '20s and '30s remain unavailable. This evening's features are Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Sergeant York (1941), and Love in the Afternoon (1957). Mr. Deeds Goes to Town solidified Gary Cooper's stardom and helped to make Jean Arthur Columbia's top female star. The film is a tad overlong and, like every Frank Capra movie, it's also highly sentimental. What saves it from the Hell of Good Intentions is the acting of the two leads – Cooper and Arthur are both excellent – and of several supporting players. Directed by Howard Hawks, the jingoistic, pro-war Sergeant York was a huge box office hit, eventually earning Academy Award nominations in several categories,...

Uggie: 'The Artist' dog star. Uggie, 'The Artist' scene-stealing dog star, has died The biggest non-human movie star of the 21st century, Uggie, whose scene-stealing cuteness helped to earn Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist the 2011 Best Picture Academy Award, has died. According to his official Facebook page, Uggie had been suffering from prostate cancer; he was euthanized last Friday, Aug. 7, '15. Born in 2002, Uggie was 13 years old. An announcement posted on Tuesday night, Aug. 11, on the Fb page Consider Uggie read: We regret to inform to all our friends, family and Uggie's fans that our beloved boy has passed away. We were not planning on posting anything until we healed a little more but unfortunately somebody leaked it to TMZ and they will be announcing it. In short, Uggie had a cancerous tumor in the prostate and is now in a better place not feeling pain.

Adolphe Menjou movies today (This article is currently being revised.) Despite countless stories to the contrary, numerous silent film performers managed to survive the coming of sound. Adolphe Menjou, however, is a special case in that he not only remained a leading man in the early sound era, but smoothly made the transition to top supporting player in mid-decade, a position he would continue to hold for the quarter of a century. Menjou is Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Day today, Aug. 3, as part of TCM's "Summer Under the Stars" 2015 series. Right now, TCM is showing William A. Wellman's A Star Is Born, the "original" version of the story about a small-town girl (Janet Gaynor) who becomes a Hollywood star, while her husband (Fredric March) boozes his way into oblivion. In typical Hollywood originality (not that things are any different elsewhere), this 1937 version of the story – produced by...

“A peach must be eaten, a drum must be beaten, and a woman needs something like that!”

Love Me Tonight plays at The Hi-Pointe Theater ( 1005 McCausland Ave., St. Louis, Mo 63117) Saturday, July 11th at 10:30am as part of their Classic Film Series

I’ve never seen the 1932 Paramount production Love Me Tonight, a classic mix of comedy, romance, song and satire with a first-rate cast, but I will this weekend. The story takes place in France around the time the film was made. It’s an early musical that employs an unusual script device in places – rhyming dialog exchanges that often lead into song (think the early ‘Musical Novelty’ Stooges short The Woman Haters). Love Me Tonight is apparently a satire of French royalty and high society households. Its characters are either the idle rich leading empty, hedonistic lives, or their compliant, consenting household staff. Maurice Courtelin, a Parisian...

'San Andreas' movie with Dwayne Johnson. 'San Andreas' movie box office: $100 million domestic milestone today As the old saying (sort of) goes: If you build it, they will come. Warner Bros. built a gigantic video game, called it San Andreas, and They have come to check out Dwayne Johnson perform miraculous deeds not seen since ... George Miller's Mad Max: Fury Road, released two weeks earlier. Embraced by moviegoers, hungry for quality, original storylines and well-delineated characters – and with the assistance of 3D surcharges – the San Andreas movie debuted with $54.58 million from 3,777 theaters on its first weekend out (May 29-31) in North America. Down a perfectly acceptable 52 percent on its second weekend (June 5-7), the special effects-laden actioner collected an extra $25.83 million, trailing only the Melissa McCarthy-Jason Statham comedy Spy, (with $29.08 million) as found at Box Office Mojo.* And that's how this original movie – it's not officially a remake,...

David O. Russell makes fashion statement on the Oscars' Red Carpet David O. Russell: Fashion statement and Oscar nomination David O. Russell, a Best Director Oscar nominee for the surprisingly successful boxing drama The Fighter, makes both a fashion and a facial statement upon his arrival with guests at the 2011 Academy Awards held on Feb. 27 at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. This was his first Best Director nomination. About five years ago, David O. Russell made headlines thanks to leaked videos showing him having a volcanic, expletive-filled confrontation with Lily Tomlin on the set of I Heart Huckabees – an ambitious all-star comedy that turned out to be much less successful than the bizarre behind-the-scenes video clips. (Check out Paul Rudd in a parody of the 'I Heart Huckabees' blow-up.) Three Kings and I Heart Huckabees alumnus Mark Wahlberg has said that he had to fight with Paramount...

Kristen Stewart, Catherine Deneuve make César Award history (photo: Kristen Stewart in 'Clouds of Sils Maria,' with Juliette Binoche) Kristen Stewart and Catherine Deneuve are two 2015 César Award nominees making history. The French Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Crafts announced the nominations on Jan. 28, 2015; the César Awards ceremony will take place on Feb. 20, 2015, at Paris' Théâtre du Châtelet. Kristen Stewart is in the running in the Best Supporting Actress category for Clouds of Sils Maria / Sils Maria. Catherine Deneuve has been shortlisted as Best Actress for In the Courtyard / Dans la cour. So, how are Stewart and Deneuve making César history? Well, let's begin with "the expected one": Deneuve. Catherine Deneuve One of the biggest film icons ever, Catherine Deneuve is one of those relatively rare international film superstars who has never bothered with – or needed – a Hollywood career. Deneuve, who turned 71 last October 22, has been...

Luis Buñuel movies on TCM tonight (photo: Catherine Deneuve in 'Belle de Jour') The city of Paris and iconoclastic writer-director Luis Buñuel are Turner Classic Movies' themes today and later this evening. TCM's focus on Luis Buñuel is particularly welcome, as he remains one of the most daring and most challenging filmmakers since the invention of film. Luis Buñuel is so remarkable, in fact, that you won't find any Hollywood hipster paying homage to him in his/her movies. Nor will you hear his name mentioned at the Academy Awards – no matter the Academy in question. And rest assured that most film critics working today have never even heard of him, let alone seen any of his movies. So, nowadays Luis Buñuel is un-hip, un-cool, and unfashionable. He's also unquestionably brilliant. These days everyone is worried about freedom of expression. The clash of civilizations. The West vs. The Other.

Warner Bros. Pictures has released the brand new trailer for next summer’s disaster-suspense film San Andreas.

The film stars Dwayne Johnson, Carla Gugino, Alexandra Daddario, Ioan Gruffudd, Archie Panjabi, Hugo Johnstone-Burt, Art Parkinson and Paul Giamatti.

Shot on location in The Gold Coast and Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, and in Los Angeles and San Francisco, San Andreas is slated to open in theatres in both 3D and 2D format on Friday, May 29, 2015.

This isn’t the first film where Southern California has been destroyed on the silver screen. San Francisco (1936) is based on the April 18, 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Directed by Woody Van Dyke, the drama stars Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald, and Spencer Tracy.

Airport originated the 1970s disaster film genre and audiences were deluged with a series of movies including the original Earthquake (1974). These films always included a huge cast, where many of the actors usually perished by the climax.

Honorary Award: Gloria Swanson, Rita Hayworth among dozens of women bypassed by the Academy (photo: Honorary Award non-winner Gloria Swanson in 'Sunset Blvd.') (See previous post: "Honorary Oscars: Doris Day, Danielle Darrieux Snubbed.") Part three of this four-part article about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Honorary Award bypassing women basically consists of a long, long — and for the most part quite prestigious — list of deceased women who, some way or other, left their mark on the film world. Some of the names found below are still well known; others were huge in their day, but are now all but forgotten. Yet, just because most people (and the media) suffer from long-term — and even medium-term — memory loss, that doesn't mean these women were any less deserving of an Honorary Oscar. So, among the distinguished female film professionals in Hollywood and elsewhere who have passed away without...

Marta Eggerth: Operetta and film star — a sort of Jeanette MacDonald of Central European cinema — dead at 101 Marta Eggerth, an international star in film and stage operettas who frequently performed opposite husband Jan Kiepura, died on December 26, 2013, at her home in Rye, New York. The Budapest-born Eggerth had turned 101 last April 17. (Photo: Marta Eggerth ca. 1935.) Although best known for her roles in stage musicals such as the Max Reinhardt-directed 1927 Hamburg production of Die Fledermaus, and various incarnations of Franz Lehár’s The Merry Widow, Marta Eggerth was featured in nearly 40 films. The vast majority of those were produced in Austria and Germany in the 1930s, as the Nazis ascended to power. Marta Eggerth films Marta Eggerth films, which frequently made use of her coloratura soprano voice, include Max Neufeld’s drama Eine Nacht im Grandhotel ("A Night at the Grand Hotel," 1931); the Victor Janson-directed musicals Once There Was a Waltz...

Ann Blyth today: Light songs and heavy drama on TCM Ann Blyth, a 1940s Universal leading lady best remembered for her Oscar-nominated performance as Joan Crawford’s cute-but-sociopathic teenage daughter in Warner Bros.’ Mildred Pierce, is Turner Classic Movies’ "Summer Under the Stars" star on Friday, August 16, 2013. Note: Today, Ann Blyth, one of the earliest surviving Oscar nominees in the acting categories, turns 85 years old. (See: “Ann Blyth Movies: TCM Schedule.”) (Photo: Ann Blyth ca. 1955.) First, the good news: Ann Blyth is a likable, talented actress and singer, and it’s great that TCM is dedicating a whole day to her movies. The bad news: As mentioned above, Ann Blyth was mostly (1944-1952) a Universal star; TCM is presenting only one of Blyth’s Universal movies, Brute Force (1947), which has been shown before. In other words, not a chance of finally having the opportunity to catch Ann Blyth in B...

Bette Davis’ eyes keep ‘Watch on the Rhine’ Bette Davis’ eyes are watching everything and everyone on Turner Classic Movies this evening, as TCM continues with its "Summer Under the Stars" film series: today, August 14, 2013, belongs to two-time Oscar winner Bette Davis’ eyes, cigarettes, and clipped tones. Right now, TCM is showing the Herman Shumlin-directed Watch on the Rhine (1943), an earnest — too much so, in fact — melodrama featuring Nazis, anti-Nazis, and lofty political speeches. (See “Bette Davis Movies: TCM schedule.”) As a prestigious and timely Warner Bros. release, Watch on the Rhine was nominated for a Best Picture Academy Award and earned Paul Lukas the year’s Best Actor Oscar. Bette Davis has a subordinate role and — for once during her years as Warners’ Reigning Queen — subordinate billing as well. As so often happens when Davis tried to play a sympathetic character, she’s not very good; Lukas, however,...

Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in ‘Mata Hari’: The wrath of the censors (See previous post: "Ramon Novarro in One of the Best Silent Movies.") George Fitzmaurice’s romantic spy melodrama Mata Hari (1931) was well received by critics and enthusiastically embraced by moviegoers. The Greta Garbo / Ramon Novarro combo — the first time Novarro took second billing since becoming a star — turned Mata Hari into a major worldwide blockbuster, with $2.22 million in worldwide rentals. The film became Garbo’s biggest international success to date, and Novarro’s highest-grossing picture after Ben-Hur. (Photo: Ramon Novarro and Greta Garbo in Mata Hari.) Among MGM’s 1932 releases — Mata Hari opened on December 31, 1931 — only W.S. Van Dyke’s Tarzan, the Ape Man, featuring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan, and Edmund Goulding’s all-star Best Picture Academy Award winner Grand Hotel (also with Garbo, in addition to Joan Crawford, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, and...

Ramon Novarro is Ben-Hur: The Naked and Famous in first big-budget Hollywood movie saved by the international market (See previous post: "Ramon Novarro: Silent Movie Star.") Turner Classic Movies’ Ramon Novarro Day continues with The Son-Daughter (1933), on TCM right now. Both Novarro and Helen Hayes play Chinese characters in San Francisco’s Chinatown — in the sort of story that had worked back in 1919, when D.W. Griffith made Broken Blossoms with Lillian Gish and Richard Barthelmess. By 1933, however, the drab-looking, slow-moving The Son-Daughter felt all wrong. (Photo: Naked Ramon Novarro in Ben-Hur.) Directed by the renowned Clarence Brown (who guided Greta Garbo in some of her biggest hits), The Son-Daughter turned out to be a well-intentioned mess, eventually bombing at the box office. And that goes to show that Louis B. Mayer and/or Irving G. Thalberg didn’t always know what the hell they were doing with their stars and properties.

Mary Boland movies: Scene-stealing actress has her ‘Summer Under the Stars’ day on TCM Turner Classic Movies will dedicate the next 24 hours, Sunday, August 4, 2013, not to Lana Turner, Lauren Bacall, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Esther Williams, or Bette Davis — TCM’s frequent Warner Bros., MGM, and/or Rko stars — but to the marvelous scene-stealer Mary Boland. A stage actress who was featured in a handful of movies in the 1910s, Boland came into her own as a stellar film supporting player in the early ’30s, initially at Paramount and later at most other Hollywood studios. First, the bad news: TCM’s "Summer Under the Stars" Mary Boland Day will feature only two movies from Boland’s Paramount period: the 1935 Best Picture Academy Award nominee Ruggles of Red Gap, which TCM has shown before, and one TCM premiere. So, no rarities like Secrets of a Secretary, Mama Loves Papa, Melody in Spring,...

Yodelling country singer best known for Rose Marie and Indian Love Call

The singer Slim Whitman, who has died aged 90, was a noteworthy figure in country music, since, although he was hugely popular outside the Us, for most of his career he was almost forgotten in his own country. In the 1970s, two decades after his American heyday, he still commanded enough of a following in the UK to be voted the No 1 international star in a music poll – four times.

Much of the reason for his success outside the Us was his high, clear, strong singing and almost operatic yodelling, characteristics that several generations in Britain, Australia and South Africa have assimilated into their notions and fantasies of the old west of America. One of Whitman's chief models was Wilf Carter, a Nova Scotian yodeller and singer of cowboy songs who was popular throughout north America in the 30s...

If not for a last minute change, legendary opera star Maria Callas would have been the female lead in The Guns of Navarone.

Opera superstar Maria Callas was set to make her movie debut in Carl Foreman’s iconic war film The Guns Of Navarone, according to a new book, The Making Of The Guns Of Navarone launched this weekend at the Bradford Widescreen Film Festival (April 26-29) by Scottish film historian Brian Hannan.

The singer had scandalised the world by her affair with Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis, who would later marry Jackie Kennedy, widow of assassinated president John F Kennedy. Callas was first choice for the role of the older female Greek partisan. Producer Carl Foreman promised ‘mucho love scenes’ with star Gregory Peck.

Commented Hannan, ‘At the time, Maria Callas was the most famous woman in the world, a fiery mixture of Princess Diana and Madonna, the...

Dead at 99: Opera star and Crosby's ex-girlfriend in 1944 Best Picture Oscar winner Risë Stevens, the Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano that moviegoers remember as Nelson Eddy's romantic partner in Roy Del Ruth's 1941 musical The Chocolate Soldier and as Bing Crosby's ex-girlfriend in Leo McCarey's 1944 Oscar-winning blockbuster Going My Way, died on Wednesday, March 20, at her Manhattan home. The former singer was 99 years old. (Pictured above: Stevens in her most famous operatic role, that of Bizet's anti-heroine Carmen.) Born in The Bronx, New York City, Stevens sang at the Metropolitan from 1938 to 1961; among her most popular roles were Dalila in Camille Saint-Saëns' Samson et Dalila, Mignon in Ambroise Thomas' opera of the same name, and most notable of all, the lead in Bizet's Carmen. After leaving the stage, she became an arts administrator with the Met and president of the Mannes College of Music.

Patty Andrews: Last Surviving member of The Andrews Sisters dead at 94 Patty Andrews, the lead vocalist and last surviving member of the Andrews Sisters musical trio, died of "natural causes" earlier today at her home in the Los Angeles suburb of Northridge, in the San Fernando Valley. Andrews, who was also the youngest sister, was 94. (Photo: The Andrews Sisters: Laverne Andrews, Patty Andrews, Maxene Andrews.) Born in Minnesota into a Greek-Norwegian family, the Andrews Sisters began their show business career in the early ’30s, while both Maxene and Patty were still teenagers. Their first big hit came out in 1938: the English version of the Yiddish song "Bei Mir Bistu Shein" (aka "Bei mir bist du schön"), with lyrics — "To me, you’re grand" — by Sammy Cahn and Saul Chaplin. (The song made into the movies that same year, but Warner Bros. star Priscilla Lane is the one singing it in Love,...

Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson rumors and gossip: Tabloid ‘news’ equals profits Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson have been used as grist for the planet’s countless rumor mills since Catharine Hardwicke’s Twilight became the worldwide sleeper hit of 2008. Following the Kristen Stewart and Rupert Sanders "scandal" in late summer 2012, "news" reports about Stewart and Pattinson breaking up, getting back together again, dating others, etc., have become not just daily, but, in the age of instant online "reports," second-ly occurrences. Now, who has the most to gain from the barrage of Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson gossip articles? The above drawing — sent to me by a follower on Twitter — makes it clear. Besides the tabloid publications themselves, Summit Entertainment and, within the last year or so, its sibling/parent company Lionsgate Pictures, have had the most to gain. Really, would the Twilight movies have been so tremendously successful without the possibility (or reality,...

Myrna Loy biography: The Only Good Girl in Hollywood Many believe that Myrna Loy is the best American actress never to have been nominated for an Academy Award. Despite having played leads and supporting roles in more than 100 movies (in addition to a few dozen bit parts during the silent era), Loy was invariably bypassed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. But that's the Oscar and the Academy's loss. For starters, Loy was a delightful light comedienne in movies such as W.S. Van Dyke's The Thin Man and Jack Conway's Libeled Lady. One of the greatest — and most beautifully politically incorrect — dialogue exchanges in movies can be heard in Rouben Mamoulian's 1932 musical Love Me Tonight: Jeanette MacDonald: "Don't you think of anything but men, dear?" Myrna Loy: "Oh yes, schoolboys." Loy could be a remarkable dramatic actress as well, as can...