Classics

  • Raoul Walsh – The Yellow Ticket (1931)

    1931-1940ClassicsDramaRaoul WalshUSA

    Marya, a Russian Jewish girl (Elissa Landi) is forced into a life of prostitution in Czarist Russia – a scandal to the naïve muckraking British journalist (Laurence Olivier). They both eventually find their lives endangered when she reveals to him tales of social crimes rampant in her country. The lecherous Baron (Lionel Barrymore), popping pills for “extra potency,” is also head of the secret police, and he is determined to seperate them.Read More »

  • Guy Lefranc – Knock (1951)

    1951-1960ClassicsComedyFranceGuy Lefranc

    Saint-Maurice, an ordinary peaceful village, lived healthily so much so that the local doctor’s practice was scant. But that was before Dr. Parpalaid retired and was replaced by a charlatan by the name of Knock. A real genius this one, for he soon managed to persuade everyone that they were ill. And not only didn’t they resent him but they even loved their physician, who made a fortune and brought prosperity to the village by turning it into a big hospital.Read More »

  • Henry King – Stanley and Livingstone (1939)

    1931-1940AdventureClassicsHenry KingUSA

    In the late 1860s, newspaperman Henry M. Stanley agrees to go to Africa to find Dr. David Livingston. The good doctor has been reported dead but Stanley’s employer, James Gordon Bennet, publisher of the New York Herald doesn’t believe. As he is fond of saying, he likes to make the news while others wait for it to happen. Stanley goes first to Zanzibar to organize his safari deep into uncharted Africa. There he becomes enamored with the beautiful Eve Kingsley. He sets off with his sidekick Jeff Slocum and they face many hazards along the way including illness and irate tribesmen.Read More »

  • Amleto Palermi – L’allegro fantasma AKA The Happy Ghost (1941)

    1941-1950Amleto PalermiClassicsComedyItalian Cinema under FascismItaly

    The nobleman Pantaleo of Santa Paola has deceased recently, but in the preamble to his will is read his confession in which he declares to have had, in his youth, an affair with a circus horsewoman from which were born two twin sons.
    The search for these twins will bring the notary Pensabene and their cousins heirs, Rosa, Lilli e Titti, to fortuitously find Nicolino, the first of the twins. The search will continue with other hilarious adventures that will see the figure of Toto alternating with several phantasmagorical characters, surrounded by a family that wants to undermine their safety in order to collect the money of Pantaleo’s inheritance.Read More »

  • James W. Horne – Bonnie Scotland (1935)

    1931-1940ClassicsComedyJames W. HorneUSA

    Stan and Ollie stowaway to Scotland expecting to inherit the MacLaurel estate. However Stan’s inheritance amounts to a set of bagpipes and a snuff box. The boys are tricked into enlisting in the army and are posted to India where the heiress to the MacLaurel estate has moved to be near her guardian. Her Scottish sweetheart Allan also enlists. The boys are “volunteered” by the Sergeant (Finlayson) to impersonate officers at the palace of Mir Jutra and foil a plot to murder the officers by overturning several beehives.Read More »

  • Jack Clayton – The Pumpkin Eater (1964)

    1961-1970ClassicsDramaJack ClaytonUnited Kingdom

    Synopsis:
    Film screenwriter Jake Armitage and his wife Jo Armitage live in London with six of Jo’s eight children, with the two eldest boys at boarding school. The children are spread over Jo’s three marriages, with only the youngest being Jake’s biological child, although he treats them all as his own. Jo left her second husband Giles after meeting Giles’ friend Jake, the two who were immediately attracted to each other. Their upper middle class life is much different than Giles and Jo’s, who lived in a barn in the English countryside. But Jo is ruminating about her strained marriage to Jake, with issues on both sides.Read More »

  • Eric Sykes – The Plank (1967)

    1961-1970ClassicsComedyEric SykesUnited Kingdom

    Classic short British comedy, full of stars. In this slapstick comedy two bumbling workmen attempt to take a long wooden plank through a London suburb to a building site. Mayhem ensues. This is done with music and a sort of “wordless dialogue” which consists of a few mumbled sounds to convey the appropriate emotion.Read More »

  • George Fitzmaurice – Suzy (1936)

    Drama1931-1940ClassicsGeorge FitzmauriceUSA

    Synopsis:
    When American showgirl Suzy (Jean Harlow) finds herself in London without work, she plans to leave her career behind and find a rich husband. Instead, she falls for brilliant but broke inventor Terry (Franchot Tone), who is developing an airplane stabilizer. When Terry is mistakenly shot by a spy, Suzy fears she will be blamed and flees to Paris, where she returns to a life of singing and marries flyboy Andre (Cary Grant). But things get complicated when Suzy learns that Terry has survived.Read More »

  • Henry King – Little Old New York (1940)

    1931-1940ClassicsHenry KingRomanceUSA

    Quote:
    In the 1800s, American inventor Robert Fulton (Richard Greene) travels from Europe to New York intent on building a steamboat that will revolutionize river travel between waterfront boroughs, but instead gets a rude welcome from a vicious shipyard boss at a local tavern owned by salty beauty Pat O’Day (Alice Faye). Pat takes a shine to Fulton and offers to help him out, but her jealous boyfriend — sailor Charles Brownne (Fred MacMurray) — fears the new vessel will put him out of work.Read More »

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