1940s

Quote:
The hero of Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead is Howard Roark (Gary Cooper), a fiercely independent architect obviously patterned after Frank Lloyd Wright. Rather than compromise his ideals, Roark takes menial work as a quarryman to finance his projects. He falls in love with heiress Dominique (Patricia Neal), but ends the relationship when he has the opportunity to construct buildings according to his own wishes. Dominique marries a newspaper tycoon (Raymond Massey) who at first conducts a vitriolic campaign against the “radical” Roark, but eventually becomes his strongest supporter. Upon being given a public-housing contract on the proviso that his plans not be changed in any way, Roark is aghast to learn that his designs will be radically altered. Roark sneaks into the unfinished structure at night, makes certain no one else is around, and dynamites the project into oblivion.Read More »

La Bataille du Rail (Battle of the Rails) is regarded by many cineastes as the one truly great French “resistance” film. Based on fact, the episodic plotline details the courageous efforts by French railray workers to sabotage Nazi reinforcement-troop trains. The film’s thesis is that this underground activity was largely responsible for the allied victory on D-Day. Writer-director Rene Clement enhanced the reality of the story by filming on actual locations and using genuine railway employees and resistance fighters in the cast. Admittedly slow going at times, La Bataille du Rail is more successful as a morale-booster than as pure entertainment.Read More »

Plot:
When Mike Sarno (Kane Richmond) out-cheats Fay Benton (Bernadene Hayes) in a crooked poker game, the two gamblers bury the hatchet and agree to become partners in crime. Posing as brother and sister, the pair finally hits the big time when Mike runs into a gambler (Phil Van Zandt) who owes him a debt and takes over his casino to square it.Read More »

A day in the life of Beby the clown. Filmed between shows at Circus Medrano, at home and in the streets of Paris, with his faithful partner and friend the clown Maïss.Read More »

Samia and Farid bump into each other by chance. Farid ends up renting a room in the house where Samia with her troop of dancers live. Their opposite characters clash while there’s also chemistry between them. Some misunderstandings drive the two away from each other. But events turn in their favour.Read More »

Synopsis:
Troubled youths Joe and Nick Lorenzo grow into very different men: Joe a small-time hoodlum and Nick an honored college graduate. When Nick falls for Joe’s girl Laurie, trouble erupts between the two men and also with the gang that has it in for Joe.Read More »

The time is the Russian Revolution. The place is a country burdened with fear – the midnight knock at the door, the bread hidden against famine, the haunted eyes of the fleeing, the grublike fat of the appeasers and oppressors. In a bitter struggle of the individual against the collective, three people stand forth with the mark of the unconquered in their bearing: Kira, who wants to be a builder, and the two men who love her – Leo, an aristocrat, and Andrei, a Communist. In their tensely dramatic story, Ayn Rand shows what the theories of Communism mean in practice. We the Living is not a story of politics but of the men and women who have to struggle for existence behind the Red banners and slogans.Read More »

Martin Fric composed several Karel Capek’s Tales in the form of story telling of train passengers. They include three tales from the book “Tales from One Pocket”: “Propuštěný” (Released), “Poslední soud” (The Last Judgment) and “Ukradený spis” (The Stolen Document); and two tales from the book “Tales from the Other Pocket”: “Balada o Juraji Čupovi” (Ballad about Juraj Cup) a “Případ s dítětem” (The Case of Baby).Read More »

This film was shown in the movie theaters two months before the landing and afterward completely disappeared only to reappear in 1993. This is of course a propaganda movie .But not more than Stelli’s “Le Voile BLeu” .

Beginning his movie with an evocation of Joan of Arc was not completely incongruous ; Guitry probably thought it was a sign from God ;1429: Joan’s odyssey begins ;birth of the Homeland ,1942: under the yoke of the Nazis ,but still proud of its past ,the country remembers .1429,1942 sinister anagram.Joan found since taken over by the far right wing .Read More »