George D. Allen and Irv Slifkin | Movie Buzz, Movie Buzz Podcast
What famous director was originally asked to direct the silent chiller classic The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari? Which symphony of horror received its lavish premiere at a zoo? Can you guess the name of the legendary actor who was so dedicated he brought his own houseplants to decorate the set? Find out the answers to these mystifying tidbits of Terror-ific Trivia, along with a host of other little-known facts behind your favorite fear films, as Ghouly Irv digs around the darkest corners of his crypt:
Gary Cahall | Staff Notes
Okay, please let me get in a few words first. Starting from the age of 12 or so--between afternoon and late late TV broadcasts, a few screenings in repertoire cinemas (Remember rep theaters? That's where college students and urban intelligentsia would flock to watch King of Hearts, Harold and Maude, and Reefer Madness before home video essentially drove them out of business) , VHS and DVD viewings, and its once-a-month-or-so appearances on TCM--I estimate that I have seen Casablanca at least 150 times. I love the movie, it's one of my top three all-time favorites (Marty and the 1939 Hunchback of Notre Dame, thanks for asking), and Casablanca roundly deserves its three Academy Awards, its generations of fans, and the praise it's been given since its November 1942 premiere.
That being said, it's not a perfect movie. No work of art, however moving or skillfully executed, is without flaws (For example, did you ever notice that the Venus de Milo's arms are missing?). And while "hate" may be an exaggeration, there are certain aspects to Casablanca--some very minor--that may puzzle, irk or even annoy me, but that I've learned to put up with over the years. They are (MULTIPLE SPOILER ALERTS!), in ascending order of "irksomeness":
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guest-blogs | FanFare Friends
Guest blogger Alexis writes:
On December 8, 1941, the day after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, the play, Everybody Goes to Rick's, was purchased by Warner Bros. Producer Hal Wallis for $20,000. This was the most money ever spent on an un-produced play and would start on of the most perfectly timed cinematic events in film history.
The original story was discovered by Irene Lee, the story department head who felt like it had potential. There is always talk about the way Casablanca was written, I'll try and bring forth what seems to be the way it ended up the way it did. The title was changed from Everybody Goes to Rick's to Casablanca because it was catchy and relevant. People at the time would have seen the word "Casablanca" in the news and were mostly aware of where it is.
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Irv Slifkin | Focus On..., Movie Buzz
I must not have been much older than three when I first saw John Wayne’s The Alamo.
It was impressive to say the least. More than likely, my father took me to see it, since he was the one who always took me to the “guy movies,” films with fighting and war and, well, lots of men. (Mom, on the other hand, got the assignment for Jerry Lewis, Disney and Doris Day movies, while Grandmom was my musicals connection.)
But from the beginning The Alamo was special to me. I am almost positive I saw it at least three times in the theaters, going again after it was reissued after its 1960 original arrival.
No doubt the character of Davy Crockett was a big draw. He was a big deal in my household before The Alamo, portrayed by Fess Parker in installments of Walt Disney’s weekly series “Disneyland.” While the exploits of “The King of the Wild Frontier” and sidekick George Russell (limned by a pre-Jed Clampett Buddy Ebsen) offered stirring adventure for any youngster—whether it be bear wrassling or battling river pirates—it was the sequences set at the Alamo and the Texans’ struggle for freedom that really got to me at an early age. So engaged I was in the myth of Crockett, that I donned a coonskin cap—like scores of other youngsters at the time—to take in Davy tackling the Goliaths in rerun after rerun on the new deluxe size Zenith television set my parents had just purchased.
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guest-blogs | FanFare Friends
Guest blogger Fred Burdsall writes:
I told you about The Brainiac and The Deadly Mantis from my childhood. Now, I’ll tell you about my favorite movie. The one movie that started my absolute love of horror and sci-fi… The Ridley Scott masterpiece… Alien.
By the time I finally got around to seeing it at the movies it was already on its last legs and playing down the street for a dollar. (Does anyone else remember the days of neighborhood theaters?) My friend Brian asked me if I had seen it yet and when I said no he told me, “I’ll meet you there because you HAVE to see this.” (A personal pet peeve is people telling me what I have to see, because it usually sucks). So with my dollar in hand I went in and was told I should sit in the front row of a fairly empty theater, but he refused to tell me why. This turned out to be the best dollar I EVER spent.
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Dr. Strangefilm | From The Files Of Dr. Strangefilm...
In the late 1940s and early '50s the United States was under attack. Not by tanks or planes, but by a much more insidious enemy, one that worked its way across America, from large cities to small hamlets. Its mission was to infiltrate all aspects of society--home, school, tavern, and even church--and slowly gain control of the will of the people before they were aware of the danger. This invasion didn't go without notice, however, and Hollywood set out to warn the populace of this new menace, even as some claimed that the filmmakers themselves had a hand in its spread.
The menace I'm talking about was, of course, television. What, did you think I meant Communism? Well, I can see, in re-reading the previous paragraph, how one might have come to that conclusion. But while Red Scare-era Tinseltown did try to reveal the perils of global Marxist domination--and appease Washington--through such efforts as My Son John, I Was a Communist for the F.B.I., and the future case file Invasion U.S.A. (no, not the Chuck Norris one), the movie moguls saw the rise of TV as a bigger threat, at least to their pocketbooks. Fortunately, today's case is a perfect example of cinematic synchronicity, because the two terrors of the McCarthy era became one in the form of...the Twonky!
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Gary Cahall | Staff Notes
Those of us who consider ourselves die-hard movie fans (not to be confused with fans of the Die Hard movies) might like to think that we'd do anything to meet our screen heroes. That bar was raised considerably in 2008's Slumdog Millionaire, when title protagonist Jamal remembers how, as a boy growing up in impoverished Mumbai, he once escaped from a locked outhouse by diving down into and wading through piles of...well, what they build outhouses for, so that he could see and get the autograph of Bollywood film star Amitabh Bachchan. That, dear readers, is dedication, and while Bachchan didn't play himself in Slumdog, it gave American audiences a glimpse of the fervent devotion the actor known as "the Big B" has built up in his native India, across South Asia, and around the world in his 40-plus-year body of work. Everywhere, that is, except here.
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Irv Slifkin | Movie Buzz, TV Tip Sheet
Soapy Sales
A favorite for its 1981-1990 run on CBS, Falcon Crest was a nighttime sudser bubbling with colorful characters, duplicitous behavior and big-time movie and TV stars. Jane Wyman is the nasty owner of a Northern California winery and matriarch of a family that includes affable nephew Robert Foxworth and lazy playboy grandson Lorenzo Lamas. Abby Dalton, William R. Moses, and Susan Sullivan also star in this series created by Earl Hamner, Jr. of The Waltons fame; guest appearances during the show’s first season include Lana Turner and Dana Andrews. All 18 episodes from the debut season can be found on Falcon Crest: The Complete First Season.
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Chris Cummins | New Releases This Week
This week's new releases include critically acclaimed favories, riveting documentaries on topics ranging from capitalism to the legendary siblings who changed the way movies were made, unoriginal comedic shenanigans from John Travolta and Robin Williams, and a one-season TV wonder finally making its DVD debut.
Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire
Yes, it's common knowledge that Lee Daniels' acclaimed drama is an incredibly well-acted, emotionally involving tour-de-force. But can we all agree that the lengthy title is a bit much? Gabourey Sidibe, Mo'Nique, Sherri Shepherd, Lenny Kravitz and Mariah Carey's phony mustache star.
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guest-blogs | Guest Contributors
Guest blogger Bill Wren writes:
I rewatched for the nth time (I’ve lost track) Howard Hawk’s Bringing Up Baby (1938). Apart from being great fun each time I watch it, this time was a bit different having read Marc Eliot’s book, Cary Grant: A Biography and having previously watched Cary Grant: A Class Apart (a documentary on the second disc of the two-disc special edition DVD).
Here’s why this is interesting: Seeing Bringing Up Baby, at least as I do, you would think Cary Grant is in full command of what he’s doing — the ever skillful and brilliant, Cary. However, what you find out is that that is anything but the case.
Grant had had huge success with the previous year’s The Awful Truth (1937). However, he never took credit for its success because he had no idea how he had done it. He felt it was a fluke. He had been extremely anxious over his character, not sure how to play him, copying many mannerisms and stances of his then director, Leo McCarey.
Following closely on The Awful Truth, he was worried again about how to play his character in Bringing Up Baby and, compounding this, “… he was afraid to make a movie that was too stylistically similar in which his performance would not be as good.” (From Eliot’s biography of Cary Grant, p. 178.)
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Jay Steinberg | Movie Buzz
March 10, 1910: D.W. Griffith launches the Hollywood film industry with In Old California, the first film to be made in the new municipality.
March 10, 1922: Hollywood hires former postmaster general Will H. Hays to oversee "moral and artistic standards in motion picture production."
March 11, 1931: The German director of Nosferatu and Sunrise, F.W. Murnau, 42, is killed in a car accident on the Santa Barbara Highway.
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