Though it gave Debbie Reynolds her greatest performance to date, Singin’ in the Rain (1952) wasn’t a monster hit upon release and the quality of the films she made in its … Continue Reading Fridays With Debbie Reynolds: Susan Slept Here (1954)
TCM couldn’t have foreseen the death of actress Debbie Reynolds when they scheduled Singin’ in the Rain to kick off their 2017 Fathom Events series. Watching the film knowing Reynolds is gone … Continue Reading Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
Originally published October 11th, 2012 Before we get to today’s review I am running a day behind (this review should have gone up yesterday) so I’ll be catching up over … Continue Reading Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954)
Originally published July 18th, 2012 We’re moving from Madrid (if you read yesterday’s review) to outer space…or at least outer space by way of Arizona. Today’s film is the 1953 … Continue Reading It Came From Outer Space (1953)
You don’t often find noir that is just plain bad. Noir has a formula and conventions, and not every testing of that formula yields gold but it’s hard to get … Continue Reading Where Danger Lives (1950)
As Method acting rose to prominence, cinema took notice and started gobbling up stage-plays, giving Method actors a playground for their finest work as well as retaining a print of … Continue Reading The Member of the Wedding (1952)
Doris Day tested her image’s bounds as Ms. Wholesome when she took on the role of torch singer Ruth Etting in Love Me or Leave Me. We’ll never know for certain, … Continue Reading Love Me or Leave Me (1955)
Originally published March 21st, 2012 Calamity Jane was the latest film I watched for my Women in Film class and this movie is frustrating. It’s cute and has some good … Continue Reading Calamity Jane (1953)
Originally published November 12th, 2014 Slander’s off-kilter air manifests itself the minute you realize there’s no actual slander found in the movie. I guess the screenwriters thought “Libel” didn’t pack … Continue Reading Slander (1957)
This week is devoted to actor Van Johnson! Originally published March 16th, 2015. The addition of a wide-screen format can provide a grander sense of scope for particular films. The … Continue Reading Brigadoon (1954)
Following the painstakingly tense Shadow of a Doubt (1943) with The Man Who Knew Too Much was always a gamble, especially since things worked together so perfectly in the last film. But … Continue Reading The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
Crippled by television and desperate to get butts back into seats, 1953 was the year of 3D movies. For that entire year, nearly every big-budget production tried their hand at throwing things … Continue Reading Kiss Me Kate (1953)
The different breeds of noir can end up creating a dark morass of shadows and fog, with little variety in-between that it’s remarkable that some noirs were able to stand … Continue Reading The Big Heat (1953)
To confess sins, whether in the cloistered confines of a confessional or the wide-open, if somewhat anonymous, world of the internet is to lay oneself bare. Alfred Hitchcock’s I Confess presents … Continue Reading I Confess (1953)
The beginnings of the 1960s saw the sun set on the Western audiences were used to seeing. John Wayne going off to bring back Natalie Wood had only happened two years … Continue Reading Cowboy (1958)
Hollywood, the Dream Factory. Ask any classic film fan and they’ll reiterate that classic films have an elegance, a fantastical quality that invites us, however briefly, into a fantasy world … Continue Reading Latin Lovers (1953)
