Reviews
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Southside 1-1000: Underrated Gem
The first clue that perhaps Southside 1-1000 (1950) isn't going to be as hard-boiled as I want it to be comes right after the opening credits, when announcer Gerald Mohr gives us a 4- or 5-minute lecture on the contemporary globo-economic outlook and the need for the Secret Service. Talking about the big conflicts troubling the world at the time—you know, East versus West, Freedom vs. Totalitarian...
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Where's That Been? - I Escaped from the Gestapo
About fifty-eight minutes into the wartime programmer I Escaped from the Gestapo (1943), a young Gestapo agent named Gordon (Bill Henry) experiences a series of flashbacks to his previous life in Germany while onboard a train headed for Seattle. If you’re quick enough, you can spot actress Frances Farmer in this montage; she’s the woman staring at the camera as she pulls a shawl towards her. Thi...
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Where's That Been? Inferno
At the Noir City Film Festival in San Francisco this past February 2013, a 3-D film noir double feature was presented in the scheduling of Man in the Dark (1953) and Inferno (1953). The latter of these two noirs was 20th Century Fox’s first foray into the 3-D craze; a taut suspense thriller starring Robert Ryan as a crippled millionaire left for dead in the desert by his unfaithful wife Rhonda Fl...
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Where's That Been? - It's in the Bag!
By the time Fred Allen made the cover of Time magazine in April of 1946, the veteran comedian was practically at the peak of his powers. Enthusiastically welcomed into the radio homes of both critics and the public every week, Allen’s ratings decline over the ether wouldn’t happen until the fall of 1948, when a giveaway program called Stop the Music—sort of the American Idol of its day—began to l...
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Soupy Sales - In Living Black and White
I'm not sure you can really 'get' Soupy Sales if you didn't grow up watching him, but I think you can certainly appreciate him. The very notion of a local kids' TV show host, let alone one who runs a ship as loose as this, seems outlandish in today's era of homogenized children's programming. Sure, there are children's cartoons that aim to appeal to grown-ups with a sly reference here and there, b...
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Blondie Johnson: Crackerjack Pre-Code
Blondie Johnson is a crackerjack pre-Code gangster drama starring Joan Blondell and Chester Morris at the top of their games. Blondell plays the title character, a woman who's suffered through a hardscrabble life and decides she wants a lot of dough, and fast. She starts running cons with the help of a genial taxi driver (Sterling Holloway) and immediately attracts the attention of Danny Jones...
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It Ain't Hay: Sit Back and Enjoy!
1943's It Ain't Hay is an Abbott and Costello vehicle adapted from a Damon Runyon story, Princess O'Hara. If you have qualms about how an established, iconic comedy team can mesh with Runyon's writing, well, why not take the carefree attitude of one Shemp Howard? Early in the film, fellow character actor Eddie Quillan asks Mr. Howard, 'What's the deal with the umbrella?' since it's n...
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Colorama: Leave Her to Heaven - The Technicolor Noir
In 1945, after several years of wartime heroines battling their troubles cheerfully for the sake of their men, American audiences were treated to two films about women who loved, not wisely, but far, far too well. Mildred Pierce , a Joan Crawford vehicle about a woman’s obsessive devotion to her worthless offspring, and Leave Her to Heaven, a movie which showcased Gene Tierney, at the radiant heig...
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Classics 101: Modern Times
For nearly 30 years, I’ve been introducing new generations to classic features, short subjects, and vintage cartoon through a series of Friday night film parties held weekly at my home. I’ve also sponsored and hosted a variety of theatrical screenings of classic films. One of the great joys I have is introducing “great films” that are also simply fun to watch, highly entertaining, and enjoyable on...
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Where's That Been? - Pitfall
John Forbes (Dick Powell) is, to borrow the title of the 1955 novel and 1956 film, The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. He’s an insurance agent, wrapped in a snug suburban cocoon with his devoted wife Sue (Jane Wyatt) and son Tommy (Jimmy Hunt). The Forbes family is the picture of domesticity and the embodiment of the American Dream—they pay their bills on time, they eat breakfast and dinner togethe...
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