Archive for June, 2011
Monday, June 27th, 2011
Super-Duper Cooper
Kevin Brownlow’s cinema history documentary, I’m King Kong!, is a profile of Merian C. Cooper. Known best as the larger-than-life director of King Kong, Cooper co-directed This Is Cinerama, which helped launch widescreen movies to the public. He also produced The Searchers with John Ford. WWI bomber pilot, war prisoner who walked 400 miles across [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Cable and DVD by DavidE
Thursday, June 16th, 2011
This Dodge Is a Ford
Even the lesser films from director John Ford have a warmth of character and a respect for human frailty that’s rarely seen anywhere else. A good example is The Wings of Eagles, Ford’s sentimental tribute to Frank “Sig” Wead. An ace pilot in World War I, Wead turned to screenwriting after a fall left him [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Cable and DVD by DavidE
Sunday, June 5th, 2011
Archetypal Western
Greatest Western of all time? Most influential Western? Archetypal Western? Stagecoach (1939) may be all three, depending on your point of view. John Ford hadn’t made a Western since 3 Bad Men (1926) and was eager to make another. Stagecoach was originally slated to be shot in Technicolor with David O. Selznick as the producer. [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Cable, DVD, and Blu-ray by DavidE
Sunday, June 5th, 2011
Alas, Poor Yorick
Until Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet (1948), Shakespeare films were considered to be box office poison. A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935) and Romeo and Juliet (1936) lost money, despite having top Hollywood stars in the leading roles. Studios were all in favor of releasing an occasional prestige film, even if it took a loss, but previous adaptations [...]