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Song and dance man or gangster? Few stars of Hollywood’s Golden Era could claim they were equally well known for two such diverse genres. Yet, the legendary James Cagney worked hard to be able to make such a claim.

He was born on July 17, 1899, in New York City. His family was poor, and Cagney was sickly as a child. While growing up in a rough neighborhood, he learned a variety of skills, including tap dancing, street fighting, baseball and boxing. When he was 19, his father died, and he took odd jobs to help support his mother and siblings. On a whim, he auditioned for a role of a chorus girl in a local production. Although he had never had professional training, he landed the role and learned the dances from watching the other performers – and it never bothered him to dress as a girl and perform. Despite his mother...

Talk about a worthy title for restoration — somebody up there likes us. Digital tools and film preservation expertise have advanced far enough to revive this marvelous pre-Code comedy-shocker in a form that showcases its wild designs and stylized 2-color Technicolor sheen. Director Michael Curtiz’s adept direction highlights Glenda Farrell’s racy dialogue delivery as well as the spooky, expressionist horrors in Lionel Atwill’s haunted ‘waxitorium.’ To top it off we have fabulous Fay Wray, the talkies’ original scream queen, shrieking her way into the horror hall of fame in the tradition of The Phantom of the Opera. Plus — for once the Warner Archive adds some fine new added value extras.

Mystery of the Wax Museum

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1933 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 77 min. / Street Date May 12, 2020 / available through the WBshop / 21.99

Starring: Lionel Atwill, Fay Wray, Glenda Farrell, Frank McHugh, Allen Vincent, Gavin Gordon, Arthur Edmund Carewe.

Cinematography: Ray Rennahan...

Great news for fans of old musicals! James Cagney in Footlight Parade (1932) is now available on Blu-ray from Warner Archives

Footlight Parade is sheer cinematic joy. In this Depression-era romp, a timid stenographer (Ruby Keeler) removes her glasses and – wow! – she’s a star. A gee-whiz tenor (Dick Powell) asserts his independence. Plucky chorines tap, greedy hangers-on get their comeuppances, and an indefatigable producer/dancer (James Cagney) and his Girl Friday (Joan Blondell) work showbiz miracles to stage live prologues for talkie houses to keep their company afloat during hard times. Honeymoon Hotel, By a Waterfall and Shanghai Lil are the shows, directed by Busby Berkeley and filled with imagination-bending sets, startling camera angles, kaleidoscopic pageantry and a 20,000-gallon-per-minute waterfall. Curtain up!

James Cagney demonstrates his Big Apple hoofer bonafides while adding his one-of-a-kind fiery grit to this Busby Berkeley musical packed with the usual sensational suspects. Chester Kent (Cagney...

Song and dance man or gangster? Few stars of Hollywood’s Golden Era could claim they were equally well known for two such diverse genres. Yet, the legendary James Cagney worked hard to be able to make such a claim.

He was born on July 17, 1899, in New York City. His family was poor, and Cagney was sickly as a child. While growing up in a rough neighborhood, he learned a variety of skills, including tap dancing, street fighting, baseball and boxing. When he was 19, his father died, and he took odd jobs to help support his mother and siblings. On a whim, he auditioned for a role of a chorus girl in a local production. Although he had never had professional training, he landed the role and learned the dances from watching the other performers – and it never bothered him to dress as a girl and perform. Despite his mother...

This amazing Busby Berkeley extravaganza is the best choice to impress newbies to pre-Code musical madness: it is absolutely irresistible. James Cagney’s nervy, terminally excitable stage producer makes the tale of Chester Kent accessible to viewers otherwise allergic to musicals — he’s as electric here as he is in his gangster movies. Remastered in HD, the fantastic, kaleidoscopic visuals will wow anybody — we really expect Porky Pig to pop up and stutter, “N-n-n-o CGI, Folks!”

Footlight Parade

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1933 / B&w / 1:37 flat Academy / 104 min. / Street Date July 16, 2019 / available through the WBshop / 21.99

Starring: James Cagney, Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell, Frank McHugh, Ruth Donnelly, Guy Kibbee, Hugh Herbert.

Cinematography: George Barnes

Art Directors: Anton Grot, Jack Okey Film Editor: George Amy

Original Music: Sammy Fain, Irving Kahal Harry Warren, Al Dubin

Written by Manuel Seff, James Seymour

Produced by Robert Lord

Directed by Lloyd Bacon

Our...

In the last decade of his career, John Ford produced and directed this ode to crony politics, with Spencer Tracy as an old-fashioned mayor who uses underhanded ploys to do right by his constituents. Tracy is backed by a veritable army of supporting actors, neatly orchestrated in Frank Nugent’s screenplay. We’re talking scores of John Ford stock company players; it’s like old home week, with Ford in firm control.

The Last Hurrah

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1958 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 121 min. / Street Date September 18, 2018 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95

Starring: Spencer Tracy, Jeffrey Hunter, Dianne Foster, Basil Rathbone, Pat O’Brien, Donald Crisp, James Gleason, Edward Brophy, John Carradine, Willis Bouchey, Basil Ruysdael, Ricardo Cortez, Wallace Ford, Frank McHugh, Carleton Young, Frank Albertson, Anna Lee, Ken Curtis, Jane Darwell, O.Z. Whitehead, Charles B. Fitzsimons, Arthur Walsh, Bob Sweeney, William Leslie, Danny Borzage, Richard Deacon, James Flavin,...

'The Magnificent Ambersons': Directed by Orson Welles, and starring Tim Holt (pictured), Dolores Costello (in the background), Joseph Cotten, Anne Baxter, and Agnes Moorehead, this Academy Award-nominated adaptation of Booth Tarkington's novel earned Ricardo Cortez's brother Stanley Cortez an Academy Award nomination for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White. He lost to Joseph Ruttenberg for William Wyler's blockbuster 'Mrs. Miniver.' Two years later, Cortez – along with Lee Garmes – would win Oscar statuettes for their evocative black-and-white work on John Cromwell's homefront drama 'Since You Went Away,' starring Ricardo Cortez's 'Torch Singer' leading lady, Claudette Colbert. In all, Stanley Cortez would receive cinematography credit in more than 80 films, ranging from B fare such as 'The Lady in the Morgue' and the 1940 'Margie' to Fritz Lang's 'Secret Beyond the Door,' Charles Laughton's 'The Night of the Hunter,' and Nunnally Johnson's 'The Three Faces...

The restoration of a newly rediscovered director’s cut of the 1931 The Front Page prompts this two-feature comedy disc — Lewis Milestone’s early talkie plus the sublime Howard Hawks remake, which plays a major gender switch on the main characters of Hecht & MacArthur’s original play.

His Girl Friday / The Front Page

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 849

Available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 10, 2017 / 39.96

His Girl Friday:

1940 / B&W /1:37 flat Academy / 92 min.

Starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy, Gene Lockhart, Porter Hall, Ernest Truex, Cliff Edwards, Clarence Kolb, Roscoe Karns, Frank Jenks, Regis Toomey, Abner Biberman, Frank Orth, John Qualen, Helen Mack, Alma Kruger, Billy Gilbert, Marion Martin.

Cinematography Joseph Walker

Film Editor Gene Havelick

Original Music Sidney Cutner, Felix Mills

Written by Charles Lederer from the play The Front Page by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur

Produced and Directed by Howard Hawks

The Front Page:...

Merle Oberon movies: Mysterious star of British and American cinema. Merle Oberon on TCM: Donning men's clothes in 'A Song to Remember,' fighting hiccups in 'That Uncertain Feeling' Merle Oberon is Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Month of March 2016. The good news: the exquisite (and mysterious) Oberon, whose ancestry has been a matter of conjecture for decades, makes any movie worth a look. The bad news: TCM isn't offering any Oberon premieres despite the fact that a number of the actress' films – e.g., Temptation, Night in Paradise, Pardon My French, Interval – can be tough to find. This evening, March 18, TCM will be showing six Merle Oberon movies released during the first half of the 1940s. Never a top box office draw in the United States, Oberon was an important international star all the same, having worked with many of the top actors and filmmakers of the studio era.

Norma Shearer films Note: This article is being revised and expanded. Please check back later. Turner Classic Movies' Norma Shearer month comes to a close this evening, Nov. 24, '15, with the presentation of the last six films of Shearer's two-decade-plus career. Two of these are remarkably good; one is schizophrenic, a confused mix of high comedy and low drama; while the other three aren't the greatest. Yet all six are worth a look even if only because of Norma Shearer herself – though, really, they all have more to offer than just their top star. Directed by W.S. Van Dyke, the no-expense-spared Marie Antoinette (1938) – $2.9 million, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made up to that time – stars the Canadian-born Queen of MGM as the Austrian-born Queen of France. This was Shearer's first film in two years (following Romeo and Juliet) and her first release following husband Irving G.

Norma Shearer films Note: This article is being revised and expanded. Please check back later. Turner Classic Movies' Norma Shearer month comes to a close this evening, Nov. 24, '15, with the presentation of the last six films of Shearer's two-decade-plus career. Two of these are remarkably good; one is schizophrenic, a confused mix of high comedy and low drama; while the other three aren't the greatest. Yet all six are worth a look even if only because of Norma Shearer herself – though, really, they all have more to offer than just their top star. Directed by W.S. Van Dyke, the no-expense-spared Marie Antoinette (1938) – $2.9 million, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made up to that time – stars the Canadian-born Queen of MGM as the Austrian-born Queen of France. This was Shearer's first film in two years (following Romeo and Juliet) and her first release following husband Irving G.

Pat O'Brien movies on TCM: 'The Front Page,' 'Oil for the Lamps of China' Remember Pat O'Brien? In case you don't, you're not alone despite the fact that O'Brien was featured – in both large and small roles – in about 100 films, from the dawn of the sound era to 1981. That in addition to nearly 50 television appearances, from the early '50s to the early '80s. Never a top star or a critics' favorite, O'Brien was nevertheless one of the busiest Hollywood leading men – and second leads – of the 1930s. In that decade alone, mostly at Warner Bros., he was seen in nearly 60 films, from Bs (Hell's House, The Final Edition) to classics (American Madness, Angels with Dirty Faces). Turner Classic Movies is showing nine of those today, Nov. 11, '15, in honor of what would have been the Milwaukee-born O'Brien's 116th birthday. Pat O'Brien and James Cagney Spencer Tracy had Katharine Hepburn.

I'll trade you two RKOs for two Warners', an even swap! This quartet of movie-magic wonderments offer a full course on old-school film effects wizardry at its best. Willis O'Brien passes the baton to disciple Ray Harryhausen, who dazzles us with his own effects magic for the first '50s giant monster epic. And the best monster thriller of the decade is offered at its original widescreen aspect ratio. It's all special enough to merit a mid-week review. Special Effects Collection Blu-ray The Son of Kong, Mighty Joe Young, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, Them! Warner Home Video 1933-1954 / B&W / 1:37 Academy - 1:85 widescreen / 335 min. / Street Date October 27, 2015 / 54.96 or 19.98 separately Starring Robert Armstrong, Helen Mack,, Frank Reicher, Victor Wong; Robert Armstrong, Terry Moore, Ben Johnson, Frank McHugh; Paul Christian, Paula Raymond, Cecil Kellaway, Kenneth Tobey, Donald Woods, Lee Van Cleef; James Whitmore, Edmund Gwenn, Joan Weldon, James Arness, Onslow Stevens,...

Douglas Fairbanks Jr. ca. 1935. Douglas Fairbanks Jr. was never as popular as his father, silent film superstar Douglas Fairbanks, who starred in one action-adventure blockbuster after another in the 1920s (The Mark of Zorro, Robin Hood, The Thief of Bagdad) and whose stardom dates back to the mid-1910s, when Fairbanks toplined a series of light, modern-day comedies in which he was cast as the embodiment of the enterprising, 20th century “all-American.” What this particular go-getter got was screen queen Mary Pickford as his wife and United Artists as his studio, which he co-founded with Pickford, D.W. Griffith, and Charles Chaplin. Now, although Jr. never had the following of Sr., he did enjoy a solid two-decade-plus movie career. In fact, he was one of the few children of major film stars – e.g., Jane Fonda, Liza Minnelli, Angelina Jolie, Michael Douglas, Jamie Lee Curtis – who had successful film careers of their own.

Groucho Marx in 'Duck Soup.' Groucho Marx movies: 'Duck Soup,' 'The Story of Mankind' and romancing Margaret Dumont on TCM Grouch Marx, the bespectacled, (painted) mustached, cigar-chomping Marx brother, is Turner Classic Movies' “Summer Under the Stars” star today, Aug. 14, '15. Marx Brothers fans will be delighted, as TCM is presenting no less than 11 of their comedies, in addition to a brotherly reunion in the 1957 all-star fantasy The Story of Mankind. Non-Marx Brothers fans should be delighted as well – as long as they're fans of Kay Francis, Thelma Todd, Ann Miller, Lucille Ball, Eve Arden, Allan Jones, affectionate, long-tongued giraffes, and/or that great, scene-stealing dowager, Margaret Dumont. Right now, TCM is showing Robert Florey and Joseph Santley's The Cocoanuts (1929), an early talkie notable as the first movie featuring the four Marx Brothers – Groucho, Chico, Harpo, and Zeppo. Based on their hit Broadway...

Olivia de Havilland picture U.S. labor history-making 'Gone with the Wind' star and two-time Best Actress winner Olivia de Havilland turns 99 (This Olivia de Havilland article is currently being revised and expanded.) Two-time Best Actress Academy Award winner Olivia de Havilland, the only surviving major Gone with the Wind cast member and oldest surviving Oscar winner, is turning 99 years old today, July 1.[1] Also known for her widely publicized feud with sister Joan Fontaine and for her eight movies with Errol Flynn, de Havilland should be remembered as well for having made Hollywood labor history. This particular history has nothing to do with de Havilland's films, her two Oscars, Gone with the Wind, Joan Fontaine, or Errol Flynn. Instead, history was made as a result of a legal fight: after winning a lawsuit against Warner Bros. in the mid-'40s, Olivia de Havilland put an end to treacherous...

Allen Jenkins. Illustration by Tony Millionaire from the book The Depression Alphabet Primer, by Daniel Riccuito with illustrations by Tony Millionaire.

Utterly relaxed in his lumpen condition, character actor Allen Jenkins craves no self-improvement—external circumstances are a perennial cause of concern, but within his skin, everything is pronounced satisfactory. He and the world have agreed to disagree. Imagine a sad and slapdash identikit collaged from discards veering toward Neanderthal.

Overall effect: the big toe.

Jenkins excels as stooges and losers when Hollywood is choked with them. His powerhouse harnessed to stock screen personas, as if to fulfill a collective need of the 1930s, every mother’s son compressed into one hyphenate—the titan-shlump. An American type, ideal for our man Jenkins, who could explode into three dimensions and collapse again; it would serve him well throughout a fairly long career, even as his habitual boozing persisted.

As a hit-man...

Godzilla 1954, Mickey Rooney, Giant Ants, Fascists, and rarely seen ‘Musty Stuffer’: Eclectic Packard Theater movies in May 2014 (photo: ‘Godzilla’) Godzilla 1954, Mickey Rooney, military fascists, deadly giant ants, racing car drivers, and The Mishaps of Musty Suffer, a super-rare slapstick comedy series from the 1910s, are a few of the highlights at the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus Theater in May 2014. Godzilla 1954 and fellow movie monsters Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla 2014, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche, Ken Watanabe, and Bryan Cranston, opens on May 16 in much of the world. On May 8 at the Packard Theater, you’ll get the chance to check out Ishiro Honda’s Godzilla 1954 aka Gojira — in the original, Toho-released, Japanese-language version (i.e., without Raymond Burr). As part of its Godzilla double bill, the Packard Theater will also present Motoyoshi Oda’s Gigantis, the Fire Monster aka Godzilla Raids Again (1955). Besides Godzilla, the Packard Theater will...

Glenda Farrell: Actress has her ‘Summer Under the Stars’ day Scene-stealer Glenda Farrell is Turner Classic Movies’ "Summer Under the Stars" star today, August 29, 2013. A reliable — and very busy — Warner Bros. contract player in the ’30s, the sharp, energetic, fast-talking blonde actress was featured in more than fifty films at the studio from 1931 to 1939. Note: This particular Glenda Farrell has nothing in common with the One Tree Hill character played by Amber Wallace in the television series. The Glenda Farrell / One Tree Hill name connection seems to have been a mere coincidence. (Photo: Glenda Farrell as Torchy Blane in Smart Blonde.) Back to Warners’ Glenda Farrell: TCM is currently showing Torchy Runs for Mayor (1939), one of the seven B movies starring Farrell as intrepid reporter Torchy Blane. Major suspense: Will Torchy win the election? She should. No city would ever go bankrupt with Torchy at the helm. Glenda Farrell...

Bette Davis movies: TCM schedule on August 14 (photo: Bette Davis in ‘Dangerous,’ with Franchot Tone) See previous post: “Bette Davis Eyes: They’re Watching You Tonight.” 3:00 Am Parachute Jumper (1933). Director: Alfred E. Green. Cast: Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Bette Davis, Frank McHugh, Claire Dodd, Harold Huber, Leo Carrillo, Thomas E. Jackson, Lyle Talbot, Leon Ames, Stanley Blystone, Reginald Barlow, George Chandler, Walter Brennan, Pat O’Malley, Paul Panzer, Nat Pendleton, Dewey Robinson, Tom Wilson, Sheila Terry. Bw-72 mins. 4:30 Am The Girl From 10th Avenue (1935). Director: Alfred E. Green. Cast: Bette Davis, Ian Hunter, Colin Clive, Alison Skipworth, John Eldredge, Phillip Reed, Katharine Alexander, Helen Jerome Eddy, Bill Elliott, Edward McWade, André Cheron, Wedgwood Nowell, John Quillan, Mary Treen. Bw-69 mins. 6:00 Am Dangerous (1935). Director: Alfred E. Green. Cast: Bette Davis, Franchot Tone, Margaret Lindsay, Alison Skipworth, John Eldredge, Dick Foran, Walter Walker, Richard Carle, George Irving, Pierre Watkin, Douglas Wood,...

Mickey Rooney movie schedule (Pt): TCM on August 13 See previous post: “Mickey Rooney Movies: Music and Murder.” Photo: Mickey Rooney ca. 1940. 3:00 Am Death On The Diamond (1934). Director: Edward Sedgwick. Cast: Robert Young, Madge Evans, Nat Pendleton, Mickey Rooney. Bw-71 mins. 4:15 Am A Midsummer Night’S Dream (1935). Director: Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle. Cast: James Cagney, Dick Powell, Olivia de Havilland, Ross Alexander, Anita Louise, Mickey Rooney, Joe E. Brown, Victor Jory, Ian Hunter, Verree Teasdale, Jean Muir, Frank McHugh, Grant Mitchell, Hobart Cavanaugh, Dewey Robinson, Hugh Herbert, Arthur Treacher, Otis Harlan, Helen Westcott, Fred Sale, Billy Barty, Rags Ragland. Bw-143 mins. 6:45 Am A Family Affair (1936). Director: George B. Seitz. Cast: Mickey Rooney, Lionel Barrymore, Cecilia Parker, Eric Linden. Bw-69 mins. 8:00 Am Boys Town (1938). Director: Norman Taurog. Cast: Spencer Tracy, Mickey Rooney, Henry Hull, Leslie Fenton, Gene Reynolds, Edward Norris, Addison Richards, Minor Watson, Jonathan Hale,...

Mary Boland movies: Scene-stealing actress has her ‘Summer Under the Stars’ day on TCM Turner Classic Movies will dedicate the next 24 hours, Sunday, August 4, 2013, not to Lana Turner, Lauren Bacall, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Esther Williams, or Bette Davis — TCM’s frequent Warner Bros., MGM, and/or Rko stars — but to the marvelous scene-stealer Mary Boland. A stage actress who was featured in a handful of movies in the 1910s, Boland came into her own as a stellar film supporting player in the early ’30s, initially at Paramount and later at most other Hollywood studios. First, the bad news: TCM’s "Summer Under the Stars" Mary Boland Day will feature only two movies from Boland’s Paramount period: the 1935 Best Picture Academy Award nominee Ruggles of Red Gap, which TCM has shown before, and one TCM premiere. So, no rarities like Secrets of a Secretary, Mama Loves Papa, Melody in Spring,...

Eleanor Parker: Palm Springs resident turns 91 today Eleanor Parker turns 91 today. The three-time Oscar nominee (Caged, 1950; Detective Story, 1951; Interrupted Melody, 1955) and Palm Springs resident is Turner Classic Movies’ Star of the Month of June 2013. Earlier this month, TCM showed a few dozen Eleanor Parker movies, from her days at Warner Bros. in the ’40s to her later career as a top Hollywood supporting player. (Photo: Publicity shot of Eleanor Parker in An American Dream.) Missing from TCM’s movie series, however, was not only Eleanor Parker’s biggest box-office it — The Sound of Music, in which she steals the show from both Julie Andrews and the Alps — but also what according to several sources is her very first movie role: a bit part in Raoul Walsh’s They Died with Their Boots On, a 1941 Western starring Errol Flynn as a dashingly handsome and all-around-good-guy-ish General George Armstrong Custer. Olivia de Havilland...

Author Slide to discuss the history of Hollywood extras at historical Lasky-DeMille Barn Film historian Anthony Slide, author of dozens of books on Hollywood history, will be discussing his most recent work, Hollywood Unknowns: A History of Extras, Bit Players and Stand-Ins, at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 10, at the Hollywood Heritage Museum, located at a Hollywood historical landmark: the Lasky-DeMille Barn, right across the street from the Hollywood Bowl. (Check out: "The History of Hollywood Extras, Bit Players and Stand-Ins: Interview with Author and Film Historian Anthony Slide.") Pictured Above are Olivia de Havilland and her The Charge of the Light Brigade stand-in, Ann Robinson, circa 1936. As per the Barn's press release, "Mr. Slide will discuss the lives and work of extras, including the harsh conditions, sexual harassment, scandals and tragedies." Besides, he'll also talk about Central Casting and the Hollywood Studio Club, the residence of a number of up-and-coming actresses,...

Going My Way (1944) Direction: Leo McCarey Cast: Bing Crosby, Barry Fitzgerald, Risë Stevens, Frank McHugh, Gene Lockhart, James Brown, Jean Heather, Porter Hall, Fortunio Bonanova Screenplay: Frank Butler and Frank Cavett; from a story by Leo McCarey Oscar Movies Barry Fitzgerald, Bing Crosby, Going My Way Director Leo McCarey and screenwriters Frank Butler and Frank Cavett poured a whole bottle of syrup into their sentimental comedy-drama Going My Way. The fact that this "inspirational" tale with religious overtones became the year's biggest blockbuster and the winner of seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, proves that McCarey, Butler, Cavett, and Paramount Pictures knew exactly what audiences wanted in 1944: the same sort of gooey star vehicle that continues to lure millions of moviegoers, e.g., Tom Hanks' Forrest Gump, Will Smith's The Pursuit of Happyness, Sandra Bullock's The Blind Side. In Going My Way, the goo is provided...

Irene Dunne, Charles Boyer in Leo McCarey's Love Affair Leo McCarey on TCM: Going My Way, Duck Soup, Love Affair, Make Way For Tomorrow Leo McCarey's Love Affair (1939) is now mostly forgotten, whereas its 1957 remake (also by McCarey), An Affair to Remember, remains a romance classic. In the original, in place of Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr we have Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne as the star-crossed lovers. Boyer would become a fantastic dramatic actor in later years (e.g., Max Ophüls' Madame De…), but here he's just Hollywood's boring version of the "suave continental." Irene Dunne, on the other hand, was one of the best actresses of the '30s and '40s. She's fine in Love Affair, though it's not one of her greatest performances. (Warren Beatty and Annette Bening starred in a widely panned 1994 remake, that also featured Katharine Hepburn in the role played...

Part of a series by David Cairns on forgotten pre-Code films.

Edward L. Cahn—how shall I sing your praises? Perhaps before seeing this film I wouldn't have bothered, though It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) is a genuinely exciting sci-fi horror, and a clear precursor to Alien. Apart from that, Cahn seems to resemble W. Lee Wilder (Billy Wilder's idiot brother), in that he was capable of semi-decent Z-grade noirs, but concentrated much of his attention on science fiction, a genre he seemed to have no understanding of and nothing but contempt for. Cahn's Invisible Invaders (1959) may safely be recommended to anybody who likes really, really stupid movies. Movies so stupid they forget to breath.

Above: The chain gang chorus line—a surprisingly uncommon trope.

But decades earlier, things were different. Cahn was already churning out several quickies a year, with snap-brimmed titles like Homicide Squad (1931) and Radio Patrol (1932). The difference was,...

Each year New York residents can look forward to two essential series programmed at the Film Forum, noirs and pre-Coders (that is, films made before the strict enforcing of the Motion Picture Production Code). These near-annual retrospective traditions are refreshed and re-varied and re-repeated for neophytes and cinephiles alike, giving all the chance to see and see again great film on film. Many titles in this year's Essential Pre-Code series, running an epic July 15 - August 11, are old favorites and some ache to be new discoveries; all in all there are far too many racy, slipshod, patter-filled celluloid splendors to be covered by one critic alone. Faced with such a bounty, I've enlisted the kind help of some friends and colleagues, asking them to sent in short pieces on their favorites in an incomplete but also in-progress survey and guide to one of the summer's most sought-after series. In this entry: what's playing Friday,...

Throughout Hollywood’s golden age rarely did character actors graduate into leading roles. Frank McHugh and Mary Wickes were almost always the buddy or the maid in studio features. That really started to change in the 1960′s. For instance, Gene Hackman went from a supporting role in Bonnie And Clyde to the lead in The French Connection within a couple of years. Such is now the case of the gifted character actor, Paul Giamatti. After memorable supporting turns in films like Private Parts ( as Howard Stern’s arch-nemesis ) and Big Fat Liar ( the poor guy’s covered in blue paint! ) , Giamatti graduated to leading roles with American Splendor and Sideways. He’s been given another opportunity to headline a film as the title role in Richard J. Lewis film of Mordecai Richler’s Barney’S Version. This time he gets to show some of his romantic side along with his considerable comedic talents.

Jedi, goofy flight attendants, a possessed young girl, and two journalists on the brink of discovery are among the characters to be honored for film preservation. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington has named 25 motion pictures to the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress.

Among the films to be preserved are George Lucas' "Return of the Jedi," "Airplane," William Friedkin's "The Exorcist," and Alan J. Pakula's "All The President's Men." This year.s selections bring the number of films in the registry to 550.

Each year, the Librarian of Congress, under the terms of the National Film Preservation Act, names 25 films to the National Film Registry that are "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant, to be preserved for all time. In other words, these films are certainly not the "best" (but we can argue that each movie truly represented high quality) but they are works of art...

Going My Way (1944) Direction: Leo McCarey Screenplay: Frank Butler and Frank Cavett; from a story by Leo McCarey Cast: Bing Crosby, Barry Fitzgerald, Risë Stevens, Frank McHugh, Gene Lockhart, James Brown, Jean Heather, Porter Hall, Fortunio Bonanova Barry Fitzgerald, Bing Crosby in Going My Way Synopsis: The new priest in parish, the jovial Father O’Malley (Bing Crosby), tries to befriend the local old-school priest, Father Fitzgibbon (Barry Fitzgerald), and to reach out to a new generation of churchgoers. Will he succeed? (Just a rhetorical question.) The Pros: Barry Fitzgerald is fun as the feisty dark-robed curmudgeon with a heart of solid platinum. ("His performance is one of the half-dozen finer things seen in motion pictures as they complete their first fifty years," said [...]...

Two cocktail waitresses are suing nightclub king Scott Sartiano, claiming he canned all the black and Asian waitresses at 1Oak so he could replace them with white girls. In a suit in Manhattan Federal Court, Cecilia Shim and Laurence Brown claim 1Oak manager Frank McHugh said he was firing them on July 8 on order from Sartiano, who allegedly told him: "What's the point of having girls if we can't [bleep] them?" But Ken Sussmane, a lawyer for the West 17th Street club, told us, "These disgruntled employees were fired for poor work performance...