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Bogart's iconic role in film noirs solidified his status as a Hollywood legend, blending suspense, crime, and complex characters. Early films like "Midnight" showcased Bogart's talent before he became a star, with noir themes of murder and mystery. Bogart's diverse roles, from a private detective in "The Maltese Falcon" to a crusading journalist in "Deadline U.S.A.," showcased his versatility.

As a legend of classic Hollywood and a true American icon, Humphrey Bogart was best known for his work within the film noir genre. While film noir was a collective term that every viewer has a slightly different definition of, it was most popular during the 1940s and 1950s and was often categorized by cynical attitudes, a black-and-white style, and crime stories involving hard-boiled detectives, cunning femme fatales, and convoluted but engrossing narratives. Bogart was known for these kinds of films as he expertly played heroes and villains in these...

The Letter (1929) Direction: Jean de Limur Cast: Jeanne Eagels, O.P. Heggie, Reginald Owen, Herbert Marshall, Irene Browne, Lady Tsen Mei, Tamaki Yoshiwara Screenplay: Garrett Fort; from W. Somerset Maugham's 1927 play, itself based on a Maugham story found in the 1924 collection The Casuarina Tree Oscar Movies, Pre-Code Movies Jeanne Eagels, Herbert Marshall, The Letter Having watched William Wyler's masterful 1940 film adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham's 1927 play The Letter and having read quite a bit about Broadway star Jeanne Eagels' remarkable talent, I was expecting to find at least a modicum of interest in Jean de Limur's 1929 version of Maugham's crime-of-passion melodrama. I'm sorry to report I was greatly disappointed, even though Garrett Fort's screenplay is quite similar to the one used in the Wyler version. Stuck on a Malayan rubber plantation with her aloof older husband (Reginald Owen), British subject Leslie Crosbie (Eagels) finds affection...

Release Date: Feb. 7, 2012

Price: DVD $19.95

Studio: Hen’s Tooth

Robert donat (l.) swashbuckles as The Count of Monte Cristo.

Robert Donat (The 39 Steps) stars in the 1934 film adaptation of the classic action-adventure swashbuckler The Count of Monte Cristo, based on the classic 1844 novel by Alexandre Dumas.

The movie tells the story of Edmond Dantes (Donat), a common seaman falsely accused of spying during the Napoleonic Wars. Imprisoned without trial in the infamous Chateau d’If, he spends over a decade in solitary confinement. Eventually, with the aid of a fellow captive (O.P. Heggie), he makes a daring escape. Once outside, he fabricates a stately new identity as the Count of Monte Cristo and vows to bring the villains who framed him to justice.

Directed by Rowland V. Lee (Captain Kidd), the classic film also stars Elissa Landi (After the Thin Man) and Sidney Blackmer (Rosemary’s Baby).

The movie was...

It was on this day, April 22 1935, that the Bride was born…

One of the most iconic images in all of horror cinema, the Bride has haunted our nightmares for 75 years now, an eerily beautiful, hissing figure covered in gauze from head-to-toe, draped in a brilliant but inelegant white shroud, and with flaming white streaks shooting up a jazzed, Nefertiti hairdo.

The Bride’s part in the 1935 Universal classic The Bride of Frankenstein is a small one, but it burns instantly and indelibly into one’s psyche, as the radiant Elsa Lanchester and the immortal Boris Karloff enact the ultimate nightmare version of a blind date.

The Bride of Frankenstein has endured for 75 years, its reputation as one of the great touchstones of early horror movies – and of Hollywood’s Golden Age — only looming larger as the decades tick past. The absolute zenith of the original Universal Horror cycle, Bride effortlessly combines everything: ghoulish chills,...