Black and White and Classic All Over
Sep 18 '01
The Bottom Line They don't make them like this anymore....{{{sigh}}}
Kind of a misnomer, actually. Some of the films I picked include color. And while I do enjoy the movies that are on every critic’s BEST OF list for the decade (like Citizen Kane and Casablanca), I have chosen my personal favorites. Perhaps they will turn some of you on to films you have not seen before and may enjoy.
These are classics because to me they represent the meat of the 40s: most of them dealing with the war and film noir.
10. Rebecca
Based on the novel by Daphne DuMaurier, this film is a classic of Alfred Hitchcock’s. Laurence Olivier is the elegant Maxim DeWinter, whose first wife, Rebecca, drowned years ago. He meets Joan Fontaine at a French seaside resort, and marries her. Naïve and sweet, she begins to feel the suffocating presence of the dead Rebecca everywhere at the family home, Manderley. She is also frightened by the dark and menacing Mrs. Danvers, the maid. It is suspenseful and gripping. Dame Judith Anderson turns in a wonderfully evil performance as Mrs. Danvers, and the film won an oscar for best cinematography. Several of the actors were also nominated but did not win.
1940
Stars: Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, Judith Anderson, George Sanders.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
9. Sergeant York
Gary Cooper won an Oscar for his performance in this movie, based on the true story of Alvin York, a pacifist Tennessee farmboy drafted to fight on World War I. Gradually he comes to see the necessity of the war he is fighting, and singlehandedly….well…I don’t want to give too much away. The real Alvin York actually consulted with the makers of the movie, so it is remarkably realistic. Cooper is wonderful.
1941
Stars: Gary Cooper, Joan Leslie, Walter Brennan, Ward Bond, June Lockhart, Noah Beery, Jr.
Director: Howard Hawks
8. Leave Her To Heaven
An adaptation of a novel by Ben Ames Williams. This movie stars Gene Tierney at the height of her beauty as a woman obsessed with her husband. Before Fatal Attraction, this movie demonstrated the lengths that some folks will go to to have what they want. You almost don’t know whether to hate her or feel sorry for her. She makes everyone around her miserable or dead. Check this one out!
1945
Stars: Gene Tierney, Cornel Wilde, Jeanne Crain, Vincent Price
Director: John M. Stahl
7. Now Voyager
My favorite Bette Davis movie. This one is adapted from the novel by Olive Higgins Prouty. If you have mother issues, check this one out and feel better about your life. Bette is a spinster (when they called then that instead of unmarried) who has put up with the psychological cruelty of her mother for too long. Finally, after some therapy, she tries to begin a new life and takes a cruise. She meets the suave European Paul Henried and then finds out he’s married. A tearjerker to be sure. This is the movie with the classic scene of him lighting cigarettes for the both of them then handing hers to her.
1942
Stars: Bette Davis, Paul Henried, Gladys Cooper, Claude Rains, Bonita Granville
Director: Irving Rapper
6. Double Indemnity
Also based on a novel, this one by James M. Cain (the same guy who wrote The Postman Always Rings Twice—which ALMOST made my list). Poor Walter. The hapless insurance agent gets caught in the web of the deadly Phyllis to kill her husband and collect the insurance proceeds from his company. Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck are outstanding in this classic film noir. Edward G. Robinson is the suspicious investigator. “I loved her like a rabbit loves a rattlesnake,” Cain had Walter say of Phyllis. See why here.
1944
Stars: Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson
Director: Billy Wilder
5. Fantasia
One of the most amazing Walt Disney movies ever made. The first true mixing of live and animated elements. If you haven’t seen the original, DO IT. Disney takes classical music pieces and illustrates them with everything from frolicking centaurs and centaurettes to dancing mushrooms, to Mickey encountering trouble with recalcitrant brooms, to an evil demon who lives on a mountaintop. The dancing hippo and her friends are classics. Musical pieces include Igor Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring,” Beethoven’s “Pastoral Symphony,” portions of Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker Suite,” and Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain.” This is truly a fest for the senses. My dad took me to see this in the theater when I was 7, and I have never forgotten that first time.
1940
Stars: Several mushrooms, Hundreds of dancing thistles, a dancing elephant troupe, 1 diva hippo, 1 gang of amorous yet hungry alligators, a bunch of floating flowers, Mickey Mouse, several hundred reconstituted brooms with water pails, 1 p***ed off sorcerer, assorted goblins and ghosts, thousands of REALLY dehydrated dinosaurs, various multicolored centaurs and centaurettes, 1 inebriated emperor with inebriated donkey… (did I leave anybody out?)
Directors:Ben Sharpsteen, James Nelson Algar, Samuel Armstrong, Ford Beebe, Jim Handley, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, Bill Roberts, Paul Satterfield
4. Mrs. Miniver
A beautiful film that pays tribute to the brave English folk living through the Blitz in World War II. Greer Garson turns in a heartwarming performance as a mother trying to hold her family together in spite of terrible odds. It not only earned 6 academy awards, but it galvanized the allied efforts. Pay close attention to the speech by the vicar.
1942
Starring: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, Dame May Whitty, Reginald Owen, Henry Wilcoxon, , Peter Lawford
3. Ball of Fire
A ton of fun. Also stars Barbara Stanwyck and Gary Cooper.
Gary is a professorial nerd. He and his fellow professors are compiling a dictionary of slang, but are not sure how to go about doing it. Boom! A gangster’s moll on the run from her boyfriend provides them with the perfect research opportunity. How could you not love a movie with a character named “Sugarpuss O’Shea?” Of course, Barbara and Gary fall for each other, and he has to fight nasty gangsters to keep her. And get a load of that lingo,
daddy-o!
1941
Stars: Barbara Stanwyck, Gary Cooper, Dana Andrews, Gene Krupa, Oscar Homolka, Dan Duryea, S.Z. (Cuddles) Sakall, Henry Travers
2. Best Years of Our Lives
Chronicles the return of three veterans of World War 2 as they return home. Three scenarios are represented: the family man (Fredric March) returns home to his loving wife (Myrna Loy) and has adjusting to do. The young married guy (Dana Andrews) returns home to find out that his floozy wife (Virginia Mayo) has been living it up with every Tom, Dick and Harry around in his absence, and the disabled veteran (Harold Russell) returns home to not much. Russell won 2 Oscars—one for best supporting actor, and a special Oscar for giving hope to fellow vets. Both of his hands were blown off and replaced with prosthetics. This movie is a tearjerker. It will make you cry, and fill you with the patriotic spirit we all need right now. But it will make you realize the true circumstances of war when all is said and done.
1946
Stars: Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Virgina Mayo, Harold Russell, Hoagy Carmichael
Director: William Wyler
1.So Proudly We Hail
One of my all-time favorite movies. If you’ve ever seen the poster of the wartime woman raising her muscled arm exclaiming “We Can Do It!” If you’ve ever felt strong and powerful as a woman, and if you need a movie to make you feel patriotic as an American right now, this is it.
This film deals with a group of nurses in the Pacific during World War 2. Claudette Colbert is their leader, and she is ably backed by Paulette Goddard and Veronica Lake.
At the beginning of the movie, Lake is a nasty sneering b****. By the end of the movie you treasure her and everything she is feeling. She will surprise you. This movie was a box office smash with the stars and the subject matter. See why.
1943
Stars: Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard, Veronica Lake, George Reeves, Barbara Britton
Director: Mark Sandrich
My notable runners-up (also worth a look):
The Postman Always Rings Twice Lana Turner and John Garfield murder her husband.
Laura An obsessive love story with a "dead" heroine.
Mildred Pierce Joan Crawford is a mother who does TOO much for her obnoxious spoiled daughter. Also a James M. Cain novel.
The Snake Pit Olivia de Haviland is thrown into a mental institution.
All This and Heaven Too The story of the forbidden love between a governess and her employer in 19th century France.
A Stolen Life The story of twin sisters- one murders the other and takes her guy-- Carol Burnett parodied this one in a skit. (The lighthouse that bellows "HI PATsy!" Maybe you remember it?)
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miselainis
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Member: Laini
Location: Rowlett, Texas, USA
Reviews written: 60
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About Me:
"Chagrinned and Bewildered"
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