Now Screening - What Are You Watching Right Now?

[walpurgis]

if i can find the dvd i will send it to you mate

Nice!

[struth]

Preston Sturges, 1941 classic, Sullivan's Travels. Stars Joel McCrea and Veronica Lake. Remastered bluray via Arrow..





Cinematographer John Seitz admired Preston Sturges' unconventional approach to his work. The opening scene comprised ten pages of dialogue to cover about four and a half minutes of screen time. It was scheduled for two complete days of shooting. On the morning of the first day, Seitz found Sturges inspecting the set with a viewfinder, looking for where he could cut the scene and change camera set-ups. Seitz dared him to do it all in one take. Never one to refuse a dare, Sturges took him up on it, although the nervous Seitz had never attempted to complete a two-day work schedule in one day. With the endorsement of McCrea and the rest of the actors, Sturges pressed on, determined to set a record. The first take was fine, but the camera wobbled a little in the tracking shot following the men from screening room to office, so they tried again. They did two or three takes at the most and that was it - two full days work by 11 a.m. on the first day, a feat that had the entire studio buzzing.

[struth]

The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, 1970. written and produced by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond, and directed by Wilder.






The subplot in which Sherlock Holmes is approached by a famous ballerina who wishes him to father her child is inspired by a real-life incident. George Bernard Shaw was once approached by the notorious dancer Isadora Duncan, who told him that, if they had a child together, it would have "my beauty and your brains"; Shaw rebuffed her quickly, saying, "Ah, yes, dear lady, but what if it has my beauty and your brains instead?" In this movie, Sherlock Holmes uses a rather different method of putting the lady off.

Originally, the scenes featuring the Loch Ness Monster were intended to be filmed in the actual Loch. A life-size prop was built which had several Nessie-like humps used to disguise flotation devices. The humps were removed, however, at Billy Wilder's request. Unfortunately, during a test run in Loch Ness, the Monster-prop sank and was never recovered. A second prop, a miniature with just the head and neck, was built, but was only filmed inside a studio tank. Geneviève Page said of this in the biography "Nobody's Perfect: Billy Wilder" by Charlotte Chandler): "When we lost our Loch Ness monster, he (Wilder) wasn't too concerned, even though he was also the producer. He was more concerned about how the man who made it felt when all his work sank to the bottom of the Loch Ness. He went over and comforted him." The original monster prop was located on the bottom of Loch Ness in April 2016 during a survey of the loch by an underwater robot.

[struth]

Jack The Ripper, 1959. British version....(both on bluray.) The film is put together from various sources as a complete copy wasnt available. This is as close as it gets. A classic of its day.




The British version is the Director's version of the movie. There was also a "continental version," which included nudity and more violent murder shots. According to the director's commentary on the Bluray, this was done for purely financial reasons, to get distribution in places that would otherwise be uninterested in it. The continental version ran 88 minutes, includes: a changing room scene with several girls having their breasts exposed; Maggie (Dorinda Stevens) and Hazel (Jane Taylor) join two gentlemen in a private room, then one of these pours champagne over Maggie's chest, and as he kisses the champagne off her chest, her dress is pulled down to expose a breast; Hazel is accosted by the Ripper in an alleyway, her breast is shown, and later there is a shot of her topless corpse; close-up shots of knives and victims faces, and items such as repeated knife thrusts vs. single thrusts, are added to the murder scenes.
The US version has a new score composed by Jimmy McHugh and Pete Rugolo.

This film was well remembered by horror and thriller fans from this period. The massive advertising campaign generated huge ticket sales and a high number of holdover dates. But, according to Joseph E. Levine, the film was a failure in the U.S. He claimed, "We dropped dead in every one! You'd think somewhere, a small town maybe, someplace, it would have done business. But no. That's a record they'll never come close to."

[Pigmy Pony]

The subplot in which Sherlock Holmes is approached by a famous ballerina who wishes him to father her child is inspired by a real-life incident. George Bernard Shaw was once approached by the notorious dancer Isadora Duncan, who told him that, if they had a child together, it would have "my beauty and your brains"; Shaw rebuffed her quickly, saying, "Ah, yes, dear lady, but what if it has my beauty and your brains instead?" In this movie, Sherlock Holmes uses a rather different method of putting the lady off.

Great stuff! I'll remember that one next time I get propositioned

[struth]

Earlier, The Eagle Has Landed, 1975..




In his autobiography, Sir Michael Caine confessed to being somewhat disappointed with the end product: "The picture was being directed by the Hollywood old-timer John Sturges, and we were all very pleased that this illustrious veteran had agreed to direct our film. That is, until one day when I was talking to him between set-ups and he informed me that, now that he was older, he only ever worked to get the money to go fishing, which was his passion. Deep-sea fishing off Baja, California, he added, which was very expensive. The moment the picture finished, he took the money and went. Producer Jack S. Wiener later told me that he never came back for the editing nor for any of the other post-production sessions that are where a director does some of his most important work. The picture wasn't bad, but I still get angry when I think of what it could have been with the right director. We had committed the old European sin of being impressed by someone, just because he came from Hollywood."

[struth]

My Man Godfrey, 1936... The Criterion Collection remastered bluray.





William Powell suggested his ex-wife Carole Lombard for the leading role with the explanation that his real -life romance with her had been much the same as it was for the characters of Godfrey and Irene. Carole Lombard had a habit of ad-libbing by inserting swear words into the dialogue, which necessitated the re-shooting of several scenes. Although stars William Powell and Carole Lombard had been divorced for three years by the time they made this, when offered the part Powell declared that the only actress right for the part of Irene was Lombard.

When William Powell and director Gregory La Cava had a disagreement over how Godfrey should be played, they talked it out over a bottle of Scotch in Powell's dressing room. The next day, LaCava returned to the movie set with a major headache, but Powell was not there. The director received a telegram from his star: "We may have found Godfrey last night but we lost Powell. See you tomorrow."

[struth]

Great Expectations, 1946.





This film has a 100% rating based on 28 critic reviews on Rotten Tomatoes.

[struth]

The Ballad Of Cable Hogue, 1970... directed by Sam Peckinpah.






Production on the film fell weeks behind schedule due to bad weather. When filming was suspended, director Sam Peckinpah, along with cast and crew, would drink. When filming finally wrapped, the bar bill came to over $70,000 (equivalent to over $483,000 in 2021).

The chaotic filming wrapped 19 days over schedule and $3 million over budget, terminating Sam Peckinpahs tenure with Warner Bros./Seven Arts, and caused permanent damage to his career. The critical and box office hits Deliverance (1972) and Jeremiah Johnson (1972) were in development at the time, and Peckinpah was considered the first choice to direct them. His departure from Warner Brothers left him with a limited number of directing jobs. Peckinpah was forced to do a 180-degree turn from this film, and travelled to England to direct Straw Dogs (1971), one of his darkest and most psychologically disturbing films. This was the favorite film of the director. Often, when asked to speak about his work, he brought a print of this film to show, instead of one of his more famous works.

Stella Stevens said in a 2004 interview that she adored Jason Robards Jr., but David Warner, on the other hand, was very strange. He had just come over from England and it was his first big film in the United States. She described a scene where he was supposed to be leaning on her as she helps him into the house, but he wouldn't touch her or really lean. And director Sam Peckinpah yelled at her saying "What are you doing? What's the matter with you?" She said "Warner wasn't really leaning; he was pretending. Actors are not pretenders. We are be-ers. We do not pretend. And he pretended. That did not sit well with me. When you see me trying to throw that pitcher at him, I mean it!" (I love Stella; lol)

[Macca]

Everyone loved Stella Stevens. I think every bloke on the planet fancied her.