I Just Watched...

[jameselliot]

THE SERPENT OF THE NILE (1953)



Starring RHONDA FLEMING WILLIAM LUNDIGAN RAYMOND BURR MICHAEL ANSARA ...and JULIE NEWMAR !!! When Julie was brought into the "throne room" (she has no lines) painted GOLD ...I recognized her right away! As described in WONG FOO - truly statuesque!!!

WILLIAM CASTLE directed... (uh-oh) and it is LOW RENT. Deepo cheapo. REEL GAH - BAJ. Can't wait to see it again (with long term planning).

I've been watching Italian peplum produced in the 60s and their sets were generally very lavish and impressive. I wasn't expecting the cheap, cramped sets of Willam Castle's movie.

[Hibi]

Wow. Never knew Castle ventured beyond the horror genre.

[dianedebuda]

Wow. Never knew Castle ventured beyond the horror genre.

After reading the review here of Serpent of the Nile, I'm not sure he did.

[jamesjazzguitar]

I hope people are watching No Man of Her Own with Gable and Lombard. This is a very good pre-code.

[CinemaInternational]

Curtain Call (1940) Dalton Trumbo wrote this sardonically funny look at theater politics. A shady producer, played by Donald MacBride, practically chews his lines and spits them out, overacting in the service of comedy. Helen Vinson is an actress whose diva antics are justified considering the unscrupulous producer (MacBride), she’s under contract to. Her director (Alan Mowbray) is somewhat of a hack, prizing what sells over artistic merit. Barbara Read plays a naive and serious playwright; she doesn’t necessarily win the day, but she emerges with her sanity intact.

I greatly enjoyed this one when it aired last month. I tracked down the semi-sequel that Ben mentioned, but it wasn't as fresh.

[TikiSoo]

After much prompting from this group, I watched INDIANA JONES & THE LAST CRUSADE '89.


I hated the Temple of Doom sequel so wasn't interested in any more, until everyone here said this one was excellent. It wasn't excellent but definitely better than ToD. I'm sure everyone has seen this already, so alert to openly discussed spoilers-

Raiders of The Lost Ark opened with a great sequence: first the wild finding of the idol and then the tension of having to remove it with the sand weight, etc. The big release is the intense chase sequence that follows- shooting arrows, spikes, floor collapsing, etc and then you see the big rock ball rolling after him- this adds just enough ridiculousness to further release the built up tension with a chuckle at how absurdly crazy a ride this will be. PERFECT.

And how does RotLA end? With the bad Nazi guys greed killing them, melting their faces off amid scary CGI ghost spirits. PERFECT.

Last Crusade attempts at replicating that winning formula, but just misses. The opening scene is a chase -but just a regular chase- nothing over-the-top like the memorable RotLA scene where Jones crawls under a speeding car held only by his whip.
And the ending? While the earth opens to swallow the evil Nazis, the only "divine" damage is a CGI deteriorating head, no scarier than Large Marge in PeeWee's comedy Big Adventure. Sorry, real physical special effects are so much more effective.

I did enjoy Sean Connery as Indy's Dad, it really fleshed the charactors out well, better than a romantic interest for Indy. I liked the addition of Dad's notebook & map mystery to unravel. And I very much liked the climax of finding/choosing the Holy Grail among the ancient keeper. The tie in of the Grail healing Indy's Dad was a great twist on the story.

The Last Crusade was a good movie, but after the perfection of RotLA, just wasn't quite as good. Just my opinion.

[cmovieviewer]

On Friday TCM showed the Carole Lombard - Fred MacMurray film Swing High, Swing Low (1937). If you are familiar with this film, you will recall that for the longest time this was only available in a version with horrible quality and was barely watchable. More recently, TCM has shown a better version with a runtime of 83 minutes. And now TCM is showing an even better version with a runtime of 97 minutes. I would say that the film is still not exactly the best HD quality, but it is much better and more complete than it was just a few years ago. If you have the WatchTCM service, the film is available there until September 17.

[jamesjazzguitar]

On Friday TCM showed the Carole Lombard - Fred MacMurray film Swing High, Swing Low (1937). If you are familiar with this film, you will recall that for the longest time this was only available in a version with horrible quality and was barely watchable. More recently, TCM has shown a better version with a runtime of 83 minutes. And now TCM is showing an even better version with a runtime of 97 minutes. I would say that the film is still not exactly the best HD quality, but it is much better and more complete than it was just a few years ago. If you have the WatchTCM service, the film is available there until September 17.

Yea, a better version than the public domain version that was being used before. Swing High, Swing Low is my second favorite Lombard\MacMurray film (first being Hands Across the Table). I like that Dorthey Lamour plays the mean girl: only her second credited role.

[Cinemaspeak59]

On Friday TCM showed the Carole Lombard - Fred MacMurray film Swing High, Swing Low (1937). If you are familiar with this film, you will recall that for the longest time this was only available in a version with horrible quality and was barely watchable. More recently, TCM has shown a better version with a runtime of 83 minutes. And now TCM is showing an even better version with a runtime of 97 minutes. I would say that the film is still not exactly the best HD quality, but it is much better and more complete than it was just a few years ago. If you have the WatchTCM service, the film is available there until September 17.

Just watched Swing High, Swing Low. Loved it. Excellent supporting cast.

[jamesjazzguitar]

On Friday TCM showed the Carole Lombard - Fred MacMurray film Swing High, Swing Low (1937). If you are familiar with this film, you will recall that for the longest time this was only available in a version with horrible quality and was barely watchable. More recently, TCM has shown a better version with a runtime of 83 minutes. And now TCM is showing an even better version with a runtime of 97 minutes. I would say that the film is still not exactly the best HD quality, but it is much better and more complete than it was just a few years ago. If you have the WatchTCM service, the film is available there until September 17.

Just watched Swing High, Swing Low. Loved it. Excellent supporting cast.

Yea, there is a Anthony Quinn in only his 3rd credited film role, Jean Dixon who was just in My Man Godfrey the year before, Charles Butterworth, and Frank Pangborn,

[Cinemaspeak59]

On Friday TCM showed the Carole Lombard - Fred MacMurray film Swing High, Swing Low (1937). If you are familiar with this film, you will recall that for the longest time this was only available in a version with horrible quality and was barely watchable. More recently, TCM has shown a better version with a runtime of 83 minutes. And now TCM is showing an even better version with a runtime of 97 minutes. I would say that the film is still not exactly the best HD quality, but it is much better and more complete than it was just a few years ago. If you have the WatchTCM service, the film is available there until September 17.

Just watched Swing High, Swing Low. Loved it. Excellent supporting cast.

Yea, there is a Anthony Quinn in only his 3rd credited film role, Jean Dixon who was just in My Man Godfrey the year before, Charles Butterworth, and Frank Pangborn,

I recognized Anthony Quinn the moment he sat down next to Maggie (Carole Lombard). It was also not hard to predict Skid's (MacMurray) reaction.

[Masha]

The Ghost and the Guest (1943)

A man wants to go to California for his honeymoon. His bride-to-be wants to spend their honeymoon on a farm. They compromise by going to the farm.

This is a comfortable little movie. It does not tax the viewer's intelligence nor does it in any way risk a viewer having a heart attack by being frightened. It is very much of its class as a "couple honeymooning in a haunted house" B-movie from a poverty row studio.

The plotting is a bit thinner than usual but the dialogue is much snappier. This is due to it having been written by: Morey Amsterdam who is likely best know as: Buddy Sorrell on: The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961-1966). It is unusual in that every character has some good lines rather than only the leads getting the laughs. That is not to say that there are many laughs. It is more of comfortable witty banter that brings smiles.

6.4/11

This movie is available for viewing with commercials on: TubiTV.

[Allhallowsday]

EXECUTIVE SUITE (1954) Again. I ended up watching the usually boring KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER on MeTV last night because NINA FOCH played a significant role... (plus LARA PARKER)...
EXECUTIVE SUITE has many wonderful performances! Not just NINA FOCH.

[jamesjazzguitar]

EXECUTIVE SUITE (1954) Again. I ended up watching the usually boring KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER on MeTV last night because NINA FOCH played a significant role... (plus LARA PARKER)...
EXECUTIVE SUITE has many wonderful performances! Not just NINA FOCH.

I was about to go to sleep, but decided to stay up late and watch Kolchak once I saw that Nina Foch was the guest star.

[Allhallowsday]

...I was about to go to sleep, but decided to stay up late and watch Kolchak once I saw that Nina Foch was the guest star.

That show is typically dull, but I like that one because of the guest stars.