John Legend is writing the score to a stage adaptation of the 1959 film Imitation of Life.
The musical, which is in development and aiming for Broadway, features a book by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage (Sweat, Ruined) and direction by Liesl Tommy, who directed Danai Gurira’s Eclipsed on Broadway. The production held a private industry reading at the end of April.
Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co, a production company led by Legend, as well as producer Mike Jackson and Friends at Work CEO Ty Stiklorius, are producing the musical.
Imitation of Life, which originated as a 1933 novel written by Fannie Hurst, follows Delilah Johnston, a Black woman and mother living in Atlantic City in the 1920s with her daughter Peola, who passes as white. Johnston forms a friendship and business partnership with Bea Pullman, a white woman who is a widow, and must navigate the...
The musical, which is in development and aiming for Broadway, features a book by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage (Sweat, Ruined) and direction by Liesl Tommy, who directed Danai Gurira’s Eclipsed on Broadway. The production held a private industry reading at the end of April.
Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co, a production company led by Legend, as well as producer Mike Jackson and Friends at Work CEO Ty Stiklorius, are producing the musical.
Imitation of Life, which originated as a 1933 novel written by Fannie Hurst, follows Delilah Johnston, a Black woman and mother living in Atlantic City in the 1920s with her daughter Peola, who passes as white. Johnston forms a friendship and business partnership with Bea Pullman, a white woman who is a widow, and must navigate the...
- 6/26/2023
- by Caitlin Huston
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
A stage musical adaptation of the Fannie Hurst novel Imitation of Life and its film versions is under development at Universal Theatrical Group, with Lynn Nottage writing the book and John Legend handling the music and lyrics. Liesl Tommy is attached to direct.
Following a private industry reading that took place April 24-28 in New York City, Universal Theatrical Group — the live theater division of Universal Pictures — announced the further development of the project today.
Liesl Tommy
Imitation of Life will be produced for the stage by Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co. The musical is being developed for Broadway.
The novel originally was published in 1933, with Universal Pictures producing two film adaptations — the first directed by John Stahl in 1934 and starring Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers, and the second in 1959, with stars Lana Turner and Juanita Moore directed by Douglas Sirk. The 1934 film was Oscar-nominated, and the...
Following a private industry reading that took place April 24-28 in New York City, Universal Theatrical Group — the live theater division of Universal Pictures — announced the further development of the project today.
Liesl Tommy
Imitation of Life will be produced for the stage by Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co. The musical is being developed for Broadway.
The novel originally was published in 1933, with Universal Pictures producing two film adaptations — the first directed by John Stahl in 1934 and starring Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers, and the second in 1959, with stars Lana Turner and Juanita Moore directed by Douglas Sirk. The 1934 film was Oscar-nominated, and the...
- 6/26/2023
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
More than five years ago, as Rhea Combs and Doris Berger were in the planning stages of research for an exhibit on early Black cinema that would open at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences planned museum, they got word of a new discovery that would come to define the exhibit.
Archivists at USC and the University of Chicago went through boxes of silent film prints acquired from a collector in Louisiana and found a 30-second reel of two Black vaudeville performers, Saint Suttle and Gertie Brown, dancing and kissing. The reel, titled “Something Good — Negro Kiss,” was dated back to 1898, making it the earliest known kiss between Black performers put to film.
Combs and Berger knew as soon as they saw it that it was the perfect piece to open “Regeneration,” an exhibit that is now running at the Academy Museum through July 16. To them, it embodies...
Archivists at USC and the University of Chicago went through boxes of silent film prints acquired from a collector in Louisiana and found a 30-second reel of two Black vaudeville performers, Saint Suttle and Gertie Brown, dancing and kissing. The reel, titled “Something Good — Negro Kiss,” was dated back to 1898, making it the earliest known kiss between Black performers put to film.
Combs and Berger knew as soon as they saw it that it was the perfect piece to open “Regeneration,” an exhibit that is now running at the Academy Museum through July 16. To them, it embodies...
- 2/3/2023
- by Jeremy Fuster
- The Wrap
John M. Stahl’s superior melodrama is a focus point for the study of African-Americans in Hollywood. Businesswoman Claudette Colbert a housekeeper Louise Beavers raise their daughters together for a story that expresses the racial divide in simple terms. Determined to pass for white, Beavers’ daughter Fredi Washington rejects her mother outright. The tale of motherly sacrifice is in some ways more honest than later ‘social justice’ films about race, yet it sticks closely to Hollywood’s segregationist rules.
Imitation of Life
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1167
1934 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 110 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 39.95
Starring: Claudette Colbert, Warren William, Louise Beavers, Fredi Washington, Rochelle Hudson, Ned Sparks, Juanita Quigley, Alan Hale, Henry Armetta, Hattie McDaniel, Paul Porcasi, Teru Shimada, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, Jane Withers, Dorothy Black.
Cinematography: Merrit Gerstad
Costumes: Travis Banton
Art Director: Charles D. Hall
Film Editor: Philip Cahn, Maurice Wright
Original Music: Heinz Roemheld...
Imitation of Life
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1167
1934 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 110 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 39.95
Starring: Claudette Colbert, Warren William, Louise Beavers, Fredi Washington, Rochelle Hudson, Ned Sparks, Juanita Quigley, Alan Hale, Henry Armetta, Hattie McDaniel, Paul Porcasi, Teru Shimada, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, Jane Withers, Dorothy Black.
Cinematography: Merrit Gerstad
Costumes: Travis Banton
Art Director: Charles D. Hall
Film Editor: Philip Cahn, Maurice Wright
Original Music: Heinz Roemheld...
- 1/17/2023
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
To Save and Project: The 19th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation – See Screening Dates
The Museum of Modern Art announced in early December the To Save and Project: The 19th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation, the latest edition of the annual festival dedicated to celebrating newly preserved and restored films from archives, studios, distributors, foundations, and independent filmmakers from around the world. Running from January 12 to February 2, 2023, this year’s program will open and close with the restoration premieres of two major silent films from MoMA’s archive: Paul Leni’s horror comedy The Cat and the Canary (1927) and Ernst Lubitsch’s comedy The
Marriage Circle (1924), respectively. To Save and Project is organized by Dave Kehr, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art, and Cindi Rowell, independent curator, with special thanks to Olivia Priedite, Film Program Coordinator, and Steve Macfarlane, Department Assistant, Department of Film.
The 2023 program includes the highly anticipated new version of Tod Browning’s insidious silent horror film...
Marriage Circle (1924), respectively. To Save and Project is organized by Dave Kehr, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art, and Cindi Rowell, independent curator, with special thanks to Olivia Priedite, Film Program Coordinator, and Steve Macfarlane, Department Assistant, Department of Film.
The 2023 program includes the highly anticipated new version of Tod Browning’s insidious silent horror film...
- 12/27/2022
- by Movies Martin Cid Magazine
- Martin Cid Magazine - Movies
Click here to read the full article.
Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898-1971, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures’ second major temporary exhibition, opening Aug. 21, is a nuanced exploration of the ways in which Black filmmakers and performers have impacted, defined and expanded American movies. The exhibition (which was five years in the making) takes a comprehensive look at film history and Black visual culture more broadly, highlighting notable items like original costumes worn by Lena Horne in Stormy Weather (1943) and Sammy Davis Jr. in Porgy and Bess (1959), tap dance shoes from the Nicholas Brothers and one of Louis Armstrong’s trumpets.
The beginning of the show, 1898, marks the creation of “the first known moving image footage of African American performers onscreen, [seen] in a dignified way,” says Doris Berger, co-curator and vp curatorial affairs at the Academy Museum. The show concludes with material from 1971, the dawn of the Blaxploitation subgenre, acknowledging the...
Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898-1971, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures’ second major temporary exhibition, opening Aug. 21, is a nuanced exploration of the ways in which Black filmmakers and performers have impacted, defined and expanded American movies. The exhibition (which was five years in the making) takes a comprehensive look at film history and Black visual culture more broadly, highlighting notable items like original costumes worn by Lena Horne in Stormy Weather (1943) and Sammy Davis Jr. in Porgy and Bess (1959), tap dance shoes from the Nicholas Brothers and one of Louis Armstrong’s trumpets.
The beginning of the show, 1898, marks the creation of “the first known moving image footage of African American performers onscreen, [seen] in a dignified way,” says Doris Berger, co-curator and vp curatorial affairs at the Academy Museum. The show concludes with material from 1971, the dawn of the Blaxploitation subgenre, acknowledging the...
- 8/21/2022
- by Evan Nicole Brown
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Racial passing occurs when a member of one racial group is either believed to be or accepted as a member of another. In the U.S., it generally means someone who is Black or of multi-racial heritage, “passing” as a White person. It’s the subject of Rebecca Hall’s well-received directorial debut “Passing,” currently streaming on Netflix. Hall, who is the daughter of the late director Peter Hall and opera singer Maria Ewing is of Dutch, Native American, African American and Scottish heritage. She adapted Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel about two African American friends: one (Tessa Thompson) is married to a prominent doctor and the other (Ruth Negga) has passed for white for years and is married to a wealthy racist (Alexander Skarsgard). Hall was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize dramatic at Sundance; “Passing” currently is nominated for five Gotham Awards including Best Picture and Breakthrough Director.
Racial...
Racial...
- 11/24/2021
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
This ‘dawn of sound’ classic from Josef Sternberg is an important early entry in the gangster genre, a romanticized tale of urban crime with little violence but a full measure of romantic revenge. Star George Bancroft is the title underworld kingpin, who risks everything to hold his girlfriend Fay Wray the way he holds onto power — with his fists and with his gun. The highly sentimental story has some odd ideas about prison rules on Death Row; although packed with ‘Sternbergian’ touches the visuals aren’t as overtly poetic as is his norm. It’s an interesting study from the first year of ‘all talkie’ pictures: the audio is highly creative but the dialogue delivery is slow — perfect for anyone learning English!
Thunderbolt
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1929 / B&w / 1:20 Movietone (?) / 85 min. / Street Date July 20, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95
Starring: George Bancroft, Fay Wray, Richard Arlen, Tully Marshall, Eugenie Besserer, James Spottswood,...
Thunderbolt
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1929 / B&w / 1:20 Movietone (?) / 85 min. / Street Date July 20, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95
Starring: George Bancroft, Fay Wray, Richard Arlen, Tully Marshall, Eugenie Besserer, James Spottswood,...
- 7/27/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Cary Grant in Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House Available on Blu-ray May 18th From Warner Archive
“You’ve been taken to the cleaners, and you don’t even know your pants are off.”
Cary Grant in Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House will be available on Blu-ray May 18th from Warner Archive
New York adman Jim Blandings is ready to say goodbye to his cramped city apartment and build, from the ground up, a Connecticut home with room enough for his growing family and dreams. All it will cost him is his time and money…and perhaps his job, marriage, happiness and what’s left of his sanity. Goodbye, Manhattan. Hello, comedy. As Jim, Cary Grant is a flustered poster boy for homeowner anxiety in this gleeful laughfest. Myrna Loy, her voice and line phrasing like musical chimes, plays Jim’s ever-patient wife. Louise Beavers is the sunny housemaid whose enthusiasm for Wham Ham saves Jim’s career bacon. And Melvyn Douglas is the perhaps-too-friendly family friend.
Cary Grant in Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House will be available on Blu-ray May 18th from Warner Archive
New York adman Jim Blandings is ready to say goodbye to his cramped city apartment and build, from the ground up, a Connecticut home with room enough for his growing family and dreams. All it will cost him is his time and money…and perhaps his job, marriage, happiness and what’s left of his sanity. Goodbye, Manhattan. Hello, comedy. As Jim, Cary Grant is a flustered poster boy for homeowner anxiety in this gleeful laughfest. Myrna Loy, her voice and line phrasing like musical chimes, plays Jim’s ever-patient wife. Louise Beavers is the sunny housemaid whose enthusiasm for Wham Ham saves Jim’s career bacon. And Melvyn Douglas is the perhaps-too-friendly family friend.
- 4/22/2021
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
It’s the disc everyone wants right now — vintage Hollywood horror fully restored to its amazing original Technicolor luster. A scientific investigation into some grisly Full Moon Murders culminates in a bizarre experiment in the fantastic lab of five potential mad doctors. Fay Wray and Lionel Atwill became horror stars, Lee Tracy provides the sidebar laughs, and then the unknown killer divulges his horrifying, Cronenberg-like secret: Synthetic Flesh! The Warner Archive scores with a follow up to last year’s The Mystery of the Wax Museum.
Doctor X
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1932 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 76 min. / Street Date April 13, 2021 / 21.99
Starring: Lionel Atwill, Fay Wray, Lee Tracy, Preston Foster, Arthur Edmund Carewe, Leila Bennett, Rovbert Warwixk, Thomas E. Jackson, Mae Busch, Tom Dugan, Louise Beavers.
Cinematography: Ray Rennahan, Richard Towers
Film Editor: George Amy
Art Director: Anton Grot
Special Effects: Fred Jackman Jr.
Makeup (effects): Max Factor
Written by Robert Tasker,...
Doctor X
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1932 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 76 min. / Street Date April 13, 2021 / 21.99
Starring: Lionel Atwill, Fay Wray, Lee Tracy, Preston Foster, Arthur Edmund Carewe, Leila Bennett, Rovbert Warwixk, Thomas E. Jackson, Mae Busch, Tom Dugan, Louise Beavers.
Cinematography: Ray Rennahan, Richard Towers
Film Editor: George Amy
Art Director: Anton Grot
Special Effects: Fred Jackman Jr.
Makeup (effects): Max Factor
Written by Robert Tasker,...
- 4/6/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Coming to Film Forum in New York City is “Black Women,” a 70-film screening series that spotlights 81 years – 1920 to 2001 – of trailblazing African American actresses in American movies.
Scheduled to run from January 17 to February 13, the series is curated by film historian and professor Donald Bogle, author of six books concerning blacks in film and television, including the groundbreaking “Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films” (1973).
“Last year, Bruce Goldstein, the repertory programmer at Film Forum, asked me if there was something I was interested in doing, and this was a topic that I had been thinking about, because I recently updated my book on the subject, ‘Brown Sugar,’ which dealt with African American women in entertainment from the early years of the late 19th century to the present,” said Bogle. “That’s really the way it came about, and it just developed from there.
Scheduled to run from January 17 to February 13, the series is curated by film historian and professor Donald Bogle, author of six books concerning blacks in film and television, including the groundbreaking “Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films” (1973).
“Last year, Bruce Goldstein, the repertory programmer at Film Forum, asked me if there was something I was interested in doing, and this was a topic that I had been thinking about, because I recently updated my book on the subject, ‘Brown Sugar,’ which dealt with African American women in entertainment from the early years of the late 19th century to the present,” said Bogle. “That’s really the way it came about, and it just developed from there.
- 1/17/2020
- by Tambay Obenson
- Indiewire
The most notorious pre-Code shocker comes to Criterion — and proves to be a superior drama with an entirely mature, sound outlook on the political issues around women’s sexuality and personal freedom. Taken from a raw novel by William Faulkner, this tale of rape and terror stars Miriam Hopkins in one of the bravest, best performances of its era. Truth-telling like this always comes at a price — Temple Drake was a prime target for the oppressive Production Code, with the result that Hopkins’ achievement was banned and unseen for over thirty-five years.
The Story of Temple Drake
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1006
1933 / B&w / 1:33 Academy / 71 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date December 3, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Miriam Hopkins, William Gargan, Jack La Rue, Florence Eldridge, Guy Standing, Irving Pichel, Jobyna Howland, William Collier Jr., Elizabeth Patterson, James Eagles, Harlan Knight, Jim Mason, Louise Beavers, Grady Sutton, Kent Taylor, John Carradine.
Cinematography:...
The Story of Temple Drake
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1006
1933 / B&w / 1:33 Academy / 71 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date December 3, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Miriam Hopkins, William Gargan, Jack La Rue, Florence Eldridge, Guy Standing, Irving Pichel, Jobyna Howland, William Collier Jr., Elizabeth Patterson, James Eagles, Harlan Knight, Jim Mason, Louise Beavers, Grady Sutton, Kent Taylor, John Carradine.
Cinematography:...
- 12/10/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Imitation of Life (1934) starred Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers who went into the pancake business
On this day in 1902 Louise Beavers born in Cincinatti. Though she was never as famous as the similarly cast Hattie McDaniel she also had her own big film moments in the studio system including the original Imitation of Life in which Claudette Colbert got wildly rich off of her recipe while she Beavers struggled with her light-skinned daughter. Free Pitch Idea For Writers Of Color: Don't you think a prestige miniseries on Black Hollywood throughout the years would be fascinating?
More on Louise Beavers and other "on this day" items after the jump...
On this day in 1902 Louise Beavers born in Cincinatti. Though she was never as famous as the similarly cast Hattie McDaniel she also had her own big film moments in the studio system including the original Imitation of Life in which Claudette Colbert got wildly rich off of her recipe while she Beavers struggled with her light-skinned daughter. Free Pitch Idea For Writers Of Color: Don't you think a prestige miniseries on Black Hollywood throughout the years would be fascinating?
More on Louise Beavers and other "on this day" items after the jump...
- 3/8/2017
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
Nostalgia just ain’t what it used to be.
When the poster for American Graffiti (1973) asked the question “Where were you in ’62?” it was marketing a trend, spiked by the increasing popularity of the theatrical musical Grease, for audiences of a certain age to look backward to a time when life wasn’t ostensibly so complicated, when your life was still out there waiting to be lived, to a time when America hadn’t yet “lost its innocence.” The demarcation point for that alleged loss is often assigned to the upheaval of grief and national confusion experienced in the wake of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, so it was no accident that the setting for American Graffiti’s night of cruising, romancing and soul-searching was placed a little over a year before that cataclysmic event. The interesting thing about Graffiti was the aggressiveness with which that...
When the poster for American Graffiti (1973) asked the question “Where were you in ’62?” it was marketing a trend, spiked by the increasing popularity of the theatrical musical Grease, for audiences of a certain age to look backward to a time when life wasn’t ostensibly so complicated, when your life was still out there waiting to be lived, to a time when America hadn’t yet “lost its innocence.” The demarcation point for that alleged loss is often assigned to the upheaval of grief and national confusion experienced in the wake of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, so it was no accident that the setting for American Graffiti’s night of cruising, romancing and soul-searching was placed a little over a year before that cataclysmic event. The interesting thing about Graffiti was the aggressiveness with which that...
- 2/13/2017
- by Dennis Cozzalio
- Trailers from Hell
The latter part of William "Wild Bill" Wellman's distinguished career is a little patchy, as much due to studio interference as anything else, but a fair bit of positive attention has focused on Track of the Cat (1954) a sweaty family melodrama about the hunt for a rapacious wildcat in the snowy wilds near Aspen, daringly filmed in color but with almost no actual color (the snow was crucial here).We've been looking at the wrong film. An almost exact opposite of Track of the Cat exists, one which trades that film's showy ambition for a quieter, but equally radical aesthetic. Where Robert Mitchum and his kin snarl at each other in Track of the Cat, in Good-bye, My Lady all is peaceful between old-timer Walter Brennan and his young nephew Brandon DeWilde (the kid from Shane). Where Track of the Cat uses a daring palette and widescreen compositions, Goodbye, My...
- 9/1/2016
- MUBI
Since 1989, the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress has been accomplishing the important task of preserving films that “represent important cultural, artistic and historic achievements in filmmaking.” From films way back in 1897 all the way up to 2004, they’ve now reached 675 films that celebrate our heritage and encapsulate our film history.
Today they’ve unveiled their 2015 list, which includes classics such as Douglas Sirk‘s melodrama Imitation of Life, Hal Ashby‘s Being There, and John Frankenheimer‘s Seconds. Perhaps the most popular picks, The Shawshank Redemption, Ghostbusters, Top Gun, and L.A. Confidential were also added. Check out the full list below.
Being There (1979)
Chance, a simple-minded gardener (Peter Sellers) whose only contact with the outside world is through television, becomes the toast of the town following a series of misunderstandings. Forced outside his protected environment by the death of his wealthy boss, Chance subsumes his late employer’s persona,...
Today they’ve unveiled their 2015 list, which includes classics such as Douglas Sirk‘s melodrama Imitation of Life, Hal Ashby‘s Being There, and John Frankenheimer‘s Seconds. Perhaps the most popular picks, The Shawshank Redemption, Ghostbusters, Top Gun, and L.A. Confidential were also added. Check out the full list below.
Being There (1979)
Chance, a simple-minded gardener (Peter Sellers) whose only contact with the outside world is through television, becomes the toast of the town following a series of misunderstandings. Forced outside his protected environment by the death of his wealthy boss, Chance subsumes his late employer’s persona,...
- 12/16/2015
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Constance Cummings in 'Night After Night.' Constance Cummings: Working with Frank Capra and Mae West (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Actress Went from Harold Lloyd to Eugene O'Neill.”) Back at Columbia, Harry Cohn didn't do a very good job at making Constance Cummings feel important. By the end of 1932, Columbia and its sweet ingenue found themselves in court, fighting bitterly over stipulations in her contract. According to the actress and lawyer's daughter, Columbia had failed to notify her that they were picking up her option. Therefore, she was a free agent, able to offer her services wherever she pleased. Harry Cohn felt otherwise, claiming that his contract player had waived such a notice. The battle would spill over into 1933. On the positive side, in addition to Movie Crazy 1932 provided Cummings with three other notable Hollywood movies: Washington Merry-Go-Round, American Madness, and Night After Night. 'Washington Merry-Go-Round...
- 11/5/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Susan Hayward. Susan Hayward movies: TCM Star of the Month Fiery redhead Susan Hayward it Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Month in Sept. 2015. The five-time Best Actress Oscar nominee – like Ida Lupino, a would-be Bette Davis that only sporadically landed roles to match the verve of her thespian prowess – was initially a minor Warner Bros. contract player who went on to become a Paramount second lead in the early '40s, a Universal leading lady in the late '40s, and a 20th Century Fox star in the early '50s. TCM will be presenting only three Susan Hayward premieres, all from her Fox era. Unfortunately, her Paramount and Universal work – e.g., Among the Living, Sis Hopkins, And Now Tomorrow, The Saxon Charm – which remains mostly unavailable (in quality prints), will remain unavailable this month. Highlights of the evening include: Adam Had Four Sons (1941), a sentimental but surprisingly...
- 9/4/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
'Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl': Johnny Depp as Capt. Jack Sparrow. 'Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl' review: Mostly an enjoyable romp (Oscar Movie Series) Pirate movies were a Hollywood staple for about three decades, from the mid-'20s (The Sea Hawk, The Black Pirate) to the mid-to-late '50s (Moonfleet, The Buccaneer), when the genre, by then mostly relegated to B films, began to die down. Sporadic resurrections in the '80s and '90s turned out to be critical and commercial bombs (Pirates, Cutthroat Island), something that didn't bode well for the Walt Disney Company's $140 million-budgeted film "adaptation" of one of their theme-park rides. But Neptune's mood has apparently improved with the arrival of the new century. He smiled – grinned would be a more appropriate word – on the Gore Verbinski-directed Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,...
- 6/29/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Imitation of Life
Written by William Hurlbut
Directed by John M. Stahl
USA, 1934
Written by Eleanore Griffin and Allan Scott
Directed by Douglas Sirk
USA, 1959
The debate about the necessity and worth of continual remakes rages on every year. Will the new version be as good as the original? Or even better? Should it have even been made to begin with? While we do seem to hear more about this recently, the concept of a remark is, of course, nothing new. Examples go back to the very dawn of cinema. What makes a remake particularly worthwhile, however, is when the films involved are dissimilar in certain aspects yet notably congruent in other areas: just enough to keep the basic premise or theme consistent, but varied enough to keep it up to date and original in one way or another. If both versions have their merits, a considerate comparison and contrast...
Written by William Hurlbut
Directed by John M. Stahl
USA, 1934
Written by Eleanore Griffin and Allan Scott
Directed by Douglas Sirk
USA, 1959
The debate about the necessity and worth of continual remakes rages on every year. Will the new version be as good as the original? Or even better? Should it have even been made to begin with? While we do seem to hear more about this recently, the concept of a remark is, of course, nothing new. Examples go back to the very dawn of cinema. What makes a remake particularly worthwhile, however, is when the films involved are dissimilar in certain aspects yet notably congruent in other areas: just enough to keep the basic premise or theme consistent, but varied enough to keep it up to date and original in one way or another. If both versions have their merits, a considerate comparison and contrast...
- 4/15/2015
- by Jeremy Carr
- SoundOnSight
Cary Grant movies: 'An Affair to Remember' does justice to its title (photo: Cary Grant ca. late 1940s) Cary Grant excelled at playing Cary Grant. This evening, fans of the charming, sophisticated, debonair actor -- not to be confused with the Bristol-born Archibald Leach -- can rejoice, as no less than eight Cary Grant movies are being shown on Turner Classic Movies, including a handful of his most successful and best-remembered star vehicles from the late '30s to the late '50s. (See also: "Cary Grant Classic Movies" and "Cary Grant and Randolph Scott: Gay Lovers?") The evening begins with what may well be Cary Grant's best-known film, An Affair to Remember. This 1957 romantic comedy-melodrama is unusual in that it's an even more successful remake of a previous critical and box-office hit -- the Academy Award-nominated 1939 release Love Affair -- and that it was directed...
- 12/9/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
By Anjelica Oswald
Managing Editor
Originally planned to screen as a 30-minute preview at AFI Fest, Ava DuVernay’s Selma, centered on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, premiered in its entirety and stirred up more Oscar buzz ahead of its Christmas Day release.
The Hollywood Reporter’s Stephen Farber says the film is “intelligently written, vividly shot, tightly edited and sharply acted,” and that it “represents a rare example of craftsmanship working to produce a deeply moving piece of history.” Meanwhile, Paul Webb’s screenplay and David Oyelowo’s portrayal of Dr. King have been praised. The Wrap’s James Rocchi says, “Oyelowo’s performance would be impressive enough if it merely recreated the icon we now revere as perfectly as he does through a variety of methods… But Oyelowo, and Webb’s screenplay, also give us a rich, rewarding portrait of King as a man,...
Managing Editor
Originally planned to screen as a 30-minute preview at AFI Fest, Ava DuVernay’s Selma, centered on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, premiered in its entirety and stirred up more Oscar buzz ahead of its Christmas Day release.
The Hollywood Reporter’s Stephen Farber says the film is “intelligently written, vividly shot, tightly edited and sharply acted,” and that it “represents a rare example of craftsmanship working to produce a deeply moving piece of history.” Meanwhile, Paul Webb’s screenplay and David Oyelowo’s portrayal of Dr. King have been praised. The Wrap’s James Rocchi says, “Oyelowo’s performance would be impressive enough if it merely recreated the icon we now revere as perfectly as he does through a variety of methods… But Oyelowo, and Webb’s screenplay, also give us a rich, rewarding portrait of King as a man,...
- 11/14/2014
- by Anjelica Oswald
- Scott Feinberg
Oscar-nominated ‘Imitation of Life’ actress Juanita Moore has died Juanita Moore, Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nominee for the 1959 blockbuster Imitation of Life, died on New Year’s Day 2014 at her home in Los Angeles. According to various online sources, Juanita Moore (born on October 19, 1922) was 91; her step-grandson, actor Kirk Kahn, said she was 99. (Photo: Juanita Moore in the late ’50s. See also: Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner photos at the 50th anniversary screening of Imitation of Life at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.) Juanita Moore movies The Los Angeles-born Juanita Moore began her show business career as a chorus girl at New York City’s Cotton Club. According to the IMDb, Moore was an extra/bit player in a trio of films of the ’40s, including Vincente Minnelli’s all-black musical Cabin in the Sky (1942) and Elia Kazan’s socially conscious melodrama Pinky (1949), in which Jeanne Crain plays a (very,...
- 1/2/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Hattie McDaniel: Best Supporting Actress Oscar competition and missing Academy Award plaque (See previous post: “Hattie McDaniel Oscar Speech.”) Besides Hattie McDaniel for Gone with the Wind, the 1939 Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominees were Geraldine Fitzgerald for Wuthering Heights, Edna May Oliver for Drums Along the Mohawk, Maria Ouspenskaya for Love Affair, and Olivia de Havilland for Gone with the Wind. It should be noted that de Havilland, who, according to some, was not at all happy at having lost the Oscar, had much more screen time than Hattie McDaniel. In fact, de Havilland had lobbied David O. Selznick to list her as a lead actress, alongside Vivien Leigh. Selznick, however, balked, fearing that de Havilland might steal away votes from her fellow Gone with the Wind player. In the next decade, Olivia de Havilland would receive four more Academy Award nominations, all in the Best Actress category, including...
- 8/21/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Lana Turner movies: Scandal and more scandal Lana Turner is Turner Classic Movies’ "Summer Under the Stars" star today, Saturday, August 10, 2013. I’m a little — or rather, a lot — late in the game posting this article, but there are still three Lana Turner movies left. You can see Turner get herself embroiled in scandal right now, in Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life (1959), both the director and the star’s biggest box-office hit. More scandal follows in Mark Robson’s Peyton Place (1957), the movie that earned Lana Turner her one and only Academy Award nomination. And wrapping things up is George Sidney’s lively The Three Musketeers (1948), with Turner as the ruthless, heartless, remorseless — but quite elegant — Lady de Winter. Based on Fannie Hurst’s novel and a remake of John M. Stahl’s 1934 melodrama about mother love, class disparities, racism, and good cooking, Imitation of Life was shown on...
- 8/11/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Douglas Sirk movies: ‘Imitation of Life,’ ‘Written on the Wind’ (photo: Lana Turner, Juanita Moore, Karin Dicker in ‘Imitation of Life’) Douglas Sirk is Turner Classic Movies’ Director of the Evening. The German-born (April 26, 1897, in Hamburg) filmmaker has developed a cult following in recent decades after his "women’s pictures" were reappraised by some critics as works of profound social criticism filled with auteuristic touches. Why it would take years (or decades) for people to realize the obvious is a little mind-boggling, until you remember that movies about women and their issues have been, for the most part, relegated to the sidelines. A stupid prejudice that continues to this very day. My statement, by the way, has nothing to do with yikesy political correctness; if you don’t believe me, just check out the Best Picture Academy Award winners or Palme d’Or winners or Golden Lion winners or Golden...
- 8/1/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Baseball Biopic Surpassing Expectations: Will Easily Top Domestic B.O. Chart This Weekend Written and directed by Academy Award winner Brian Helgeland (L.A. Confidential screenwriter), and starring Chadwick Boseman as pioneering black baseball player Jackie Robinson and veteran Harrison Ford as the Brooklyn Dodgers' team executive Branch Rickey, the biopic 42 was the no. 1 movie at Friday's domestic box office; it'll surely be the weekend's top film, too. As per early, rough estimates found on the web site Deadline.com, the period drama will be the only movie grossing more than $20 million at the domestic box office. (See below more information about Scary Movie 5 and last weekend's holdovers.) (Pictured above are an unrecognizable Ford as the Brooklyn Dodgers' team executive Branch Rickey and Boseman wearing Robinson's baseball uniform.) The 42 movie brought in an estiamted $8.5 million at 3,003 U.S. and Canada venues on Friday (April 12) and by Sunday evening may possibly...
- 4/13/2013
- by Zac Gille
- Alt Film Guide
The Oscar-winning success of last year's "The Help" was a throwback in many ways, principally to the socially-conscious melodramas of Stanley Kramer, like "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner." Another comparison point that came up frequently in reviews of Tate Taylor's film was "Imitation Of Life," the 1959 film by director Douglas Sirk, but it's scarcely fair: over fifty years on, Sirk's picture stands head and shoulders above virtually every other melodrama.
The story follows widow and aspiring actress Lora (Lana Turner), whose daughter Susie goes missing at the beach, and is found by an African-American divorcee, Annie Johnson (Juanita Moore), there with her own light-skinned daughter, Sarah Jane. The two become friends, Lora taking Annie in as a housekeeper, and Annie's care helping Lora achieve her dream of becoming a Broadway star. Eleven years later, however, their children have grown up, and Susie (Sandra Dee) develops a crush on her mother's boyfriend Steve,...
The story follows widow and aspiring actress Lora (Lana Turner), whose daughter Susie goes missing at the beach, and is found by an African-American divorcee, Annie Johnson (Juanita Moore), there with her own light-skinned daughter, Sarah Jane. The two become friends, Lora taking Annie in as a housekeeper, and Annie's care helping Lora achieve her dream of becoming a Broadway star. Eleven years later, however, their children have grown up, and Susie (Sandra Dee) develops a crush on her mother's boyfriend Steve,...
- 4/17/2012
- by Oliver Lyttelton
- The Playlist
Hal Kanter (see photo), creator of the groundbreaking television series Julia, starring Diahann Carroll (photo) as a nurse, died Sunday, Nov. 6, of complications from pneumonia at Encino Hospital in the Los Angeles suburb of Encino. Kanter was 92. Julia (1968-71) marked the first time a black actress had an important role in an American television series playing something other than a maid (e.g., Ethel Waters and Louise Beavers in the 1950s series Beulah). As quoted in the Los Angeles Times obit, Kanter said he didn't want to make profound political statements with each Julia episode. But political statements were made all the same, as Kanter explained: There is a fallout of social comment. Every week we see a black child playing with a white child with complete acceptance and without incident. One of the recurring themes in the thousands of letters we get is from people who thank us for...
- 11/8/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
The African-American servant or 'Mammy' is one of Hollywood's more troublesome cliches. Does new hit film The Help subvert or reinforce the stereotype, asks Xan Brooks
Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House is an amiable 1948 comedy that casts Cary Grant as an imperilled advertising executive who is rescued, on the day of the deadline, by his beaming black domestic servant. "If you ain't eating Wham, you ain't eating ham," quips the servant, bustling in with a freshly prepared breakfast and casually providing a slogan to save her master's bacon. Naturally Blandings is delighted. "Darling!" he calls to his wife. "Give Gussie a $10 raise." This, back in 1948, was what passed for a Hollywood happy ending.
These days, thank heaven, the help are paid more fairly. For evidence, check out The Help, a 60s-set, Mississippi-based drama about a bunch of servants who "help" a white journalist write a book and...
Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House is an amiable 1948 comedy that casts Cary Grant as an imperilled advertising executive who is rescued, on the day of the deadline, by his beaming black domestic servant. "If you ain't eating Wham, you ain't eating ham," quips the servant, bustling in with a freshly prepared breakfast and casually providing a slogan to save her master's bacon. Naturally Blandings is delighted. "Darling!" he calls to his wife. "Give Gussie a $10 raise." This, back in 1948, was what passed for a Hollywood happy ending.
These days, thank heaven, the help are paid more fairly. For evidence, check out The Help, a 60s-set, Mississippi-based drama about a bunch of servants who "help" a white journalist write a book and...
- 10/21/2011
- by Xan Brooks
- The Guardian - Film News
Ann Sothern, Linda Darnell, Jeanne Crain, A Letter to Three Wives Linda Darnell, the gorgeous leading lady of numerous 20th Century Fox productions of the '40s, is Turner Classic Movies' "Summer Under the Stars" player this Saturday, August 27. TCM, which has leased titles from the Fox library, is showing 14 Linda Darnell movies, including no less than 9 TCM premieres. [Linda Darnell Movie Schedule.] Right now, TCM is showing writer-director Joseph L. Mankiewicz's A Letter to Three Wives (1949), winner of Academy Awards for Best Direction and Best Screenplay. This curious comedy-drama about a husband who leaves his wife for another woman — but whose husband? Linda Darnell's, Jeanne Crain's, or Ann Sothern's? — also earned Mankiewicz the very first Directors Guild of America Award and a Writers Guild Award (which Mankiewicz shared with Vera Caspary) for the Best Written American Comedy. The husbands in question are Kirk Douglas, Paul Douglas, and Jeffrey Lynn.
- 8/28/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Make Way For Tomorrow (1937) Direction: Leo McCarey Cast: Victor Moore, Beulah Bondi, Fay Bainter, Thomas Mitchell, Porter Hall, Barbara Read, Elisabeth Risdon, Maurice Moscovitch, Minna Gombell, Louise Beavers Screenplay: Viña Delmar; from Josephine Lawrence's novel, and Helen Leary and Nolan Leary's play Recommended with Reservations Beulah Bondi, Victor Moore, Make Way for Tomorrow The main conflict in Leo McCarey's Make Way for Tomorrow revolves around an elderly couple, Barkley and Lucy Cooper (Victor Moore and Beulah Bondi), who lose their home and are forced to move in with their adult children. The sons and daughters hesitate, then reluctantly agree to house the couple. [...]...
- 5/17/2011
- by Danny Fortune
- Alt Film Guide
Of course! We’ll get a film centered on the white executive who signed Jackie Robinson to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1945, before we get a film based on the life of Jackie Robinson himself!
Robert Redford has signed on the star in a film to be directed by Brian Helgeland (he wrote the scripts for L.A. Confidential & Mystic River), centered on Branch Rickey, the Major League Baseball executive who helped break the games color barrier by signing African American player Jackie Robinson.
“No one really knows the Rickey part, the political maneuvers and the partnership they had to share… It’s the story underneath the story you thought you knew,” said Redford to the Los Angeles Times.
This has apparently been in the works for about 3 years now, initially planned as an Espn production, and Redford has always been attached to star. Now it looks like it’s officially heading to the big screen.
Robert Redford has signed on the star in a film to be directed by Brian Helgeland (he wrote the scripts for L.A. Confidential & Mystic River), centered on Branch Rickey, the Major League Baseball executive who helped break the games color barrier by signing African American player Jackie Robinson.
“No one really knows the Rickey part, the political maneuvers and the partnership they had to share… It’s the story underneath the story you thought you knew,” said Redford to the Los Angeles Times.
This has apparently been in the works for about 3 years now, initially planned as an Espn production, and Redford has always been attached to star. Now it looks like it’s officially heading to the big screen.
- 4/7/2011
- by Tambay
- ShadowAndAct
Enjoy a selection of those moments when solid cinematic gold is transformed into liquid assets – and suggest your own below
It's springtime at last. And that means summer will come. And that means heat. And that heat means melting. Everything does it, from the tarmac on the streets to that ice lolly you bought moments ago that's already dribbling down your hand. Movies are the perfect medium to experience this effect of heat in motion, turning solids into something a bit more viscous. Of course you can photograph a bit of ice, but until the advent of cinema the motion of this in effect was unfilmable and thus this facet of the majesty of nature was left unrecorded. It didn't take long for those entertainment boffins to realise that melting, far from simply being a neat visual shorthand for the passage of time and the circularity of the seasons, was...
It's springtime at last. And that means summer will come. And that means heat. And that heat means melting. Everything does it, from the tarmac on the streets to that ice lolly you bought moments ago that's already dribbling down your hand. Movies are the perfect medium to experience this effect of heat in motion, turning solids into something a bit more viscous. Of course you can photograph a bit of ice, but until the advent of cinema the motion of this in effect was unfilmable and thus this facet of the majesty of nature was left unrecorded. It didn't take long for those entertainment boffins to realise that melting, far from simply being a neat visual shorthand for the passage of time and the circularity of the seasons, was...
- 3/16/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
Boris Kodjoe is 37 today. The Hollywood heartthrob was last seen in 2009’s Surrogates, opposite Bruce Willis (a forgettable movie), and has 3 projects in various stages of production, notably his starring role in wunderkind director/producer J.J. Abrams’ upcoming TV actioner, Undercover, which has been described as Mr & Mrs Smith meets The Bourne Identity.
Cheryl “Salt” James from the 80s/90s all-girl rap group Salt-n-Pepa, is 46 years old today! Wow! Time sure flies doesn’t it? I’m sitting here thinking she’s in her late 30s. Cheryl has done a bit of acting here and there, over the years, but nothing memorable. She last played a Puerto Rican detective in a Mario Van Peebles straight-to-dvd movie in 2000 titled Raw Nerve. Anybody see it? On TV, there was The Salt-n-Pepa Show reality TV program in 2007, and lately, she’s been hanging out with Pepa on her own reality TV show titled Let’s Talk About Pep,...
Cheryl “Salt” James from the 80s/90s all-girl rap group Salt-n-Pepa, is 46 years old today! Wow! Time sure flies doesn’t it? I’m sitting here thinking she’s in her late 30s. Cheryl has done a bit of acting here and there, over the years, but nothing memorable. She last played a Puerto Rican detective in a Mario Van Peebles straight-to-dvd movie in 2000 titled Raw Nerve. Anybody see it? On TV, there was The Salt-n-Pepa Show reality TV program in 2007, and lately, she’s been hanging out with Pepa on her own reality TV show titled Let’s Talk About Pep,...
- 3/8/2010
- by Tambay
- ShadowAndAct
In my quest to figure out good Xmas and Kwanzaa gifts for my people this year, I realized we always recommend movies, DVD’s and VODs, but I’ve seldom read about good books here on S&A. So, I’ve compile a great list for of Black cinephile-based books for the filmgoing audience. Some you’re definitely familiar with, others maybe not, but nonetheless here it is:
Donald Bogle’s books
I’ve been reading Bogle’s books for 20 years now, so considering I’m just on the precipice of my (eek!) mid-30’s, that’s saying a lot of the amount of Black film knowledge that he’s imparted to the masses for decades.
Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies & Bucks
Arguably Bogle’s greatest, if not simply his best known book, “Toms…” is the definitive study of American Black film images going back to the beginning with Birth of...
Donald Bogle’s books
I’ve been reading Bogle’s books for 20 years now, so considering I’m just on the precipice of my (eek!) mid-30’s, that’s saying a lot of the amount of Black film knowledge that he’s imparted to the masses for decades.
Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies & Bucks
Arguably Bogle’s greatest, if not simply his best known book, “Toms…” is the definitive study of American Black film images going back to the beginning with Birth of...
- 12/19/2009
- by Curtis the Media Man
- ShadowAndAct
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