Favorite Films (lists up to participating site members)

[GUT]

Hello Jeff. Thanks.

He also played a police lieutenant on a Kolchak episode. Was he not also the voice of the talking car?

Cheers.
LC

Which talking car I remember a few.

KITT and My Mother The Car, spring to mnd as two.

[Mayerling]

G'Day GUT and L.C.

Daniels was the voice of the car KITT in "Nightrider".

Ann Southern was the voice of the 1928 Porter in "My Mother the Car" with Jerry Van Dyke and Avery Schreiber as Col. Mazzini. By the way, they made up that make of the antique automobile - although it sounds like it could have been the name of a make, like "Packard", "Peerless", "Stutz Bearcat", or "Mercer", nobody ever named an automobile make the "Porter".

Hi Rocky,

The conclusion of "Dante's Inferno" is scary - it's a luxury liner that is a floating casino ablaze at sea. The film was made in 1935, and was the last major film in the career of Henry Walthall (the "Little Colonel" in D.W. Griffith's "The Birth of a Nation"), and it gave Tracy an opportunity to play a negative character who was greedy and ambitious at everyone else's expense. But that conclusion was based on current events. At the time the film was made the country was talking about the September 1934 burning at sea of the luxury cruise ship "Morro Castle" off the New Jersey coast, the deaths of over 130 people from burning and drowning. It was the worst shipwreck of the 1930s. If you compare photos of the "Castle" when burning and when simply sailing, that ship looks like Tracy's ship in the picture. *

Actually the "Morro Castle" Disaster deserves a thread of it's own on this website in "Shades of Whitechapel". The reason is the very real possibility that it was not an accident but a deliberately set fire (thus making the fatalities crime victims). The most likely suspect was the "heroic" wireless officer, George Rogers, who was the one ship's officer who seemed to know his responsibility during the disaster. But in later years Rogers tried to kill one person (his superior in a Jersey police job), spent a few years in prison, and then killed an elderly man and his daughter whom Rogers lived with, and went to prison for murder for life. When he tried to kill the Chief of Police in the 1940s Rogers had used an incendiary bomb device that almost did the trick. There is also a second mystery in the "Castle" case - the ship's Captain, William Warms, had died suddenly the night before after dinner - and the ship's doctor could not figure out what killed him. Rogers and the Captain had been seen having a serious argument earlier on the day of the Captain's death. During the fire the body of Captain Warms and the ship's doctor disappeared.

Lest you think that I have unfairly stacked the deck against Rogers, an alternative theory of the fire is that members of the crew who were communist union members may have set it due to an on-going labor dispute with the ship's owners, "The Ward Line".

In 1935, by the way, another Ward liner, the "Mohican" was in a puzzling collision with the freighter "Talisman" off the New Jersey coat again, and sank with the loss of about 55 people. The Ward Line went out of business shortly after that.

[*In 1938, only four years after the tragedy, enough time seemed to pass to allow for the disaster to become a bit of a joke. In the film "Boy Meets Girl" with Ralph Bellamy, Pat O'Brien and your favorite Jimmy Cagney, O'Brien and Cagney are writers working at the studio in Hollywood run by the supposedly Irving Thalberg wunderkind played by Bellamy (who doesn't know what's the difference between trumpets and trombones). O'Brien and Cagney usually are driving Bellamy to distraction with their antics, but they have been building up an infant child star at the expense of Dick Foran (the studio's answer to John Wayne in westerns). The infant's mother has been falling for a British stunt man in the studio, and this may lead to the infant being taken out of films. Cagney and O'Brien decide to scotch this by writing a letter from the missing father of the infant to the mother, and one of the lines in it (emoted with suitable brio by Cagney) is , "I did not go down on the "Morro Castle". That was possibly the last time that ship's tragedy popped up in a film.]

Jeff

[Mayerling]

On a thread under "Books" I mentioned how I really favor biographies of those I consider "the terminably forgettable" in history, because nobody really knows (or cares) about them. So I thought I might make a list here of biographies about forgotten people that were made into films.

1) Gallant Journey - Glen Ford as John J. Montgomery of California, who was an early glider expert, and a pioneer in heavier than air flight.

2) The Red Tent - True story of the Arctic crash of the non-rigid airship "Italia" in 1928, under command of Italian Colonel Umberto Nobile (Peter Finch) and the travails of him and the other survivors before their rescue by an international group. Sean Connery plays the better remembered polar explorer Roald Amundsun in the film (Amundsun was killed in the rescue attempts).

3) Sister Kenny - Rosalind Russell as the Australian nurse and pioneer in treating polio victims

4) Silver Dollar - Edward G. Robinson in a fictionalized account of the rise and fall of Nevada "Silver King" Haw Tabor.

5) The Magic Box - Robert Donat as English movie projector/camera pioneer William Friese-Green.

6) Cheaper By the Dozen - Clifton Webb as early 20th Century efficiency expert Frank Gilbreth. Myrna Loy played his wife (and later his widow) in this film and the sequel "Bells on Their Toes" as she too became a business efficiency expert of the times.

7) Sutter's Gold - Swiss settler in the California lands of Mexico (and - to his cost - the United States) "General" John Sutter (played by Edward Arnold) who lost his lands and property due to the discovery of gold on his land in 1848. He died in poverty in Washington, D.C. in 1880, still hoping the U.S. government would pay him over a billion dollars (in 1880 currency) for his losses.

8) The Dolly Sisters - Betty Grable and June Havoc as the Hungarian born singers who were musical stage stars from the teens to the 1930s in the U.S.

9) Boomerang - True (if slightly fictionalized) retelling of the story of how Bridgeport, Connecticut District Attorney Homer Cummings (later FDR's Attorney General in the 1930s) distinguished his reputation by proving the innocence instead of the guilt of an arrested suspect (Arthur Kennedy) in the murder of a priest. Cummings was played by Dana Andrews.

10) The First of the Few/ Spitfire - Leslie Howard as R. J. Mitchell, the engineering genius who developed the great World War II fighter plane in the 1930s, but died before he saw it save his country in the "Battle of Britain". David Niven was his leading pilot.

I am sure there are far more than these, but these will do as an introduction to the list - note that they all can have some degree of period notoriety that traces remain of, but that they are not generally recalled by the public.

Jeff

[Robert]

The Seven Little Foys - Bob Hope. Only time I've ever heard of them.

[RockySullivan]

G'Day GUT and L.C.

Daniels was the voice of the car KITT in "Nightrider".

Ann Southern was the voice of the 1928 Porter in "My Mother the Car" with Jerry Van Dyke and Avery Schreiber as Col. Mazzini. By the way, they made up that make of the antique automobile - although it sounds like it could have been the name of a make, like "Packard", "Peerless", "Stutz Bearcat", or "Mercer", nobody ever named an automobile make the "Porter".

Hi Rocky,

The conclusion of "Dante's Inferno" is scary - it's a luxury liner that is a floating casino ablaze at sea. The film was made in 1935, and was the last major film in the career of Henry Walthall (the "Little Colonel" in D.W. Griffith's "The Birth of a Nation"), and it gave Tracy an opportunity to play a negative character who was greedy and ambitious at everyone else's expense. But that conclusion was based on current events. At the time the film was made the country was talking about the September 1934 burning at sea of the luxury cruise ship "Morro Castle" off the New Jersey coast, the deaths of over 130 people from burning and drowning. It was the worst shipwreck of the 1930s. If you compare photos of the "Castle" when burning and when simply sailing, that ship looks like Tracy's ship in the picture. *

Actually the "Morro Castle" Disaster deserves a thread of it's own on this website in "Shades of Whitechapel". The reason is the very real possibility that it was not an accident but a deliberately set fire (thus making the fatalities crime victims). The most likely suspect was the "heroic" wireless officer, George Rogers, who was the one ship's officer who seemed to know his responsibility during the disaster. But in later years Rogers tried to kill one person (his superior in a Jersey police job), spent a few years in prison, and then killed an elderly man and his daughter whom Rogers lived with, and went to prison for murder for life. When he tried to kill the Chief of Police in the 1940s Rogers had used an incendiary bomb device that almost did the trick. There is also a second mystery in the "Castle" case - the ship's Captain, William Warms, had died suddenly the night before after dinner - and the ship's doctor could not figure out what killed him. Rogers and the Captain had been seen having a serious argument earlier on the day of the Captain's death. During the fire the body of Captain Warms and the ship's doctor disappeared.

Lest you think that I have unfairly stacked the deck against Rogers, an alternative theory of the fire is that members of the crew who were communist union members may have set it due to an on-going labor dispute with the ship's owners, "The Ward Line".

In 1935, by the way, another Ward liner, the "Mohican" was in a puzzling collision with the freighter "Talisman" off the New Jersey coat again, and sank with the loss of about 55 people. The Ward Line went out of business shortly after that.

[*In 1938, only four years after the tragedy, enough time seemed to pass to allow for the disaster to become a bit of a joke. In the film "Boy Meets Girl" with Ralph Bellamy, Pat O'Brien and your favorite Jimmy Cagney, O'Brien and Cagney are writers working at the studio in Hollywood run by the supposedly Irving Thalberg wunderkind played by Bellamy (who doesn't know what's the difference between trumpets and trombones). O'Brien and Cagney usually are driving Bellamy to distraction with their antics, but they have been building up an infant child star at the expense of Dick Foran (the studio's answer to John Wayne in westerns). The infant's mother has been falling for a British stunt man in the studio, and this may lead to the infant being taken out of films. Cagney and O'Brien decide to scotch this by writing a letter from the missing father of the infant to the mother, and one of the lines in it (emoted with suitable brio by Cagney) is , "I did not go down on the "Morro Castle". That was possibly the last time that ship's tragedy popped up in a film.]

Jeff

Thanks Mayer, this is real interesting!

[Mayerling]

Thanks Mayer, this is real interesting!

You're welcome. I made one error. The second Ward liner to get into a disaster, in a 1935 collision off New Jersey, was not the "Mohican" but the "Mohawk".

Jeff

[GUT]

Thanks Mayer, this is real interesting!

Pretty much everything he posts is, personally I think it's a name thing.

[Mayerling]

Pretty much everything he posts is, personally I think it's a name thing.

Thanks GUT. At a moment like this I recall a bit of dialog in a Sherlock Holmes' story. Holmes has just referred to Professor Moriarty:

Watson: "The mastermind as famous among criminals as...."
Holmes: "My blushes Watson...."
[Pause]
Watson: "I was about to say as he is unknown to the general public!"

Jeff

[Mayerling]

In honor of a great Hollywood actress - one of the last survivors of the golden age of films - who just died:

Films of Maureen O'Hara:

Jamaica Inn
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
The Black Swan
This Land is Mine
How Green Was My Valley
The Spanish Main
Miracle on 34th Street
Rio Grande
The Quiet Man
Under Two Flags
The Wings of Eagles
Our Man In Havana
Mr. Hobbs Takes A Vacation
McClintock
Only The Lonely

Add any others....

[DJA]

Kangaroo, 1952.

[Steadmund Brand]

So sad to hear about the passing of another legend....

I'll Add to this great list if I may.

1- 1946- Sentimental Journey- chaming film, plus William Bendix is always fun

2- 1949- The Forbidden Street- Dana Andrews is also magnificant!!!

3- also 1949 (good year eh?)- Father was a Fullback- ok not a great film, but hey Jim Backus is in it and that adds a star or two in my book..

4-1963- Spencer's Mountain-Henry Fonda and Maureen O'hara were great together!!

Steadmund Brand

[Mayerling]

New Topic

It's been over a month, so I propose this topic for our next bunch of films. It seems suggested to me by recent events and a personality on this board:

Movies with a Know-it-all, self-satisfied, or pretentious character in them:

[Sometimes the character may actually be one who is genuinely a genius and the hero. More frequently it's a self-deluded phony]

1) Clifton Webb as "Lynn Belvedere" in "Sitting Pretty", "Mr. Belvedere Goes to College", and "Mr. Belvedere Rings the Bell"
2) Monty Wooley as "Sheridan Whiteside" in "The Man Who Came to Dinner"
3) Robert Morley as "Andrew Undershaft" in "Major Barbara"
4) Leslie Howard as "Professor Henry Higgins" in "Pygmalion"
a) Honorable mention: Esme Percy as "Zoltan Karpathy" in "Pygmalion"
5) Rex Harrison as "Professor Henry Higgins" in "My Fair Lady"
a) Honorable mention: Theodore Bikel as "Zoltan Karpathy" in "My Fair Lady". [R.I.P. Mr. Bikel. I was fortunate to see you twice in your one man show.]
7) Fred MacMurray in "The Absent Minded Professor" and "Son of Flubber"
6) Sig Ruman as "Colonel Erhardt" in "To Be or Not To Be"

Please add any you can think of.

[GUT]

It's been over a month, so I propose this topic for our next bunch of films. It seems suggested to me by recent events and a personality on this board:

Movies with a Know-it-all, self-satisfied, or pretentious character in them:

[Sometimes the character may actually be one who is genuinely a genius and the hero. More frequently it's a self-deluded phony]

1) Clifton Webb as "Lynn Belvedere" in "Sitting Pretty", "Mr. Belvedere Goes to College", and "Mr. Belvedere Rings the Bell"
2) Monty Wooley as "Sheridan Whiteside" in "The Man Who Came to Dinner"
3) Robert Morley as "Andrew Undershaft" in "Major Barbara"
4) Leslie Howard as "Professor Henry Higgins" in "Pygmalion"
a) Honorable mention: Esme Percy as "Zoltan Karpathy" in "Pygmalion"
5) Rex Harrison as "Professor Henry Higgins" in "My Fair Lady"
a) Honorable mention: Theodore Bikel as "Zoltan Karpathy" in "My Fair Lady". [R.I.P. Mr. Bikel. I was fortunate to see you twice in your one man show.]
7) Fred MacMurray in "The Absent Minded Professor" and "Son of Flubber"
6) Sig Ruman as "Colonel Erhardt" in "To Be or Not To Be"

Please add any you can think of.

Thanks for re booting a sensible thread.

[Rosella]

Michael Caton in 'Birdman'. Actually, the whole film is pretentious but Caton takes the prize cake!

Ethan Hawke as Troy Dyer in 'Reality Bites' (1994)

'Last Year at Marienbad' (1961) Everyone in it was pretentious as was the film. My companion went to sleep, but I actually didn't mind it in a strange sort of way.

Wes Bentley as Ricky Fitts in 'American Beauty' (1999) He indulges himself by filming a plastic bag blowing in the wind for what seems like an eternity.

[DJA]

Michael Caton in 'Birdman'.

He was OK in the late 1960s Kings Cross production of "Hair".

Thought "The Castle" was over rated.

Not a fan.

Thanks,I'll keep clear of that one.

Edit. JB HiFi in Oz has Ripper Street 1 & 2 on DVD for $23.98 until Sunday.