In the era of the Motion Picture Production Code, depictions of homosexuality were verboten, classified under the Code’s rather vague catch-all category of “sex perversion.” While those making films prior to 1934 enjoyed more freedom in their ability to depict some obvious—and even blatant—homosexual characters, the establishment of the Production Code Administration (PCA) put an…
For this week’s Saturday Morning Cartoons entry, we’re jumping back in time a couple of years from last week’s post. On a whim last night, I decided to watch Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Well, perhaps it wasn’t so whim-ish; I saw this post yesterday on grammatically-incorrect movie titles, and it reminded me that I’ve been…
It’s been delayed by a couple of weeks (apologies—it’s been a busy month!), but today we’re going to take a look at the final Doris Day-Rock Hudson pairing, 1964’s Send Me No Flowers. In their third outing together, Day and Hudson are no longer sparring singletons, but a loving husband-and-wife duo, living out the mid-century…
Two years after debuting a sparkling chemistry in 1959’s Pillow Talk, Doris Day and Rock Hudson re-teamed for another romantic comedy, Lover Come Back. Again, they were joined by Tony Randall and a slew of amusing bit players for an appealing, candy-coated concoction of wit, sex, and broad humor. Over the years, I’ve read several…
This past weekend marked classic movie star Doris Day’s 87th birthday (at least, according to TCM’s online biography of the star … some sources list various other years as Day’s official date of birth). And what better way to celebrate than to dedicate this week’s posts to a trio of films from the beautiful, charming,…
Susan Slept Here (1954) is a delightful, if somewhat creepy (by today’s standards, anyway) bit of holiday fluff. Starring Debbie Reynolds and Dick Powell, the film played with the censors at a time when it seemed everyone in Hollywood was determined to give the Hays Office its share of hell. Reynolds stars as the titular…
If there is one movie that I really wish TCM would play sometime in the near future, it’s The Farmer’s Daughter, an absolutely delightful comedy starring Loretta Young, Joseph Cotten, and Ethel Barrymore. The movie’s never been released on DVD as far as I can tell (drats!), and I’m seriously jonesing for a fresh viewing.…
I recently received a copy of Saul Austerlitz’s Another Fine Mess: A History of American Film Comedy, which was released last month. It is, in a word, engrossing. But a pithy, single-word review won’t do, will it? Nor is that single word sufficient, really, to explain to you how wonderful this compendium of film comedy…
True Classics 