Mar 24, 2023

In this Dorothy McGuire Acteurist Oeuvre-view episode, a couple of disparate films: Elia Kazan's anti-semitism exposé drama, Gentleman's Agreement (1947), and a marital comedy about the hardships of being a doctor's wife, Mother Didn't Tell Me (1950). We discuss the qualities that McGuire brings to her...

Mar 17, 2023

[[New Improved edition – with restored Home From the Hill content!]]

It's March Minnelli Madness as we watch three melodramas directed by Vincente Minelli, plus one nightmarish comedy: The Long, Long Trailer (1954), starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz; The Cobweb (1955), starring Richard Widmark and Lauren Bacall...

Mar 10, 2023

Our Fox 1942 episode explores two different modes of Betty Grable Fox musical (both choreographed by Astaire collaborator Hermes Pan) that draw on the Hollywood musical modes established in the 1930s:in black and white, the Warneresque backstager Footlight Serenade, shot by Lee Garmes; and the...

Mar 3, 2023

In this week's Acteurist Oeuvre-view, we look at two very different Dorothy McGuire movies from 1946 that share a striking adultness: Claudia and David (directed by Walter Lang), a marital comedy that's surprisingly frank about infidelity, and Till the End of Time (directed by Edward Dmytryk), a "post-war readjustment"...

Feb 24, 2023

In this very special Warners 1942 episode we discuss two Dave faves, both starring (and romantically pairing) Ann Sheridan and Ronald Reagan, that push against the restrictions of the Production Code: Sam Wood's Peyton Place/Twin Peaks forerunner, Kings Row, and Curtis Bernhardt's noirish agrarian socialist drama,