I’ll bet as soon as you read the title for this post and saw the dancing box of popcorn, the tune from this famous snack-bar ad began running through your head. Expect it to stay there for a few days! I have been singing “Let’s all go to the lobby . . .” for a week, ever since I ran across an article about the making of this famous bit of Americana. I discovered that the ad was produced by a Chicago company called Filmack Studios, and puffed up with hometown pride, I decided to investigate.

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A few months ago, I saw a charming Mexican film called My Dear Tom Mix (Mi Querido Tom Mix (1991), directed by Carlos Garcia Agraz). Set in a small Mexican village during the 1920s, the nostalgic fable tells the story of  Joaquina, a woman of mature years who has never married. Her time is filled with going to the movies, where she lets her imagination take her away. When her young nephew comes for a visit, she introduces him to the magic of the cinema. For Joaquina—and countless other movie fans—that magic is dependent on ignoring the distinction between the movie stars and the characters they play. When marauding bandits plague her small town, she writes to legendary western hero Tom Mix, the King of the Cowboys, imploring him to ride to the rescue on Tony the Wonder Horse to save her village.  And, in a way, he obliges—not so much the cowboy himself but the spirit of Tom Mix. It is this spirit of larger-than-life heroism, long associated with the western hero, that My Dear Tom Mix celebrates. While the spirit lives on in some Hollywood movies, it was virtually a mandate during the silent era, not only for onscreen heroes but also for offscreen movie stars.

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Even in his relative youth on film, Trevor Howard was an unlikely film star. He always looked older than he was. His was a plain, simple face, with a nose broken long ago, rather large ears, a rough cheek, a mouth tight with resolution, (or is it pain?), eyes that seem haunted by unforgettable sights and feelings, and a voice, when he wasn’t asked to waste time playing one of those “Thanks awfully, old chap” type of parts, capable of both a fairly devastating restrained romanticism and gruff, hard-earned cynicism. In other words, he may have been a perfect exemplar of how an average Brit saw himself at the end of WWII.

One of the pleasures of this year’s Summer Under the Stars is seeing some seriously rare films–such as the broadcast of Barbara Stanwyck‘s first feature last night, The Locked Door (1929), (and boy, did the lock on that early talkie creak when they opened it–though any curiosity I might ever have had about Rod La Rocque is now satisfied), and the upcoming airing of Frank Borzage‘s quietly powerful Man’s Castle (1933) with Spencer Tracy and Loretta Young on August 31st.

While many of the performers featured each day are quite familiar to us, the lineup of films for one outstanding individual this Friday, August 22nd, when TCM will devote 24 hours to an exploration of Trevor Howard‘s films, is most welcome, (please click here for a list of the movies on that day). READ MORE

Ethel Barrymore (1879-1959)

“That’s all there is, there isn’t any more…”
~Ethel Barrymore‘s curtain call line, designed to send insistently worshipful audiences on their way.

I recently joined a group of 34 other similarly committed individuals on a 19 month ‘quest’ (more on this in a future post). While getting to know one another we shared our backgrounds, interests and hobbies etc., and when I told one of them that I wrote for TCM’s blog he asked “what classic movies do you recommend to novices such as myself?”, which is a very good yet challenging question to answer, I thought. In fact, in answering his question, I mentioned that I’ve compiled a list of more than 400 essential classics on my website to which he responded “Whoa, can you narrow it down a bit?” In other words, he was looking for a top 10 list of classic films which he could readily find in a video store, at the library, or via a DVD mail service like Netflix.

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Since I’ve been on a bit of a vacation this week, I’ll apologize in advance for the delightful lack of verbosity in this blog. As many of my fellow woolgatherers do at this time of year, I’ve shirked my duty to remain an informed and permanently outraged citizen of this republic, or even an observant movie fan.

Instead, I’ve contemplated the resemblance of that cloud on the horizon to a winged horse, the number of butterflies in a quiet meadow, and the best way to cook an ear of fresh corn.

In between these bemused thoughts, it’s occurred to me that I’ve recently come across a number of stories that indicate quite a few near misses in the casting department in the studio era. Perhaps you might enjoy these “what might have beens” as well and can contribute other tales from golden era, (or at least the silver age) of film related to role selections. READ MORE

There she is. Elegant, strong, sexy and poetic all at the same time. The exquisite dancer without peer on film, one girl in the movies who never needed to say a word. She didn’t have to. Words were unnecessary. READ MORE

He belonged on a stamp. Ask a random bunch of Americans who represents them best, some
will say the still controversial John Wayne, others might name the somewhat unjustly forgotten
Gary Cooper, but James Stewart probably came closest to playing the classic American better than anyone. Stewart was born one hundred years ago on May 20, 1908. Only yesterday, literally and figuratively, yet a world away from this time and place.

Through the odd alchemy of
his nature, his subtle art and the long memory that film has given us, this man’s work and life has a resonance that still touches many of us. READ MORE

Fatal Attraction…  A couple months ago, this last March, I found myself having lunch at The
Pioneer Inn in Lahaina, Maui, during a family vacation in Hawaii. The
Pioneer Inn, built in 1901, boasts of being the oldest Inn on Maui and
is next to the oldest Banyan tree on Maui as well (first planted in
1873) – and both are right next to the sea. My family had wrapped
up a whale-watching gig on one of the many tourist boats that
accommodate these things (this having been the time for whales to
migrate through the area for their mating season), and we finished the
expedition by wobbling off the boat, fried from too much sun exposure,
with an edgy hunger that could have us eat a sea lion. READ MORE