Ann Rutherford
1939: Hollywood's Greatest Year is a once-over-lightly evocation of a slate of classic films unmatched before or since. In a year permitting 10 Best Picture nominees, the final cut included Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, Dark Victory, Goodbye, Mr. Chips, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Ninotchka, Of Mice and Men, Stagecoach, Wuthering Heights, Love Affair. Shut out: The Roaring '20s, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Intermezzo, Destry Rides Again, Idiot's Delight, Young Mr. Lincoln, Gunga Din. This hour-long film finds room to acknowledge a few of these non-starters, but its brevity means a lot gets left out. This includes the absence of anything that doesn't celebrate the studio system, including the practices of the shrewd tyrants who ran them, seen in brief archival footage.
This documentary revisits the making of Gone with the Wind via archival footage, screen tests, insightful interviews and rare film footage.
Out-takes (mostly from Warner Bros.), promotional shorts, movie premieres, public service pleas, wardrobe tests, documentary material, and archival footage make up this star-studded voyeuristic look at the Golden age of Hollywood during the 30s, 40, and 50.
A would-be filmmaker and actress shake up the industry with a trick dog who gets discovered by a studio bus driver in the 1920s.
An enigmatic young woman has been murdered in a small California coast town. The investigation by the local sheriff uncovers a complex web of relationships centering on the victim; the scattered trail of evidence ranges from a mysterious photograph to the victim's own dog. During the investigation, the sheriff meets and becomes romantically involved with a woman whose connection to the murder is ambiguous.
A pilot devises a plan to airlift hay to thousands of ranch cattle stranded and dying due to severe winter weather.
The adventures of the notorious Spanish Lothario Don Juan highlights Errol Flynn's swashbuckling and romantic antics.
Walter Mitty, a daydreaming writer with an overprotective mother, likes to imagine that he is a hero who experiences fantastic adventures. His dream becomes reality when he accidentally meets a mysterious woman who hands him a little black book. According to her, it contains the locations of the Dutch crown jewels hidden since World War II. Soon, Mitty finds himself in the middle of a confusing conspiracy, where he has difficulty differentiating between fact and fiction.
A pair of married ex-convicts trying to go straight get jobs at a department store. A gangster who knows about their past threatens to expose it unless they agree to help him rob the department store.
This drama is an updated version of Ulmer's 1944 film Bluebeard. It is set in New York and follows the exploits of an eccentric Parisian painter who has come to New York to escape a controversy surrounding his work. The trouble stems when the model he has used in all his work is found floating dead in the Seine.
An orchestra leader (William Marshall) turns sleuth to clear his ice-skating girlfriend (Vera Hruba Ralston) for murder.
After nearly running over him with her cab, Patty Mitchell picks up a fare who claims to have amnesia. As he fumbles to remember the basic facts of his identity, Patty becomes interested in the stranger and decides to help him in his search. But as the pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, and Patty's interest becomes more personal, the stranger finds that he is the prime suspect in a murder case.
A beautiful female doctor visits her small hometown on her way back to Chicago. Her overworked uncle, who is the town's doctor, wants her to stay and help him, and he and a macho test pilot who's fallen for her come up with a plan that involves the pilot faking an illness and being treated by her, with her uncle's "help".
A young husband becomes a game-show participant in the hopes of winning the cash to pay his pregnant wife's doctor.
A private eye and a niece investigate when six World War I veterans start dying in the same week.
Radio crime show host "The Fox" finds himself on the trail of a serial killer while a suspect himself.
A multi-studio effort to show the newsreel audience the progress of the Hollywood war effort.
An Iowa drugstore owner becomes embittered when his son is killed in World War II. The druggist believes that the boy's life was cut short before he had an opportunity to truly appreciate his existence.
While Judge Hardy handles a couple's divorce, Andy takes a shine to their shy daughter.
A young newlywed (Robert Sterling) finds working for his nasty father-in-law difficult.
Radio sleuth Wally 'The Fox' Benton travels to Georgia with his fiancé Carol to be married; and to help Carol's college chum, Ellamae Downs, solve a mystery involving a murdered man, old Fort Dixon, and buried treasure.
Andy is about to head off to college but he's got a few things to take care of before leaving. For starters, he must try and sell his junk car for $20 to pay for a bill and he must convince his father not to go with him to college. Worst of all is that Polly wants to make up but her best friend decides to give Andy a test.
Connie Ward is in seventh heaven when Gene Morrison's band rolls into town. She is swept off her feet by trumpeter Bill Abbot. After marrying him, she joins the bands tour and learns about life as an orchestra wife, weathering the catty attacks of the other band wives.
The operators of 'Silver Haven', a cultish group bilking gullible rich people out of money, is set to inherit a large sum after the deceased woman's heir also dies. Leader Joesph Jones decides to hurry the process along and kidnaps Wally Benton, his fiancé, and a friend, to further this goal. Wally, 'The Fox', is a radio sleuth who solves murders on the air. Jones wants him to devise a perfect murder, and isn't above killing others sloppily along the way to get his foolproof murder plot.
Up-and-coming Universal leading man Robert Stack made his western-movie debut in Badlands of Dakota. Set in the Dakotas during the days of the Great Gold Boom, the story finds brothers Jim and Bob Holliday (Stack and Broderick Crawford) dukeing it out over the affections of pretty Anne Grayson (Ann Rutherford). While all this is going on, Wild Bill Hickok (Richard Dix) does his best to neutralize the local criminal element-and to fend off the romantic overtures of boisterous Calamity Jane (Frances Farmer).
With his high school graduation behind him, Andy Hardy decides that as an adult, it's time to start living his life. Judge Hardy had hoped that his son would go to college and study law, but Andy isn't sure that's what he wants to do so he heads off to New York City to find a job. Too proud to accept any help from Betsy Booth, Andy finds that living on his own isn't so easy. With perseverance he eventually finds a job and even gets to date the pretty receptionist in his office. He also has to face several of life's lessons leading him to conclude that he may still have a bit of growing up to do.
All set to graduate from high school , Andy Hardy flunks his English exam -- in spite of the fact that Aunt Milly is his teacher, and that the Judge has gone to all the trouble of getting him his very own private secretary.
An elderly businessman (Frank Morgan) plans what he thinks is an innocent night on the town while his wife is away. Instead, he finds himself involved in a showgirl's murder.
Judge Hardy takes his family to New York City, where Andy quickly falls in love with a socialite. He finds the high society life too expensive, and eventually decides that he liked it better back home.
Wholesome comedy about newlyweds (and the bride's understanding--but sometimes interfering--parents) discovering married life isn't always bliss.
Comic mayhem results when a small town pet store owner, mistakenly believed killed during a sea voyage, turns up very much alive. Director William Thiele's 1940 film stars Frank Morgan, Billie Burke, Ann Rutherford, John Shelton, Harold Huber, Donald Meek, Nat Pendleton, Renie Riano, Frank Albertson, Reginald Owen, Ann Morriss and Richard Carle.
Andy wants to buy a new car so he goes into the judge's home office where his father is about to write a $200 check to charity. He asks his dad for the $200 and they go used car shopping.
This short promotes the premise that movies often create a demand for the fashions seen in them. It starts with a vignette in rural America. A mother and daughter go to town to buy a new dress. In the dress shop window is a designer dress worn by Joan Crawford in a recent movie. We then go to Hollywood and visit Adrian, MGM's chief of costume design, and see how multiple copies of a single clothing pattern are produced. The film ends with short segments of several MGM features.
This 1940 presentation features highlights of earlier (1928 onward) Oscar ceremonies including Shirley Temple and Walt Disney, plus acceptance speeches for films released in 1939 with recipients and presenters including Vivien Leigh, Judy Garland, Hattie McDaniel, Fay Bainter, Mickey Rooney, Thomas Mitchell, Sinclair Lewis, and more, with host Bob Hope.
Mr. and Mrs. Bennet have five unmarried daughters, and Mrs. Bennet is especially eager to find suitable husbands for them. When the rich single gentlemen Mr. Bingley and Mr. Darcy come to live nearby, the Bennets have high hopes. But pride, prejudice and misunderstandings all combine to complicate their relationships and to make happiness difficult.
Judge Hardy guides Andy through problems with girls, money and an essay contest.
A drunken college student invites a dance hostess to the big college dance and then forgets he asked her. When she shows up at school, he tries to get rid of her, but she won't leave. Instead she stays and shows up both him and his classmates snooty dates.
Young Andy develops a crush on his drama teacher. When his play is chosen as the school's annual production, Andy seizes the opportunity to spend as much time as possible with his pretty teacher. Meanwhile, Judge Hardy has his own problems when he gets conned into forming a phony aluminum corporation
Young Women go through Nursing School together, each with there own motivation for being there. They learn more than how to be a Nurse.
Right before the dancing Tobius' ought to film a new production, his wife tells Freddy Tobius that she's pregnant. So the producer desperately has to seek a replacement and starts a countrywide competition among all college girls. However the contest is bogus: young dancer Patty Marlow is sent to a little college in the Midwest. Only Pug, a college reporter, suspects something.
This MGM Passing Parade series short tells the story of Clara Barton, the founder of the Red Cross.
Sixth of the Judge Hardy series. Judge James K. Hardy is brought the fabulous news from attorney George Irving, that he could be the heir to 2 million dollars. In order to claim the inheritance, he and his family must leave for Detroit. The disinherited heir Philip 'Phil' Westcott, adopted son of the deceased relative, has to leave the fabulous mansion Detroit. But the playboy Phil ain't going down without a fight. He decides on a charm offensive. First with Polly Benedict and foremost Andrew 'Andy' Hardy, the son of Judge Hardy.
The spoiled daughter of a well-to-do plantation owner is forced to use every means at her disposal to claw her way out of poverty, following Maj. Gen. William Sherman's destructive "March to the Sea,” during the American Civil War.
Judge Hardy goes to his friend's Arizona ranch to help her in a legal dispute, and he takes his family with him.
Classic Charles Dickens holiday tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, the miser's miser who has a huge change of heart after spirits whisk him into the past, present, and future.
This is a story about family relationships, set in the time before and during the American Civil War. Ethan Wilkins is a poor and honest man who ministers to the human soul, while his son Jason yearns to be a doctor, helping people in the earthly realm. It is a rich story about striving for excellence, the tension of father-son rebellion, and the love of a mother that can never die.
Judge Hardy takes a business trip to Washington, DC, where Andy promptly falls for the French ambassador's daughter.
Aspiring actress Louise Muban attends the prestigious Paris School of Drama during the day and assembles gas meters at night.
Andy Hardy becomes entangled with three different girls all at the same time.
A poor singer in a bar masquerades a rich society woman thanks to a rich benefactor.
Deputies Gene Autry and Frog go up against modern cattle rustlers. These rustlers use technology such as, airplanes, radios and refrigerated trucks to steal the cows, butcher them in the field and ship them out before getting caught. This causes the town to bring in a modern NYC detective to catch the crooks, but will Autry and Frog be permanently out of a job?
Andy Hardy and his sister find romance during a family vacation in Catalina.
In this short, the janitor of a Paris museum's Egyptology department agrees to help a girl hide from the police.
In the fine tradition of And Sudden Death, Columbia's The Devil is Driving tabulates the dangers of drunken driving in an exciting, unabashedly melodramatic fashion. In his first true portrayal of a "little creep," Elisha Cook Jr. stars as Tony, the spoiled-rotten son of the wealthy and influential Mr. Stevens.
Federal Agents Tipton and Bridger have been sent to Wyoming where the vote on statehood is imminent. Plummer and his gang are out to make sure the vote fails. When Plummer's men kill Bridger, Tipton fights on. He sends fake telegrams that trap some of Plummer's men. Then he organizes the ranchers and on election day they descend on the town barricaded by Plummer's gang.
Though he fought for the North in the Civil War, John is asked by the Governor of Texas to get rid of some troublesome carpetbaggers. He enlists the help of Holden before learning that Holden too is plundering the local folk.
His horse Champion steals the show from Gene when what's at stake is a horse race and a bull fight.
In late 18th century Scotland, Annie Laurie and William Douglas love each other, but their clans are on opposite sides of the country's civil war. Their love is made immortal through the title song of this film.
Kate Flannagan and Belle Dugan operate a downtown coffee shop and, while dispensing their locally-famous doughnuts, engage in their favorite pastime, friendly quarreling between themselves. This changes when Belle suddenly becomes heir to a small fortune which allows her to crash high-society and make her daughter,Joan, a débutante. This creates a rift between the two former partners, with the result that the proud Kate refuses to accept her friend's good fortune nor allow her son, Jerry, who is in love with Joan, to do so.
Army Captain takes a leave of absence to find out what happened to his missing father.....
In a small town in Indiana in the 1890s, the domineering and ambitious Mrs. Biddle arranges a marriage between her spoiled daughter Thelma and the town's prize catch, harvester David Langston, who is wedded to the soil. David is friends with orphan Ruth Jameson and, although she is in love with him, he eventually gives in to the machinations of Mrs. Biddle and consents to marry Thelma. Meanwhile, technological advances come to town, including its first gasoline buggy, galvanic battery, and metal bathtub fitted with running water. When Mrs. Biddle tries to convince David to give up the farming life and join her husband in real estate, Mr. Biddle, hen-pecked and dissatisfied with city life, warns David against selling his farm.
Greek sponge divers in Tarpon Springs, Florida duel over diving methods and fight over the same girl, and only one will survive.
Tex rides to the rescue when badguys led by LaCrosse and Utah Joe kidnap Lettie.
Gene goes after the badguys after they kidnap the baby he should have been babysitting.
Corporal Larry Grant and Sergeant "Mac" McGowan, of the United States Marine Corps, are rival for the love of Frances Schiller, but team up to hunt down "The Tiger Shark," a mad, scientific wizard who is holding Sergeant William Schiller, Frances' brother, a prisoner on a wild, jungle island in the Pacific.
When a young man is befriended by a gambling ship operator and made a partner in the business, he becomes involved in a police manhunt after he covers up a murder committed by his new partner.
A philosophy professor accompanies his school's rowing team on a worldwide tour.
