Category Archives: The Story Behind the Film
STREAMING SATURDAY! THE HOLLY AND THE IVY Make for a Prickly Christmas
Welcome to another edition of Streaming Saturdays, where we bring you a free, fabulous movie to watch right here every week! How can you help but love a Christmas movie where a brother and sister duck out on the family festivities to get roaring drunk? They have their reasons. But then just about everyone has cause to knock back a few in The …
From Laurel & Hardy to James Dean and Beyond: A Love Letter to George Stevens
You know how with some people, you say “I love their work!” but really, let’s face it, you’re actually in love with them? That’s me with George Stevens. Today is his birthday, and yet it’s not even a national holiday. That’s just wrong. But we’re celebrating here at Sister Celluloid, sharing behind-the-scenes glimpses of the man at work. (And at …
Joel McCrea and Jean Arthur “Stoop” to Conquer in THE MORE THE MERRIER
In Sullivan’s Travels, Preston Sturges made a convincing case that comedy is often the best balm for tragedy. But for his friend and colleague George Stevens, the horrors of World War II left him with little capacity for comedy when he returned home from the front lines. From 1943 to 1946, Stevens covered the war in Europe for the Army …
TINTYPE TUESDAY: A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE Debuts on Broadway
Welcome to another edition of TINTYPE TUESDAY! Four years before it made its way into celluloid history, A Streetcar Named Desire opened on Broadway 68 years ago this week, on December 3, 1947. Three of the four principals—Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter and Karl Malden—followed the play to Hollywood, but Jessica Tandy lost the role of Blanche DuBois to …
The Topperesque Adventures of Roland Young
Roland Young almost became Cosmo Topper. Not in the movies—he did that in spades, all rubber limbs and befuddlement—but in real life. The manor-born, well-educated young man came thisclose to toiling out his days soberly and sensibly in some handsome, wood-paneled office. Young’s father Keith was the most prominent architect in London, and young Roland was being fast-tracked to …
TINTYPE TUESDAY: Bette Davis’s Unrequited Love Affair—With Dogs
Welcome to another edition of TINTYPE TUESDAY! In December 1930, Bette Davis stepped off the Twentieth Century Limited and swanned into Union Station all set to conquer Hollywood, with her mother by her side and her wire-haired terrier, Boojum, in her arms. A rep from Warner Bros. was supposed to meet the happy trio, but no …
Four Extraordinary Heroes, One Regiment: Basil Rathbone, Ronald Colman, Claude Rains and Herbert Marshall in World War I
Basil Rathbone conceived an almost certain suicide mission—and carried it off disguised as a tree. Herbert Marshall, who lost a leg to a sniper’s bullet, downplayed his sacrifice, saying his most salient memories of the trenches were numbness and boredom. Claude Rains lost almost half his sight to a poison gas attack. And Ronald Colman …
STREAMING SATURDAY! It’s Friday the Dog to the Rescue in EYES IN THE NIGHT
Welcome to another edition of Streaming Saturdays, where we embed a free, fabulous movie for you to watch right here every weekend! This week: Eyes in the Night! In 1942, a few years before he began turning out such classics as High Noon, From Here to Eternity and Oklahoma!, Fred Zinnemann directed a neat little thriller about …
Remembering James Dean 60 Years On—And Busting Some Myths Along the Way
Sixty years ago today, a wildly gifted young actor was killed. And a one-dimensional legend was born. The brooding rebel in the leather jacket. Which summed up about one half of one percent of who James Dean was either as an actor or a person. Those who knew him, loved him and worked with him …
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