Welcome to BlogHub: the Best in Veteran and Emerging Classic Movie Blogs
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You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
What I Learned About Peggy Dow
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 17, 2020
Peggy Dow Helmerich hasn’t been a Hollywood starlet for about 70 years. However, she still delights fans years later in her movies including Harvey, starring Jimmy Stewart in one of his incomparable performances. I recently took a look back at some of her other movies that saw her starring al read more
You Can’t Take It With You (1938): Quality Capra
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 16, 2020
This is my post in The 120 “Screwball” Years of Jean Arthur Blogathon put on by the Wonderful World of Cinema! Mr. Kirby (Edward Arnold), or A.P. as his deferential colleagues call him, is a business magnate with innumerable successful endeavors. He has the full pockets to go along with a career read more
Drums Along The Mohawk (1939): Ford, Fonda, and Colbert
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 15, 2020
Recently, it’s come to my attention there is really is a dearth of colonial America pictures between the likes of Disney’s Johnny Tremain and Mel Gibson’s The Patriot. The reasons seem somewhat obvious at least in the current day and age. Period pieces cost money and such material read more
Jesse James (1939): Tyrone Power & Henry Fonda
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 13, 2020
Reputed screenwriting scribe Nunnally Johnson starts off on clever footing by giving his mythic western hero an obvious antagonist. It was the railroad — that lawless iron horse — forcing Jesse James into the position of a criminal. Though he would evolve over time into the complicated read more
Classic Movie Beginner’s Guide: 60s Spy Spoofs
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 10, 2020
As part of our efforts to cater to up-and-coming classic movie fans, here’s our latest installment to our classic movie beginner’s guides. In appreciation of the James Bond franchise and the newest installment that will hopefully still be released early next year, we thought it would be read more
Dark Victory (1939): Bette Davis at Her Best
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 8, 2020
Dark Victory reminds one how eclectic the Warner Bros. stock company was in 1939 because, in a Bette Davis vehicle, the first visage to present itself is none other than a wry Humphrey Bogart. The movie is a veritable grab bag of assorted talent from Bogart to Ronald Reagan and even kindly, bushy-b read more
Goodbye Mr. Chips (1939): Championing Education
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 6, 2020
“Chips” of Brookfield School is a bit of a human institution. Now over 80 years of age and retired from his esteemed post at the school, he still is afforded a decent bit of celebrity. The years have not slowed down his wit nor the warmth behind his words. His full life h read more
Story of The Last Chrysanthemum (1939): A Traditional Japanese Epic
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Oct 1, 2020
Akira Kurosawa is obviously known for samurai pictures — the famed jidaigeki genre — and Yasjiro Ozu is most sedulous when it comes to the relational bonds between parents and children in Japanese society. However, in some sense, of the so-called “Big-Three,” it is Kenji Miz read more
In Name Only (1939): Carole & Cary
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 29, 2020
If you know very little about In Name Only and only see the two acting forces who lead the charge: Cary Grant and Carole Lombard, you would come to expect a comedy on almost any given occasion. Oddly enough, this movie is very much a melodrama, though our two stars have fine chemistry and meet in w read more
Of Mice and Men (1939) and Dreaming About Providence
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 24, 2020
Being the ignorant sot that I am, I needed to reacquaint myself with the allusion in Steinbeck’s title, plucked from Scottish poet Robbie Burns. The Scottsman wrote, to the effect that, the best-laid plans of mice and men oft go awry. This is not cynicism but merely an observation on the reali read more
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) and The Rejected Cornerstone
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 22, 2020
Note: This post was originally written a few days after the Notre Dame fire on April 15th, 2019. “All over France, in every city there stand cathedrals like this one, triumphant monuments of the past. They tower over the homes of our people like mighty guardians keeping alive the invincible f read more
Rachel and The Stranger (1948): Indentured Servitude
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 17, 2020
It becomes increasingly apparent Rachel and The Stranger is a peculiar little movie that would have no place in the modern landscape, and not simply because RKO Studios is no longer in existence. It feels like arguably its biggest star is off-screen more than he is on because he was probably in at read more
Man With The Gun (1955): Mitchum The Town Tamer
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 15, 2020
“I’ve seen some cures worse than the disease.” – The Doctor The opening images set the tone. It’s a sleepy afternoon in a ghost town. There’s a boy with his dog. The dog starts yipping at the boots of a rider cutting through town. In an instance, the merciless kil read more
River of No Return (1954): Mitchum and Monroe on a Raft
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 10, 2020
River of No Return is nearly worthwhile for its opening visuals alone. There stands the vestige of American manhood: Robert Mitchum — unmistakably himself — felling a tree. He pulls off his hat, wipes his brow, and we get a gorgeous lingering look at his backyard. God’s majesty as read more
Vera Cruz (1954): Gary Cooper and Burt Lancaster
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 8, 2020
Below the Mexican border, during Antebellum days, a diverse array of Americans find themselves in the middle of the fight against Maximillian of France. Vera Cruz is far from a history lesson, however. It need not be. Still, it plays as an important footnote in a different type of history altogether read more
Sierra (1950): A B-Movie in The Mountains
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 3, 2020
Burl Ives, knocking out the title ballad in his instantly recognizable tones, is the welcome mat laid out by the film. The setting is slightly novel. High in the hills and mountainous crags is the crib for our story. Sierra gives numerous hints at its modest budgeting. This is no grand, windswept ep read more
The Violent Men (1955) and Rockefellers on The Range
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Sep 1, 2020
The Violent Men is an age-old tale of cattle wars on the range. The local apothecary warns about Wilkerson a man from the long tradition of land eaters. There are only two choices: run or stand and fight. Before we ever see him, his cronies are messing around town. In the town’s main street t read more
Lonely Are The Brave (1962): The Last Cowboy
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Aug 27, 2020
Armed with black and white and rolling plains full of instantly recognizable western exteriors, Lonely Are The Brave goes for an intimate approach. The camera focuses on a man splayed out with his hat tipped over his eyes in slumber. This could have been out of many earlier pictures up until this m read more
Gunman’s Walk (1958): A Cain & Able Western
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Aug 25, 2020
“I think it’s high time for this state to remember its history!” – Van Heflin The whistling intro to Gunman’s Walk is one of the most insouciant beginnings to a western you might ever see. Regrettably, the opening lines of dialogue, penned by Frank S. Nugent, don’ read more
Last Train from Gun Hill (1959): Douglas Vs. Quinn
4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on Aug 20, 2020
The action begins with a chase of sorts, except with the men pursuing a buckboard, carrying a woman and a young boy, it’s more like a game of cat-and-mouse. As a Native American maiden and a pretty one at that, they look to have their way with her. A horrible incident follows, and it’s a read more