Tag Archives: 1940s

The fiery performance, conducted by Giuseppe Morelli with the Rome Opera Chorus and Orchestra, knocks all recent digital efforts into a cocked hat. A few cinematic liberties seem permissible to me and this is surely one of the best films of an opera.
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People are afraid of the usurer Chazaj and are convinced that he is the bearer of evil. One day Chazaj pays a visit to the poor artist Simon Jordán and asks him to paint his portrait. Simon agrees but as he progresses with the work his mind conjures up terrible thoughts and in the end he commits suicide.
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Indian agent Fred CArson is secretly the leader of a band of outlaws, using his official position to loot the U.S. Government if Indian allotment money. Aided by Ceta, the tribal Medicine Man, Carson directs raiding and robbing activities, both against the Indians and the local ranchers.
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Milland is charming as Gilbert Sedley, an innocent professor – he’s apparently been isolated working in the Orient too long – who is baffled by his strong reactions to a young newspaper reporter, Kate Farrell (Teresa Wright). Why does he think of Niagara Falls whenever he’s around her?
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Clara Wieck meets the talented Robert Schumann in her father’s Leipzig music school. And entirely against her father’s wishes, who thinks only of her future artistic career, she falls in love with Robert. The final break comes after a successful tour as a pianist at the side of Franz Liszt.
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Shiftless Jeeter Lester and his family of hillbilly stereotypes live in a rural backwater where their ancestors were once wealthy planters. Their slapstick existence is threatened by a bank’s plans to take over the land for more profitable farming; subplots involve the affairs and marriages of son Dude and daughter Ellie May.
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Lady, Let’s Dance was a 1944 black and white film directed by Frank Woodruff that was nominated for two Oscars. Produced by Monogram Studios, the film is unique as an ice skating musical. Lady, Let’s Dance starred ice skaters Belita, James Ellison, Werner Groebli and Hans Mauch (more commonly known as ‘Frick & Frack’) and Walter Catlett.
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Suspecting that a safari guide is a wanted killer, undercover policeman Geoffrey Bishop joins a safari led by the suspect for a scientist that hopes to find and prove that a fabled white gorilla is a missing link.
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A father and his son, a son and his father. Horikawa is a widower, a teacher, and a good father to Ryohei, who’s about 10. After a tragedy, Horikawa resigns from teaching and takes Ryohei from Tokyo to the town of Ueno, enrolling him in junior high; to the lad’s sorrow, he will be a boarder. Horikawa returns to work in Tokyo, their separation is complete. Jump ahead more than ten years: with dad’s help, Ryohei has finished college and has a teaching job in Akita. Horikawa considers living with his son, which Ryohei wants, but the elder’s notions of duty and hard work preclude it. Ryohei arranges a ten-day vacation with his father. Heartbreak comes quietly, nearly hidden by dignity.
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Promoter Frankie Christopher, being grilled by police in the murder of model Vicky Lynn, recalls in flashback: First meeting her as a waitress, Frankie decides to parlay her beauty into social acceptance and a lucrative career. He succeeds only too well: she’s on the eve of deserting him for Hollywood…when someone kills her. Now Frankie gets the feeling that Inspector Ed Cornell is determined to pin the killing on him and only him. He’s right. And the only one he can turn to for help is Jill, the victim’s sister, who’s been cool toward him…
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