Director: George Stevens Starring: Cary Grant, Irene Dunne
Genres: Drama, Romance
IMDB 7.0 / Amazon 4.2 / Tomatometer 93%
Oscars: Nominated for 1 Won 0
A couple’s big dreams give way to a life full of unexpected sadness and unexpected joy. IMDB 7.0 from over 3,221 users
A marriage is put to the test when an earthquake leads to a miscarriage, leaving the woman barren but this is only the beginning. When the couple is barely able to scrape by financially due to a new job, and their adopted daughter suddenly becomes fatally ill, their despair drives them to the brink of a breakdown. Amazon 4.2 stars from over 101 users
Irene Dunne) begins reflecting on her past. She recalls her near-impulsive marriage to newspaper reporter Roger Adams (Cary Grant), which begins on a deliriously happy note but turns out to be fraught with tragedy. While honeymooning in Japan, Julie and Roger are trapped in the 1923 earthquake, which results in her miscarriage and subsequent incapability to bear children. Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer 93% Audience 74%
Oscars won (1 of9): Best Writing/Screenplay (Orson Welles, Herman Mankiewicz) / nominated: Best Picture, Best Actor (Orson Welles), Best Director (Orson Welles), Art/Interior (Perry Ferguson, Van Nest Polglase, A Roland fields, Darrell Silvera), Cinematography (Gregg Toland), Film Editing (Robert Wise), Music (Bernard Herrmann), Sound (John Aalberg)
Ranked #1Greatest Movies Through 1960, in 37 of 41 best movies lists, a Zagat Top Movie
Following the death of a publishing tycoon, news reporters scramble to discover the meaning of his final utterance. IMDB rating: 8.5 from over 177,676 users
Arguably the greatest of American films, Orson Welles’s 1941 masterpiece, made when he was only 26, still unfurls like a dream and carries the viewer along the mysterious currents of time and memory to reach a mature (if ambiguous) conclusion: people are the sum of their contradictions, and can’t be known easily. Amazon 4.0 stars from over 806 users
At the height of the Hollywood studio system, when studio bosses controlled every aspect of filmmaking from production to exhibition, this film was made by a handful of brilliant artists who were given virtually the unprecedented creative freedom to do whatever they wanted. Incredibly, the film was spearheaded by an extraordinary triple-threat talent (Welles, who co-wrote, directed, and starred in addition to producing) who, at only 25 years old, had cut his teeth on radio and stage, but had never before made a film… Controversy surrounding the release of the film has become an enduring part of its legend. The character of Charles Foster Kane was widely recognized at least in part as a fictionalized version of newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, and Hearst furiously did his best to suppress the picture and have it destroyed. Read full Decent Films review (rated A+,Superior artistic-entertainment for Teens & Up)
NOTE: this is arguably the greatest movie ever made and it shows up in more lists of great movies than any other movie – usually in the top ten and often in the top three! What is interesting is that it was written and directed by Orson Welles who also starred in it! But most interesting is that it was his first feature movie – all at the old age of 25! It is said that this movie resembled a bit too much the life of William Randolph Hearst who tried to stop the film from being made and then from being shown in theaters. Apparently the movie was actually booed at the Academy Awards ceremony and the only award it won was for best screenplay.
Director: John Huston Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Gladys George
IMDB 8.3 / Amazon 4.6 / MRQE 93% / Movie Mom A+
Genre: Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
Oscars: nominated for 3, won 0
Ranked #30 Greatest Movies Through 1960, a Zagat Top Movie
A private detective takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals, a gorgeous liar, and their quest for a priceless statuette. IMDB 8.3 rating from over 67,453 users
Still the tightest, sharpest, and most cynical of Hollywood’s official deathless classics, bracingly tough even by post-Tarantino standards. Humphrey Bogart is Dashiell Hammett’s definitive private eye, Sam Spade, struggling to keep his hard-boiled cool as the double-crosses pile up around his ankles. Amazon 4.6 stars from over 252 users
One of the most interesting aspects of this classic movie is the way that Sam Spade thinks though the moral dilemmas. When he is deciding whether to tell the police about Brigid, he is very explicit about weighing every aspect of his choices. It is not an easy decision for him; he has no moral absolutes. BeliefNet Movie MomA+
Director: Preston Sturges Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, Charles Coburn
Genres: Comedy, Crime, Romance
IMDB 8.0 / Amazon 4.5 / Tomatometer 100%
Oscars: nominated for 1, won 0
Ranked #37 Greatest Movies Through 1960, a Zagat Top Movie
A trio of classy card sharks targets the socially awkward heir to brewery millions for his money, till one of them falls in love with him. IMDB 8.0 rating from over 9,463 users
In 1941, Barbara Stanwyck was offered two screwball roles equally suited to her tart intelligence, deft comic timing, and undeniable sex appeal, and it’s a photo finish as to which was funnier–showgirl-on-the-lam Sugarpuss O’Shea, the title character in Howard Hawks’s Ball of Fire, or con artist Jean Harrington a.k.a. Lady Eve Sidwich, the delirious fulcrum for this classic Preston Sturges comedy. Amazon 4.5 stars from over 76 users
(Preston Sturges) wrote and directed this classic romantic comedy starring Henry Fonda and Barbara Stanwyck, who are involved in a scintillating battle of the sexes, as Sturges points up the terrors of sexual passion and the unattainability of the romantic ideal. Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer 100% Audience 87%
Greatest Movies Through 1960 