Halloween Harvest for 2026

 

Compare Here and Below If You Can Stand It ...

'Tis Another Spook Season --- Part One

Here’s Where We Spot AI From a Mile Away --- To collect lobby cards, you often  make do. Pinholes, scuff marks, even paint dabs can be fixed. Fading cannot. Cards sat often in the sun, displayed outdoors to damaging rays. It didn’t take long for Old Sol to do his harm. I got this group scene from Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and tried to kid myself it was OK, self-deception collectors often engage, but no, it was bleached and no denying. Still I’ve kept it because a pristine specimen would cost upward of five hundred, Holmes and Rathbone always a lure, plus being early Fox offering. For fun’s sake, I turned AI loose on the image and got result shown here. Such modern, no ... miracle, treatment looks better than that $500 original would, sharper anyway, except no one’s going to pay $500 for such chromo. We want the real thing, faded even, if that’s all there is.

To Think Folks Took Such a Gallery for Granted Back Then ...

Bridal Bouquets --- For every screen fiend there’d be an eventual Bride(s), gateway to sex and procreating a Son of said fiend. Healthy progress in its way, whatever the unholy results. Barbara Payton as Bride of the Gorilla suggested possibilities undreamt of to then, she being Barbara Payton, and what was a gorilla for her other than slight step down from Tom Neal? We’d all give much to have been at the Capitol when Lon Chaney made his live-on-stage appearance. What did he do or talk about? Was it enough to merely stand there and let us stare at him? Would have been plenty for me, for this was, after all, the Wolf Man, Mummy, Count Alucard, classics still rotating heavy in the early fifties when Bride of the Gorilla made its rounds. Producer Jack Broder was the man who kept such favorites in circulation thanks to his “Realart” deal with Universal which dated back to the late forties. I’d like knowing what Chaney was paid for showing up at the Capitol. Somebody please tell us too where this Capitol was located. Small town or large? I’ll bet small, but probably within driving distance of Chaney home and hearth.

And Multiple Brides for Dracula --- He came, saw, seduced many a lass by 1960 when Hammer, if not distributing Universal, realized that sex was an only way to profitably sell a Dracula movie, the vampire king becoming long-in-the-teeth otherwise (Francis Lederer for UA’s “Return” … who cared?). Hammer had David Peel, older than he looked, but a champ conqueror of manifold maids, several to make up guest lists at Hammer reunions into a next century. This Memphis Screamiere at the Malco was historic. Management had wanted to preem The Mummy a previous year, but Universal said no, be patient, your time will come, which it did in 1960 for blockbuster Brides event. There is experiencing Brides of Dracula at home, a sharpest Blu-Ray, seeing it even at a theatre back in the day, but nothing would approach this one-of-a-kind extravaganza, evoked if not replicated by Greenbriar on 4/14/2007 and between covers of Showmen, Sell It Hot. Of all places on heaven or earth to have been at a particular juncture of time, this would stand tall.

Use What You Got to Look Like a Lot --- In the exhibition trade, you work with resources you have. For Halloween or horror theme, or sci-fi … well after all it’s the same pudding whipped different perhaps, but still standard recipe. Here was a manager with a 1956 show he probably didn’t know from any other shocker in and off the screen within a day or slightly more. Did local management figure Invasion of the Body Snatchers for an update on the 1945 Body Snatcher? That had done OK, and Boris Karloff was in it, so why not use an on-hand Frankenstein mask and horror gloves to march across lobby and street environs? This showman never knew from “seminal,” as we know Invasion of the Body Snatchers to be, but outlook then was very different. Any show of this sort went poof and was gone, the then-audience caring little more than men who booked and ran the film. Our Liberty used Invasion of the Body Snatchers for two days during mid-week, this a local equivalent to roadshowing for weirdies. I don’t believe Colonel Forehand kept a Frankenstein mask on hand. At least we never saw ushers wear one.

Low on Stars, But Here They Are --- Maybe not apropos to Halloween and horror, but being Star Wars is fantasy, and features a horror-associated player, here we go. How to bill a cast where most of that cast are unknown? This was summer 1977 remember, and no one knew from youths that “starred” in Star Wars. Peter Cushing and Alec Guinness, however, were stars, and where names are needed for the marquee, theirs would do. I like how Cushing went first. He’d been a jobbing British player for long after Guinness took pole position among UK luminaries, which ask yourself how many true such came out of Britain, at least until Sean Connery, and I’m talking worldwide mega-sort names. Cushing and Guinness were said to have received a percentage of Star Wars, enjoyed wealthy third acts as result. I wished while watching Star Wars that Cushing would be the principal villain and be active throughout the show, which wish came largely to naught. Also read where Mark Hamill showed up on days he didn’t work to grill Cushing about his previous work for Hammer and with Laurel and Hardy in A Chump at Oxford. Alec Guinness had a remarkable likeness to Stan Laurel and used it for early stage work. He also wrote Laurel “a gushing fan letter” in 1961 but never met the comedy great. Why not? ... for Stan was in the phone book. Perhaps Guinness being naturally shy had something to do with it.

This Jungle Was Greener Than Green --- Again more fantasy than straight-up horror, but when did Technicolor look so utterly fantastic as this, even on TCM where much comes across visually compromised to some degree or other. The Jungle Book was produced by Korda, filmed in Hollywood (1942). England shoot was hazardous due to war, especially hothouse handling here, color amidst wild, with animals wilder. Distinction of The Jungle Book is Sabu talking to, and with, wildlife. They understand and respond to him. Tarzan had same tricks but this played as something uncanny, and we buy it, or at least I did. Disney made The Jungle Book two decades later as a cartoon. Korda’s treatment was a lot more serious. It really should be available on a deluxe Blu-Ray with extras. United Artists distributed, but it looks like Janus/Criterion owns The Jungle Book now. Do they think it too obscure? You’ll not have a Technicolor experience like this anyplace else. Mark Vieira restored the color images above. One I believe was originally the cover for a soundtrack album, among earliest sold.

UPDATE (10/19/2026, 8:40 am): Ever-welcome Scott MacGillivray finds another Lon Chaney appearance on behalf of Bride of the Gorilla, "in Detroit, at the Capitol Theatre (a 24-hour grind house) and the Gratiot Drive-In, on October 10 and 11, 1951." Thanks as Always, Scott.

Count Your Blessings #7

 

Patriarch of All He Surveys Burt Lancaster was at a Disadvantage in Whatever Version of The Leopard Unspooled

CYB: The Leopard (1963)

THE LEOPARD (1963) --- Made the mistake of watching the 2003 standard DVD release in mistaken belief there was no Blu-Ray, learning subsequent that Criterion upgraded to Blu later on. The Leopard is like so many European features hobbled by necessity of an English language version to properly sell stateside. That meant dubbing of everybody aboard, even star Burt Lancaster, who though he spoke English during the Italian shoot, had to do-over his voice for Twentieth-Fox distribution, that version supervised by the actor along with American director Sydney Pollack. Result was a mess that couldn’t help being a mess, the original Technirama debased to standard scope projection with inferior Color by Deluxe Fox was using in the sixties as opposed to rich Technicolor Euro audiences got. Length was also reduced by 24 minutes, 185 minutes down to 161 for domestic dates (the Rome premiere actually ran 205 minutes). I looked at the 185 edition, then portions of the Fox job, mainly to hear Lancaster, understand now why The Leopard failed, at least in the US. There seemed no way this or any Euro effort, let alone such an epic as here, would survive the crossing. Everybody spoke in voices not their own, here and there, each using native language during shooting and having to leave final outcome to post-production techs. Such was reality of multi-lingual filming and distribution worldwide. Yes, Lancaster spoke English when he acted his role in Italy, but all that had to be post-post-dubbed by him once back in America, and imagine how difficult that was with director and Italian crew moorings lost. Lancaster had to essentially work alone and try to remember nuances of a performance he had given months before. Poor guy ended up badly dubbed by both others and himself. Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale were major names with no little appeal to worldwide audiences, but neither were heard in America, substitute speakers the rule with actors suffering for the switch. Delon especially loses what conviction he’d have otherwise brought to the US version, having to rely, like Cardinale, and Lancaster, on whatever impact his physical presence could have. This was enough to some extent, for these players had visual appeal during shared peak period, but to rely upon that would not support The Leopard enough in most markets it played.

Want to Hear These Actors Speak? Go Find France's Edition of The Leopard

Lancaster could not speak Italian, Cardinale could not speak sufficient English to dub her part for US release, Delon in the same position. He and Cardinale were only heard in their real voices for the French language version, which is available on a Region Two Blu-Ray. That may be the closest to an authentic rendition of the film in circulation, but wait, Burt Lancaster did not speak French, so there goes that. Fact is most Europeans never got to hear the actual voice of Lancaster and many other major American stars, as they of necessity were dubbed for whatever of their films circulated offshore. As with silent features and many a talkie from Europe, I frankly find it more satisfying to “learn” the narrative from a couple of viewings, then turn off the subtitles and watch the shows sans reading from there on. Certainly it helps from a visual standpoint, and we can sense most of drama and conflict from character expressions, the tone and tenor of their voices, or whoever's voice has been grafted onto the action. In that sense, European films are essentially silent, enjoyed best where we approach them that way. 60's critics argued endlessly on dubbing vs. subtitles, neither camp emerging the clear winner. A general public spoke loudest perhaps ... they'd take neither. Euro receipts from The Leopard gratified, but reviews and boxoffice in the United States crashed, $673K collected in domestic rentals against $2.466 million spent on the negative (Italian producers bankrupted by the venture). Final loss recorded by Fox was $1.422 million. Darryl Zanuck had seen and evaluated footage as production went on, him back in charge as crisis of Cleopatra deepened. The Leopard was anything but Zanuck’s sort of movie, him baked from beginnings in narrative-centered oven where languor or distractions of any sort were shaved before he’d permit release, but Zanuck knew also that his way of work was largely finished, especially where confronted by European methods and philosophy. He was in this regard not unlike Burt Lancaster’s character in The Leopard.

Inapt Comparison to The Longest Day and Cleopatra Was Far From Ideal Way to Sell The Leopard in the US

Critics in the US would not support The Leopard, which based on what they had to look at was understandable. Lancaster and Pollack did the best they could with what they had, a near-hopeless commission. The Leopard suffered on all screens for a story and background (obscure Italian history) that viewers needed thick encyclopedias to follow. I never understood what conflicts were really about and had to rely on colors of opposing uniforms as to who shot who, but never did I fully grasp why. The one mass battle scene seems a disorganized mess, now-sharpness of a restored image revealing soldiers running aimlessly forward or backward without really engaging one another. Zanuck surely winced when he screened these dailies. Director Luchino Visconti was celebrated enough to go forward with much resource, but till then smaller films may not have prepared him to now stage outsized action. In fact, he had not wanted the fight footage but was obliged by producers wanting size to sell. Euro makers dreamed constantly of American markets they’d crack. It had been done, by Italians in fact with La Dolce Vita, but insistence on an American star was not enough to overcome so many obstacles to The Leopard’s success in English-speaking markets. For all attempts at action, this came off insistently like an art film, which meant mainstream housing would bypass it, Burt Lancaster or not in the lead. He hosted an effusive trailer but showmen smelled a rat. Maybe they remembered how he stiffed them before with art-inclined projects. Television was as cruel. ABC used The Leopard first on November 5, 1967, again May 12, 1968. Ratings bottomed out both times. This film like so many others was utterly wrecked by square-framed tubes, or maybe viewers were used to seeing mere 60%, if that, of intended images. I’ll confess to that being the case for me. Fox recovered $491K from televised exposure of The Leopard.

A Ballroom Tour-De-Force to Influence Many Films That Would Come Later

Even If You Lose the Story's Thread, There Still is Wonderment Just to Look At

What did we know of proper ratio at the time? There was a book I eagerly bought during run-up to new network offerings called “TV 68,” cost $1.25. A most critical section, which I more-less memorized, was “Movies on TV Are Better Than Ever,” NY Times critic Howard Thompson brief reviewing near-all features networks had scheduled for the new season. One was The Leopard, which Thompson started out praising, “strikingly artistic, moodful, and atmospheric tableau,” then out came the stiletto, “also slow and extremely remote.” Result was me skipping ABC's run. It was a school night anyway and I would not have been permitted to stay up (same thing happened, and more traumatically, with Shane). Considering Leopard length, it would have been midnight before embrace of Morbius, although I can imagine how much ABC chopped this offering to keep it out of AM hours. The Leopard would wait long to flower. Per often, Criterion got the job done. Their Blu-Ray is the best The Leopard ever looked, the US cut there as an extra but not restored. The Italian “legitimate” version now seems the only one serious cinephiles care to watch. I don’t say “Count Your Blessings” lightly here. The Leopard as rendered by Criterion is a rescue for what many consider a masterpiece, a till-then oblivion admirers thought The Leopard would never emerge from. Still a commitment to get through, but highlights are more than memorable, a final forty minutes centered on a lavish ball one of the outstanding highlights of sixties, or anytime, filmmaking. We see clear where inspiration for parts of The Godfather, The Deerhunter, Heaven’s Gate, and The Age of Innocence came from. They all learned from Visconti, though I’d not say any surpassed him.

Trade Talk #7

 

What Trades Told: Paramounts on Parade, Frank Wants Back In, and Adults Only Please

Re Broadway's legendary Paramount Theatre (interior above), how’s addressing sheer vast of the place, a closest millions came to entering a king’s palace, let alone as welcome guests, not sweeping ash but treated like royals manor born. I personally never stood in a so-called “movie palace,” crumbled remnants of a few, yes, a more sad than satisfying experience. Ever visit such ruins? They're like Pompeii after the eruption. In fact, preservationists are doing a better job keeping Pompeii intact these days. Once there was a collector’s show (1976) at a rundown Greensboro venue, promoter-in-part Don Key who used to publish the fabled Big Reel where we enthusiasts could buy 16mm. The onetime Paramount anchor now saw reels and old posters change hands in spacious common areas once pristine and filled with excited patronage. There was smell of decay about it, but what did we care so long as there was film plus paper to barter back and forth? Broadway’s Paramount Theatre was ultimate showcase for freshest product its corporate owner had to offer, the site a model to which others could aspire, but never equal. People who never knew luxury in their lives could come here and experience it. An admission bought far more than a feature plus live entertainment, however spectacular these were.

Walking upon plushest carpet, using facilities unknown at barely plumbed homes, what survives of such grandeur stilled images as published by trades, plus Paramount fronts and marquees photographed for whatever posterity they’d know. Then too were ads that once enticed, prices notably lowered following the war when receipts began falling as folks found other ways to dispose of dollars. Trades tried to assure a nervous industry that renewed prosperity was just around a late forties corner, but wiser heads knew better. How do you maximize profits while forced to lower admissions just to fill a fraction of your seats? Simple truth was movies not so entrancing as before. Neither were the live acts now that swing had passed its prime. Trouble was studio output much more costly to complete, then compete, for leisure dollars. You’d not dream it all could disappear, but consent decrees cruelly scattered the lot of Broadway palaces plus others of similar size at key sites throughout the country. Little is left of these monuments now, only ads, stills, to convince us they existed, a fact the harder to conceive with ever fewer of eyewitnesses to confirm that life was indeed once like this.

I'm Told the Paramount Even at Peak of Frank's Popularity Put Plants in the Audience to Shriek and Swoon for Him

Meet Danny and Meet Frank Again --- Trades didn’t tell it at the time but run-down-at-heels Frank Sinatra fairly begged old stand the Paramount Theatre to let him back in to live perform with Meet Danny Wilson, a Universal comparative cheapie that hoped to revive both Frank and musicals not necessarily the strength of this studio. The Paramount was by now a free agency for exhibition of films they’d choose rather than have them chosen by previous owner Paramount Pictures, entity formerly in control of this Broadway house plus 1,200 or so more across the country. That was then and this was now, choke collars off theatres and if you wanted a favor, like Frank obviously did, you took your hat in hand and called on Mr. Manager. Sinatra's relationship with the Paramount was good for multiple appearances at this acknowledged sweet spot of all presentation houses he graced over years since starting. It all came inevitably to accumulated good will, this true all over but especially so in exhibition. Tricks of the Trade were better called Trust of the Trade.

Swim In a Heated Morgan’s Creek --- Trade folk followed each other like hounds after meat. Word would get out of a selling device that worked and sniffers from however far would ape the scheme and be off to respective banks with reward. Far from resenting the purloin, showmen were flattered when brothers of the business took their example and ran farther with it, like for instance Miracle of Morgan’s Creek, a 1945 hot potato to declare censors defeated and come on in to wide open comedy forbidden till now. Who were they kidding really, though proof was in pudding whipped by Preston Sturges, who wrote-directed Morgan’s and made Miracle of beating prudes at their suffocating game. Did the Chicago Theatre here go too far? What if would-be patronage took the “Adults Only” tag serious? Storks a-flyin’ bespeak babies born, that of course what Morgan Creek’s Miracle was all about. Word spread fast that Betty Hutton’s character gets knocked up, but by which of many servicemen she kisses goodbye? It all seemed too good to be true for sauce seekers so far frustrated by Hollywood pulling in horns. Had a new day dawned for moviegoers?

Scope Samples #5

 

Montgomery Clift Beset by Hollywood Hillbillies He's Come to Straighten Out

Wide Worlds: Wild River and Patton

Mere Five Year Age Difference Separated Clift and Co-Star Jo Van Fleet

WILD RIVER (1960) --- Montgomery Clift ideally cast here. He’d have been less so prior to the road accident that changed his face, manner, and suitability for parts he had prior to the catastrophe. Before-after represents two distinct actors, and I never thought the after was ruin or decline for Clift. His skills still were there, if abated a matter of opinion, and certainly he suffered from what had happened, but boon for us is him not giving up or leaving the screen as many (most?) would have after what he’d been through. Monty chose to work, perhaps more so than when enjoying a peak of fame during which he turned down a lot of promising projects. Wild River was a starring part in color and Cinemascope, a Fox release done largely on location. Clift is a government hire sent Tennessee way to get people off an island to be flooded by the Valley Authority so surroundings can be made safe from flooding. His is not a romantic role, the romance in fact thrust upon him by Lee Remick as shack dweller girl ill-suited to say the least for “Chuck Glover’s” sort of sensibility. Frankly sad ending for me is the poor guy hog-tied by Lee and flying off with her and brats toward for-life trap, this after Chuck made such a good argument against tying himself down with domestic obligations. Chuck needed Sigma strength here, Remick as “Carol Garth” molding him like softest clay. We see Chuck tossed in the river by bumpkins familiar from westerns and comedies (Jay C. Flippen, James Westerfield, who’d been a slapstick cop for Disney). These aren’t Deliverance hillbillies who’d scare us later, nor inbreds that shot Dennis Hopper off his motorcycle. Such then is familiar if comforting aspect of Wild River. Would director Elia Kazan have been better served hiring locals? It seems so in hindsight and by comparison with those later explorations of scary Southland.

Too Late for Monty to Learn Sigma Lessons, Him Hog-Tied by Remick and Brat Brood

Southern Showman Trying Darndest to Make Wild River Appealing to Yokals

Some of us know real south when we see it, director Elia Kazan at least getting accents mostly right if not attitudes. We know Monty’s in trouble when he speaks tactless to these natives, getting past that learning curve a hardest challenge he’ll face. I found myself saying, No Monty, you don’t talk to Southern folks that way, and sure enough, here comes another beating or dunk in muddy water. Clift took lots of physical punishment in films done after the wreck. It seemed at times like a sort of penance. Kazan observes hicks like natural wonders sprung from mud, some of his compositions resembling Depression-era photography more social statement than simple capture of people and scenes. Much evokes A Face in the Crowd, Kazan the microscope hovered over us bugs down in Dixie. Unlike Face, Wild River is too serious to laugh off, part reason perhaps why it failed ($2.5 million spent on the negative … $2.1 million back in worldwide rentals … $1.8 lost). Rube cinemas sold hard if misleadingly, such as here with home-typed reference to “Fightin, Lovin’ Garths,” them the object of Monty’s mission. It’s OK funnin’ the South except where lasers burn too deep. Jo Van Fleet is the object of strife, her a last holdout to modern progress. The South heard a lot of that during the fifties and sixties, almost like Feds were going to reboot reconstruction (in fact, they did). I bet anybody snookered into drive-ins by that Fightin’ Garths pitch drove out quick once put wise. I can’t confirm what happened locally, assume our Allen Theatre got Wild River per product split with the Liberty (Allen's lock on Fox product). Wild River went to TV syndication in 1965 after NBC had a March 1964 primetime run, full-framed exposure no good to the film’s reputation. Wild River is one that needs every inch of Scope to register effectively. It plays well on Blu-Ray as part of a Kazan box, plus it’s available separate from Fox, plus Eureka Region Two ... also streams here and there.

For Lots of Watchers' Money, That Man Patton Did Everything Right

PATTON (1970) --- Ann says she stood on line round the corner from the Liberty to see Patton. At age nine. I was not there. Why was I not there? Another misstep, like with On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. George Scott turned down Best Actor, but not for flower childish reason. He felt actors should not be put in a position of competing with one another. Few could argue that. The AA’s were always phony baloney, as is freshly proved each year. I understand they’re going to You Tube, too bad because You Tube is too good for them. Patton is on Blu-Ray but I hear rumblings it needs an upgrade. Last night’s show looked OK, but yes, one can imagine 4K helping here. Patton/Scott says in his opening speech that “we never lost a war,” this as Nam wall was falling down, and too there was Korea after Patton’s time. Dig how this soldier studied past soldiers, thought he was reincarnated from a line of them going back centuries. George Patton was a little mad, maybe a lot mad. Still, we love him, or did we? Anti-warriors surely steamed at the sympathetic portrayal. Many wrote Patton delivered “both ways” by accommodating pro and anti-attitudes. I’d call it 95% pro, or is that just my attitude? Patton had a big mouth, no governors, and notoriously slapped a soldier for cracking up in the face of battle. Fact is he slapped two different soldiers for the same perceived offense, both living long enough to see the movie in 1970. Him who played one of them showed up at 90’s autograph shows, Tim Considine. He’d sign stills of the moment when Scott strikes him. Was this better than being Spin, or was it Marty? Patton had 70mm engagements and was one of only four 1970 releases shot that way. Charlotte hosted it in July but not on reserved seat basis. Their Carolina Theatre got a 70mm print, as they had when I saw The Sound of Music there in 1965. They did a second run, April 1971, also 70mm, so Patton must have been popular. Revivals in the format have been plentiful.

Like With That's Entertainment! in 1974, Boy Did We Need Patton in 1970

Patton is admired the more for having used “practical” effects, CGI now a sort of dirty word (or letters) for special fx. Jeeps flip over with guys underneath. Explosions send men flying. Patton’s driver is played by Bill Hickman of Bullitt fame, so you know he was loaded for bear. Did success of The Longest Day enable Patton? Other actors were offered the part before Scott took it. Robert Mitchum admitted he could not have done half so good a job. John Wayne would have been too familiar as John Wayne for him to work. They get at irony of the way Patton died (road accident) by giving him a near miss with an oxcart, a moment played for humor, but we get the forebode. Patton made so many wild moves in his time that they simply could not show them all. I wondered if he would cross the Rhine ahead of everybody else in violation of orders, but no, we only had three hours to tell this story, all of which went by fleet for me. This really was Everybody’s War Movie. I bet even hippies and draft dodgers would admit they like it. Problem for Scott: What to do for an encore? There was reprise of Patton for a TV-movie, but I haven’t the heart to watch. Sort of like when Lee Marvin did Major Reisman for the tube (1985, him too old, the concept too tired). Bummer, and certainly beneath him. Scott would do uneven things, one where he drove for criminals that started with John Huston as director, but he and Scott fell out (The Last Run). Scott had a hot temper and drank. Being the world’s greatest actor would have been a heavy weight to haul. Scott gave his wives work and had a son who inherited some of his talent. It was neat seeing him head-to-head with Brando in The Formula, not a fair contest for Brando being a little nutsy by then. I think Brando gave his peculiar perf in part because he knew Scott was the better actor, and was afraid to take him on honest.

Writers Had a Way with Westerns ...

 

Panning for Frontier Gold: Gun Fury, 3:10 to Yuma, The Deadline, and The Lonely Man

Often (always?) matters less who directed a western that who wrote it. That applied even to what Ford, Hawks, most famed and associated with the genre, did. I see particular names in credits and know there will be much ahead to like. All movies compel for good story and dialogue, westerns the more so. Or maybe I like them enough to sift continually for sleepers. For sure there are diamonds amidst much that is ruffage.

Depth That Didn’t Need 3D --- Gun Fury (1953) was a writer’s western laden with a short-lived gimmick not really needed. It was based on a novel by a woman named Kathleen Granger, who because she was a woman and felt aced out of western literature, created a triple credit for her novel, Ten Against Caesar, two men (her creation) whose names would grease acceptance for her work. Caesar was bought by Columbia and they put Irving Wallace and Roy Huggins on the job of adapting it. Wallace was prolific and got more so later in the fifties and into the sixties when he wrote bestsellers The Chapman Report and The Prize, both manna for movies. Huggins would dream up sure-fire concepts for television like other people tied shoes, creative brilliance for him strictly routine (credits: 77 Sunset Strip, Cheyenne, Maverick, The Fugitive, The Rockford Files, more … much more). Where names like these dressed credits, there was no doubt the western would go off worn paths and tender something fresh if not unique. Gun Fury and similars would not reinvent wheels or attempt same. They took tropes and tweaked them to effect they’d seem like reinvention. First step was often heavies with texture, as here Philip Carey as a self-described “unreconstructed” Southerner after the Civil War. All any director needed was words and situations to service settings and background, or as here overlay of 3D where well enough applied, details well attended by Raoul Walsh, who upon reading the Wallace-Huggins script had to know he’d finish in the money, this director recognizing distinction when he saw it. Good enough writing almost can’t be botched. Twilight Time released a very nice 3D Blu-Ray, out of print and expensive now.

Solid Opportunity to Root for the "Bad Guy" Here

Two Against the Clock --- High Noon had been an influence, sometimes to good effect, more often lazily applied. As for 3:10 to Yuma (1957) it was a benefit, in ways perhaps improving on the model. Desperate for cash Van Heflin takes the job of putting stage robber Glenn Ford aboard the train for Yuma prison. Complications with Ford’s gang ensues. That’s pretty much all, but critics and a thinking public saw more and called 3:10 something special among westerns offered in its year. Delmer Daves directed and more importantly salved the script. Less maybe of that was needed for story having origin with Elmore Leonard, who always brought fresh meat to western cookouts. Credited scribe also was Halsted Welles who wrote TV scripts by seeming thousands from fifties onward. Director Daves was assurance always of good output, especially westerns, his direction sure enough, but it was story and dialogue skills applied to each project that dug crucial inroads. Heflin and Ford do two-man verbal and sometimes physical combat throughout 3:10 to Yuma. Neither part goes cliched route, that to be expected given credits here, shadings to character plus great actors a guarantor to fine finished product. I like heavies with charm which Ford exerts throughout. You’d almost think he was a good guy getting a bad rap but for fact he shoots two men in cold blood during the opener strongbox steal. Ford had his choice of which part and this time he chose the bad man, a wise pick. Heflin has wife trouble that is neatly understated. How is it westerns benefit so splendidly from fine and subtle writing? At least they do for me. 3:10 to Yuma is on a Criterion Blu-Ray where words and image sound and look fine.

Nobody Wants Buck for Having Been a Convict. Who Says "B" Westerns Were Simple-Minded?

Buck Obliged to Pull in His Horns --- They’re letting Buck Jones out of prison on strict parole in The Deadline, modern dress letting us know this is here-and-now (1931) rather than wilder west days. That means Buck must behave or he’ll land right back, says warden John Elliot, who’s not kidding and Buck knows it. Thing is Buck is innocent of manslaughter he served for and suspects certain party who framed him, but what can he do? Local folk shun Buck for being an ex-con and he has to back down to bullies who know one wrong move will return him to the pen. Heartland America was still raw enough in 1931 for us to believe gunplay and fights in the street could and did happen. Look at bank robbers on the loose back then, and it seemed none got caught. Buck rides about like it’s 1879 and we believe him. Lambert Hillyer wrote and directed The Deadline. Fans who know westerns certainly know Hillyer. He began with Bill Hart and pegged the word prolific. Hillyer did over a hundred westerns and wrote the bulk of them in addition to directing. He slept outdoor yarning and made everything he did look and sound authentic. Hillyer, like Lesley Selander, William Witney, brotherhood of western specialists, all assuring fast and convincing action. Add Hillyer to Buck Jones and you got a good hour for sure. Old age didn’t slow him, as he finished up writing Highway Patrol episodes. Fun fact: Lambert also directed Dracula’s Daughter and The Invisible Ray, both excellent horrors. Mill Creek has The Deadline in a nine-feature Buck box.

Of Course I'm Crying ... We're Doing a Psychological Western Here.

Frontier Family Troubles --- 50’s westerns had to be “adult.” Don’t know who set that rule or when, but it was concrete by the time High Noon and Shane rode in to reconquer the frontier. About a same time saw series “oaters” ushered out, not gently but by toe of showworld boots, so-called “B” cowboys consigned to TV or oblivion. That’s thumbnail explain of what happened with westerns but detail of truths is more complicated, to which explaining I’d suggest Brian Garfield, Jon Tuska, Packy Smith among august panel of experts I always defer to (all past, and sadly, passed). Rest of us are like dilettante art observers who at least know what we like. To be an adult western meant you’d pour more drama and characterization. The Lonely Man trades on 50’s trend, the sullen, hateful boy who won’t forgive Dad for long ago leaving Mom. James Dean contaminated a lot of young players, including Anthony Perkins. I kept wanting Jack Palance to tan his hide for insolence, especially since Palance is set up from start as a big-time robber that deals harsh with weaklings. Does parental guilt run so deep as apparently it did in those days? Writer Harry Essex came from newspapers and short stories. I guess all the best talent began this way, certainly back then they did. Essex wrote good science-fiction in the fifties and even better film noir before that. He and writing partner Robert Smith give The Lonely Man what texture it has and no one was going to misread this as for-kids cowboys. There’s dragging through parts of 88 minutes till a showdown finish wraps conflict neatly. Such well-staged massacre helps up-to-then medicine go down.

ASTERIX: Turns out Greenbriar did Gun Fury back in 2018 at some length. Not too much overlap. Comes under heading I suppose of, Good Pictures Are Forever New. Call this then, another Black Camel moment.

The Art of Selling Movies #6

 

First Ever Opportunity to Read One of J.J. Hunsecker's Columns ... Only at Greenbriar!

Art of ... Sweet Smell of Success, Monsieur Verdoux, Judy Garland Revisit, and Cass Timberlane

FORGIVE AND FORGET? --- Ads called Sweet Smell of Success “The Motion Picture That Will Never Be Forgiven or Forgotten.” By who exactly … Walter Winchell, readers of New York tabloids, night club operators? Trouble among many for Sweet Smell of Success was a mass public seeing nothing not to forget, let alone forgive. Much ado about who cares was this, Gotham elite account of things that mattered to no one else. Even tougher now to interest anyone in Sweet Smell of Success, for who recalls ink-wet daily papers tossed in heaps to eager readership, printed news extinct or headed there, and what columnist, assuming there are still columnists, have anything like reach of a J.J. Hunsecker? Fans must face it … Sweet Smell of Success is rarefied and removed from daily experience. If there is a modern Hunsecker, he/she might be influencing at some corner of You Tube or Tik Tok. Sweet Smell was snakebit from a start. Sophisticates stayed home. A mainstream and certainly showmen preferred Lancaster and Tony Curtis on Trapeze highwires. Lancaster produced Sweet Smell, small comfort to him years later when fans seeing the film for free on television called it ambrosia. Rule One among those who spent to make a movie: If it failed to sell, it don’t matter how good it was. A dud is a dud where too few pay. The “Cool” Loew’s State ad is busy, if talkative. Was cool their conception of the movie, or did it refer to air-conditioning? (this was June 27, 1957). There was an added Disney short called The Wetback Hound which I’d enjoy them trying to reissue today. Has it surfaced anywhere? The Loew’s front had towering Burt poised to slap Tony. Most of slaps in Sweet Smell of Success, however, were verbal. Such a shame when something so fine fails. Loew’s State had been home to lushest of Metro output. Now they were cut loose from Lion moorings, each booking a gamble all its own.

CHAPLIN CHANGES --- CAN YOU? --- This was query UA put to patronage in 1947 when poor prospect Monsieur Verdoux sallied forth to empty cinemas and disappointed remains of Charlie Chaplin viewership. He hadn’t worked since The Great Dictator, which was a hit, but dated now and surely to goodness CC wouldn’t try being the Little Tramp again. He did not, but exhibitors hoped he might, at least instead of “The Modern Bluebeard.” Was putting the Tramp in an upper left corner teasing us to possibility? Loew’s advertising seems almost reluctant to spell out premise of Charlie as a serial killer of women, him the offscreen conqueror of oft-underaged fair sex, and to scandalous outcome. In fact, his last press in profusion circled round drain that was le affaire Joan Barry, who with compliant jurors and judges took Chaplin to edge of ruin and lightened his purse toward support of offspring demonstrably not his. So here comes Monsieur Verdoux to be schizo sold as “strange, haunting romance, shocking drama,” with “surprising laughter.” Yes, they’d be surprised in view of rotten press Chaplin had been getting, his recent meet with reporters, intended to boost Verdoux, being instead a turkey shoot with Charlie the gobbler. Didn’t help when he opened the conference by saying, “You may proceed with the butchery,” actually one of my favorite lines Charlie ever uttered. He could have won the Irish sweepstakes and still been in a hole. CC accused United Artists of dumping Monsieur Verdoux. Maybe they did, but it would have taken a marketing genius with a forklift to peddle these goods. At least Loew’s put best feet forward with a crowded Vaude bill to support their star. I’m thinking Charlie would been better re-staging his old Karno Night in the Show. At least this would have made for merrier matinees. Disaster that Verdoux was, Chaplin would not give up on it. A 1964 revival booking in New York saw his broken toy redeemed and folks lining up for weeks to see it. Raves ensued. We like Verdoux now for lots that Chaplin dared. Criterion has a Blu-Ray flush with extras.

JOYOUS JUDY NOW … AND THEN --- Imagine romance of wintertime trek to Loew’s State, its glittery marquee beckoning from a block away,  evocative capture here to suggest what magical occasion this would be. Digging reveals this still was shot between November 11 and 17, 1966. I had assumed it was a 1952 booking to tie in with Judy live at the Palace, and who knows, that could be the case. What year does that green taxi look to be? Either way I’d go for MGM (past) glory of two surefires, Meet Me in St. Louis with Babes in Arms. We know Judy still performed as of 1966, had dates around town and was seen frequent, so revivals seemed a safe bet. Who knows, she might have stopped into Loew’s to relive memories. Both features had played television for some time before ’66, but some yet preferred seeing them on screens as intended. Prints would be fresh off “Perpetual Product Plan” as launched in 1962. Got a feeling Babes in Arms was still shorn of the Mickey-as-Roosevelt number that came out after the President’s death and stayed gone till Warners put it back in a video release. Note fifty cent admission. Loew’s probably bought both shows at flat rate. That was the customary arrangement with oldies during the sixties. You couldn’t make much profit running vaulties on percentage. What a lovely place pre-hellscape Broadway could be. Photos like this --- marquees like Loew’s --- all beyond modern reach. I’ll guess this is indeed 1966 because it is a fact they ran the combo that year, and because in 1952, Loew’s was still very much a first-run palace and would have been hard put to book past attractions without specific cause. This reminds me of another Gotham house using Desperate Journey with Edge of Darkness in 1957. Product shortage keenly enough felt obliged theatres to fill time with proven hits of yore. Look to local listings and you’ll see theatres doing a same now. Our Liberty had the old Polar Express for Christmas season 2025. I bet more came to see it than anything that was new.

EARNING YOUR SEAT --- Would you walk through a chest-high snowdrift to see Cass Timberlane with Blondie’s Holiday? I used Cass as sample of a once-thought-important Metro special later reduced to ninety-minute TV spotting by Charlotte’s Channel 9, just another of their “Pre-48 Greats” leased from MGM and fed into broadcast chipper. Put yourself in the photographer’s position. He or she had enough sense to capture the image, hail a cab, head either home or to a bar. Me on the other hand would have braved elements to get under that marquee, admire displays to shiver point, then pay ways in to inspect the lobby plus concessions. No matter how high boots were, I’d still be soaked to my shirt, or hopefully overcoat. Imagine sitting hours in such circumstance. Would there be a Tom and Jerry or Tex Avery in support of the feature? I figure shorts would have been less because Cass had company in Blondie, which frankly I would not have stayed for, having avoided Blondie for all of life so far. Channel 7 in Spartanburg ran them, me for switching whenever one surfaced. Metro especially felt the postwar pinch but try to make them stop spending as though it were blooming and booming early forties. 1946 was a record year, late 1947 and into 1948 to slip noticeably, result hard lesson learned by all the majors. Cass Timberlane as I recall was an OK picture, well enough made to engage. They need not all be great to impress. Trouble for thousand or more seat showcases was less people inclined to come downtown for movies. What with war ended and families expanding, they had more vital things to do. Farther-sighted Hollywood observers predicted several years prior that this would happen, and now it did.

UPDATE (9/14/2026) 2:18 pm: Griff supplies a World Premiere Gotham ad for Monsieur Verdoux.

UPDATE --- 9/20/2026, 4:37 AM: Lou Lumenick, past master of New York theatre ads who can find rarities in any Gotham haystack, supplies the Loew's State display for St. Louis and Babes in Arms, plus he confirms that it was indeed February 15, 1952. Also see Lou's comment just added to that section, and be sure to follow his ongoing movie and TV archeological digs at X, where every day brings a showmanship surprise.