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A place with a name like Okefenokee feels immanently American and this is an inherently American story though expatriate Jean Renoir feels sympathetic to these types of folks. He wasn’t a working-class filmmaker but in movies from his home country like Toni or La Bete Humaine, you see his con read more

I feel like few filmmakers understood the menace of the Nazis as well as Fritz Lang. Perhaps it’s because he had firsthand experience, and he knew their schemes and what they were capable of — at least to a degree. But he does not make them total fools nor distant adversaries. They are read more

British Pathe released a number of entertaining short pieces on arts and crafts and some of the best featured talented model-makers. One of these was Harold Gough, a 16-year-old (in 1941) whose hobby was building mansions made of matchsticks. The rainy season in England must indeed be long! Never mi read more

“Do you think he drinks?” “He didn’t get that nose from playing ping pong.” Self-reflexive metanarratives have the capacity of dissecting celebrity and playing with personas. Such a context is ripe with possibility and so when we find ourselves on a studio lot with W.C read more

It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals. This week’s musical: Let’s Go Collegiate (1941) read more

If Arsenic and Old Lace (1944) were a tragic drama instead of a screwball comedy, it might play out something like Ladies in Retirement (1941), in which a desperate young woman goes to extreme measures to protect her psychologically complicated sisters. We talk about insanity and mental health very read more

I’ll admit it. I’ve only seen Betty Grable in two films. It’s not because I’m not a fan; I’ve always thought she was lovely, with a gorgeous figure – I’ve even read her biography – but she’s mostly a musical gal, and if you know me, you’ll know I’m not exactly the world’s biggest read more

It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals. This week’s musical: Lady Be Good (1941) – read more

Silver Screen Standards: A Woman’s Face (1941) Although it’s not as iconic as films like The Women (1939) or Mildred Pierce (1945), I really enjoy the George Cukor murder melodrama A Woman’s Face (1941) because it gives us a different view – quite literally – of star Joan Crawford. When read more

The movie’s faux Scandinavian backdrop can be traced back to its origins in an early vehicle for Ingrid Bergman back in her native Sweden that was released in 1938. Since I haven’t seen the original, I cannot attest to Bergman, but she doesn’t immediately spring to mind in a role read more

Director Anatole Litvak's Out of the Fog (1941) delivers on the promised atmosphere, with fog heavy piers and dark alleys providing a moody setting for this story of Brooklyn's waterfront working class, but the tone veers away from true noir thanks to the sympathetic and often very funny characters read more

It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals. This week’s musical: Rise and Shine (1941) – read more

Silver Screen Standards: The Wolf Man (1941) Chaney’s werewolf form makes him monstrous but retains enough of his humanity to be unsettling, especially because we can see his very human eyes in the monster’s face. When I’m asked to choose a favorite among the classic Universal monster movies, read more

It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals. This week’s musical: Keep ‘Em Flying (1941) read more

Silver Screen Standards: That Night in Rio (1941) Fox made many of these light musical comedies during the war years, and several feature a South American theme with Brazilian star Carmen Miranda. I turn to Fox’s cheerful Technicolor musicals whenever I really need a morale booster, and That read more

The final post for Noirvember 2021 shines the spotlight on a gal who’s often more femme than fatale: Millie Pickens in Among the Living (1941). WHAT’S AMONG THE LIVING ABOUT? Nestled in a category I think of as Gothic noir, Among the Living tells the story of a millionaire, John Baden (Albert Dekker read more

It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is my weekly feature about musicals. This week’s musical: Buck Privates (1941) – read more

Gas station attendants Chuck ( Bud Abbott ) and Ferdie ( Lou Costello ) happen to be present when gangster Moose Matson ( William Davidson ) is shot by the police during a car chase. His last will and testament leave all that he owns to those who are present at his death, hence the boys inherit Moos read more

“Are you thinking of allowing her to play Roxanne to your Cyrano?” – Van Hefflin to Robert Taylor Pretty faces don’t always add up to a quality movie and if you want to find where the faults lie, you might look between the players and the script then split the difference. Jo read more

Unfinished Business commences with a wedding ceremony we’re trying to place. Because it is not Irene Dunne getting married, although she stretches her famed vocal cords in lieu of a wedding march. It is her baby sister — the girl she’s mothered her entire life up to this point. No read more