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Let’s consider the reasons Joan Crawford is a terrible choice to star in Dancing Lady (1933), one of those films about an aspiring hoofer, Janie, who is willing to do anything but trade sexual favors to get on the stage, and who is so talented she actually makes it. 1. So talented at dancing? read more

When we last left you, with a picture of photo of Carole Lombard and Ernst Lubitsch similar to that seen above, I was on my way to day two of the Die Laughing Film Festival in Hollywood, where my romantic comedy screenplay "Stand Tall!" was to get a partial reading and compete for awards.And the goo read more

Carole Lombard reads through a script, pouring over its elements. I can't read the dialogue, so I can't tell what film it's from or whether it was a project she ultimately didn't make.Today, I take my next step as a screenwriter at the Die Laughing Film Festival in Hollywood, as actors will read a s read more

Another Saturday means another Saturday Double Feature! Okay, let’s start with a quick recap of the “rules”, shall we? The basic idea here is to take a movie that is out in theaters now, and pair it up with another movie from the 1980s or before. Sometimes the connection will be ob read more

While she's shown here posing on the passenger side of a vehicle, Carole Lombard loved cars. Her passion for them wasn't to the level of second husband Clark Gable, mind you; Carole's cars were more utilitarian than fancy (generally sedans that called little attention to herself), and she preferred read more

Screening of "A Letter to Three Wives" May 29 at Daystar Center A Letter to Three Wives (1949) Where: Daystar Center, 1550 S. State Street When: May 29, 2018 Time: 6:30 p.m. Hosted by Stephen Reginald A Letter to Three Wives (1949) is based on a novel by John Klempner. His novel read more

Yes, Carole Lombard, I'm as surprised by the news as you are -- but while "True Confession" may have a mixed legacy, her final Paramount film lives on...in print, though you won't find it used on any typewriter."What is he talking about?", you wonder. Well, check the opening title card to that 1937 read more

In the baseball parlance of Carole Lombard's tomboy childhood, she was a hot hitter at the close of 1937. After her home run in "My Man Godfrey" (above) the previous year, Lombard bashed some doubles and triples with "Swing High, Swing Low" (Paramount's biggest money-maker for all of '37), "Nothing read more

This luscious photo of Carole Lombard wearing a nightgown, looking oh so seductive, ran in the New York Sunday News and other publications in 1941. But it's not the only shot of her from that session. Witness:More proof Carole looked good from nearly every angle.Those and other Lombard images -- 25 read more

This photo of Jane Alice Peters, the future Carole Lombard, on the beach with brothers Stuart and Frederic is believed to be from 1916, a year or two after Elizabeth Peters brought her three children west from Fort Wayne, Ind. I have no idea what they were specifically taught in the city's public sc read more

I remember John Russell Fearn from my younger days (cough, wheeze) as being a somewhat mediocre science fiction writer — rather in the mold of Charles Eric Maine but, in my youthful opinion, not as good. It was only quite recently that I discovered he also wrote quite a number of mysteries an read more

Carole Lombard's yeoman work in Indianapolis on Jan. 15, 1942 paid off in a big way -- and the national press reported it the next day. Witness this from United Press, in newspapers Jan. 16 (I'm not certain where this one is from):Carole's fundraising enabled the American military to have money for read more

For the first few chapters, Bela Lugosi can carry The Phantom Creeps. He’s hamming it up as a mad scientist surrounded by actors who can’t even ham. Creeps has some truly terrible performances, particularly from its other leads, Robert Kent and Dorothy Arnold. He’s the military intelligence officer read more

Sadly, there’s not much world destroying in To Destroy the World. Not even when Bela Lugosi, finally reunited with his meteorite and able to escape, decides instead he’s going to steal a biplane and bomb things. Starting with the federal building. Only he drops a bomb on a zeppelin, which does inde read more

The Blast features some of Phantom Creeps’s most prevalent tropes. Good guys following bad guys because they happened to drive and pass one another. Jack C. Smith’s henchman (to Bela Lugosi’s mad scientist) getting shot and dazed. Smith’s been shot at least three times (and dazed) in the serial. read more

The title, Phantom Footprints, could almost refer to when a spy–seeing invisible Bela Lugosi’s shadow–thinks there might be something there. But then another spy just tells the first spy to shut up about it. It happens twice, first with Anthony Averill saying it’s stupid, then (after Averill read more

Is "Brief Moment" the most overlooked of Carole Lombard's five films for Columbia? You could make a good case for that. It doesn't have the pre-Code dynamite of "Virtue" nor the occasional comic Carole forays of "No More Orchids." Her last for the studio, "Lady By Choice," gives her some splendid in read more

Speeding Doom once again has the good guys, bad guys, and Bela Lugosi trying to get Lugosi’s box. In the box is a powerful meteorite, which allows for all of Lugosi’s inventions. But the good guys and bad guys don’t know about it yet. They still aren’t sure Lugosi’s alive. Until the bad guys read more

Because of scheduling and other issues, the Durnmoose Movies blog will be taking just a short break. Regular posting will resume May 15th. read more

Trapped in the Flames is yet another exciting installment of The Phantom Creeps. Yet again, the Feds (led by Robert Kent) pursue the foreign agents (Anthony Averill’s the chief henchman, Edward Van Sloan’s the boss) trying to find Bela Lugosi’s missing box. No one but Lugosi (presumed dead by read more