Singing In The Rain (Gene Kelly)

I love this song! It makes me happy. :) xx

Meet Me In St. Louis 1944- The Trolley Song

I love this song. It makes me feel happy. xx

All About Eve (1950)

Margo Channing is a person of opposite qualities, of conflicting needs and desires. On the surface an acerbic and outspoken person, she occasionally allows an underlying vulnerability to emerge. She is clearly competitive with other women but relies on the companionship and loyalty of her best (and unthreatening) friend Karen Richards (Celeste Holm). A dedicated careerist, she nonetheless finds herself tiring of her profession and wanting a relationship with her director, Bill Sampson (Gary Merrill, who later did marry Davis). She would like to keep working but realizes that at her age appropriate leading roles are unlikely to come her way, and she already feels uncomfortable with her latest role, a Southern belle and clearly much younger than Margo herself. Her need for status and professional recognition drives her to want to hold on to her position as Broadway's leading actress, yet she knows that eventually she will be replaced by a younger actress whose ambition matches her own, although she doesn't expect it to be so soon, and she doesn't expect that person to be the outwardly adoring but secretly scheming Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter).



 

This is a brilliant film!  Enjoy! :) xx

Adam's Rib (1949)

 

 

 Doris Attinger (Judy Holliday) follows her husband (Tom Ewell) with a gun one day and sees that he is having an affair with another woman (Jean Hagen). In her rage, she fires at the couple multiple times. One of the bullets hits her husband in the arm.

 
The following morning, married lawyers, Adam and Amanda Bonner (Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn) read about the incident in the newspaper. The two argue over the case; Amanda sympathizes with the girl, particularly noting the double standard that exists for men and women regarding adultery, while Adam thinks she is guilty of attempted murder. When Adam arrives at work, he finds that he has been assigned the case (on the side of the prosecution). When Amanda hears this, she seeks out Doris and, to Adam's dismay, becomes her defense lawyer.

 

 

 

Amanda bases her case on the belief that women and men are equal, and that Doris had been forced into the situation through her husband's poor treatment. Adam feels she is showing a disregard for the law as there should never be an excuse for such behavior. Tension increasingly builds at home as the couple battle each other in court. The situation comes to a head when Amanda humiliates Adam during the trial, having her female witness pick him up, and Adam later storms out of their house. When the verdict for the trial comes in, Amanda's plea to the jury to "judge this case as you would if the sexes were reversed" proves successful, and Doris is found not guilty.

 

 

 

That night, Adam sees Amanda and their neighbor Kip (David Wayne), who has shown a clear interest in Amanda, together through the window. He breaks into the apartment, pointing a gun at the pair. Amanda is horrified, and says to Adam "You've no right to do this, nobody does!", which satisfies Adam as he feels he has proven his point about the injustice of Amanda's line of defense. He then puts the gun in his mouth, to which Amanda and Kip scream, but Adam merely bites down on it—the gun was made of liquorice.  Amanda is furious with this prank, and a three-way fight ensues.

 

The couple is reluctantly reunited for a meeting with their accountant, where they talk about their relationship in the past tense. They soon become sad when talking about the farm they own, and realize how they love each other. They go to the farm, where Adam announces that he has been selected as the Republican nominee for County Court Judge. Amanda jokes about running for the role as the Democratic candidate.

 

 

 

I love this comedy.  Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracey are brilliant together! :) xx

The Heiress (1949)

 

 

Olivia de Havilland won an Oscar, for her portrayal of the title character, Catherine Sloper, in 1949′s The Heiress, and if you want to see another side of this lovely actress, I definitely recommend this movie.

 

Miss Sloper is a plain, unaccomplished young lady living with her father, a wealthy doctor (Ralph Richardson) in New York during the mid-19th century. Despite having all the best schooling, Catherine is shy, unskilled in social graces, dancing, music … in short, all the things that young ladies were supposed to be able to do at that time. She is a constant disappointment to her father, who despairs of ever finding her a husband. More importantly, he compares her to her dead mother, and finds her extremely lacking. Catherine seems unaware of his disappointment, though, and remains blindly faithful to him, and not unhappy with her rather reclusive lifestyle.

All of that changes when she meets handsome Morris Townsend (Montgomery Clift), who immediately shows a preference for Catherine, and very soon sweeps her off her feet. Her father, given his negative opinion of his daughter, believes Townsend to be a fortune hunter, as Catherine will be very wealthy upon his own death. What ensues is a power struggle between Dr. Sloper and his daughter as she learns to stand on her own feet and makes plans to marry the man she loves. The big question, though, is whether or not he really loves her … or her money. 

 

 

The Heiress is a taut, emotional film with excellent performances. Each of the characters move through a variety of stages over the course of the film: we see Richardson indulge his daughter, then take control of her; he sometimes seems to acknowledge his dislike for her, but ultimately contends that his actions are out of love.  

Montgomery Clift does a truly remarkable job with the character of Townsend; one moment you’re sure he’s just a cad out for Catherine’s money, and the next moment you think maybe you’ve misjudged him, and he really does care for her. Both of these actors strike the fine balance necessary to showcase the flaws in their characters, and to keep the plot and the emotional tension of the movie running tight and high.

Olivia de Havilland, though, is a revelation. It’s hard to describe the transformation of her character without giving too much of the plot away, but I’ll do my best. In the beginning, Catherine is a loving, obedient daughter, content with life. She’s not at all unhappy with not being the belle of the ball. After she meets Morris, she is a young woman in love, capricious and emotional, and torn between her feelings for her lover and her duty to her father. What comes after, though, is something altogether removed from either of those aspects. She becomes a tower of strength, but at the same time, something so fragile that you fear she might burst apart at any moment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All in all, if you like classic films, you should definitely give this one a try!  It's another favourite of mine! :) xx

Now Voyager (1942)

Here is another Bette Davis classic!  "Now, Voyager" (1942) was directed by Irving Rapper, starring Bette Davis, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains and Gladys Cooper. The movie is based on the novel by Olive Higgins Prouty, who got the title from a poem by Walt Whitman ("Now voyager, sail thou forth to seek and find"). Bette Davis plays Charlotte Vale, an ugly duckling and spinster without any self-esteem, who lives with her controlling, dominating mother (Gladys Cooper). Fearing for Charlotte's mental well-being, her sister-in-law Lisa (Ilka Chase) arranges for her to meet psychiatrist Dr. Jaquith (Claude Rains), who has her admitted to his sanatorium. At the sanatorium and away from her mother, Charlotte slowly starts to recover. Having transformed into a beautiful swan but still insecure, she goes on a cruise and meets a married man, Jerry Durrance (Paul Henreid), and they fall in love. But since Jerry is married, they decide not to pursue their love any further. Returning home from the cruise, strenghtened by her memories of Jerry, Charlotte finally stands up to her mother. But when her mother dies of a heart attack after a quarrel with Charlotte, Charlotte blames herself and guilt stricken returns to the sanatorium. At the sanatorium she meets a teenage girl Tina (Janis Wilson) who reminds her of herself. She takes the girl under her wings and starts to care for her, especially when she finds out that it's Jerry's daughter. Knowing she can't be with the man she loves, Charlotte sees helping Jerry's daughter as her new mission in life and as a way of remaining close to him.

This improvised moment by Paul Henreid lighting two cigarettes at once and handing
one to Davis became an instant classic. 

 

Bette Davis and Gladys Cooper

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was the first Bette Davis movie I saw. I was about nine years old. I fell in love with the characters, the story, music and the actors. I love this movie! Highly recommend it! xx 

 

 

 



 

Bringing Up Baby (1938)

 

 

A dog belonging to an eccentric heiress (Katharine Hepburn) steals a dinosaur bone from David (Cary Grant), a Zoology professer.  David  follows the heiress home and all hell breaks loose when he loses his pet leopard Baby.

 

 

 

 

Brilliantly directed by Howard Hawks, Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn are a match made in heaven. 

 

 

 

 

Bringing Up Baby is one of cinema's greatest scewball comedies ever made. :) xx









Titanic (1997)

Nothing on earth can rival the epic spectacle and grandeur of Titanic. Winner of eleven Academy Awards, this sweeping love story is one of my favourites. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio are Rose and Jack who are separated by class but are determined to be together. They meet and fall in love on the RMS Titanic but when the luxury liner hits an iceberg in the freezing North Atlantic their passionate love affair becomes a thrilling race for survival!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Titanic is a tale of forbidden love and tragedy. I do not watch this film very often but when I do I enjoy it.  xx