Four Favorite Noirs Blogathon May 16, 2022

That’s life. Whichever way you turn, Fate sticks out a foot to trip you- Al Roberts

12-Cry of the City 1948

From the heart of its people comes the … cry of the city.

Directed by Robert Siodmak (The Killers 1946 , Phantom Lady 1944, The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry 1945, The Spiral Staircase 1946, The File on Thelma Jordon 1949) with a screenplay by Richard Murphy from the novel The Chair for Martin Rome by Henry Edward Helseth, and an uncredited Ben Hecht.

Editorial use only.No book cover usage. Mandatory Credit: Photo by 20th Century Fox/Kobal/Shutterstock (5876973e)
Robert Siodmak, Victor Mature Cry Of The City 1948 Director: Robert Siodmak 20th Century Fox USA On/Off Set La Proie

The moody black and white photography is by cinematographer Lloyd Ahern Sr. and music by Alfred Newman. Eddie Muller refers to Cry of the City as “Siodmak’s most operatic noir.” It is Siodmak’s most focused work, and the first film noir he shot extensively on location. The film reunited Siodmak with producer Sol Siegel who worked on three Paramount B pictures together after the director settled in Hollywood during the early 1940s. The song ‘Street Scene’, a recurring motif heard in several noirs and written by composer Alfred Newman, flows at the opening of the film. The song can be remembered in I Wake Up Screaming, also starring Mature. It is an urban melody that evokes dreamy nightscapes of the city. “Street Scene” is the same as that played in the earlier Henry Hathaway’s , The Dark Corner 1946. It was originally written for the film Street Scene (1931).

Siodmak loves a rain soaked street in his noir films, with it’s themes of fatalism and obsession, and the shocking story of the clash between law and lawlessness. The story borrows from a familiar plot device which sets up an opposition between two characters who come from the same background as children, but wind up clashing in their adult life.

Trivia:

Originally, Victor Mature was cast as the killer and Richard Conte as the cop. The roles were switched.

Richard Conte as the character  of Martin Rome would later co-star in the movie Tony Rome (1967) with Frank Sinatra.

Cry of the City is the most ‘operatic’ (Muller) film noir not just stylistically, but the theme its essential that you not hate Marty Rome’s character. The whole idea is that these are two boyhood friends who come from the same neighborhood and it's just through circumstance one becomes a criminal and one a lawman, but they're basically the same guy. That’s the whole point of the film. It's essential that he play someone with that swagger (Conte) and that criminal intent, but he also has a vulnerability you can see in both of them. You can see the boy in the man. It ends so tragically that it feels operatic…You could see that Siodmak is using the street like this huge stage"

Cry of the City stars Victor Mature as Lt. Vittorio Candella, and Richard Conte as the ruthless Marty Rome. Fred Clark plays Cadnella’s partner Lt. Jim Collins whose tongue is fast on the trigger. Shelley Winters is Marty’s old flame Brenda Martingale. Brenda is Martin’s loyal ex-gal who spirits the wounded Conte around the city, while an unlicensed doctor works on his bullet wounds in the back seat of her car.

Betty Garde is Nurse Frances Pruett, and Berry Kroeger is the unsavory, amoral lawyer W. A. Niles. Debra Paget plays angelic Teena Riconti. Tommy Cook plays Conte’s cop hating kid brother who worships him, and it’s clear is heading down the same doomed path, as hi older brother Marty.

Garde and Emerson worked together in John Cromwell’s Caged 1950. Garde is Conte’s sympathetic nurse And Hope Emerson as the darkly imposing Rose Given. In Emerson’s first credited feature film she plays a masseuse and a sadist, is the nefarious Amazon who desperately wants the jewels that Conte has lifted from sleazy lawyer Kroeger. One of the best supporting roles in Cry of the City is Hope Emerson as the ‘monolithic’ (Dinman) Rose Givens who dominates the scenes with Conte.

In Robert Siodmak's sublime noir Cry of the City 1948 Emerson plays Madame Rose Given who runs a massage parlor, loves to cook, is a pancake eatin' -looming "˜heavy'"¦ who loves jewels and just wants a little place in the country where she can cook, eat pancakes and fresh eggs"¦ ‘yeah that's livin'. From her brawny swagger to her grumbling yet leisurely voice, Emerson’s delicsiouly diabolical performance is the highlight of the film!

Continue reading “Four Favorite Noirs Blogathon May 16, 2022”

The Film Score Freak Recognizes: And little things between…

 Above photo of composer Dave Grusin

The art of film wouldn’t resonate without the language of music to help speak for it!

*And don’t think I forgot Jerry Goldsmith. He is my ultimate inspiration and will get a feature tribute all to himself!

*Billy Goldenberg

(Columbo episodes) Murder by the Book and Ransom for a dead man.

*Gil Mellé

The Sentinel 1977

Embryo 1976

Columbo episodes-Blueprint for Murder 1972, Short Fuse, Dead Weight and Death Lends a Hand

*Malcolm Williamson

Crescendo 1970

*Johnny Mandel

The Sandpiper 1965

*Dave Grusin

Columbo episode Presciption Murder (1968)

3 Days of the Condor 1973

The Nickel Ride 1974

*Michel Legrand

The Thomas Crown Affair 1968

Summer of ’42 (1971)

*Krzysztof Komeda

Rosemary’s Baby 1968 (courtesy of Soundtrack Fred)

*Jerry Fielding

The Enforcer 1976

The Mechanic 1972

The Big Sleep 1978

*Pino Dinaggio

Don’t Look Now 1973

*Francis Lai

live for life 1967

Bilitis 1977

The Forbidden Room 1977

*Colin Towns

The Haunting of Julia 1977 aka Full Circle

*Jaime Mendoza-Nave

The Brotherhood of Satan 1971

*Fred Myrow

Soylent Green 1973

*Waldo De Los Rios

The House that Screamed 1969

*David Raksin

Force of Evil 1948

The Big Combo 1955

Night Tide 1961

The Bad and the Beautiful 1952

*George Duning 

Picnic 1955

The Devil at 4 O’Clock 1961

*Ernest Gold

Ship of Fools 1965

*Maurice Jarre

Ash Wednesday 1973

Les yeux sans visage (1960)

*Alex North

A Streetcar Named Desire 1951

Hard Contract 1969

Shanks 1974 (courtesy of Goregirlsdungeon)

Spartacus 1960 love theme

The Children’s Hour 1961

*David Shire

Norma Rae 1979 “It goes like it goes”

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974)

The Conversation 1974

*Quincy Jones

The Getaway 1972

*Michael Small

Klute 1971

The Stepford Wives 1975

Audrey Rose 1977

*Lalo Schifrin

The Fox 1967

Cool Hand Luke 1967

Prime Cut 1972

Bullitt 1968

*Ennio Morricone

The Sicilian Clan 1969

courtesy of Soundtrack of the Mind

Violent City 1970

*Kenyon Hopkins

12 Angy Men (1957)

*Ron Grainer

The Omega Man 1971

*John Carpenter

Escape from New York 1981

*Trevor Jones

courtesy of Soundtrack of the Mind

Labyrinth 1986

This is your EverLovin’ Joey sayin’ all the beautiful little things between – will always stay the same here at The Last Drive In!

 

Thank You For Being a Friend: Saying Goodbye to Betty White – Dec 31, 2021

A legacy of comedic brilliance!

There are times when my heart is heavy and the only thing in this world that I can process with ease, is an episode of The Golden Girls. There are no words that can sum up Betty White’s legacy, a comedic giant who wasn’t afraid to just let it rip, a compassionate animal rights activist, and a national icon who wound up becoming one of the most beloved figures. She is purely golden. I’ll let Betty White’s genius speak for itself.

Actress Betty White poses for a photograph in Los Angeles, California May 26, 2010. REUTERS/Gus Ruelas (UNITED STATES – Tags: ENTERTAINMENT)

clip-‘The Triangle’ Season One episode 5

clip ‘The Competition’ Season One episode 7

clip ‘Flu Attack’ Season One episode 21

clip ‘It’s a miserable life’ Season 2 episode 4

clip ‘The Sisters’ Season 2 episode 12

clip ‘And then there was one’ Season 2 episode 16

Tribute to Rose Nyland!

THIS IS YOUR EVERLOVIN’ JOEY SAYIN’ WE ALL LOVE YOU BETTY. THANK YOU FOR BEING OUR FRIEND!

 

To Sidney, With Love-Saddened by the loss of Legendary actor Sidney Poitier

Sidney Poitier-elegant, profoundly influential and trailblazing actor and filmmaker Sir Sidney Poitier has passed away at the age of 94.

NEW YORK TIMES TRIBUTE

I think I've been in love with Sidney Poitier since I saw him in To Sir, With Love. He won me over like his awe-struck students, with his beautiful gentle manner. After that I was drawn in by his keen ability to portray a depth of character in all of his roles. He's got a way about him, a kind of magnetic pull. Maybe it's his bright smile with a light that shines within. Maybe it's the intensity he brings to the screen, because he does not go half way with his emotional fortitude. Sidney Poitier is a legend because he mastered the utterance of genuine skill with a singular essence of dignity, composure and grace.

"I felt very much as if I were representing 15, 18 million people with every move I made"

Sidney will be remembered for his riviting performance in the tense, racially charged No Way Out 1950, in the film noir Edge of the City 1957 and combustible dramas The Defiant Ones 1958 and Pressure Point 1962 not to mention his portrayal of Gordon Ralfe in the heartwrenching A Patch of Blue 1965.

Poitier was the first Black actor to win the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1964 for his performance in "˜Lilies of the Field.' He gave one hell of a startling performance as Virgil Tibbs In 1967’s In the Heat of the Night and as Mark Thackeray in To Sir, With Love 1967.

To Sidney, With Love, Joey

What A Character Blogathon 2021: Actresses of a Certain Character: Mildred Dunnock & Patricia Collinge

I’m an ordinary person in an ordinary life-Mildred Dunnock

Once again my favorite blogathon has rolled around, giving me the chance to pay tribute to the great character actors who add a certain depth and extra layer to stage, film, and television. Just a brief glimpse of them in a story manages to bring something quite special and undeniably memorable. Thank you so much to Aurora of Once Upon A Screen, Kellee of Outspoken and Freckled, and Paula of Paula’s Cinema Club for the opportunity to take a deep dive into the span of these two women’s careers. Leave it to the finest classic film bloggers to host one of the BEST blogathons there is!

It is with extreme pleasure that I’ll be giving attention to two extraordinary actresses who have contributed a quiet depth of character to both film and dramatic television, Patricia Collinge and Mildred Dunnock. Both actresses were also prominent leading ladies of the theatre.

And coincidentally The Nun's Story co-starred Mildred Dunnock and Patricia Collinge. This was Collinge's last appearance in film.

MILDRED DUNNOCK

NEW YORK CITY – JANUARY 20: Mildred Dunnock was sighted on January 10, 1975, at DJ Nite Club in New York City. (Photo by Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images).

A "superb actress who didn't find nearly the roles she deserved" and "suffered the deprivations more keenly than less sensitive artists would have." –Elia Kazan

I WANT YOU, Mildred Dunnock, 1951 Courtesy Everett Collection PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xCourtesyxEverettxCollectionx MBDIWAN EC033

With the dignity of a weathered carved tree, Dunnock is spare and angular, a handsome yet fey-looking woman with a modest hairstyle and time-worn features. She is an American actress who was prolific in playing spinsters and middle-class mothers. Her weighty performances earned her two Oscar nominations and praise for her performance in Tennessee William's Sweet Bird of Youth. But the role that would garner the most praise, both stage and screen versions, is Linda Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. She originated the role of Loman's hapless wife in Arthur Miller’s classic play on Broadway in 1949. Mildred Dunnock was a founding member of the Actors Studio.

Dunnock was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and acted throughout her college years with the Vagabond Players and the John Hopkins University troupe in Baltimore. She later taught at the Friends School in New York and acted with the Morningside players in their show Life Begins which led her to Broadway, working with the Selwyn Theater in 1932.

Dunnock’s career spanned over four decades, and she was one of the few actresses to have created important roles in the theater by some of the leading playwrights of the twentieth century, Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller. Her theatrical career debuting on The Great White Way at the age of thirty, lasted over 45 years including 23 shows on Broadway. Though she only appeared in 25 feature films, the quality of her work is to be celebrated.

Dunnock's breakthrough role came eight years later, as Miss Ronberry in the original production of Emlyn Williams' hit play The Corn is Green 1940-42.

Mildred Dunnock was cast in the supporting role of Ethel Barrymore who by that time, had a long and successful stage presence. Barrymore inhabited the role of Miss Moffat the spinster schoolteacher who is passionate about transforming the lives of uneducated, proud young Welsh Miners and giving them a chance to lift themselves out of the darkness and reach toward a better life.

Dunnock plays the prissy spinster Miss Ronberry, a reluctant assistant teacher who becomes devoted to Moffat's endeavor. Her performance attracted the attention of Hollywood. Ironically it was Dunnock, and not Barrymore, who was asked to reprise her role on film when Warner Bros bought the rights and insisted their star Bette Davis be cast for the lead in 1945.

When we first meet Miss Ronberry she is eager to become acquainted with the new tenant whom she thinks is a rugged Colonel. She studies his sizable collection of books and includes his "˜virile' wastepaper basket as one of the illuminating artifacts she infers as deliciously masculine. But Miss Ronberry is stunned when the “L.C.” who wrote the letter she receives turns out to be the feisty Lilly Christabel (“L.C.”) Moffat (Bette Davis).

Dunnock also created the role on the stage of Lavinia Hubbard in Lillian Hellman's Another Part of the Forest with Patricia Neal as Regina. The play was the prequel to Hellman's The Little Foxes, which was a story that reflected the assorted lives of a cunning, bourgeois Southern family in the wake of the Civil War. Bette Davis would bring to life the treacherous Regina in the 1941 film The Little Foxes directed by William Wyler. And Patricia Collinge would be cast in the role of Birdie Hubbard, giving one of the most poignant performances of her career. Dunnock's role playing Lavinia went to Florence Eldridge in the film version of Another Part of the Forest in 1948.

Dunnock appeared with Margaret Rutherford in the stage production of Farewell, Farewell Eugene, and co-starred with Hermione Baddley in Tennessee William’s play The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore at the Morosco Theatre. Shown below are the two actresses with playwright Tennessee Williams.

Mildred Dunnock starred in the dramatic television series, The Ford Theater Hour presentation of Night Must Fall in 1948 co-starring Fay Bainter and Cloris Leachman. Based on the play by Emlyn Williams, and adapted to the big screen in 1937 starring Rosalind Russell, Dame May Whitty, and Robert Montgomery.

She continued to turn in stellar performances on stage. In 1945 she had the supporting role of Tallulah Bankhead on Broadway in the comedy by Phillip Barry called Foolish Nation. Also on Broadway, she starred in Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt 1951 where she played John Garfield's mother Tase. Then she appeared in Lee Strasberg's short-lived production of Jane Bowles in The Summer House 1953-54. A "˜surreal and operatic' and "˜darkly funny' (Axel Nissen) work, starring Judith Anderson and Dunnock as manipulative, domineering mothers.

In February of 1949, at the Morosco Theatre on Broadway, Mildred Dunnock premiered in the role that will forever be remembered as her most iconic performance. That of Linda Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, co-starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman. In 1951, Dunnock went on to star in the film version directed by Laszlo Benedek, with Fredrick March stepping into the role of Willy Loman.

Mildred Dunnock from the film ‘Death Of A Salesman’, 1951. (Photo by Columbia Pictures/Getty Images)

New York Times' snarky film critic Bosley Crowther wrote of Dunnock's performance that she was, "simply superb, as she was on the stage "¦ For her portrayal of a woman who bears the agony of seeing her sons and husband turn out a failure, supports the one pretension of this drama to genuine tragedy."

Mildred Dunnock was nominated for her first Academy Award in 1951 for Death of a Salesman but lost to Kim Hunter for Tennessee William's A Streetcar Named Desire. Though Dunnock did not win the Oscar her performance in Salesman began a fruitful decade in both film and theater.

After her 1956 performance in The Wings of a Dove (the stage adaptation of Henry James' novel Child of Fortune), Dunnock disappeared from Broadway for almost four years.

In 1957 Dunnock appeared in the dramatic television series Climax! episode ‘Don’t Touch Me’ co-starring Shelley Winters, three episodes of Kraft Theatre 1950-1957, and four episodes of Studio One 1951-1957.

One of my favorite television appearances of Mildred Dunnock is perhaps the most engrossing episode of Boris Karloff's anthology series Thriller. The Cheaters tells the story about a pair of specs that give the wearer the ability to know "˜the truth', to read other people's thoughts, and to see your true self in the mirror. The episode features Dunnock as Mother Alcott, an eccentric little old-fashioned lady who is a spirited kleptomaniac. She stumbles onto the cursed odd spectacles or "˜cheaters' when she lifts them from a junk/antique store. When she puts them on, she is able to hear her nephew and his wife's interior machinations about Mother Alcott's death. They plan to kill off the old biddy for her money.

Dunnock is perfectly waspish as the old gal who is convinced they are putting poison in her tea, which she spills into the flower pots next to her bed as she confesses to her family doctor/companion about her suspicions. However, her prickly neurosis does bear warning and she manages to take matters into her own hands.

Mother Olcott commits murder – death by hat pin- driven by the cheaters’ revelatory powers. which exposes the scheming of her greedy relatives. Dunnock was superb in Boris Karloff’s anthology series Thriller in the episode The Cheaters 1960.

The Four Skulls of Jonathan Drake (1959)-My lips are sealed, or “only the evil that men do, live after them!”

She appeared in Roald Dahl’s warped television series Way Out episode – William and Mary 1961. Below is Dunnock blowing smoke into the tank holding the brain of her cantankerous husband, Henry Jones.

Mildred Dunnock in the episode ‘William & Mary’ from the television show ‘Way Out’, March 27, 1967. (Photo by CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images).
L.A. – APRIL 4: Mildred Dunnock as Aunt Ida and Shelley Winters as Carol in the CLIMAX! the episode, “Don’t Touch Me.” Image dated April 4, 1957. (Photo by CBS via Getty Images).

In 1964 Mildred Dunnock brought her reserved white gloved sophistication to the role of Minnie in The Alfred Hitchcock Hour episode Beyond the Sea of Death starring alongside Diana Hyland.

As sure as my name is MonsterGirl, this is a Boris Karloff Thriller! “The Storm”

It was during these years she delivered some of her best and most beloved screen roles in films like Baby Doll 1956, Peyton Place 1957, The Nun's Story 1959, BUtterfield 8 1960, and Jack Garfein's Something Wild 1961. Dunnock co-stars as Carroll Baker's judgmental mother, who goes through an emotional journey to reconnect with her traumatized daughter.

Peyton Place earned Dunnock a Golden Globe nomination, for her sensitive portrayal of the devoted school teacher, Miss Elsie Thornton who is undeservedly passed over as principal. Miss Elsie shares strong felt wisdom,” Allison a person doesn’t always get what she deserves. Remember it.”"Allison, if there is anything in life you want, go and get it. Don't wait for anyone to give it to you.”

In The Nuns Story (Audrey Hepburn is a strong-willed nurse who struggles with her place in the church and whether taking her vows was the best direction for her humanitarian work ) Dunnock plays Sister Margarita "Mistress of Postulates" or The Living Rule, (which means an ideal example to the novices and other nuns), where she gives a quiet yet powerful performance as the very serious acolyte to the church. Other sisters include our featured actress Patricia Collinge, the great Peggy Ashcroft, and Dame Edith Evans.

Mildred Dunnock had a creative presence on television in the 1950s and though her film appearances were relatively sparse, they were no doubt memorable. Her keen acting style earned her two Oscar nominations, not just for Death of a Salesman but for Elia Kazan's Baby Doll 1956. Kazan's 1956 version of his play was the one dramatization, Tennessee Williams adapted for the screen himself. In 1957, while Dunnock was nominated for an Oscar a second time, It went to Dorothy Malone for Written on the Wind.

BABY DOLL, from left: Mildred Dunnock, Karl Malden, 1956 Courtesy Everett Collection ACHTUNG AUFNAHMEDATUM GESCHÄTZT PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xCourtesyxEverettxCollectionx MBDBADO EC075.

Baby Doll, is the uncomfortably, subtly amusing, sensually charged, deviant story set in the South about an abusive blustering slob Karl Malden, anxious with explosive sexual frustration, awaiting his virginal bride (Carroll Baker) to reach the age he can consummate his marriage. (Baker should have won an Oscar for her arresting performance in Something Wild.)

Dunnock's part as Aunt Rose Comfort, a Jacobson hat-wearing, ditzy spinster who shuffles around the house like a lost mouse, suffering from far-reaching timidity is a spark of vulnerability. Malden spends the entire film using Rose as a verbal punching bag bullying her, and threatening to throw her into a home. She may have occupied a tangential piece of the story, nevertheless, her contribution is distinctive.

Tennessee Williams considered Big Mamma to be one of Dunnock's most poignant performances in his play, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof 1955-56, which won the Pulitzer Prize. When the story was adapted to the screen, she lost the role to Judith Anderson. While I think Anderson is a force to be reckoned with, I believe she wasn't the right choice to play Big Momma, the Southern vacuous wife of Big Daddy Pollitt. Dunnock should have been a natural choice. Margaret "Maggie" Pollitt – He says bull when he’s disgusted. Ida "Big Momma” Pollitt – Yes, that’s right. I say bull too, like Big Daddy.

1959 Press Photo Mildred Dunnock in The Confessions of Saint Augustine.

Dunnock took on a rare loathsome role as Gig Young's emasculating mother. In the classic courtroom drama, The Story on Page One 1960 written and directed by Clifford Odets. This puts Dunnock in our view as an oppressive presence and a middle-class dragon in aloof clothing. Mrs. Ellis is a departure from her usual roles and gave her a shot at playing a "monstrous mom", a devouring mother.

Gig Young's defense attorney (Anthony Franciosa), sums up Mrs. Ellis as an- "˜unmitigated monster" A film critic referred to her as "a cruel and voracious she-wolf in deceptively virtuous sheep's clothing."

He is on trial with his lover Rita Hayworth (who gives a fantastic performance) both accused of murdering her drunk and abusive husband played by Alfred Ryder, when Young shoots him in self-defense. Dunnock turns in a chilling performance with her taut strokes of hypocritical correctness, sanctimonious rhetoric, and unfailing selfishness that is an unnerving example of suffocating motherhood, as we watch her compressing the life out of her son.

Dressed in decorous tailored suits, hats, and gloves, Mrs. Ellis spouts banalities, "It's one of the great lessons of life: There's no substitute for breeding."

Dunnocks' role in BUtterfield 8 1960 is closer to her typified mother as she weighs in on her daughter's (Elizabeth Taylor) life as a high-paid escort. Taylor won Best Actress for her performance.

Other films Dunnock made in the 1960s include Sweet Bird of Youth 1962, the adaptation of Tennessee William's play from 1959. The film stars Geraldine Page as the aging screen diva Alexandra del Lago. Dunnock worked with Page once again in the psychological thriller (underscored by Gerald Fried’s menacing soundtrack) What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? 1969. In Sweet Bird of Youth, Dunnock plays Aunt Nonnie the sister-in-law to Boss Finley (Ed Begley) and aunt to Heavenly Finley (Shirley Knight). Dunnock brought to the film her signature "quiet authority and timorous tenderness." (Axel Nissen)

Directed by John Ford, 7 Women (1966) features a dynamic cast, Anne Bancroft, Margaret Leighton, and Betty Field. Mildred Dunnock, along with Flora Robson, plays older missionaries who are seized by ruthless Mongolian bandits. The standout performance in the film is Anne Bancroft as a wildly ‘progressive’ doctor.

CIRCA 1966: Actress Anne Bancroft and Mildred Dunnock on the set of the movie “7 Women”, circa 196. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images).

Dunnock and Lee J Cobb revised their exceptional roles in a television version of Death of a Salesman, for which she was nominated for an Emmy.

LOS ANGELES – MAY 8: DEATH OF A SALESMAN The television adaptation of the 1949 play by Arthur Miller. Mildred Dunnock as Linda Loman, Lee J Cobb as Willy Loman. Air date, May 8, 1966. (Photo by CBS via Getty Images).
1949: Lee J Cobb and Mildred Dunnock in a US production of Arthur Miller’s ‘Death Of A Salesman’. (Photo by Keystone Features/Getty Images).

After What Alice Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? in 1969, she appeared in television series and made for tv movies, like Murder or Mercy 1974 with Melvyn Douglas and The Patricia Neal Story in 1981. The Pick-Up Artist 1987 was her last appearance on the big screen.

Unspecified – 1974: (L-R) Mildred Dunnock, Melvyn Douglas appearing in the ABC tv movie ‘Murder or Mercy’. (Photo by Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images).

She also appeared as Mrs. Rule in the television series, Circle of Fear 1972 once again co-starring with Melvyn Douglas in the episode ‘House of Evil’. Her final show on Broadway, was in Marguerite Duras' play, Days in the Trees in 1976.

Mildred Dunnock remained active in theater through the 1980s, participating in numerous stage productions at the Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven where she starred in Long Day's Journey Into Night. She also played Amanda Wingfield as part of her collaboration with Tennessee Williams from his story The Glass Menagerie. Dunnock went on to teach at Yale Drama School. She passed away on July 5, 1991, at the age of 90.

FEATURED CLIPS:

Miss Ronberry The Corn is Green 1945

Miss Rizzo Kiss of Death 1947

Mrs. Linda Loman Death of a Salesman 1951

Celanese Theatre ‘On Borrowed Time’ 1952

Mrs. Wiggs The Trouble With Harry 1955

Aunt Rose Comfort Baby Doll 1956

Miss Elsie Thornton Peyton Place 1957

Mrs. Ellis The Story on Page On 1959 

Way Out 1961 ‘William and Mary’

Minnie Briggs Alfred Hitchcock Hour ‘Beyond the Sea of Death’ 1964

Miriam Olcott Thriller The Cheaters 1960

Mrs. Wandrous BUtterfield 8 1960

Mrs. Gates Something Wild 1961

Aunt Nonnie Sweet Bird of Youth 1962

Miss Tinsley What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice 1969

Photograph by Diane Arbus: 1961.

PATRICIA COLLINGE

Over the years, in my journey through classic film and television, I discovered character actress Patricia Collinge, an endearingly beautiful woman, with winsome, kind eyes that glimmer when she speaks. Through her broad sweet-tempered smile, emerges her voice, with a quality that strikes me as distinct, giving the impression of spaces between her words. Like the spaces of amber honeycomb, that are drizzled with her authentically regal and splendid kindness. You will recognize her most often playing sympathetic widows, whimsical mothers, aunts, or vulnerable older women. Collinge was primarily a celebrated stage actress from 1908-1952. I can only imagine what her stage presence would be like, knowing the depth of her acting integrity.

Born in London, Collinge emigrated to America in 1907 and began her acting career on Broadway in 1908 with her first New York stage appearance when she was 16 years old, as a flower girl in The Queen of the Moulin Rouge at the Circle Theatre on Broadway. Look at those beautifully expressive eyes.

She became an acclaimed actress of the theatre in many classic stage productions, penned by such playwrights as George Bernard Shaw, Henrik Ibsen, and J.M. Barrie. Some notable stage appearances — She was the first actress to play the lead role of Pollyanna, which was popularized by Hayley Mills in the 1960 ‘filmitization’ which was also rendered by Mary Pickford in 1920. Collinge received rave reviews for the four-act stage adaptation of Catherine Chisholm Cushing's novel which opened in 1916 at the Hudson Theater on Broadway and ran for 112 shows. She appeared in Hedda Gabler 1926, The Importance of Being Earnest 1926, Venus 1927, She Stoops to Conquer 1928, Becky Sharp 1929, The Lady with the Lamp 1931, The Little Foxes 1939, as Abby Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace 1941, The Heiress 1947 and her last appearance on stage was 1952 in I’ve Got Sixpence.

Patricia Collinge in the theatrical production of Tillie 1916.

From 1947-48 she starred as Lavinia Penniman in The Heiress at the Biltmore Theatre where she gave 410 performances.

Collinge originated the role of Birdie Hubbard in Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes on Broadway in 1939, probably her most notable performance as well as her film debut is that of the forlorn and fragile, beguiling and heartbreaking interpretation of Aunt Birdie Hubbard in the screen version of Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes 1941, which was a recreation of her role in the original Broadway production in 1939, which she co-starred with Tallulah Bankhead. While Bankhead was considered to reprise her role as Regina Giddens in the film adaptation, Bette Davis was cast instead. Collinge’s psychologically tortured, neglected, and alcoholic Aunt Birdie is perhaps the most startling performance of the picture.

Collinge's touching performance won her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, and in my opinion, should have delivered her the honor. She lost to Mary Astor for The Big Lie.

Another memorable role is Collinge's Emmie Newton in Alfred Hitchcock's psychological thriller, Shadow of a Doubt 1943 where she plays Teresa Wright's humble, proud, and chatty housewife who dotes over her baby brother Charlie, The Merry Widow Killer. Collinge also rewrote the scene with Macdonald Carey confessing his love for her in the garage. The cast was reportedly dissatisfied with the dialogue and she was asked to rewrite the script, which pleased Hitchcock.

Aside from being an actress, Collinge was a playwright, author, and columnist. In 1938, her comedy, “Dame Nature”, an adaptation of a French drama by André Birabeau was published. Several of Collinge’s short stories were published in the New Yorker and she was also a contributor to the New York Times Book Review. Collinge is also uncredited for writing some of the other dialogue for Shadow of a Doubt, and having been one of several writers on Hitchcock's Lifeboat 1944 in which she did not appear as an actress.

Collinge and Wright would appear together in two other features, The Little Foxes 1941 and as Mrs. Drury once again playing Wright’s mother in Casanova Brown 1944. The film is a seldom-credited romantic comedy about Gary Cooper and Wright who get divorced only to discover that she has given birth to their child. Collinge is a quirky eccentric who judges her daughter's marriage by interpreting the astrological signs to decide whether Cooper is the right man for her daughter.

She later appeared in Hitchcock's anthology mystery series, from 1955-1961. Starring in four episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and in 1962 two episodes of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour. Collinge’s participation in Hitchcock’s outstanding mystery series is a startling example of her acting and should be considered some of her best work. See film clips below:

Aside from The Little Foxes and Shadow of a Doubt, major motion pictures and television credits include Tender Comrade 1943 co-starring Ginger Rogers, Ruth Hussey, and Kim Hunter as women who have moved in together while their husbands are fighting in WWII.

In Teresa 1951, after a six-year absence from film, Fred Zinnemann cast Collinge as Clara Cast, GI John Ericson's controlling, possessive mother who refuses to let go of her son when he brings home an Italian bride (Pier Angeli) after the war. Her performance is quite a shift from her familiarly likable characters. She appeared briefly as Sister William in The Nun’s Story 1959, Collinge also gave dramatic performances in such television series The Web 1953 “Midnight Guest” Celanese Theatre 1952 “Mornings at Seven”, Goodyear Playhouse “The Rumor” 1953, Omnibus “Lord Byron’s Love Letter”, and Studio Ones “Crime at Blossom’s”, The River Garden” and “The Hero”. She also appeared in Armstrong Circle Theater 1955-56 and East Side/West Side 1963 “Creeps Live Here”, and United Steel Hour 1962 “Scene of the Crime”.

Patricia Collinge passed away in New York City at the age of 81 on April 10, 1974.

Patricia Collinge co-stars with Ginger Rogers, Kim Hunter, and Ruth Hussey in Tender Comrade 1943.

9 FEATURED CLIPS:

*As Birdie Hubbard in The Little Foxes 1941

*The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in Bonfire as Naomi Freshwater with psychopathic Peter Falk

*Emmie in Shadow of a Doubt 1943

*East Side /West Side 1963 ‘Creeps Live Here’ as Miss Harriet Allen

*Alfred Hitchcock Presents 3 episodes

Across the Threshold S5 Ep 22 1960, The Rose Garden Season 2 1956, and The Cheney Vase 1955

*Casanova Brown as Mrs Drury 1944

*As Clara Cass in Teresa 1951

This is your EverLovin’ Joey showing a little appreciation to two actresses of a certain character!

Groovy Opening Credits for Halloween – Blacula 1972 & The Dunwich Horror 1971

A cross between Saul Bass and Lotte Reiniger with two groovy scores by Gene Page and Les Baxter!

This is your EverLovin’ Joey saying don’t binge too much on that discounted Halloween candy and see ya soon with Brides of Horror: Scream Queens of the 1960s

Happy Halloween from The Last Drive In! –

I planned to offer a huge feature here on October 31st – in keeping with my tribute to those Scream Queens of Horror and Sci-Fi, as I have in the past, 1930s, 1940s and 1950s… but I’ve been experiencing technical issues with WordPress which I am trying to iron-maiden out. 

I hope you all have a very satisfying, scary and safe All Hallow’s Eve and take a stake throught the heart, I’ll be publishing BRIDES OF HORROR: SCREAM QUEENS OF THE 1960S this week. Better late than netherworld, as they say! Do they say that? No that’s just me!💀

Heroines & Scream Queens of Classic Horror: the 1940s! A very special Drive In Hall–ween treat!

So don’t run away, just yet…

This is Your EverLovin’ Joey sayin’ No tricks, All treats here at The Last Drive In! And say… Maybe when Aunt Ida and Aunt Hattie are done carving up those pumpkins, they’ll bake us some killer pies! 

A Trailer a Day Keeps the Boogeyman Away! Robert Quarry-“I’m hard to scare”

For this upcoming Halloween, I thought I’d pay the Boogeyman off with a few fearful trailers! I put together a little theme here at The Last Drive In – and I thought to myself… how ’bout offering up several off-beat & groovy horror flicks from the 1970s featuring that smooth & sinister villain – cult horror star!-Robert Quarry, the enigmatic dark anti-hero of horror, suave yet not overtly theatrical. He’s got a sublime sex appeal with the underlying trance like magnetism of a viper – mysterious, charistmatic and dangerous. He even attained his villainous status to go head to head with Vincent Price as Darrus Biederbeck, his nemisis in Dr. Phibes Rises Again 1972 and in Sugar Hill 1974 he plays another predatory bastard – Morgan who needs to get his arrogant ass whooped by the entrancing Marki Bey as Diana ‘Sugar’ Hill.

It’s his aesthetic that works so perfectly in the cult horror genre. And I believe that the sophistication and malignant evil of his Count Yorga is perhaps one of THE most exquisitely predatory vampires in the history of terror on screen! Quarry’s vision of his style of vampirism, was to move away from the conception of what we experienced watching Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee’s Dracula. Not to downplay the significance of those two great performances. He wanted to give Yorga ‘a kind of reality and play him straight.’ (Robert Quarry in an interview)

Narrator: (George Macready) A vampire, in ancient belief, was a malignant spirit who when the earth lost its sunlight rose nightly from its dark grave to suck blood from the throats of the living. Its powers were many. It could see in the dark, which was no small ability in a world half-veiled from light. Its hypnotic skills baffled the domain of science. It was of a cunning more than mortal, for its cunning was a growth of ages, since it could not die by the mere passing of time. It had to have been by a wooden stake driven deep into its heart, or exposure to the rays of the sun, which would instantly decompose its body into a miasma of putrid decay. The believers of this superstition referred to vampires as the living dead. I seem to be making use of the past tense. Perhaps the present would be more precise, for it stands to reason that if one is superstitious, even on a small, seemingly insignificant level, one must be vulnerable to all superstitions, conceivably even those of vampires. Superstition? (laughs maniacally)

COUNT YORGA, VAMPIRE 1970

Dashing, Dark and Deadly-MISTRESSES of the DEATHMASTER – sharing his hunger for human flesh, his thirst for human blood, his evil lusts that even Hell cannot fulfill!

“… the special appeal of Count Yorga, Vampire may well be its Los Angeles locale… Count Yorga’s ambience is pure Hollywood and the seamy elegance of Robert Quarry’s performance… exactly compliments {sic} that ambience. Bob Kelljan’s direction, often resourceful, does especially well by Quarry’s disdainful civility… “ – Roger Greenspun, New York Times, November 12, 1970.

Count Yorga, Vampire is a moody 70s dive into terror, amidst a sense of mounting dread, squalor, claustrophobic panic and Robert Quarry’s conjuration of arrogance and menace, with an opening seasoned with campy irony and provocative narration by character actor George Macready! At the time of it’s release, because Yorga is a departure from Victorian or 1930’s settings, the film can be considered a move forward, bringing the vampire lore into modern times, that started a new trend. Though not showcasing modernity with the wheels of progress spinning as with films like The Hunger 1983 or The Lost Boys 1987, Count Yorga possesses a somewhat reformist aura and the hints of Gothic fairytale meeting up with a contemporary feel that makes for a very  inventive atmosphere. Though Quarry’s vampire still wears a cape, his Machiavellian hostility oozes from underneath his blood red velvet smoking jacket. It is this remnant of actors sinking their teeth into the role of Dracula or in this case another descendant of European vampiric royalty transported to contemporary California – that gives Quarry’s attempted tribute a bit of a twist, yet deliciously cliché.

I was so lucky to have seen Count Yorga, Vampire during it’s theatrical release in 1970. I hadn’t experienced anything like it before having grown up being transfixed by Bela’s swarthy, sensual, old world vampire, and Christopher Lee’s terror inspiring, blood red eyed Count. With Yorga, he evokes a level of disquiet in me from watching a slew of campy yet shockingly gruesome scenes in the film. There’s a languidness, an eerie dread, a modern Gothic sensibility that washes over films like Yorga, overcast with a hazy lens of 70s colors and an uncanny pacing that is indicative of many of the decade’s horror films. Consider Let’s Scare Jessica to Death 1971 – and any attempt at contemporary homage to that grand decade of experimental horror, will always lack that organic moody vibe that is persistent in 70s classic cult horror. To me it all seems to appear – a forgery.

Directed by Bob Kelljan  Yorga co-stars Roger Perry, Michael Murphy, Michael Mcready (George’s son), Donna Anders as Donna, Judy Lang as Erica, Edward Walsh as the brutish Brudah, Marsha Jordan as Donna’s mother (reigning queen of softcore cinema in the 1960s), Julie Conners, Paul Hansen as Peter and Sybil Scotford as Judy.

The film takes place in contemporary Los Angeles where vintage hipsters assemble a groovy séance in order to contact Donna’s (Donna Anders) mother, who has recently passed away. The medium who has been chosen to lead the ceremony is the enigmatic Count Yorga, who claims to have been her mother’s lover. Oddly, Yorga talked Donna out of cremation. He is in fact a modern day vampire who also has the power of telepathy and hypnosis. After the séance, Erica (Judy Lang) and Paul (Michael Murphy) take Yorga back to his creepy isolated mansion, and must camp out in the surrounding woods when their van gets stuck in a convenient mound of mud. After the couple indulge in some 70s VW van nookie, Yorga lurks, then attacks to the backdrop of cricket’s eerie night song and a lake of murky dark. He beats Paul unconscious and bites Donna, putting her under his control.

The next day, Paul notices the strange puncture wounds on Erica’s neck and takes her to see his friend, a blood specialist, Dr. Hayes (Roger Perry), who discovers that the pale as chalk Erica has been drained of blood and is now suffering from pernicious anemia. After they find Erica drinking the blood from her WARNING: – kitten- Paul is skeptical about the existence of a modern day blood sucker, but Hayes suspects that she is the victim of a vampire attack. That evening, Yorga summons Erica and offers her eternal life, taking her back to his secluded castle where his other brides await. She is transformed into a lustful creature, ghostly, predatory, under Yorga’s masterful spell and hungry for blood.

Paul, Donna, her boyfriend Michael and Dr. Hayes show up at the castle looking for Erica. Her boyfriend Paul who had arrived earlier and has been killed by his servant Brudeh.

There begins a restless game of cat and mouse as Dr. Hayes insinuates himself in Yorga’s castle, and tries to talk Yorga into dawn, working his way up to the question, does he believe in vampires? Vampires are real and more superior than humans, he smugly informs Hayes. Onto Haye’s game, Yorga manages to evade the daylight, so he and Michael plan on coming back the next night kill him. Donna, under Yorga’s hypnotic domination, exercising his influence on others, is summoned to the castle. Hayes and Pete (Paul Hansen) must somehow fight off the grotesque servant, Brudah, Yorga’s thirsty brides (Donna’s mother being one of them), who dwell in the castle like deathly Hammer nymphs, and must somehow save Donna and ultimately destroy Yorga.

Quarry would go on to reprise his role in 1971 with The Return of Count Yorga.

THE RETURN OF COUNT YORGA 1971

The overlord of the damned… The last of the vampires walks again among us… and Evil will have its bloodiest hour! 

American International Pictures brought back Yorga using the original crew, a script by Yvonne Wilder, directed by Kelljan and a bigger budget. The film also stars Mariette Hartley as the heroine, Cynthia Nelson, who will become the object of Yorga's desire. There's a looming sense of expressionist disharmony. It opens with a sequence in a graveyard, in almost Jean Rollin fashion, where buried vampire brides break through the ground while young Phillip Frame (as creepy Tommy from the neighboring Orphanage), plays with his ball, and winds up coming face to face with Count Yorga. Once again Yorga uses his powers of hypnosis to get his victims to do his bidding, and the film does suggest that Tommy has himself become a fiend.

The undead vamps slaughter a family at a fancy dress party in suburbia. Yorga, wipes the memory of the surviving members who were attacked. Tommy has an evil little ghostly angel face, and he lies about what happened to the family who were murdered, as well as helps Yorga ensnare his victims and he too commits murder, when he stabs Jennifer to death. Jennifer (Yvonne Wilder) is mute and somehow resistant to Yorga’s influence. She’s the only one who knows what happened the night of the attack, but no one believes her.

Once again, Count Yorga waves his powers of hypnosis over Cynthia, who also survives the attack, and eventually pieces from that night start coming back to her. The overlord of the damned decides that he is in love with Cynthia and wants her to share an eternity with him, though he wants her to come willingly. She comes to stay with him at Gateway Mansion, where David (Roger Perry) fights for her eternal soul.

Perry is back once again as a doctor, this time Dr. David Baldwin, her fiancé, and George Macready makes an actual appearance as Professor Rightstat. The Return of Count Yorga also co-stars Michael Pataki and Walter Brooke.

Incidentally, George Macready is the producers father, which explains the actors involvement in both films, though Macready is not a stranger to being cast in eerie narratives. He gave a feverish performance in Boris Karloff's anthology series, Thriller episode The Weird Tailor, (written by Robert Bloch) where he will stop at nothing, even black magic, to bring his son back to life.

THE DEATHMASTER 1972

Eyes Like Hot Coals…Fangs Like Razors! Khorda the Deathmaster Has Left His Tomb!

Directed by Ray Danton (actor I’ll Cry Tomorrow 1955, The Longest Day 1962-directed the very freaky Psychic Killer 1975) Screenplay by R L Grove, music by Bill Marx who also worked on Scream Blacula Scream 1973. The Deathmaster resurrects Robert Quarry’s synergy of sophistication and menace, this time as Korda, a long haired vampire who washes up on a Southern California beach in his coffin, and is met by a flute playing spaced out hippie, that serenades his arrival, then proceeds to drag his master along the sand on his back. Only after he has strangled a surfer who has made the mistake of looking inside the coffin. The opening feels like an exploration into the bohemian netherworld, somehow inverted into a modern dance of the macabre. Marx’s opening score, using bell trees, clarinets and harpiscord are truly a moody piece of work.

Korda proceeds to play a Guru surrounded by hippies, sans cape this time, instead trading in his smoking jacket for a Nehru or ruffled poet shirt and beads and a talisman around his neck and leather sandals and sardonic goatee. The Deathmaster is a trippy low-budget dive into the craze for spiritual growth and metaphysical discourse, with Korda spouting philosphical meanderings that Quarry in fact improvised. After fusing together a Manson type cult, they all become lambs to the slaughter. Korda radiates his connection to immortality which gives him a godlike aura he uses to mesmerize this 1970s generation that are renegade seekers of truth and transcendence, and free will and free love. The only one who rebels against the master, is Pico who sees him as a false prophet. Pico’s girlfriend, Rona becomes Korda’s object of desire.

Deathmaster also features John Fiedler as poncho wearing Pop, Bill Ewing as Pico and and Brenda Dixon as Rona-who appeared in 165 episodes of the popular soap opera- The Young and The Restless.

FUN FACT:

A production still reveals that the picture was filmed in December 1970 under the shooting title “Guru Vampire.”

The critic Robert Ebert claims that the Santa Monica beach used at the start of the movie is the exact same location used by Corman’s “Attack of the Crab Monsters”.

Quarry wears the same set of prop vampire fangs in this as he did in both Count Yorga movies. They were specially made and fitted by his dentist.

This is your EverLovin’ Joey sayin’ keep your homemade stakes wittled out of broom handles, ready in case Robert Quarry’s lurking round your VW van… don’t you wish you had one! I do…

Keep Watching the Skies! Science Fiction Cinema of the 1950s: The Year is 1956 – Part Two: Forbidden Planet

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TO SEE 1956 PART ONE – HERE!


A MASTERPIECE OF SCIENCE FICTION OPERA, FREUD’S id AND SHAKESPEARE’S THE TEMPEST – IN SPACE.

Forbidden Planet

Earthmen on a fabulous, peril-journey into outer space!

🚀

A month after Invasion of the Body Snatchers was released, 12 years before the studio wowed audiences with its mesmerizing, complex production of 2001: A Space Odyssey, MGM released their spectacular, colorful, big-budget science fiction space Opera – Forbidden Planet. Replacing the threat of an alien intruder seeking to take over our minds, the enemy WAS our mind and its potential to manifest a subconscious monster- a cartoon animated monster from the id. Perhaps a variation of Stevenson’s horror of duality, Jekyll and Hyde is set in a futuristic milieu – on another planet.

Recognizing this theme, Walter Pidgeon’s character Morbius emphasizes the duality that exists within his nature. Behind the facade of the rational mind prowls the primitive instincts and desires, now incarnate right from its source – Freud’s id. Morbius is in denial that he has in fact manifested the monster himself. It’s an allegory of insatiable ego, internal agony and torment, and perhaps incestuous jealousy. A collection of his suppressed rage hidden behind the outwardly rational scientific mind.

Shakespeare informs Prospero  – “this thing of darkness I acknowledge mine.”Â  Morbius is the true villain in Forbidden Planet, embodied by a power, intensified a thousand percent from the ancient science of the extinct Krell, who brought into existence their nightmares, ultimately proving to be the end of them.

Forbidden Planet has been the benchmark of the science fiction genre for years by the sheer scope of its production values. MGM was the studio that had painted for us, an unforgettable daydream – The Wizard of Oz in 1939. Director John Landis referred to the studio as making pictures with ‘gloss’ and Forbidden Planet was their feature science fiction film trading in Singing in the Rain for robots and ray guns. John Carpenter says that in terms of traditional science fiction “˜formulas’ this film “˜broke it’ Carpenter also attributes Forbidden Planet to his wanting to become a director.

And John Dykstra who did the FX on Star Wars comments – “It was a serious attempt to represent a completely unique world”¦ it’s gotta be a world that nobody knows and at the same time everyone recognizes as being alien.”

Forbidden Planet is an allegory of technological power and mortal arrogance.

After years of its initial release Forbidden Planet finally reached its cult following and is considered the Star Wars of the 1950s with its flamboyant color scheme, Wide Screen presentation, indelible visual effects, and endearingly kitsch touches. Only one other dazzling post-war science fiction space Opera of the 1950s comes to mind -Joseph M. Newman and an uncredited Jack Arnold’s This Island Earth 1955  nears Forbidden Planet’s exhilarating yet a bit tacky tone.

Historian Carlos Clarens has remarked that Forbidden Planet is “a rare flight of fancy by the earthbound MGM – it resuscitates the classical elements of the horror movie, with ultra-modern decor.”

Seth Lerer in his article Forbidden Planet and the Terrors of Philology -called it an “Esteemed science fiction film, a blend of high cultural allusion and high camp effects.”

Forbidden Planet has the feel of a fantastical pulp tale straight out of Amazing Stories, Astounding, or Fantastic Adventures Magazine. The film showcases all the great elements of a classic science fiction story. Advanced technology, space travel, futuristic tidbits like forcefields, lightning-inspired laser beams, brain-boosting machines, transport beams, subterranean worlds,  ““ rayguns, the vast planetary energy wells, likable robots, and a terror-inspiring monster that lurks and tears its victim’s limb from limb. It’s interesting to note, that we see Earthmen traveling in a typified flying saucer of 1950s alien flicks instead of the traditional phallic-shaped rocket.

Aside from “˜The sensuousness of the color’ (Carlos Clarens An Illustrated History of the Horror Film and Science Fiction)–or the sensorial experience brought about by the lush colors, my heart used to pump and pound (and still does), when as a kid I’d await the scene where the fiery id materializes. It emerges menacing, startling, causing a delightful jolt of fear and I was thrilled to see Its sparking outline ambushed in the force field. This iconic scene is one of the contributing joys that gave me an appetite for classical science fiction, fantasy, and horror in my childhood.

Forbidden Planet was directed by Fred McLeod Wilcox with a screenplay by Cyril Hume who adapted his script from an original story by Allen Adler & Irving Block. So much has been written on how they presumably modeled the film after the fatalistic comic allegory – William Shakespeare’s The Tempest. (uncredited).

Continue reading “Keep Watching the Skies! Science Fiction Cinema of the 1950s: The Year is 1956 – Part Two: Forbidden Planet”