By 1941, Clark Gable had appeared in eight movies with Joan Crawford, in six with both Myrna Loy and Jean Harlow, and in three opposite Norma Shearer.  Harlow had died in 1937, and the others would soon be done with MGM, leaving the studio during World War II.  But Gable was in full post-Rhett Butler glory, still the uncontested King [...]

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Sorry, Ann Miller, but Eleanor Powell was the Hollywood musical’s greatest female tap dancer.  Ms. Powell, who died at 69 in 1982, would have turned 100 this November 21st.  I’ll never forget seeing her for the first time, when That’s Entertainment! (1974) spotlighted her in two breathtaking dances from Rosalie (1937) and Broadway Melody of [...]

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In honor of Veterans Day, consider Hollywood’s most famous World War II veteran, the King himself, Major Clark Gable.  Away from the screen since 1942, the year of the plane-crash death of his wife Carole Lombard, Gable had gone to war, surviving several bombing missions over Europe.  Anticipation was high for his return vehicle at MGM, with the studio intending [...]

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With anticipation running high for Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln starring Daniel Day-Lewis, which I haven’t yet seen, I can’t help thinking about the best Lincoln movie thus far:  John Ford’s Young Mr. Lincoln starring Henry Fonda.  Instead of a heavy-handed school-lesson biopic laden with “importance,” Ford’s film is a restrained, lyrical, and deeply affecting movie with nothing pretentious or [...]

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