And...we're done. The first twenty-four films and twenty-three years have been covered, and things do seem to be improving from an artistic perspective. Do I always agree with the Academy's choices from an artistic point of view? Not really, but nothing is nearly as bad as Cimarron, and there does seem to be a consistent… Continue reading So Ends the second section of Best Pictures…
Category: Best Picture Winner
All About Eve
A witty, sometimes vicious look at an intergenerational rivalry between two actresses and the social circle around them, one rising and the other falling, All About Eve is a movie about actors that is a showcase for its actors, leading to five acting nominations (the only one who won was the sole man nominated, which… Continue reading All About Eve
All the King’s Men
There's an interesting bit of behind the scenes information about Robert Rossen's All the King's Men, the adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Robert Penn Warren. After scripting, filming, and an initial cut, Rossen's movie was coming to 250 minutes in length. Harry Cohn, Columbia's studio head, was happy to release the film… Continue reading All the King’s Men
Hamlet (1948)
Making a movie from Shakespeare is kind of cheating, isn't it? Laurence Olivier, fresh off of his success of bringing Henry V to the screen in 1947, ended up zeroing in on Hamlet as his follow up (Orson Welles' long in the works pair of adaptations of Macbeth and Othello apparently helped affect Olivier's thinking),… Continue reading Hamlet (1948)
Gentleman’s Agreement
This is not drama. It's really not. It's polemic with elements of drama inelegantly hanging over different parts here and there in an effort to make it look like drama, wearing a drama suit that doesn't fit. This is didacticism at its most forceful, obvious, one-sided, earnest, and well-meaning, taking a fight for a good… Continue reading Gentleman’s Agreement
David Vining, Author 