TCM Classic Movie Fan Club of LOS ANGELES

01/09/2026

Yesterday Sunday, August 30, I attended my last screening of the Academy Museum Vistavision film series at the David Geffen Theater with a showing of the rarely-seen-in-theaters 1955 movie musical Girl Rush starring Rosalind Russell. I especially wanted to see Girl Rush because it was only one of actress Rosalind Russell's two movie musicals in her entire 50 film career (the other was Gypsy). I was also curious because it was produced by her Broadway and movie producer husband Frederick Brisson.

Out of all honesty. I have to say from an entertainment standpoint that it was the least enjoyable film of the Academy's recent Vistavision series, but nevertheless Rosalind Russell still gave it her all and demonstrated her musical and dance talents. Joining her in the cast was Fernando Lamas, Gloria DeHaven, Eddie Albert, Marion Lorne and chorus dancer George Chakiris. The movie, though very uneven, had great a great comedy plot premise--Rosalind's character Kim Halliday surprisingly discovers that she inherited ownership of a Vegas casino from her late gambler father and flies to Las Vegas with her aunt to assume part ownership only to discover that her dad's still living business partner gambled away both his and her holdings.

I like Rosalind Russell so much that I do not regret seeing this rarely screened film of her's (and might have even just watched her read names out of a phone book--when there were phone books), but with her husband movie producer's Broadway musical pedigree (including the hit shows Damn Yankees and Pajama Game) I would have expected much better songs and less shlockiness--even though the film had decent production values.

Nevertheless, highlights of the film for me included many incredible and breathtaking early actual 1950's exterior neon shots of the early Las Vegas strip plus a memorable appearance of character actress Marion Lorne as Russell's befuddled and often confused, but adorable "Aunt Clara"--a role she later reprised on the popular 1960's TV sitcom Bewitched where apparently that TV show's producers liked her performance in this film so much that they decided to retain her same character name for Bewitched.

Thanks to my good classic movie buff friend Jan M. for treating me to see a film I had not seen before and was not a blockbuster, but still had enough moments and performances to keep me entertained.

31/08/2026

Worth reading on legendary cameraman James Wong Howe...

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1544410151052178&id=100064496240346&mibextid=wwXIfr

29/08/2026

I attended last Monday's Academy Museum Vistavision film series at it's David Geffen Theater with a showing of the rarely-seen-in-theaters 1955 unusual holiday dark comedy We're No Angels in Technicolor starring three normally more gangster/detective oriented actors Humphrey Bogart, Peter Ustinov and Aldo Ray in more lightly comedic roles.

Making this film more interesting was the fact that it was directed by Michael Curtiz--known more for dramas including perhaps his most famous movie Casablanca 1942.

Bogart is the leader of a rag-tag trio of fugitives who escape from the Devil’s Island prison off the coast of French Guiana on Christmas eve.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about this film were its realistic outdoor sets--all of the film was shot on the Paramount lot using elaborate sets inside soundstages. I wouldn't say the movie was spectacular because it was intended to be a much smaller scale film, but it was surprisingly entertaining and enjoyable all the way through and the archival print that was screened was phenomenal (apparently with specially remixed 3 channel stereo).

An interesting sidenote is that Bogart helped revive co-star and actress Joan Bennett's career by by using his influence to have her casted in this film. Joan had apparently been shunned by the movie industry after becoming in the midst of a then major "scandale" when her husband caught her and her talent agent lover together and shot him in his privates (he thankfully survived), though it tarnished her career and she found herself unable to get acting roles until Bogie added his words of encouragement to studio execs. In the 1960's Bennett's fame got further rekindled in the first horror network TV soap opera Dark Shadows of which I was a huge fan.

29/08/2026

I attended last Monday's Academy Museum Vistavision film series at it's David Geffen Theater with a showing of the rarely-seen-in-theaters 1956 movie musical Anything Goes. 

Aside from being Bing Crosby's last film Paramount Studios, I truly didn't know what to expect because I read so many mixed reviews on the film from the time it was released. Then on top of that I learned that the movie only retained some of the most famous songs from the Broadway show and earlier 1936 movie musical with the same name Anything Goes and had also featured Crosby with co-star Ethel Merman

But the 1956 remake was greatly updated with most of the dance being theatrical jazz dance oriented and a whole new plot and characters. The only thing  this version had in common was the inclusion of Crosby and its key original songs by Cole Porter with a blend of new songs by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn.

The movie was way more entertaining than I expected it to be and was definitely brought more to life with the additional lead cast members of Donald O'Connor, Mitzi Gaynor and French dancer/singer Z**i Jeanmaire. I enjoyed the unique mix of musical dance numbers that were integrated into the film--rap, ballet, jazz and avante garde which held the audience's interest and my own.

The Vistavision print was pristine and it was interesting to see the very favorable reaction from a modern day audience of a lesser known, but highly entertaining, non-MGM Technicolor movie musical.  I would actually give it 4 stars out of 5.
https://youtu.be/yQ_sOZ9FdFU?is=NRtYkfzCNSCVmKJ6

24/08/2026

TCM Classic Movie Fan Club of Los Angeles--RSVP Policy Request:

If you're interested in attending any of our local LA area screening outings or events, please ALWAYS RSVP beforehand to organizer Jono with your full name and contact phone number at [email protected]

After having moved from Meetup to Facebook both apps work differently and we want to be able to track when our members do attend. That also gives the possibility of meeting before or after a screening for coffee or a drink to discuss the movie we saw. Thanks for your participation and cooperation!

Find our LOS ANGELES area classic film buff club on Facebook at...
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100068388545466&mibextid=wwXIfr&mibextid=wwXIfr

23/08/2026

I attended last night's (Friday) showing of the 1957 Gunfight At The OK Corral as part of the Academy Museum's impressive end of summer Vistavision widescreen film series. The huge audience turnout was impressive for a 1957 western themed film. Although the movie was projected both vividly and sharply, very disappointingly nothing was told to the audience about the 35mm print that was shown. So afterwards I approached various academy staff and received a lot of conflicting information. One supposedly knowledgeable staff member claimed the print was an original archived print from 1957, while another claimed that Paramount struck a new 35mm Vistavision format print when the film was restored in 2009.

The other major let down was that the movie was presented only with monaural behind-the-screen sound, but throughout the duration of the entire film there were very loud periodic and disruptive pop sounds coming from the side speakers in the auditorium, so I suspect that despite installing original Vistavision projectors they unfortunately did not equip the auditorium with the coinciding Perspecta Sound equipment.

Paramount Studios devised Vistavision to be able to utilize 35mm film for it's widescreen movie releases. The 35 mm film was run horizontally through projectors instead of vertically which allowed two adjacent frames to be used for every screen image providing more density and clarity of the film's image without having to resort to using more costly 70mm film stock. To further reduce costs, instead of using magnetic striped film prints for four stereo channels (as Fox did with Cinemascope prints), Paramount resorted to the original mono optical track, but added a special device that would periodically send the sound to different zones of the theater auditorium to simulate stereo.

My guess is that the very loud annoying disruptive pop sounds last night may have actually been electronic signals intended to cue the Perspecta Sound equipment of which use was disappointedly omitted for at least last night's showing of Gunfight At The OK Corral. I have a feeling somebody out there in the social media universe might know more about all of this, so I will look forward to hopefully hearing follow up comments.

My understanding is that the Academy is using the same refurbished original Vistavision equipment from over 60 years ago that Quentin Tarantino temporarily had installed at his Vista Theater for the special engagement of the newly shot in Vistavision 2025 film One Battle After Another. But my understanding is that for that particular special release they ran a separate synchronized audio recording so that film could have modern day, state-of-the-art stereo which I am not sure the Academy's projection team took into consideration for its current series of vintage Vistavision movies--at least for those titles being shown from 35mm Vistavision prints.

22/08/2026

As some of you may know, I worked at 20th Century Fox studios in the late 1980s in television distribution. At that time the studio had a number of longtime employees who were revered almost as family members and had worked at Fox for literally decades. With my fascination of movie history, I had the pleasure to get to know and learn so many interesting stories about the studio's past from a number of these employees.

From various assessments, Marilyn as an actress was complicated, she was not the dumb blonde she often portrayed, she was smart and strong willed, but also vulnerable from her earlier life experiences including the period of her childhood when her mother suffered from mental illness and she lived at the Hollygrove Orphanage near Paramount Studios.

One of those people I was blessed to meet and get to know was the late Lee Hannah who had been one of studio head Darryl Zanuck's secretaries--before later working for filmmaker Joseph Mankiewicz, producer Ernest Lehman and eventually Darryl Zanuck's son director Richard Zanuck. I heard so many interesting stories from Lee including about Marilyn Monroe-- though don't have time to share them at this moment.

Another was James Blakely, a very dapper man who always dressed in stylish suits, ties and occasional ascots. His career began as an actor after being discovered in a New York nightclub by Columbia Pictures studio head Harry Cohn. He was married to a beautiful 1930's film actress named Mary Carlisle who appeared in a number of Bing Crosby films. But after World War II broke out, he swiched gears and became a military training pilot. Then after World War II, his wife's uncle and prominent film editor Grant Whytlock helped get him back into the film business door as a film editor trainee.

Blakely was an apprentice film editor at 20th Century Fox in the 1950's, but he was assigned the daunting task (though sadly uncredited) of editing the now infamous Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend production number in the 1953 Marilyn Monroe movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. He told me that although Marilyn glowed on screen and was a true Hollywood icon, that she could at times become too distracted and was not always the best at remembering lines or dance steps. What is interesting is that scene from the film is now considered a major precursor to modern day movies often being shot and edited at a much more rapid pace than any of the Hollywood movies before it. In fact, the one influence on the faster editing pace of modern day feature films were music videos--but particularly the 1984 Madonna music video Material Girl whose director and editor both attributed their inspiration to the Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend sequence from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

Jim told me when he edited "Diamonds" that he was not trying to reinvent the wheel or change the longtime movie editing process, but that in order to make that scene work on screen, he was forced to join together small fragments of film in such a way to work with the music and natural rhythm of the scene. He said Marilyn had increasing difficulty working with the film's choreographer (Jack Cole) and ultimately the director (Howard Hawks) who was practically forced to tediously have Marilyn take a couple of steps then cut and then take another few steps then cut. Blakely said at the time he nearly had a nervous breakdown trying to assemble all of that extensive film footage together in such a way that seemed to flow for movie viewers, but he eventually was able to and that one movie scene has inspired countless generations of both film directors and movie editors to this very day.

When I met Jim in the late 80's he must have been in his early 70s, but after years of later editing some of Fox's hit TV shows such as Batman and MASH, he wanted to continue working, so to keep him busy he was tasked with editing new feature films to remove questionable content for various airline passenger showings--that is when I knew him. Around that same time he was teaching film editing classes at night at UCLA--one of which I attended in the final days of film editing when moviolas were still being used and film was meticulously cut by hand before the entire film editing process was shifted to video and then digital. But I recall him being asked at his UCLA class about his most famous edited film scene from "Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend"--and he said at the time he never anticipated anything he did would have any bearing on the history of film editing and he was just trying to finish that job so he would continue getting paid and be assigned other studio editing work. Jim is in film heaven now, he died in 2007 when he was 93 years old, but left his mark on film production without ever realizing it.

There is a new book on choreographer Jack Cole (including his extensive work with Marilyn Monroe named Jazzed by dance critic and writer Debra Levine which I highly recommend.

Below for comparison are two weblinks: Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend with Marilyn from 1953 and Material Girl 30 years later with Madonna from 1984...

https://youtu.be/H69qXOHVS04?is=3bn0e3w89J8fBpIJ

https://youtu.be/6p-lDYPR2P8?is=fd9jcM3wME9eg7cf

22/08/2026

Last Wednesday night I attended a rare theatrical screening at the Royal Theater in West L.A. of Marilyn Monroe's very last feature film Let's Make Love directed by the legendary George Cukor and co-starring Yves Montand. Believe it or not it is the one Marilyn movie that I had never seen before--not even on TCM.

To be honest, I certainly knew about the movie, but it is probably her only film that has not been periodically shown in movie theaters. Over the years I may have caught a scene or two of it on TV, but surprisingly had never seen the entire movie. Perhaps I subconsciously had not wanted to see it because of hearing various film buffs comments over the years mentioning it was difficult watching Marilyn on film after she was starting to decline (due to divorce, emotional issues, drug problems, etc.) However, a classic movie fan acquaintance of mine named Debra Levine just wrote a marvelous book on the history of film choreographer Jack Cole who was a key figure in Marilyn's on screen development and she was invited to introduce Let's Make Love in person, so I made sure to attend this rare screening. Debra herself was a former professional dancer earlier in her career, but now is more widely known as an established dance critic and editor of the Arts Meme--a popular online review of the arts world including dance, art, film and more.

Jack Cole was a huge influence in Marilyn Monroe's on screen life and was with her for much of her luminous movie career beginning with Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and with her until this very last released film Let's Make Love. According to Debra, he was actually responsible for her many film characterizations--how she walked, how she talked and general body movements--not just danced.

But Cole's film choreography and magic was not limited to Marilyn or movies, he also was involved with Broadway shows and also worked closely with Betty Grable and particularly Gwen Verdon. The Museum Of Modern Art in New York defined Cole as one of the most influential figures in 20th century dance and yet somehow sadly he got overshadowed by Bob Fosse, Jerome Robbins, Gower Champion, Busby Berkeley and others which Debra's new book Jazzed finally attempts to correct. If you have a chance pick up the book or you might be able to read excerpts of it online.

19/08/2026

WIDE SCREEN VISTAVISION--In 1954 Paramount Studios created their own unique wide screen format that was intended to compete with 20th Century Fox's Cinemascope and also the advent of 70mm presentation which was usually reserved for roadshow engagements of selected Hollywood movies and also integrated 6 track multichannel stereo.

The Vistavision process utilized existing 35mm film, but instead of being run vertically through movie theater projectors, the process introduced special projectors that could run the 35mm film horizontally and essentially utilize 2 adjoined frames of film to project a wider film image with more depth, brightness and clarity. Such imagery was superior to standard vertically projected 35mm film, but was cheaper for the studio to produce and easier and less expensive for movie theater operators to screen--in comparison to 70mm film stock. The only sacrifice was with the process's audio track. To save money rather than use 4-track magnetic striping on 35mm film prints (as was used on many 35mm Cinemascope prints) or 6-track magnetic used for 70mm, Paramount opted to use a type of synthetic stereo called Perspecta Sound that would utilize the print's optical track then directionally shift sound to specific speakers around the theater auditorium to simulate a stereo effect. However, there were only about 100 movies produced and actually screened in true Vistavision from 1954 to 1961.

Over the past couple of years, two Hitchcock films that were filmed in Vistavision--the 1958 Vertigo and 1959 North By Northwest--were each restored in new prints retaining their original Vistavision aspect ratio and remixed in stereo, but at that time Vistavision projectors were not known to still readily exist, so they were adapted to 70mm prints.

But in 2025, after more than 60 years (the last major Vistavision film One Eyed Jacks was released in 1961) acclaimed filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson decided to shoot his highly anticipated movie One Battle After Another in the original Vistavision format. The only challenge was that after so many years, only a handful of original Vistavision 35mm projectors remained in existence, so only a select few theaters around the country were able to screen the film in its proper format (including Quentin Tarentino's Vista Theater in Silverlake that installed restored Vistavision projectors temporarily for that sepcial engagement).

Now this summer, the Academy Museum has announced that it will be dedicating a special film series PRESENTED IN VISTAVISION from only August 20-31, 2026 at the most state-of-the-art movie theater in the world--its own David Geffen Theater. They are temporarily installing actual Vistavision projection equipment for this series which will be used to project a selected roster of archival films that can still be shown in their original 35mm Vistavision (it will be interesting to see if they also use Paramount's directional Perspecta Sound). However, other films will still be projected in their original Vistavision aspect ration even if shown from remastered 70mm film prints or restored digital files. (I only wish their list included the 1957 Paramount classic WIld Is The Wind and 1958 St. Louis Blues--both which were in Vistavision).

I will be soon adding to our group screening schedule some of the actual screenings of films from original 35mm Vistavision film prints plus one or two others. The only handicap about attending screenings at the Academy Museum is the parking challenge. If you unknowingly park in the museum's underground parking lot the fee is $24. On weekend days 9am-8pm a cheaper alternate is the Onyx Tower at 6100 Wilshire where with validation the rate is only $10. With the new Fairfax subway stop, depending on where you live, it might be easier and cheaper to take one of the subway lines. But in any case, you are encouraged to enjoy the entire series and attend other showings as well listed on the Academy Museum's website at

The Academy Museum celebrates VistaVision with an 11-day series of ultra-rare prints, 70mm remasters, and new 6K digital scans, screening in the David Geffen Theater August 20–31, 2026.

19/08/2026

The other night, late on the TCM schedule, for my first time I watched the 1961 Rosalind Russell/Alec Guiness movie A Majority Of One. Although the film definitely has a few flaws related to the industry consciousness at the time it was produced, I still very much enjoyed Russell's acting and the heart she instilled her "Jewish mother" character. The hardest part of the film was seeing actor Alec Guiness portray the Japanese lead character with heavy makeup that made his eyes more Asian shaped. Sadly, for too many decades, the entertainment industry often casted ethnic characters with actors outside of such ethnicity. Luckily, this is no longer the present day norm.

I was also fascinated to discover that A Majority Of One was directed by Mervyn LeRoy who produced the Wizard Of Oz and directed a number of high profile movies. Unfortunately, I do not think this title is yet available for on demand streaming on Amazon Prime or Apple TV, as of today this film is only available when shown on TCM or if you purchase a DVD off Amazon. But in any case I think it has good enough moments that make A Majority Of One worth seeing!