Movie-A-Day #197: Double Indemnity (1944).
Happy birthday to Barbara Stanwyck, who killed it in the highly essential noir “Double Indemnity.” But watch it, fellas. There’s a speed limit in this state – 45 miles per hour.
Movie-A-Day #196: Control (2007).
Ian Curtis of Joy Division would’ve been 55 years old today. Just think about how much richer the world of music could’ve been in the past 30 years if he had been in it. Instead we’ve had to settle for “Control” and New Order.
Movie-A-Day #195: Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (1973).
The notorious outlaw Billy the Kid was finally gunned down by Sheriff Pat Garrett on this date in 1881. The relationship between the two men has been romanticized in folklore and films like Sam Peckinpah’s “Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid,” but as usual reality is much less interesting than mythology. In actuality, the two men had always disliked each other. Also, the real Billy the Kid was pretty ugly.
Movie-A-Day #194: Devil Doll (1964).
This is National Ventriloquism Week, celebrating the disturbing art of making creepy little dolls talk seemingly on their own. No wonder filmmakers, like the creators of “Devil Doll,” like to make them evil.
Movie-A-Day #193: Freaks (1932).
Today marks the birth of director Tod Browning, Hollywood’s earliest master of the macabre. His best films, mostly made with Lon Chaney before Chaney’s early death, weren’t necessarily horror films, but did cover subject matter that was grim and uncomfortable. The closest comparison among today’s filmmakers might be David Cronenberg, or maybe Tim Burton, but with less whimsy and more genuine menace. “Freaks” was his masterwork, but also ultimately his undoing. It’s too bad he didn’t live quite long enough to see its cultural rediscovery in the 1960s and the subsequent reappraisal of him as an important director and not just a washed-up alcoholic.
Desuko Movie Spot. 