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The 1st Academy Awards ceremony took place 95 years ago, on May 16, 1929. There were only 12 categories at the inaugural Oscars, three of which were permanently discontinued the following year. Wings was the very first movie to win Best Picture, then called Outstanding Picture, at the Oscars.

12 lucky individuals and movies won the very first Oscars 95 years ago at the 1st Academy Awards. The 2024 Oscars on Sunday, March 10, 2024, are just around the corner. With a stacked lineup of 2024 Oscar nominees across all categories, the 96th Academy Awards are sure to be an exciting night. The award show may be a grand spectacle now, but the very first Oscars, which took place on May 16, 1929, before the ceremony and the awards themselves were ever colloquially known as "Oscars," was a much more lowkey affair.

The 1st Academy Awards ceremony, which honored films released between August 1, 1927, and July 31, 1928, was hosted by Academy President Douglas Fairbanks...

Where to Watch Powered by Wings, a 1927 film, features an impressive dolly shot achieved through creative tricks and careful choreography of extras, showcasing the skills of cinematographers before the invention of the Steadicam. The dolly shot in Wings proves that high-tech equipment and post-production tricks are not always necessary for visually impressive shots, highlighting the importance of practical filmmaking techniques. Director William A. Wellman went to great lengths to achieve not only the dolly shot but also the aerial and battle sequences in Wings, making it a groundbreaking film for its time with scenes depicting nudity and same-sex relationships.

Filming techniques and technology have come a long way, making “impossible” shots a lot easier to make, either practically or in post-production, but one 1927 movie still has one of the greatest shots in cinema history, almost 100 years after its release. Silent films were key in the development of cinema and its techniques,...

Margia Dean, who co-starred in the cult sci-fi classic The Quatermass Xperiment and appeared alongside the likes of Clint Eastwood, Vincent Price, Esther Williams and George Reeves in other movies, has died. She was 101.

Dean died June 23 in her apartment in Rancho Cucamonga, California, her niece Denyse Barr told The Hollywood Reporter.

From 1948-56, Dean worked in about 20 features for producer Robert L. Lippert, founder of the B-movie studio Lippert Pictures, thus earning the nickname “The Queen of Lippert.”

She acted for Sam Fuller in two of those films, the first two features he ever directed, in fact — I Shot Jesse James (1949), in which she portrayed a saloon singer, and the Price-starring The Baron of Arizona (1950).

Based on a popular BBC serial, Hammer Films’ The Quatermass Xperiment (1956), directed by Val Guest and starring Brian Donlevy, told the story of an astronaut (Richard Wordsworth) who crash-lands back on Earth and...

The French Alps in VistaVision and Technicolor really sell this inspirational thriller. Spencer Tracy stars is the utterly ethical mountaineer, and young Robert Wagner his venal, verminous, just plain no damn good younger brother. Make that Much younger. Edward Dmytryk directs for big dimensions and strong emotions, and Paramount’s remaster makes the special effects of the mountain climb look good again. It’s a morality tale pitched at grade school level, and one of Tracy’s better late-career pictures. With Anna Kashfi as a plane crash victim deserving of rescue, and William Demarest as a French priest with a Preston Sturges accent.

The Mountain

Region Free Blu-ray

Viavision [Imprint] #198

1956 / Color / 1:78 widescreen (VistaVision) / 105 min. / Street Date February 22, 2023 / Available from [Imprint] / Aud 34.98

Starring: Spencer Tracy, Robert Wagner, Claire Trevor, William Demarest, Barbara Darrow, Richard Arlen, E.G. Marshall, Anna Kashfi, Richard Garrick, Harry Townes.

Cinematography: Franz Planer

Costume Designer: Edith Head

Art Director: Hal Pereira,...

After Paramount’s “Top Gun: Maverick” soared with both critics and audiences last year it scored with the academy last month earning six Oscar nominations including Best Picture. The Tom Cruise blockbuster is in a dogfight for this top award with the likes of “Everything Everywhere All At Once,” “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “The Fabelmans” and “The Banshees of Inisherin.”

Turning the clock back over nine decades, the very first Best Picture winner in Oscars history was another high-flying Paramount release, 1927’s “Wings,” which also claimed the prize for best engineering effects. Directed by 30-year-old World War I vet William A. Wellman, who was snubbed, “Wings” revolves around two young smalltown men Jack (Charles “Buddy” Rogers) and David to compete against legions of other fans plus our experts and editors for best prediction accuracy scores. See our latest prediction champs. Can you top our esteemed leaderboards next? Always remember...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) has, ever since 1927, been giving out awards to the best movies, directors, actors, and other artisans throughout the industry. Or at least, they've been giving awards to the ones that can win an annual popularity contest.

Say what you will about the Oscars and their credibility — they were, after all, invented to bust unions, not celebrate the art of cinema — but for nearly 100 years they have done a great job of raising the visibility of motion pictures which, on a long enough timeline, were otherwise destined to fade into obscurity. For every "Casablanca" or "Titanic," blockbuster films that have seemingly permanently invaded the public consciousness, there's a "Cavalcade" or a "The Greatest Show on Earth," which haven't made nearly as much of a cultural footprint, and which are more likely to be seen by modern audiences specifically because they won the Best Picture Oscar,...

After the success of Dracula in early 1931, several studios large and small rushed into production on their own macabre features. With the early thirties being the depths of the Great Depression, these studios were eager to make films on low budgets that could turn large profits. As has continued to be the case even to this day, horror films were the prime candidate. Besides Universal, the studio with one of the strongest track records in the genre during this time was Paramount. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) had been a financial and critical success, winning its star Frederic March an Academy Award for his dual role. The studio decided to return to the well of literature for its follow-up, adapting H.G. Wells’ The Island of Dr. Moreau into Island of Lost Souls (1932), which remains an important and effective example of early science fiction/horror.

The film stars Charles Laughton as Dr.

It’s a collection of 6 — count ’em Six — horror and sci-fi curiosities from the ’40s and ’50s, aimed straight at covetous fantasy film addicts. Wacky scripts, strange characterizations and poverty row production values are on view, but the fine transfers reveal professional cinematography and occasional impressive direction. The films are definitely of their time — the censor-inhibited 1940s pictures rely on spooky situations because they can’t show blood or too much violence. And a pair of low-end B&w ‘scope thrillers from the ‘fifties drive-in era do more with less, cutting corners in interesting ways. Viavision anoints the shows with expert commentaries and a couple of real surprises: an entire extra feature and a rare 1950s TV show.

Silver Screams Cinema

Region-Free Blu-ray

Return of the Ape Man, The Phantom Speaks, The Vampire’s Ghost, Valley of the Zombies, She Devil, The Unknown Terror

Viavision [Imprint] 54, 55, 56

1944-1957 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen...

This ‘dawn of sound’ classic from Josef Sternberg is an important early entry in the gangster genre, a romanticized tale of urban crime with little violence but a full measure of romantic revenge. Star George Bancroft is the title underworld kingpin, who risks everything to hold his girlfriend Fay Wray the way he holds onto power — with his fists and with his gun. The highly sentimental story has some odd ideas about prison rules on Death Row; although packed with ‘Sternbergian’ touches the visuals aren’t as overtly poetic as is his norm. It’s an interesting study from the first year of ‘all talkie’ pictures: the audio is highly creative but the dialogue delivery is slow — perfect for anyone learning English!

Thunderbolt

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1929 / B&w / 1:20 Movietone (?) / 85 min. / Street Date July 20, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: George Bancroft, Fay Wray, Richard Arlen, Tully Marshall, Eugenie Besserer, James Spottswood,...

"Wtf Value"

By Raymond Benson

Only serious film history aficionados and perhaps viewers of Turner Classic Movies will be aware that there was once a live-action version of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland adapted by Hollywood in the early pre-code years. It was released in 1933 by Paramount and directed by Norman Z. McLeod, the guy who had helmed the Marx Brothers’ comedies Monkey Business (1931) and Horse Feathers (1932). McLeod would go on to make such titles as It’s a Gift (1934), Topper (1937), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947), and The Paleface (1948).

The production of Alice in 1933 boasts a screenplay by none other than heavyweights Joseph L. Mankiewicz and William Cameron Menzies, the man behind Things to Come and a production designer whose hands were all over Hollywood and British productions over the next two decades. The script also borrows heavily from the popular and then-current stage production written by Eva La Gallienne and Florida Friebus,...

Article by Sam Moffitt

I have a personal connection to World War One combat aviation, a personal and family connection. My Uncle Millard Brooks, my maternal Grand Father’s (Eli Brook’s) brother and my mother’s uncle, volunteered for the American Expeditionary Force (Aef) when America finally got off the fence and committed troops to what was then called The Great War or the War to End all Wars

Uncle Millard had worked in Grandpa Brook’s blacksmith shop, at the crucial time when blacksmithing (shoeing horses and other work with iron) was giving way to mechanical work (repairing the engines in Model T Fords and other early automobiles).

I’ll give you the short version of Uncle Millard’s story Millard Brooks was such a good mechanic he was sent to a special school in Scotland to learn how to time the engines on the bi planes when...

As the first wave of ‘adult’ westerns began to fade, 1959 gave us a burst of genuinely adult stories about the famed lawless towns of the frontier. Henry Fonda is at his moody best in a replay of his earlier Wyatt Earp, de-mythologized as just one more self-oriented opportunist in a land where even lawmen have an angle to play. But Fonda’s gun skills are impressive, and his deadly Clay Blaisedell is halfway to becoming the soulless ‘Frank’ from Once Upon a Time in The West. Edward Dmytryk almost rights his capsized directing career, and Robert Alan Aurthur’s screenplay delivers both an intense drama, & great gunslinging action.

Warlock

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1959 / Colo / 2:35 widescreen / 122 min. / Street Date May 21, 2019 / Available from Twilight Time Movies / 29.95

Starring: Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda, Anthony Quinn, Dorothy Malone, Dolores Michaels, Wallace Ford, Tom Drake, Richard Arlen, DeForest Kelley, Frank Gorshin, Vaughn Taylor, Don Beddoe, Whit Bissell,...

The critical consensus about Howard Hawks' themes and talents strikes me as bang on. The Cahiers critics identified him as a classic auteur, continually exploring characters and situations he had an affinity for, and in a consistent style. The surprise is it took so long for style and characters to come together to form the Hawks we know: his best early films are outliers, and only gradually did he come to explore the kind of group dynamics, sexual sparring and codes of professionalism with which he's now justly associated.Early 1930s Hawks just isn't quite all there yet, but you can see lots of Hawksian characters and themes struggling to come together and be their ideal selves.This one has Edward G. Robinson as a "Portagee" fisherman with a Chico Marx accent and an earring. For some reason, Hawks didn't really connect effectively with the urban tough guy actors until Bogart came his way,...

A happy discovery! This is a major late- silent-era gem on the order of Von Sternberg’s Docks of New York — a special treat that will please fans of director William Wellman — he revisited parts of it in a later talkie. It’s also a key movie in our education/adoration of the maverick actress Louise Brooks, the erotic sensation too hot and too independent for Hollywood.

Beggars of Life

Blu-ray

Kino Classics

1928 / B&W / 1:33 Silent Aperture / 81 min. / Street Date August 22, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Wallace Beery, Richard Arlen, Louise Brooks, Blue Washington, Roscoe Karns, Robert Perry, Guinn ‘Bog Boy’ Williams.

Cinematography: Henry Gerrard

Film Editor: Alyson Shaffer

Assistant Director: Charles Barton

Music: The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

Written by Jim Tully and Benjamin Glazer from a novel by Jim Tully

Produced by Jesse L. Lasky, Adolph Zukor, William A. Wellman

Directed by William A. Wellman

Director...

“Hello Yank, welcome to a very merry little war. And now how about a wee drop for the King and Uncle Sam?”

The 1927 silent classic Wings will screen at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium (470 East Lockwood) April 14th at 7:30pm. Wings will be accompanied by an original score by the Prima Vista Quartet. Tickets are $10.00

Ticket information can be found Here

http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2844369

In 1927, the first Best Picture Oscar went to Wings, a thrilling silent WW1 drama from director William S. Wellman. Wings told the story of poor boy Jack (Charles Rogers) and rich boy David (Richard Arlen) who are in love with the same woman, which causes the two to become bitter enemies. When WW1 breaks out the two are thrown together and quickly become friends, although David is too nice to let Jack know that the girl back home doesn’t love him. Clara Bow...

A Tribute to King Kong takes place as part of the The St. Louis International Film Festival Sunday, Nov. 6 beginning at 6:00pm at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium. The first film screened will be the new documentary Long Live The King, which explores the enduring fascination with one of the biggest stars — both literally and figuratively — in Hollywood history: the mighty King Kong. Produced and directed by Frank Dietz and Trish Geiger, the creative team behind the award-winning “Beast Wishes,” the documentary devotes primary attention to the 1933 classic, celebrating the contributions of filmmakers Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, stars Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, and Bruce Cabot, writer Edgar Wallace, and especially stop-motion innovator Willis O’Brien. But Kong’s legacy is also fully detailed: the sequel “Son of Kong,” the cinematic kin “Mighty Joe Young,” the Dino DeLaurentis and Peter Jackson remakes, even the Japanese versions by Toho Studios.

Women suffrage movie 'Mothers of Men': Dorothy Davenport becomes a judge and later State Governor in socially conscious thriller about U.S. women's voting rights. Women suffrage movie 'Mothers of Men': Will women's right to vote lead to the destruction of The American Family? Directed by and featuring the now all but forgotten Willis Robards, Mothers of Men – about women suffrage and political power – was a fast-paced, 64-minute buried treasure screened at the 2016 San Francisco Silent Film Festival, held June 2–5. I thoroughly enjoyed being taken back in time by this 1917 socially conscious drama that dares to ask the question: “What will happen to the nation if all women have the right to vote?” One newspaper editor insists that women suffrage would mean the destruction of The Family. Women, after all, just did not have the capacity for making objective decisions due to their emotional composition. It...

Coleen Gray in 'The Sleeping City' with Richard Conte. Coleen Gray after Fox: B Westerns and films noirs (See previous post: “Coleen Gray Actress: From Red River to Film Noir 'Good Girls'.”) Regarding the demise of her Fox career (the year after her divorce from Rod Amateau), Coleen Gray would recall for Confessions of a Scream Queen author Matt Beckoff: I thought that was the end of the world and that I was a total failure. I was a mass of insecurity and depended on agents. … Whether it was an 'A' picture or a 'B' picture didn't bother me. It could be a Western movie, a sci-fi film. A job was a job. You did the best with the script that you had. Fox had dropped Gray at a time of dramatic upheavals in the American film industry: fast-dwindling box office receipts as a result of competition from television,...

Los Angeles' Bendix Building. Photo by Jordan Cronk.The bats have left the bell towerThe victims have been bled Red velvet lines the black boxBela Lugosi's dead —BauhausBela-Bonkers Brit Bloke Brazenly Boosts Bendix-Building Black Bandana!In the annals of Los Angeles crime, it was hardly an episode to titillate James Ellroy. Was it even really a crime? I was on the short stairwell that connects the 11th—the top—floor of the Bendix Building, a Garment District block on the corner of Maple St and 12th St, when I spotted the square of white-patterned black cotton. Into my pocket it rapidly went, compensation for the fact that my quest for rooftop access had been stymied. An orange plastic sign across the door up ahead, warning (bluffing?) of alarms that would ring out if opened, dissuaded further progress. I wasn't too disheartened—my unplanned visit to the Bendix Building had yielded sufficient delights.

“We’ll give him more than chains. He’s always been king of his world, but we’ll teach him fear. We’re millionaires, boys. I’ll share it with all of you. Why, in a few months, it’ll be up in lights on Broadway: Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World!”

King Kong screens at Schlafly Bottleworks (7260 Southwest Ave.- at Manchester – Maplewood, Mo 63143) Thursday, May 7th at 7pm. It is a benefit for Helping Kids Together

Doors open at 6:30pm. $6 suggested for the screening. A yummy variety of food from Schlafly’s kitchen is available as are plenty of pints of their famous home-brewed suds. A bartender will be on hand to take care of you. “Culture Shock” is the name of a film series here in St. Louis that is the cornerstone project of a social enterprise that is an ongoing source of support for Helping Kids Together (http://www.

“Hello Yank, welcome to a very merry little war. And now how about a wee drop for the King and Uncle Sam?”

The 1927 silent classic Wings will screen at 2pm on Sunday March 8th at the St. Louis Scottish Rite Cathedral Auditorium (3633 Lindell Blvd, St. Louis, Mo 63108) with live organ music by Dr. Marvin Faulwell.

In 1927, the first Best Picture Oscar went to Wings, a thrilling silent WW1 drama from director William S. Wellman. Wings told the story of poor boy Jack (Charles Rogers) and rich boy David (Richard Arlen) who are in love with the same woman, which causes the two to become bitter enemies. When WW1 breaks out the two are thrown together and quickly become friends, although David is too nice to let Jack know that the girl back home doesn’t love him. Clara Bow plays the girl who is madly in love with Jack but...

There are numerous underrated or forgotten horror classics from yesteryear. While many will rewatch great classics like Frankenstein and Dracula, few will attempt to look much further. One such “lost” movie is the horror classic, The Island Of Lost Souls starring the inimitable, Charles Laughton as the cold, soulless Victor Frankenstein-like Dr. Moreau. As the star of this movie, Laughton is amazing but it’s the darkness that quietly impresses. A horror film noir, its shadows and blackness create a mood that is sinister in all aspects. The movie is perfect in black and white. Genre fans should occasionally “cleanse their palates” of modern horror and CGI to appreciate the older foundations of the genre.

In this movie adaptation of H.G. Wells 1896 book, The Island Of Dr. Moreau, Edward Parker (played by Richard Arlen), our hero, is floating on the sea after an unseen shipwreck. He is rescued by...

Dubbed the last great silent film, William A. Wellman's 1927 action-packed epic is a simple story of friendship, love and rivalry set against the colossal backdrop of the First World War. Featuring some of the most incredible aerial battles ever committed to film, Wings remains a bona fide cinematic spectacle to this day, thanks in large part to a gorgeous new restoration.Small town lad Jack (Charles "Buddy" Rogers) is infatuated with city girl Sylvia (Jobyna Ralston), unaware that she has pledged her devotion to his best friend, David (Richard Arlen), heir to the town's richest family. When war breaks out, both men enlist in the air corps, with Jack mistakenly believing Sylvia is in love with him. He also fails to realise that Mary (Clara...

[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...

(William A Wellman, 1927; Eureka!, PG)

In the mid-20s, Hollywood's movie moguls were always on the lookout for grand projects to head their annual schedules, and in 1926 Paramount (then the major studio) bought Wings, a Great War flying story by John Monk Saunders. A wartime training instructor who, to his enduring chagrin, never got to France, Saunders devoted his Hollywood career to flying movies, creating what became a dominant adventure genre of the 30s. A little-known B-movie director, William A Wellman, was hired as director because of his active service as a pilot in the war, and the film was shot in Texas with the Us army providing 220 planes and hundreds of skilled extras.

A mixture of melodrama, sentimental romance and heavy-handed comedy, Wings was superbly choreographed with skilfully photographed stunt flying and aerial combat. It tells the tale of two small-town boys (Richard Arlen, Charles Rogers) undergoing flight training...

Article by Tom Stockman

The big guy once known as ‘The 8th Wonder of the World’ is celebrating his 80th birthday. A landmark accomplishment in cinema and fantasy, King Kong still holds the power to astonish and inspire, so in honor of its 80 years, here’s a look at the movie’s groundbreaking production and significant legacy.

Carl Denham, who brought Kong from Skull Island to New York, was an adventurous, globe-hopping filmmaker and the same was true of Merian C. Cooper, the mastermind behind the movie King Kong. Born in 1893, Cooper had been an aviator and hero in the First World War. He began his movie career in the mid-1920s at Paramount Pictures where he teamed up with Ernest B. Schoedsack, a pioneering motion picture photographer and news cameraman who would become his filmmaking partner. Their first successes were a pair of ambitious anthropological documentaries inspired by the...

Following the success of Fox' "Planet Of The Apes", Warner Bros. has confirmed development of a new feature adapting author H.G. Wells' horror novel, "The Island Of Dr. Moreau", focusing on human/animal hybrids, for Appian Way partners Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Davisson Killoran.

Screenplay is by Lee Shipman and Brian McGreevy ("Hemlock Grove"). Appian Way will produce with Mad Hatter Entertainment’s Michael Connolly.

Published in 1896, as "an exercise in youthful blasphemy", the original book is narrated by 'Edward Prendick', a shipwrecked man rescued by a passing boat who is left on the island home of 'Doctor Moreau', who creates human-like beings from animals via vivisection.The novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature.

At the time of novel's publication in 1896, there was growing discussion in Europe regarding degeneration and animal vivisection. Two years...

Mary Boland movies: Scene-stealing actress has her ‘Summer Under the Stars’ day on TCM Turner Classic Movies will dedicate the next 24 hours, Sunday, August 4, 2013, not to Lana Turner, Lauren Bacall, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Esther Williams, or Bette Davis — TCM’s frequent Warner Bros., MGM, and/or Rko stars — but to the marvelous scene-stealer Mary Boland. A stage actress who was featured in a handful of movies in the 1910s, Boland came into her own as a stellar film supporting player in the early ’30s, initially at Paramount and later at most other Hollywood studios. First, the bad news: TCM’s "Summer Under the Stars" Mary Boland Day will feature only two movies from Boland’s Paramount period: the 1935 Best Picture Academy Award nominee Ruggles of Red Gap, which TCM has shown before, and one TCM premiere. So, no rarities like Secrets of a Secretary, Mama Loves Papa, Melody in Spring,...

Wings, Dr. Strangelove: Film preservation and ‘Amazing Tales from the Archives’ (photo: Charles ‘Buddy’ Rogers, Clara Bow, Richard Arlen in William A. Wellman’s Wings) The 2012 San Francisco Silent Film Festival’s edition of "Amazing Tales from the Archives" was perhaps the weakest of the series to date. In the past, they have done a wonderful job demonstrating the excitement of finding lost films and footage, assembling them together, preserving and restoring them. This installment revolved around the "Digital Age," and did not concentrate only on silent film. The reconstruction of William A. Wellman’s Wings (1927), the first Best Picture (or "Best Production") Academy Award winner, was a familiar story of how an old film print could be dusted off and used for the production of a Digital Cinema Package. By now, we all are aware of the importance of film preservation, which is part detective work and part modern technology.

For years now Island Of Lost Souls has been DVD’s most glaring omission from the Golden Age of Horror. It won the Rondo Award several times for Film Most in Need of DVD Released or Restoration , but last October, classic horror fans rejoiced when Criterion finally released the film. They were not disappointed and this year, not surprisingly, Island Of Lost Souls won the Rondo for Best Classic DVD.

Island Of Lost Souls (1932), the first adaption of H.G.Well’s 1896 novel The Island of Dr. Moreau was one several shocking horror films from the early 30′s that helped advance the enforcement of the Hays Code, Hollywood’s self-censoring rules deeming “no picture shall be produced that will lower the moral standards of those who see it.”. It wasn’t Island Of Lost Souls’s radical scenes of horror (like Freaks) or the deviant sexuality (like the Frederick March version of Dr.

Gone With The Wind Actress Ann Rutherford Dies. [Photo: Ann Rutherford as Carreen O'Hara, Evelyn Keyes as Suellen O'Hara in Gone with the Wind.]

Ann Rutherford‘s most notable screen roles were in films made away from both MGM and Wallace Beery. She was a young woman who falls for trumpeter George Montgomery in Archie Mayo’s 20th Century Fox musical Orchestra Wives (1942), and became enmeshed with (possibly) amnesiac Tom Conway in Anthony Mann’s Rko thriller Two O’Clock Courage (1945).

Following a couple of minor supporting roles — in the Danny Kaye comedy The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947) at Goldwyn and the Errol Flynn costumer The Adventures of Don Juan (1948) at Warner Bros. — and the female lead in the independently made cattle drama Operation Haylift (1950), opposite Bill Williams, Ann Rutherford retired from the screen. (Rutherford would later say that her Operation Haylift experience was anything but pleasant.)

She then turned to television, making regular television appearances in the ’50s (The Donna Reed Show, Playhouse 90,...

If you’ve hunted around for movie bargains, you’ve probably seen some of Mill Creek Entertainment’s 50-Movie Packs on DVD. Apart from other great releases by Mill Creek, these packs are phenomenal boons to cinephiles looking to collect older titles.

There are three new packs available, and I want to not only let you in on a discount code, but I have one of the packs available for you to win.

I know a lot of people may be quick to overlook these packs, and not every movie included stands out as a major value, but there are some great titles in each of them, and fans of the genres will be pleasantly surprised by what they get out of the deal. I have to admit that there is something about seeing a 50-movie pack, especially when it doesn’t cost a couple of hundred dollars, or more,...

Had I not been lucky enough to see William Wellman’s 1928 silent film Beggars of Life years ago, or read the works of Gene Fowler, I might not know about Jim Tully, the scrappy Irish-American who became celebrated for writing about the subject he knew best: the hardscrabble life of an orphan turned boxer turned “road kid.” His most successful book (an autobiography in novel form), Beggars of Life came to the screen with Wallace Beery, Richard Arlen, and Louise Brooks in the leading roles…and ironically, the onetime hobo spent the last twenty years of his life in Hollywood, paying the bills by writing first for Charlie Chaplin, and then for a variety of fan magazines...

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Movie trivia: Did you know that “Wings,” a silent film made in 1927 starring Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Richard Arlen, won the first ever Academy Award for Best Picture (technically, the film won the award for Best Production, an award that was later discontinued and replaced with our Best Picture award). And now, “Wings” is coming back to the theaters for a limited time! Very limited, in fact–May 2 and May 16. “Wings” is bring brought back to the screen thanks to Cinemark, who has also brought the remastered versions of “The Godfather” and “The Godfather: Part II” back to theaters for limited engagements. Check out the list [ Read More ]...

This new era of re-releases has definitely got its perks. Whether it’s seeing a modern classic like Jurassic Park return home to theaters or a movie from out of the mist of the past, it’s the kind of cash-grab that should be celebrated. What other time in your life would you be able to see the 1927 silent flick about pilots in Wwi bravely battling (and kissing each other) as it was meant to be seen? Cinemark Theaters will play Wings – the first Best Picture Oscar winner – in select theaters on Wednesdays May 2nd and 16th. Those participating theaters can be found on the Cinemark website. The print has been completely restored. What’s crazy is that they’re showing in their Extreme Digital auditoriums, which means they much have restored the hell out of it. The movie itself is one of William A. Wellman‘s masterpieces. It also represents big budget studio thinking in the...

Wings - winner of the first Academy Award for Best Picture 1927, finds Cinemark Xd release on May 2nd via Paramount Pictures. We are pleased to offer you the trailer as well as images from the classic war drama/romance directed by William A. Wellman. Starring in the film which first made its premiere on May 19th, 1927 in San Antonio, Texas, are Clara Bow, Charles 'Buddy' Rogers, Richard Arlen, Jobyna Ralston, El Brendel, Richard Tucker and Gary Cooper. In Wings, two young men of different social status - one being rich, the other middle class, are both in love with the same woman, and become fighter pilots in World War I. The silent film has been masterfully restored, including an all-new recording of the original soundtrack, and surround sound by Skywalker sound...

Wings - winner of the first Academy Award for Best Picture 1927, finds Cinemark Xd release on May 2nd via Paramount Pictures. We are pleased to offer you the trailer as well as images from the classic war drama/romance directed by William A. Wellman. Starring in the film which first made its premiere on May 19th, 1927 in San Antonio, Texas, are Clara Bow, Charles 'Buddy' Rogers, Richard Arlen, Jobyna Ralston, El Brendel, Richard Tucker and Gary Cooper. In Wings, two young men of different social status - one being rich, the other middle class, are both in love with the same woman, and become fighter pilots in World War I. The silent film has been masterfully restored, including an all-new recording of the original soundtrack, and surround sound by Skywalker sound...

Cinemark is pleased to announce that the very first motion picture to win an Academy Award®, the silent film .Wings,. will return to screens for a rare presentation May 2 and 16, 2012. Presented by Paramount Pictures, .Wings. was meticulously restored to give fans the chance to view the visually stunning epic in pristine condition.

.Cinemark is thrilled to present this silent film masterpiece as our next Reel Classics offering,. states James Meredith, Vice President of Marketing for Cinemark Theatres. .This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see Hollywood history on screen, with incredible visuals and the original score recorded by a full orchestra..

.Wings. is a 1927 World War I drama that explores the devastating effects of war through the story of two men who go off to battle and the woman they both leave behind.  This historic piece of cinema stars Clara Bow, Charles .Buddy. Rogers and Richard Arlen, and...

Latest Additions Include Star-Studded Appearances, Noted Film Historians,

An Opening-Night Poolside Screening of High Society (1956)

And a Vanity Fair Showcase of Architecture in Film

Complete Schedule for 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival

Now Available at http://www.tcm.com/festival

With just over two weeks left before opening day, the 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival continues to expand its already-packed slate with new events and live appearances:

On opening night of the festival, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel will be the site of a poolside screening of the lavish Cole Porter musical High Society (1956), starring Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. Actresses Maud Adams and Eunice Gayson will attend a 50th Anniversary screening of the James Bond classic Dr. No (1962) and participate in a conversation about being “Bond Girls.” Filmmaker Mel Brooks will be on hand to introduce his brilliant parody Young Frankenstein (1974). Filmmaker John Carpenter will introduce his favorite film, the...

The 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival has unveiled another spectacular lineup of special guests and events for this year’s four-day gathering in Hollywood. Among the newly announced participants for this year’s festival are five-time Emmy® winner Dick Van Dyke, Oscar® winner Shirley Jones, two-time Golden Globe® winner Angie Dickinson, six-time Golden Globe nominee Robert Wagner, seven-time Oscar nominee Norman Jewison, longtime producer A.C. Lyles and three-time Oscar-winning editor Thelma Schoonmaker. In addition, the festival will feature a special three-film tribute to director/choreographer Stanley Donen, who will be on-hand for the celebration.

As part of its overall Style and the Movies theme, the festival has added several films featuring the work of pioneering costume designer Travis Banton. Oscar-nominated costume designer Deborah Nadoolman Landis will introduce the six-movie slate, with actress and former Essentials co-host Rose McGowan joining her for one of the screenings.

Other festival additions include a screening...

Chicago – By today’s standards, “Wings” would be more expensive than any movie ever made. That’s what an undertaking this legendary film was for Paramount in the ’20s. The biggest studio in the world set out to make the biggest film in history, presenting viewers with things they had never seen before and pushing the boundaries of what was capable on celluloid. Sadly, “Wings” has somewhat become an answer to a trivia question and the remarkable quality of the film itself has been underappreciated by time. This glorious Blu-ray restoration should help fix that oversight.

Blu-ray Rating: 4.0/5.0

As the Blu-ray version of the film opens, the Paramount logo cycles back through its different iterations, arriving at what it was in 1927 when “Wings” was released. It’s a brilliant overture, taking us back in time. A sepia-tinged plane flies overhead and the gloriously-reconstructed score, which was rerecorded by a modern...

It’s a phrase out of the music industry: one-hit wonders. Those bands that come out of nowhere, hit the top of the charts with a catchy – maybe even impressive – single, or have one chart-topping album, and then never seem to be able to hit that sweet spot again. Anybody remember Boston’s second album? Another hit single after “96 Tears” from Jay and the Mysterians?

But they’re not alone. There’s not an area of entertainment where the phenomenon doesn’t exist. Rod Serling never topped The Twilight Zone, and Chris Carter never came up with another series as good as The X Files. Fitzgerald wrote a lot of impressive stuff, but never matched The Great Gatsby, and drank himself to death over it (well, Zelda being crazy didn’t help). Michael Cimino copped an Oscar for The Deer Hunter (1978), and then began a long, spectacular flameout.

It happens.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences screened the first Best Picture Winner, "Wings," as part of Paramount Pictures' 100th Anniversary Celebration.

The 1927 film starred Clara Bow, Charles "Buddy" Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper.

The event also exhibited "Paramount's Movie Milestones: A Centennial Celebration," featuring photographs, posters, design sketches and personal correspondence highlighting some of the studio's most celebrated films and filmmakers over the last century.

Check out the video!

With The Artist making waves on the awards circuit, it’s no surprise that a screening of the silent movie classic Wings would be a hot ticket. The 1927 war movie, which starred Clara Bow, Charles Rodgers and Richard Arlen, was the first movie to win the best picture Academy Award. It screened accompanied by a live organ Tuesday night at the Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theatre as part of Paramount’s just-launched 100th anniversary celebration. Paramount chairman and CEO Brad Grey took the occasion to donate the original score with musical cues to Academy president Tom Sherak, “to put it in your

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Screenwriter Frederica Sagor Dead at 111: Wrote Movies for Norma Shearer (photo), Clara Bow, Louise Brooks Now, whether Frederica Sagor's Hollywood Babylon-like tales bear any resemblance to what actually happened at studio parties and private soirees, I can't tell. But on the professional side, one problem with the information found in The Shocking Miss Pilgrim is that studios invariably used numerous writers, whether male or female, in their projects. Usually, in those pre-Writers Guild days, only two or three contributors received final credit, not because of the uncredited writer's gender but in large part because the final product oftentimes had little — if anything — in common with the original source. While doing research for my Ramon Novarro biography, I went through various drafts, written by various hands, of his movies. A Certain Young Man, for instance, went through so many changes (including director, cast, and title), that the final film...

The first Academy Awards were handed out in 1927, when the silent World War I epic "Wings" took home the prize for Outstanding Picture, the precursor to today's Best Picture.  Starring Clara Bow, Charles "Buddy" Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper, "Wings" tells the story of two young rivals from the same small town who join the war effort as fighter pilots. On Wednesday, January 18, the Academy will screen a new, professionally restored copy of "Wings" at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills as part of a celebration of Paramount Pictures' 100th anniversary.  The restoration, a collaboration between Paramount and the...

Photos © A.M.P.A.S.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will screen the first Best Picture winner, “Wings,” starring Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper, as part of a celebration of Paramount Pictures’ 100th anniversary, on Wednesday, January 18, at 7:30 p.m. at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. The evening will premiere a restoration by Paramount Pictures in cooperation with the Academy Film Archive, with live musical accompaniment by Clark Wilson on the Allen Theatre Organ.

The Academy is pleased to return the Best Picture winner “Wings,” which first premiered in 1927, to the big screen in a vibrant and meticulously restored version that includes the original color tints and re-creates the Handschiegl color process used for additional visual effects. Organist Clark Wilson, who has accompanied silent films at theaters around the country including the Walt Disney Concert Hall, will offer...

By Josh Abraham

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will screen the first Best Picture winner, “Wings,” starring Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper, as part of a celebration of Paramount Pictures’ 100th anniversary, on Wednesday, January 18, at 7:30 p.m. at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. The evening will premiere a restoration by Paramount Pictures in cooperation with the Academy Film Archive, with live musical accompaniment by Clark Wilson on the Allen Theatre Organ.

Click to read more…...

HollywoodNews.com: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will screen the first Best Picture winner, “Wings,” starring Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper, as part of a celebration of Paramount Pictures’ 100th anniversary, on Wednesday, January 18, at 7:30 p.m. at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. The evening will premiere a restoration by Paramount Pictures in cooperation with the Academy Film Archive, with live musical accompaniment by Clark Wilson on the Allen Theatre Organ.

The Academy is pleased to return the Best Picture winner “Wings,” which first premiered in 1927, to the big screen in a vibrant and meticulously restored version that includes the original color tints and re-creates the Handschiegl color process used for additional visual effects. Organist Clark Wilson, who has accompanied silent films at theaters around the country including the Walt Disney Concert Hall, will offer live organ accompaniment that...

DVD Playhouse—November 2011

By Allen Gardner

Tree Of Life (20th Century Fox) Terrence Malick’s latest effort is both the best film of 2011 and the finest work of his (arguably) mixed, but often masterly canon. A series of vignettes, mostly set in 1950s Texas, capture the memory of a man (Sean Penn) in present-day New York who looks back on his life, and his parents’ (Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain) troubled marriage, when word of his younger brother’s suicide reaches him. Almost indescribable beyond that, except to say no other film in history so perfectly evokes the magic and mystery of the human memory, which both crystalizes (and sometimes idealizes) the past. Like Stanley Kubrick’s 2001, this is a challenging, polarizing work that you must let wash over you. If you go along for the ride, you’re in for a unique, rewarding cinematic experience. Also available on Blu-ray disc.

Back in February of this year I completed my journey into watching all of Oscar's Best Picture winners when I caught the 1927 World War I feature Wings on Turner Classic Movies' "31 Days of Oscar", a gem of a month for anyone looking to catch films that are hard to find or are unable to find entirely. At the same time I also caught Cavalcade, a film that actually is on DVD, but only as a part of Fox's 75th Anniversary Collection, which will run you $389.99 based on [amazon asin="B0041T4LZQ" text="current pricing"]. No thanks. Wings, however, is about to become more readily available. Just as Paramount did when they released African Queen on March 23, 2010, which, at the time, was probably the highest profile studio feature not available on DVD and Blu-ray, the studio will now release Wings for the first time on DVD and Blu-ray on January 24, 2012 with a brand new restoration, which was detailed...