A few surprising new ones this week, in the sense that I can’t believe Taxi Driver (Friday) and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Tuesday) have never come up in Film on TV before, at least not that I could find. In addition to those two Must Sees, TCM has a trio of Burt Lancaster films that I’ve admittedly never seen but quite want to for their Summer Under the Stars tribute to him on Thursday. The other tributes this week are Joan Crawford on Monday, Conrad Veidt on Tuesday (hence Caligari), Joan Blondell on Wednesday, Peter Lawford on Friday, Linda Darnell on Saturday, and Carole Lombard on Sunday (I’d especially recommend her night, with a whole raft of amazing screwball comedies).

Monday, August 22

11:00pm – TCM – Mildred Pierce
In quite probably Joan Crawford’s best role (only perhaps excepting her catty “other woman” in The Women), she plays a woman trying to work her way up in the world from lowly waitress to entrepreneur, all the while dealing with her shrew of a daughter. Melodrama isn’t a particularly prized genre these days, but films like Mildred Pierce show how good melodramas can be with the right confluence of studio style, director, and star.
1945 USA. Director: Michael Curtiz. Starring: Joan Crawford, Zachary Scott, Ann Blyth, Eve Arden.
Must See

2:30am (23rd) – MGM – Midnight Cowboy
Notable as the first and only X-rated film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture, Midnight Cowboy doesn’t work that well for me, but it does have moments of brilliance in its story of a young cowboy (Jon Voight) trying to make his way in New York by offering her services to wealthy ladies, mostly due to the older, wiser, and sadder character played by Dustin Hoffman.
1969 USA. Director: John Schlesinger. Starring: Jon Voight, Dustin Hoffman.
(repeats at 10:00pm on the 27th)

Tuesday, August 23

7:30pm – Fox Movie – The Verdict
Powerhouse filmmaker Sidney Lumet returns to his 12 Angry Men courtroom milieu for The Verdict, starring Paul Newman as an on-the-rocks lawyer who takes a medical malpractice suit to trial in a somewhat desperate attempt to salvage his career.
1982 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Paul Newman, Charlotte Rampling, Jack Warden.
(repeats at 12:15am on the 24th)

10:00pm – TCM – The Thief of Bagdad
An early Michael Powell film (in collaboration with several others), before he teamed up with Emeric Pressburger, but no less an impressive display of stunning Technicolor cinematography on the fantastic Arabian Nights story.
1940 UK. Director: Michael Powell, Ludwig Berger. Starring: Sabu, Conrad Veidt, June Duprez.

12:00M – TCM – Casablanca
Against all odds, one of the best films Hollywood has ever produced, focusing on Bogart’s sad-eyed and world-weary expatriot Rick Blaine, his former lover Ingrid Bergman, and her current husband Paul Henreid, who needs safe passage to America to escape the Nazis and continue his work with the Resistance. It’s the crackling script that carries the day here, and the wealth of memorable characters that fill WWII Casablanca with life and energy.
1943 USA. Director: Michael Curtiz. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains.
Must See

3:15am (24th) – TCM – The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
One of the most notable examples of German Expressionism, its also a highly watchable film about a strange series of murders that may be tied back to a somnambulist controlled by the somewhat sinister Dr. Caligari. The heightened emotions and strikingly off-kilter set designs and high contrast lighting would all be greatly influential on film noir a few decades later.
1919 Germany. Director: Robert Weine. Starring: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt, Friedrich Feher.
Must See
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Wednesday, August 24

8:00am – IFC – Pan’s Labyrinth
One of my absolute favorite films of the past decade (or ever, really), an absolutely beautiful and terrifying fantasy that juxtaposes the gruesome horrors of the Spanish Civil War with an equally horrifying fantasy world that provides, if not escape, at least some measure of importance and control to the film’s young heroine. Guillermo Del Toro solidified my view of him as a visionary filmmaker with this film, and it still stands to me as a testament to what fantasy can and should do.
2006 Spain/Mexico. Director: Guillermo Del Toro. Starring: Ivana Baquero, Sergi López, Meribel Verdú, Doug Jones.
Must See
(repeats at 3:15pm)

2:45pm – TCM – Gold Diggers of 1933
The story’s nothing to get excited about (and in fact, the subplot that takes over the main plot wears out its welcome fairly quickly), but the strong Depression-era songs, kaleidoscopic choreography from Busby Berkeley, and spunky supporting work from Ginger Rogers pretty much make up for it.
1933 USA. Director: Mervyn LeRoy. Starring: Joan Blondell, Warren William, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell, Aline MacMahon, Ginger Rogers, Guy Kibbee.

4:30pm – TCM – Footlight Parade
Other Busby Berkeley-choreogaphed films are better known than this one (42nd Street, the Gold Diggers series), but this one is one of my favorites, with James Cagney taking on a musical role and giving the film that extra burst of energy that he brings to everything. Though known mostly for his gangster roles, Cagney was actually a song-and-dance man before he came to the movies, and it’s fun to see him hoofing his stuff.
1933 USA. Director: Lloyd Bacon. Starring: James Cagney, Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell.

2:00am (25th) – MGM – Radio Days
This essentially plotless Woody Allen film consists of a series of nostalgic vignettes about a 1940s working class New York family. The title comes from their love for the radio, the center of pop culture at the time; the radio also provides the subplot following Mia Farrow as a wanna-be radio singer who gets mixed up with gangsters. It’s not particularly deep, but it’s also pretty enjoyable.
1987 USA. Director: Woody Allen. Starring: Julie Kavner, Mia Farrow, Seth Green, Dianne Wiest.
(repeats at 12:00M on the 26th)

3:30am (25th) – Fox Movie – The Name of the Rose
A fine adaptation of Umberto Eco’s novel of medieval mystery and religion, with two monks tasked with finding a murderer in their midst. Not as esoteric as the novel, which is probably just as well for a film, but more thoughtful and deep than many mystery films.
1986 France/Italy. Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud. Starring: Sean Connery, Christian Slater, Helmut Qualtinger.

Thursday, August 25

9:30am – Fox Movie – Unfaithfully Yours
Preston Sturges’s last great film is a pitch-black comedy with Rex Harrison as a jealous conductor who fantasizes ways to deal with his wife’s supposed infidelity as he conducts a symphony. The combination of bombastic music and his by turns morbid and farcical fantasies makes for one of the more unusual memorable films of the 1940s.
1948 USA. Director: Preston Sturges. Starring: Rex Harrison, Linda Darnell, Rudy Vallee.

12:00N – TCM – Sweet Smell of Success
One of the most acidically witty films of the 1950s, Sweet Smell of Success turns its gaze on Broadway gossip columnist Burt Lancaster, who connives with press agent Tony Curtis to break up his sister’s romance – a searing indictment of unscrupulous newspaper men, yes, and a bitingly funny one to boot.
1957 USA. Director: Alexander Mackendrick. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Tony Curtis, Susan Harrison, Martin Milner, Sam Levene.

6:00pm – TCM – A Child is Waiting
One of Judy Garland’s last roles in one of John Cassavetes’ earliest (and given the star power here, likely biggest-budgeted) films, about a boarding school for developmentally challenged children and the unorthodox psychologist (Burt Lancaster) who leads it and hires an inexperienced musician (Garland) as a teacher.
1963 USA. Director: John Cassavetes. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Judy Garland, Gena Rowlands, Steven Hill.
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8:00pm – TCM – The Leopard
A decadent drama of falling aristocracy and rising nouveau riche from famed Italian director Luchino Visconti (who had been a neorealist leader twenty years before this), mixing American, Italian, and French actors together to sumptuous effect.
1963 Italy. Director: Luchino Visconti. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Claudia Cardinale, Alain Delon.
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8:05pm – Sundance – The Royal Tenenbaums
My favorite of all of Wes Anderson’s films (and indeed, one of my favorites of the whole decade), a web of fine characterizations surrounding Royal Tenenbaum, an eccentric old man whose imminent mortality forces a reunion with his family. But its morbidity is tempered by absurd humor and quirk.
2001 USA. Director: Wes Anderson. Starring: Gene Hackman, Anjelica Huston, Gwyneth Paltrow, Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson, Ben Stiller, Bill Murray.
Must See

11:30pm – TCM – The Killers
Burt Lancaster made his film debut in this excellent noir, an expansion of an Ernest Hemingway short story. Lancaster is a quiet gas station attendant killed in the opening of the film by two hitmen – the events that lead up to his death (involving, among other things, a classic femme fatale played by Ava Gardner) are told in flashback throughout the rest of the film.
1946 USA. Director: Robert Siodmak. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Edmond O’Brien, Albert Dekker, Sam Levene.

12:15am (26th) – MGM – Blow Out
Sound man John Travolta is recording sound samples one night, and may have accidentally recorded a murder occurring. As he tries to investigate, he’s drawn into a dangerous conspiracy. Inspired to some degree by Antonioni’s photography-based Blow-Up, but this is definitely DePalma’s film all the way.
1981 USA. Director: Brian DePalma. Starring: John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgow, Dennis Franz.
(repeats at 1:45pm on the 27th)

12:35am (26th) – IFC – The Dreamers
Bernardo Bertolucci’s love letter to the French New Wave, with American Michael Pitt heading to Paris just in time to join the ’68 Cinematheque riots, becoming friends and eventually lovers with a siblings Louis Garrel and Eva Green, a pair of fellow cinephiles. Bertolucci draws on Band of Outsiders and Jules and Jim especially, as well as the history of the era and his own sensibilities. It loses me personally a bit in the eroticism of the second half, but the first part is fantastic.
2003 France/UK/Italy. Director: Bernardo Bertolucci. Starring: Michael Pitt, Louis Garrel, Eva Green.

1:30am (26th) – TCM – Seven Days in May
Political intrigue from one of the masters of the genre, with Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas as rival generals facing off over political aspirations surrounding the perceived weakness of a president supporting nuclear disarmament. Frankenheimer is great at cold war paranoia, and the supporting cast here is wonderful as well.
1964 USA. Director: John Frankenheimer. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Fredric March, Ava Gardner, Edmond O’Brien, Martin Balsam.
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Friday, August 26

11:00am – MGM – The Purple Rose of Cairo
A love letter to cinema, The Purple Rose of Cairo has Woody Allen at his most romantic. Unhappy housewife Cecilia (Mia Farrow) escapes to the cinema to see The Purple Rose of Cairo again and again, where she fantasizes over hunky character Tom Baxter (Jeff Daniels). Much to her surprise (and the other characters’ consternation), Baxter steps off the screen to join her. It makes it even more complicated when Gil, the actor who played Baxter, turns up as well.
1985 USA. Director: Woody Allen. Starring: Mia Farrow, Jeff Daniels, Danny Aiello.

11:30am – Fox Movie – I Wake Up Screaming
Better known for bright and sunny musicals, Betty Grable took a turn for the noir in this crime film, playing the sister of a recently-murdered model with a rising career. It’s a slight noir, but fun nonetheless, especially for the chance to see Grable in a role unusual for her.
1942 USA. Director: H. Bruce Humberstone. Starring: Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis.

4:00pm – TCM – Royal Wedding
This isn’t one of the all-time great Fred Astaire musicals, but it’s quite charming in its small way, and has the distinction of including the Fred’s “dancing on the ceiling” extravaganza, as well as a few surprisingly competent dance numbers from Fred and not-dancer Jane Powell. Oh, and Fred’s love interest is Sarah Churchill, Winston Churchill’s daughter, which is interesting (Powell plays his sister).
1951 USA. Director: Stanley Donen. Starring: Fred Astaire, Jane Powell, Sarah Churchill, Peter Lawford.

5:30pm – IFC – Thank You For Smoking
Jason Reitman’s breakout film was also one of my favorites of 2005 – sure, it’s a bit slight and isn’t perfect, but its story of a hotshot PR guy working for cigarette companies struck just the right note of cynical and absurd humor. The really high-quality cast doesn’t hurt either, with everybody, no matter how small their role, making a memorable impression.
2005 USA. Director: Jason Reitman. Starring: Aaron Eckhart, Katie Holmes, Rob Lowe, Maria Bello, David Koechner, J.K. Simmons, Adam Brody, Sam Elliott.

6:30pm – MGM – Fiddler on the Roof
A Tzarist-era Russian Jewish village doesn’t seem a particularly likely place to set a musical, but Fiddler on the Roof does a good job of it, exploring the clashing cultures as patriarch Tevye tries to marry his daughters off to good Jewish husbands with decreasing success.
1971 USA. Director: Norman Jewison. Starring: Topol, Norma Crane, Leonard Frey, Rosalind Harris, Michele Marsh, Neva Small, Michael Glaser.

7:30pm – IFC – Taxi Driver
One of the most electric films ever made, Martin Scorsese’s tale of a psychotic New York taxi driver and his vigilante attempts to free a child prostitute is just as disturbing now as it was thirty-five years ago. De Niro practically jumps off the screen.
1975 USA. Director: Martin Scorsese. Starring: Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd.
Must See
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10:00pm – Sundance – Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
Sadly this turned out to be Sidney Lumet’s final film before his death. But from what I hear, this is a fine one to have as a swan song, an intense and well-constructed heist thriller – something Lumet was certainly skilled at directing. I have got to get around to checking it out myself soon.
1997 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, Albert Finney.

12:00M – Fox Movie – Naked Lunch
This is a wacked out movie, more of an exploration of beat author William S. Burrough’s life and writing process than an adaptation of his novel of the same name, with addictive bug powder, murders, hallucinogenic trips, typewriters that turn into cockroaches, and espionage plots. I saw it ages ago when I probably wasn’t ready for it; ought to try it again sometime.
1991 Canada. Director: David Cronenberg. Starring: Peter Weller, Judy Davis, Ian Holm.

Saturday, August 27

6:00pm – IFC – Wassup Rockers
Small film about a group of teenage Latino skateboarders from South Central LA. They go up to Beverly Hills to skateboard, get caught by cops, escape, meet up with some girls, get in fights with preppy 90210 guys, and try to get home. But the moments that’ll get you are when they’re just talking, to the camera, or to the girls, about their life and what it’s like to live in South Central. It doesn’t go anywhere, really, but it’s a wonderful slice of life.
2005 USA. Director: Larry Clark. Starring: Jonathan Velasquez, Francisco Pedrasa, Milton Velasquez, Usvaldo Panameno, Eddie Velasquez.

6:00pm – Sundance – Carlos
Sundance has all of Olivier Assayas’ 5 1/2 hour long epic about Venezuelan revolutionary Carlos the Jackal playing. I’ve heard the film is quite a good one and worth the length, so check it out here to see it in its entirety.
2010 France/Germany. Director: Olivier Assayas. Starring: Édgar Ramírez, Alexander Scheer, Alejandro Arroyo.

8:00pm – TCM – A Letter to Three Wives
An Oscar-winner for Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s directing, this film also has an interesting narrative structure, following three women who receive a letter from a woman who has run away with one of their husbands – but which one is a mystery. The letter-writer (voiced by Celeste Holm) never appears in the film, but her presence pervades it.
1949 USA. Director: Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Starring: Jeanne Crain, Linda Darnell, Ann Sothern, Kirk Douglas, Paul Douglas, Barbara Lawrence.
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Sunday, August 28

6:00am – Sundance – A Town Called Panic
One of the most delightful films I saw in 2009, a whacked out stop-motion film from Belgium that follows Horse, Cowboy, and Indian throughout a series of adventures, mostly focused on trying to rebuild their house which keeps getting stolen every night. This is mile-a-minute absurdity with more inventiveness in 75 minutes than I usually see all year.
2009 Belium. Directors: Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar. Starring: Stéphane Aubier, Jeanne Balibar, Bruce Ellison, Vincent Pater.
(repeats at 12:40pm and 4:25pm)

6:30am – IFC – The New World
Terrence Malick may not make many films, but the ones he does make, wow. Superficially the story of John Smith and Pocahontas, The New World is really something that transcends mere narrative – this is poetry on film. Every scene, every shot has a rhythm and an ethereal that belies the familiarity of the story we know. I expected to dislike this film when I saw it, quite honestly. It ended up moving me in ways I didn’t know cinema could.
2005 USA. Director: Terrence Malick. Starring: Colin Farrell, Q’orianka Kilcher, Christian Bale, Christopher Plummer.
Must See
(repeats at 3:30pm)

4:30pm – TCM – Twentieth Century
In one of the films that defines “screwball comedy” (along with The Awful Truth and Bringing Up Baby), John Barrymore plays a histrionic theatre producer trying to convince his star Carole Lombard to come back to him – both professionally and personally. Lombard is luminous as usual, and Barrymore can chew scenery with the best of them, which is precisely what his role calls for.
1934 USA. Director: Howard Hawks. Starring: John Barrymore, Carole Lombard, Walter Connolly.

5:30pm – Fox Movie – Bedazzled
One of the best films of the British mod era, a comedic take on Faust with Dudley Moore a socially inept guy infatuated with the unattainable (to him) Eleanor Bron – granted seven wishes by Satan (Peter Cook), he tries to wish his way to her, but somehow fails hilariously every time.
1967 USA. Director: Stanley Donen. Starring: Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Eleanor Bron.

6:15pm – TCM – To Be or Not to Be
If you never listen to anything else I ever say, listen to this: To Be or Not To Be is one of the greatest films of all time, and you should see it. It’s a comedy about Nazi Germany. I know. Jack Benny plays the leader of a Polish theatre troupe, specializing in playing Hamlet alongside his philandering wife, played by Carole Lombard. I know. When Hitler takes over Poland, the troupe engages in an act of espionage both dangerous and ridiculous. I know! It’s simultaneously hilarious, ominous, and heartbreaking. Director Ernst Lubitsch’s finest hour? For me it is. Carole Lombard’s best role (the final one of her career, before she was killed in a plane crash returning from a war bond tour)? For me it is.
1943 USA. Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Starring: Jack Benny, Carole Lombard, Robert Stack, Felix Bressart, Lionel Atwill, Sig Ruman.
Must See

8:00pm – TCM – My Man Godfrey
A great combination of two classic 1930s cinematic tropes: the dazzling screwball comedy, set in the world of wacky high society looneys, and the depression-era forgotten man story. The never-disappointing Carole Lombard is one of the society looneys who whimsically hires homeless derelict Godfrey (William Powell) as her butler; the film invites social commentary while never ever losing its comedic sparkle.
1936 USA. Director: Gregory LaCava. Starring: Carole Lombard, William Powell, Alice Brady, Gail Patrick, Eugene Pallette.

11:30pm – TCM – Nothing Sacred
A newspaper offers to give terminally-ill Carole Lombard her dream trip to New York City in exchange for publishing her experiences. Only problem is, she’s lying about being terminally ill. One of the zaniest of all 1930s zany comedies – that said, it can be a little on the shrill side.
1937 USA. Director: William A. Wellman. Starring: Carole Lombard, Fredric March, Charles Winninger, Walter Connolly.

1:00am (29th) – TCM – Mr. and Mrs. Smith
No relation to the 2005 Pitt-Jolie vehicle, this Mr. and Mrs. Smith is one of Hitchcock’s only straight comedies, no suspense or mystery plot in sight. It’s a serviceable screwball comedy, with Robert Montgomery and Carole Lombard as the title couple who discover their marriage may not be legally binding. It’s worth watching once, but overall it’s a relatively minor entry in both Hitchcock’s career and the annals of screwball comedy.
1941 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Robert Montgomery, Carole Lombard, Gene Raymond, Jack Carson.