At this point the movie industry is rounding into form. However, 1938 in particular is a weird year. Yes, there’s romcoms and movies by great directors like Capra, Cukor, Hitchcock. However, 1938 has a distinctly international feel compared to other years, with great, innovative stuff coming out of Germany, France, the USSR, and the UK.
Now, the motivation for Leni Riefenstahl’s documentary about the 1936 Olympics is more sinister: the German’s planned to use this as war propaganda for a certain upcoming war they were about to start. It’s also not crazy riveting material. However, it stands as one of the earliest made documentaries in film history, and a tribute, ironically to Jesse Owens and the Americans who dominated the games.
Marcel Carne’s seedy take on the film noir. Jean Gabin stars as a man who drifts into the Havre (a port in France), hoping to get a boat trip out quickly. Instead, he gets embroiled in a potboiler involving Michele Morgan’s beauty, pursued by more sinister gentlemen. Carne’s direction clouds the streets in fog, giving a half dream/half nightmare type feel to the proceedings.
William Wyler gave Victor Fleming a trial run for Gone With the Wind. Bette Davis stars as Scarlet O’, er, Julie Marsden, a Southern Belle famous for wearing red dresses and causing scandal while dancing with a man, Rhett, er, Henry Fonda. Davis carries the movie with those eyes, and general talent of hers, getting an Oscar for her work.
This Yuletide staple started the run on Christmas movies seen in the following years. You all know the story by this point. See an early version of it, lavishly produced by MGM, starring a decent Reginald Owen as Ebeneezer Scrooge. No muppets in this one though, sorry.
Of course Frank Capra saw a smart, jaded cynical Broadway play and transformed it into an uplifting Best Picture Winner. Jean Arthur is the normal member of the kooky strange Sycamore family. Jimmy Stewart is a member of the uptight Kirby family. Wouldn’t ya know it, they are attracted to one another…but and, here’s the crazy thing, there families might not get along. No! Predictable, as you can see. Funny? Also true!
Melodramatic as it may be, this movie means well. Spencer Tracy plays a priest who runs an orphanage, giving every kid a chance to succeed in life despite being given a rotten hand. His biggest test is Mickey Rooney, in one of the films that made him a star.
This is about as screwey a screwball comedy can get. Katharine Hepburn’s heiress decides she wants to marry Cary Grant’s paleontologist. So how does she woo him? Why, using her pet leopard of course! Howard Hawks’s story gets zanier after that, but when the Grant/Hepburn pairing anchors your movie, it’s still gonna deliver regardless of the lunacy.
Alfred Hitchcock directed this in the UK. Before he came stateside, he was scaring the bejeezus out of everyone still, especially Margaret Lockwood, who insists that she’s been on a train with Dame May Whitty, but no one else on the train knows what she’s talking about. What follows is a tonally light movie for the master of suspense, with surprising twists and a sorta fun, sorta thrilling conclusion.
Sergei Eisenstein’s Soviet Propaganda film about a famous Russian leader is more than just the reasons it was made. It’s a beautifully shot, terrifically entertaining story, culminating in one of the great battle sequences in early film history…on ice!
Like the Wizard of Oz, the technicolor made it stand out at the time. But as time goes on, the movie speaks for itself. Errol Flynn is excellent as the man who steals from the rich and gives to the poor. Olivia de Havilland is great as Miriam, and Michael Curtiz does amazing work making this movie look as big and exciting as possible.
