Hotchka Movies by the Decade feature #260 :: July 17•23

Summer blockbusters dominated the latter half of the century this week with a Marvel superhero making his debut, a raunchy comedy made waves, a film that was nearly not made scores an Original Song Oscar, a documentary filmed at the bottom of the Earth wins another Oscar, a comedy classic based on a literary classic is a hit, and classic zombies hit the big screen again. The earlier part of the century had a William Castle film without a gimmick, a film that was the basis for a classic stage and screen musical that is still being produced today, and a musical pairing Gene Kelly with an unusual dance partner. Scroll down to see all of the films that premiered this week across the decades and tell us if any of your favorites are celebrating milestone anniversaries.

1925

• July 17 – The Lawful Cheater (USA, B.P. Schulberg Productions)
• July 18 – Don Dare Devil (USA, Universal Pictures)
• July 19 – The Marriage Whirl (USA, Corinne Griffith Productions)
• July 20 – A Little Girl in a Big City (USA, Burton King Productions)
• July 23 – Billy the Kid (USA, Independent Pictures)

Lost films: The Lawful Cheater, The Marriage Whirl

Unknown status: Don Dare Devil, Billy the Kid

The Lawful Cheater was banned by the British Board of Film Censors. A Little Girl in a Big City is preserved in both negative and positive formats in the Library of Congress. It was Gladys Walton’s final film.

1935

• July 17 – Rainbow’s End (USA, First Division Pictures)
• July 18 – The Daring Young Man (USA, Fox Film Corporation)
• July 19 – Shanghai (USA, Walter Wanger Productions)
• July 19 – Silk Hat Kid (USA, Fox Film Corporation)
• July 19 – The Student’s Romance (London, British International Pictures)
• July 20 – Front Page Woman (USA, Warner Bros. Pictures)
• July 20 – Paradise Canyon (USA, Paul Malvern Productions)
• July 22 – D’Ye Ken John Peel? (UK, Julius Hagen Productions)
• July 22 – Death Drives Through (UK, Associated Talking Pictures)
• July 22 – Emil and the Detectives (UK, Richard Wainwright Productions)

The Student’s Romance entered general UK release on February 3, 1936, and was released in the US on October 10, 1936. D’Ye Ken John Peel? first opened in London on January 9, 1935, and was released in the US on March 18, 1935 as Moonlight. Death Drives Through has no known US theatrical release date. Emil and the Detectives was released in the US on April 14, 1938.

The Daring Young Man was the last film released by Fox Film Corporation before merging with Twentieth Century Pictures to form 20th Century-Fox.

The working title for Front Page Woman was Women Are Born Newspapermen. This was one of three 1935 films to star Bette Davis and George Brent (they made thirteen films total), and Davis’ fourth collaboration with director Michael Curtiz (they worked together a total of seven times).

Paradise Canyon was John Wayne’s final film for Monogram Pictures. A colorized version was released on home video under the title Guns Along the Trail. Death Drives Through was produced as a quota quickie.

Emil and the Detectives is a remake of the 1931 German film of the same name, moving the setting from Berlin to London, following the original Billy Wilder screenplay closely, using Allan Gray’s music, and recreating many of the same camera shots.

1945

• July 18 – Wildfire (USA, Action Pictures)
• July 19 – Along Came Jones (USA, International Pictures)
• July 19 – Anchors Aweigh (USA, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer)
• July 20 – A Thousand and One Nights (USA, Columbia Pictures)
• July 20 – Idiots Deluxe (USA, short, Columbia Pictures)
• July 21 – Tee for Two (USA, short, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer)
• July 23 – Jealousy (USA, Republic Pictures)

Along Came Jones starred Gary Cooper, and was the only film he produced during his career. Cooper chose Loretta Young to be his co-star. The film’s working title was American Cowboy. Cooper had the town set built at the Iverson Movie Ranch, and the set was re-used in many productions over the next two decades. The film’s title likely inspired the 1959 song by The Coasters.

Anchors Aweigh was the first of three films to pair Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra. The film is best known for the scene in which Kelly dances with the animated Jerry mouse from the Tom & Jerry cartoon. Tom can briefly be seen as a butler in the scene. Sources claim Mickey Mouse was originally to be used and Walt Disney had agreed, but his brother Roy nixed the project as the studio was in debt and focusing on getting their own films out on time, so he didn’t think they had any business making cartoons for other studios. The film earned five Oscar nominations, including Bests Picture, winning for Best Scoring of a Musical Picture.

Shelley Winters and Nina Fochs appear uncredited in A Thousand and One Nights as Harem Girls. The film was nominated for two Academy Awards: Best Art Direction – Color, and Best Special Effects.

Idiots Deluxe was the 85th of 190 Three Stooges shorts from Columbia Pictures. It was the last short produced in 1944, filmed between October 5 and 9. It is a satire of the Clark Gable-Norma Shearer film Idiot’s Delight. It is also a remake of the 1935 short Oh, My Nerves, and it was remade again with the Stooges in 1957 as Guns a Poppin, with the use of minimal stock footage. The original story came from the 1934 Laurel and Hardy short Them Thar Hills.

Tee for Two is the 20th Tom & Jerry short from MGM.

1955

• July 18 – The Time of His Life (UK, Shaftesbury Films)
• July 18 – You Lucky People! (UK, David Dent Productions)
• July 21 – I Am a Camera (USA/UK, Remus Films)
• July 22 – How to Be Very, Very Popular (USA, Twentieth Century Fox)

The Time of His Life and You Lucky People! have no known US theatrical release dates.

You Lucky People! was originally titled Get Fell In, but was retitled to match star Tommy Trinder’s familiar catchphrase. The film was shot in a French process to rival CinemaScope called CameraScope, with the publicity trumpeting it as the first black-and-white film to be made with an anamorphic lens.

I Am a Camera is based on Christopher Isherwood’s 1945 book The Berlin Stories and the 1951 play I Am a Camera. Julie Harris reprises her Tony Award-winning stage role as Sally Bowles. The stage and film adaptations of Cabaret are based on the same material. UK and US censors had issues with the source material and demanded many changes that would alter the original story. Four members of the UK censor board attended a production of the play, and all agreed it could not be filmed as is without getting an X-rating. One suggestion was to leave the Bowles character poor and unsuccessful at the end of the film due to her sexual promiscuity. The completed film received one objection from the British censors, a line of dialogue that suggested foot fetishism. With the line removed, the film did receive an X-rating. The film was resubmitted in 1961 for television broadcast, but the censors found the subject of abortion prevented it from being re-rated. In the US the film was denied the approval seal of the Production Code Administration, again due to the ‘sexual promiscuity on the part of the leading lady.’ Many cinemas would not run the film without the seal. The National Legion of Decency condemned the film, and one theater pulled it from exhibition due to attacks on the film by Catholic priests.

How to Be Very, Very Popular featured Betty Grable in her final film role, and Sheree North in her first starring role. It was the third film based on the 1933 novel She Loves Me Not, following a 1934 film of that title, and a 1942 film titled True to the Army. The film was also based on the Broadway adaptation of the novel, as well as a second play, Sleep It Off. Nunnally Johson originally wrote the film for Grable and Marilyn Monroe, who had starred together in How to Marry a Millionaire, which saw Monroe become the top star at Fox in the 1950s after Grable was the top star in the 1940s. There was no rivalry between them and they became friends after Grable told Monroe to grab her fame because she had already had hers. The lead character of Curly Flagg was made the secondary character to accommodate Grable. Monroe, however, refused to take the role of Stormy Tornado and was suspended by Fox, with North being moved from a film called Pink Tights to replace Monroe. Grable had not yet been cast, and was offered to Johnson in Monroe’s absence. North was forced on Johnson, and he was not impressed with her acting abilities, or lack thereof. Johnson later felt that Billy Wilder ‘stole’ the plot for Some Like It Hot, which featured Monroe in a role similar to the one she turned down.

1965

• July 19 – A Home of Your Own (USA, Dormar Productions Limited)
• July 19 – Rotten to the Core (USA, Tudor Productions)
• July 21 – I Saw What You Did (USA, Universal Pictures)
• July 22 – The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (UK, Winchester Productions)

A Home of Your Own first opened in the UK on December 11, 1964. The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders first opened in the US on May 26, 1965.

Rotten to the Core featured Charlotte Rampling’s first credited role. The film was BAFTA-nominated for production design.

I Saw What You Did was a William Castle film that was promoted with the gimmick that seats in one section of the theater would be equipped with seat belts for audience members ‘who might be scared out of their seats.’ The gimmick was abandoned before the release of the film.

The lead role in The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders was to be played by Diane Cilento, following the acclaim for her role in Tom Jones, but she had other commitments. Had she appeared in the film, Sean Connery would have been her co-star. Kim Novak was cast instead, with Richard Johnson cast over 140 other actors to co-star. The pair married in March 1965. The original story’s era was moved from the seventeenth to eighteenth century due to the difficulty in finding authentic locations. The new setting allowed for the use of Queen Anne architecture. Oscar Wilde’s son Vyvyan Holland was the film’s period adviser. Novak took a three year break from motion pictures after the film. Her scenes in 1965’s Eye of the Devil were deleted and re-shot with Deborah Kerr.

1975

• July 23 – Cover Girl Models (USA, Filmgroup International)
• July 23 – Return to Macon County (USA, American International Pictures)

Roger Corman’s New World Pictures had been producing films in the Philippines to save money, but as costs began to rise Cover Girl Models was one of his last films made in the country. Return to Macon County is a sequel to 1974’s Macon County Line. The film’s tone was influenced by American Graffiti.

1985

• July 19 – Day of the Dead (USA, Laurel Entertainment Inc.)
• July 19 – The Legend of Billie Jean (USA, Delphi III Productions)
• July 19 – The Man with One Red Shoe (USA, Twentieth Century Fox)
• July 19 – Wetherby (USA, Zenith Entertainment)
• July 19 – Where Is Parsifal? (UK, Slenderline)

Where Is Parsifal? has no known US theatrical release date.

Day of the Dead is the third of George Romero’s zombie series. Production began shortly after the release of Dawn of the Dead but was halted so Romero could make Knightriders and Creepshow. Romero’s original screenplay was described as ‘the Gone With the Wind of zombie films’, but the producers had to insist the film be made with the intention of an R-rating to be financially successful for that scope. Romero rewrote the script several times and opted to make it much smaller to be released without a rating. Outdoor scenes were filmed on location in Fort Myers and Sanibel, Florida. Interiors were filmed in a suburb of Romero’s hometown, Pittsburgh. While successful, the film did not match the acclaim of the previous films and was the last of Romero’s zombie series until 2005’s Land of the Dead. Romero has an uncredited cameo in the film as Zombie with a scarf. Members of the group NRBQ also have cameos as zombies. The film has been reappraised over the years and has developed a cult following.

The original title for The Legend of Billie Jean was Fair is Fair. The Man with One Red Shoe is a remake of the French film The Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe. Where Is Parsifal? was the final film of Peter Lawford.

1995

• July 19 – Clueless (USA, Scott Rudin Productions)
• July 19 – Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home (USA, Regency Enterprises)
• July 20 – Dad and Dave: On Our Selection (AUS, Anthony Buckley Films)
• July 20 – Mushrooms (AUS, Rosen Harper Entertainment)
• July 21 – Living in Oblivion (USA, JDI Productions)

Dad and Dave: On Our Selection has no known US theatrical release date. Mushrooms was released in the US in March 1997.

Clueless was first developed as a television pilot in 1993. Writer and director Amy Heckerling first spotted Alicia Silverstone in an Aerosmith music video. Studio execs suggested Alicia Witt, Keri Russell, Tiffani Thiessen, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Angelina Jolie for the part of Cher, but did not pressure Heckerling to cast a name actor, and Silverstone got the role. Sarah Michelle Gellar was offered the role of Amber Mariens but turned it down due to her commitments to All My Children, while Zooey Deschanel auditioned for the role of Amber as well. Lauryn Hill auditioned for the role of Dionne. Seth Green auditioned for the role of Travis (Breckin Meyer), Terrence Howard and Dave Chappelle were considered for the role of Murray (Donald Faison), Jeremy Renner and Jamie Walters auditioned for the role of Christian (Justin Walker), and Jerry Orbach and Harvey Keitel were considered for the role of Cher’s father, Melvin Horowitz (Dan Hedaya). Brittany Murphy was 17 at the time of production and required a guardian on set during filming. The character Wendell Hall was inspired by a real-life debate teacher at Beverly Hills High School and a friend of Heckerling’s. The ‘underwear’ Calvin Klein dress worn by Cher was actually designed by Anna Sui who, at the time, was an emerging designer. Calvin Klein was credited due to more brand recognition during the time.

Jason James Richter, Jayne Atkinson, August Schellenberg, Michael Madsen and Mykelti Williamson reprise their Free Willy roles in Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home. A robotic whale was used for the film as the original whale, Keiko, had been moved to the Oregon Coast Aquarium to be rehabilitated from poor health.

Dad and Dave: On Our Selection features performances from several well-known actors including Noah Taylor, Murray Bertlett, Barry Otto and Geoffrey Rush. The film features opera singer Dame Joan Sutherland in her only feature film role.

Living in Oblivion features the film debut of Peter Dinklage. The film had been rejected by all studios, but the actors and friends of director Tom DiCillo felt so strongly about the project that they financed it. Two of the producers, Michael Griffiths and Hilary Gilford, were given parts in the movie for helping to finance the film. The film was shot in three parts after DiCillo shot for five days, realizing it was too short to be a feature and too long to be a short.

2005

• July 21 – Rash (AUS, documentary, Mutiny Media)
• July 22 – Bad News Bears (USA, Media Talent Group)
• July 22 – Hustle & Flow (USA, Crunk Pictures)
• July 22 – March of the Penguins (USA, documentary, National Geographic Films)
• July 22 – November (USA, limited, Subliminal Pictures)
• July 22 – The Devil’s Rejects (USA, Cinelamda)
• July 22 – The Island (USA, Parkes/MacDonald Image Nation)

March of the Penguins first opened in France and Belgium on January 26, 2005 as La marche de l’empereur.

Terrence Howard initially turned down the role of DJay in Hustle & Flow for fear of being typecast as a ‘pimp’ archetype. He reconsidered after reflecting on the complexity and emotional depth of the character. The project had faced rejection for years, and longtime supporter John Singleton was pivotal in the film’s production, funding the project himself after being frsutrated by the industry’s refusal to see its potential. It was difficult to translate the significance in African American culture of the terms ‘hustle’ and ‘flow’ to foreign audiences. In Russia, the film was titled The Bustle and the Motion, in Italy it was The Color of Music, and in China it was Street Hip Hop. The film earned two Academy Award nominations for Best Actor (Howard) and Best Original Song, ‘It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp’, which it won making it the second hip hop song to win the Oscar after Eminem’s ‘Lose Yourself’ from 8 Mile.

It took two isolated cinematographers a year to shoot March of the Penguins. As the film was shot in Antarctica, there was no film studio nearby to process the film, so the cinematographers had to remember what had been filmed for continuity. For the cameras to operate in −40° temperatures and below, all of the film had to be loaded for the day prior to shooting because it was impossible to reload the cameras outside. The film won the 2006 Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.

The closing credits for November run 10 minutes, comprising 13% of the film’s running time.

The Devil’s Rejects is the second of Rob Zombie’s ‘Firefly’ film series, and is a sequel to House of 1000 Corpses. Sid Haig, Bill Moseley, and Zombie’s wife Sheri Moon Zombie reprise their roles from the first film, with Leslie Easterbrook replacing Karen Black as the matriarch. It was the final film to feature Matthew McGrory before his death, although he has a posthumous cameo in 2017’s The Evil Within, which was filmed in 2002. The film was submitted to the MPAA eight times, earning an NC-17 every time but the last, with censors objecting to the tone of the motel scene between Moseley and Priscilla Barnes. Zombie cut two minutes of the scene for the R-rated theatrical release, but restored it for home video.

Scarlett Johansson’s character in The Island, Jordan Two Delta, was originally named Ester and was meant to be pregnant. The original screenplay was rewritten to decrease the budget, with the second and third acts heavily rewritten, and the scene of Ewan McGregor’s character finding a butterfly added. The film’s final budget was $126 million, and it grossed $162.9 million putting it in the flop category.

2015

• July 17 – Ant-Man (USA/Canada/UK, Marvel Studios)
• July 17 – Irrational Man (USA, limited, Perdido Productions)
• July 17 – Mr. Holmes (USA, limited)
• July 17 – Thomas & Friends: Sodor’s Legend of the Lost Treasure (UK, limited, Arc Productions)
• July 17 – Trainwreck (USA/Canada, Apatow Productions)

Ant-Man first opened in France on July 14, 2015. Irrational Man expanded to a wide release in the US on August 7, 2015. Mr. Holmes expanded to a wide release in the US on July 24, 2015. Thomas & Friends: Sodor’s Legend of the Lost Treasure premiered on home video in the US on September 8, 2015.

Pre-production on Ant-Man began in October 2013 after being put on hold so director Edgar Wright could finish The World’s End. Wright exited the project in May 2014 over creative differences, but still received a writing credit. Wright said he wanted to make a Marvel movie, but Marvel didn’t want to make an Edgar Wright movie. Peyton Reed replaced him after Scott McKay pulled out of negotiations, and he and Paul Rudd contributed to the screenplay. Rudd was initially under consideration to play Hank Pym, but Michael Douglas was eventually cast and Rudd took the role of Scott Lang. The film had been intended to start Phase 3 of the MCU but was moved to complete Phase 2. For the role of Yellowjacket, Corey Stoll wore a motion capture suit on set which was replaced with an entirely digital character. The film received a BAFTA nominations for Visual Effects.

Irrational Man was the second consecutive film Emma Stone made with Woody Allen following Magic in the Moonlight. It was the last film produced by Allen’s longtime collaborator Jack Rollins before his death in June 2015.

Young Sherlock Holmes star Nicholas Rowe has a cameo in Mr. Holmes, portraying Holmes in a sequence spoofing the Basil Rathbone ‘Sherlock Holmes’ films. The Conan Doyle Estate filed legal action against the filmmakers for alleged unauthorized use of copyrighted material. An agreement was reached before the film’s US release.

Thomas & Friends: Sodor’s Legend of the Lost Treasure is the ninth film in the ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ series. John Hasler provides the voice of Thomas in the UK release, while Joseph May voices the character in the US release. John Hurt and Eddie Redmayne also provide voices. The film received praise for its direction and plot, but was criticized for its dark undertone.

Barkhad Abdi was originally announced to appear in Trainwreck, but his role was ultimately filled by LeBron James. The film received Golden Globe nominations for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, and Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy for Amy Schumer.