Weekly DVD Alert Fourteen: March 8-March15, 2010

This movie is not airing this week; I'm just putting a picture up to make these posts easier to find. Also, my eyes hurt again.


Monday, March 8


2AM-4AM, TCM: CONTEMPT, 102m.
Jean-Luc Godard's 1963 masterpiece; I'll never grasp how he squeezes so much material into an hour-forty-two without it not feeling rushed or too dense. When I was a young man, I loved the moviemaking scenes and tended to tune out the arguments between Brigitte Bardot's and Michel Piccoli's married couple. Now, those scenes are riveting because they're so resonant and true. Jack Palance's producer character also comes off as even more vague and shaded than what I remember of his first impression. Fritz Lang's scenes are even sadder, too.

4AM-6AM, TCM: THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL, 118m.
From here, a belated-birthday [February 28, 1903] Vincente Minnelli mini-marathon begins: Minnelli & Charles Schnee's trashy piss take on producer David O. Selznick is far too beautifully made for its own good, but making a smaller, less polished movie based on Selznick's life probably would have offended him more than making a movie about what a dick he was in the first place. You're gonna do it, do it big and do it right. Kirk Douglas, Lana Turner and Dick Powell star.

6AM-8:15AM, TCM: THE STORY OF THREE LOVES, 122m.
Early '50s anthology film about …. the dance! I love any movie that can star Pier Angeli, Leslie Caron, Agnes Moorehead and Ethel Barrymore. James Mason, Kirk Douglas and Farley Granger co-star. Minnelli shared the director's chair with Gottfried Reinhardt, although I don't know why.

6AM-7:30AM, Sun: LYNCH, 84m.
Soren Larsen's portrait of David Lynch, made during his making of INLAND EMPIRE. [Reairs at 1PM and then on the 16th at 6:30AM, 11:30AM and 4:20PM.]

6:15AM-7:45AM, IFC: BROADWAY DANNY ROSE, 86m.
A funny mid-career Woody Allen movie. [Reairs at 12:05PM and 5:30PM; and the 23rd at 8:30AM and 1:30PM.]

7:30AM-9AM, Sun: THE RETURN OF THE WAR ROOM, 85m.
Chris Hegedus and D.A. Pennebaker return for an updated view of how politicians' lackeys more effectively lie to us about the bill of goods pretending to be a government reformer or maverick. WARNING: There's a lot of asskissing from the now-sidelined media dinosaurs to today's smaller, quicker-adapting mammals; it gets nauseating fast. James Carville and George Stephanopolous "star." [Reairs at 2:30PM.]

8:15AM-10:15AM, TCM: THE BAND WAGON, 112m.
And from here, a 79th birthday marathon for the late Cyd Charisse begins: WAGON is a fun Broadway jaunt starring Fred Astaire [in a role that could have easily plunged into self-parody and self-pity; Astaire was a better actor than he ever got credit for], Jack Buchanan and an absolutely gorgeous Cyd Charisse. I've often wondered why [or if] Minnelli's use of color grew more muted over the years, even on projects that demanded vivid, bold work like this movie -- or if it's the film itself. I understand that color-timing 3-strip Technicolor was more art than science, so even with these DVD remasterings and restorations, we may be seeing a 2003 techie's best guess of what a 1953 director/cinematographer intended.

10AM-Noon, FMC: THE STREET WITH NO NAME
Noon-2PM, FMC: THE DARK CORNER, 99m.
A sentence probably ever before typed: "Wow, a Mark Stevens double feature!" Two nice 20th Century Fox noirs starring the largely forgotten leading man; to show his versatility, he played a determined FBI Agent in the former and a determined private eye in the latter. William Keighley directed STREET with fine acting from Richard Widmark, Ed Begley and Barbara Lawrence; CORNER co-stars Lucille Ball [yes really] and Clifton Webb, with support from William Bendix. Henry Hathaway directs from Jay Dratler's & Bernard C. Schoenfeld's screenplays from Leo Rosten's story. [These films reverse order and reair on the 27th at 10AM.]

10:15AM-12:15PM, TCM: BRIGADOON, 108m.
Never seen it, have no excuse -- a Vincente Minnelli Technicolor musical about two Americans stumbling across a Scottish village that only materializes once a century, starring Gene Kelly and Charisse, who undoubtedly dance together? Duhr.

11:45AM-12:50PM, Sun: STANLEY KUBRICK'S BOXES, 61m.
Probably the program I'm most looking forward to seeing this week: Even by director/producer/perfectionist standards, Kubrick left behind a massive archive of notes and material; documentarian Jon Ronson digs into the boxes and interviews some of Kubrick's family and associates to assemble this film impression of him. [Reairs at 5:45pm]

12:15PM-2PM, TCM: IT'S ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER, 101m.
Gene Kelly & Stanley Donen direct, Kelly stars with Dan Dailey and Cyd Charisse.

2PM-4PM, FMC: THIEVES' HIGHWAY
A noir-ish Jules Dassin drama about a war veteran returning home to San Francisco to avenge the maiming and robbing on his father by a rival fruit seller. Richard Conte stars with Valentina Cortese and those warhorses Lee J. Cobb and Barbara Lawrence.

4PM-6PM, TCM: SILK STOCKINGS, 118m.
A hodge-podge adaptation of both the original Ernest Lubitsch, Melchior Lengyel, et al.'s film NINOTCHKA and its stage-musical adaptation by George S. Kaufman, Leueen MacGrath and Abe Burrows, this movie is a broth ruined by too many cooks. Rouben Mamoulian directs a cast boasting the likes of Fred Astaire, Charisse, Janis Paige, Peter Lorre and George Tobias, produced by Arthur Freed and songs by Cole Porter. It was Mamoulian's last completed movie and Astaire's last musical, two sad facts forgotten a few seconds into Charisse's opening strip tease.

6PM-8PM, TCM: TWO WEEKS IN ANOTHER TOWN, 107m.
Minnelli loved doing Broadway/Hollywood behind-the-scenes movies; this is one of his edgier [if such a term can be applied to the auteur as song & dance man] efforts. I'd love to know if how autobiographical this story of a recovering-alcoholic director struggling to get his career back on track in Rome is, but I don't want to find out. Kirk Douglas, Edward G. Robinson and Charisse star

6PM-8PM, GUILTY CONSCIENCE
It sounds like another cheap '80s made-for-TV movie, which it probably was, but it also sounds like an ideal vehicle for a leading actor with chops, which it has: Anthony Hopkins plays a brilliant lawyer who decides to kill his wife. He mentally puts himself on trial over and over to find the perfect alibi before he does the deed. Blythe Danner and Swoosie Kurtz co-star under David Greene's direction.

8:20PM-10PM, Sun: METROLAND, 101m.
This is either a charming indy movie or it's a patronizing, split-the-difference cop-out: Christian Bale and Emily Watson play a young couple who just moved to the suburbs to live the bourgeois life when Bale's best friend [Lee Ross] from the days when he had a life of culture and excitement reenters his life. Many questions about the life choices are presumably made. Philip Saville directs this adaptation of the Julian Barnes novel. [Reairs on the 14th at 7:15PM.]

9:45PM-11:15PM, TCM: THE JAZZ SINGER, 89m.
You ain't heard nothing yet, folks. We should all work to perfect our Al Jolson impersonations so that, if David Mamet calls to discuss us working on his next play, we can pick up the phone and bellow "HELLO MAMAAAAYYYYYET!!!" I bet he'd enjoy that the first few times.

10PM-12:30AM, SHO2: SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING "Vic Darchinyan vs. Rodrigo Guerrero"
Rebroadcast of last weekend's fights. The Raging Bull made another step along his comeback trail by fighting the young, never-before-seen-on-television, granite-chinned stoic Guerrero, in a match that was enjoyable but still would have been far more acceptable as the televised undercard to Dirrell-Abraham. In the opening bout, Lenny Zappavigna lost his title fight [for the vacant IBO lightweight championship] against Fernando Angulo in the ring but won it on the judges' scorecards. I would love to see Angulo fight again.

11PM-1AM, Sun: LET'S GET LOST, 120m.
Everyone should see Bruce Weber's iconic profile of cool-jazz trumpeter/singer Chet Baker at least once; Sundance has scheduled it to air often enough this month that everyone will. [Reairs at 5AM, on the 13th at 6:15AM and 5:10PM, on the 21st at 7PM, on the 22nd at 6:35AM and 11:55AM, on the 26th at 10:30AM and 5PM and on the 31st at Noon.]


Tuesday, March 9


12:05AM-12:35AM, HBO: THE ROAD TO DALLAS: MANNY PACQUIAO VS. JOSHUA CLOTTEY, 27m.
This is the only on-channel promotion the Manny Pacquiao-Joshua Clottey pay-per-view fight is getting. It was scheduled to make its debut after last Saturday's BOXING AFTER DARK broadcast. It aired well over a half-hour before its scheduled start time, so any fans who tuned in just to watch Pac-Clottey got an episode of MAKING IT IN AMERICA or whatever it's called instead. [What happened was the B.A.D. fight ended early and rather than plug the almost perfectly 30-minute gap with, say, that episode of MAKING IT IN AMERICA, they ran ROAD TO DALLAS early. Is that incompetence, indifference or malice? Conventional wisdom says that, as Clottey is not well-known, HBO and Top Rank should be pushing the fight more to raise awareness of it in casual fans' minds. So, passively or actively, why is this fight getting buried? [Reairs all throughout this week.]

12:35AM-2AM-ish, HBO: BOXING AFTER DARK "Devon Alexander vs. Juan Urango"
Considering how many of today's top junior welterweights are HBO fighters, this title unification could almost serve as a backdoor first round for a Super Six-style tournament. Alexander surprised the hell out of me, but not as much as how HBO/Sports totally screwed themselves with THE ROAD TO DALLAS.

2:15AM-3:55AM, SHOFamily: BUD GREENSPAN'S KINGS OF THE RING: FOUR LEGENDS OF HEAVYWEIGHT BOXING
A stately collection of profiles of Jack Johnson, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali. [Reairs on the 16th at 10PM and the 17th at 4:20AM.]

5AM-7AM, TCM: CASABLANCA, 103m.
I suppose nothing need be said about this film, except that I don't think Jack Benny is in it as an extra. Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid and Claude Rains star, in a script written by the Brothers Epstein & Howard Koch and direction by Michael Curtiz.

8:15AM-10:40AM, IFC: DANCER IN THE DARK, 137m.
This was the first movie to come out after I lost all interest in Lars Von Trier's movies -- that's not a knock on him or them, I just stopped watching new movies around that time -- but it sounds like a lot of fun. I imagine the behind-the-scenes as being less Dogme95 and more like an Andy Hardy movie. A gritty musical starring Bjork, Vladica Kostic, Catherine Deneuve, Peter Stormare and David Morse. [Reairs at 2:30PM.]

9:45AM-11:45AM, TCM: MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS, 113m.
Yeah yeah yeah, it's a great musical and a remarkably honest family movie -- especially with the jagged edges and unanswered questions about Margaret O'Brien's character and story arc -- but what really gets me with this movie is how lovingly Vincente Minnelli filmed his then-girlfriend Judy Garland. I've always found it strange that so many filmmakers want to make a "women's picture" but don't like women very much, and it shows.

2PM-4PM, TCM: MY SISTER EILEEN, 107m.
Never seen it, but it sounds like it could be entertaining: Betty Garrett and Janet Leigh play two small-town girls looking to make it big in the Big City. Jack Lemmon co-stars with direction from Richard Quine.

6PM-7:45PM, FMC: THE SEVEN-UPS, 103m.
What happened to Philip D'Antoni? He produced BULLITT, then THE FRENCH CONNECTION and then produced and directed this film, which is said to have an even more amazing car chase than the previous two, collected an Academy Award or two, produced a few things for TV and then …. nothing. Is there a story there? [Reairs on the 14th at 3:45PM.]

6:30PM-9PM, IFC: IT'S ALIVE, 80m.
A small order of 1968 schlock from Larry Buchanan: A demented farmer keeps a cave-nested prehistoric monster as a pet, and feeds it three people, who strenuously object to the situation. [Reairs at 3:50AM and on the 25th at 12:35AM.]

8PM-10:30PM, TCM: IKIRU, 143m.
The movie-marathon celebration of Akira Kurosawa's 100th birthday begins, interestingly enough, with this De Sica-esque little epic about an dying old man's effort to build a playground for some local children. Takashi Shimura stars, with Nobuo Kaneko and Kyoko Sieki and NOT Toshiro Mifune. I've sometimes wondered if there was a reason why he didn't get or take a part in this film.

10:30PM-12:30AM, TCM: THRONE OF BLOOD, 109m.
Kurosawa's version MACBETH is one of my very favorites of his movies, and his most rewatchable samurai movie. Toshiro Mifune and Isuzu Yamada outdo themselves as the Lord and Lady all the way up to a concluding set piece that, frame for frame, is the most exciting thing Kurosawa ever filmed.


Wednesday, March 10


12:30AM-3AM, TCM: THE HIDDEN FORTRESS, 139m.
I don't know if this is one of Kurosawa's lesser efforts or if it's just that it reminds me how what a stealing stealerpants George Lucas was. Toshiro Mifune, Misa Uehara and Ninoru Chiaki star.

12:30AM-2:30AM, FMC: BARTON FINK, 116m.
Writing movies really will drive you crazy after a while.

1AM-2:30AM, Sun: THEM, 77m.
I clearly don't watch horror movies correctly, especially shock thrillers; they just don't scare and/or shock me. Even with a patina of post-SCREAM self-awareness, most of these movies are still just as stupid, cliched and illogical as before. This barely feature-length French hicksploitation horror movie, "based on a true story" or not, doesn't separate itself from the pack by much, but I'd watch Olivia Bonamy in nearly anything.

3AM-6AM, TCM: HAKUCHI, 166m.
This lengthy 1951 adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's THE IDIOT is one of Kurosawa's lesser-seen movies. Setsuko Hara, Masayuki Mori and Toshiro Mifune star.

6AM-8:10AM, TCM: DONZOKO, 125m.
At first blush, it does seem odd how profound a connection Kurosawa had to Russian literature but they both place a premium on characterization via character interaction and community. It's most educational to compare this adaptation of Maxim Gorky's THE LOWER DEPTHS to Jean Renoir's [Criterion helped us out by packaging the two films together] -- Renoir takes the story as a three-character romantic drama with dreary organic and inorganic backgrounds, whereas Kurosawa breaks the story in a much more ensemble-minded direction. Isuzu Yamada, Toshiro Mifune and a startlingly straight Bokuzen Hidari star.

6:45AM-7:30AM, HBO: RIGHT AMERICA: FEELING WRONGED - SOME VOICES FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL, 44m.
It used to annoy me that Alexandra Pelosi gets the kind of support and access that most political documentarians would kill for because of which vagina she fell out of, but there's something about her movies that I find engaging. Engaging but never challenging; the few hard questions offered are the kind that any politico above the county-office level can see coming. Still, it's like watching home movies showcasing our political overlords' banal lives -- who wouldn't enjoy that? I haven't seen this one in a while, but I remember it being hilarious, lots of John McCain-loving white people struggling to manage their fear, anger and hatred as it becomes more and more clear that they're in the minority this time. POLIWOOD easily bests RIGHT AMERICA on every level -- even in being sympathetic to the plight of conservative Americans -- but this one has a few entertainingly raw moments of everyman racism, which is always fun. [Reairs Mar 22 at 7:30AM.]

7:30AM-9AM, FMC: THE HOUSE ON 92ND STREET, 88m.
Torn from still-wet headlines and widely cited as the first modern-style docudrama, this 20th Century Fox potboiler is about Nazi secret agents tearassing around NYC trying to steal our atomic-bomb secrets. Leo G. Carroll, William Blythe, Signe Hasso, Gene Lockhart star [with a very young E.G. Marshall making his screen debut] under the direction of Henry Hathaway. [Reairs on the 27th at 8:30AM.]

8:15AM-10:55AM, Sun: A CHRISTMAS TALE, 152m.
A Christmas family comedy [sorta] from Arnaud Desplechin,
Catherine Deneuve and Jean-Paul Roussillon? I'm sold, but why show an Xmas movie in March? Mathieu Amalric and Emmanuelle Devos costar. [Reairs on the 13th at 2:30PM, on the 18th at Midnight, on the 28th at 5:50PM and on the 29th at 4:05AM.]

8:20AM-12:15PM, Indie: ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA, 229m.
One of the few four-hour films that can [or should] easily sell you on sitting for the whole thing with just a thumbnail description: "Sergio Leone's GODFATHER, but Jewish." I wonder if the stories that Leone's rough cut was eight to ten hours long are true, and if that footage still exists if it ever did; there's a TV miniseries that would still rake in eyeballs 25 years later. Robert De Niro heads a hugh cast featuring Joe Pesci, Burt Ward [at long last, both greasy sidekicks in the same movie], James Woods, Elizabeth McGovern, Danny Aiello, Tuesday Weld, Treat Williams, William Forsythe, et al. with Jennifer Connelly making her film debut. [Reairs at 5:05PM, then on the 16th at 5:20AM and 5:05PM, and the 27th at 5:45AM and 3:25PM.]

10AM-11:35AM, IFC: BRUCE LEE: HIS LAST DAYS, HIS LAST NIGHTS, 91m.
This unauthorized-biographical flick is an onion of exploitation; so many layers. Li Hsiu Hsien [later renamed "Danny Lee"] stars as Bruce Lee; Betty Ting Pei co-stars as Lee's lover … Betty Ting Pei. Three years after the real Lee mysteriously died in Pei's apartment. So creepy. The movie has one of the greatest non-starting starts I've ever seen; an interminable fight scene in the middle of nowhere. I believe it was F. Scott Fitzgerald who passionately believed that the first two chapters of a story are written solely for the writer's benefit and should be cut outright before revisions; Scott would probably burst into flames and/or ejaculate after the first half-hour of this movie. [Reairs at 2:45PM, on the 25th at Noon and on the 26th at 5AM.]

2PM-4PM, FMC: OUR MAN FLINT, 108m.
When no one's looking, I try to rewrite film histories to claim this 1966 James Coburn vehicle as a remake of ALPHAVILLE. [Reairs on the 21st at 4:30PM.

4PM-6PM, FMC: IN LIKE FLINT, 114m.
James Coburn's superspy franchise lands ass-first on out and out camp; still a fun crappy movie. Lee J. Cobb and Jean Hale costar.

5:55PM-8PM, IFC: DAYS OF GLORY, 120m.
Indie war movie about how North Africans/Arabs/Muslims in French-controlled colonies volunteered to fight Nazis and liberate France despite the kind of discriminatory treatment one normally only imagines black American soldiers received during World War II. Directed by Rachid Bouchareb from a screenplay co-written with Olivier Lorelle. [Reairs on the 25th at 6PM.]

6PM-8PM, FMC: MODESTY BLAISE, 119m.
It's '60s spy/comic-strip day at Fox Movie Channel, apparently. I've not seen, sort of looking forward to seeing this one. [Reairs at 3:45AM.]

6PM-6:20PM, Sun: MADAME TUTLI PUTLI, 17m.
The still in this stop-motion animated short's information page looked nice, and I found the combination of phrases "a night train" and "a timid woman in red" irresistible. The actual film is slightly more creepy than whimsical, but very pretty regardless. [Reairs on the 16th at 6:10AM and 11:40PM.]

6PM-7:45PM, TCM: MERRY ANDREW, 103m.
This 1958 movie sounds too good to not be poorly executed -- "An archaeologist's search for Roman treasure gets him mixed up with a circus troupe." -- but Pier Angeli gets second billing. Pier Angeli! Danny Kaye and Salvatore Baccaloni costar under direction by Michael Kidd.

8PM-10PM, Sun: NIGHTS OF CABIRIA, 118m.
It's startling and enchanting how late-period Chaplinesque this this early Fellini film is; the film even looks like a sound-era Chaplin in its grain. Giulietta Masina stars, with Amadeo Nazzari. [Reairs at 3:45AM, on the 19th at 6:35AM and 1:30PM, on the 25th at 6PM and on the 26th at 5:15AM and 12:30PM.]

10PM-10:45PM, SHO2: CLASSIC BOXING "2007: Chris Arreola vs. Malcolm Tann"
An eight-round heavyweight fight from three years and 30 pounds earlier in "The Nightmare's" career. I have no memory of him ever fighting on Showtime; I hope this isn't just a case of Yahoo's listings having a senior moment or somesuch.


Thursday, March 11


6:45AM-8:30AM, Sun: THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD, 100m.
Guy Maddin's best. Mark McKinney is a great leading man. [Reairs at 1PM, and then on the 27th at 10PM, on the 28th at 3:25AM and on the 30th at 6:40AM and 2:15PM.]

10:15AM-11:30AM, Sun: THE HOME SONG STORIES, 103m.
Tony Ayres wrote and directed this semi-autobiographical, appropriately meandering movie about his desperately materialistic single-mother [Joan Chen], his sister and their ever-shifting home life. I still haven't actually Googled it yet to confirm, but the idea that Joan Chen's not only a protege of Chairman Mao's wife, but may also still be pro-Cultural Revolution even now has made her much less bonerific in my eyes. Eye. Whether that's true or not, my penis and its two closest advisers in the Gang of Three have already denounced me for being Counter-Revolutionary. Still, Chen is compelling in this film, letting the viewer in on everything she's feeling except, in key points, whatever the thoughts are every mother clearly hides from her children. [Reairs at 4:30PM, on the 19th at 8:35AM and 3:30PM and on the 23rd at 9AM and 4:20PM.]

12:30PM-2:30PM, FMC: PRINCE VALIANT, 100m.
This is one weird concept: Hal Foster's classic illustratorly comic strip comes to the very big screen [it's one of if not the first film shot in CinemaScope, 2.55:1] via director Henry Hathaway and the woefully underrated screenwriter Dudley Nichols [STAGECOACH, BRINGING UP BABY, SCARLET STREET, GUNGA DIN, THE BELLS OF ST. MARY'S, THE INFORMER, etc.], who hit on the fairly ingenious method of adapting the absurdly complex and long continuities of the strip by using panels from the strip as storyboards for the movie. This should be a milk run for making a solid adventure movie, right? They cast Robert Wagner for the lead, Janet Leigh as his Princess Aleta, James Mason as the heavy, The Black Knight and Sterling Hayden as Valiant's comic relief/mentor Sir Gawain. All well and good, but somehow the ingredients don't quite cook the way that, say, THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD come together although it may simply be that Wagner's terrible bob wig throws me every time. VALIANT is visually gorgeous but it is curious how fast the film's editing rhythm is; I wonder if it was done with some technical reason due to the new film ratio, or if they just had too much plot to squeeze into even a roadshow-length film, or what. The individual shots are as amazingly composed as you would expect from a movie that Hal Foster "storyboarded."

5:15PM-6:30PM, TCM: THE POLICE DOG STORY, 63m.
6:30PM-8PM, TCM: IT'S A DOG'S LIFE, 87m.
I can already hear Turner's voiceover artist saying "Tonight, TCM goes to the dogs! First, James Brown and Merry Anders train a pup to sniff out trouble in THE POLICE DOG STORY; then Edmund Gwenn and Dean Jagger witness a bull terrier's rags-to-riches life story in IT'S A DOG'S LIFE. Be good and SIT! for a treat on Turner Classic Movies tonight!"

8PM-9:45PM, TCM: THE LADY EVE, 94m.
The classic Preston Sturges screwball romance, starring Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda.

8PM-9PM, ESPNC: CLASSIC BOXING "2005: Ricky Hatton vs. Kostya Tszyu"
For one brief, shining moment, Ricky Hatton looked like a pound-for-pound great, making the mighty Tszyu not only quit the fight on his stool but boxing itself.

9PM-11:05PM, Sun: RESCUE DAWN, 125m.
Werner Herzog dramatizes his documentary LITTLE DIETER NEEDS TO FLY as a Hollywood P.O.W.-escape movie. I'm not a big fan of this one but it's fascinating to compare the doc to the drama. The most crackling action in DAWN isn't between the prisoners and the Laotian guards but between century-class character actors Steve Zahn and Jeremy Davies as they bulldoze star Christian Bale in their twitching battle to steal the most scenes. [Reairs at 3:15AM, on the 17th at 11PM, on the 18th at 4:45AM, on the 24th at 1AM and on the 29th at 12:05AM.]


Friday, March 12


Midnight-1:45AM, TCM: OVER 21, 105m.
This late/post-war newspaper yarn sounds a bit too ridiculous -- "When a newspaper editor enlists during World War II service, his wife has to run interference with his boss." -- but I've started to really enjoy watching Charles "King" Vidor movies just to see how he shoehorns his favorite themes and ideas into any story. Irene Dunne, Alexander Knox and Charles Coburn star.

12:45AM-2:15AM, Sun: ERASERHEAD, 85m.
David Lynch's debut feature film. It's a classic. I haven't seen it. Chinga tu madre, cineastehole. [Reairs at 11:05AM, on the 20th at 8:30AM and 4PM, on the 24th at 10:30PM, on the 25th at 5:45AM and on the 29th at 11:50PM.]

2AM-3:35AM, FMC:THE ADVENTURE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES' SMARTER BROTHER, 91m.
If you squint, this movie could look like a lost mid-'70s Mel Brooks film; Gene Wilder wrote the screenplay and stars with Madeline Kahn, Marty Feldman, Leo McKern and Dom Deluise in this specifically sub-genre specific spoof, complete the inspired Brooksian stunt-casting of Leo McKern as Professor Moriarty. But Wilder also directed the film and showed that he is no borscht-belt fartypants like his one-time mentor, producing a far more adult piece of silliness than YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN or HIGH ANXIETY. [Reairs on the 18th at 6:30PM.]

6AM-7:30AM, FMC: THE BLACK SWAN, 87m.
9AM-11:30AM, FMC: BLOOD AND SAND, 125m.
For SAND: Tyrone Power! Linda Darnell! Rita Hayworth! Rouben Mamoulian! When they were all young-ish! A really young Anthony Quinn! Vicente Blasco Ibanez's novel! Bull fights! Passion! Technicolor! And, for SWAN: Tyrone Power, again! Maureen O'Hara! Quinn, again! Pirates! Even more Technicolor! [SAND reairs on the 28th at 7:30AM; SWAN reairs on the 21st at 7:15AM.]

7:30AM-9AM, FMC: DANTE'S INFERNO, 89m.
There must be a hell of a story to explain how this Spencer Tracy movie got by the Hayes Office; Spence plays a carnival barker who's ready and eager to cut every corner to get to the top, no matter how many stunt-disaster set pieces it causes. I often talk up NIGHTMARE ALLEY as the bleakest, craziest thing ever produced by studio-era Hollywood, but ALLEY doesn't start with Tyrone Power in blackface boozing it up after work, which is how Tracy is reportedly introduced here. WTF FTW, indeed. Henry B. Walthall, Scotty Beckett and Alan Dinehart co-star, with a dancing cameo from a pre-"Hayworth" Rita Casino and enough dream-sequence-ish nudity that parents with young children should be happy that they have zero interest in black & white television. Harry Lachman directs from a loose adaptation of Dante's poem written by a squadron of screenwriters.

8:40AM-10:30AM, IFC: BRIGHT YOUNG THINGS, 105m.
Writer/actor/first-time director Stephen Fry adapts Evelyn Waugh's novel VILE BODIES into a fine, witty ensemble period-piece. Stephen Campbell Moore, Emily Mortimer, Peter O'Toole star, Dan Aykroyd, Simon Callow and Stockard Channing cameo. [Reairs at 2:45PM; and on the 27th at 6:30AM and 1:15PM.]

10:15AM-Noon, TCM: PSYCHE 59, 94m.
Noon-2PM, TCM: THE COLLECTOR, 119m.
A Samantha Eggar double feature -- I've not seen 59, but I like the number and I love Patricia Neal to pieces. I have seen THE COLLECTOR -- it's a little too well-made to be effective; it's a newsprint story told on gold-edged manuscript paper, as compared to a cheap take on similar material like DIE! DIE! MY DARLING! But, taking it as an actor's showcase for a young Terence Stamp, it's pretty great. William Wyler directs.

8PM-10:30 FOX LEGACY: HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY,118m.
John Ford's gentle, elegiac classic about a family of Welsh coal miners beat out CITIZEN KANE, HERE COMES MR. JORDAN, THE LITTLE FOXES, THE MALTESE FALCON, SERGEANT YORK and SUSPICION for the Best Picture Oscar in 1941. I don't know if it deserved it -- the film raked in more Awards for Best Director and Best Supporting Actor, Best Art Direction and Best Cinematography as well as nominations for Best Supporting Actress, Best Film Editing Best Music for a Dramatic Picture, Best Sound Recording and Best Writing -- but it's undoubtedly one of John Ford's, Philip Dunne's, Walter Pidgeon's, Maureen O'Hara's, Donald Crisp's, Sara Allgood's and Roddy McDowall's greatest efforts. Warning: This is a "Fox Legacy" presentation of the movie, so the first 20 minutes or so will be FoxFilm CEO Tom Rothman talking about how awesome the movie and Fox are, so don't lowball the recording time on your TIVO/DVDR/Betamax timer. [Reairs at 10:30PM and 1AM, and then on the 21st at 8PM.]

10PM-11:45PM, Sun: METROPOLITAN, 98m.
Whit Stillman's debut as a writer-director, a Wilde-esque comedy of manners and another fine movie that makes you love Christopher Eigeman at the same time you want to punch his character in the mouth. Edward Clements co-stars. [Reairs at 3:30AM and 8:15AM, then on the 18th at 9:45AM and 4:45PM and on the 27th at 8:15AM.]

10PM-10:45PM, SHO2: CLASSIC BOXING "2008: David Haye vs. Enzo Maccarinelli"
A short-lived cruiserweight fight, but it's so rare to see a Haye fight on American television at all.


Saturday, March 13


2:30AM-4:15AM, TCM: SHANKS, 93m.
4:15AM-5:45AM, TCM: MR. SARDONICUS, 90m.
Here's a phrase you used to hear more often, I would think: "William Castle late-night double-feature." Marcel Marceau stars as a mute puppeteer who uses corpses in the former, Oskar Homolka stars as a man who literally can't stop smiling.

3AM-4:20AM, Indie: GAS!, 78m.
Roger Corman's last movie as a director for American International. Even when he made shit -- "nerve gas kills everyone older than 25 in a Texas town, so the survivors travel to a New Mexico hippie commune" -- there's something about Corman that I find compelling. This one probably will be aired in Pan & Scan, but it's not a movie that gets a lot of play anyway. [Reairs on the 24th at 5:15AM.]

6AM-7:01AM, FMC: THE BIG TRAIL, 120m.
John Wayne's first starring role, very much like the old OREGON TRAIL video game [see also: UNTAMED; Fox really had a thing for this story]. Raoul Walsh was no John Ford, but neither was John Ford most of the time. Lots of magnificent scenery in this one, appropriately enough. [Reairs on the 27th at 6AM.]

6:20AM-8:05AM, IFC: CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS, 104m.
I haven't seen this since it came out on VHS; I'm very curious to see how Woody Allen & Alan Alda's four-handed [well, maybe two and a half] middle finger to Larry Gelbart plays out now that he's dead. I didn't know that Alda was imitating him when I saw it, but I remember wondering why Allen seemed to want us to dislike Alda's character when he didn't seem so bad, just a little too glib -- I chalked it up to yet another actor not wanting to be disliked. I'm really hoping that I'm old enough to appreciate the Martin Landau-Anjelica Huston-Jerry Orbach half of the film. It can't be as leaden as I thought, it was me not getting it, right? [Reairs at Noon and 5:15PM; and on the 29th at 5:55AM, 11:30AM and 5:15PM.]

8:05AM-9:45AM, IFC: TAPEHEADS, 93m.
I've still done no research to confirm this, but I'm reasonably sure that everyone who was cool in 1988 is in this movie. [Reairs at 1:50PM.]

8:30AM-10AM, FMC: AS YOUNG AS YOU FEEL, 77m.
Small-budget comedy about an old man fighting back against his company forcing him to retire. Monty Woolley is the [old] man, with support from Jean Peters, Thelma Ritter, David Wayne and a young Marilyn Monroe and direction from Harmon Jones from old Lamar Trotti's adaptation of young Paddy Chayefsky's story. [Reairs on the 23rd at 10:30AM.]

8:30AM-10:30AM, TCM: THE HARDER THEY FALL, 109m.
Mark Robson does a beautiful job directing -- in the visuals, Robson and cinematographer Burnett Guffey were more faithful to Budd Schulberg's savagely honest novel about the shit-crusted underbelly of boxing than screenwriter Philip Yordan was in his script adaptation -- with a cast starring Bogart [his final movie], Rod Steiger, Jan Sterling and a number of notable boxers [Jersey Joe Walcott, Max Baer, etc.]

6:15PM-8PM, TCM: RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY (1962)
Sam Peckinpah's breakout as a writer/director is the first of his many two-fisted eulogies for The Old West. Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea star, with Mariette Hartley.

8PM-9:45PM, IFC: AMERICAN PSYCHO, 97m.
Bret Easton Ellis and director Mary Harron almost made it too easy for cultural conservatives of all stripes to attack this movie for its most irrelevant aspect, the extreme violence. It undoubtedly put asses in theater seats, but the excess weakens the movie's impact and a lot of its jokes. The scene about the business cards kills me every time. Christian Bale stars, with Willem Dafoe, Jared Leto, Reese Witherspoon, Samantha Mathis, Chloe Sevigny and Guinevere Turner, who co-wrote the adaptation. [Reairs on the 14th at 12:15AM.]

10PM-Midnight, TCM: DEAD HEAT ON A MERRY-GO-ROUND, 107m.
I've often wondered if this 1966 heist movie is any good, or if it's outlived its expiration date because it was Harrison Ford's first movie. James Coburn and Camilla Sparv star, under direction by Bernard Girard.


Sunday, March 14


Midnight-1:30AM, TCM: THE BIG HEAT, The (1953)
Fritz Lang's magnificent potboiler about an obsessed police detective and a scarred moll conspiring to destroy the gangster who hurt them. This film is so saturated with violence and desperation it practically oozes off the screen. Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame and Lee Marvin star.

4:30AM-6AM, TCM: CALYPSO HEAT WAVE, 86m.
This movie had me sold at its title; that it's a jukebox movie that features Maya Angelou and a young, singing Alan Arkin, well, what else can one ask from a Calypsploitation movie? Well, you could ask for Louis Farrakhan to have sung a song in the movie -- he was still performing as "The Charmer" back then. Well, and a Belafonte performance or two, but that's all that's missing from this one.

9AM-11AM, H: EINSTEIN
A fine biography of the immortal physicist and his theories.

11AM-1PM, H: ART OF WAR
Another program I'm very eager to see: An examination of Sun Tzu's 6th-century treatise using the lessons he learned in his life as well as demonstrations of his theories using famous battles from history. All my history-nerd synapses just fired at once and, exploded into spaaa-aaa-aaace.

Noon-1:45PM, TCM: HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO, 101m.
Preston Sturges at his peak: HERO isn't his best film, but the sheer writing and directing skill he brings to a little farce about a bunch of real WWII vets helping out a podunk piker is breathtaking. The entire movie collapses if you stop to think about the story and characters you're watching -- if you think about how psychotic the Marine with the mother issues is, it's perverse to realize that he's the catalyst and driving narrative force for almost the entire plot -- but Sturges never gives you a chance. Eddie Bracken, Ella Raines [as the sweetest of Sturges' small-town girls], William Demarest and the rest of Sturges' wrecking crew of classic character actors star.

1PM-3PM, H: STEALING LINCOLN'S BODY
Possibly the craziest story ever told on the History Channel, rendered even crazier by being told in the channel's carefully measured house style: A bunch of Chicago mobsters decide to steal the President's corpse in 1876 and hold it for ransom.

3PM-5PM, H: FORT KNOX: SECRETS REVEALED
Not that many secrets are revealed, duh, but this doc gives a fascinating look at the U.S. Bullion Depository near Fort Knox.

4PM-5:45PM, TCM: SUMMERTIME, 100m.
As I remember it, this movie does for romances what BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK did for Westerns around the same time; both are about how WWII changed our world without really ever being about WWII at all. This Katharine Hepburn vehicle was director/co-writer David Lean's last "small" movie prior to BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, but it's just as visually stunning as those "big" movies. Rossano Brazzi, Isa Miranda and Darren McGavin co-star.

5PM-7PM, H: RUMRUNNERS, MOONSHINERS AND BOOTLEGGERS
A history of illegal alcohol in America. Here's hoping that there's an entire segment devoted to Joe Kennedy building his family's entire fortune off the Jazz Age's version of crack cocaine.

8PM-10PM, TCM: GOD'S LITTLE ACRE, 118m.
A rare non-Western from Anthony Mann's '50s work, it's curiously sedate and undercooked for an oversexed Southern melodrama based on the then-mega popular novel of the same name. Mann and cinematographer Ernie Haller seem more turned on by the location scenery than Tina Louise's body -- no one over the age of 12 was ever aroused by Ginger's acting -- but the movie has a full house of faces that are always nice to see: Robert Ryan, Aldo Ray, Buddy Hackett [pump that water nice, boy!] Jack Lord, Fay Spain, Vic Morrow, Helen Westcott, Rex Ingram, and a young Michael Landon as … an albino. Blacklisted screenwriter Ben Maddow [THE ASPHALT JUNGLE, THE WILD ONES] adapted the book for the screen using Philip Yordan as a front.

8PM-11:30PM, FMC: FOX LEGACY: PATTON
One of the most interior epics you'll ever see. George C. Scott really is mesmerizing, even when the movie around him is a slogging march through war cliches and Cliffs Notes history. I'm fairly sure that "Fox Legacy" is the packaging that presents Fox's CEO talking about how great the movie is, how great 20th Century was in bankrolling it and how awesome Fox Movie Channel is for airing it so often, so you might want to program your recorders or your schedules accordingly.

9PM-10PM, HBO: THE PACIFIC: Episode One, 52m.
"BAND OF BROTHERS: WEST COAST." I've been avoiding the hype and hoopla for this WWII series, so all I know for sure is that it's set in …. the Pacific. [Reairs on the 16, 17, 19, 20 and 31.]

11PM-Midnight, ESPNC: CLASSIC BOXING "1986: Mike Tyson vs. James 'Quick' Tillis"
Midnight-12:30AM, ESPNC: CLASSIC BOXING "1988: Mike Tyson vs. Larry Holmes"
12:30AM-1AM, ESPNC: CLASSIC BOXING "1989: Mike Tyson vs. Frank Bruno"
1AM-4AM, ESPNC: RINGSIDE "Tyson---Champion"
A block of three of Iron Mike's best fights leading into an episode of Bert Sugar's weekly in-depth discussion program devoted to Kid Dynamite's brief reign as the undisputed best in his division.


Monday, March 15


Midnight-1:30AM, TCM: THE MAGICIAN, 79m.
This week's Silent Sunday is a 1926 Rex Ingram drama: "A devil worshiper tries to seduce a young innocent." SOLD! Paul Wegener, Ivan Petrovitch and Alice Terry star.

4:15AM-6AM, TCM: BRUTE FORCE, 98m.
A postwar Jules Dassin thriller about some convicts preparing to smash their way off the drain-pipe detail and on to freedom. Burt Lancaster [in, I think, his feature-film debut], Vince Barnett and Hume Cronyn star.

6AM-8AM, FMC: NIGHTMARE ALLEY, 110m.
Tyrone Power, getting ground into the dirt and then ground even further! Joan Blondell, being so lovely you'll want to punch yourself in the face after a while! Edmund Goulding, in a once-in-a-lifetime performance as a director! George Jessel, earning a producer credit in his filmography guaranteed to trigger generations of double-takes to come! Circus Noir Overdrive!

8PM-10:15PM, TCM: BOOM TOWN, 119m.
I'm often surprised to see that Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy didn't really make that many movies together; they had an exciting, engaging chemistry. Hedy Lamarr and Claudette Colbert co-star under direction by Jack Conway.

10PM-Midnight, SHO2: SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING "Edwin Valero vs. Antonio DeMarco"
Edwin Valero's American-television coming-out party. It's a terrible idea for him to move up in weight as fast as he can when he's still a young man and one hell of a banger as a lightweight. [Reairs on the 15th at 10PM.]

10:15PM-12:15AM, TCM: THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER, 118m.
Warner Bros. workhorses William Keighley & Laird Doyle's adaptation of the Mark Twain novel. The Mauch twins star, with support from Errol Flynn and Claude Rains.

10:30PM-12:10AM, IFC: KURT COBAIN: ABOUT A SON, 96m.
The most attractive aspect of this particular recounting of Cobain's story is that he narrates it himself via a cache of interview recordings. [Reairs on the 20th at 8PM and on the 21st at 4AM.]

11PM-12:30AM, Sun: ALICE NEEL, 83m.
Andrew Neel assembled a fascinating, appropriately frustrating profile of his grandmother, the late great portrait painter Alice Neel. [Replays at 4:40AM.


And, that's another week.