Welcome to "Love Those Classic
Movies!!!" Second Annual Classic Mr. & Mrs. Clause. This year to
kick it off we have two extrememly gifted (and perhaps a team one would NEVER thought would see as a couple) and top classic leading actor and actress:
Robert Mitchum & Ginger Rogers.
These personalities will keep a room filled all night
and enteretained!!!
Robert Mitchum & Ginger Rogers have
both been good sports and have dressed up in various Christmas outfits and posed
for us during their busy schedules, so thank you!!! After a lot of assistants to help
with getting the right outfits and the rest of the glamour squad to do hair the
photo shoots were just swell! These two know how to ham it up for the camera and
for the fans all the time and to look glamorous!
Starring: William Powell, Ginger Rogers & Gene Lockhart
Gowns by: Bernard Nweman
Taglines: The titian-haired star of "Gay Divorcee" and "Roberta" joins hands with the master of all screen sleuths in a sparkling, mystery drama breathless with thrills...
Plot:
Clay 'Dal' Dalzell (Powell) is a successful lawyer and on the side plays detective and is very good at it. Clay is able to get his muderer and is asked by a friend Tim Winthrop to work for him on a case. The case involves a missing girl from a year ago with no trace and this girl Alice is esepcially close to Tim since it is his girl. Clay of course loving to solve a good mystery takes this on.
On Clay's arm is the beautiful socialite Donna Mantin (Rogers). Donna is drapped in the most beautiful gowns and diamonds fitting for the most stylish 1930's styles of the day. Donna asks for Dal to stop a story to stop occurring on notes a gentleman she was seeing and of course with some choice words our man steps up and gets the notes back and saves the young lady from a harmful story being printed. The gossip columnist Tommy Tennant goes to see "Dal" in his art deco lavish apartment and during the visit is shot dead by someone outside. The police arrive a believe that Dal shot Tennant due to a story that he was going to publish and confirm. In order to shut Tennant up the thought goes that Dal shot him dead and in accident shot himself and grazed his head as well. This leaves no option since now Dal is prime suspect in the murder of Tennant to take on the case. Donna heads up and meets with Dal and obtains the notes and now finds out the letters written were not from her but from her from married friend that she was saving.
Donna and Dal are smitten with one another and together arm in arm (a beautiful couple at that) go to solve the dissappearance of this lady going missing and to clear Dal's name and to find the true killer of Tennant and what happened to Alica the veiled stage performer.
Note from the classic movie gentleman:
~ Ginger Rogers at this time just starred in her huges successful Astaire/Rogers musicals for RKO and became for her studio: RKO box office bonanza! At this same time the "Thin Man" film from MGM Studios were released starring William Powell & Myrna Loy and were as well HUGE box office success. The thought of course for many studios was to duplicate the success of the husand and wife mysteries such as RKO borrowing William Powell and pairing him up with their queen Ginger Rogers in a high class murder mystery. This film did not have sequels and Powell & Rogers sadly never made another motion picture again and seeing them together they were actually very good together. RKO used their lavish sets in this film to show Dal's apartment in the city and the fancy clubs then showing there beautifu leading lady in aptly designed gowns. A very nice team in this classic gem!!
Happy Holidays: The Classic Movie Style!!!!
(Part 8)
Here
is part eight of our holiday season's best in pictures, music and all things
Classic Movies!! Hope you enjoy these installments as much as I do with putting
them together. It is a lot of fun to see our favorite screen celebrities and
lovely tunes to enjoy, what true gifts in my book! I will be posting a few of
these to keep us all posted as to what our ladies and gentlemen of the silver
screen are up to and singing for this holdiay season, so let's get a good egg
nog and put the lights down for some fun yule tides!!!! Happy watching. : )
I'll Be Seeing You (1944) / Selznick International Pictures Directed By: William Dieterle Starring: Ginger Rogers, Joesph Cotten, Shirley Temple
Costumes: Edith Head (for Miss Rogers)
Taglines: Both living a secret...each afraid to tell!
Plot:
The setting is the 1940's during the heigth of WWII and it is the holiday season and fastly approaching Christmas when we meet Mary Marshall (Rogers) and Sgt. Zachary Morgan (Cotten). On a train heading towards Pine Hill, both Mary and Zach find themselves sitting across one another on this ride. What they do not know about each other at this point is that they are both stunted individuals with a lot of package. Mary is on a eight day furlong from prison so she can spend Christmas with her aunt and uncle in the small town of Pine Hill. Where Zach is suffering from shell shock from the war and is granted a ten day leave from the millitary hospital to try to adjust to daily life. Each decides to hold onto their own secret when finally introducing themselves to one another. Mary tells Zach that she is a traveling saleslady going to visit her family for Christmas while Zach says he is going to Pine Hill as well to visit his sister. They both find this to be the more approachable story and something that they want to actually rather accept than the darker reality.
The train then arrives at the Pine Hill depot where the two exchange names and then part ways. Mary then goes to visit her Aunt Clara and Uncle Henry's home. During this time Zach heads into the town and checks into the local YMCA. Mary finds herself depressed while at the family home realizing that the idea of a family and husband are not going to happen due to prison. Shortly, thereafter a perfect phone call happens where Zach calls Mary and she invites him over for a lovely dinner. Together they enjoy friendly conversation and a nice home cooked meal. Afterwards Zach then decides to tell the truth to Mary that he does not have a sister in town but rather chose to stop in Pine Hill to be near Mary. Mary is taken back from this statement and seemingly starts to like him and they decide together to attend a movie at the local movie house.
Mary now knows that Zach was in the war and they head to the local cafe where the local soda jerk has a noticable facial tick. The man then recounts how he got it from having shell shock as well in WWI. With the fear that this is what will happen to him the facial and other ailments in the future Zach runs out of the cafe not able to verbally share any of this with Mary.
Mary is stunned and returns home where she is sharing a room with her cousin Barbara (Temple). Barbara distrusts Mary and labels possessions so they do not get used nor stolen. To get Barbara to better relate to her Mary told her the whole story of why she went into jail. Mary as a secretary is invited one night to go out with her wealthy boss. The dinner is in his apartment which the young Mary should have known better not tohave accepted since he was going to of course try to make advances. Mary truly believes what he says that it is a party she is attending but that quickly changes once arriving and no one is there accept the two of them. Horrible advances are made toward Mary from the boss which she is horrified and avoids. During one of the advances that Mary avoids she pushes him away which has enough momentum to throw him throw the apartment's open window and to his death thus bringing her to court and jail. Barbara now knows Mary's true story of what happened and is touched by her telling it to her so she pleads for forgiveness. The cousins are now better and understand each other.
The next day Zach arrives and invites Mary to spend the day at a local lake with him which she accepts. While they are at the lake Zach takes this time to tell her the real reasons for why he ran of the day before and his war experiences. Later Zach invites the family to the New Year's party at the YMCA where Aunt Sarah buys Mary a new dress to wear so she looks lovely. The party goes very well and at the end of the evening Zach walks Mary home. During this walk they are attacked by a dog where Zach fends him off and then Mary is pleased to tell him that he seems to be getting better. The next issue that Zach faces is that he leaves the next day as does Mary. Zach starts to discuss a future with the two of them and Mary asks to refrain on the topic and to delay it. Mary goes into the house crying and confides into Sarah that she truly loves Zach. During the evening Zach also then suffers a relapse and gets himself better by having himself hear Mary's voice. Yes, Zach truly loves Mary.
Mary finds out when they enter that train together that Zach acts odd and very distant and finds out that Barbara inadvertently says to Zach details of prison with Mary. Mary is then very sadden and cries and when it comes the night to arrive to prison gates in the dark , Zach steps from the shadows to embrace and declare his love.
Note from the classic gentleman:
This is a holdiay classic romance/drama that shows that during the height of WWII people can find true love during the holidays even with harsh circumstances.
Queen Kelly (1929) /Gloria Swanson Pics & United Artists
Directed By: Eric Von Stroheim
Starring: Gloria Swanson, Walter Byron & Seena Owen.
Plot:
The kingdom of Kronberg is ruled by Queen Regina V (Owen) who rules with an iron fist. The Queen is not that friendly of a woman and is very jealous since her fiance Prince Wolfram (Byron) is a dashing young man. He is a ladies man where all young ladies are attracted to his good looks along with being athletic since the film starts out with him racing carriages against others. The Prince is a very active man and goes out with friends often from the guard and ladies seem to appear everywhere he is.
The very jealous Queen meets back with the Prince over dinner and decides prior to this meeting to have him get engaged with the miliatia of the palace to keep him busy on missions. The Queen thinks this will keep him in check at all times and not mingling with young ladies. At the same time during this dinner she announces in her very dramatic way as she only knows how to live life such as her appearance with her blonde hair bound up on top of her head and with feathers and jewels all over and her dog in her hand at all times. As we can see the Queen has been very pampered sleeping in and a life of leisure. So the statement is said that the marriage between the Prince and herself has been pused up , rather than waiting several week it was going to happen the very next day. Needless to say the Prince is stunned at this information but agrees with a smile.
Prince Wolfram departs on his travels with the other militia and meets up during the long travels on the road a group of school girls attending a local convent. The nuns speak with the future king and the girls of the conventall bow and meet the Prince. The prince instantly is smitten with one girl named Kelly (Swanson) as soon as he saw her. They spoke and he laughed at her for a piece of her under garnments fell off and that left Kelly feelin horrible so she threw them right at him! The nuns were horrified and the prince was not angry but seems to intrigued by this young lady.
Later that day, the Prince can not help but think about her more and then he and a friend decide to ride to the convent and visit Kelly. Upon arriving to the convent the question came, how to get Kelly out and spend time with her? The answer was to start a little fire within something that thw amoke would drive one and all out of the building locating Kelly. And this happened and worked they found Kelly in the fog of smoke where she passed out and they took her to the palace. The prince hides her day clothing that Kelly was holding onto during her leaving of the convent where now she has her nightgown and his goat on to sleep. She awakes startled and they talk and the sparks start to fly between them. These two are fast becoming romantically involved. The prince spends the rest of the night with Kelly having a huge dinner made for her in his room while the Queen is staying under the same roof but in her own wing. This new couple seem to have a lot of affection sharing stories and laughter and a kiss. Meanwhile, the Queen is waiting to see her fiancee so sneeks outside of the prince's bedroom to see the other woman sharing his bed! She quietly enters the room finding a whip hanging from the wall and then startles the young couple with her anger.
The queen demands for Kelly to leave her palace at once at to never come back. During this time she educates Kelly on the knowledge that the prince never spoke about which was their marriage thenext day. Kelly is visiablly shaken up and leaves crying and ashamed. The prince tries to run after her but is stopped by the queen saying if you try to that the girl will never make it out of the palace - a threat of course! The prince does not care and says I am never to wed you and want Kelly no matter what! This makes the Queen see RED with mad and she leaves the room and order the guards to not let him out and she goes after the grief stricken Kelly. She speaks to Kelly and then quickly in a very memorable scene start to whip Kelly over and over again. Kelly runs towards the main door as the Queen just goes at her again and again. The final words before Kelly leaves is by the Queen that she is to never going to see the prince and have him....NEVER!
The prince is put right into the prison for not obeying the Queen at her hand of marriage. Kelly is distraught and almost takes her own life from jumping off a bridge not being able to handle it though is saved by a policeman. Kelly with now not having her love around travels to German East Africa to visit her dying aunt. While there Kelly's life is in ruins and she has no value to anything and is forced by people to wed this gross man named Jan. Kelly's aunt passes away and leaves it to her so now Kelly is the new head Madam of the brothal. In the meantime the prince is freed and is in search of Kelly and during this Jan dies and the Queen is assasinated leaving the thrown available. The next in line is the Prince who weds the now official "QUEEN KELLY!"
Jack Benny & Jane Russell had a splendid time for being 2010's first ever. We did featured articles showing these stars in their holiday best and antics. It is time to choose yet another couple for this grand award. We will be announcing categories and who is nominated what we will need is YOUR VOTES!! Be on the lookout for the up-coming articles for the voting to begin!!!
Join "Love Those Classic Movies!!!" for our 2nd celebration with choosing the perfect classic actor and actress to be 2012's "Classic Mr.s & Mrs. Clause."
Last year's celebrities were Jack Benny & Jane Russell who were perfection as our very first to ring in this tradition! This year we want your particpation on choosing who would be best for wearing these hats. We will give you a lengthy list for both roles and will give you time to choose both - it is simple the actor and actress that received the most votes will become this year's Mr. & Mrs. Clause!
