#noir alley

Here’s 5 to watch on TCM for the week of Sept. 13, 2021:

1. Vivacious Lady (1938) at 4:15 pm ET/1:15 pm PT Tuesday, Sept. 14: Tuesday’s daytime lineup is filled with film’s from the great leading ladies of ‘30s, such as Irene Dunne (Theodora Goes Wild at 9:45 am ET), Katharine Hepburn (Bringing Up Baby at 11:30 am ET), and Greta Garbo (Ninotchka at 6 pm ET). Click the link for the full September schedule: https://www.tcm.com/schedule-monthly…. We’ll be watching Ginger Rogers as a nightclub singer who entrances a sheepish botany professor (James Stewart) in this cute rom-com. Beulah Bondi (once again playing Jimmy’s mom) is a delight.

2. Intruder in the Dust (1949) at midnight ET/9 pm ET Wednesday night/Thursday morning: The wonderful Puerto Rican actor Juano Hernandez plays a black man who becomes the target of a lynch mob in this excellent adaptation of William Faulkner’s novel. Intruder in the Dust is part of a night of films celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month.

3. Key Largo (1948) at 12:15 pm ET/9:15 am PT Thursday, Sept. 16: All four of Lauren Bacall’s films with her husband/costar Humphrey Bogart are airing on Thursday afternoon as part of a birthday tribute to the late actress. Things start out with their final film together, Key Largo, before moving on to Dark Passage (1947) at 2:15 pm ET. Their two best films, the classic noirs The Big Sleep (1946) and To Have and Have Not (1944), are airing at 4:15 pm ET and 6:15 pm PT.

4. I Love Melvin (1953) at 10 pm ET/7 pm PT Thursday, Sept. 16: Donald O'Connor once again shows off his superhuman dancing skills in the roller-skating number in this pleasant musical comedy. In our opinion, O'Connor is even more impressive than Gene Kelly’s famous skate/dance in It’s Always Fair Weather (1955). BTW that film is airing at 8 pm ET.

5. Human Desire (1954) at midnight ET/9 pm PT Saturday night/Sunday morning: The great Gloria Grahame’s desperate housewife in this Fritz Lang-directed noir is both the ultimate femme fatale and something much more rich and strange. Actor Dana Delany, who recently wrote an appreciation of Grahame in Noir City magazine, will introduce this film with Noir Alley host Eddie Muller.
Human Desire will have an encore presentation at 10 am ET Sunday.

Here’s 5 to watch on TCM for the week of Sept. 6, 2021:

1. The Rink (1916) at 9:45 pm ET/6:45 pm PT Thursday, Sept. 9: TCM’s spotlight for September features movies with roller-skating scenes (surprisingly, there are a lot of them). No one loved skates more than comedian Charlie Chaplin, who used them both in this sublime short film and in Modern Times (1936), which is airing at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT.

2. The Seventh Victim (1943) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Friday, Sept. 10: Old Hollywood horror doesn’t get much more chilling than this “cult” classic from producer Val Lewton about the disappearance of a woman (Jean Brooks) that may be connected to a group of satanists.

3. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Saturday, Sept. 11: This beloved drama about Civil Rights and the joys and trials of childhood is the pick of retired NYC firefighter Thomas Prin, Jr., who was a first responder on 9/11.

4. Drive a Crooked Road (1954) at 1 am ET/10 pm PT Saturday night/Sunday morning: Mickey Rooney doesn’t usually come to mind when old Hollywood fans think of film noir, but he’s great in this taut little B thriller about a mechanic who is conned (by a dame, of course) into driving the getaway car for a bank heist.
Drive a Crooked Road will have an encore presentation at 10 am ET/7 am PT Sunday.

5. Show Boat (1936) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Sunday, Sept. 12: This version of the oft-filmed Kern-Hammerstein musical has its problematic moments, but it also features star of the month Paul Robeson’s soaring rendition of “Ol’ Man River.” It is not only a marvelous vocal performance by Robeson, but also a cri de couer for the racism experienced by African-Americans.

Greetings, fellow TCM fans. Our very favorite time of the year is almost here.
This year’s Summer Under the Stars lineup starts on Sunday, Aug 1 with 24 hours of films starring the legendary Bette Davis. The fun starts at 6 am ET with Bette’s fine performance in the gangster expose Marked Woman (1937) and continues with a blockbuster prime time schedule: Old South saga Jezebel (1938) at 8 pm ET, and the excellent historical mystery All This, and Heaven Too (1940) at 10 pm ET.
SUTS continues throughout August with stars such as ‘30s favorite Kay Francis (Aug. 9), noir icon Gloria Grahame (Aug. 17), and all-time great James Cagney (Aug. 30) in the lineup. Here’s the best of the rest for the week of July 29.

Double Wedding (1937) at 6:30 pm ET/3:30 pm PT Thursday, July 29: TCM is celebrating William Powell’s 129th birth date (Powell was born July 29, 1892, in Pittsburgh) with a daytime lineup of his films, which gives viewers an excellent chance to catch a few screwballs with Powell’s frequent costar Myrna Loy. Another Powell-Loy rom-com, Love Crazy (1941), is airing at 1:45 pm ET.

Blade Runner (1982) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Friday, July 30: The final night of neo-noir films includes director Ridley Scott’s science-fiction classic about a loner (Harrison Ford) who is tracking human replicants in a dystopian society. A cult classic upon its release, the film has since went on to become perhaps the most influential film of the '80s. It’s not a traditional crime movie, but it was heavily influenced by classic film noir in both plot and style (everything in the future happens in the night and/or in the rain, apparently).

Hollow Triumph (1948) at 12:30 pm ET/9:30 pm PT Saturday night/Sunday morning: Noir Alley will be on break throughout August, but you can bid it a fond farewell with this excellent thriller starring Paul Henreid as a notorious criminal who poses as a psychiatrist.
FYI: Hollow Triumph won’t have an encore presentation on Sunday morning, so you’ll have to stay up late on Saturday or set the DVR.

Barbara Stanwyck’s 114th birth date is Friday, July 16. TCM is celebrating with a daytime lineup of films from the Old Hollywood icon. Stanwyck successfully played everything from screwball heroines to femmes fatale, and her talent and vast range make almost any film she appeared in worth watching . We recommend Christmas in July fun with the classic comedy Christmas in Connecticut (1945) at 11:15 am ET and the wickedly entertaining pre-code melodrama Baby Face (1933) at 6:30 pm ET.

Here’s other great stuff to watch this week:
Gone With the Wind (1939) at 11:15 pm ET/8:15 pm PT Monday, July 12: Monday night’s lineup features films from composer Max Steiner who is known as “the father of film music.” Whatever else you can say about this Oscar-winning Civil War saga, Steiner’s score is an absolute masterpiece with the famed Tara theme being instantly recognizable to generations of movie fans.

The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek (1944) at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT Wednesday, July 14: Writer-director Preston Sturges screwball about unwed motherhood is a very funny takedown of small-town morality. Betty Hutton and Eddie Bracken star, but Sturges favorite William Demarest steals the show as Hutton’s increasingly exasperated father.

Los Tallos Amargos (1956) at 12:15 am ET/9:15 pm PT Saturday night/Sunday morning: We’re super-excited about the TCM premiere of this Spanish-language noir. We’ve never seen it, but there’s lots of good buzz among those who saw it a few years ago at the TCM Film Festival. There’s an encore presentation at 10 am ET Sunday.

Stormy Weather (1943) at 10 pm ET/7 pm ET Sunday, July 18: Sunday night’s lineup celebrates the tap-dancing duo the Nicholas Brothers with a lineup of films they appeared in. Sadly, racism prevented the brothers’ extraordinary talents from being fully appreciated, but their athletic performance to “Jumpin Jive” is a joyous tour-de-force. There’s a reason why Fred Astaire called this number the greatest musical sequence he had ever seen.