The man in possession 1931 - One of Montgomery's delightful comedies

Publicity picture of Robert Montgomery, circa 1931

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0022117/?ref_=nv_sr_1
IMDB rating: 7,1

Director: Sam Wood
Main Cast: Robert Montgomery, Charlotte Greenwood, Irene Purcell, C. Aubrey Smith, Reginald Owen, Alan Mowbray

"Robert Montgomery plays an aimless young man who secures a job as a bailiff's deputy. Montgomery is assigned to guard a house under writ, but when he falls for the lady of the house (Irene Purcell), the boy decides to serve as her butler to keep up her family's appearances. Throughout the film, Montgomery assumes several more disguises to keep the family's legal reverses from becoming public. P. G. Wodehouse adapted H. M. Harwood's play The Man in Possession for this brisk film version. The story was Americanized in 1937 as Personal Property, with Robert Taylor and Jean Harlow in the leads." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/the-man-in-possession-v101236

DVD links:

The unholy three 1930 - The only talkie of Chaney ('Man of a thousand faces")

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021505/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
IMDB rating: 6,8

Director: Jack Conway
Main Cast: Lon Chaney, Lila Lee, Elliott Nugent

"While this 1930 sound remake of The Unholy Three is not quite up to the 1925 silent version (which also starred Lon Chaney), it is nevertheless a gripping little melodrama - and what's more, it offers the only chance to hear Chaney speak on screen. That Chaney should die so soon after the release of this film is a crime, depriving the American public of a 'second act' that could easily have been the equal of his illustrious silent-era first act. Chaney takes to the microphone like a duck to water; his performance shows a fine mastery of 'talkie' acting that combines the emotional resonance of his physicality with a sense of just how far to mute that physicality to make it palatable when combined with sound. He is a joy to watch and in enthralling from start to finish. Lila Lee is good as his love interest, and Harry Earles and Ivan Linow are appropriately creepy as the other parts of the titular trio; it must be admitted, however, that Earles' voice is irritating and often hard to understand. Unholy isn't as good as the original only because Tod Browning's nightmarishly personal vision has been replaced by Jack Conway's professional and efficient but impersonal one." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/the-unholy-three-v51855/

DVD links:

Merrily we live 1938 - Basically a cute, charming remake of My man Godfrey

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030442/?ref_=nv_sr_1
IMDB rating: 7,4

Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Main Cast: Constance Bennett, Brian Aherne, Alan Mowbray, Billie Burke, Patsy Kelly, Ann Dvorak, Tom Brown, Bonita Granville

"It's hard to argue that Merrily We Live doesn't owe a huge debt to My Man Godfrey, with which it has a great deal in common. Normally, copycats of classics are pale imitations that provide, at best, a few moments of diversion but are in no real way memorable. So it's quite a surprise that Merrily is actually quite a scintillating little screwball comedy, in spite of its Xerox-like origins. Merrily lives up to its title, being one of the most delightfully madcap comedies of the era. While the screenplay that Jack Jevne and Eddie Moran cooked up isn't high on originality, it's quite skillfully put together and very well structured. Yes, we often can see that a particular gag is coming, yet when it arrives we welcome it as a friend whom we haven't seen in so long that his familiarity seems fresh. Credit is also very much due to Norman Z. McLeod's lightning fast direction, which keeps everything going at a crisp pace yet never allows things to get so frenetic that the audience loses track of things. The cast is also a delight, with lovely Constance Bennett a joy and Brian Aherne turning in a perfectly calibrated comic performance. Best of all, though, is Billie Burke, having found the part that she was always meant to play and one which takes thorough advantage of her very distinctive personality and even more distinctive way with a phrase." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/merrily-we-live-v102162/

Download links:

(flv, 1 GB):

http://filenuke.com/sxdtpyi0w095

Or:

J'accuse (I accuse) 1938 - A stunningly effective anti-war classic

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031503/?ref_=fn_ft_tt_6
IMDB rating: 7,1

Director: Abel Gance
Main Cast: Victor Francen, Line Noro, Marie Lou

"This 1938 sci-fi and horror-tinged war drama from writer/director Abel Gance is an updated remake of Gance's own 1919 silent feature of the same name. The mix of stark realism in the World War I scenes, with its bitter depictions of trench warfare and the effect of four years of combat on all of those involved, soldiers and civilians alike, gives way to scenes of joy in the wake of the Armistice - but the betrayal of the peace heralds the main section of the film, an astonishing mix of science-fiction and horror elements as we reach the real emotional core of the movie. Gance's story-telling technique had peaked in the silent era, but the more advanced technical means at his disposal in the 1930's only enhanced the range of his work. His 1938 J'accuse, in its reach and assembly of images and messages, seems to anticipate the future work of Stanley Kubrick, in Paths of Glory but also aspects of the symbolism 2001: A Space Odyssey (though this would more apply to Arthur C. Clarke's more explicitly pacifist novel, written contemporaneously with Kubrick's screenplay). The convergence of historical/literary reference - the title is derived from Emile Zola's denunciation of the injustice behind the Dreyfuss affair - and the cinema of the fantastic have combined, with the images and the message behind them, to make this one of the most startling films of its era, a reputation that it continues to deserve some seven and eight decades later." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/jaccuse-v25633/

Download links:

(avi, 700 MB, English subtitles):

http://dfiles.eu/files/1kw7dt31o