The bridge on the River Kwai 1957 - One of the greatest war films ever made

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 8,3

Director: David Lean
Main Cast: William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald

"The Bridge on the River Kwai ranks as one of the greatest films of all time and arguably director David Lean's best film. At the heart of the film is the performance of Alec Guinness as the obsessively principled Colonel Nicholson. In a lesser film, his character might be simplified into a heroic martyr, but The Bridge on the River Kwai revels in its moral ambiguity: no significant character is either purely a hero or purely a villain. Filmed in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), the film features brutal prisoner-of-war work camps that are nonetheless considerably nicer than their historical counterparts, a good decision since it frees the audience to focus on the battle of wills, at first between Nicholson and Saito (Sessue Hayakawa), later between Shears (William Holden) and Warden (Jack Hawkins). The film's closing line ('Madness... Madness') is among the best-known and most enigmatic closings in screen history.
Bridge on the River Kwai won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for the legendary British filmmaker David Lean, and Best Actor for Guinness. It also won Best Screenplay for Pierre Boulle, the author of the novel on which the film was based, even though the actual writers were blacklisted writers Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson, who were given their Oscars under the table." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Paths of glory 1957 - Kubrick's breakthrough war masterpiece

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 8,5

Director: Stanley Kubrick
Main Cast: Kirk Douglas, Ralph Meeker, Adolphe Menjou

"Paths of Glory is a remarkable anti-war film that retains its impact decades after its release. The story's horrifying, tragic inevitability combines with Stanley Kubrick's forthright documentary style to create a film of rare power, a stinging, pre-Vietnam indictment of the inflexibility of war-time decision-making. Kirk Douglas, who produced the film, seems an odd choice to play a French colonel in World War I, yet he fills the screen with his righteous indignation. Kubrick's indictment of a military elite out of touch with - even openly antagonistic towards - its own men is brilliantly vicious. Filmed in pristine black-and-white that mirrors the thematic emphasis on the battle between good (enlisted men) and evil (the officers), with Kubrick's keen eye toward detail, Paths of Glory is both an intellectual and a visual treat. The film touched many raw nerves, and it was banned in several European countries, with France the last to lift the ban in the late 1970s. The conclusion features the soon-to-be Mrs. Kubrick in a sentimental and melodramatic scene that has been criticized as out-of-step with the rest of the somber and gritty film." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Friendly persuasion 1956 - Pacifism put to the test during the Civil War

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 7,5

Director: William Wyler
Main Cast: Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire, Anthony Perkins, Richard Eyer, Robert Middleton, Phyllis Love

"Friendly Persuasion is a charming, sensitive tale of a family of Quakers that attempts to maintain their pacifist ideals amid the turmoil of the U.S. Civil War. Best-known for playing quiet, understated characters who use violence when pushed too far, Gary Cooper gets the opportunity to explore a more peaceful resolution - though the film occasionally suggests that no person can be completely pacifistic. The tech credits are solid, as should be expected for a film directed by William Wyler; of particular note are Dimitri Tiomkin's score and Dorothy Jeakins's costume design. Though the film tends to exaggerate Quaker speech, the performances are convincing, and the screenplay (by blacklisted Michael Wilson) does a good job of transferring Jessamyn West's story to the screen. The film received six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, though it did not win in any category." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Mister Roberts 1955 - Petty tyranny and the man who fights it

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 7,9

Directors: John Ford, Mervyn LeRoy
Main Cast: Henry Fonda, James Cagney, William Powell, Jack Lemmon, Betsy Palmer, Ward Bond, Philip Carey

"Mister Roberts was one of the more thoughtful, reflective films from the 1950s to deal with World War II. It was a reflection of the distance filmmakers as well as the public had come from the war, a distance which allowed for a more sophisticated dramatic treatment of the conflict and the people involved. Other films during this era also reflected the new maturity, among them, The Caine Mutiny, Between Heaven and Hell, and The Naked and the Dead. Mister Roberts was the most successful of them all, and for good reason - though getting it made properly took real work. It stood to figure that John Ford was ideal for the project, since he loved the United States Navy more than almost anything else in his life (he retired from the reserves as a rear admiral). With Mister Roberts, however, Ford may have been too close to his subject to do justice to the script, and he butted up against the competing personality of star Henry Fonda. Fonda had scored a huge hit on Broadway in the stage version of Mister Roberts, but he'd given up hope of ever doing the movie, since he hadn't been on-screen in eight years and major studios weren't convinced that he was still a box office draw. As a condition of directing the film, Ford insisted on Fonda to star - but the two were at loggerheads from the beginning of the production, mainly over the director's tendency to inject rough-house comedy into his movies. Such an approach breathed life into Ford's somber cavalry movies, such as Fort Apache, but Mister Roberts was a character-driven story with very little real action, and Fonda thought the director's emphasis on laughs would destroy the integrity of the material. Ford's demanding, dictatorial directing style - exacerbated by his excessive drinking - created tension between the two, which erupted into a fistfight after only a few weeks' work. Ford left the production and was replaced by Mervyn LeRoy, who essentially asked the cast to use their best judgement and make the kind of movie Ford would've made. The end result is a finely textured character study that captured the best dramatic moments of the play as it interspersed an effective, new comic element. Fonda, who'd previously performed in four films for the director, would never work with Ford again; the director would only make one more navy film after Mister Roberts, the successful Donovan's Reef.
One of the finest service comedies ever made, Mister Roberts spawned a less amusing sequel, Ensign Pulver (1964), as well as a 1965 TV sitcom." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Jeux interdits (Forbidden games) 1952 - The horrors of war through the eyes of children

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 7,8

Director: René Clement
Main Cast: Georges Poujouly, Brigitte Fossey, Amédée, Laurence Badie

"It should come as no surprise that filmmaker Rene Clement spent five years in search of financing for this unsparing look at the ravages of war on children. It's not that the violence in the film is so intense; even both of the story's young protagonists, Paulette and Michel Dolle, survive without a scratch. But the portrait Forbidden Games paints of its adult characters is unsparingly disdainful; this is not exactly a tribute to the imperishable spirit of the French people during wartime. Paulette and Michel have their own way of dealing with war, by building a cemetery for animals in an abandoned mill. Michel's parents and older siblings and their neighbors, the Grouards, have their way, too, by sniping at each other and jockeying for position among the community as to who is perceived as the most generous - or least selfish. The Dolles' decision to take in Paulette is based in part on their fear that if the Grouards do the same, they'll earn another civilian medal. There is more than one set of forbidden games being played here: The secret that Paulette and Michel share runs parallel to an affair between Michel's teenaged sister, Berthe, and the Grouard's son, Francis, a soldier on leave. But even here, the children come off as more noble than their furtively groping adult counterparts. For a story with the potential to drip with easy sentimentality (generous peasant family takes in adorable war orphan), Forbidden Games offers something more bracing: a clear-eyed view of the innocence of children and the myopia of adults amid the ravages of war. Unsentimental and yet heartbreaking, Forbidden Games demonstrates the strategies of children who witness war to deal with the constant presence of death. It's also a bitter condemnation of the selfishness of adults who could offer their charges more love and protection.
Nothing else in Clement's career matched the achievement of this classic." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

From here to eternity 1953 - Pearl Harbor, Schofield Barracks, aspirations & frustrations

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 7,8

Director: Fred Zinnemann
Main Cast: Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Deborah Kerr, Donna Reed, Frank Sinatra, Ernest Borgnine

"There were few movies greeted with more anticipation than Fred Zinnemann's From Here to Eternity when it opened in 1953. Adapted from one of the best-selling novels of the previous ten years, it was a film for which everyone had high expectations. It lived up to all of them and then some, adding a new level of violence and frankness to popular dramatic films just when the public was ready to accept these elements. (However, the movie couldn't even hint at an aspect that James Jones' novel mentioned almost at its outset: the homosexual advances that Prewitt parried from his former sergeant, resulting in his transfer to a rifle company.)
Burt Lancaster, who'd previously established himself as a hero-victim in a series of film noirs made under the auspices of Universal and as a costume hero in a pair of Warner Bros. period adventure films (The Flame and the Arrow, The Crimson Pirate), transformed himself into the quintessential macho leading man with his performance; Montgomery Clift gave the performance of his life as Robert E. Lee Prewitt, unwilling boxer and trumpet player; ex-navy enlisted man Ernest Borgnine dominated every scene he was in as Sgt. Judson, the most vicious enlisted man seen onscreen in a mainstream American movie up to that time; Deborah Kerr, previously known for her plucky, lady-like roles, got to play an unabashedly sexual woman, and a married one at that; Donna Reed, cast against type as the prostitute with delusions of her own, gave the most honest and wrenching performance of her career; and Frank Sinatra, cast against all prevailing wisdom in Hollywood (and beating out Eli Wallach for the choicest supporting role in Hollywood that year), became a great actor overnight as the doomed Maggio.
No words could do justice to the film's most famous scene: the nocturnal romantic rendezvous on the beach, with Burt Lancaster's and Deborah Kerr's bodies intertwining as the waves crash over them. If you're able to take your eyes off the principals for a moment or two, keep an eye out for George Reeves; his supporting role was shaved down when, during previews, audiences yelled 'There's Superman!' and began to laugh.
From Here to Eternity raised the bar for realism (and the genuine, jagged, if ugly side of life) in war movies, and in movies in general; winning eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and supporting awards to Sinatra and Reed." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Stalag 17 1953 - POW classic with William Holden's strong performance

IMDB Link
IMDB Rating: 8,1

Director: Billy Wilder
Main Cast: William Holden, Don Taylor, Otto Preminger, Robert Strauss, Harvey Lembeck, Peter Graves, Neville Brand

"Billy Wilder's Stalag 17 was a new kind of war movie in 1953, a more realistic look at POW camp life than earlier POW movies (often British) had offered, featuring vivid depictions of larceny, betrayal, sadism, gallows humor, and a near-lynching of an innocent (though hardly guiltless) man. Wilder and his actors -- even though several are trapped in stock war-movie characterizations -- create a level of tension that forces the viewer to suspend disbelief, even as the movie seldom moves outside the confines of a single barrack. Stalag 17 helped William Holden establish his cynical, macho persona, a more hard-bitten descendant of the characters that Humphrey Bogart played in such 1940s movies as Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon; (ironically, Holden and Bogart would play brothers in Wilder's next movie, Sabrina).
Despite the seriousness of the situation, Stalag 17 is as much comedy as wartime melodrama, with most of the laughs provided by Robert Strauss as the Betty Grable-obsessed "Animal" and Harvey Lembeck as Stosh's best buddy Harry. Other standouts in the all-male cast include Richard Erdman as prisoner spokesman Hoffy, Neville Brand as the scruffy Duke, Peter Graves as blonde-haired, blue-eyed "all American boy" Price, Gil Stratton as Sefton's sidekick Cookie (who also narrates the film) and Robinson Stone as the catatonic, shell-shocked Joey. Writer/producer/director Billy Wilder and coscenarist Edmund Blum remained faithful to the plot and mood the Donald Bevan/Edmund Trzcinski stage play Stalag 17, while changing virtually every line of dialogue.
William Holden won an Academy Award for his hard-bitten portrayal of Sefton." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Roma, citta aperta (Open city) 1945 - A cinematic landmark that changed the pace of filmmaking

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 8,1

Director: Roberto Rossellini
Main Cast: Aldo Fabrizi, Anna Magnani, Marcello Pagliero, Harry Feist

"Roberto Rossellini's Roma, Città Aperta (known in English as Open City) was one of the landmark films of the 1940s on several levels. Aesthetically, it was one of the first major works of Italian neorealist filmmaking and perhaps the single most influential example of the style. Historically, it was among the first postwar European films to gain a significant audience in the United States, opening the door for a greater appreciation of international filmmaking in America. And politically, it was a work of tremendous bravery. The screenplay was written by Roberto Rossellini in association with Federico Fellini and Sergio Amidei while Rome was still occupied by German forces in 1943-44. Rossellini began filming in secret, using scavenged film stock without sound equipment, shortly before the city was liberated in June of 1944. Several key members of his creative team had been active in the Italian resistance movement. With its rough, documentary-style look, multi-layered narrative, and a cast that mixed amateurs with actors who didn't look like film stars, Roma, Città Aperta captured the harsh and unforgiving textures of real life as few movies of its time had dared. It set the pace for Italian Neorealism as an influential postwar film style that combined outdoor light and location shooting with non-actors, a focus on simple stories of everyday life, and a concern for the poor and for social problems. Roma, Città Aperta shows the lives of a group of people living in Rome during the Nazi occupation, after the Germans had declared it an 'open city'. Anna Magnani plays a woman in love with a member of a resistance group; in helping him, she risks not only her own life, but also that of her unborn child. Aldo Fabrizi plays a priest who aids the anti-Nazi cause and pays dearly for his activism. Marcello Pagliero is an outspoken communist who runs afoul of the Nazis. And Harry Feist plays a German officer who has taken an Italian lover, but whose affection for Romans does not run especially deep." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The way to the stars 1945 - Life around a British WWII air base

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,5

Director: Anthony Asquith
Main Cast: Michael Redgrave, John Mills, Rosamund John, Douglass Montgomery, Stanley Holloway

"Originally released in England as The Way to the Stars, Johnny in the Clouds is the story of how the Battle of Britain affected the lives of combatants and civilians alike. Terence Rattigan's screenplay concentrates on three groups of people: an American pilot and his wife, a doomed British officer with a wife and child, and a young couple who plan to marry despite the precariousness of wartime romances. Most of the action takes place at an air base and the neighboring village, where the private citizens react to rationing and other restrictions with various degrees of nobility and selfishness. The American title of this film is derived from the poem 'Johnny in the Clouds', recited in tribute to the decease British airman; the U.S. version, which was released after the war, includes a prologue set in the deserted air base, with the bulk of the film offered as a flashback." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The miracle of Morgan's creek 1944 - One of the best comedies of all time

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 8,0

Director: Preston Sturges
Main Cast: Eddie Bracken, Betty Hutton, Diana Lynn, William Demarest, Brian Donlevy, Akim Tamiroff

"In 1944, with the restrictive Hays Code very much in effect, the mere fact that Preston Sturges was allowed to make The Miracle of Morgan's Creek was remarkable in itself. After all, a comedy about a girl who gets drunk at a party with a bunch of soldiers and wakes up the next morning hung over and pregnant, with no memory of who the guilty party might be (except that his name sounded like 'Ratzywatzy'), hardly conformed to Hollywood's ideal of womanly virtue. But while the film's audacious content was out of the ordinary in its day, its lasting importance comes from the fact that it's a very, very funny movie. Sturges' superb ear for dialogue is in evidence throughout, as is his knack for bringing out the best in his cast: Betty Hutton gives the best and funniest performance of her career, while Eddie Bracken's work is rivaled only by his turn in Sturges' other 1944 masterpiece, Hail the Conquering Hero. If the premise seemed daring, Sturges gleefully heaped absurdity after absurdity upon it, to the point where even Norval and Trudy are barely able to keep track of their own hare-brained scheme to retain Trudy's good name (as well as that of Mr. Ratzywatzy, wherever he is). While the movie can be accused of playing Trudy's unwed pregnancy for laughs, she certainly seems painfully aware of the gravity of her situation, no matter how funny the circumstances it puts her through. And the scene between Trudy and Norval shortly after she's given birth is sweet and unexpectedly moving, as, after a genial assault on propriety, we're reminded in all sincerity of the simple power of love between two people. In Sturges' best movies, people do ridiculous things but somehow land on their feet; his characters rarely fell farther, or landed with more unexpected aplomb, than in The Miracle of Morgan's Creek." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The life and death of Colonel Blimp 1943 - A British masterpiece from Powell & Pressburger

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 8,1

Directors: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger
Main Cast: Roger Livesey, Deborah Kerr, Anton Walbrook, Roland Culver

"By today's standards, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Life And Death of Colonel Blimp seems a brilliantly written and executed character study with period overtones - 'the British Citizen Kane', as one critic described it in recent years. But the 163-minute movie was one of the most controversial productions in England during the war, and the disputes over its content and distribution overshadowed the film's virtues for nearly 40 years. Powell and Pressburger, also known as 'The Archers', had already courted controversy in 1941 with their propaganda movie 49th Parallel. Blimp seemed as if it was designed to engender displeasure from the government: Anton Walbrook, who was the leader of the anti-Nazi Germans in 49th Parallel, plays an even more sympathetic expatriate German in this movie; the title character, who represents the epitome of the British officer class of the First World War, is depicted as a well-meaning but doddering old buffoon, incapable of dealing with the Nazi threat; and the hero, Clive Candy (brilliantly played by Roger Livesey), makes his name on a civilian escapade during the Boer War, just as Prime Minister Winston Churchill had. The movie seemed certain to attract official censure, and it did. Powell and Pressburger were denied the use of military equipment or personnel while Blimp was in production, and the government voiced its further strenuous objections to the parties financing the movie. Once it was completed and released, the film was denied an export license to the United States until almost two years after the war, by which time it had been shorn of nearly an hour of material. It took 40 years for the uncut version to reach America in its original Technicolor splendor. After the wait, audiences found a movie that seized upon many of the structural elements found in Orson Welles' Citizen Kane, with its back-to-front-to-back narrative path. The Archers took the class satire and social consciousness found in the best work of Noel Coward - as well as in the original David Low cartoon whence the Colonel Blimp character originated - and turned those elements into something uniquely theirs, a film very wry and dry in its tweaking of British sensibilities, universal in its observations on life, love and longevity in the middle of a world war." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

To be or not to be 1942 - A controversial classic

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 8,3

Director: Ernst Lubitsch
Main Cast: Carole Lombard, Jack Benny, Robert Stack, Felix Bressart, Lionel Atwill

"Ernst Lubitsch directs the 1942 political satire classic To Be or Not to Be, which marked the final screen appearance of comedienne Carole Lombard. To Be or Not to Be remains one example of a wartime propaganda film that retains its freshness and entertainment value outside its original historical context. Made during World War II by German expatriate Ernst Lubitsch, the film features anti-fascist themes that never overwhelm the characters, and it allows star Jack Benny to fashion a likeable performance that transcends the story's political content. Where many topical comedies veer into either serious drama or excessive sentimentality, To Be or Not to Be maintains its satiric edge without descending into self-parody. The film works as a comedy, as a political thriller, as an anti-fascist satire, and as an allegorical parable. The dialogue contains sharp, ironic observations aimed at the absurdity of totalitarian dogma. While Nazis and Hitler were Lubitsch's specific targets, the film retains a more universal mockery of government oppression and the willingness of bureaucrats to accept their tasks without questioning them. The movie was remade in 1983 starring Mel Brooks and real-life wife Anne Bancroft." - www.allmovie.com

Download links:

(DVDrip, avi, 727 MB):

http://dfiles.eu/files/xe0w9vxls

Casablanca 1942 - A truly classic masterpiece

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 8,6

Director: Michael Curtiz
Main Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, S. Z. Sakall

"One of the most beloved American films, this captivating wartime adventure of romance and intrigue from director Michael Curtiz defies standard categorization. It's hard to imagine a movie in which the leads are better cast: Humphrey Bogart's tough, effortless cool gives Rick the ideal balance of honor and cynicism, Ingrid Bergman's luminous beauty makes it seem reasonable that men would fight for Ilsa's affections, and Paul Henreid's Victor is cold enough that you can imagine Ilsa's being tempted by her old flame. The supporting cast is superb down the line; Claude Rains, Peter Lorre, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Dooley Wilson, and S.Z. Sakall are all so memorable that one tends to forget that none is onscreen for very long. The screenplay often walks the border of cliché, but the story has just enough twists, and the dialogue so much snap, that it stays compelling throughout. And Michael Curtiz knew just when to turn on the schmaltz and when to cut it off. Casablanca blends romance, suspense, humor, and patriotic drama with such skill that one imagines it must have happened by accident, and the movie looks better with each passing year." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Gunga Din 1939 - The ultimate motion picture adventure

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,6

Director: George Stevens
Main Cast: Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine, Victor McLaglen, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Sam Jaffe

"George Stevens' Gunga Din was not only the best of Hollywood's forays into colonialist adventure yarns, it served as the blueprint for many action-adventure movies for years after its release. It is a tribute to Stevens' direction and the uniformly superb cast that the film was a rousing success upon its release, and has endured as a popular favorite for decades since. Americans have always had problematic relationships with stories of British colonialism, but they also love a good adventure yarn, and the usual Hollywood compromise is to ignore the particulars, hold one's nose at the worst elements of subjugation, and just tell the story. That was the approach of the five screenwriters (including Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur and the uncredited William Faulkner) involved in the project, and director Stevens adhered to their work to the letter in telling Rudyard Kipling's story of life, love, and adventure on the frontier of the Indian subcontinent. In the film, the British army is a peace-keeping force, protecting the native populace from a murderous cult of religious fanatics who kill anyone in their way, including their own people. If the paternalistic attitude of the British seems heavy-handed, the oversight is more than outweighed by the savagery of the characters they're fighting. The pacing includes room for ample roughhousing, some of it bordering on slapstick, and rich character development. The actors play their parts as though they were born for them: Victor McLaglen, in particular, cuts a surprisingly dashing figure as Sergeant McChesney; the actor was nearly a decade away from settling into the more comical and jovial character roles that he played in John Ford's films. Cary Grant displays a larcenous side to his screen persona which in many ways anticipates his most compelling dramatic performance, in None But the Lonely Heart. Ironically, for a film that introduced author Kipling to the mass public than any other adaptation of his work, Gunga Din ran afoul of the sensibilities of the author's widow, who objected to the scenes depicting an unnamed, Kipling-like journalist, and those shots were cut at her request after the first run of the movie. These scenes would remain unseen until the late 1980s, when they were restored under the auspices of Turner Entertainment, the company that purchased the RKO film library.
Originally slated to be directed by Howard Hawks, Gunga Din was taken out of Hawks' hands when the director proved to be too slow during the filming of Bringing Up Baby. His replacement was George Stevens, who proved to be slower and more exacting than Hawks had ever been!" - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The four feathers 1939 - 'When war was war and men were men!'

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,7

Director: Zoltan Korda
Main Cast: John Clements, Ralph Richardson, C. Aubrey Smith, June Duprez

"This was the first sound production of A.E.W. Mason's classic adventure novel, which was brought to the screen three times in the silent era. Zoltan Korda's 1938 The Four Feathers was the last and best traditional patriotic film of the pre-World War II era. The movie benefited from glorious Technicolor photography and unique location shooting: Korda and his second unit crew, under Osmond H. Borradaile, not only shot the action scenes where the battles really took place but also included among the extras people who'd actually seen the fighting (and participated in it) 45 years earlier. Coupled with Korda's skills as an action director (he'd been a cavalry officer, and he knew how to move men and their mounts quickly and to good effect), the result was a movie that captured the imagination of the public on the eve of World War II with its vision of self-sacrifice and gallantry. The movie is a reminder of a time when it was possible to believe that armies could liberate peoples from tyranny, and that the use of force could be a good thing. The film is not unquestioning in this belief, as attested by its brutally humorous treatment of the aging general played by Sir C. Aubrey Smith ('Those were the days when war was war, and men were men'), but ultimately it comes down on the side of action as opposed to inaction. Korda's and Borradaile's African footage was so good that it has been reused in dozens of other movies (including remakes of this one).
The Four Feathers was a great critical and commercial success and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Cinematography.
Follow That Camel, by the British Carry On company, was a direct and savage satire of The Four Feathers." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The eagle and the hawk 1933 - A forgotten anti-war aviation

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,2

Director: Stuart Walker
Main Cast: Fredric March, Cary Grant, Jack Oakie, Carole Lombard, Guy Standing

"A stirring and accomplished anti-war film, The Eagle and the Hawk is a little-known gem that deserves greater recognition. Although Eagle does have its flaws, including a slight tendency to get on a soapbox about its worthy message, it's told with compassion and skill and is a thoroughly captivating film. Screenwriters Seton Miller and Bogart Rogers have deftly laced the drama with some genuine humor and wit, yet haven't let it interfere with the seriousness of the picture. Seemingly inspired by the story they have adapted, they have produced work that is top drawer and emotionally affecting. Stuart Walker directs carefully; he doesn't imbue the material with a strong directorial vision, but he serves the material very nicely and creates atmosphere and tension that add to the overall effect. The action sequences have drama aplenty, but he can also play up the more romantic moments admirably. Eagle's finest asset, however, is its strong cast. Though the love story involving her is perhaps the film's weakest aspect, Carole Lombard is such a magnificent figure and brings such personality and charm to the film that one scarcely cares about how it all fits in with the rest of the show. Cary Grant, in an early part, is still defining his screen persona; it's mostly there, but there are enough slight rough edges to surprise and delight. Fredric March is simply aces in the lead role, grabbing hold of the drama and running for all it's worth. And Jack Oakie's humor makes the character's ultimate fate the more devastating." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

The bitter tea of general Yen 1933 - Capra's most atypical and sensual film

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,2

Director: Frank Capra
Main Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Nils Asther, Toshia Mori, Walter Connolly, Gavin Gordon

"The Bitter Tea of General Yen is the oddest, least characteristic talkie effort of director Frank Capra. Barbara Stanwyck stars as the intended of an American missionary (Gavin Gordon) who is sent to spread the good word in China. During a military revolution, Stanwyck and her fiance inadvertently wander into forbidden territory while trying to help a group of orphans escape. The couple is forcibly detained by elegant warlord General Yen (played by Swedish actor Nils Ashter), who relies upon the financial advice of drunken American expatriate Walter Connolly. Yen is overcome with desire at the sight of Stanwyck; at first repulsed by his attentions, Stanwyck finds herself strangely drawn in by his charisma. When everyone but Connolly deserts Yen when he needs them most, Stanwyck offers to stay behind with the General. Fearing that he will never be able to truly attain the woman he so loves, the honorable General Yen commits suicide by drinking poisoned tea rather than put her in harm's way. The one scene that everyone remembers takes place during one of Stanwyck's fevered dreams, in which she imagines Yen as a Fu Manchu-type rapist, who then melts into a gentle, courtly suitor. Directed with the exotic aplomb of a Josef von Sternberg by the usually down-to-earth Frank Capra, The Bitter Tea of General Yen was unfortunately a box office failure, due in great part to its miscegenation theme (this was still 1933)." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Pack up your troubles 1932 - Stan & Ollie and a little girl

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 7,3

Director: George Marshall
Main Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Don Dillaway, Mary Carr, James Finlayson

"Drafted into the army during World War I, those muddled misfits Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy make a shambles of Training Camp before being shipped to France. When their best pal Eddie (Donald Dillaway) is killed in battle, Stan and Ollie vow to locate the grandparents of Eddie's orphaned little daughter (Jacquie Lyn). Unfortunately, the grandparents are named Smith - and they live in New York City. With only a city directory and phone book as their guide, Stan and Ollie undergo several chucklesome misadventures as they scour the canyons of Manhattan to find Mr. and Mrs. Smith. With the orphanage officials hot on their heels, the boys take drastic action to raise enough money to get out of town with the little girl. All turns out well when Eddie's grandfather makes an appearance under the least likely circumstances. But before Laurel & Hardy can enjoy their own happy ending, they cross the path of an old enemy from their army days: a knife-wielding chef with blood in his eye.
The second of Laurel & Hardy's feature-length films, Pack Up Your Troubles is infinitely more amusing than their first feature effort, 1931's Pardon Us. Best bit: An overtired Laurel, attempting to tell a bedtime story to the little girl, ends up snoozing away as the kid finishes the story. The powerhouse supporting cast includes such Laurel & Hardy regulars as James Finlayson, Billy Gilbert, Rychard Cramer, Charles Middleton and Charlie Hall. George Marshall, the film's director, proves a mirthsome menace in the small role of the vengeful chef." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Suicide fleet 1931 - Fighting sailing ships

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 5,8

Director: Albert S. Rogell
Main Cast: William Boyd, Robert Armstrong, James Gleason, Ginger Rogers

"Coney island vendors Baltimore Clark (Bill Boyd), Dutch Herman (Robert Armstrong) and Skeets O'Reilly (James Gleason) spend their off-hours (and some of their on-hours) carrying on a friendly rivalry for the affections of the pert Sally (Ginger Rogers). But when America enters WW1, our three heroes leave Sally behind and join the Navy. Before long, Baltimore, Dutch and Skeets find themselves smack in the middle of an ongoing conflict between the German U-boat fleet and a shadowy 'mystery' ship. Naturally, the boys are crewmen on the aforementioned mystery vessel, which is used as a decoy to bring the enemy out into the open. Despite this tense situation, the film spends a goodly amount of time showing the three protagonists cheerfully cheating on Sally with fetching foreign damsels in other ports of call." - www.allmovie.com

DVD links:

Seas beneath 1931 - Visually interesting sea adventure

IMDB Link
IMDB rating: 5,7

Director: John Ford
Main Cast: George O'Brien, Marion Lessing, Mona Maris

"Seas Beneath is a rousing sea adventure from John Ford that takes place in the closing months of World War I. Largely unavailable for decades, Seas Beneath remains a solid and gritty war picture that is also guilty - like much of Ford's work - of idealizing history. About half of the film takes place in a Spanish port town, where German spies abound. These scenes suffer from a stasis probably dictated by the technical restrictions of the early sound era, but Ford injects them with a seediness and mysteriousness that makes them compelling nonetheless. When Seas Beneath really comes alive, however, is when Captain Kingsley and company leave port and embark on their cat-and-mouse game with the German U-boat. With the invaluable aid of some remarkable location camerawork (as well as the assistance of the U.S. Navy), Ford places the viewer into the center of the action, creating a sense of authenticity that makes these scenes all the more dramatic, and leading up to a stunning climactic sea battle. The battle scenes are the highlight of the picture, and some credit must go to the sound crew for capturing the intensity of the action as the U-boat bombards the schooner over and again while Kingsley waits for his chance to strike. Another valuable element to the film is Ford's wise decision to actually have the Germans speak German, with only a minimal use of intertitles to translate the more important dialogue. The cast is solid, especially Mona Maris as the seductive spy Lolita. Seas Beneath is not a classic, but it deserves to be far better known and more widely seen." - www.allmovie.com

Download links: