Citizen Kane 1941 - Considered as the finest American film ever made

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IMDB rating: 8,4

Director: Orson Welles
Main Cast: Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, Agnes Moorehead, Ruth Warrick, Everett Sloane

"Orson Welles's film debut reconceived Hollywood conventions of story-telling and visual structure, suggesting the essential mystery of a person's inner self and inspiring countless filmmakers with its technical accomplishments. Already famous for his work in radio and theater, 24-year-old Welles was given complete creative freedom when RKO Pictures signed him in 1939. Co-authored with Herman J. Mankiewicz, the Kane screenplay dispensed with linear biographical narrative in favor of flashbacks recounting Kane's life from several points of view, ostensibly to solve the puzzle of Kane's deathbed utterance. Collaborating with cinematographer Gregg Toland, Welles used specially constructed sets to compose the film through a number of long takes in deep focus and high-contrast black-and-white, creating meaning through the juxtaposition of multiple actions and characters in a single take rather than through numerous edits. While the imagery and the carefully choreographed soundtrack provide clues to Kane's nature as he ages from innocent boy to corrupt magnate, he ultimately remains an enigmatic figment of memory. Kane's real-life model, however, was no mystery; newspaper baron William Randolph Hearst tried to suppress what he considered an unflattering portrait of himself. While RKO rejected an offer to reimburse their costs in exchange for burning the negatives, Citizen Kane's release was hindered by Hearst's campaign against it. Though non-Hearst papers recognized it as a vanguard work, and it was nominated for nine Oscars (four for Welles himself), Kane was not a popular hit. Despite the film's artistic approbation and subsequent wide-ranging influence, from 1940s film noir to the French New Wave to American film school grads, Welles never again had creative control in Hollywood." - www.allmovie.com

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The bank dick 1940 - A very funny all time classic

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IMDB rating: 7,4

Director: Edward F. Cline
Main Cast: W. C. Fields, Cora Witherspoon, Una Merkel

"W. C. Fields plays Egbert Souse, a bibulous denizen of Lompoc who supports his family by winning radio contests. When a fleeing bank robber is knocked cold upon tripping over the park bench where Egbert sits, Souse is hailed as a hero and offered the job of bank guard. The next day, he is approached by one J. Frothingham Waterbury (Russell Hicks), who offers to sell Egbert shares in the Beefsteak Mines. Souse raises the necessary money by convincing bank clerk Og Oggilby (Grady Sutton), the fiance of Egbert's daughter Myrtle (Una Merkel), to 'borrow' some funds from the bank; it isn't really embezzling, explains Egbert, because the mine is bound to pay off. Unfortunately, bank examiner J. Pinkerton Snoopington (Franklin Pangborn) comes calling, spelling possible trouble for Souse.
The Bank Dick is perhaps W. C. Fields' best movie. Despite a scant 72-minute running time, it breezes through enough plot for ten lesser films, managing to build and double back on itself to a satisfying conclusion. The humor is both physical and intellectual. Fields was among the innovators of early sound films in using contemporary cultural references; yet the movie is not so tied to its era that its references have become obscure." - www.allmovie.com

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Pride and prejudice 1940 - Jane Austen in the Hollywood fashion

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IMDB rating: 7,5

Director: Robert Z. Leonard
Main Cast: Greer Garson, Laurence Olivier, Maureen O'Sullivan, Ann Rutherford, Marsha Hunt, Heather Angel, Mary Boland, Edmund Gwenn

"Pride and Prejudice is a moderately faithful re-telling of Jane Austen's best-known novel. The protagonists are appropriately composed in the pre-Victorian England setting, championing Austen's rebellion against what she saw as the excessive emotionalism and romantic world view of the literature of her time. Austen's aim of puncturing holes in the snootiness of upper-middle class figures is retained in Aldous Huxley's screenplay and Robert Leonard's occasionally stiff direction. The unlikely romance of the leads, played conventionally but effectively by the attractive pair of Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson, evolves from contempt to understanding to affection, retaining a modern appeal in its focus on illusory first impressions and the follies of personal pride and class prejudice. Though Austen's novel was set in 1813, the year of its publication, the film version takes place in 1835, reportedly so as to take advantage of the more attractive costume designs of that period. Not surprisingly, a few changes had to be made to mollify the Hollywood censors (eager to find offense in the most innocent of material): the most notable is the character of Mr. Collins (Melville Cooper), transformed from the book's hypocritical clergyman to the film's standard-issue opportunist." - www.allmovie.com

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Pinocchio 1940 - A lesson in honesty

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IMDB rating: 7,6

Directors: Norman Ferguson, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Jack Kinney, Hamilton Luske, Bill Roberts, Ben Sherpsteen

"Though only Disney's second feature-length cartoon, Pinocchio is still celebrated as one of the company's greatest achievements for its Academy Award-winning music, its humor, its beauty, and, most of all, its production value. Determined to make an animated film that improved upon its predecessor, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Walt Disney employed over 750 staff members on Pinocchio and worked them relentlessly for several years. Technicians developed an enhanced multiplane camera that could dolly in and out of an animated scene (similar to live-action photography), as opposed to Snow White's vertical method of shooting. Animators pioneered using glass plates over the animation to create a realistic underwater look for the scene in the ocean, and established a technique called 'the blend' to give the two-dimensional animation some depth. Twelve artists labored for 18 months to design the character of Pinocchio alone, and the perfectionist Walt Disney is rumored to have thrown out over 2,300 feet of footage (at least five months of work) because it did not fit his vision. Pinocchio's box-office returns did not surpass Snow White's, but its ingenuity and polish impressed critics and further established Disney as an artistic force." - www.allmovie.com

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The thief of Bagdad 1940 - An enchanting fairy tale for the whole family

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IMDB rating: 7,7

Directors: Ludwig Berger, Michael Powell, Tim Whelan (Alexander Korda, Zoltan Korda, William Cameron Menzies)
Main Cast: Conrad Veidt, Sabu, June Duprez, John Justin, Rex Ingram

"In ancient Bagdad, Abu, a good-natured young thief (Sabu), befriends the deposed king Ahmad (John Justin) as both are imprisoned in the palace dungeon, awaiting execution under orders from the evil vizier Jaffar (Conrad Veidt), who has seized the throne. But they escape and make their way to Basra, where Ahmad, now living as a beggar, meets and falls in love with the Princess (June Duprez), who has been betrothed by her father the Sultan (Miles Malleson, who also wrote the screenplay) to Jaffar. Their fight for the love of the Princess triggers a series of adventures for the young Abu that brings him halfway around the world and into mystical realms with help from a towering genie (Rex Ingram), brushing up against the gods and transforming the little thief into a hero in the process. Along the way, we encounter a wide array of characters, some of them charming, such as the gentle Old King (Morton Selten), and some sinister, such as the devious Halima (Mary Morris), plus a range of color and lushly designed sets and set pieces (and special effects) that still dazzle the eye seven decades later. And it all leads to an amazing and suspenseful ride on a magic carpet, and a race against time to save the king and his beloved.
The Thief of Bagdad is one of those rare fantasy films that has only improved with age as a dazzling example of the screencraft of the era. If seams and joins show on some of the special-effects work, it doesn't hurt, because we accept the film as a fantasy tale woven before our eyes; just as no one minds the brush-strokes on a truly great painting. It has endured as an artifact of a lost world of innocence and wonder - Thief of Bagdad was the last major movie started in England before the outbreak of the Second World War, and the last fantasy film released before America's entry into World War II. And, like Frank Capra's Lost Horizon (1937) and Mervyn LeRoy's production of The Wizard of Oz (1939), the movie speaks from a time before A-bombs, air-raids, and concentration camps, and as such, provided a two-hour escape for those seeking refuge from the horrors of war, which still resonates seven decades later." - www.allmovie.com

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The letter 1940 - Bette Davis in one of her nastiest roles

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IMDB rating: 7,8

Director: William Wyler
Main Cast: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, Gale Sondergaard, Cecil Kellaway

"The Letter combines William Wyler's smooth direction and a fine performance from Bette Davis into one of the screen's best melodramas. The film is distinguished by its lush production values, including Tony Gaudio's cinematography and costume gowns by Orry-Kelly, but mostly it is Davis who carries the film. She is ably assisted by her co-stars, particularly Herbert Marshall as her husband and James Stephenson as her lawyer. W. Somerset Maugham's source novel provides a strong framework, which had been filmed before in 1929, with Marshall as the murdered lover. Although the Wyler version scored an impressive seven Oscar nominations, it went home empty-handed." - www.allmovie.com

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Fantasia 1940 - Combination of animation and classical music

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IMDB rating: 7,8

Directors: Norman Ferguson, James Algar, Samuel Armstrong, Ford Beebe Jr., Jim Handley, T. Hee, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, Bill Roberts, Paul Satterfield, Ben Sharpsteen

"Fantasia, Walt Disney's animated masterpiece of the 1940s, grew from a short-subject cartoon picturization of the Paul Dukas musical piece The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Mickey Mouse was starred in this eight-minute effort, while the orchestra was under the direction of Leopold Stokowski. Disney and Stokowski eventually decided that the notion of marrying classical music with animation was too good to confine to a mere short subject; thus the notion was expanded into a two-hour feature, incorporating seven musical selections and a bridging narration by music critic Deems Taylor. The first piece, Bach's 'Toccata and Fugue in D Minor', was used to underscore a series of abstract images. The next selection, Tchaikovsky's 'Nutcracker Suite', is performed by dancing wood-sprites, mushrooms, flowers, goldfish, thistles, milkweeds and frost fairies. The Mickey Mouse version of 'Sorcerer's Apprentice' is next, followed by Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring', which serves as leitmotif for the story of the creation of the world, replete with dinosaurs and volcanoes. After a brief jam session involving the live-action musicians comes Beethoven's 'Pastorale Symphony', enacted against a Greek-mythology tapestry by centaurs, unicorns, cupids and a besotted Bacchus. Ponchielli's 'Dance of the Hours' is performed by a Corps de Ballet consisting of hippos, ostriches and alligators. The program comes to a conclusion with a fearsome visualization of Mussorgsky's 'Night on Bald Mountain', dominated by the black god Tchernobog (referred to in the pencil tests as "Yensid", which is guess-what spelled backwards); this study of the 'sacred and profane' segues into a reverent rendition of Schubert's 'Ave Maria'. Originally, Debussy's 'Clair de Lune' was part of the film, but was cut from the final release print; also cut, due to budgetary considerations, was Disney's intention of issuing an annual 'update' of Fantasia with new musical highlights and animated sequences. A box-office disappointment upon its first release (due partly to Disney's notion of releasing the film in an early stereophonic-sound process which few theatres could accommodate), Fantasia eventually recouped its cost in its many reissues. A sequel, Fantasia 2000, was released in theaters in 1999." - www.allmovie.com

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