Respected film biographers converse @ TCM Fest
A Friday panel discussion—one of many such interesting events at “Club TCM,” a special gathering place for attendees of TCM Classic Film Festival—tapped the minds, memories and methodologies of three prominent film biographers: Donald Bogle, Scott Eyman, William J. Mann, with smart moderation by TCM’s Alicia Malone. Invited by Ms. Malone to consider their careers ...
Farber on Film: TCM Fest 2018 brings home the power of the press
This year’s TCM Classic Film Festival, which opens in Hollywood tomorrow night, is divided into several theme-related programs. One of the most intriguing—and certainly the timeliest—is called “Power of the Press” and celebrates movies about journalists. All the President’s Men was the Festival’s opening night film in 2016, so this year’s selections are not such ...
Farber on Film: ‘Lady in the Dark’ @ TCM Fest 2017
A strong female character is at the center of Lady in the Dark, a forgotten 1944 film that was presented in a beautiful 35mm nitrate print at the Egyptian Theatre on the final night of the festival. This movie was adapted from a Broadway play written by Moss Hart, with music by Kurt Weill and ...
Go Grover! Grover Dale does the boogaloo in ‘The Landlord’
I so enjoyed seeing “The Landlord” (1970), Hal Ashby’s maiden voyage as a film director, screened at TCM Fest 2017. One of those rambling and intriguing seventies movies that is so direct, so real, and wearing its heart on its sleeve. As the credits rolled, an added bonus — the name of arts·meme friend, Grover ...
Farber on Film: ‘The Landlord’ @ TCM Fest 2017
Apr
14
2017
One of the special guests at this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival was actress and director Lee Grant, who gave a spirited interview before the screening of The Landlord, the film that earned her one of her four acting nominations for best supporting actress. Grant’s first nomination came for William Wyler’s Detective Story in 1951, ...
Farber on film: ‘David and Lisa’ @ TCM Fest 2017
Many out-of-town patrons attend the TCM Festival to catch the big productions with the big stars in attendance: In the Heat of the Night, The China Syndrome, Saturday Night Fever. Or they line up for perennial audience pleasers like Casablanca, which celebrated its 75th anniversary in the large Chinese Theatre. But for some of us, ...
“Baby Jane” never better than at poolside screening, TCM Fest
Apr
8
2017
The highlight of our first day of this, our eighth TCM Turner Classic Film Festival, was hands down WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? (1964) screened poolside of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. We so enjoyed viewing the Gothic horror movie so smartly directed by Robert Aldrich and graced by the outre performance of Bette Davis and ...
Critic Robert Koehler’s TCM Fest 2017 game plan
Despite the untimely death of its venerated, longtime host, film historian Robert Osborne, this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival isn’t likely to take on a funereal mood. Instead, it’ll probably be more like a wake. That’s because the overarching theme of the new edition is comedy, under the theme, “Make ‘Em Laugh: Comedy in the ...
Comedy-themed TCM Fest 2017 unfunny in oversight of women 2
Apr
1
2017
In our writing about TCM Classic Film Festival four years ago, we gushed in print, “We love the women of TCM Classic Film Festival 2013.” That year, the annual festival (we have covered TCM Fest since its inception in 2010) honored Barbra Streisand’s tour-de-force film debut in “Funny Girl.” Tippi Hedren, Eva Marie Saint, Mitzi ...
Triumvirate of critical talent to tackle TCM Fest
Mar
31
2017
It’s that time again. arts·meme is launching, for the eighth year running, its special coverage of TCM Classic Film Festival, a whopping four-day spectacular that would make Cecil B. DeMille proud. It’s when the popular television channel moves off the airways and into real time and space, taking over Hollywood Boulevard like the landing of ...