TCM Schedule for Friday, January 10, 2014 -- Friday Night Spotlight: Science in the Movies

[Staph]

Today is a continuation of Star of the Month Joan Crawford, followed by the Friday Night Spotlight -- Science in the Movies. Enjoy!



6:30 AM -- Chained (1934)
A kept woman finds herself drawn to a charismatic South American rancher.
Dir: Clarence Brown
Cast: Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Otto Kruger
BW-76 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Joan Crawford met her biological father only once when he visited her on the set of Chained (1934). She would never see him again.


8:00 AM -- Sadie McKee (1934)
A working girl suffers through three troubled relationships on her road to prosperity.
Dir: Clarence Brown
Cast: Joan Crawford, Gene Raymond, Franchot Tone
BW-93 mins, TV-G, CC,

Part of this movie is used as the golden oldie Joan Crawford is watching as Blanche Hudson in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962).


9:45 AM -- I Live My Life (1935)
A flighty society girl tries to make a go of her marriage to an archaeologist.
Dir: W. S. Van Dyke
Cast: Joan Crawford, Brian Aherne, Frank Morgan
BW-97 mins, TV-G, CC,

A different ending was shot for the British release, which toned down the behavior of Brian Aherne at the wedding.


11:30 AM -- No More Ladies (1935)
A society girl tries to reform her playboy husband by making him jealous.
Dir: Edward H. Griffith
Cast: Joan Crawford, Robert Montgomery, Charlie Ruggles
BW-81 mins, TV-G, CC,

Joan Crawford loaned her make-up man, hairdresser and an Adrian gown to Gail Patrick for her screen test. When Patrick got the role and tried to thank Crawford, she wouldn't hear of it saying only, "People helped me when I started out."


1:00 PM -- The Gorgeous Hussy (1936)
President Andrew Jackson's friendship with an innkeeper's daughter spells trouble for them both.
Dir: Clarence Brown
Cast: Joan Crawford, Robert Taylor, Lionel Barrymore
BW-103 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Actress in a Supporting Role -- Beulah Bondi, and Best Cinematography -- George J. Folsey

Crawford's only period film of the sound era. Its failure prompted her never to do another.


3:00 PM -- Love On The Run (1936)
Rival newsmen get mixed up with a runaway heiress and a ring of spies.
Dir: W. S. Van Dyke
Cast: Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Franchot Tone
BW-80 mins, TV-PG, CC,

The film was written to cash in on the popularity of "runaway heiress" films, like "It Happened One Night."


4:30 PM -- The Bride Wore Red (1937)
A chorus girl crashes an exclusive Swiss resort to snare a rich husband.
Dir: Dorothy Arzner
Cast: Joan Crawford, Franchot Tone, Robert Young
BW-103 mins, TV-G, CC,

Originally, in 1937, Dorothy Arzner had been assigned by MGM producer Joseph L. Mankiewicz in 1937 to direct Luise Rainer in "The Girl from Trieste," an unperformed Ferenc Molnár play about a prostitute trying to reform herself who discovers the hypocrisies of the respectable class which she aspires to. After the death of Irving Thalberg, Louis B. Mayer was put in charge of MGM. Mayer disliked the perceived exploitation of the female lead's character, and insisted that Molnár's play be rewritten so that it was no longer about a prostitute, but instead a slightly dark Cinderella story with a happy ending. Retitled by Mankiewicz as The Bride Wore Red (1937), Rainer withdrew and was replaced by Joan Crawford.


6:15 PM -- The Last of Mrs. Cheyney (1937)
A chic jewel thief in England falls in love with one of her marks.
Dir: Richard Boleslawski
Cast: Joan Crawford, William Powell, Robert Montgomery
BW-98 mins, TV-G, CC,

Myrna Loy was originally cast as Fay Cheyney, while Joan Crawford was cast in Parnell (1937). Because Crawford did not like her role in that film, she switched roles and films with Loy.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: FRIDAY NIGHT SPOTLIGHT: SCIENCE IN THE MOVIES



8:00 PM -- Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
To save his wife, Baron Frankenstein must build a mate for his monster.
Dir: James Whale
Cast: Karloff, Colin Clive, Valerie Hobson
BW-75 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Sound, Recording -- Gilbert Kurland (sound director)

Elsa Lanchester said that her spitting, hissing performance was inspired by the swans in Regent's Park, London. "They're really very nasty creatures," she said.


9:30 PM -- Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde (1941)
A scientist's investigations into the nature of good and evil turn him into a murderous monster.
Dir: Victor Fleming
Cast: Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman, Lana Turner
BW-113 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Nominated for Oscars for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White -- Joseph Ruttenberg, Best Film Editing -- Harold F. Kress, and Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic Picture -- Franz Waxman

The studio had originally cast Ingrid Bergman in the Beatrix Emery role and Lana Turner in the Ivy Peterson role. Bergman felt the role of Ivy was more challenging and persuaded the producers to switch roles with Turner.

The concept of the two female loves of Jekyll/Hyde's life, aristocratic Beatrix Emery and barmaid Ivy Petersen, actually originated in the original stage version of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", as adapted by T.R. Sullivan for the great 19th century stage actor Richard Mansfield. The Stevenson novella mentions no female love interest of any sort for either Jekyll or Hyde.


11:30 PM -- The Thing From Another World (1951)
The crew of a remote Arctic base fights off a murderous monster from outer space.
Dir: Christian Nyby
Cast: Margaret Sheridan, Kenneth Tobey, Robert Cornthwaite
BW-87 mins, TV-PG, CC,

Howard Hawks asked the US Air Force for assistance in making the film. He was refused because the top brass felt that such cooperation would compromise the U.S. government's official stance that UFOs didn't exist.


1:15 AM -- Forbidden Planet (1956)
A group of space troopers investigates the destruction of a colony on a remote planet.
Dir: Fred McLeod Wilcox
Cast: Walter Pidgeon, Anne Francis, Leslie Nielsen
C-99 mins, TV-PG, CC, Letterbox Format

Nominated for an Oscar for Best Effects, Special -- A. Arnold Gillespie, Irving G. Ries and Wesley C. Miller

Star Trek (1966) creator Gene Roddenberry has been quoted as saying that this film was a major inspiration for that series. Perhaps not accidentally, Warren Stevens, who plays "Doc" here, would later be a guest star in 1968's Star Trek: By Any Other Name (1968), where the true shape of the alien Kelvans, like the Krell in this movie, was implied to be extremely non-humanoid but never shown. 1701, which is the serial number of the Starship Enterprise, allegedly comes from the clock mark 17:01 when the C57D enters orbit around Altair IV.


3:00 AM -- Solaris (1972)
An alien intelligence infiltrates a space mission.
Dir: Andrey Tarkovskiy
Cast: Donatas Banionis, N. Grinko, Natalia Bondarchuk
C-167 mins, TV-14, Letterbox Format

The extended scene following Berton as he rides back to the city was filmed in Osaka and Tokyo. Foreign travel was not easily approved in the Soviet Union, and the reason this long scene was left in the movie was probably to justify that trip for the director and crew. A Japanese city circa 1970 may not look very futuristic to modern audiences, but its impression on Soviet viewers at that time of the film's release was probably quite different. Tarkovski's diary reveals that they just missed the World's Fair, and they may have planned to shoot footage at it that would have looked far more futuristic.