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Palm Springs is where one goes to be seen; neighboring Rancho Mirage, well, not so much. That’s why many A-List Hollywood stars pulled up sticks in the mid-20th century, moving from Palm Springs — and L.A. — to the more discreet Rancho Mirage, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary as a city this year.

Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Lucille Ball, Red Skelton, at least one Marx brother, Bing Crosby, and even the guy who played the wizard in The Wizard of Oz, MGM contracted character actor Frank Morgan, lived there. All were seeking the country club lifestyle away from the party scene and camera flashbulbs.

Lawrence Welk, Frank Sinatra, Dinah Shore and Barbara Sinatra at the 1972 Dinah Shore Colgate Winner’s Circle in 1972 at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California.

Rancho Mirage also has long been known as the “Playground of the Presidents,” especially...

The following essay was produced as part of the 2019 Locarno Critics Academy, a workshop for aspiring film critics that took place during the 72nd edition of the Locarno Film Festival.

“Locarno … has become respectable, too,” Locarno’s incoming Artistic Director Lili Hinstin wrote in the press release that accompanied the festival’s program announcement last July. She borrowed the quotation from the People’s Pervert John Waters, who has long shared the very sentiment with regards to his own work.

As Hinstin explained, the decades-old festival is not just respectable now, it’s also respected and “that respect was gained by being one of the major world festival that takes the bigger risks. The one that shakes things up, brings surprises, ruffles feathers, asks questions.” The 72nd edition of the festival presented many challenges for Hinstin and her mission to keep such an ethos going, from how to fill the...

Ronald Colman: Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Month in two major 1930s classics Updated: Turner Classic Movies' July 2017 Star of the Month is Ronald Colman, one of the finest performers of the studio era. On Thursday night, TCM presented five Colman star vehicles that should be popping up again in the not-too-distant future: A Tale of Two Cities, The Prisoner of Zenda, Kismet, Lucky Partners, and My Life with Caroline. The first two movies are among not only Colman's best, but also among Hollywood's best during its so-called Golden Age. Based on Charles Dickens' classic novel, Jack Conway's Academy Award-nominated A Tale of Two Cities (1936) is a rare Hollywood production indeed: it manages to effectively condense its sprawling source, it boasts first-rate production values, and it features a phenomenal central performance. Ah, it also shows its star without his trademark mustache – about as famous at the time as Clark Gable's. Perhaps...

Turner Classic Movies' 2017 Gay Pride film series comes to a close this evening and tomorrow morning, Thursday–Friday, June 29–30, with the presentation of seven movies, hosted by TV interviewer Dave Karger and author William J. Mann, whose books include Wisecracker: The Life and Times of William Haines and Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood, 1910-1969. Among tonight's movies' Lgbt connections: Edward Albee, Tony Richardson, Evelyn Waugh, Tab Hunter, John Gielgud, Roddy McDowall, Linda Hunt, Harvey Fierstein, Rudolf Nureyev, Christopher Isherwood, Joel Grey, and Tommy Kirk. Update: Coincidentally, TCM's final 2017 Gay Pride celebration turned out to be held the evening before a couple of international events – and one non-event – demonstrated that despite noticeable progress in the last three decades, gay rights, even in the so-called “West,” still have a long way to go. In Texas, the state's – all-Republican – Supreme Court decided that married gays should be treated as separate and unequal. In...

Considering everything that's been happening on the planet in the last several months, you'd have thought we're already in November or December – of 2117. But no. It's only June. 2017. And in some parts of the world, that's the month of brides, fathers, graduates, gays, and climate change denial. Beginning this evening, Thursday, June 1, Turner Classic Movies will be focusing on one of these June groups: Lgbt people, specifically those in the American film industry. Following the presentation of about 10 movies featuring Frank Morgan, who would have turned 127 years old today, TCM will set its cinematic sights on the likes of William Haines, James Whale, George Cukor, Mitchell Leisen, Dorothy Arzner, Patsy Kelly, and Ramon Novarro. In addition to, whether or not intentionally, Claudette Colbert, Colin Clive, Katharine Hepburn, Douglass Montgomery (a.k.a. Kent Douglass), Marjorie Main, and Billie Burke, among others. But this is ridiculous! Why should TCM present a...

We open today's roundup with reports on current projects by directors who've taken opposite approaches, Steven Soderbergh and Ilya Khrzhanovsky. Plus Hou Hsiao-hsien on The Assassin, Jennifer Lawrence on fairness, a new book on Marlene Dietrich and Leni Riefenstahl, another on Paul Wegener, reviews of Vincente Minnelli's Some Came Running, David Cronenberg's The Brood, Mario Bava's Black Sabbath and Bay of Blood, Karel Reisz’s The French Lieutenant’s Woman, Karina Longworth on William Haines, further thoughts on the late Chantal Akerman—and more. » - David Hudson...

We open today's roundup with reports on current projects by directors who've taken opposite approaches, Steven Soderbergh and Ilya Khrzhanovsky. Plus Hou Hsiao-hsien on The Assassin, Jennifer Lawrence on fairness, a new book on Marlene Dietrich and Leni Riefenstahl, another on Paul Wegener, reviews of Vincente Minnelli's Some Came Running, David Cronenberg's The Brood, Mario Bava's Black Sabbath and Bay of Blood, Karel Reisz’s The French Lieutenant’s Woman, Karina Longworth on William Haines, further thoughts on the late Chantal Akerman—and more. » - David Hudson...

Joan Collins in 'The Bitch': Sex tale based on younger sister Jackie Collins' novel. Author Jackie Collins dead at 77: Surprisingly few film and TV adaptations of her bestselling novels Jackie Collins, best known for a series of bestsellers about the dysfunctional sex lives of the rich and famous and for being the younger sister of film and TV star Joan Collins, died of breast cancer on Sept. 19, '15, in Los Angeles. The London-born (Oct. 4, 1937) Collins was 77. Collins' tawdry, female-centered novels – much like those of Danielle Steel and Judith Krantz – were/are immensely popular. According to her website, they have sold more than 500 million copies in 40 countries. And if the increasingly tabloidy BBC is to be believed (nowadays, Wikipedia has become a key source, apparently), every single one of them – 32 in all – appeared on the New York Times' bestseller list. (Collins' own site claims that a mere 30 were included.) Sex...

Joan Crawford Movie Star Joan Crawford movies on TCM: Underrated actress, top star in several of her greatest roles If there was ever a professional who was utterly, completely, wholeheartedly dedicated to her work, Joan Crawford was it. Ambitious, driven, talented, smart, obsessive, calculating, she had whatever it took – and more – to reach the top and stay there. Nearly four decades after her death, Crawford, the star to end all stars, remains one of the iconic performers of the 20th century. Deservedly so, once you choose to bypass the Mommie Dearest inanity and focus on her film work. From the get-go, she was a capable actress; look for the hard-to-find silents The Understanding Heart (1927) and The Taxi Dancer (1927), and check her out in the more easily accessible The Unknown (1927) and Our Dancing Daughters (1928). By the early '30s, Joan Crawford had become a first-rate film actress, far more naturalistic than...

click to embiggenBacklots on "the happiest marriage in Hollywood" William Haines and Jimmy Shields from the golden age

Coming Soon first image & poster from Dracula Untold starring Luke Evans which opens in October. (I always giggle when "untold" is used in titles or taglines for characters that every man woman and child has heard of.

Buzzfeed great article on Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook, and melodrama

Vf Hollywood Mary Steenburgen on joining Orange is the New Black for Season 3 (I think she removed this tweet because I can't find it) 

Jezebel is the Justice League movie really only going to have one female character?

The Film Stage That's "Sir" Daniel Day-Lewis to you 

Guardian interesting read on how social media killed the official websites for new movies 

Coming Soon Frank Grillo optimistic about returning in Captain America 3 despite being kind of burned alive in Winter Soldier

Variety Adrien Brody and John Cusack...

The release of Ron Howard’s Rush, one of the most anticipated (not to say mega-hyped) films of the year, inevitably begs comparisons to some of the great car-themed movies of the past.

“Rush.” Photo by Jaap Buitendijk

© 2013 – Universal Pictures.

It seems that automobiles have played key roles in films of every genre, from drama to horror to comedy to documentary. In some, like American Graffiti, Rebel without a Cause, and Bonnie and Clyde, the vehicles primarily help set the tone of the era in which the stories are set. In other films the cars themselves are the story. The animated Cars comes to mind, along with the Love Bug series, Christine, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. And then there are films in which the cars have taken their place alongside the human stars as film icons in their own right. James Bond’s Aston Martin DB5, for instance, as...

Ramon Novarro in one of the best silent movies: ‘The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg’ (photo: Ramon Novarro leapfrog) (See previous post: "Ramon Novarro Ben-Hur: First Big-Budget Hollywood Movie Saved by the International Market.") Ben-Hur also solidified Ramon Novarro’s international superstardom. In fact, moviegoers outside North America helped to keep Novarro working steadily at MGM up to the mid-’30s, several years after his domestic popularity had markedly diminished — and several years after fellow male silent era stars John Gilbert and William Haines had been gone from the studio. With the passing of the decades, especially since the release of William Wyler’s multiple Oscar-winning 1959 version of Ben-Hur, starring Charlton Heston, Ramon Novarro’s 1925 movie fell into oblivion. The following is from Beyond Paradise: The Life of Ramon Novarro: As the years passed, Ben-Hur, the motion picture that would “remain, as the Bible remains” became but...

Our look back over the history of MGM continues, as the silent era gives way to the talkies and musicals of the 20s and 30s...

It’s 1928, and the success of Warner Bros’ musical, The Jazz Singer, has ushered in a new age of talking pictures. Audiences adored it, and it was sink or swim time for MGM. Suddenly, the silent cinema rule book was thrown out of the window and numerous opportunities opened up in Hollywood.

Composers were in demand, and song and script writers, along with voice coaches, were needed more than ever. White Shadows In The South Seas was the first MGM sound picture, although not a talkie. Originally filmed as a silent picture, MGM realised that sound wasn’t just a passing fad and, like most studios at the time, swiftly added sound effects to its music. But they did make one character speak – and that was Leo the lion,...

Barbara Kent, a minor leading lady during the transition from silent to sound films, died October 13 in Palm Desert, in Southern California. A resident of the local Marrakesh Country Club, Kent was either 103 or 104. No cause of death was given. Barbara Kent was never a star. Not even close. In fact, most of her 35 movies were probably forgotten the week after their release. Paradoxically, Kent has become one of the most important performers of the silent era. No, not because she was Harold Lloyd's leading lady in his first talkie, Welcome Danger (1929). Or because of her career highlight: romancing Glen Tryon in Paul Fejos' naturalistic drama Lonesome (1928), frequently compared to F. W. Murnau's Sunrise. Barbara Kent has taken an importance incommensurate to her actual movie career because she was the very last individual to have had notable adult leads in American silent films. Everybody else, from Lillian Gish to Joan Crawford,...

Lon Chaney on TCM: He Who Gets Slapped, The Unknown, Mr. Wu Get ready for more extreme perversity in West of Zanzibar (1928), as Chaney abuses both Warner Baxter and Mary Nolan, while the great-looking Mr. Wu (1927) offers Chaney as a Chinese creep about to destroy the life of lovely Renée Adorée — one of the best and prettiest actresses of the 1920s. Adorée — who was just as effective in her few early talkies — died of tuberculosis in 1933. Also worth mentioning, the great John Arnold was Mr. Wu's cinematographer. I'm no fan of Laugh, Clown, Laugh (1928), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923), or The Phantom of the Opera (1925), but Chaney's work in them — especially in Hunchback — is quite remarkable. I mean, his performances aren't necessarily great, but they're certainly unforgettable. Chaney's leading ladies — all of whom are in love with younger, better-looking men — are Loretta Young (Laugh, Clown, Laugh), Patsy Ruth Miller...

Jean Harlow in her mother's living room (top); Harlow in Hollywood authors Mark Vieira and Darrell Rooney (middle); Cafe Trocadero 1935: Edith Gwynne Wilkerson (wife of Trocadero owner Billy Wilkerson), Jean Harlow, William Powell, William Haines' lover Jimmy Shields (standing), Anderson Lawler, unidentified man (standing), Haines, Edith's sister Marge (bottom) Jean Harlow in Hollywood – Introduction to Interview with Author Mark Vieira How did the Jean Harlow book project come about? Darrell Rooney, besides being a respected director of animated movies, has a huge collection of Jean Harlow memorabilia. Eight years ago I suggested that he and I collaborate on a book like the one I had done on Greta Garbo. We wanted to build on the research that David Stenn had done for Bombshell, his 1993 Harlow bio, but we wanted to tell Harlow’s story with photographs and newly uncovered correspondence. We also wanted to document how she became...

As news breaks that MGM has risen out of bankruptcy, this writer would like to take a moment and remember when this studio first entered the news, with its formation being the result of a corporate merger on Wall Street over eighty years ago. Following this merge, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer would be the dominant motion picture studio in Hollywood, from the end of the silent film era through World War II.

The man behind the merger was Marcus Loew, the owner of a large theater chain known as Loew’s Theatres. Wanting to provide a steady supply of films for his theaters, he had purchased both Metro Pictures Corporation and Goldwyn Pictures. However, both of these companies lacked leadership, and Loew was unable to spare his longtime assistant, Nicholas Schenck, as he was needed in New York City to oversee the theater chain. The answer came to Loew when his visited the...

The Marines Are Coming (1934) Direction: David Howard Screenplay: James Gruen; from Colbert Clark and John Rathmell’s story Cast: William Haines, Esther Ralston, Conrad Nagel, Armida, Edgar Kennedy, Hale Hamilton The Marines Are Coming was a last-minute substitution for the 1936 version of M’Liss, starring Anne Shirley, which was originally scheduled but didn’t arrive in time for Cinesation 2009. William Haines‘ last film, The Marines Are Coming follows Haines’ usual formula: a cocky, womanizing soldier (Haines) vies with his superior officer (Conrad Nagel) for the hand of beautiful girl (Esther Ralston). Inevitably, Haines’ character later proves his worth when he saves his fellow American officers from a band of Mexican bandits. Though hardly a good film, The Marines Are Coming [...]...