Title: Arsenic and Old Lace Year: 1944 Director: Frank Capra Cast: Cary Grant, Priscilla Lane, Jack Carson, Raymond Massey Synopsis: A noted bachelor shocks everyone with an engagement notice. When he informs his kindly old pair of aunts, things take...
Title: It’s a Wonderful Life Year: 1946 Director: Frank Capra Cast: Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Thomas Mitchell, Beulah Bondi, Henry Travers Synopsis: George Bailey (Stewart) recollects his life’s many touchstones thanks to an unlikely angel when he contemplates...
It’s almost funny, in a foul-tasting way, to read that the initial box office failure of Frank Capra’s 1932 The Bitter Tea of General Yen was attributed by some to racism on the part of moviegoers unwilling to accept the...
When you think of Frank Capra, you probably think of many things, mostly big and emotional ones, but you don’t think of subtlety. That certainly holds true for his 1944 adaptation of the popular stage play Arsenic and Old Lace (actually filmed...
I decided to undertake a movie challenge in 2017. This seemed like a good way to see some classic movies that I have unfortunately never seen. The Battleship Pretension Top 100 list provided such a challenge. I have a tradition with...
FRANK CAPRA IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE, IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON It took an Italian immigrant, with his own rags to riches background to help define and refine American pop cinema. Some of his most notable...
