Taschen: Movies of the 40s

Highly enjoyable film by Preston Sturges. There's witty dialogue and a great performance from McCrea, not so great a performance from Lake, but she still steals every scene with that beauty of hers.

A brilliant Val Lewton film. "I Walked With A Zombie" has a genuine creepy atmosphere thanks to the combination of great lighting and the voodoo drum soundtrack. Just more proof that bloody images are not necessarily the answer to a good scare, subtlety is the key.
Strangely I Walked With A Zombie reminded me of Mulholland Drive in parts, and I wonder whether David Lynch was influenced by it. In I Walked With A Zombie we have Betsy travelling from Canada to Fort HOLLAND whilst in Mulholland Drive we have Betty travelling from Canada to MulHOLLAND Drive. Betsy's job is to take care of the mentally paralysed Jessica whilst Betty ends up taking care of amnesiac Rita. There's a brilliantly eerie scene (my favourite scene in fact) where Betsy and Jessica are walking hand in hand through the sugar cane plantation and end up coming face to face with the terrifying Zombie guy, which again made think of Betty and Rita walking through Sierra Bonita coming face to face with the corpse. Coincidence maybe?
Oh, and I've read that the people who bought you Saw will be remaking this along with 3 other RKO horror films. I think we all know how that will turn out.

A brilliant film noir. Gene Tierney was great, Clifton Webb's performance is also worth a mention.

Visually stunning.

I've been meaning to watch this for ages but for some reason kept putting it off everytime I had the chance to. Maybe I wasn't expecting much of it but damn was I wrong!
Of course it's a classic of it's genre and almost flawless. Today it may seem a bit sugary and sweet but it is still just so delightful! Garland was great and so are the songs, most notably "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and "The Trolley Song" (which I haven't been able to stop singing for 2 days now!). Got to mention Margaret O'Brien also as the death fixated Tootie whole stole every scene she was in.

A simple and terribly British tale of true love. Everything about it is perfect, from the two lead performances, to the locations to the brilliant Rachmaninov soundtrack.

A magical film! The effects and visuals are stunning. The costumes, music and cinematography are also wonderful.

"There never was a woman like Gilda!"

A brilliant film noir, right from the opening shot. Hayworth is just dazzling, I think I'm in love with Rita Hayworth as Gilda! Glenn Ford and George Macready must also be mentioned, the gay subtext between them is intriguing, and once Macready is out of the picture the film does go a bit downhill and ends up like any routine film noir.
The dialogue is also snappy and suggestive and there are some excellent use of shadows, in particular one scene between Ford and Macready.
A must see!

The story lost me after a certain point, but it's full of style and constantly inventive. I still couldn't get used to Welles' accent though...

Powell and Pressburger do it again. A beautiful film shot in technicolor about a woman forced to chose between her two loves, her husband and the ballet. The 15 minute dance sequence is glorious.

Great performances from Dennis Price as the quintessentially British and exceedingly charming serial killer plus man of many faces Alec Guinness, as no less than eight members of the D'Ascoyne family.

"I shot an arrow in the air; she fell to earth in Berkeley Square."

A beautiful masterpiece. After "La Belle et la Bete" I didn't think it could get much better but I was wrong. Plus those effects are amazing!

Fabulous!