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Posts Tagged ‘Classic Hollywood’

S.T. Karnick

Hollywood’s Greatest Year: 1939

by S.T. Karnick

This year marks the 70th anniversary of Hollywood’s greatest year, 1939. Accordingly, Turner Classic Movies is celebrating the anniversary this month by showing 39 films released in ‘39, starting with The Wizard of Oz. Throughout the month, TCM will also screen a new documentary, 1939: Hollywood’s Greatest Year.

It’s a truism among fans of classic movies that 1939 was the Hollywood cinema’s greatest year. But if it has become something of a cliche to say so, it’s only because it’s so undeniably true.

It’s really rather amazing to consider how many classic or transcendentally classic films were released during that annus mirabilis. Among the most highly praised then and in the ensuring years were the following: (more…)

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Posted Jul 5th 2009 at 7:03 am in Featured Story | 28 Comments

S.T. Karnick

Charm Overcomes Comic Anarchy at U.S. Box Office

by S.T. Karnick

It will be a good thing if the Sandra Bullock romantic comedy The Proposal continues its box-office success–if Hollywood draws the right conclusions about why it did well.

The film had a rather surprisingly strong opening weekend at the U.S. box office, finishing on top of the heap with a take of $34.1 million in North American ticket sales.

It’s the first film starring Sandra Bullock in a decade to reach number one. Men accounted for a healthy 37 percent of the audience, according to Reuters. The film’s trailers and commercials strongly established the film as a by-the-books romantic comedy centered on a distinctly meager and unoriginal comic premise: female executive fakes engagement to her assistant in order to escape deportation (she’s from Canada). When she takes him to meet her family, hilarity ensues. (more…)

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Posted Jun 27th 2009 at 11:02 am in Entertainment, News | 2 Comments