Cast: Elisabeth Risdon

Direction Raoul Walsh

Cast James Cagney · Priscilla Lane · Humphrey Bogart · Gladys George

Synopsis The Roaring Twenties (1939) follows three World War I veterans—Eddie, George, and Lloyd—who return to America with dreams of prosperity. As Prohibition begins, their paths diverge: Eddie becomes a bootlegger, George a nightclub owner, and Lloyd a district attorney. Their...

Direction Raoul Walsh

Cast Humphrey Bogart · Ida Lupino · Alan Curtis · Arthur Kennedy

Synopsis Roy 'Mad Dog' Earle is broken out of prison by an old associate who wants him to help with an upcoming robbery. When the robbery goes wrong and a man is shot and killed Earle is forced to go on...

Direction Mervyn LeRoy

Cast Claude Rains · Gloria Dickson · Edward Norris · Otto Kruger

Synopsis A southern town is rocked by scandal when teenager Mary Clay is murdered on Confederate Decoration Day. Andrew Griffin, a small-time lawyer with political ambitions, sees the crime as his ticket to the Senate if he can find the right...

Direction Mervyn LeRoy

Cast Ronald Colman · Greer Garson · Philip Dorn · Susan Peters

Synopsis As the First World War ends a soldier wanders out of a Midlands asylum. Smithy was found in the trenches having lost his memory and all contact with the past. Amidst the noise of the armistice celebrations he meets a...

Direction Josef von Sternberg

Cast Peter Lorre · Edward Arnold · Marian Marsh · Elisabeth Risdon

Synopsis Von Sternberg’s first film after leaving Paramount (and Dietrich) was this expressionistic riot based on the Dostoevsky novel, about student Peter Lorre (in his Hollywood debut) obsessed by a murder he committed, and the police inspector (Edward Arnold) equally obsessed...

Direction Curtis Bernhardt

Cast Robert Taylor · Audrey Totter · Herbert Marshall · Dorothy Patrick

Synopsis Steven Kenet, suffering from a recurring brain injury, appears to have strangled his wife. Having confessed, he's committed to an understaffed county asylum full of pathetic inmates. There, Dr. Ann Lorrison is initially skeptical about Kenet's story and reluctance to...

Direction Frank Borzage

Cast Dorothy Lamour · Akim Tamiroff · John Howard · Judith Barrett

Synopsis A doctor's medical studies are threatened by his infatuation with a Chinese girl. The girl returns to China, but complications ensue when she runs into him in Nanking during a Japanese bombing raid.

Direction John Farrow

Cast Chester Morris · Lucille Ball · Wendy Barrie · John Carradine

Synopsis After their airplane crashes in the South American jungle, the passengers and crew must survive until the repairs can be made. Apart from the two pilots there is an elderly couple, a gangster traveling with a young boy, a bounty...

Direction Mel Ferrer

Cast Claudette Colbert · Robert Ryan · Jane Cowl · Paul Kelly

Synopsis During the ceremony marrying Ellen and David, a stranger stands up when that phrase "if anyone knows why these two may not be joined..." is spoken. The stranger announces that Ellen is already married. Ellen however insists she is not,...

Direction Michael Curtiz

Cast William Powell · Irene Dunne · Elizabeth Taylor · Edmund Gwenn

Synopsis In late nineteenth century New York a Wall Street broker likes to think his house runs his way, but finds himself constantly bemused at how much of what happens is down to his wife. His children are also stretching their...

Direction Richard Fleischer

Cast Lawrence Tierney · Priscilla Lane · Phillip Reed · June Clayworth

Synopsis Homicide detective Mike Carter is tossed off the police force for insubordination and violating regulations. He reluctantly takes a job as bodyguard to Mrs. Gene Dysen, the owner of a local meat-packing plant. In investigating threats against her life, Carter...

Direction Jules Dassin

Cast Charles Laughton · Robert Young · Margaret O'Brien · William Gargan

Synopsis In the 1600s, cowardly Sir Simon of Canterville flees a duel and seeks solace in the family castle. His ashamed father seals him in the room where he is hiding and dooms him to life as a ghost until one...

Direction Richard Thorpe

Cast Mickey Rooney · Walter Connolly · William Frawley · Rex Ingram

Synopsis The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a 1939 film adaptation of Mark Twain's classic novel of the same name, starring Mickey Rooney in the title role.

Direction Edwin L. Marin

Cast John Wayne · Ella Raines · Ward Bond · George 'Gabby' Hayes

Synopsis When a stranger arrives in a western town he finds that the rancher who sent for him has been murdered. Further, most of the townsfolk seem to be at each other's throats, and the newcomer has soon run contrariwise to...

Direction Lewis Allen

Cast Joel McCrea · Gail Russell · Herbert Marshall · Phyllis Brooks

Synopsis When Elizabeth Howard (Gail Russell) comes to fashionable Crescent Drive to take charge of two motherless children, she finds them spoiled, unmanageable yet strangely cognizant of all the weird events going on in the ostensibly empty, shuttered house next door....

Direction Richard Boleslawski

Cast Irene Dunne · Melvyn Douglas · Thomas Mitchell · Thurston Hall

Synopsis The small-town prudes of Lynnfield are up in arms over 'The Sinner,' a sexy best-seller. They little suspect that author 'Caroline Adams' is really Theodora Lynn, scion of the town's leading family. Michael Grant, devil-may-care book jacket illustrator, penetrates Theodora's...

Direction Chester Erskine

Cast Claudette Colbert · Fred MacMurray · Marjorie Main · Louise Allbritton

Synopsis Based on the true-life adventures of best-selling humorist Betty MacDonald. A young urban bride agrees to help her new husband realize his life-long dream of owning a chicken farm. A dilapidated house, temperamental stove, and suicidal chickens test the bride's...

Direction Dorothy Arzner

Cast Rosalind Russell · John Boles · Billie Burke · Jane Darwell

Synopsis A domineering woman marries a wealthy man for his money, and then uses her position to further her own ambitions for money and power.

Direction Garson Kanin

Cast John Barrymore · Peter Holden · Virginia Weidler · Katharine Alexander

Synopsis In 1923, Gregory Vance, a widower with two children, is a former scholar who has turned from book-to-bottle. He works, slightly, as a night-watchman and his children, who know him for what he is and what he isn't, are his...

Direction William A. Seiter

Cast Deanna Durbin · Franchot Tone · Walter Brennan · Robert Stack