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Showing posts from May, 2023

Success or Snub? Going My Way (17th Academy Awards Review Pt. 2)

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  To see part 1, click here . Double Indemnity Suite~Miklós Rózsa - Double Indemnity As the war furor seemed to be dying down and victory for the Allies became more and more assured, the list of war movies slowly morphed from pure propaganda films to actually making some genuinely excellent films, a few of which actually took risks. For example, there was None Shall Escape which was the first film to actually tackle the Nazis’ persecution of the Jews. The movie is surprisingly dark for such an old film and the villain, Wilhelm Grimm (Alexander Knox), is one of the most effective and chilling bad guys of the war years. Long before this type of character would become commonplace in most WWII dramas, this is the first Nazi villain to really show the horrors of prejudice and fascism. At the other end of the spectrum is Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller, Lifeboat . This movie takes place after a ship was sunk by a German U-boat and a colorful cast of characters all board the nearest lifeboat

Oscars Retrospective: Going My Way (17th Academy Awards Review)

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  That's An Irish Lullaby~Bing Crosby - Going My Way There are movie stars and then there are multimedia movie stars. These are stars who do it all. They sing, they’re in movies, they’re on TV, they sell out their likeness to every piece of merchandise you can imagine. And today, we’re going to be looking at the pioneer of multimedia stardom. Before Miley Cyrus, before Michael Jackson, before Elvis Presley, before Frank Sinatra, there was Bing Crosby. To put in perspective how big this guy was in his day, Crosby was once voted the “most admired man alive” by Americans in 1948, ahead of Jackie Robinson, the President of the United States and the Pope. Crosby is a Hollywood icon in the same league as Clark Gable, being particularly well known for his singing chops. Before him, singers were known for an almost belting quality, as their voices were meant to fill the room. Crosby was one of the first to cater his singing towards the microphone and audio recording. (In case you’re n