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Post by louise on Sept 4, 2018 19:21:37 GMT
the African Queen. delightful film, Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn on a boat in Africa, what more could you want?.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 4, 2018 22:56:23 GMT
I just watched Gone With The Wind for the 30 time i think.
The movie is still 10\10 in my opinion.
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Post by teleadm on Sept 5, 2018 17:31:18 GMT
The Man in the Iron Mask 1977, directed by Mike Newell, based on a novel by Alexandre Dumas, staring Richard Chamberlain, Patrick McGoohan, Louis Jourdan, Jenny Agutter, Ian Holm, Ralph Richardson, Vivien Merchant, Brenda Bruce, Esmond Knight and others. American-British adventure about D'Artagnan (Jourdan) and his fellow Musketeers' plot to replace the ineffectual Louis XIV (Chamberlain) of France with his secretly imprisoned twin brother Philippe who is the firstborn and rightful king. Fairly entertaining retelling of the famous Dumas story that was released both as a TV-Movie and as a widescreen cinema version, and it's the later I watched. This version is more about plot and characters around the Sun King, than the later rambling rousing 1998 version with Leonardo DiCaprio. Filmed on great locations in France and England. It's a but confusing the first 10-15 minutes before all characters has been identified, who's bad and who's good. Great cinematography by three time Oscar winner Freddie Young. The Musketeers appearances is very peripheral in this version. American producer Norman Rosemont made a whole bunch of TV movies based on the classics, that also in some cases had cinema releases too, usually in collaboration with British producers, including another one with Chamberlain, The Count of Monte Cristo 1975. Entertaining, especially with this actors and actresses.
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Post by kijii on Sept 6, 2018 5:32:00 GMT
The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941) All That Money Can Buy (original title) / William Dieterle Rented from Amazon Prime for streaming
I first became familiar with this Stephen Vincent Benet story as a Junior in high school. The theme of the story is probably ages old. It is the story of a man "selling his soul to the devil" in exchange for an instant reward, usually money.
This story takes place at the 1840 intersection of Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts, at a time when the well-known golden American orator was Daniel Webster (from Massachusetts). This fantasy is well presented and well cast with Walter Huston deliciously playing Mr. Scratch making a bargain with the early New England version of Job, Jabez Stone (James Craig). Neither Stone nor his New England neighbors were having any good luck as farmers. But then, Mr. Scratch appears on the scene and makes a seven-year bargain with Stone which changes his outward fortune while those around him continued to fail.
Stone's wife is played by Anne Shirley, his long-suffering mother by Jane Darwell, and the devil's temptress, Belle, by Simone Simon. In the end, Daniel Webster (Edward Arnold) acts as Stone's defense attorney in a trial with of infamous American miscreants as the jurors:Mr. Scratch (Walter Huston): You shall have your trial, Mr. Webster. But I'm sure you'll agree, this is hardly the case for an ordinary jury. Daniel Webster (Edward Arnold): Let it be the quick or the dead, so long as it is an American judge and an American jury! Mr. Scratch : 'The quick or the dead!' You have said it. [he stomps on the barn floor; a door opens] Mr. Scratch : You must pardon the leathery toughness of one or two. Jabez Stone (James Craig): [afraid] Mr. Webster! Mr. Scratch : Captain Kidd - he killed men for gold. Simon Girty, the renegade - he burned men for gold. Governor Dale - he broke men on the wheel. Asa, the Black Monk - he choked them to death. Floyd Ireson and Stede Bonnet, the fiendish butchers. Walter Butler, King of the Massacre. Big and Little Harp, robbers and murderers. Teach, the Cutthroat. Morton, the vicious lawyer... and General Benedict Arnold. You remember him, no doubt. Daniel Webster : A jury of the damned... Mr. Scratch : [laughs] Dastards, liars, traitors, knaves. Your suggestion, Mr. Webster - 'the quick or the dead.' Daniel Webster : This is outrageous, I asked for a fair trial... Mr. Scratch : Americans, all.
The sets, atmosphere, and camerawork in this movie are great, but the great music of Bernard Herrmann's Oscar-winning score is not well matched to the rest of the audio work of the movie (It's too loud when compared to the voices of the actors. It is too bad when the one has to decrease the volume whenever the music kicks in).
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Post by ZolotoyRetriever on Sept 6, 2018 18:40:24 GMT
Scent of Mystery / Holiday in Spain (1960). Directed by Jack Cardiff, with Denholm Elliott, Peter Lorre, Beverly Bentley, Leo McKern. DVR’d from recent TCM telecast. First-time viewing.
Uneven but interesting film originally shown (under the title Scent of Mystery) in theaters specially equipped with a “Smell-O-Vision” feature: “the first to use the Smell-O-Vision system to release odors at points in the film's plot. It was the first film in which aromas were integral to the story, providing important details to the audience.” [Wiki]
It was a commercial as well as a critical flop, but seen today, without the accompanying aromas, of course (and retitled as Holiday in Spain), it does make for a nice travelogue sort of picture, as it was filmed almost entirely in very scenic parts of Spain. I wouldn’t mind seeing this in its 70mm Cinerama theater release format.
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Post by teleadm on Sept 7, 2018 17:49:02 GMT
Treasure Island 1950, directed by Byron Haskin, based on a novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, staring Bobby Driscoll, Robert Newton, Basil Sydney, Walter Fitzgerald, Dennis O'Dea, Finlay Currie, Geoffrey Keen, Francis De Wolff and others. Disney adventure with treasure seeking adventures of young Jim Hawkins (Driscoll) and pirate captain Long John Silver (Newton). Since I've never read Stevenson's book I don't know how correct this version is, but as it is it's a fairly family friendly adventure movie. Eye-rolling and ahrrrs galore from Robert Newton who's obviously overplaying is what makes this movie interesting, and that his character is very cunning, balancing between playing a good guy and the pirate he is, and the movie made him a star, slightly above character actors. Driscoll is such a natural as the wide eyed Jim but as the story goes just as cunning as Silver in how to survive in all situations, it's so sad to know that he in real life was a very troublesome kid. I've seen this movie before and didn't like it, this time I must have been in the right mood because I liked it. The movie is notable for being Disney's first completely live-action film and the first screen version of "Treasure Island" made in color. Since the movie became a huge hit, Disney continued to explore British history in movies to come. Exteriors were shot in and around Cornwall, Devon and Bristol, and if anyone here has been there and don't recognize anything, Disney had some of the greatest "matte" painters.
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Sept 8, 2018 1:06:05 GMT
Shark! 1969 Burt Reynolds helps treasure hunters in shark-infested waters but the real danger is from dry land. Not a good movie, but back when Jaws came out, anything with a shark theme instantly became more interesting. I sometimes thought of this film and wondered-what if they had one big shark that attacks the ship, would it be better remembered? The shark scenes were funny since we see a diver with a shark in the background--but it seemed a little weird. I detected something about it that wasn't right-then later on when the shark passes in front of the diver I saw that it was a tiny shark.
This film seems like the type of thing John Huston could have done with Humphrey Bogart if a few changes were made. Walter Huston in the Arthur Kennedy part, Robert Blake as runt, etc.
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Post by kijii on Sept 8, 2018 5:32:44 GMT
Conduct Unbecoming (1975) / Michael Anderson Streamed from Filmstruck
It's interesting how many movies we have to watch before we find some undiscovered gem that we had never heard of before. But this movie definitely fits in that category for me!! Based on a story by Robert Enders and a play by Barry England, here we have a movie about British Colonialism in India which combines the best of that genre with the best of courtroom drama, mystery, and made up of bizarre incidents.
Although this is fiction and Breaker Morant (1980) is based on real events, I can see many similarities between the two movies, including an officer being forced into a case with "all the cards stacked against him." That is, being forced to defend a seemingly guilty person in an antagonistic environment filled with traditions and a history unknown to the defending attorney. So, why has this movie only been given a 6.4 on the IMDb? My only guess might be that there are only 6 user reviews and this is movie should be seen by more people.
To begin with, Anderson has assembled one of the best British casts of that era (with at least 4 Oscar nominees): Michael York, Richard Attenborough, Trevor Howard, Stacy Keach (American) at his very best, Christopher Plummer (Canadian), and Susannah York.
The story is complicated but the IMDb brief synopsis may serve as an opening:
So where does this idea of pigsticking come from?
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Sept 8, 2018 7:41:15 GMT
DON Q-SON OF ZORRO 1925 Sequel to Douglas Fairbanks' 1920 film has him playing both father and son. Not what I expected in plot--figured it would be the ol passing of the torch but its more like a case where the father gets to see his son is a chip off the old block and fight side by side with him.
Once I got over Fairbanks resemblance to William Devane I noticed in the original film that there were elements that would be a no no in later Hollywood--Zorro is an aristocrat and by the end it is up to the other patriarch landowners to save the peasantry from injustice. Contrast with the 1998 version where it is the landowners who are the bad guys. He also frees some people from jail but leaves in a good number of them inside too. And while we are at it, contrast that with Batman who is also aristocratic but he chose to fight crime from personal revenge due to childhood trauma, not as an adult on an altruistic social mission like Zorro did.
In the sequel it starts with a text that reads 'in the long chain of noble names--warriors, conquerors, statesmen, whose brilliant lives are written in the stories of Spanish conquest, the name of De Vega stands well to the fore. A De Vega stood with Balboa when he discovered the Pacific. A De Vega fought with Pizarro in the conquest of Peru. On the "Night of Tears" when Cortez drenched the New World with the best blood of old Spain, a young De Vega died in armor.'
Don Cesar is an expert with the whip and a fun-loving guy who takes a vacation in Spain. Warner Oland is a silly Archduke who gets killed and Don Q is blamed for it. He fakes his death and then plots his return (but sends a letter to Dad-who takes a ship for the old World with his faithful servant). Zorro wears the mask at the end for the final duel-the son interestingly enough, never does. They do one split screen shot so Fairbanks can interact with himself. An upbeat story with no tragic elements-even the bad guys are not really that bad--the archduke was teasing his killer to the point of irritation, he sort of had it coming---and what was the last adventure movie where the father and son both live at the end?
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Post by ZolotoyRetriever on Sept 8, 2018 8:14:46 GMT
Record of a Tenement Gentleman (1947). Directed by Yasujiro Ozu, with Chôko Iida, Hôhi Aoki, Eitarô Ozawa. DVR’d off of TCM telecast.
Simple but engrossing tale of Kohei (Hôhi Aoki), a young Japanese boy who has somehow gotten separated from his father and ends up far from home in the care and custody of strangers who, essentially, not only don’t know what to do with the boy but don’t *want* anything to do with him or the attendant responsibility and expense of taking care of an orphan in immediately post-war Japan. But eventually that responsibility falls to a certain Otane (Chôko Iida), a crochety, boss-faced, middle-aged widow who very reluctantly takes on the task of being the kid’s surrogate mother. The viewer immediately feels sorry for the poor kid… but just a few scenes later, when it’s revealed that the kid is a bed-wetter, the viewer suddenly starts to feel sorry for poor old Otane as well.
Slowly but surely the boy begins to win Otane over, and by the end of the film you’ll undoubtedly go through a number of laughs - and sobs - as these two eventually become nearly inseparable.
I really enjoyed this one on a number of levels, not least of which was the way such a simple tale, done in Black & White without the use of elaborate sets or other movie-making contrivances, can have such a profound effect on the viewer. Not hard to see why Ozu was, and still is considered one of Japan's all-time-great directors.
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Post by teleadm on Sept 8, 2018 15:07:01 GMT
Shark! 1969 Burt Reynolds helps treasure hunters in shark-infested waters but the real danger is from dry land. Not a good movie, but back when Jaws came out, anything with a shark theme instantly became more interesting. I sometimes thought of this film and wondered-what if they had one big shark that attacks the ship, would it be better remembered? The shark scenes were funny since we see a diver with a shark in the background--but it seemed a little weird. I detected something about it that wasn't right-then later on when the shark passes in front of the diver I saw that it was a tiny shark. This film seems like the type of thing John Huston could have done with Humphrey Bogart if a few changes were made. Walter Huston in the Arthur Kennedy part, Robert Blake as runt, etc. I remember this as one of those early video movies, and really pushing Burt Reynolds name, The ideas might have been right, but the movie was awfull. I think, but I might be wrong, that one of the stuntmen or divers was actually eaten by a shark during the productions.
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Sept 8, 2018 15:38:49 GMT
I think, but I might be wrong, that one of the stuntmen or divers was actually eaten by a shark during the productions. That is what I read.
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Post by louise on Sept 9, 2018 20:05:10 GMT
hope and Glory (1987). CHarming film based on the director's own memories of childhood during WW2,. the child actors are particularly good. best line, when the child BIlly's grandfather is complaining about having four daughters "too many women in our family" and Billy says "don't you love them, grandpa?" To which his grandfather replies "Oh, love them, yes, but never try to understand them - that road leads to ruin."
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Post by kijii on Sept 9, 2018 21:43:54 GMT
BlacKkKlansman (2018) / Spike Lee Seen at the local movie theater We were able to get out and watch a real movie in the theater this week. This is based on a true story that occurred in Colorado Springs in the early 70s. As a native of Colorado, I would give this movie a midland rating. That is, the story was interesting and the main actors were very good. But, the movie could have been more subtle, without the over-the-top in its presentation of the black activist students and worshiping KKK members on the CC campus. And, it could have done it without losing the dramatic impact of the overall story. It's not that Coloradans could not be that racist in the 60s and 70s, it's just that we didn't have that many blacks, with Afros, on the campus at that time, especially in the Springs which was--and still is--a relatively conservative town. The idea that there were many swooning black activists student and KKK members in that town and at time---well, it just doesn't comport with my recollection. If anything, we were more apathetic to a cause that we knew little about. Still, the movie does build with John David Washington (Denzel's son) as Ron Stallworth, the first black policeman on the Springs Police Force, who was bored in the records room and wanted to do something more challenging. He wanted to infiltrate the local KKK, However, to infiltrate the KKK, Stallworth (understandably) had to work closely with a white officer (who also happened to be Jewish), Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver). The two policeman had to work very closely with each other, even learning to imitate each other's voice so that they would sound the same over the phone. And, Zimmerman had to actually interact with Klansmen to enthusiastically convince them that he was one of them. Other notable persons in the cast were Harry Belafonte, as Jerome Turner who related stories of the Jim Crow south to the students, and Topher Grace, would played David Duke when he was the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. As I say, the story does build, and the archival footage of the Charlottesville riots of 2017 (at the end of the movie) brings home the notion that the fight still continues under Trump.
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on Sept 10, 2018 13:29:43 GMT
100 Rifles (1969) starring Jim Brown, Raquel Welch and Burt Reynolds...and so begins my Burt-A-Thon. Trying to watch some of the Burt Reynolds movies I missed, and maybe a few I have seen before as well. Burt is actually the sidekick to Jim Brown's character in this one, his character's name is Yaqui Joe, a Yaqui native. I've already moved on to Navajo Joe, where Burt plays a member of the Navajo tribe. Burt was not necessarily a case of non-ethnic casting, he was part Cherokee himself.
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Post by OldAussie on Sept 10, 2018 13:36:05 GMT
2 For Burt....
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Post by kijii on Sept 10, 2018 15:02:40 GMT
The Rack (1956) / Arnold Laven Streamed from FilmSturck in the Paul Newman Group
This is another very good trial movie about a soldier from the Korean War being accused of giving aid and comfort to the enemy during his time as POW. This was Paul Newman's 3rd feature film and he was quite good as the accused in this purely dramatic movie. In the movie, Walter Pidgeon played his military father, and Anne Francis played his sister-in-law. (Francis' her husband--Neman's brother and Pidgeon's younger son had been killed in Korea during the war). At the court-marshal, Wendell Corey played the prosecuting attorney, Edmond O'Brien the defense attorney, and Lee Marvin played one of the principal accusers from the POW camp where Newman had been.
The trial tests the difference of two types of torture while at the POW camp, as well as exposing the relationship between the father and his son as a possible extenuating circumstance of Newman's behavior.
Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. (Walter Pidgeon) : [Coming into Ed's darkened bedroom in a very agitated state] Ed! Ed! Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr (Paul Newman). : [Drowsily] What time is it? Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : [Angrily] Get up! Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [Waking up] What's the matter? Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : [Angrily] Get up! Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : [Ed gets up] All right... I want to ask you a question. I want a simple, direct yes or no answer. Did you collaborate with the enemy? Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : [Ed appears stunned by the question] Did you collaborate with the enemy? Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [Deliberately] Yes, I did. Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : [Screaming emotionally] Why didn't yuh die? Why didn'y yuh die like your brother did? It would have been much better that way! Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [Hall, Sr. walks out and a distraught Hall Jr. limps hurriedly after him] Dad! Dad! Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [Stopping before the bottom of the stairs] I would have liked it better too... a nice, clean, acceptable death with dignity. Does that make sense to you? Col. Edward W. Hall, Sr. : Your excuses for treason must have been tremendous to make you crawl on your belly and break faith with your country and me! Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [Angrily shouting] With you? What about me? You know what I got for that crawl on my belly? You know what I got, Dad? Well, I'll tell you. I sold my soul for a blanket that smells of fish and urine and three lousy hours of uninterrupted sleep, and you know what else, Colonel? At the time I thought I was getting one hell of a bargain!
SPOILER QUOTE: Capt. Edward W. Hall Jr. : [addressing the court martial one last time after the verdict has been read] This isn't going to be an extenuation, but I want to say it anyway. Capt. Miller came to my hotel this morning, just about dawn. He's the witness who was tortured. He said he'd read the papers and he'd seen my testimony there and he wanted to talk. So we sat down and we started talking about the men we knew who were prisoners over there... He said he thought that every man has a moment in his life when he has to choose. If he chooses right, then it's a moment of magnificence. If he chooses wrong, then it's a moment of regret that will stay with him for the rest of his life. I wish that every soldier... I wish that everybody could feel the way I feel now. Because if they did, they'd know what it is like to be a man who sold himself short... and who lost his moment of magnificence. I pray to God that they find theirs.
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Post by Doghouse6 on Sept 11, 2018 0:14:20 GMT
"Classic Hollywood" at its best means many things to many people: the maturity and honesty of The Best Years Of Our Lives' intimate human drama; the cinematic audacity of Citizen Kane; the enduring, touches-all-bases resonance of Casablanca; the gut-punch austerity of film noir; the opulence of spare-no-expense epics; screwball rom-coms, dazzling musicals, grandly passionate tragedies and so on. Among the things Classic Hollywood did best was pure escapism: glamorous; romantic; exotic. Before turning his attention to the post-war rawness of Brute Force, The Naked City or Thieves' Highway, director Jules Dassin turned in a minor but neglected masterpiece of glossy escapism: 1946's Two Smart People, a lighter-than-air yet satisfying menu of intrigue and romance, danger and double-crosses, high living, elegant travel and snappy banter. Con artists Ace Connors (John Hodiak) and Ricki Woodner (Lucille Ball) meet at a Beverly Hills hotel where both have their eyes on the same mark - Ace soliciting investment in phony oil wells and Ricki in forged artworks - and each crabs the other's deal. New York detective Bob Simms (Lloyd Nolan), who has been on Ace's trail for so long that - allowing each other grudging respect, affection and even guarded trust - they've become friends of a sort, has finally got the goods on him in a case involving a half-million worth of stolen government bonds, but Ace forestalls arrest by making a deal with the NY D.A. to surrender himself voluntarily in five days' time, and Bob is handed the responsibility of delivering him. Facing a negotiated five-year-sentence plea deal copping only to theft of the bonds but not their possession, Ace proposes a gentleman's agreement to Bob: a five-day fling with first-class service all the way - on Ace's dime - that, with Bob's retirement imminent, they can both remember for years to come. Tipped off to the bonds by sleazy associate Fly Feletti (Elisha Cook, Jr.), Ricki turns up on their eastbound train: let the romance, snappy banter and double-dealing begin. What follows is part road film, part buddy adventure and part caper, wherein Ace is greeted by name and with open arms everywhere from an impossibly picturesque bordertown inn to the finest establishments in New Orleans. Will Bob find the bonds' hiding place? Will Ricki beat him to them? Will Ace honor his deal with Bob? Will he and Ricki run off together? Will Fly catch up with them to extract his cut? It all climaxes with a frenetic, graffiti-strewn pursuit through a Mardi Gras parade, and the only thing missing from this glistening examination of life as it was lived only in movies is glorious Technicolor. For all its escapist fantasy, Two Smart People is sustained not only by its souffle-like enchantment but by the basic sincerity at its core. No, I don't think there were ever people who actually lived or behaved this way, but it's the kind of Classic Hollywood fairy tale that makes you wish there had been, and that they did. Alas, only in Classic Hollywood, but how satisfying it is that it at least happened there. When you want nothing more than to escape humdrum reality for an hour and a half, hop on the train with Two Smart People for a glittering ride to never-never-but-should-have-been land.
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Post by teleadm on Sept 11, 2018 18:29:31 GMT
A Place in the Sun 1951, directed by George Stevens, based on a novel by Theodore Dreiser and a play by Patrick Kearney, music score by Franz Waxman, staring Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, Shelley Winters, Anne Revere, Keefe Brasselle, Fred Clark, Raymond Burr, Herbert Heyes, Shepperd Strudwick, Frieda Inescort, Ted de Corsia and others. Romantic drama about a poor boy who gets a job working for his rich uncle and ends up falling in love with two women, one rich and one poor and pregnant, so one has to die, and one do indeed die, but was it murder or was it an accident... Knowing very well that this is a very famous movie, and that I have seen before and disliked it, I thought I would give it another try. There is a sence of doom over the whole movie, including the acting, cinematography and especially in Waxman's music score. The romance between Clift and Taylor though very well played is also very boring, and Winters though pityful and sad comes of as rather needy too. Clark and Burr though sparkles in the second half of the movie in the courtroom scenes. Maybe I understood it a bit better this time around, but I still can't embrace it. Winner of six Oscars for Director, Writing, Screenplay, Cinematography, Black-and-White, Costume Design, Black-and-White, Editing and Music, It was also nominated for Best Picture, Actor in a Leading Role (Clift) and Actress in a Leading Role (Taylor). The lake scenes were shot at Lake Tahoe, Echo Lake and Cascade Lake in California. In the lakes scenes they hear loons and looks up the trees, even if loons nest on the ground near lakes and live on the water and are never found in trees (a funny little factual error).
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Post by louise on Sept 11, 2018 20:51:19 GMT
for Better, For Worse. RAther bland 50s comedy about the problems a young married couple have setting up home. DIrk Bogarde rather wasted as the young husband. DEnnis Price amusing as the waspish man who rents them their flat, but we don't see enough of him.
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