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Happy New Year!The Siren usually keeps her contemporary reviewing duties off-blog, but to clue in her patient readers on what she's been watching this year in her capacity as a freelance critic for the...
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In Memoriam: Juanita Moore, 1914-2014
The clip above is from a so-called soundie, made in 1943 to promote The Mills Brothers’ hit “Paper Doll.” The woman in the lap of the Mills Brother on the far left, best visible at about the one-minute...
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The Collaboration: Hollywood's Pact With Hitler
Hollywood was not exactly a beacon of overt anti-Nazi moviemaking in the years between Hitler's ascent to power and Confessions of a Nazi Spy in spring 1939, a fact known to anyone familiar with the...
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King Vidor, The Crowd, and the Dragon
(This is a disgracefully belated entry for the Film History Blogathon. The Siren's post, on 1928, would have been part of the 1927-1938 section, hosted by Ruth at Silver Screenings. For the years...
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In Memoriam: Shirley Temple, 1928-2014
It was a day that, due to some long-forgotten domestic dust-up, required distraction, and the Siren sat her boy-girl twins in front of the computer and began to frantically search Youtube for something...
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Gigi (1958): A Defense
Kate Aurthur’s ranking of Best Picture winners is not the worst film list the Siren has ever seen, nor even the worst list she’s seen on Buzzfeed. Several movies the Siren reveres did pretty well with...
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Let's Talk About Kim Novak
She was born Marilyn Novak in Chicago in 1933, and she always said she never wanted to be an actress, much less a star. She came to California as “Miss Deep Freeze,” demonstrating appliances on a sales...
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Five Questions About Five Came Back: An Interview with Mark Harris
When the news came that Pearl Harbor had been bombed, John Ford was having Sunday lunch at the home of Rear Admiral Andrew Pickens in Virginia. Like a true Southern hostess, Mrs. Pickens tried to make...
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Auteurs Gone Wild: A Look at the Series at Anthology Film Archives
Recently, over breakfast at their favorite neighborhood joint, the Siren’s close personal friend Glenn Kenny twitted her gently about that time in the very recent past when she made a crack about...
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Good News for Silent Film Fans
Mickey Rooney is one of the last surviving silent-film actors. He turns 94 years old on Sept. 23, and he just got an early birthday present: His first starring role, Mickey’s Circus, a comedy short...
View ArticleHerrmann/Sondheim
GROSS: Now, you've also mentioned that there was a Bernard Herrmann influence.SONDHEIM: Yeah, that's it. You know, when you talked about Milton Babbitt's influence, much less Milton Babbitt's influence...
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In Memoriam: Mickey Rooney, 1920-2014
Roll out the red carpet, folks, and stand by. That boy is here again, the Pied Piper of the box office, the eighth or ninth wonder of the world, the kid himself — in short, Mickey Rooney.— The New York...
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Missing Reels: The Siren's Novel
Voilà, one reason the Siren has been MIA for long stretches this year: Missing Reels, her first novel, will be published by the Overlook Press this November. It is available for pre-order at Amazon.com...
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Miss Wright Regrets She's Unable to Pose Today
Above, Teresa Wright bestows the look of love on Dana Andrews at the end of The Best Years of Our Lives. They showed it again last night on TCM, for Memorial Day, causing some to point out that the...
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Some Memories of Maurice Sendak
(When Maurice Sendak died, I wrote this small essay, and then I held it back. It's been two years now, and today would have been his 86th birthday. Somehow, it felt like it's time now. Happy birthday,...
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In Memoriam: Ruby Dee, 1922-2014
She signed on even though she would not have the ingenue role of Walter Lee's sister that she desired; Diana Sands got the part, while Claudia McNeil portrayed his mother. Instead, Ms. Dee would play...
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Jeanne Eagels in The Letter (1929)
“Margo, as you know, I have lived in the theater as a Trappist monk lives in his faith. I have no other world; no other life — and once in a great while, I experience that moment of revelation for...
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In Memoriam: Lauren Bacall, 1924-2014
Lauren Bacall walked into the New York Hermès outpost one day in the early 1990s to have a bag repaired. For those who care about such matters, it was a bowling-style, not a Birkin, and the Siren...
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Onward! The Novel, the Screening, the DVD, the Celebration of Preservation
The Siren could start by looking at the date of her last post and fluttering, “Did y’all miss me?” but that would be coy. She’s missed you.It has been, as you may gather, an alarmingly busy time for...
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A Few Words About Jack Carson
(Oct. 27 is Jack Carson's 104th birthday, and TCM is having an all-day, eight-film celebration that includes both Mildred Pierce, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Roughly Speaking. The Siren wrote this in...
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