Wednesdays at 4 p.m. Matinee Movies.
December’s matinee lineup includes three classics from the 1940s featuring comedy, romance, and a bit of holiday spirit.
December 4th: HIS GIRL FRIDAY
(1940; Howard Hawks, director; starring Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant)
Screwball comedies of the 1930s and 1940s are known for their rapid-fire wisecracking dialogue, and no one cracked wise faster or better than Grant and Russell in this cynical tale of a newspaper editor who is determined not to lose his ace reporter—also his ex-wife—to a second marriage and life as a housewife in suburbia.
December 11: UNFAITHFULLY YOURS
(1948; Preston Sturges, director; starring Rex Harrison and Linda Darnell)
“One of the most sophisticated slapstick comedies ever made… There are so many great lines and situations in this movie that writers and directors have been stealing from it for years, but no one has ever come close to replicating the wild-man devilry of the best Preston Sturges comedies.” –Pauline Kael
In what might be Preston Sturges’ darkest comedy, Rex Harrison is a jealous symphony conductor convinced his wife is having an affair. While conducting a concert featuring three pieces of classical music, the desperate, deranged maestro imagines three drastic ways to deal with the imagined infidelity.
December 18: REMEMBER THE NIGHT
(1940; Mitchell Leisen, director; starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray)
Five years before they lit up screens in the classic film noir Double Indemnity, MacMurray and Stanwyck starred in the holiday classic Remember the Night. Stanwyck is perfectly cast as a thief and MacMurray is the assistant district attorney set to prosecute her for shoplifting during the holiday season. Bail is posted, a road trip follows, and troubled holiday romance is inevitable. The great Preston Sturges wrote this funny, romantic, and touching film, and described it as “…a lot of schmaltz, a good dose of schmerz, and just enough schmutz to make it box office.” In a just world, it would be in regular rotation on television this time of year.
