What if seeing a stranger murder someone made you CRAY-ZEE??? And the only doctor who could help you turns out to be the murderer??? If this happens to you, you’re probably a character in a film noir.
Wikipedia says Lynn Bari “specialized in playing sultry, statuesque man-killers.” She’s more of a “get a man to be a killer” here, but close enough. Her real name is Marjorie Fisher, and I can totally see a parallel world where Marge Fisher specializes in playing the sassy friend to the romantic lead. She worked on at least 113 films over 20 years, so she kept busy.
It’s hard to find posters to mimic for titles as generic as this. I ended up making something that matches the layout of the original, but that’s about it.
I also got lazy and used Photoshop’s “automatic color” thing, which is why her hair fades to black and white.
It was a pleasure to sit a room full of strangers and laugh at something that was intentionally made to be funny. And they nailed the most important requirement of any Naked Gun movie: a Weird Al Yankovic cameo.
For today’s poster I thought “What’s the opposite of naked?”
A classic “we have a great idea for the first half of a story” movie. No bad performances (and some really good ones), but they can’t charm the movie into having an ending that both makes sense and sticks to the tone of the first two thirds of the film.
Not my best fake poster. The only people who will know what movie is referenced are true film freaks.
Why are all the other characters in this movie smitten with George (Montgomery Clift)? He’s handsome, but he’s a lunkhead. George’s uncle gives him a job where one rule is explicitly given as unbreakable: Don’t date employees. If George had just followed that one rule, everyone ends up happy. Grow up, George.
George is played by Montgomery Clift, who I knew stories about but mostly knew through the Clash song about him. He played a lot of aloof, sensitive men. I won’t get into it here, but he had a rough, short life.
There are only two motion picture Walk of Fame stars at 6104 Hollywood Boulevard. Next up: 6116!
The dumb thinking for today’s poster: This movie is called “A Place in the Sun,” and the sun shines, so…
Orson Welles plays a Nazi who is so smart that he’s destroyed all evidence of who he is and passed himself off as not German to a small town in the middle of America, but still buries bodies in shallow graves within walking distance of his house. Lots of strong performances make the nonsense of the story work.
Also: Loretta Young and Edward G. Robinson seem to be having an eyebrow contest. Loretta is winning. And speaking of Loretta:
This is exactly the kind of person that made me start this Walk of Fame project. An Acadamey Award winner who was in over 100 films, and I’d somehow seen none of them. But what you probably want to know is “did she have a recipe for chicken curry?”
This movie officially finishes 6100 Hollywood Boulevard on the Walk of Fame! It’s my first step eastward, and it only took three days! At this rate I’ll be done in less than a couple of decades!
Today’s poster doesn’t quite make sense, but I loved it and the movie it came from so much that I forced it to work. Mostly.
This is a movie I’d seen referenced a million times but never bothered to see. What a mistake- this thing is a hoot and a half! Bette Davis is made of fire and acid.
Walk of Fame Watch: Gregory Ratoff
Why would you put this guy on the same corner as Gregory Peck? Sure, the guy was a big producer and director, but a much less famous actor than Peck. In All About Eve he plays something he played a lot: a producer. Big stretch, buddy!
Okay, this fake poster made me chuckle.
Based on another movie from the “<word> About <3 letter name>” title collection.
This is a movie that has a heavy racial equality message. It’s also a movie where a black woman lives and works in the home of a white woman for for over a decade and the white woman doesn’t realize the black woman has friends. It’s a movie where Lora treats Annie as an equal, but lets Annie call her “Miss Lora” for her entire life. It’s a movie where Annie’s daughter is berated for wanting to pass as white, but expects her to limit her life to “acceptable” jobs for black people.
Walk of Fame Watch: Juanita Moore
Juanita Moore was nominated for an Academy Award and A Golden Globe for this part. She appeared in over 50 films, and worked for 40 years after this movie came out.
And when did she get her star on the Walk of Fame?
October of 2024, ten years after she died. Way to be timely, Hollywood.
Today’s poster inspiration is another movie about the imitation of life.
I’m starting a new project (because lord knows I need more projects). The Hollywood Walk of Fame has not-quite 3000 stars on it, and about 1200 of those were awarded for motion picture achievements. My goal: to have seen at least one movie that each one of the honorees worked on. One movie can represent multiple people/groups, so it should be far fewer than 1200 movies total. I’m going to start on the southeast end of Hollywood Boulevard, work my way down the south side, then come back up the north side. After that, the same idea going up and down Vine. I’m using Wikipedia’s version of the list. If someone doesn’t have a motion picture star (even if they’ve done a ton of movies) I’m not counting them.
There are seven stars at 6100 Hollywood. I remember seeing movies from three of them:
Stanley Kramer: Produced High Noon, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T, and It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
Gregory Peck: starred in To Kill a Mockingbird, The Omen, and a billion other movies.
Jimmy Smits: surprisingly few films. I’ve definitely seen him in Attack of the Clones & Rogue One, though.
The other four: William C. de Mille, Juanita Moore, and Gregory Ratoff.
Today’s movie takes care of director William C. de Mille, older brother of Cecil B. DeMille (who changed the spelling of his name to look cool). He wrote a lot of scripts based on plays. Miss Lulu Betts was originally a novel, then a play.
That’s him!
This is a comedy based on a nonsense premise: two people pretending to marry are told the wedding was accidentally real. It’s about as feminist as a 105 year old movie directed by a man could manage, and it’s pretty fun. It’s on Youtube.
Today’s fake poster is a Lulu.
Three more movies and I get to move all the way to 6104 Hollywood Boulevard!
Sandler hangs out with someone. Somewhere along the way (and with ZERO pressure) he says “Hey, I’m making a movie. Wanna be in it?” If the other person asks if the movie is good, Sandler says “it’ll be fun.” The other person knows Sandler is right, so they say “Why not?”
I knew when this movie was announced that I almost certainly wouldn’t care about it. I only watched because I read about the insane opening sequence and had to see if it was as bizarre as it sounded (and yes it is). But I have nothing against it. It’s a silly, pretty harmless story made by a bunch of people enjoying getting paid for goofing around; who could complain about that?
