This post contains links to all of the entries in my Golden Age of Hollywood series.

I will update each Wednesday with the current week’s post.

Enjoy!

Birth of the Talkies

A Toothless Code

Screwing Around

The Case for Barbara Stanwyck

The Greatest Year in Movies

The Fabulous Forties

The Shrew Who Would Not Be Tamed

Remake Rumbles

Hitch and Grace In Three Acts

From Page to Screen

More Films

Five Films To Get You Started

If I’ve piqued your interest on classic films but you don’t where to start, you can’t go wrong by beginning with these five stellar films. If you don’t love these, then classic Hollywood films are not for you.

  • The Philadelphia Story (1940)
    • Katharine Hepburn’s funniest–and best–film. Also Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant, and the best script in Hollywood history
  • The Lady Eve (1941)
    • Barbara Stanwyck tortures poor Henry Fonda in this tale of her revenge between losing and regaining his love.
  • Casablanca (1942)
    • Of all the gin joints, in all the towns, in all the world, Bergman walks into Bogie’s.
  • All About Eve (1950)
    • Bette Davis at her absolute best. As relevant today as it was seventy years ago.
  • Rear Window (1954)
    • Hitchcock directs Grace Kelly, the cool blonde that got away.

Sources

Actor/Actress/Director Biographies

  • Possessed: The Life of Joan Crawford, Donald Spoto
  • Clark Gable: A Biography, Warren G. Harris
  • Screwball: The Life of Carole Lombard, Larry Swindell
  • Stanwyck, Axel Madsen
  • Starring Miss Stanwyck, Ella Smith
  • Dark Victory: The Life of Bette Davis, Ed Sikov
  • A Talent for Trouble: The Life of Hollywood’s Most Acclaimed Director, William Wyler, Jan Herman
  • Cary Grant: A Biography, Marc Eliot
  • Spellbound by Beauty: Alfred Hitchcock and his Leading Ladies, Donald Spoto
  • High Society: The Life of Grace Kelly, Donald Spoto
  • Bette and Joan: The Divine Feud, Shaun Considine

Cinema History and Film Essays

  • Sin In Soft Focus: Pre Code Hollywood, Mark Vieira
  • The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking In The Studio Era, Thomas Schatz
  • A World of Movies: 70 Years of Film History, Richard Lawton
  • The Noir Style, Alain Silver and James Ursini
  • American Cinema of the 1930s, Edited by Ina Rae Hark
  • American Cinema of the 1940s, Edited by Wheeler Winston Dixon
  • American Cinema of the 1950s, Edited by Murray Pomerance