Midnight Oil:Movies and More

“Shenandoah” (1965) IMDb with James Stewart playing the lead role provides a less than usual perspective on the American Civil War. The film tells the story of a well ensconced Virginian farming family caught up in the latter part of the Civil War. Stewart, as Charlie Anderson, vehiculates a pragmatic pacificism about a mean and dirty war that now encroaches on his land and his family. Anderson himself is not undergirded by a particularly robust morality about the war nor about his position on pacificism. He finds himself fighting a losing battle even though he technically remains “out of the war”.

The Uncivil War episode offered by Saturday Night at the Movies pairs “Ride with the Devil” (1995) IMDb with this movie classic from 1965. SNAM’s interviewed guests bring out the relationship of “Shenandoah” with American sentiments of the day concerning young American men snatched up into the war in Vietnam and the accompanying anger, confusion and sense of helplessness on the part of those at home.

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See the SNAM preview for The Uncivil War here. Dig in to the background for the films through the Interviews on The Uncivil War with experts on the period.

Catch the video trailer for “Shenandoah” (1965) here.

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"Went the Day Well?" (1942) , from a short story by Graham Greene, is a wartime propaganda film with some surprises up its sleeve. The film, set in a sleepy English village, depicts the responses of ordinary folk to the extraordinary situation of having some German paratroopers land in their backyard posing as a British engineering detail. Watch out for dithering sweet little old ladies who serve tea and crumpets while secretly wielding an axe against unsuspecting German servicemen!

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Catch the video trailer of "Went the Day Well?"

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“Panic in the Streets” (1950) starring Richard Widmark and Jack Palance as directed by Elia Kazan, makes for a scary combination. I’m not sure which one you should take your chances on; the menace of the totally deadly pneumonic plague (a form of the Black Plague) or the totally creepy Jack Palance as the villain. The hero, Richard Widmark, as Lieutenant Commander Clint Reed, runs around New Orleans with his syringe, prepared to do battle with either culprit. (Apparently, it is true that the totally deadly effects of pneumonic plague can be forestalled with a dose of antibiotics within 24 hours.) This highly potent concoction of gangsters, bioterrorism, post-war anxieties with a bit of romance thrown in, thanks to Barbara Bel Geddes as the good doctor’s wife, makes it a highly watchable film more than 50 years later. It may not be Elia Kazan’s best film ever, but it’s worth a look. And it’s so comforting in this crazy post-SARS world of ours to think that there is some nice, upstanding medical man out there who has everything under control with his syringe, if he could just get all those nasty miscreants rounded up.

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Are you ready to "roll up your sleeve"? See the video excerpt from "Panic in the Streets" (1950)

“Kiss of Death” (1947)INDb starring Victor Mature with Karl Malden is overshadowed by the Tommy Udo character played by Richard Widmark. Widmark is unforgettable as the sneering psychopath who inhabits this film. The movie is constructed so that we’re supposed to cheer for the ex-con, Nick Bianco (Mature) and his new love (Coleen Gray) as they try to make a new life for their family far away from the criminal past. Suspense builds as Tommy Udo swears revenge on Nick Bianco for turning him in to the policeand then goes on the hunt for his family. It ends up that it’s Widmark who makes an indelible impression on people’s minds and on film history, and not the “good guy” who gets the girl and the happy ending.

See the SNAM blog authored by Thom Ernst on a dedication to the recently passed Richard Widmark.

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"Fahrenheit 451" (1966) IMDb, inspired by Ray Bradbury's science fiction novel of the same name, delivers a disturbing vision of a futuristic world where books are contraband to be burned by the state. For those of us who love books, this is a truly scary and undesirable future reality. Werner Oskar stars as the fireman who begins to question the purpose behind burning books in the oppressive police state. Julie Christie plays the double role of the witless wife of the fireman, Linda, and the open minded free spirit, Clarisse.

Check out Thom Ernst's blog for the scoop on his interview with the original author, Ray Bradbury, for the TVO Saturday Night at the Movies Interviews.

View the TVO video web preview for "Fahrenheit 451" (includes snippets of the Bradbury interview)

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See the video trailer for "Fahrenheit 451" (1966)

visit videodetective.com for more info