The Lost Weekend is a 1945 American drama film noir directed by Billy Wilder, and starring Ray Milland and Jane Wyman. It was based on Charles R. Jackson's 1944 novel of the same name about an alcoholic writer. The film was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won four: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Adapted Screenplay. It also shared the Grand Prix at the first Cannes Film Festival, making it one of only three films—the other two being Marty (1955) and Parasite (2019)—to win both the Academy Award for Best Picture and the highest award at Cannes.
Ray Milland was a Welsh-American actor and film director. He is often remembered for his portrayal of an alcoholic writer in Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend (1945), which won him Best Actor at Cannes, a Golden Globe Award, and ultimately an Academy Award—the first such accolades for any Welsh actor.
Ann-Margret Olsson, credited as Ann-Margret, is a Swedish-American actress and singer. She has won five Golden Globe Awards and been nominated for two Academy Awards, two Grammy Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and six Emmy Awards, winning in 2010 for a guest role in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
The Good Son is a 1993 American psychological thriller film directed by Joseph Ruben and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It was written by English novelist Ian McEwan. Its story follows a 12-year-old young boy named Mark who, after the death of his mother, is sent to stay with his aunt and uncle while his father is away on business trip. While there he meets his cousin Henry, who shows signs of violent and evil behavior. It stars Macaulay Culkin, Elijah Wood, Wendy Crewson, David Morse, Daniel Hugh Kelly, and Jacqueline Brookes.
Murder, My Sweet is a 1944 American film noir, directed by Edward Dmytryk and starring Dick Powell, Claire Trevor and Anne Shirley. The film is based on Raymond Chandler's 1940 novel Farewell, My Lovely. It was the first film to feature Chandler's primary character, the hard-boiled private detective Philip Marlowe.
Dorothy Ann Todd was an English film, television and stage actress who achieved international fame when she starred in The Seventh Veil (1945). From 1949 to 1957 she was married to David Lean who directed her in The Passionate Friends (1949), Madeleine (1950), and The Sound Barrier (1952). She was a member of The Old Vic theatre company and in 1957 starred in a Broadway play. In her later years she wrote, produced and directed travel documentaries.
The Big Clock is a 1948 American thriller directed by John Farrow and adapted by novelist-screenwriter Jonathan Latimer from the 1946 novel of the same title by Kenneth Fearing.
Secret Beyond the Door is a 1947 American film noir psychological thriller and a modern updating of the Bluebeard fairytale, directed by Fritz Lang, produced by Lang's Diana Productions, and released by Universal Pictures. The film stars Joan Bennett and was produced by her husband Walter Wanger. The black-and-white film noir drama is about a woman who suspects her new husband, an architect, plans to kill her.
The Seventh Veil is a 1945 British melodrama film directed by Compton Bennett and starring James Mason and Ann Todd. It was made by Ortus Films and released through General Film Distributors in the UK and Universal Pictures in the United States. The screenplay concerns Francesca (Todd), a brilliant concert pianist who attempts suicide while she is being treated for a disabling delusional disorder centred on her hands that makes it impossible for her to play. A psychiatrist uses hypnosis to uncover the source of her crippling fear and to reveal, one by one, the relationships that have enriched and troubled her life. When the last "veil" is removed, her mind is clear. She regains the ability to play and knows whom she loves best. The film's title comes from the metaphor, attributed to the fictional psychiatrist, that while Salome removed all her veils willingly, human beings fiercely protect the seventh and last veil that hides their deepest secrets, and will only reveal themselves completely under narcosis.
The Major and the Minor is a 1942 American romantic comedy film starring Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland. It was the first American film directed by Billy Wilder. The screenplay credited to Wilder and Charles Brackett is "suggested by" the 1923 play Connie Goes Home by Edward Childs Carpenter, based on the 1921 Saturday Evening Post story "Sunny Goes Home" by Fannie Kilbourne.
Madeleine is a 1950 British film noir directed by David Lean, based on a true story of Madeleine Smith, a young Glasgow woman from a wealthy family who was tried in 1857 for the murder of her lover, Emile L'Angelier. The trial was much publicised in the newspapers of the day and labelled "the trial of the century". Lean's adaptation of the story starred his wife, Ann Todd, with Ivan Desny as her character's French lover. Norman Wooland played the respectable suitor and Leslie Banks the authoritarian father, both of whom are unaware of Madeleine's secret life. Lean made the film primarily as a "wedding present" to Todd, who had previously played the role onstage. He was never satisfied with the film and cited it as his least favourite feature-length movie.
One Life to Live is an American soap opera that was broadcast on the ABC network from 1968 to 2012. The series began with One Life to Live storylines (1968–1979). The plot continues in One Life to Live storylines (1980–1989). The plot in the next decade is outlined in One Life to Live storylines (1990–1999) and the story concludes in One Life to Live Storylines (2000–2013).
Kitty Foyle, subtitled The Natural History of a Woman, is a 1940 drama film starring Ginger Rogers, Dennis Morgan and James Craig, based on Christopher Morley's 1939 bestseller Kitty Foyle. Rogers won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of the title character, and the dress she wore in the film became known as a Kitty Foyle dress.
Kitty is a 1945 film, a costume drama set in London during the 1780s, directed by Mitchell Leisen, based on the novel of the same name by Rosamond Marshall, with a screenplay by Karl Tunberg. It stars Paulette Goddard, Ray Milland, Constance Collier, Patric Knowles, Reginald Owen, and Cecil Kellaway as the English painter Thomas Gainsborough. In a broad interpretation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, the film tells the rags-to-riches story of a beautiful young cockney guttersnipe who is given a complete makeover by an impoverished aristocrat (Milland) and his aunt (Collier) in hopes of arranging her marriage to a peer, thereby repairing their fortunes and their social status.
Lewis Allen was a British-born director whose credits included classic television series and a diverse range of films. Allen worked mainly in the United States, working on Broadway and directing 18 feature films between 1944 and 1959. From the mid-1950s he moved increasingly into television and worked on a number of the most popular shows of the time in the US.
Stage Mother is a 1933 American pre-Code drama film directed by Charles Brabin and starring Alice Brady and Maureen O'Sullivan. The film is about a frustrated vaudeville performer who pushes her daughter into becoming a star dancer; selfishness, deceit and blackmail drive mother and daughter apart until a reconciliation at the end of the film. The screenplay was written by John Meehan and Bradford Ropes, based on the 1933 novel of the same name by Ropes.
Loose Ankles is a 1930 pre-Code romantic comedy with songs, produced and released by First National Pictures, which had become a subsidiary of Warner Bros. The film was directed by Ted Wilde and stars Loretta Young, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Louise Fazenda and Edward Nugent. It was a remake of the 1926 silent film titled Ladies at Play, which had been produced by First National Pictures. Both versions were adapted by Gene Towne from the 1926 play Loose Ankles by Sam Janney. Sam Janney was to direct the film but died in a car crash during production.
Wise Girl is a 1937 American romantic comedy film directed by Leigh Jason and starring Miriam Hopkins, Ray Milland and Walter Abel. The screenplay concerns a wealthy socialite who tries to gain custody of her orphaned nieces.
For Her to See is a 1947 historical mystery crime novel by the British author Marjorie Bowen, writing under the pseudonym of Joseph Shearing. It was inspired by the unsolved murder of Charles Bravo in 1876. It was published in London by Hutchinson. The American version was published by Harper under the alternative title So Evil My Love.
