Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress, model and dancer. A stage, film, and television star, during her 60-year professional career she was known for her strong, realistic screen presence and versatility. She was a favorite of directors, including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang, and Frank Capra, and made 85 films in 38 years before turning to television.
The Thin Man is a 1934 American pre-Code comedy-mystery film directed by W. S. Van Dyke and based on the 1934 novel by Dashiell Hammett. The film stars William Powell and Myrna Loy as Nick and Nora Charles, a leisure-class couple who enjoy copious drinking and flirtatious banter. Nick is a retired private detective who left his very successful career when he married Nora, a wealthy heiress accustomed to high society. Their wire-haired fox terrier Asta was played by canine actor Skippy. In 1997, the film was added to the United States National Film Registry having been deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Ninotchka is a 1939 American romantic comedy film made for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by producer and director Ernst Lubitsch and starring Greta Garbo and Melvyn Douglas. It was written by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, and Walter Reisch, based on a story by Melchior Lengyel. Ninotchka marked the first comedy role for Garbo, and her penultimate film; she received her third and final Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. In 1990, Ninotchka was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2011, Time also included the film on the magazine's list of "All-Time 100 Movies".
Stella Dallas is a 1923 novel by Olive Higgins Prouty and published by Houghton Mifflin, written in response to the death of her three-year-old daughter from encephalitis. It tells the story of the eponymous protagonist, a working-class woman who marries a rich businessman but struggles to adapt to her new life. After the marriage fails, she sacrifices her own happiness for the sake of her daughter.
The Whales of August is a 1987 American drama film directed by Lindsay Anderson and adapted by David Berry from his play of the same name. It stars Bette Davis and Lillian Gish, the latter in her final film appearance, as elderly sisters living on the Maine coast. The cast also features Vincent Price and Ann Sothern. It was the final film appearance for both Gish and Sothern, and the second-to-last appearance of Davis.
Dodes'ka-den is a 1970 Japanese drama film directed by Akira Kurosawa. The film stars Yoshitaka Zushi, Kin Sugai, Toshiyuki Tonomura, and Shinsuke Minami. It is based on Shūgorō Yamamoto's 1962 novel A City Without Seasons and is about a group of homeless people living in poverty on the outskirts of Tokyo.
The Most Beautiful is a 1944 Japanese drama and propaganda film written and directed by Akira Kurosawa. The semidocumentary film follows a group of female volunteer workers at an optics factory during the Second World War, during which the film was produced.
A Streetcar Named Desire is a 1951 American Southern Gothic drama film adapted from Tennessee Williams's Pulitzer Prize-winning play of the same name. It is directed by Elia Kazan, and stars Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter, and Karl Malden. The film tells the story of a Mississippi Southern belle, Blanche DuBois (Leigh), who, after encountering a series of personal losses, seeks refuge with her sister (Hunter) and brother-in-law (Brando) in a dilapidated New Orleans apartment building. The original Broadway production and cast was converted to film, albeit with several changes and sanitizations related to censorship.
Remember the Night is a 1940 American Christmas romantic comedy trial film starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray and directed by Mitchell Leisen. The film was written by Preston Sturges and was the last of his scripts shot by another director, as Sturges began his own directorial career the same year with The Great McGinty.
No Man of Her Own is a 1950 American film noir drama directed by Mitchell Leisen and featuring Barbara Stanwyck, John Lund, Phyllis Thaxter, Jane Cowl and Lyle Bettger. Made and distributed by Paramount Pictures, the production is the second film Stanwyck made with director Mitchell Leisen. Its screenplay was adapted from Cornell Woolrich's 1948 novel I Married a Dead Man. Woolrich is cited in the film's opening credits by one of his commonly used pseudonyms, "William Irish".
Olive Higgins Prouty was an American novelist and poet, best known for her 1923 novel Stella Dallas and her pioneering consideration of psychotherapy in her 1941 novel Now, Voyager.
Street Scene is a 1931 American pre-Code drama film produced by Samuel Goldwyn and directed by King Vidor. With a screenplay by Elmer Rice adapted from his Pulitzer Prize-winning play of the same name, Street Scene takes place on a New York City street from one evening until the following afternoon. Except for one scene which takes place inside a taxi, Vidor shot the entire film on a single set depicting half a city block of house fronts.
Stella is a 1990 American drama film produced by The Samuel Goldwyn Company and released by Touchstone Pictures. The screenplay by Robert Getchell is the third feature film adaptation of the 1923 novel Stella Dallas by Olive Higgins Prouty. Previous film versions were Stella Dallas (1937) and the silent film Stella Dallas (1925).
So Big is a 1932 pre-Code American drama film directed by William A. Wellman and starring Barbara Stanwyck. The screenplay by J. Grubb Alexander and Robert Lord is based on the 1924 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name, by Edna Ferber.
Stella Dallas is a 1925 American silent drama film that was produced by Samuel Goldwyn, adapted by Frances Marion, and directed by Henry King. The film stars Ronald Colman, Belle Bennett, Lois Moran, Alice Joyce, Jean Hersholt, and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Prints of the film survive in several film archives.
Stella Dallas was an American radio soap opera that ran from October 25, 1937, to December 23, 1955. The New York Times described the title character as "the beautiful daughter of an impoverished farmhand who had married above her station in life."
The Wedding Night is a 1935 American romantic tragedy film directed by King Vidor and starring Gary Cooper and Anna Sten. Written by Edith Fitzgerald and based on a story by Edwin H. Knopf, the film is about a financially strapped novelist who returns to his country home in Connecticut looking for inspiration for his next novel and becomes involved with a beautiful young Polish woman and her family.
Her Brother is a 1960 Japanese drama film directed by Kon Ichikawa. It is based on the novel Otōto by Aya Koda.
His Brother's Wife is a 1936 American romantic drama film directed by W. S. Van Dyke and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Taylor. Written by Leon Gordon and John Meehan, based on a story by George Auerbach, the film is about a scientist preparing to leave for the jungles of South America to work on a cure for spotted fever. Wanting to have some fun before his trip, he goes to a gambling club where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful model while falling deep into debt. When he turns to his brother for help, his brother agrees to cover the debt, but only if he leaves without her. While the scientist is away, his brother and the model get married.
Off to the Races is a 1937 American comedy film directed by Frank R. Strayer and written by Robert Ellis and Helen Logan. The film stars Slim Summerville, Jed Prouty, Shirley Deane, Spring Byington, Russell Gleason and Kenneth Howell. The film was released on February 5, 1937, by 20th Century Fox.
