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To celebrate William Holden's 98th birthday, which is on Sunday, this week on «Film Friday» I bring you the first film I ever saw him in. Incidentally, this was my first Billy Wilder picture, as well as the first time I saw Gloria Swanson (and all the other actors in it, really) on the screen. This also happens to be one of my absolute favourite films of all time. Directed by Billy Wilder, Sunset Boulevard (1950) tells the story of Joe Gillis (William Holden), a debt-ridden screenwriter «with a couple of B pictures to his credit.» One day, while fleeing from repossession men seeking his car, Joe turns into the private driveway of a decaying 1920s mansion on Sunset Boulevard, where he hides the vehicle in an empty garage. He quickly discovers that the house belongs to Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson), a long-forgotten silent film star, whose fragile illusions are preserved by her servant and former director, Max von Mayerling (Erich von Stroheim). When Norma learns that Joe is a s...

Directed by William Wyler, Wuthering Heights (1939) begins when a traveller named Mr. Lockwood (Miles Mander) gets caught in a snowstorm and ends up at Wuthering Heights, an old house on the barren moors of Yorkshire, England, owned by the dour Heathcliff (Laurence Olivier). Lockwood asks for a guide to take him to his place at The Grange, but Heathcliff refuses and reluctantly allows him to stay the night. Later that night, Lockwood is awaken by a noisy window shutter. As he closes it, he hears a woman outside calling, «Heathcliff, let me in! I'm out on the moors. It's Cathy!» and then feels an icy hand touching his. When Lockwood relates the disturbance to Heathcliff, he frantically runs into the blizzard, calling out to Cathy. Ellen Dean (Flora Robson), the housekeeper, tells a perplexed Lockwood that he has seen the ghost of Catherine Earnshaw, Heathcliff's great love, and proceeds to tell him their story.   Forty years previously, an orphan boy named Heathcliff is fo...