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To celebrate Glenn Ford's 100th birthday, which is on Sunday, this week on «Film Friday» I bring you my second favourite of his films  —  the first being  The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1963). Directed by George Marshall, The Gazebo (1959) tells the story of Elliott Nash (Glenn Ford), a television writer and director who is being blackmailed by a man named Dan Shelby (Stanley Adams) over old nude photographs of his wife, Nell (Debbie Reynolds). Elliott does not tell Nell, the star of a Broadway show, about this situation, but works feverishly to make enough money to pay off Shelby's demands. Ultimately, he decides that murder is the only way out. He makes preparations, incorporating some advice from his friend, District Attorney Harlow Edison (Carl Reiner). When the presumed blackmailer shows up at his house to collect the money, Elliott shoots him and then hides the body in the concrete foundation being poured for the antique gazebo Nell has bought.   The next ...

During Hollywood's Golden Age, it was not uncommon for film studios to emphasize the romantic appeal of their actors. Moreover, the movie press sold papers relating which actor was dating which actress, where they dined and what clubs they frequented. Warner Bros. contract player Ronald Reagan understandably received his fair share of coverage, much of it courtesy of Louella Parsons, a prominent gossip columnist from Dixon, Illinois, where Ronnie grew up after his parents moved there in 1920. She took a liking to Reagan, with whom she appeared in his second film, Hollywood Hotel (1937), based on Parsons' own radio show of the same name.   LEFT: Portrait of Louella Parsons c. 1941. MIDDLE: Original theatrical release poster for Hollywood Hotel . RIGHT: Portrait of Ronald Reagan c. 1938.        The tenth film Ronnie worked on was William Keighley's Brother Rat (1938), a B comedy set at the Virginia Military Institute — the title taken from the vernacular word f...

In honour of Sandra Dee's 74th birthday, which is tomorrow, this week on «Film Friday» I bring you the first film I ever saw her in. Incidentally, this is one of my personal favourites. Directed by Robert Mulligan, Come September (1961) follows the tribulations of Robert Talbot (Rock Hudson), a wealthy American businessman and confirmed bachelor who, once a year — always in September — flies to Italy to romance his beautiful, but highly temperamental, Roman mistress, Lisa Fellini (Gina Lollobrigida), at his luxurious seaside villa in Portofino. Although Lisa loves him, she has grown tired of waiting for his elusive marriage proposal and has decided to marry instead a stuffy Englishman named Spencer (Ronald Howard). However, when Robert moves up his annual visit to July and calls her on his way from Milan, Lisa cancels the wedding and rushes to meet him. Upon his arrival, Robert discovers that, in his absence, his major-domo, Maurice Clavell (Walter Slezak), has transformed the v...

Directed by Billy Wilder, Stalag 17 (1953) concerns a group of American air force sergeants interned in a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp in 1944. This motley crew of men, placed at Barracks 4, includes J. J. Sefton (William Holden), an entreprising cynic who trades openly with the German guards for cigarettes, eggs, silk stockings, and other luxuries; Stanislas «Animal» Kusawa (Robert Strauss), who is infatuated with movie star Betty Grable; Harry Shapiro (Harvey Lembeck), Animal's wisecracking best friend; Price (Peter Graves), the righteous security chief; Hoffy (Richard Erdman), whom the prisoners have appointed as their leader; and Cookie (Gil Stratton), who inventories and protects Sefton's stash of contraband items. One day, fellow inmates Manfredi (Michael Moore) and Johnson (Peter Baldwin) try to escape through a tunnel, but are shot by waiting guards when they emerge outside the barbed wire fence. The other prisoners naturally conclude that one of them must have told t...