Teams of experts put hours and hours into this project, including night shifts and weekends, in order to get them ready for release. In the case of both of these classics, their source elements were newly manufactured, and there was no indication that there would be any hold-up in moving along.Īs it turned out, both films had their own set of problems which required a great deal more work, and therefore more time, than originally anticipated. When film elements are problematic, they are usually rejected at the outset of the process. Going in, it was known it was going to take a lot of work to get these classics cleaned up and ready for distribution.
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At this point, it should be said that both Naughty Marietta (1935), their first movie together, and Sweethearts (1938), their first in Technicolor, did have some deterioration in the film stock not unusual for films that are over 70 years old. It took some doing to get Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald out of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer vaults and into viewers' homes. On the MGM Recording Stage with Nelson and Jeanette Charlton Heston was the original choice to play the role of Sefton, but as the character got darker, Wilder went to Holden, who had starred in his 1950 classic "Sunset Boulevard." 1 suspect is the slick Sefton (Holden), a cynical, gruff prisoner who barters with the Germans for all sorts of goodies. The film is set in a German POW camp where one of the prisoners is considered a German traitor. William Holden won his only Oscar in Billy Wilder's dark World War II comedy, which arrived in July 1953. The studio's promos kept the fact that it was set during Christmas a secret. Zanuck who insisted it come out during the summer to attract bigger audiences. Ironically, the film, which won three Academy Awards, including one for supporting actor Edmund Gwenn, as the Macy's Santa Claus who insists he's the real deal, didn't open during the yuletide season. The most expensive MGM production of the time - its budget was a whopping $2.7 million - it didn't recoup its cost until after several reissues.Īlong with "It's a Wonderful Life," this delightful holiday fantasy is one of the top Christmas movies of all time. 25, 1939, though it opened earlier that month in a few places, including Hollywood, New York and Oconomowoc, Wis. Most moviegoers got their first chance to see Dorothy and the gang in this beloved musical that made a superstar out of Judy Garland on Aug. But sadly, his success was short-lived he died four years later at the age of 31. "Blood" was a huge box-office hit and solidified Valentino's status in Hollywood. Moviegoers couldn't get enough of superstar heartthrob Rudolph Valentino 89 years ago in this silent epic in which he plays a bullfighter whose successful career is derailed when he is torn between two women. Here's a sampling of some of the seminal movies that were introduced during the summer: The studios knew, though, that the box office was stronger during the summer and released several now-classic movies during those summer months, but they were of a much wider variety than the diet of comic-book, sequel, animated and teen fare we see now. The studios' major films, such as "Lawrence of Arabia" and "The Sound of Music," would play in a big city's movie palace sometimes for more than a year before heading to the neighborhood theaters. Summer was a different movie season before 'Jaws'īesides scaring swimmers everywhere, "Jaws" changed the summer movie landscape.īefore the release of the Steven Spielberg-directed thrill ride on more than 400 screens on June 20, 1975, about a great white shark on a feeding frenzy around fictional Amity Island (Martha's Vineyard), the summer blockbuster didn't really exist.