Purely to end the confusion (NSFW, obviously): [link] So there, but small. Who knew that she, not Thora Birch, would be the one who'd become a star from the Hole?

I don't think anyone's confused about how big they are(n't). Just about how big they can look.

Domino trailers -- talk about no personality.

Exactly! Elizabeth Bennet is supposed to give off a "Well, at least she's smart..." vibe (until you get to know her and realize that you could get lost in her stunning eyes blah blah lovecakes). Kiera? NSM.

Today is Basil Rathbone day on TCM, incidentally. Lots of swashbucklers and Sherlock Holmes.

Tomorrow looks like Sophia Loren day. She made a fair number of crap movies it seems.

Day after is Norma Shearer day. Including the intriguing Idiot's Delight (Gable, oddly pro-lefty antiwar movie from 1939 before they squelched that sentiment) and He Who Gets Slapped (disturbing Lon Chaney - aren't they all - silent). Plus The Women of course.

Spencer Tracy, Randolph Scott, Deborah Kerr and Constance Bennett all have full day schedules coming up too.

The Constance Bennett day has lots of cool pre-code stuff, and also Topper.

Bogie day is Aug. 31st.

Super stylized late existential revenge Noir. Late sixties in SF and LA. Lee Marvin hunts his way up the chain of revenge.

Worth seeing just for the scene where Angie Dickinson exhausts herself hitting Lee Marvin, and he never flinches. But there's a lot of cool shit in that movie.

Makes a great double bill with the Don Siegel version of The Killers (with Ronald Reagan as a grey flannel gangster - his last movie, and oh so prescient).

Somebody tell Betsy that Roberta is playing on TCM on August 26th at 3am.

Including the intriguing Idiot's Delight (Gable, oddly pro-lefty antiwar movie from 1939 before they squelched that sentiment) and He Who Gets Slapped (disturbing Lon Chaney - aren't they all - silent). Plus The Women of course.

Which makes a hell of a triple feature.

Unfortunately, TCM is also showing the biopic Marie Antoinette, which starts with a too-old-to-play-a-15YO-convincingly Shearer playing a 15YO who's told she's going to marry. A scene that features the all-time camp line, "I'm going to be Queen! Queen of France!" A scene and line that are reprised in flashback at the end of the movie.

But TCM is also showing The Divorcee, which is a worthy early talkie.

Was Norma Shearer really all that, though? I thought she was coasting on being the boss's wife, especially by the end of her career. Very stiff performances.

Was Norma Shearer really all that, though?

Mick Lasalle wrote a whole book about forgotten film actresses of the 30s, with a large focus on Shearer who was a HUGE star at the time. I've seen a fair number of her early films because the played them at pre-Code fests at the Roxie. They're mostly interesting for the kind of character she played, often a Divorcee, liberated, sophisticated etc.

I think that's my problem; I haven't seen very many pre-Code films. The few Shearer films I've seen have been from later in her career, and I just find that whole "elegant lady" style of performance unbearably stiff. I prefer the vitality of Bette Davis and Kate Hepburn.