[6]

Call me a sucker for an Olympic swimmer in a loincloth, but I enjoy Johnny Weissmuller’s maiden swing through the jungle. This first feature in the long running matinee series is the one where Tarzan meets Jane (Maureen O’Sullivan), whose on expedition with her father to find a fabled elephant graveyard. He kidnaps her, but then she saves him from her angry father, he learns a little English (“Me Tarzan, you Jane”), and the two fall in love. Hey, if it can happen that fast for the J-Lo, it can happen that fast for the Lord of the Apes.

I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932)

December 12, 2013

[8]

A man is wrongly convicted and sentenced to a brutal chain gang in this gripping tragedy from Mervyn LeRoy (The Wizard of Oz). Paul Muni (Scarface, Life of Emile Zola) stars as the innocent prisoner who succeeds in a daring escape and becomes a well-respected member of society before the law catches up with him. State extradition laws offer him some sanctuary, but Muni is tricked into voluntarily returning to the labor camp with the hope of wiping his record clean. Once there, all hope of a promised pardon vanishes and he’s forced to plot his second deadly escape.

Grand Hotel (1932)

July 19, 2013

[6] The lives of tenants at a Berlin hotel interconnect over the course of one day in Grand Hotel, based on the novel by Vicki Baum and produced by the famed Irving Thalberg. With Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Jean Hersholt, Wallace Beery,…

The Most Dangerous Game (1932)

July 11, 2013

[7] An eccentric recluse hunts shipwrecked humans on a remote jungle island in The Most Dangerous Game, one of the earliest successful 'talkies'. The film's creative team (including producer Willis O'Brien and director Ernest B. Schoedsack) would next bring us King Kong,…