A Star is Born (1937)
[6] Janet Gaynor and Fredric March star in a love story so good, they've made it four times now -- most recently with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper in the roles. Gaynor plays a small-town girl with dreams of becoming…
Yellow Sky (1948)
[6] Gregory Peck stars in William Wellman's (The Ox-Bow Incident, The Story of G.I. Joe) eerie western about a band of thieves that wander into a Death Valley ghost town where a young woman (Anne Baxter) and her grandfather have…
Beau Geste (1939)
[7] Three orphans grow up together as brothers under the care of a kindly benefactor. When they're old enough, they join the Foreign Legion, but their dreams of adventure are dashed when a sinister sergeant turns their first outpost into…
The Story of G.I. Joe (1945)
[7] This isn't the romanticized WWII of modern cinema, it's probably closer to the real thing. The Story of G.I. Joe is based on print journalist Ernie Pyle's interviews with soldiers in the field. Pyle was in the foxholes with…
The Public Enemy (1931)
[7] James Cagney makes his breakthrough performance as a Chicago street kid who becomes a successful gangster during prohibition. I don't usually like gangster movies, but director William Wellman (Wings, The Ox-Bow Incident) frames The Public Enemy as a cautionary…
Track of the Cat (1954)
[5] Robert Mitchum headlines this William Wellman flick about a family battling their personal demons while also trying to hunt and destroy a near-mythical black panther that is preying on their cattle during a deadly snowstorm. Mitchum plays one of three…
The High and the Mighty (1954)
[6] John Wayne leads an ensemble cast in this William Wellman film about the passengers and crew of a trans-Pacific flight who experience engine failure and a loss of fuel. When they realize they won't reach the California shore, everyone…
The Ox-Bow Incident (1943)
[7] In 1880's Nevada, news spreads of the murder of a local cattle farmer, inciting a few dozen townspeople to form a posse hellbent on lynching those responsible for the crime. Based on the book by Walter Van Tilburg Clark…
Wild Boys of the Road (1933)
[8] It's the Great Depression and young boys (and a few girls) are running away from home to lessen the burden on their poor families. This movie follows two boys, played by Frankie Darro and Edwin Phillips, who hop aboard…
Battleground (1949)
[7] Van Johnson and Ricardo Montalban are among the men holed up under snow and fog in William Wellman's (Wings) depiction of the Battle of the Bulge. Unlike most other war films of the time, Battleground is more of a…