September Pre-Code Festival on TCM

TCM will be highlighting Pre-Code Hollywood films this month. Pre-Code Hollywood is the era in the American film industry between the intorduction of sound in the late 1920s and the strict enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code beginning in the mid-1930s. Now's the chance to see several of these films. According to the TCM website,

Films of this period included unflinching portrayals of such subject matter as sexuality, prostitution, illegal drug use, abortion and extreme violence. Without the interference of censors, law-breakers in the movies were often allowed to profit from their schemes, and fallen women became the heroines of many films. Gangster films were popular, and their protagonists were viewed with some sympathy despite their law-breaking ways.

For the complete listing and schedule, Go Here.

This is a contination of TCM's Friday Night Spotlight (July featured Noir films, introduced by Eddie Muller). Each Friday in September, Alec Baldwin and TCM host Robert Osborne will introduce the films airing in primetime. There will be a total of 67 movies, covering a wide range of genres and represents the output of all the major Hollywood stuidoes of the era.

Films include Illicit (1931), Ladies They Talk About (1933) and Baby Face (1933).  Some of the leading ladies include Barbara Stanwyck, Mae West, Norma Shearer, and Bette Davis, as well as Loretta Young.  Leading men include Warren William (Kine of Pre-Code), Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney and Paul Muni.

It's going to be a great month for the movies!

Read more HERE.

Pre-Code Movie Posters Uncovered in PA attic

Flavorpill has a wonderful post with comments and illustrations on 30 + Pre-Code Vintage Movie Posters that were uncovered in an attic in Berwick, PA. The posters had been displayed in a local theater where they had been glued on top of each other as new posters (and films) as they arrived at the venue, and then the whole stack was stuffed into the walls of the attic as insulation. And there they remained, until the contents of the house were sold in an estate sale.

According to MUBI, “They had survived in such good condition for a number of reasons. First of all, a movie theater in the early 1930s would have used a water-soluble wallpaper paste to put up the posters, so it was possible, even eight decades later, to steam them apart with no damage to the paper. And Smith [Grey Smith, Director of Heritage Vintage Movie Poster Auctions] thinks that the cool climate of Pennsylvania may have helped, as well as the temperature in the attic itself. According to Smith, the colors on the posters are ‘astoundingly bright.’”

The posters are being auctioned off individually by Heritage Vintage Movie Poster Auctions, and the online bidding starts today.

See the article and more  Posters HERE.

Hat Tip: Bill Crider