A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) Directed by: Michael Curtiz and William Keighley Written by: Norman Reilly Raine and Seton I. Miller Starring: Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland, Claude Rains, Basil Rathbone, Alan Hale. Eugene Pallette On May 14, 1938, Warner Bros. Pictures released The Adventures of Robin Hood, a Technicolor action-adventure film starring Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland, Claude Rains, Basil Rathbone, Alan Hale, and Eugene Pallette. Based on ancient English legends that date as far back as the 1200s, The Adventures of Robin Hood was written by Norman Reilly Raine ( The Life of Emile Zola ) and Seton I. Miller ( Here Comes Mr. Jordan ), from a story treatment by an uncredited Rowland Leigh ( The Charge of the Light Brigade ). The Adventures of Robin Hood was originally assigned by producer Hal B. Wallis to director William Keighly when the project began as a vehicle for James Cagney. When Cagney didn’t take on the role of Robin Hood and w...

For the first three decades of broadcast television in the United States, most movie buffs could only see movies from Hollywood’s Golden Age when they were shown on local independent stations. Cable TV and videotape devices existed as far back as the late 1940s and early ‘50s, but neither of these delivery systems were as available to the average consumer as they would be from the late 1970s to the present day.  Most of America’s TV markets have one or more “indies,” and the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area of my childhood was no exception.  Most of the local stations could be found on the UHF channels, but WCIX-TV (Channel Six) was on the “regular” VHF dial right next to the affiliates of the Big Three networks (ABC, CBS and NBC).  Along with the indies’ standard fare of children’s programming, reruns of syndicated dramas and sitcoms, and local newscasts, WCIX aired a plethora of older Hollywood films. With rare exceptions, in the early to mid-1970s these flicks were mostly f...

There is, of course, no such thing as a perfect movie. There’s always a little visual flub that got past a cinematographer or an editor, or there will be a bit of dialogue that doesn’t jive with reality. Such things are part and parcel of the art and business of filmmaking, after all. (C) 2012 Warner Home Video For instance, history-savvy "Casablanca" fans often wonder why the Nazis would honor letters of transit signed by Gen. Charles De Gaulle. De Gaulle, after all, was considered a traitor by the French collaborative government in Vichy. A more accurate script would have mentioned General  Weygand  as the issuer of the letters of transit. However, there are a handful of movies that are so good that they’re considered perfect even if they have flaws, and 1942’s Best Picture winner “Casablanca” is one of them. Written by Julius and Philip Epstein with Howard Koch, the screenplay is based on the stage play "Everybody Comes to Rick's" ...

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) When I was growing up in the 1970s and early ‘80s, the Miami-area television station which is now CBS4 (WFOR) was located on another place on the VHF dial: Channel Six. Back then, its call letters were WCIX and it was an independent station unattached to any of the Big Three national networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC). Before the advent of the Fox TV network and 1989’s “Big Switch,” WCIX used to air a mixed bag of local programming, blocs of syndicated reruns of older TV series (“I Dream of Jeannie,” “Bewitched,” and “Star Trek”), and movies from various decades and of variable quality. Until the VCR Revolution of the mid-1980s, the only way in which most Americans who did not belong to the One Percent could watch movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood was to catch them on indie stations.  WCIX aired them on weekday nights as the 8 PM Movie and on weekends at 1, 3, and 5 in the afternoon. One of the really good movies I saw back the...