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I resaw the Cary Grant film "My Favorite Wife" (1940) which is about a man whose wife supposedly drowned 10 years before, remarries and on the same day his "drowned" wife (Irene Dunne) returns. It was being remade as "Something's Got to Give" with Marilyn Monroe but was never completed due to her death. The film was then remade as "Move Over Darling" with Doris Day.

 

The film is very loosely based on the poem "Enoch Arden" by Tennyson, but in the poem, it is the husband who returns after having been assumed to have drowned, and the poem is far from being a comedy. But the surname Arden was used in the films.

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I saw John Ford's film "The Fugitive" (1947) starring Henry Fonda. This was based on a Graham Greene book, but with fundamental differences. The film is set in an unnamed Central American state where religion has been oppressed and Fonda is a priest on the run from the police because he is a priest. Apparently this was one of Ford's favorite films and Fonda considered it to be his best work. The film is full of religious symbolism from the very beginning to the end. What was striking to me was the black and white cinematography. Apparently there is a colourised version but that would totally destroy the film. There is a reason why top photographers use black and white stock - to enhance shadows and light.

 

The cinematographer was Gabriel Figueroa, a Mexican, and was Luis Bunuel's main cinematographer whilst Bunuel was in Mexico. In The Fugitive, some of the scenes are not dissimilar to some of Eisenstein's films in a photographic sense.

 

The new priest who appears right at the end of the film was played by Mel Ferrer (uncredited) in his film debut.

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I resaw To Be or Not to Be (1942) which ranks as one of the best farce/black comedies ever made. Besides Carole Lombard in her last film and Jack Benny in easily his best film, there was also Robert Stack (best known for Eliot Ness in the TV series The Untouchables) in a very early role.

 

I also saw Build My Gallows High (1947) with Robert Mitchum. Jet black film noir with most of the main characters being killed off by the end of the film. A very early appearance from Kirk Douglas in his second film. The film was released as Out of the Past in the USA and was remade as Against All Odds in 1984.

 

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27 Dresses (2008) - formulaic romcom which was watchable but nothing special about it. The most original thing about the film was the closing credits which took the form of a newspaper article about the closing scene (no details to avoid spoiler) showing the credits embedded in the article.

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