Kay Francis
Also Known As: Katherine Edwina Gibbs, Katherine Francis
Biography: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Kay Francis (January 13, 1905 – August 26, 1968) was an American stage and film actress. After a brief period on Broadway in the late 1920s, she moved to film and achieved her greatest success between 1930 and 1936, when she was the number one female star at the Warner Brothers studio, and the highest paid American film actress. Some of her film related material and personal papers are available to scholars and researchers in the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives. Description above from the Wikipedia article Kay Francis,licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Department: Acting
Place of Birth: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA
Adult: No
Birthday: January 13, 1905
Age: 120 years old
Gender: Female
Deathday: August 26, 1968
Popularity:
Known For:
Trouble in Paradise
Overview: Thief Gaston Monescu and pickpocket Lily are partners in crime and love. Working for perfume company executive Mariette Colet, the two crooks decide to combine their criminal talents to rob their employer. Under the alias of Monsieur Laval, Gaston uses his position as Mariette's personal secretary to become closer to her. However, he takes things too far when he actually falls in love with Mariette, and has to choose between her and Lily.
Genres: Comedy Crime Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-10-30
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The Cocoanuts
Overview: During the Florida land boom, the Marx Brothers run a hotel, auction off some land and thwart a jewel robbery.
Genres: Comedy Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-05-23
Popularity:
In Name Only
Overview: A wealthy man falls for a widow but is locked into a loveless marriage with a woman who has contrived to convince his parents she is the ideal wife.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-08-18
Popularity:
King of the Underworld
Overview: Physician Carole Nelson, suspected of having ties to notorious gangster Joe Gurney, must prove her innocence or the Medical Board will revoke her license. When Gurney seeks her out for treatment after being shot, it could be the break Nelson needs. Now she has a chance to use her medical know-how to outwit Gurney and his goons and reestablish her professional reputation.
Genres: Romance Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-01-14
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One Way Passage
Overview: A terminally ill woman and a debonair murderer facing execution meet and fall in love on a trans-Pacific crossing, each without knowing the other's secret.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-10-04
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Allotment Wives
Overview: Unscrupulous women marry servicemen for their pay.
Genres: Drama Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1945-11-08
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Charley's Aunt
Overview: In 1890, two students at Oxford force their rascally friend and fellow student to pose as an aunt from Brazil--where the nuts come from.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1941-08-01
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Jewel Robbery
Overview: A gentleman thief charms a Viennese baron's wife and also conducts a daring daylight robbery of a jeweller's shop.
Genres: Romance Comedy Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-07-08
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The House on 56th Street
Overview: A beautiful chorine marries a handsome rich socialite, but her idyllic life ends when she visits a dying old beau and is charged when he commits suicide.
Genres: History Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-12-23
Popularity:
Confession
Overview: Vera Kowalska is put on trial for murdering concert pianist Michael Michailow. In court it is revealed that some years earlier Michael ruined Vera's life.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-08-19
Popularity:
Another Dawn
Overview: Colonel John Wister, on duty with the British army in the desert region of Dubik, returns to England on leave. There he falls in love with Julia Ashton, who cares deeply for him but believes herself incapable of love following the death of her fiancé; some time before. Wister convinces her that he loves her enough to live without her romantic love and that she should marry him. She does so and returns to Dubik with him. There she meets his adjutant, Captain Denny Roark. Roark is a dashing young man who reminds Julia thoroughly of her lost love. Soon she finds she is indeed capable of love, but it is Roark with whom she falls in love, not her husband. As warfare with the local tribes heats up and as Wister gains awareness of the unconsummated romance growing between his wife and best friend, tragedy lurks.
Genres: Adventure Drama Romance War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-06-26
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Man Wanted
Overview: A female editor of a magazine falls in love with her male secretary.
Genres: Romance Comedy Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-04-23
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The Feminine Touch
Overview: A college professor who believes there's no place for jealousy in modern marriage, John Hathaway (Don Ameche) moves with his wife, Julie (Rosalind Russell), to New York where he plans to publish a book on the subject. Meeting with publisher Elliott Morgan (Van Heflin), who falls head over heels for Julie, John is assigned to his assistant Nellie (Kay Francis), who only has eyes for her boss. Working closely with Nellie, who Julie thinks is after her husband, John continues his high-minded ways while his angry spouse schemes to make him so jealous he'll knock Elliott's block clean off.
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1941-10-01
Popularity:
Always in My Heart
Overview: A man is pardoned from prison and returns to Santa Rita, CA to be with his family, but discovers his children have been told he's dead and his wife is in love with another man.
Genres: Drama Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1942-03-14
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Girls About Town
Overview: A dynamic duo in silk and ermine entertain hick businessmen looking for a good time while in Manhattan.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-11-07
Popularity:
Raffles
Overview: A distinguished English gentleman has a secret life--he is the notorious jewel thief the press has dubbed "The Amateur Cracksman". When he meets a woman and falls in love he decides to "retire" from that life, but an old friend comes to him with a predicament that entails him committing one last job.
Genres: Adventure Crime Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-07-11
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Four Jills in a Jeep
Overview: Reenactments of actual USO experiences of its female stars entertaining troops overseas.
Genres: Comedy Music War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1944-03-17
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Wife Wanted
Overview: Career-slipping movie star Carole Raymond buys in as a real estate partner of Jeff Caldwell. Actually, through his secretary, Nola Reed, Caldwell runs a matrimonial bureau and, with the aid of his associate, Lee Kirby, they defraud and blackmail a large group of lonely people. Carole, unknowingly, is used as bait for one of their victims, Walter Desmond, who "commits suicide." Reporter William Tyler thinks otherwise.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1946-11-02
Popularity:
I Loved a Woman
Overview: The son of a ruthless meatpacking king goes through a number of changes in ideals and motivations as he reluctantly inherits the mantle and falls in love.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-09-23
Popularity:
Transgression
Overview: When British mining engineer Robert Maury is sent to India on an extended business trip, his wife Elsie finds romance with a Spanish playboy.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-06-27
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First Lady
Overview: A politician's wife plots for her husband to become the next U.S. President.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-12-04
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Dr. Monica
Overview: A prominent New York doctor, unable to have a child, discovers her philandering husband has impregnated her best friend.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-06-23
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Play Girl
Overview: When a gold digger starts to get a little old to ply her trade, she teaches a younger woman all her tricks.
Genres: Comedy Music Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1941-01-29
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It's a Date
Overview: An aspiring actress is offered the lead in a major new play, but discovers that her mother, a more seasoned performer, expects the same part. The situation is further complicated when they both become involved with the same man.
Genres: Comedy Music Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-03-22
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When the Daltons Rode
Overview: Young lawyer Tod Jackson arrives in pioneer Kansas to visit his prosperous rancher friends the Daltons, just as the latter are in danger of losing their land to a crooked development company. When Tod tries to help them, a faked murder charge turns the Daltons into outlaws, but more victims than villains in this fictionalized version. Will Tod stay loyal to his friends despite falling in love with Bob Dalton's former fiancée Julie?
Genres: Western
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-08-23
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Wonder Bar
Overview: Harry and Inez are a dance team at the Wonder Bar. Inez loves Harry, but he is in love with Liane, the wife of a wealthy business man. Al Wonder and the conductor/singer Tommy are in love with Inez. When Inez finds out that Harry wants to leave Paris and is going to the USA with Liane, she kills him.
Genres: Crime Drama Music Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-03-31
Popularity:
British Agent
Overview: In the days leading up to the Russian Revolution, Stephen Locke, a minor British diplomat in St Petersburg, falls in love with a Russian spy.
Genres: Romance Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-09-15
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The Goose and the Gander
Overview: When Georgiana Summers learns that the woman who stole and married her husband is planning a romantic tryst with a new love, she hatches a giddy plot to expose the rendezvous and pay her back.
Genres: Comedy Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-09-21
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Scandal Sheet
Overview: Confirming his principle that no one escapes the news, a tabloid editor prints a scathing story about his wife.
Genres: Drama Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-01-31
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Street of Women
Overview: An architect has an affair with a woman who inspires him. Her brother is in love with the architect's daughter. The complicated entanglement leads to misunderstanding and dissolution, but ultimately love.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-06-04
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Guilty Hands
Overview: A district attorney commits the perfect murder when he kills his daughter's womanizing fiancé and then tries framing the fiancé's lover.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-08-22
Popularity:
Divorce
Overview: A woman who has been married and divorced five times comes back to her small hometown, where she proceeds to complicate, and potentially destroy, the marriage of her childhood boyfriend.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1945-08-18
Popularity:
Dangerous Curves
Overview: A young bareback rider in a circus is in love with a trapeze artist, but he has two problems: he drinks too much and he's fallen under the spell of a "vamp" who's nothing but trouble for him.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-07-12
Popularity:
The Marriage Playground
Overview: A delightful pre-code cocktail recipe. Take three couples (add gin and tonic), their several divorces and the seven children/stepchildren of their intermarriages and blend thoroughly, and you have a mixture a too-young-to-believe Frederic March will try to straighten out.
Genres: Comedy Romance Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-12-12
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Strangers in Love
Overview: Fredric March essays a dual role in this story of a ne'er-do-well who impersonates his brother when the latter dies.
Genres: Comedy Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-03-05
Popularity:
Let's Go Native
Overview: The company of a musical comedy gets shipwrecked on a tropical island inhabited by a "king" from Brooklyn and his coterie of wild native girls.
Genres: Music Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-08-15
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Secrets of an Actress
Overview: Two architects lose their heads over a glamorous actress.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-09-10
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Cynara
Overview: A London barrister's marriage is under strain after his affair with a shopgirl who is out to have him. The story is told in flashback.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1932-12-24
Popularity:
Street of Chance
Overview: 'Natural' Davis (William Powell) is a respected gambler who follows a ruthless code of honor with those who cheat against him. His wife, Alma (Kay Francis), wants to divorce him because of his addiction and lifestyle, but they agree on a reconciliation and second honeymoon together and 'Natural' promises to give up gambling. However, his plans change when his brother, 'Babe' (Regis Toomey), arrives in town looking to score big, and 'Natural' has to devise a plan quickly to put him off gambling forever.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-02-08
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A Notorious Affair
Overview: A scheming musician seduces a wealthy woman for love and money.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-04-26
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The Virtuous Sin
Overview: Marya gets friendly with General Platoff in order to save her husband Victor from being executed.
Genres: War Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-10-24
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Stranded
Overview: A Traveler's Aid worker who delights in solving people's problems gets mixed up with gangsters.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-06-29
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Women in the Wind
Overview: A famous aviator helps an amateur enter a cross-country air race for women.
Genres: Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-04-15
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Give Me Your Heart
Overview: An American lawyer's wife is reunited with her child and his father, an English nobleman.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-09-17
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Stolen Holiday
Overview: A young model is set up with her own fashion business by a crooked financier, who sells worthless bonds.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-02-06
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Hollywood Out-takes and Rare Footage
Overview: Out-takes (mostly from Warner Bros.), promotional shorts, movie premieres, public service pleas, wardrobe tests, documentary material, and archival footage make up this star-studded voyeuristic look at the Golden age of Hollywood during the 30s, 40, and 50.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1983-02-25
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Passion Flower
Overview: A bored society woman invites scandal and heartache when she falls in love with her low-born chauffeur.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-12-06
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Mary Stevens, M.D.
Overview: A woman doctor decides to have a baby without benefit of marriage.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-07-22
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The Keyhole
Overview: A private eye specializing in divorce cases falls for the woman he's been hired to frame.
Genres: Comedy Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-03-25
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Behind the Make-Up
Overview: Gardoni, a down-on-his-luck vaudeville performer, is taken in by a fellow performer, a clown who has a bicycle riding act. Gardoni shows his appreciation by stealing the clown's act and his girlfriend, whom he marries.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-01-18
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Living on Velvet
Overview: A lay-about falls for his best friend's fiancee. The two of them run away from a life of privilege to one of middle-class normalcy. When an influx of money enters their life, their differences come to light.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-03-02
Popularity:
For the Defense
Overview: William Foster is a slick attorney who stays within the law, but specializes in representing crooks and shady characters. He's adept at keeping them out of jail, winning acquittals, and having decisions reversed, thus springing criminals out of prison. He is romantically involved with dancer Irene Manners, who is two-timing him, although she wants to marry him. She kills a man driving while out with her other man, Jack Defoe, who takes the blame. Unfortunately, a ring Foster had just given Irene is found at the crime scene. Foster ends up defending Jack, but when the ring is found, he thinks he is protecting Irene, so pleads guilty to jury tampering.
Genres: Crime Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-07-19
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The Vice Squad
Overview: A diplomat is blackmailed by crooked vice cops into helping them frame prostitutes.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-05-29
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Women Are Like That
Overview: Businesswoman Claire King is the daughter of a powerful advertising executive. When Claire marries humble copywriter Bill Landin, she wants to use her influence to help her husband get ahead, but he will have none of it.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-04-23
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Comet Over Broadway
Overview: Story of a rising stage star and the trouble she causes by her ambition.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-12-03
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24 Hours
Overview: A nightclub singer is carrying on an affair with a married man. When she is found murdered, her lover is suspected of the crime.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-10-03
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I Found Stella Parish
Overview: A blackmailer preys on an actress who is trying to protect her daughter from her past.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-11-16
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The False Madonna
Overview: A woman who is a member of a gang of con artists impersonates the mother of a wealthy blind man.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-12-05
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Ladies' Man
Overview: A society gigolo goes after a rich mother and her daughter, but tries to find true happiness with his girlfriend, who is neither rich nor in "society."
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1931-04-16
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Mandalay
Overview: Abandoned by her lover, a woman becomes the main "hostess" in a decadent nightclub, but tries to put her past behind her on a steamer to Mandalay.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-02-10
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Storm at Daybreak
Overview: Sarajevo June 28, 1914. Dushan, the Serbian mayor of a Hungarian town, has come to see the parade of Archduke Ferdinand. While there he runs into Geza, an old friend in the Hungarian Army and invites him to come to his house and visit him and his new wife.
Genres: Drama Romance War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1933-06-14
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The White Angel
Overview: In Victorian England, Florence Nightingale's heroic measures slowly change the attitude towards nurses when it was considered a disreputable profession.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-06-25
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Movies on Sundays
Overview: A short, introduced in Pennsylvania when the state had laws disallowing the screening of films on Sunday, to sway voters on a referendum to allow such screenings.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-01-01
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Illusion
Overview: A vaudeville magician team is broken up when Carlee, an ex--circus performer, becomes infatuated with socialite Hilda Schmittlap. Meanwhile his vaudeville partner, Claire, has chosen a new partner, but her "heart isn't in it" because she is disconsolate over Carlee. Curious about her new act, Carlee attends a performance and sees Claire nearly killed when she fails to substitute fake bullets for real ones. Rushing to her aid, Carlee realizes how much Claire means to him.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-09-21
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My Bill
Overview: An impoverished widow fights scandal for the sake of her four children.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-07-08
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Little Men
Overview: Jo March and her husband Professor Bhaer operate the Plumfield School for poor boys. When Dan, a tough street kid, comes to the school, he wins Jo's heart despite his hard edge, and she defends him when he is falsely accused. Dan's foster father, Major Burdle, is a swindler in cahoots with another crook called Willie the Fox. When the Plumfield School becomes in danger of foreclosure, the two con men cook up a scheme to save the home.
Genres: Drama Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-11-29
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William Powell: A True Gentleman
Overview: A short documentary about William Powell.
Genres: Documentary
Original Language: en
Release Date: 2005-08-02
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Gentlemen of the Press
Overview: A newspaperman is drawn away from family life by the needs of his paper until a new woman enters his life.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1929-05-04
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Paramount on Parade
Overview: This 1930 film, a collection of songs and sketches showcasing Paramount Studios' contract stars, credits 11 directors
Genres: Music Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1930-04-22
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Breakdowns of 1936
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1936.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-12-30
Popularity:
Between Us Girls
Overview: A 20-year-old stage actress takes on her most challenging role when she pretends to be her own mother's 12-year-old daughter.
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1942-09-04
Popularity:
Hidden Hollywood II: More Treasures from the 20th Century Fox Vaults
Overview: Second installment of deleted scenes, mostly musical or comedic, from Fox films of the 30's - 50's.
Genres: Music Documentary
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1999-07-20
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Blow-Ups of 1947
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1947.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1947-12-31
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The Man Who Lost Himself
Overview: John Evans encounters his lookalike, Malcolm Scott. When Scott is killed in an accident, Evans finds himself mistaken for Scott and decides to do some good in his new role.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1941-03-21
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Breakdowns of 1938
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1938.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-12-31
Popularity:
Breakdowns of 1937
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1937.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-12-31
Popularity:
Breakdowns of 1939
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1939.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-12-31
Popularity:
Things You Never See on the Screen
Overview: Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1935.
Genres: Documentary Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-12-01
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Show-Business at War
Overview: A multi-studio effort to show the newsreel audience the progress of the Hollywood war effort.
Genres: Documentary
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1943-05-21
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Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
Overview: Period music, film clips and newsreel footage combined into a visual exploration of the American entertainment industry during the Great Depression.
Genres: Documentary History
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1975-08-06
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Complicated Women
Overview: Looks at the stereotype-breaking films of the period from 1929, when movies entered the sound era, until 1934 when the Hays Code virtually neutered film content. No longer portrayed as virgins or vamps, the liberated female of the pre-code films had dimensions. Good girls had lovers and babies and held down jobs, while the bad girls were cast in a sympathetic light. And they did it all without apology.
Genres: Documentary TV Movie
Original Language: en
Release Date: 2003-05-06
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