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The Old Dark House is a film with a fascinating history. Newly restored and presented at the 2017 Venice and New York Film Festivals, the Cohen Film Collection Blu-ray release is taken from that 4K restoration.

Directed by James Whale between Frankenstein and The Invisible Man, top billing in the film’s original October 1932 release went to Boris Karloff whose role as a hulking, lecherous servant in the house of a bedridden 102-year-old man and his three nutty, elderly children, is a fun but underdeveloped supporting one. Melvyn Douglas, as one of the five visitors seeking shelter from a storm, shared star billing with Karloff, with Charles Laughton, Gloria Stuart, and Raymond Massey, billed below them in smaller print. The 1939 reissue gave over-the-title billing to Laughton, Massey, and Douglas in that order. The trailer for the current release gives star billing to Laughton, Stuart, Karloff, and Douglas in that order, although print ads listed Karloff, Douglas, Laughton, and Stuart in that order. I guess Raymond Massey, who is in all of Stuart’s scenes as her husband, is no longer relevant.

It was Stuart’s witty commentary on the early 1990s laserdisc that spurred James Cameron to seek her out for her Oscar-nominated comeback role in 1997’s Titanic. Her commentary was brought over to the 1998 Kino DVD release along with one by Whale biographer James Curtis. Both have been imported for the Cohen release as has a fascinating interview with director Curtis Harrington, Whale’s protรฉgรฉ, who was instrumental in locating the film’s long missing negative in 1968, leading to its 1972 restoration by the George Eastman House. The film could not be shown commercially because although Universal owned the film, rights to the property were sold to Columbia for an inferior 1963 remake.

Appearing with Karloff, Laughton, Douglas, Stuart, and Massey, are Lillian Bond as Douglas’s love interest; Ernest Thesiger, Eva Moore, and Bremmer Wills as the nutty siblings; and 61-year-old actress Elspeth Dudgeon, billed as “John” Dudgeon, as their 102-year-old father.

Most critics regard Mark Sandrich’s 1942 film Holiday Inn to be superior to Michael Curtiz’s 1954 quasi-remake, White Christmas, but I’ve always preferred the latter. I’ve always found its concentration on one holiday to be easier to cozy up to than the earlier film that is all over the place.

In addition to both the original black-and-white and 1990s colorized versions of Holiday Inn, the new Blu-ray release from Sony also includes the recent Broadway version of the show which will be shown theatrically for one night in November. Despite engaging performances by Bryce Pinkham, Corbin Bleu, Megan Sikora, and Laura Lee Gayer in the roles originally played by Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, Marjorie Reynolds, and Virginia Dale, I found it even more ponderous than the original. I’d still rather watch Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, and Vera-Ellen cavort in glorious technicolor in the quasi-remake. While no one can top Crosby singing “White Christmas” in either film, his version of “Easter Parade” in Holiday Inn was easily topped six years later by Astaire and Judy Garland in the far superior Easter Parade.

Jennifer Jones won an Oscar for 1943’s The Song of Bernadette and nominations in the next three years for Since You Went Away, Love Letters, and Duel in the Sun. Her mentor and later husband, David O. Selznick, who produced both Since You Went Away and Duel in the Sun, had hopes of earning her a fifth consecutive nomination for Portrait of Jennie, but the film, which began filming in January 1947, was delayed in post-production and could not be released until Christmas Day, 1948 in Los Angeles and 1949 in New York and the rest of the country.

The film is about an artist played by Joseph Cotten who is obsessed with an ethereal young girl played by Jones whose eventual painting of her becomes his masterpiece. It is very much a tender ghost story in which Jones’ character turns out to be someone who lived twenty years before Cotten’s time. For decades, fans of the film have insisted that Ethel Barrymore as the kindly art dealer who nurtures Cotten is the elderly manifestation of Jones’ character, but that has generally been debunked.

Although not successful in its initial release, the film has since become a beloved classic. Long shown in black-and-white, the new Kino Blu-ray restores the green tint to the climactic storm at sea and sepia tone leading up to the ending which showcases the finished portrait in technicolor.

As for Jones’ fifth Oscar nomination, she would have to wait until 1955’s Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing for that.

Alan Ladd had long been a top box-office star, but wasn’t really considered a good actor until George Stevens’ 1953 western classic Shane brought renewed interest to his career. His second-best performance was arguably that of the former cop railroaded to prison on a false murder charge in the long unavailable on home video 1955 film Hell on Frisco Bay, directed by Frank Tuttle who helmed Ladd’s first major success, 1942’s This Gun for Hire.

Long sought by fans of the film, Warner Bros. refused to release Hell on Frisco Bay on home video because of the faded print they owned. The original was held by the Ladd estate. Whether they obtained that print or found another in mint condition in their vaults or restored it from their existing bad print, has not been made public, but the newly released Warner Bros. Blu-ray is a thing of beauty. The rich colors and striking use of cinemascope infuse the on-location filming of this tightly constructed tale.

Released from San Quentin, Ladd sets out to find the real killer of the second-rate gangster he was sentenced to five years for killing. He knows it was local crime boss Edward G. Robinson who ordered the kill, but can’t prove it.

Robinson has his best gangster role since Key Largo as the two-faced lying mobster who will order the killing of anyone he sees as a threat, including relatives and loyal supporters. There are rich supporting turns by William Demarest as Ladd’s only remaining friend in the police department, Paul Stewart as Robinson’s disfigured sidekick, Perry Lopez as Robinson’s nervous nephew, and especially Fay Wray as a faded star struggling to retain her dignity. Only Joanne Dru in a throwaway role as Ladd’s estranged wife is under-utilized. The on-location filming of San Francisco in the mid-1950s is a definite plus.

There are only two feature-length episodes of the venerable series in Midsomer Murders: Series 19, Part 2, the latest release of the long-running British hit, but they are two of the best in the franchise which has been renewed for its twentieth season. Neil Dudgeon and Nick Hendrix star as DCI John Barnaby and his latest DS, Jamie Winter. This time they are called upon to investigate the murder of a young girl at a Jane Austen weekend and a violinist killed with a string from his stolen Stradivarius. They’re both great fun with twists and turns you won’t see coming.

This week’s new releases include the Blu-ray debuts of The Miracle Worker and Junior Bonner.

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