Cary Grant Project

It's like a double feature. I'm adding "Kiss And Make-Up" and "Thirty Day Princess", both from 1934, at the same time. They're combined on one DVD. How about that!  There's something about these pre-1937 Cary Grant movies, it's almost like they're still treating the movies as fancy theater productions. Not that the scenes are static or anything, but what I notice is that Cary Grant generally seems physically real stiff, and overly made up, even with thick lipstick. Well, that's my impression. And then it seems like some big leap forward happened between '36 and '37.

In "Thirty Day Princess", he's the thorn in the side of those nasty bankers keeping the common Depression-era man down. But this banker's using a hot princess-lookalike to raise money for a foreign country's bond issue.  And how could a hot princess-lookalike not fall for Cary Grant.  In "Kiss And Make-Up", he's some kind of smarmy beauty doctor, doing plastic surgery (or the 1930's equivalent) and promoting skin creams and diet and exercise. Because all women want to be beautiful and to be loved.  Ah, some things never change!  There's even a very 1930's-ish car chase scene, filled with longshots that look like a simple studio lot and closeups with fast-moving street scenes projected behind the actors.  (The dude whose wife he steals is played by Edward Everett Horton, who was in no less than 5 movies with Cary Grant. He was 36 when his first movie came out -- but then, there weren't any movies before then. That was in 1922.  Over the next 50 years he had a good 175 movie and TV credits. I kind of wonder if that provided a comfortable standard of living for him. I'm guessing he did alright; although it wouldn't surprise me if his lifetime earnings were less than a star is paid to be in one movie today.)

1. "North By Northwest", 1959, also starring Eva Marie Saint and James Mason
2. "Bringing Up Baby", 1938, also starring Katharine Hepburn
3. "Charade", 1963, also starring Audrey Hepburn
4. "The Philadelphia Story", 1940, also starring Katharine Hepburn and James Stewart
5. "The Awful Truth", 1937, also starring Irene Dunne
6. "Notorious", 1946, also starring Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains
7. "His Girl Friday", 1940, also starring Rosalind Russell and Ralph Bellamy
8. "People Will Talk", 1951, also starring Hume Cronyn
9. "Houseboat", 1958, also starring Sophia Loren
10. "Holiday", 1938, also starring Katharine Hepburn
    
11. "My Favorite Wife", 1940, also starring Irene Dunne
12. "Father Goose", 1964, also starring Leslie Caron
13. "Indiscreet", 1958, also starring Ingrid Bergman
14. "Suspicion", 1941, also starring Joan Fontaine
15. "The Bachelor And The Bobby-Soxer", 1947, also starring Myrna Loy
16. "An Affair To Remember", 1957, also starring Deborah Kerr
17. "To Catch A Thief", 1955, also starring Grace Kelly
18. "The Talk Of The Town", 1942, also starring Jean Arthur and Ronald Colman
19. "That Touch Of Mink", 1962, also starring Doris Day and Gig Young
20. "Operation Petticoat", 1959, also starring Tony Curtis
21. "Arsenic And Old Lace", 1944, also starring Raymond Massey
22. "The Bishop's Wife", 1947, also starring Loretta Young and David Niven
23. "Monkey Business", 1952, also starring Ginger Rogers
24. "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House", 1948, also starring Myrna Loy and Melvyn Douglas
25. "Walk Don't Run", 1966
26. "Destination Tokyo", 1943, also starring John Garfield
27. "Only Angels Have Wings", 1939, also starring Jean Arthur
28. "I Was A Male War Bride", 1949, also starring Ann Sheridan
29. "Once Upon A Honeymoon", 1942, also starring Ginger Rogers
30. "In Name Only", 1939, also starring Carole Lombard
31. "Thirty Day Princess", 1934, also starring Sylvia Sidney
    
32. "The Amazing Adventure", 1936
33. "Topper", 1937, also starring Constance Bennett
34. "Born To Be Bad", 1934, also starring Loretta Young
35. "The Grass Is Greener", 1960, also starring Deborah Kerr and Robert Mitchum
36. "Kiss Them For Me", 1957, also starring Jayne Mansfield, Ray Walston, and Werner Klemperer
    
37. "Penny Serenade", 1941, also starring Irene Dunne
38. "Kiss And Make-Up", 1934, also starring Helen Mack
    
39. "Night And Day", 1946, also starring Alexis Smith
40. "The Howards Of Virginia", 1940, also starring Martha Scott
41. "Room For One More", 1952, also starring Betsy Drake
42. "Sylvia Scarlett", 1935, also starring Katharine Hepburn
43. "I'm No Angel", 1933, also starring Mae West
44. "Gunga Din", 1939, also starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.
45. "None But The Lonely Heart", 1944, also starring Ethel Barrymore
46. "She Done Him Wrong", 1933, also starring Mae West
47. "The Pride And The Passion", 1957, also starring Frank Sinatra and Sophia Loren