99 River Street 1953 John Payne, Evelyn Keyes, Brad Dexter, Peggie Castle. Solid film noir. The main character Ernie Driscol is not that likeable, but perhaps he has a reason to be that way because his boxing career was ended due to an eye injury, and he has become a cab driver. Further, his beautiful wife Pauline (Castle) is unhappy with his career change and told him she is leaving him. He finds her kissing another man (Dexter), who has been involved in a diamond theft - which leads to other crimes some implicating Ernie. Luckily, Ernie is helped out by the pretty Linda James (Keyes). ***
In This Our Life
1942 Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, George Brent, Dennis Morgan, Charles Coburn. Dir John Huston/ Raoul Walsh. Spoiled Stanley Timberlake steals her sister's husband (Morgan) just before Stanley was to have married Craig Fleming (Brent). Her sister (de Havilland) and Fleming become a pair… - ***
Honeymoon for Three
1941 George Brent, Ann Sheridan, Charlie Ruggles, Osa Massan, Jane Wyman. Looking at the cast, one expects something fairly good, but it really doesn't come together very well. **
The Old Maid
1939 Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins, George Brent. Clem (Brent) returns home after 2 years, only to find his girl Delia (Hopkins) hasn't waited for him and is marrying another man. Delia's cousin Charlotte (Davis) has a short fling with Clem before he goes to fight in the Civil War. ***
Big Business Girl
1931 Loretta Young, Frank Albertson, Ricardo Cortez, Joan Blondell (near the end). Claire McIntyre (Young) finishes up college and heads to the city to find a job. Meanwhile her boyfriend (Albertson) heads off to Paris with band. She finds a job working for Robert Clayton (Cortez), who is strongly attracted to her. - ***

THE SHOP AT SLY CORNER 1947
This is an atmospheric crime movie set in London. Oscar Homolka plays an antique shop owner who uses his premises as front as a fence in stolen jewels. His sneaky assistant discovers this and blackmails him. The blackmailer goes too far when he insists on marrying Homolka's daughter.
BURKE'S LAW 1963
I enjoyed the first season of this TV series. It has a lot of well known actors playing eccentric roles. Gene Barry had a routine movie career but he was very successful on TV in the 1960s. This is his possibly his best series. They changed the format for the third season so I'll likely give that a miss.

First viewings:
Before Midnight / Richard Linklater
(2013). Longtime lovers (Ethan Hawke & Julie Delpy) spend an idyllic and at times stressful night in Greece, pondering their love and lingering questions about the strength of their relationship. The last film in Linklater’s “Before” trilogy, it’s another beauty, although I like the first,
Before Sunrise
, the best. I saw the middle film,
Before Sunset
last week and had some questions about the ending of that one, but now I completely understand it. Hawke and Delpy are outstanding in all of the films under Linklater’s excellent direction. And both actors and the director received Oscar nominations for best adapted screenplay for both this and
Before Sunset
. And according the TCM introduction to
Before Sunrise
, Hawke and Delpy contributed greatly to that one, too, improvising a lot of what was actually filmed. Kudos to all of them for their remarkable accomplishments. Highly recommended.(On Tubi and Roku)
All the Empty Rooms / Joshua Seftel
(2025). A journalist (Steve Hartman) and a photographer (Lou Bopp) set out to memorialize the bedrooms left behind by children killed in school shootings. This 34 minute documentary won the Oscar this year in its category, and it’s an essential and devastating piece of documentary filmmaking, one that’s haunting to see. My only criticism is that I wish it had been longer. Highly recommended. (On Netflix)
Re-watches:
Petulia / Richard Lester
(1968). A fractured narrative masterwork, bold and innovative in its use of flashbacks, ellipses, and, most uniquely, flash-forwards, it tells the story of two disintegrating marriages and the flowering of a love affair between Julie Christie and George C. Scott set against the backdrop of the Viet Nam war (waged on television screens), which is a potent counterpoint to the emotional chaos and violence in the characters' lives. In spite of its fractured narrative, Lester succeeds in maintaining a forward momentum to culminate in an emotionally and intellectually satisfying catharsis. A film way ahead of its time with exceptional performances by all the cast, especially Shirley Knight in a heartbreaking turn as Scott's devastated wife and Richard Chamberlain in the unlikely role of Christie's abusive husband, it’s a vastly underrated, overlooked film, in my opinion. And the fascinating screenplay was written by Barbara Turner, mother of Jennifer Jason Leigh. Highly recommended. (On TCM through April 27.)
Our Vines Have Tender Grapes / Roy Roland
(1945). A Norwegian farmer (Edward G. Robinson) and his wife (Agnes Moorehead) lovingly raise their daughter (Margaret O’Brien) in small town Wisconsin. A beautiful film, very well performed and directed, with a wonderful script by Dalton Trumbo, it’s one that’s hard not to love. Margaret O’Brien is especially wonderful, as is Robinson in his unusual father/farmer role. Its excellent supporting cast includes James Craig, Jackie “Butch” Jenkins, and Frances Gifford. Highly recommended especially for fans of the cast and the genre. (It may be available on TCM; if not it’s here: LINK)
George Washington Slept Here / William Keighley
(1942). New Yorkers (Jack Benny, Ann Sheridan) move into a Pennsylvania serious fixer upper bought by his wife for its historical significance. Based upon the George Kaufman and Moss Hart play, it’s quite enjoyable because of the cast and the script. The supporting cast includes Charles Coburn, Percy Kilbride, and Hattie McDaniel. Strongly recommended for those looking for an enjoyable time. (On TCM through April 28)

The Four Feathers (1939) - A Technicolor film about a man who is pressured to live up to his warrior caste obligations in a British colonial war in Sudan. I felt it should have been longer. I would have liked to see more of his efforts to get where he was going rather than seeming to pop up in places. I guess I wanted more man against nature.
After the Thin Man (1936) - The sequel to The Thin Man. It has been a long time since seeing the first so I can't say how it compares but it was good, even though I don't really like how these kinds of films often wrap up,
everybody brought into a room and a confession elicited after explaining everything that happened in the movie
. I didn't know Jimmy Stewart was in this. It's a little odd to see him in a relatively small role.
It Happened Tomorrow (1944) - A movie about a man who gets a magic newspaper. Rene Clair said he didn't like it (except for the final twenty minutes which he said was the best thing he did in Hollywood) but I did like it. I can understand why he liked the end, where fate starts closing in.