This Valentines Day, we're celebrating with a nice double feature of pre Code movies:

I love these Vampira and Bela Lugosi Valentine cards. They have you covered either way! ♥️🪦🦇

Nancy Carroll in a Valentines Day mood. Photo by Otto Dyar, 1931.

Esther Muir and Robert Woolsey in So This is Africa (1933).

Happy Valentine’s Day to all who celebrate. Mary Astor and Clark Gable in Red Dust (1932).

Dracula, starring Bela Lugosi, received a wide release in the United States on this date 95 years ago. #filmsky #horrorsky #dracula

🎉 Happy Birthday to Jack Benny! 🎉 Celebrate the legendary comedian’s Illinois roots and Hollywood legacy today. 👉 hometownstohollywood.com/illinois/jac... #JackBenny #ClassicComedy #HollywoodHistory #OnThisDay #IllinoisHistory

Wishing you a Happy Valentine’s Day with a Greta Garbo card. 💘

Carole Lombard with Jay Henry (L) and Ray Milland in We’re Not Dressing (1934). Also, congratulations — you made it through another week.

Leila Hyams for The Big Broadcast (1932).

Organist Helen Crawford of New York’s Paramount Theatre with her Wurlitzer, pictured in 1931 (the hardest image I’ve ever seen).

Chicago! 💘 We'd love to see you at @haymarkethouse.bsky.social this weekend for our latest Radical Used Book Fair (indoor edition)! Sunday, February 15th at 11 AM CT - 4 PM CT More info: events.haymarketbooks.org/events/hayma...

There's a fun layout from 1930 where Screenland asked a bunch of movie stars to name the role they most wanted to play. Gary Cooper said Sydney Carton, Claudette Colbert said Juliet, etc. William Powell said A Wealthy Retired Motion Picture Actor on the Riviera 😂 #driveinmob

Shameless plug! I talk all about Doctor Zhivago in my upcoming book BUT HAVE YOU READ THE BOOK: ROMANCE EDITION #TCMParty www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/krist...

This is the way. When they come at us, we come back at them twofold. Raise that Pride flag every time they take it down. If they prevent that, surround the park with Pride flags. Ruin their petty little lives until they shit rainbows. Never stop. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/12/n...

"Every true crime story that has attracted the emotional engagement of the American public since, including [Nancy Guthrie], has followed the media playbook from the Lindbergh case." Riveting look back at the Lindbergh kidnapping. www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/m...

I’ve seen two TikTok’s this week with authors saying “I have to promote my book or no one buys it, sorry for being annoying” and I feel like it’s a good day to echo that sentiment.

His performance at the end of Two Seconds (1932) is one of the greatest moments in American film. bsky.app/profile/negl...

This one comes recommended by my friend Karen at Shadows and Satin. I will never say no to a Lubitsch film I haven't seen! BROKEN LULLABY (1932), tonight at 9:45 PM on #TCM. #classicmovies #precode #thelubitschtouch

Publicity still for GEORGE WHITE'S SCANDALS (1934)

Stream 4,000+ Public Domain Movies on WikiFlix: Silent Classics, Academy Award-Winners, Hitchcock Films & More

Get a feel for what gives director Ernst Lubitsch's films their sophisticated and sensual “je ne sais quoi" with six films from the German-born filmmaker beginning tonight at 8pm ET.

A real gem. The whole cast is superb, but the movie belongs to Aline MacMahon. Given the juiciest of roles to play--a one-time bad girl who has renounced her femininity and found peace more or less living as a man in the middle of nowhere--MacMahon puts all her soul and skill into the performance.

Joan Crawford is the happiest pirate ever. Photo by Ruth Harriet Louise for MGM, 1929. (Arrr…It’s a Thread)

Mary Carlisle getting in a pirate-y mood for MGM, early 1930’s.

Barbara Stanwyck, 1931.

In 1929, Rouben Mamoulian, man of the theatre, made the great theatre-centric Applause, with an effort at a distinctively cinematic aesthetic—and was recognized for it in @newyorker.com at the time; at 1pm at Film Forum in 35mm.: www.newyorker.com/goings-on-ab... www.newyorker.com/magazine/192...

Glenda Farrell on the drums, ca. mid-1930s. Definitely amongst the photos about which I wish I knew more context.

If you want more, I do have a list I've assembled:

🎉 Welcome to the Public Domain, DOUGHBOYS (1930) 🎤 #BusterKeaton talks… & sings! In his first talkie, the Stone Face of the silent era reveals a surprisingly deep voice 🎶 & joins a ukulele-led scat jam of with Cliff “Ukulele Ike” Edwards. Full film ➡️ archive.org/details/doug... #PublicDomainDay

Ahoy! It’s Alice White by Elmer Fryer for Playing Around (1930). (Thread)

Lupe Velez, actress, hams it up and glams it up on passenger train (1929) Photos: Chicago History Museum

Getting revision notes for a chapter the day before you're about to submit revisions on a different one.

Joan Crawford stars in DANCING LADY, up next in PRE-CODE PARADE, Tuesday 2/10 at Nitehawk Prospect Park. After the movie, join us in Trees Lounge for a a DJ set of pre-code era tunes by Owen Kline and our signature series cocktail “Blonde in Hell.”

Kay Francis is Mary Stevens, M.D. in Lloyd Bacon’s 1933 picture for National Women Physicians Day

Remembering Anna May Wong on the anniversary of her death (February 3, 1961) 💕

Josef Von Sternberg’s 🇺🇸 American pre-Code romantic melodrama “SHANGHAI EXPRESS” starring Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna Mae Wong and Warner Orland premiered #OnThisDay in 1932 at the Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles 🎬 Paramount Pictures

How many murders can you put in a cozy mystery? Like, do you think three or four is fine but more than that seems like a bloodbath?

Ruby Keeler by Edward Steichen for a photo feature in Vanity Fair, November 1, 1932.

HBO Max added LAUGHING SINNERS (1931) for Clark Gable’s b'day. After trying to kill Joan Crawford in their first team-up, here he saves her from suicide. Gable made a better gangster than Salvation Army officer, but even this moralistic mess couldn't squelch his hot chemistry w/ Crawford. #FilmSky

Dorothy Lee by Robert Coburn for RKO, 1934.

For this week’s Silent Sundays I spoke with professor and programmer @hennefem.bsky.social about her work in silent film, and why the era still speaks to us today.

Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, and Mary Astor star in Victor Fleming's 🇺🇸 American pre-Code romantic drama film “RED DUST” (1932) 🎬 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Helen Chandler by Freulich in a publicity portrait for Dracula (1931). #botd

😍 Now playing on the Criterion Channel! 😍 Sign up through tomorrow and get 20% off a year of great movies during our Winter Sale at criterionchannel.com!

Remembering the late 🇺🇲American actor #ClarkGable (1 February 1901 – 16 November 1960) born #OnThisDay in Cadiz, Ohio

Carole Lombard poses at her home for a photo by Don English, 1931.

Jean Harlow and Clark Gable #botd in a classic still from Red Dust (1932).