Personal highlights from #NoKings in Manchester, #Vermont yesterday: 🇺🇸 Lady gave my signless dad a flag to wave just as we arrived 🦄 Antifa unicorn 🦖 Twerking T-rex 🎀 Pink lady in sparkly beret 🛻 Vintage truck driver honking with gusto 🍩 Someone who couldn't attend sent a friend to hand out donuts

"Vermont, you are just as weird as we remembered you," declared @gregproops.bsky.social during WHOSE LIVE ANYWAY? at Rutland's Paramount theater last night. Thank you to improv masters Greg, Ryan, Gary, Jeff, and Laura for a hilarious show out here in the land of bears, libraries, and snowy peaks!

13 WASHINGTON SQUARE is a delightful silent film that deserves to be more widely enjoyed! Sort of a sillier cousin of THE CAT AND THE CANARY. 🖤 And thanks for the shoutout! This was a fun commentary to do. I got to talk about a bunch of underrated actors, film tech changes of the era, and more.

An inviting autumn landscape. Might've been yesterday, but it's actually an autochrome from 1912. "Autumn Gold" by Hugh C. Knowles From the V&A's collections: bit.ly/42Fh4Bv

From Ingmar Bergman's SUMMER INTERLUDE (1951) 🍂🍂🍂

Continuing my pre-autumn program of old dark house comfort viewing with FOG ISLAND (1945). Savoring the saturnine suavity of George Zucco and his eyes of infinite menace. Here he hosts a little game of retribution among enemies. Giallo-esque B full of loathsome people who meet justly nasty ends.

Post a random picture, or else everything will go bad in September. (Save us, Eve Arden, save us.)

Tonight's creepy pre-autumn programming: the thoroughly bonkers chiller NIGHT MONSTER (1942). This cast is somewhat underused, but mysterious bloodstains, the Universal fog machine on overdrive, a surprisingly high body count, and creative shadows all elevate the old dark house-y proceedings.

Signs that you're in for a good time

Enjoying a spell of cool weather here in VT, so I'm leaning into the autumn preview by breaking out the horror-tinged gothic mysteries. Last night: THE BEAST WITH FIVE FINGERS (1946) Tonight: SHE-WOLF OF LONDON (1946) Both comfort chillers IMO. Fun and delightfully atmospheric.

I obviously lack the advantages of Technicolor VistaVision but here are a few snapshots from my dirt road walks last autumn to prove I’m not joking about the enduring TROUBLE WITH HARRY-ness of Vermont! #TCMParty

This line + Shirley MacLaine's delivery = perfection

So true, bestie

Can confirm that Vermont in autumn does still look the way it does in Hitchcock's THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY (1955). This is why I put up with the spotty wifi out here tbh. #TCMParty

I love GIRL MISSING (1933) so much.

The TCM announcer just said "there's no escaping Glenda Farrell tonight" which is kind of a weird way of inviting us to enjoy her movies? But, on the hand, sure, all hail our overlord Glenda! #TCMParty

Whenever I see future Oscar winner Jane Wyman in a B movie, like SMART BLONDE, I think about the big WB stars she remembered as encouraging: "Jimmy Cagney knew me and was always shouting, 'Hang in there, kid! Fight for every part!' And Kay Francis was very nice to the youngsters, as we were called."

The most memorable bit of THESE GLAMOUR GIRLS (1939) is Marsha Hunt, the tragically awkward has-been campus sweetheart, shakily lighting up a cigarette as she waits for an oncoming train to annihilate her and her pain. Feels like someone cut a noir scene into a college screwball comedy.

Black dresses don't get much more timeless than this Dolly Tree design worn by Lana Turner over the course of an all-night college house party crawl in THESE GLAMOUR GIRLS (1939). The dark color and sleek lines help Turner's winsome outsider stand out from the catty debutantes in laces and frills.

THE THIN MAN cinematographer James Wong Howe (back, center) making magic that will live forever. #ThinMan #FilmSky

My fav #ThinMan story is that Nat Pendleton challenged William Powell on his pronunciation of "suspects" and brought in a bunch of dictionaries to show it could be said his way. TBH I find the emphasis on "sus-PECTS" (noun, plural) in THE THIN MAN quite off-putting! I'm Team Pendleton on this.

THE THIN MAN understands that one sign of a successful marriage is affectionately calling each other an idiot for as long as you both shall live. (Source: I'm the only child of hilarious happily married parents who constantly send each other 💩 emojis via text.) #ThinMan

William Powell wiggling his moustache over that drink is as good an illustration of star power as any, I think. #ThinMan

Woodbridge Strong "One-Take Woody" Van Dyke II with William Powell and Myrna Loy on the set of AFTER THE THIN MAN. I think this was taken at the same time as the birthday cake photo (that I can't find) ^PG #ThinMan

✅ Vintage #ThinMan DVD in player 📀 ✅ Tea brewing in Christmas mug ☃️ ✅ Remote control in hand 📺

How to take the edge off a Monday night? An hour and a half with Nick and Nora Charles (and Asta!) is always a good idea. #TCMParty

On this day in 1931, pre-Code Gothic chiller MURDER BY THE CLOCK opened in U.S. theaters. I recall this one as a bit creaky, but extremely worth the price of admission for Lilyan Tashman as an ultra-glam femme fatale.

Me giving a mini lecture on my latest niche interest to people who are politely nodding just offscreen:

Look, you want something done, you go find the woke spinster in town. Whether it's a bake sale or digging up a body. Doesn't matter. She will be there and she will come prepared. #LifeLessons #NoirAlley

I adore Elizabeth Patterson, as did Faulkner. Although she often played homey country spinsters, she was quite a chic lady IRL. She dyed her hair auburn, shelled out for custom-made dresses, and rode around Hollywood in a limousine. #NoirAlley

I appreciate that INTRUDER IN THE DUST doesn't try to sugarcoat Chick's motives behind his "friendship" with Beauchamp—trying to undercut Beauchamp's independence. Chick absorbed the racism all around him and it's rightly uncomfortable to watch! #NoirAlley

Clarence Brown isn't really associated with crime movies, but he directed the famously unavailable LETTY LYNTON (1932). I'd say it deserves mention as a pre-Code proto-noir, in which Joan Crawford tries to free herself from homme fatal Nils Asther. #NoirAlley

I love SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SECRET WEAPON because it contains the amazing scene where Moriarty is like "so how do you want to die: [usual choices]" and Holmes is like "you basic bitch, you can't even supervillain properly; you ought to draw my blood out drop by drop." SO MORIARTY TRIES IT.

I'd also recommend his noir novel THE DOUBLE TAKE. Some choice morsels of I-can't-believe-it's-not-Chandler prose make it worth your time. The 1948 film adaptation, I LOVE TROUBLE, is much goofier but still a fun ride.

Revisiting SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SECRET WEAPON (1942) tonight and this shot of Holmes being flown back to England by a crisply confident Air Transport Auxiliary woman pilot (or "attagirl") stood out to me.

Hosted a training on something UX-related today and managed to include this picture of Dick Cavett interviewing Groucho Marx in my slide deck. 😂

For #Caturday, a striking shot of a sleek daredevil feline hanging out high above the city streets in THE GARDEN MURDER CASE (1936):

"My dad took my hand and said, ‘Honey, whatever you want to do, just do your best.’" Oscar winner Eva Marie Saint is 101 today. 📸 LIFE Magazine, 1949 #FilmSky #BOTD

BTW if you're looking for a movie that literally takes place on the 4th of July, strikes at the root of America's corrupting obsession with advancement at any price, and oozes with anxiety, guilt, and despair, FORCE OF EVIL (1948) has got you covered!

Revisited one of my favorite perfect-for-summer crime movies: Hammer's THE SNORKEL (1958) last night. Still a winner! Sun-drenched Italian coastal background + hissable villain with perfect crime gimmick + angry teen girl determined to make him pay = great flick.

On this day in 1949, TAKE ONE FALSE STEP opened in NYC. I remember this one being more good than great as a noir, but *extremely* worth watching for Shelley Winters and William Powell as an unlikely pair of ex-lovers who shared a wartime fling.

Quite good as the avenging angel wife, who vamps a creepy stalker cop to save her husband's life, in Poverty Row noir I WOULDN'T BE IN YOUR SHOES (1948).

Went to block today's noxious new arrival and discovered that a Bluesky blocklist already has me covered. 🙌

It’s not a distraction. They are genuinely cruel people who want to hurt all sorts of different groups because it personally brings them satisfaction. There’s no grand scheme where they’re only awful to this group so they can kick people off of Medicaid, it’s the same shit Chuck, it’s the one story.

On Ralph Bellamy's birthday, as much as I love his screwball doesn't-get-the-girl roles, I feel compelled to recommend BLIND ALLEY (1939), in which his coolheaded psychoanalyst plays Freudian mind games to destroy the gangster holding him hostage.

Thinking of everyone in Iran right now, and thinking of the ruins of Persepolis, which where able to survive thousands of years, but might not be able to survive someone who went bankrupt running a casino.

Remarkable. MSNC: "I want to reiterate this has been 100% peaceful." Seconds later, LA County sheriffs start firing on the crowd. Yet again, "law enforcement" deliberately escalated.

Manchester Vermont No Kings Rally 10am 6.14.25 #NoKings #ManchesterVT

I was there! Hundreds of friendly people lining the roads early. Much enthusiastic honking. Some chanting of "This is what democracy looks like." One hip lady drumming. I'll try to share some images later.