Touch of Evil, 1958

Touch of Evil, 1958

Roger Ebert.

Marlene Dietrich.  And more. 

Sleep, My Love, 1948

I saw this movie, Sleep, My Love, 1948, years ago and loved it then. love it even more today. Bob Cummings' performance is memorable, "Bachelor in the bleachers."  This is a good review of the film.

A lot of scenes in this movie that later movies borrowed.  The ending where Dr. Rhinehart falls through the glass inside the mansion several floors to his death: that scene reminds me of the first installment of the Jason Bourne trilogy, The Bourne Identity, 2002, referred to as the "stairwell plunge."

Not Quite Moby Dick but Similar Denoument

Shack Out on 101, 1955, with a young Lee Marvin and workhorse, Frank Lovejoy, shares something in common with Terror in a Texas Town, 1958, starring Sterling Hayden as George Hansen.  

 

The script for "Terror" was written by Dalton Trumbo.  

Stan's Drive-Thru in The Crooked Web, 1955

1955, I saw the movie The Crooked Web, 1955, the other day, starring Richard Denning, Frank Lovejoy, and Mari Blanchard.  

From the start, I liked the movie, in large part due to the car hop in the opening scene, named Stan's.  It turns out that Stan's was an actual restaurant, and not something built just for the movie.  

1951, Built in late 1938, the drive-in became a "Stan's" in December 1951.  It was demolished in 1971.

Another view of Simon's from the 1950 movie, 711 Ocean Drive.  Hollywood High School can be seen across the street.  This means that the drive-in sits on the southeast corner of Sunset Blvd. and Highland Avenue in Hollywood.  

You can see Stan's sign in the very opening scene, and its art deco design is quite elegant and beautiful.  

 

1958, View showing Stan's Drive-in Coffee Shop on the SE corner of Sunset and Highland Avenue, 6760 Sunset Blvd., across from Hollywood High School and Currie's Ice Cream.  

Historical Notes

Previously, the southeast corner of Sunset and Highland was the site of Simon’s Drive-in…one of two Simon’s on Sunset for a few years (since 1938). As of December 1951, Simon’s became Stan’s Drive-in. Since Stan’s took over the Carpenter’s at Vine that same year, there were now 2 Stan’s on Sunset.

Payoffs at Simon Drive-In, 6700 Sunset Boulevard on the SE corner of Highland, one of several locations of this local mini-chain.  The Church of the Blessed Sacrament at 6641-6657 Sunset can be seen beyond the trees.  

More pics of Stan's from Water and Power.

1966, Stan's Drive-in on the SE corner of Sunset & Highland, kitty-corner to Hollywood High School.  Sunset-Highland Recording Studios is seen in the background.  

Stan’s stood on the SE corner as seen above until 1971 when it was demolished. Today, a Chick-fil-A is at the corner. Click HERE to see the contemporary view.

1950s, ##^* – View showing a woman drinking a soda while leaning on a street sign post with a Stan’s Drive-in seen in the background on the 4400 block of Sunset Blvd (SE corner of Sunset and Virgil Ave, across the street from the Vista Theatre). Click HERE for a contemporary view.

Historical Notes Stan's was a chain of drive-ins with at least a dozen LA locations built in the late 1950s and '60s. Click HERE to see more in Early Views of LA Drive-in Restaurants.

What a fight! What a fight!

Watched a good boxing movie the other night, the 1951 film starring Jeff Chandler, titled Iron Man.  

The story opens in a coal mine in Coal Town, Pennsylvania.  What 

So I began to think of all the boxing movies of the 1950s.

1947, Body and Soul, starring John Garfield and Lilli Palmer.

1949, The Set-Up, starring Robert Ryan and Audrey Totter.  

Well, well, well, this movie contains a scene of the Hill Street Tunnel in Downtown Los Angeles near the courthouse where Dad worked.  Find the location and older pictures of the Hill Street Tunnel here.

See the tunnel starting @ the 00:17 mark to the 1:42 mark.   

Below is a 1928 photo of the Hill Street Tunnel.  

1954, The Hill Street tunnels, seen from the Temple st entrance, downtown Los Angeles. With Bunker Hill intact. Can u say NOIR?  Thank you to Alvaro ComputerDude Guevara.

1951, Iron Man, starring Jeff Chandler. 

1952, Kid Monk Baroni, starring Leonard Nimoy.

1953, Joe Louis.

1954, Tennessee Champ.

1954, The Long Count is a short film (20 minutes) starring Frank Lovejoy.  Not much of a fight movie as much of a short noir that exposes the lengths that desperate owners and promoters will go to make big money scores.  I liked the ending line, "You take a chance when you hire McGraw.  He has a mean streak of honesty in him."  Richard Deacon, plays the coroner.  Biff Elliot plays "Pretty Boy Mendero."  Memorable character actor, Nestor Paiva, 1905-1966.  Mel Welles plays Sam Grogan.  Ted de Corsia plays Vic Kelcey

1955, Square Jungle, starring Tony Curtis. 

1956, The World in My Corner, starring Audie Murphy and Barbara Rush.

1956, The Leather Saint.

1956, Requiem for a Heavyweight, a teleplay written by Rod Serling, starring Jack Palance, Keenan Wynn,

Serling's teleplay was made into the 1962 movie, starring Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Mickey Rooney, and Julie Harris. 

1956,  The Harder They Fall, starring Humphrey Bogart.  This was Bogart's last film.  Wikipedia explains, 

In early 1956, Bogart was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, and he died on January 14, 1957. Steiger recalled the actor's professionalism during production, even while coping with the disease . . . . 

Co-starring Rod Steiger and Mike Lane.  And some drama behind the scenes, 

Primo Carnera sued Columbia for $1.5 million in damages, alleging that the film was based on him and invaded his privacy.^[8] The lawsuit was not successful.^[4]

The above review mentions Jan Sterling's prior movie with Kirk Douglas, 1951, Ace in the Hole.  Maybe I've seen parts of it.  Not sure.  And I've always liked Kirk Douglas in so many roles as a young actor.  Love his voice, tough-noir character, but when I read recently that he was accused of raping Natalie Wood when she was just 15, and he 38, it just sickened me.  

1956, Somebody Up There Likes Me, starring Paul Newman and 

Then watched Patterns, or Patterns of Power, 1956. 

Ara Parseghian, 1923-2017

Our entire program mourns the loss of one of the pillars of our University, Coach Ara Parseghian. pic.twitter.com/nXS3xyei05

— Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) August 2, 2017

Here are some other tributes on Ara Parseghian.  It's funny what I remember when it came to Dad and Notre Dame football.  The coaches of the modern era always seemed to disappoint him.  Even if Notre Dame bear USC that year, even if they went onto a national championship, he'd begrudgingly concede a fine effort or some talent by the coach.  But I can imagine it was hard for him to like Parseghian (who coached from1964-1974) or Dan Devine (who coached from 1975-1980).  

Dad frequently shook his head at Dan Devine, but his winning percentage .764 was comparable to Lou Holtz's, .765.  Devine's win-loss record was 53-16-1.  But I'll never forget a report of Devine's dog being killed.  But that was not in the context of his coaching performance during any Notre Dame season or specific game, it was in his 3rd and final year, 1974 as coach of the Green Bay Packers that Devine's dog was shot, one year before he was brought over to coach the Fighting Irish.  That certainly wouldn't be considered conduct becoming of a Catholic.  Someone shot his his dog.  

By then fans had grown disenchanted and ran Devine out of town. So angry were some, that Devine's dog was shot to death

Apparently, the shooting of Devine's dog wasn't done by some disgruntled Packers' fan.  

My dad was also a fan of the energized and devoted Catholic, Lou Holtz, loved him, in fact.  But it wasn't just a winning season that caused Dad to either love or be dismayed by a Notre Dame coach, it was also their devotion to the Virgin Mary and the Catholic Church.  If the coach demonstrated fervent devotion to the Virgin Mary AND coached Notre Dame to a commanding victory over USC, then he would praise the coach.  You see he was comparing all of the up-and-coming coaches and Notre Dame (for it was the entire franchise that he judged) to player and Coach Frank Lahey, Knute Rockne, the Four Horsemen

I had kind of forgot Gerry Faust (1981-1985).  Boy did his name cause Dad all kinds of grief.  Notre Dame hired Faust based on his successes at Archbishop Mueller HS in Ohio.  

It was his amazing high school record, sound ethics and the quality football players from Moeller who later played at Notre Dame, that led Notre Dame officials to take a calculated gamble and hire him when Dan Devine stepped down after the 1980 season. For Faust, a devout Roman Catholic, it was a dream come true. He had coveted the head coaching job at Notre Dame for years and said all along that he would never leave Moeller for anything else. Faust inherited a solid squad that included nine of his former players from Moeller. He switched the team's home jerseys from green back to blue, although initially it was a lighter Madonna blue shade than the navy blue that had been previously worn (and returned to in 1984), and kept the players' names on the backs. A self-proclaimed eternal optimist brimming with enthusiasm, Faust had visions of winning more games and national championships and coaching at Notre Dame longer than anyone else. Then when he saw Notre Dame's schedule, he was quoted as saying, "I hope my lifelong dream doesn't end in a nightmare." Sadly, it proved to be a prophetic statement and his era at Notre Dame, initially referred to as "The Bold Experiment",[3] fell far short of expectations.

 

But it was Lou Holtz (coached from 1986-1996 with a record of 100-30-2) who restored his faith in Notre Dame Football.  But his health was faltering that would lead to greater disability before ge passed in 1988.  But at least for a couple of years he git to see a kind if revival at Notre Dame and he loved reading about Lou Holtz's game strategies and Catholic devotions.  For it wasn't just the brawn and muscle on the grid iron, for Fad, it was always a spiritual battle about how much territory one's team, or one's convictions, would would cede.  

LA County Park in Arcadia, CA Christened in Interwar Years

Pictures sent from a friend in So. Cal.

I love the font on this sign.

LA County Park in Arcadia was christened as a public county park in 1937.  Prior to that, the area was known as Ross Field, [find more here] named for Lieutenant Cleo J. Ross of the 8th Balloon Company, where dirigibles were tested and military men trained in the interwar years. A note on him from Richard DesChenes from Military Museum,

It was in November that the school was formally named after Lt. Cleo J. Ross of the 8th Balloon Company. Lt. Ross and Lt. Herbert Hudnut were aloft and attacked by a Fokker D. VII, the balloon burst into flames. Lt. Ross made sure that his observer got over the side safely. He went over the side and after his parachute deployed, burning fragments of the balloon fell on the parachute. Lt. Ross fell to his death from several thousand feet. His was the only death in the Balloon Corps due to aerial activity.

It is 1 of 5 parks in Arcadia and 1 of 500 parks in LA County.

From the Living New Deal,

Dedication of the Arcadia County Park in 1937 culminated years of hard work by the County of Los Angeles and the WPA (Works Progress Administration) in converting Ross Field into a recreation facility. Completion of the swimming pool, tennis courts, golf course, bowling greens, picnic tables, and other facilities in subsequent years affords Arcadians and others a center for leisure.”

– Arcadia – Yesterday and Today
by Christine Van Maanen, City Clerk of Arcadia, 1956 – 1988.