Recommended TCM viewings...

Greetings Film Buffs,

Some great movies will be on TCM over the next few days. Here’s an over view from Friday July 18 – Wed July 23

Friday July 18 TCM 8:00pm In The Heat of the Night 1967 Color 1.85:1
Dir: Norman Jewison
DP: Haskel Wexler ASC

Saturday July 19 TCM 10:00 AM The Desperate Hours 1955 B&W
Dir: William Wyler
DP: Lee Dewey Garmes 1898-1978

Sunday July 20 TCM 11:30 AM 12 Angry Men B&W 1.66:1
Dir: Sidney Lumet
DP: Boris Kaufman

Sunday July 20 TCM 5:15 PM West Side Story
Dir: Robert Wise/Jerome Robbins
DP: Daniel L. Fapp

Monday July 21-22 1:00AM Apocalypse Now 1979
Dir: Francis Ford Coppola
DP: Vittorio Storaro

Tuesday July 22 3:30 PM the Best Years of Our Lives 1946
Dir: William Wyler
DP: Gregg Toland

Wednesday July 23 5:45 PM The Apartment 1960
Dir: Billy Wilder
DP: Joseph LaShelle

These are all highly recommended for viewing. Note all aspects of production:
direction, blocking, camerawork- moves, focus, lighting, art direction/props, etc.
Think of the different departments, their functions and any specific problems that any one department in particular had to deal with.


Here are some production notes for a few of the above.

July 18 TCM 8:00pm In The Heat of the Night 1967 Color 1.85:1
Dir: Norman Jewison
Dp: Haskel Wexler ASC

Production Notes:
• Rod Steiger was asked by director Norman Jewison to chew gum when playing the part. He resisted at first but then grew to love the idea,and eventually went through 263 packs of gum during the shooting of the film.

• Mississippi was eventually ruled out as a location due to the existing political conditions. Sparta, Illinois, was selected as the location, and the town's name in the story was changed to Sparta so that local signs would not need to be changed. The greenhouse was added to an existing home and filled with $15,000 worth of orchids.

• The scene that took place at the sheriff's house featured dialog that came out of improvisations between Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger.

• It was suggested to Rod Steiger that he base his performance of Bill Gillespie upon the popular cult icon of the day, "The Dodge Sheriff", but minus the comedy. The Dodge Sheriff was a stereotypical Southern (USA) Sheriff in TV commercials and magazine advertisements of the day promoting the high-performance line of Dodge automobiles.

• The movie's line "They call me Mister Tibbs!" was voted as the #16 movie quote by the American Film Institute

• The movie's line "They call me Mister Tibbs!" was voted as the #76 of "The 100 Greatest Movie Lines" by Premiere in 2007.

• Virgil arrives in Sparta, and subsequently leaves town, via the old Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad.

• The "Owl on the Prowl" song: According to Norman Jewison and Haskell Wexler on the DVD commentary, they originally wanted the song "Hey There Little Red Ridin' Hood" by 'Sam the Sham and The Pharoahs' , which is what was actually playing in that scene and what the character Ralph Henshaw (Anthony James) is dancing to. Apparently, Sam the Sham wanted too much money for use of the song and it was probably Quincy Jones who came up with the new song and Glenn Campbell is singing.

• Frequently cited as Sidney Poitier's favorite of all the films he's done.

• In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked this as the #75 Greatest Movie of All Time. It was the first inclusion of this film on the list.

• Set in a hot Mississippi summer but filmed during Autumn in Illinois, many of the actors had to keep ice chips in their mouths (and spit them out before takes) to prevent their breath from appearing on camera during the night scenes.


Location Notes:

Belleville, Illinois
Chester, Illinois,
Dyersburg, Tennessee, (cotton fields)
Freeburg, Illinois, USA (opening railroad scene)
Raleigh Studios - 5300 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California,
(California Studios site) (studio)
Sparta, Illinois, USA (Sparta, Mississippi)


July 19 TCM 10:00 AM The Desperate Hours 1955 B&W
Dir: William Wyler
DP: Lee Dewey Garmes 1898-1978

Production Note: First B&W film to shot in VistaVision –
A few notes on VistaVision –
VistaVision is a variant of the 35 mm motion picture film format created by Paramount Pictures in 1954 based on the Glamorama and Superama widescreen systems.

Paramount, who did not buy into the anamorphic systems available, such as CinemaScope, looked for a more satisfying alternative. Paramount's intention was to create finer-grained negatives through shooting with larger surface area on film, which when printed and projected on the screen in the new flat widescreen formats, would register as clear as those which were not magnified for variable ratios.
In shooting VistaVision, the film is run horizontally, as in a still camera, with a width of 8 perforations per frame, which required special cameras.
This gave a wider aspect ratio of 1.5 against the conventional 1.37, and a larger image area. VistaVision films were shown in a number of aspect ratios, the most popular being 1.85:1. Others included 2:1 and 1.75:1.
the process saw limited usage, as it required considerable labwork including optical printing and matting down to a conventional aspect ratio on vertical film (with the exception of a very small number of theaters between 1954 and 1956), as well as the cost of twice as much film stock during filming. VistaVision lost out in the general market to the less expensive, anamorphic systems such as Panavision and the more capable 70 mm format. Since its last usage in the American market for One Eyed Jacks in 1961, it has virtually disappeared as a primary imaging system for feature films. Most films today are shot in Panavision,

In 1975, Dykstraflex, a retooled VistaVision camera, was created for Industrial Light and Magic's use on process shots in Star Wars. Since then, the format has enjoyed a brief renaissance as an intermediate format used for shooting special effects, since the larger negative area compensates against the increased grain created when shots are optically composited. However, the advent of computer-generated imagery, advanced film scanning and digital intermediate work, film stocks optimized for special effects work, lenses and film stocks with higher resolving power, and usage of 70 mm for similar optical compositing work has largely rendered this usage of VistaVision obsolete as well.


July 20 TCM 11:30 AM 12 Angry Men B&W 1.66:1
Dir: Sidney Lumet
DP: Boris Kaufman
Production Notes:
The filming was completed after a short but rigorous rehearsal schedule in less than three weeks on a budget of about $350,000.

At the beginning of the film, the cameras are positioned above eye level and mounted with wide-angle lenses to give the appearance of greater depth between subjects, but as the film progresses the focal length of the lenses is gradually increased. By the end of the film, nearly everyone is shown in closeup using telephoto lenses from a lower angle, which decreases or "shortens" depth of field. Lumet, who began his career as a director of photography, stated that his intention in using these techniques with cinematographer Boris Kaufman was to create a nearly palpable claustrophobia