Veronica Lake in I MARRIED A WITCH (1942)

Pedro Infante playing triplets in Los Tres Huastecos (1948) dir. Ismael Rodríguez.

Fate of a Man is a 1959 war drama film directed by Sergei Bondarchuk. It is an adaptation of a short story by Mikhail Sholokhov.

Synopsis: The film is told in flashback as the main character, Andrei Sokolov, recounts his life story to an old man in the spring of 1946. Born in 1900 in a village in Voronezh, he flees elsewhere to survive the Russian Famine of 1921-2, then returns to find his whole family dead. While working as a carpenter he meets and falls in love with a young woman, and they begin a family together. For 17 years they live happily, until Germany invades the Soviet Union in 1941, starting the Great Patriotic War. Andrei enlists and his wife tearfully prophesies “We shall never meet again in this world” as they are saying their last goodbyes, and Andrei angrily pushes her away. Andrei is captured along with his unit and housed in a ruined church for time, then forced to march to a prison camp. After a remark he makes angers the commanding officer of the camp the officer calls him in and tells him he will shoot him, but offers him a final drink of vodka first. Andrei drinks the whole glass in one go and refuses a chaser, so the officer gives him a second glass, which Andrei drinks in one go. A third glass he drinks without chaser also, and the officer is so impressed he spares Andrei’s life. After Germany’s invasion of Stalingrad fails the Russian POWs are no longer seen as disposable and are treated marginally better. Andrei is assigned chauffeur to another German officer and does his work diligently for a time, then kidnaps his officer and drives into Russian territory, where he turns over the German officer’s briefcase to the commanding Russian officer. Malnourished, Andrei is rewarded for his bravery by being sent home to Voronezh to recover, only to find his entire street bombed into nothing, along with his wife and daughters. Only his son survived, who was working in a factory, and he later enlisted in the army. Heartbroken over the loss of his wife and daughters, Andrei pins his remaining hopes on marrying off his son after the war and caring for his grandchildren, but his son, who becomes a decorated hero, is killed just before the end of WWII. Devastated, Andrei takes up work as a truck driver in faraway parts of Russia, working in Uryupinsk, where he gets to know an orphaned young boy, whose father died in action and whose mother died in a bombing raid. Andrei decides to tell the boy that he is his father and adopts the boy, thereby giving new hope to the both of them. But, he tells the old man, he’s started having heart trouble, and he’s not sure if he’ll see the boy reach adulthood.

Review: The film is good, although old-fashioned. It feels a lot like American WWII films made in the postwar period in terms of subject matter, and the scriptwriting and directing have a very Golden Age Hollywood feel to them, nothing like the newly-emergent modern cinema of the day. The main character suffers much hardship but escapes from several dire situations through sheer strength, heroicness, and gumption, which is typical of old films but may leave modern viewers rolling their eyes. The story is touching, admittedly. Overall whether I’d recommend this film depends on whether you like old movies and their conventions and clichés or not. If you like classic cinema then this film will be right up your alley, and you can watch it on YouTube here.

Marilyn Monroe

i made myself a tf2 oc to ship with demo. say hi to jaimito.

hes a milkman hired by tf industries to deliver imported milk specifically to the red/blu base because local milk is radioactive (he has his own logo!! hes important)

The beauty of Ava

On this day 63 years ago…

March 5, 1962

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Marilyn Monroe and José Bolaños at the Golden Globes where she won the award for World Film Favorite Female 1961

To the event Marilyn wore a green sequinned Norman Norrell dress alongside emerald and diamond earrings. She had purchased the dress the previous year to wear at a party with Frank Sinatra (whom gifted her the earrings) and during a photoshoot with Douglas Kirkland in November 1961.

Following her gall bladder surgery, Marilyn had lost weight. Concerned that the original design of the dress might flatten her bustline, her maid, Hazel, attached a discreet strap around her neck, transforming the dress into a halter style, which resulted in a crowl neck design. Marilyn wanted an exposed back, so she opted not to use the side straps, instead integrating them into the dress’s front.

Buster Hitches a Ride

Music: Car Song by Woody Guthrie

Marlene Dietrich at Columbia Records studio, New York, 1952; photo by Eve Arnold.

Marilyn Monroe c. 1953

Pedro Infante and Blanca Estela Pavón in Los Tres Huastecos (1948) dir. Ismael Rodríguez.

James Dean and Marlon Brando in 1954

alain delon during the filming of purple noon/plein soleil

(1960)

Marilyn Monroe photographed by Alfred Eisenstaedt, 1953

Cary Grant