East of Eden - 1955

East of Eden, James Dean, 1955 Framed Art Print
24.875 in. x 30.875 in.

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Director Elia Kazan's updated re-telling of the Biblical story of rival brothers, Cain and Abel and a paradise lost. A brooding James Dean - as the unappreciated son (Cain), vies against his dull, but favored stuffy brother (Abel) for the affections of their father. The maligned, misunderstood Cain character, representing the unlikeable and outcast director himself (for naming names before the HUAC Committee in 1952), becomes the sensitive hero of this film. As the poster stated, "Sometimes you can't tell who's good and who's bad!..."

Writer Paul Osborn's screenplay adapted John Steinbeck's 1952 novel with the same title for this dramatic Warner Bros. film. [The film tells only a small portion of Steinbeck's work, leaving out the childhood of the parents and the Chinese character of Lee.] The CinemaScopic film, set in 1917 at a time just before the US entry into World War I, portrays the relationship between insecure, tortured, neurotic loner Caleb "Cal" Trask (Dean, in his first major role and film) and his dutiful, favored brother Aron (Davalos) - twin sons. Their father is a stern, hardened, devoutly religious, self-righteous man named Adam (Massey), a lettuce farmer living with his family in Salinas, California. The plot becomes emotionally charged when Cal expresses a liking for his brother's girlfriend Abra (Harris), and then learns that his mother (Van Fleet) is actually alive and operating a nearby brothel.

The Day the Earth Stood Still - 1951

The Day The Earth Stood Still, 1951 Giclee Print
9 in. x 12 in.

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One of the seminal science fiction films of motion picture history, The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) is based on Edmund H. North's adaptation of the short story "Farewell to the Master" by Harry Bates. Much like the "drive in movies" of the 1950's, such as The War of the Worlds (1952), Forbidden Planet (1956), and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), this influential, fantasy sci-fi film featured state-of-the-art visual effects and salient social commentary on the Cold War and warfare. The film not only examined wider issues of politics and society, but also at human emotions and frailties. This cautionary science fiction parable begins with the landing of a spacecraft on the White House Mall.

A benevolent, interplanetary alien in humanoid form, Klaatu (Rennie), causes a panic when he demands to speak to all of the representatives of Earth's governments. Although he warns the people of Earth to be non-violent and stop nuclear testing, he is shot by a nervous soldier. His massive robotic companion Gort (Martin) vaporizes the offensive weapons, as Klaatu is hospitalized. He goes into hiding posing as an Earthling named Carpenter while residing with a human family (single mother/widow Helen (Neal) and her son Bobby (Gray)), in order to observe their lives, and meanwhile to attempt to establish contact with Earth's leading scientist Dr. Bernhardt (Jaffe). Klaatu's demonstration of power over the industrial complex -- by stopping power everywhere for half an hour -- ends up tragically. One of the most famous phrases in science fiction history is recited by Helen to stop Gort's rampage when Klaatu is killed: "Gort, Klaatu barada nikto." The film ends with the alien visitor's resurrection and a warning-proclamation. With a memorable score by Bernard Herrmann.

In A Lonely Place - 1950

In a Lonely Place, Gloria Grahame, in a Gown by Jean Louis, 1950 Photographic Print
18 in. x 24 in.

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A mature, bleak and dramatic 1950 film noir from maverick director Nicholas Ray - from a complex script by Andrew Solt. World-weary, acerbic, self-destructive, hot-tempered, depression-plagued Hollywood screenwriter and laconic anti-hero Dixon Steele (Humphrey Bogart), while planning to adapt a trashy best-selling romance novel, becomes the prime suspect in a murder case of a night-club hat-check girl Mildred Atkinson (Martha Stewart). After he invites her to his apartment to discuss the book that he hasn't read, she is found brutally murdered the next morning. His romantic relationship with a lovely neighbor/would-be starlet Laurel Gray (Gloria Grahame) in the housing complex grows stronger when she confirms his alibi, but ultimately is put to the test as she becomes increasingly suspicious of his disintegrating self.

From Here to Eternity - 1953

From Here to Eternity, Deborah Kerr, 1953 Photographic Print
18 in. x 24 in.

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Based on James Jones' best-selling, hard-hitting novel of on-duty/off-duty military life among recruits in the pre-Pearl Harbor era of 1941 - on the eve of WWII. A combination romance, combat and melodramatic film set at the Schofield Barracks Army base on Oahu. Sensitive bugler Pvt. Robert E. Lee "Prew" Prewitt (Clift) is dealt harsh treatment when he stubbornly refuses to fight for the company's boxing team. The bored company commander's wife Karen Holmes (Kerr) engages in a torrid affair with the good-guy Sgt. Milton Warden (Lancaster) - their embrace in the pounding surf is indelibly imprinted in cinematic history. Pruitt falls in love with a nightclub "hostess" (prostitute) Alma (Lorene) (Reed). Meanwhile, Prew's Italian friend Angelo Maggio (Sinatra) is tormented by sadistic stockade Sgt. "Fatso" Judson (Borgnine).

The Big Heat - 1953

Il Grande Caldo- The Big Heat Framed Art Print
12.9375 in. x 16.9375 in.

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A dark, very brutal and violent, classic, expressionistic film noir/melodrama and gangster film that explores the seamy underworld of American organized crime. Following the suicide of a guilt-stricken, supposedly-honest fellow cop, homicide Sgt. Dave Bannion (Ford) is determined to discover the truth. A car bomb meant for him accidentally kills his wife Katie (Brando). Suspended from duty on the force, he tenaciously avenges the mob's murder of his wife, confronting the city crime ring to uncover the truth. A hard-hitting showdown is destined with ruthless, meglomaniacal kingpin Mike Lagana (Scourby), aided by a sadistic, psychotic thug Vince Stone (Marvin). One of the film's most celebrated scenes is the coffee-scalding scene - an enraged Stone hurls his boiling coffee into the face of his moll girlfriend Debby Marsh (Grahame) - in retribution, she courageously aids Bannion's search for the culprits and returns the coffee-scalding favor to Vince. No Academy Award nominations.

The Asphalt Jungle - 1950

The Asphalt Jungle Poster
26.75 in. x 38.625 in.

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A classic noirish thriller, an adaptation based on a novel by W. R. Burnett, about a mastermind, aging, ex-convict criminal Doc (Jaffe), who comes out of retirement (prison) for one last jewel robbery with an assemblage of underworld characters - Kentucky horse-farm loving Dix Handley (Hayden) with tough-girlfriend Doll (Hagen), and sleazy lawyer partner Alonzo Emmerich (Calhern) who plans to fence the jewels to support his expensive habits (e.g., an affair with seductive mistress Monroe - in a cameo role). The heist unravels quickly and everything falls apart when an alarm accidentally sounds and the safecracker is mortally wounded by a stray bullet. While Emmerich commits suicide, and others are either jailed or wounded, Doc's creepy voyeurism for a young girl dooms him during his escape. Dix reaches his childhood Kentucky farm but expires in a field surrounded by horses. Academy Award Nominations: 4, including Best Supporting Actor--Sam Jaffe, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best B/W Cinematography.

Shane - 1953

Shane, Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin, 1953 Giclee Print
12 in. x 9 in.
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Shane (1953) is a timeless, classic western tale - a very familiar and highly regarded seminal western and the most successful Western of the 1950s. The film's rich color cinematography captures the beautiful environment of the legendary frontier (filmed on location in Jackson Hole, Wyoming) with its gray-blue Grand Tetons as a backdrop.

The screenplay was based on Jack Schaefer's successful 1949 book of the same name. The film received six Academy Awards nominations: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Brandon de Wilde), Best Supporting Actor (Jack Palance), Best Director, Best Screenplay (by A. B. Guthrie, Jr.), and Best Color Cinematography, and won its sole Oscar award for photographer Loyal Griggs. Unbelievably, star Alan Ladd in probably his best known and realized performance, was un-nominated. Director/actor Clint Eastwood's Pale Rider (1985) paid homage to Stevens' film with a similar storyline.

Veteran director/producer George Stevens' film is often considered the second film of his "American trilogy," positioned between A Place in the Sun (1951) and Giant (1956). Stevens self-consciously fashioned this simple western into a wide-screen, Technicolored panoramic masterpiece to create a symbolic myth: the age-old story of the duel between good and evil, the advent of civilization (with families, law and order, and homesteaders) and progress into the wilderness (a world of roaming cattlemen, lawless gunslingers, and loners on horseback), a land-dispute conflict between a homesteader and cattle baron, and the coming of age of a young boy. The film is dotted with classic sequences - the uprooting of the stubborn stump in the yard, Torrey's murder in the muddy street and his hilltop funeral, and the climactic finale.

Roman Holiday - 1953

Roman Holiday, Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck, 1953 Giclee Print
9 in. x 12 in.
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Rebel Without a Cause - 1955

Rebel Without a Cause Framed Art Print
18 in. x 23.75 in.
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Rebel Without a Cause (1955) is a film that sympathetically views rebellious, American, restless, misunderstood, middle-class youth. The tale of youthful defiance, which could have been exploitative - but wasn't, provides a rich, but stylized (and partly out-dated) look at the world of the conformist mid-1950s from the perspective of the main adolescent male character - a troubled teen with ineffectual parents, who faces a new school environment.

The screenplay (by Stewart Stern from an adaptation by Irving Shulman of an original storyline synopsis by director Nicholas Ray) was based on an actual case study (contained in Dr. Robert Lindner's 1944 factual book titled Rebel Without a Cause: The Story of a Criminal Psychopath) of a delinquent, imprisoned teenage psychopath in the post-war years. The film was originally titled The Blind Run - the same as the title of the series of vignettes, both violent and strangely erotic, that Ray had penned. The actual film's title, Rebel Without a Cause, was the same as the title of Lindner's psychological study - signifying the rebellious and idealistic protagonist's search for a 'cause' - honesty and decency in a hypocritical world.

Rear Window - 1954

La Finestra sul Cortila- Rear Window Framed Art Print
12.9375 in. x 16.9375 in.
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After breaking his leg during a dangerous assignment, professional photographer L. B. "Jeff" Jeffries (Stewart) is confined to a wheelchair in his Greenwich Village apartment, whose rear window looks out onto a small courtyard and several other apartments. During a summer heat wave, he passes the time by watching his neighbors, who keep their windows open to stay cool. The tenants he can see include a dancer, a lonely woman, a songwriter, several married couples, and Lars Thorwald (Burr), a salesman with a bedridden wife.

After Thorwald makes repeated late-night trips carrying a large case, Jeff notices that Thorwald's wife is gone and sees Thorwald cleaning a large knife and handsaw. Later, Thorwald ties a large packing crate with heavy rope and has moving men haul it away. Jeff discusses these observations with his wealthy girlfriend Lisa (Kelly) and his home-care nurse Stella (Ritter), then explains to his friend Tom Doyle (Corey), a local police detective, that they believe Thorwald murdered his wife. Doyle looks into the situation but finds nothing suspicious.

Soon after, a neighbor's dog is found dead with its neck broken. When a woman sees the dog and screams, the neighbors all rush to their windows to see what has happened, except for Thorwald, whose cigar can be seen glowing as he sits in his dark apartment. Convinced that Thorwald is guilty after all, Jeff has Lisa slip an accusatory note under Thorwald's door so Jeff can watch his reaction when he reads it. Then, as a pretext to get Thorwald away from his apartment, Jeff telephones him and arranges a meeting at a bar. He thinks Thorwald may have buried something in the courtyard flower patch and then killed the dog to keep it from digging it up. When Thorwald leaves, Lisa and Stella dig up the flowers but find nothing.

The Night of the Hunter - 1955

The Night of the Hunter Framed Art Print
16 in. x 22 in.
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The Night of the Hunter (1955) is a truly compelling, haunting, and frightening classic masterpiece thriller-fantasy, and the only film ever directed by the great British actor Charles Laughton. The American gothic, Biblical tale of greed, innocence, seduction, sin and corruption was adapted for the screen by famed writer-author James Agee (and Laughton, but without screen credit). Although one of the greatest American films of all time, the imaginatively-chilling, experimental, sophisticated work was idiosyncratic, film noirish, avante garde, dream-like expressionistic and strange, and it was both ignored and misunderstood at the time of its release. Originally, it was a critical and commercial failure.

Robert Mitchum gave what some consider his finest performance in a precedent-setting, unpopular, and truly terrifying role as the sleepy-eyed, diabolical, dark-souled, self-appointed serial killer/Preacher with psychotic, murderous tendencies while in pursuit of $10,000 in cash. Lillian Gish played his opposite - a saintly good woman who provided refuge for the victimized children.

The disturbing, complex story was based on the popular, best-selling 1953 Depression-era novel of the same name by first-time writer Davis Grubb, who set the location of his novel in the town of Moundsville, WV, where the West Virginia Penitentiary (also mentioned in the film) was located. Grubb lived in nearby Clarksburg as a young teenager.