Bank holiday Monday Movies.

I had a good time out the other night. I wasn't hungover and I got home for midnight so didn't turn into a pumpkin. The food was good, the company was fine.
I spent the weekend just enjoying the sunshine, taking the kids to the park and shopping, so that's exciting isn't it.
Thanks for the comments on my bears and my cushion. Whenever I make anything I don't prepare for it, I just do it. This has got me into bother on more than one occasion. I was lucky that the cushion turned out as well as it did. I didn't have any tracing paper for the picture so I just traced it onto some tissue paper and then pretty much gouged through the tissue paper with a pencil onto the material. I went wrong quite a few times and had to unpick the embroidery. The dress proved to be a pain, I had originally done long stitches to look like the pen marks but it pulled too much so I decided to just stitch it with small stitches instead. I've also made a mistake transferring the head, but you don't know that, okay.I watched lots of films whilst doing this, it's amazing how much time it takes. The next day I had to find some way to put it onto a cushion and so looking at quilt books I tried to work out a way to frame it. Using the log cabin quilt method I got myself all confused so in the end I just made it up as I went along and after a lot of adjusting it turned out okay. My friend was very pleased with the end result, as was her daughter so I was happy I decided to make her something home-made and not shop bought.

So now my films. I thought I'd best make it Bank holiday Monday Movies instead of Friday films. These are my favourite five black and white thrillers (some of which I watched whilst making the cushion) I've included links for the trailers (on youtube) which can give you more of a taster than my wittering on).

5:Seance on a wet afternoon (1964).
*click here for the trailer*

I have seen this film many times on TCM but have yet to own it on dvd. It is on my list (My endless list) of Dvds to buy. This is a British film about medium, Myra Savage, who convinces her weak husband they must kidnap a wealthy couples daughter, collect the ransom and let Myra gain fame from her psychic knowledge of the child's whereabouts. Unfortunately the plan goes awry as Myra becomes more and more unhinged and we find out just why she is the way she is.
It's a very dark film and it's setting is dreary but that is what makes the film work for me. (Apparently this film received a Japanese remake in 2000 called 'Seance').

4: Night must fall (1964).
The lusty brawling star of 'Tom Jones' goes psycho in Night must fall.
*click here for the trailer*

Starring a very young Albert Finney and Susan Hampshire. I love this film because I remember my Dad appearing as Danny in a production of this done by his amateur dramatics group (My Dad often played the baddy, once when my Grandma went to see one of the plays it reached a part where my Dad was doing the murder scene. So engrossed was my Grandma that she exclaimed out loud 'ooh our Michael!!!'). I used to help my dad learn his lines and was horrified when a hand was found in the rubbish in the play version of Night must fall, I was about six or seven so as you can imagine I thought it was terrifying. In the film it isn't a hand that is discovered. Albert Finney carries a hat box with him, you never see the contents but when you find out a body has been found without a head, you don't need much imagination as to what is in there. Charismatic and ever so slightly strange Danny wins over first the maid of a house, then the owner (A wheelchair bound old lady) and finally her daughter Olivia. Moving in to do some painting, he brings only a few clothes, the hat box, an almost empty case but a lot of psychotic baggage! Albert Finney plays his part scarily well and as he declines into madness you can't help but get carried along, and be gripped by the story. I did let L watch this with me, she didn't like it though, not because it was scary but because it was so strange and surreal.
The first film of this came out in 1937, but I have yet to see this version.

3: Don't bother to knock. (1952).

You've never met her type before.
*click here for the trailer*

I guess it's no surprise that I love Marilyn Monroe. I particularly like her in this movie because she is playing a serious part and her usual glamorous part. Recently institutionalized, none-too-stable babysitter Nell Forbes, looks after a girl in a Manhattan hotel whilst the child's parents attend a party downstairs. She begins a flirtation with another guest Jed Towers (Richard Widmark) who is in the apartment opposite and who is on the rebound from a recent breakup with his singer girlfriend (Anne Bankcroft) Eventually he realises what a mistake he has made with Nell when she starts to reveal her dark side.

2. The Nanny: (1965).
Nanny wasn't responsible...WAS SHE?
*click here for the trailer*

It took me ages to get this film on dvd. I finally managed to do so when it was re released! typical. This is a hammer house of Horror production and starts Bette Davis in fine form, as the Nanny whose charge 10 year old Joey has just been released from a home for disturbed children.When he finds out that Nanny is still at home and waiting for him, he becomes reluctant to go back and once there his behaviour becomes strange and erratic. Nobody believes his accusations apart from the girl who lives upstairs. Wendy Craig is fabulous as Joey's broken weak mother who always leans on Nanny for support and help. What has Joey got against Nanny and will his suspicions be proved right?

1: Bunny Lake is missing: (1965)

No one admitted while the clock is ticking.
*click here for the trailer*

I have yet to get this on dvd, mostly because it is only available in the US (grrr). It was supposed to be re released here not so long ago but there is some hold up with it. (grrr again). but this is undoubtedly my favourite black and white thriller. In fact I was very dismayed to find out that Reece Witherspoon was going to remake this. Why do they always insist on remaking classics, it never works.
The film is about a woman called Ann Lake (Carol Lynley), who has recently moved to England with her daughter Bunny. When Ann goes to pick up Bunny after her first day of school, there is no sign of her, nobody has seen her, nor has she been registered with the school. The police, and Supt Newhouse (Laurence Olivier) cannot find any evidence that the girl ever existed and even Ann's brother Stephen casts doubt about his sisters sanity. Ann has to try to prove that Bunny is real and get her back. Is Bunny real or is she just a figment of Ann imagination?

So there we are, my favourite black and white thrillers mostly containing unhinged psychopaths.. what does that say about me! I am aware that my list does not include any Alfred Hitchcock but that is a list for another day I feel! I am an avid fan of Hitchcock.
I would be delighted to hear of any of your favourite thrillers especially if I haven't seen them and I can go and check them out! I hope you all had a good weekend.