Happy September, everyone! Hope everyone had fun with Summer Under the Stars this year, I know I did. That’s always a hard programming line-up to top, but there’s a lot of very interesting things coming up on TCM in September.
Susan Hayward is September’s Star of the Month and her films will be shown every Thursday night. On Tuesdays, TCM will be running a series called Five Came Back, spotlighting five major American film directors who were involved with World War II by working to create documentaries and other films for the government. The series will include some of these films, as well as their movies that directly deal with the war and show how their wartime experiences changed their styles. This should be an absolutely fascinating series; I’m really looking forward to it.
On September 25, there will be a spotlight on the television career of James Dean. This should definitely be interesting, since these appearances are rarely seen. If you’ve only seen his major Hollywood films and always wanted to see more of his work, this is a golden opportunity.
Without further ado, let’s get on to the rest of the schedule…
September 1: The month kicks off with the first installment of TCM’s Five Came Back spotlight and the director of the night is Frank Capra. See Meet John Doe at 8:00 PM, Coming!! Snafu!! at 10:10 PM, Prelude to War at 10:15 PM, Booby Traps at 11:10 PM, The Battle of Russia at 11:15 PM, The Negro Soldier at 12:45 AM, Private Snafu Vs. Malaria Mike at 1:40 AM, Tunisian Victory at 1:45 AM, With the Marines at Tarawa at 3:00 AM, The Battle of Britain at 3:30 AM, Snafuperman at 4:25 AM, Know Your Ally: Britain at 4:30 AM, and War Comes to America at 5:15 AM.
September 2: It’s a day of George Cukor movies, so of course there are a few gems to be found in today’s scheudle like A Woman’s Face at 1:00 PM and It Should Happen to You at 6:30 PM.
September 3: Susan Hayward has her first turn as Star of the Month with Beau Geste at 8:00 PM, Adam Had Four Sons at 10:00 PM, Reap the Wild Wind at 11:30 PM, Canyon Passage at 1:45 AM, Tulsa at 3:30 AM, and My Foolish Heart at 5:00 AM.
September 4: Marion Davies’ Show People is on at 1:45 PM. If you’ve never seen it, you’re in for a treat! I’m also interested in Make Me a Star at 3:15 PM. Then it’s on to a night of W.C. Fields with The Bank Dick at 8:00 PM, It’s a Gift at 9:30 PM, You Can’t Cheat an Honest Man at 11:00 PM, and David Copperfield at 12:30 AM.
September 5: All sorts of good things on today. I Walked With a Zombie at 1:45 PM, Royal Wedding at 3:15 PM, Now Voyager at 8:00 PM, Mrs. Parkington at 10:00 PM, and The Pirate at 12:15 AM.
September 7: It’s time for TCM’s annual 24-hour tribute to the Telluride Film Festival, which includes the documentary Billy Wilder Speaks at 11:00 AM, Witness for the Prosecution at 12:30 PM, the documentary Bergman Island at 2:30 PM, Smiles of a Summer Night at 4:00 PM, Fragments (a collection of surviving clips from otherwise lost silent films) at 10:00 PM, and THX 1138 at 12:00 AM.
September 8: It’s time to look at director John Huston as part of the Five Came Back spotlight with Across the Pacific at 8:00 PM, Report from the Aleutians at 9:45 PM, In the Aleutians at 10:40 PM, San Pietro at 10:45 PM, The Infantry Blues at 11:25 PM, Let There Be Light at 11:30 PM, The Goldbrick at 12:40 AM, The Red Badge of Courage at 12:45 AM, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre at 2:00 AM, and The Man Who Would Be King at 4:15 AM.
September 11: Today there’s The Man Who Played God at 7:00 AM, Cat People at 11:15 AM, Born to Dance at 12:30 PM, Shall We Dance at 2:30 PM, and It Should Happen to You at 4:30 PM. Then it’s a night of selections by Robert Osborne with Evergreen at 8:00 PM, The Macomber Affair at 10:00 PM, Snows of Kilimanjaro at 11:45 PM, and Went the Day Well? at 2:00 AM.
September 13: There’s Bell Book and Candle at 12:00 PM, Mogambo at 2:00 PM, The Day the Earth Stood Still at 6:15 PM, Gaslight at 8:00 PM, Hush…Hush…Sweet Charlotte at 10:00 PM, and Eyes Without a Face at 4:15 AM.
September 15: It’s time for more Five Came Back tonight with John Ford. The Long Voyage Home at 8:00 PM, Gripes at 9:55 PM, The Battle of Midway at 10:00 PM, A Lecture on Camouflage at 10:25 PM, A Lecture on Camouflage at 10:25 PM, How to Operate Behind Enemy Lines at 10:30 PM, Spies at 11:40 PM, December 7th at 11:45 PM, Private Snafu Presents the Seaman Tarfu in the Navy at 1:10 PM, They Were Expendable at 1:14 AM, and Mister Roberts at 3:45 PM.
September 16: Tonight is all about Jean-Luc Godard with Breathless at 8:00 PM, Charlotte et Son Jules at 9:45 PM, Pierrot Le Fou at 10:15 PM, Masculin-Feminin at 12:15 AM, Alphaville at 2:15 AM, A Woman is a Woman at 4:00 AM, and All Boys are Called Patrick at 5:30 AM.
September 17: Susan Hayward is back with Demetrius and the Gladiators at 8:00 PM, The Conqueror at 10:00 PM, I’ll Cry Tomorrow at 12:00 AM, I Want to Live! at 2:15 AM, and Top Secret Affair at 4:30 AM.
September 21: TCM salutes the late Omar Sharif with Doctor Zhivago at 8:00 PM, Funny Girl at 11:30 PM, and Funny Lady at 2:30 PM.
September 22: Lots of robots on TCM today with Metropolis at 6:00 AM, The Day the Earth Stood Still at 9:00 AM, The Robot Vs. the Aztec Mummy at 2:15 PM, and 2001: A Space Odyssey at 3:30 PM. (I’m totally down for any day that starts with Metropolis and later involves The Robot Vs. the Aztec Mummy.) Then it’s time for more of the Five Came Back series with William Wyler. Mrs. Miniver at 8:00 PM, The Home Front at 10:25 PM, The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress at 10:30 PM, Fighting Tools at 11:25 PM, Thunderbolt at 11:30 PM, Going Home at 12:25 AM, The Best Years of Our Lives at 12:30 AM, and The Fighting Lady at 3:30 AM.
September 24: It’s a day of 1960s Elizabeth Taylor movies with Butterfield 8 at 6:15 AM, The VIPs at 8:15 AM, The Sandpiper at 10:30 AM, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at 12:30 PM, Reflections in a Golden Eye at 3:00 PM, The Comedians at 5:00 PM. Then Susan Hayward is back with The Marriage-Go-Round at 8:00 PM, Back Street at 9:45 PM, Valley of the Dolls at 11:45 PM, Stolen Hours at 2:00 AM, and The Honey Pot at 3:45 AM.
September 25: Tonight TCM will be showing some of James Dean’s television work with Something For an Empty Briefcase at 8:00 PM, Sentence of Death at 9:00 PM, A Long Time Till Dawn at 9:30 PM, Harvest at 10:30 PM, Run Like a Thief at 11:30 PM, I’m a Fool at 12:30 AM, The Dark Dark Hours at 1:00 AM, The Thief at 1:30 AM.
September 28: All day long, you can see movies that were based on stage plays, including Arsenic and Old Lace at 6:00 AM, Gaslight at 10:00 AM, Dial M For Murder at 12:00 PM, The Letter at 4:00 PM, and Wait Until Dark at 6:00 PM. And at 8:00 PM, don’t miss Colleen Moore in Why Be Good?, which is a total gem of a movie.
September 29: One last installment of the Five Came Back series, this time focusing on George Stevens with The More the Merrier at 8:00 PM, Censored at 9:55 PM, That Justice Be Done at 10:00 PM, The Nazi Plan at 10:15 PM, The Diary of Anne Frank at 12:30 AM, Judgment at Nuremberg at 3:45 AM.
September 30: It’s a birthday tribute to Michael Powell with Something Always Happens at 7:00 AM, The Spy in Black at 8:15 AM, Contraband at 9:45 AM, I Know Where I’m Going at 11:30 AM, A Matter of Life and Death at 1:15 PM, The Tales of Hoffman at 3:15 PM, Night Ambush at 5:30 PM. Then actress Diahann Carroll takes over as Guest Programmer with Claudine at 8:00 PM, Now Voyager at 10:00 PM, Gilda at 12:15 AM, and Glory at 2:15 AM.
