On Trailers From Hell they’re doing a tribute to Ronald Reagan movie star so I’ll jump on the bandwagon and do a top ten
1) Kings Row (1941) - genuinely great film and good performance from Ronnie
2) The Killers (1964) - as above, Don Siegel giving remakes a good name
3) Dark Victory (1939) - he’s not much but this is a v good Bette Davis weepie (screenwriters should read the introduction to the published script where Casey Robinson goes through his creative decisions)
4) Knute Rockne All American (1940) - silly inspirational sports movie biopic which works on its own level and because the main characters died young which always helped - Notre Dame college refused to let Jimmy Cagney play the lead because he was anti Franco during the Spanish Civil War
5) Desperate Journey (1942) - makes running around Germany in WW2 seem like a lark but has Errol Flynn as an Aussie so that gets points
6) The Hasty Heart (1949) - slick, well done guy cry movie with Richard Todd as a terminally ill soldier finding friends
7) Tropic Zone (1951) - Bright, colourful “south of the border” banana plantation film in the mode of Torrid Zone. Try to put aside thoughts of what the United Fruit Corporation got up to and enjoy Rhonda Fleming have one of her best roles and give one of her best performances as a woman who inherits a banana plantation and goes for lots of swims and showers (I guess it is the tropics). Teams well with Ronnie
8 ) That Hagen Girl (1947) - truly spectacular car crash of a movie, one of far too many around this time where woman falls in love with man she thinks he’s her father and it turns out he’s not so that’s okay... but it’s got Shirley Temple as the girl, doing some Shakespeare, Miss Monneypenny from the Bond films, suicide attempts, genuinely good direction, messy script - has to be seen to be believed
9) Santa Fe Trail (1940) - anti-anti-slavery film, with Raymond Massey great as John Brown, Errol Flynn as Jeb Stuart and Reagan as Custer - raids history, has decent action
10) Hellcats of the Navy (1957) - Ronnie and Nancy in love on screen... captured for all of us
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