Movie Trailers

• Directors: George Stevens
• Producers: George Stevens
• Writers: Rudyard Kipling, Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur, Joel Sayre, Fred Guiol
• Genres: Action, Adventure, War
• Actors: Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen, Douglas Fairbanks Jr, Eduardo Ciannelli, Sam Jaffe, Joan Fontaine

On the Northwest Frontier of colonial India, circa 1880, contact has been lost with a British outpost at Tantrapur in the midst of a telegraph message. Colonel Weed (Montagu Love) dispatches a small detachment of British Indian Army troops to investigate, led by three sergeants of the Royal Engineers, MacChesney (Victor McLaglen), Cutter (Cary Grant), and Ballantine (Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.), long-time friends and veteran campaigners. Although they are a disciplinary headache for their colonel, they are the right men to send on a dangerous mission. Accompanying the detail is a regimental bhisti (water-bearer), Gunga Din (Sam Jaffe), who longs to throw off his lowly status and become a soldier of the Queen.

They find Tantrapur apparently deserted and set about repairing the telegraph. However, they are soon surrounded by hostile natives. The troops fight their way out. Colonel Weed and Major Mitchell (Lumsden Hare) identify an enemy weapon brought back as belonging to the Thuggee, a murderous cult that had been suppressed for many years.

Ballantine is due to leave the army in a few days to wed Emmy Stebbins (Joan Fontaine) and go into the tea business, a combined calamity that MacChesney and Cutter consider worse than death. Meanwhile, Gunga Din tells Cutter of a temple he has found, one made of gold. Cutter is determined to make his fortune, but MacChesney will have none of it and has Cutter put in the stockade to prevent his desertion. That night, Cutter escapes with Din’s help and goes to the temple, which is all that Din had claimed. Unfortunately, they discover that it belongs to the Thugs when the owners return. Cutter creates a distraction and allows himself to be captured so that Din can slip away and sound the warning.

…

When the regiment comes to the rescue, the guru boasts that they are marching into the trap he has set, with the three sergeants as bait. He orders his men to take their positions, but when he sees that they are unwilling to leave him in enemy hands, he leaps to his death in a pit full of cobras to remove that obstacle. Thugs then climb the temple and overwhelm the soldiers, shoot and bayonet Cutter. Gunga Din is also bayoneted, but manages with the last of his strength to climb to the top of the gold dome of the temple and sounds the alarm with the bugle. He is then shot dead, but the British force is alerted and defeats the Thuggee forces. At Din’s funeral pyre, the colonel formally inducts Gunga Din as a British soldier and reads the last lines of the Kipling poem over the body:

• Directors: George Stevens
• Producers: George Stevens
• Writers: Screenplay, Michael Wilson, Harry Brown, Novel, Theodore Dreiser, Play, Patrick Kearney
• Genres: Drama, Romance
• Actors: Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, Shelley Winters, Anne Revere

George Eastman (Montgomery Clift), the nephew of industrialist Charles Eastman (Herbert Heyes), takes a job in his factory to learn the business. While working there, he starts dating factory worker Alice “Al” Tripp (Shelley Winters), who becomes pregnant.

At the same time, he meets society girl Angela Vickers (Elizabeth Taylor), and loses interest in Al. Shortly after Al tries to blackmail George into marrying her by threatening to expose their relationship to Angela, she is killed in a boating accident, while out on the lake with George. The film ends when George is convicted of her murder.

• Directors: George Stevens
• Producers: George Stevens
• Writers: Edna Ferber, Fred Guiol, Ivan Moffat
• Genres: Drama, Romance, Western
• Actors: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, James Dean

Bick Benedict (Rock Hudson), the head of the rich Benedict ranching family of Texas, goes to Maryland to buy a stud horse, War Winds. There he meets and courts the socialite Leslie (Elizabeth Taylor), who becomes his wife. They return to Texas to start their life together on the family ranch, Reata. Luz (Mercedes McCambridge), Bick’s sister, and Leslie don’t get along. Jett Rink (James Dean) the family handyman, is envious of the Benedict wealth and flirts with Leslie.

Luz dies after War Winds bucks her off, and as part of her will, Jett is given a plot of land within the Benedict ranch. Bick tries to buy back the land, but Jett refuses. Jett keeps the fenced off waterhole as his home and names the property Little Reata. Leslie eventually gives birth to twins, Jordan Benedict III (Dennis Hopper), or Jordy, and Judy Benedict (Fran Bennett), and a younger daughter named Luz Jr (Carroll Baker).

Jett discovers oil on his property, and when he gets his first gusher, he barges onto the Benedicts’ property proclaiming in front of the entire family that he will be richer than the Benedicts. Bick and Jett have a fistfight and Jett runs off.

…

A major sub-plot of the movie is the racism against Mexican Americans in Texas. When the movie starts, Bick and Luz are racist towards the Mexicans who work on their ranch, which shocks Leslie. By the end of the movie, though, Bick realizes the wrongs of racism and defends his daughter-in-law and grandson, Juana and Jordan Benedict IV, respectively and earns Leslie’s respect.

• Directors: George Stevens
• Producers: George Stevens
• Writers: Jack Schaefer, A B Guthrie Jr
• Genres: Drama, Western
• Actors: Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin, Brandon De Wilde, Jack Palance

A mysterious stranger named Shane (Alan Ladd) drifts into an isolated western valley. It soon becomes apparent that he is a gunslinger, and he finds himself drawn into a conflict between simple homesteader Joe Starrett (Van Heflin) and powerful cattle baron Rufus Ryker (Emile Meyer), who wants to force him and every other homesteader in the valley off the land. Shane accepts a job as a farmhand, but finds Starrett’s young son Joey (Brandon DeWilde) drawn to him for his strength and skill with a gun. Shane himself is uncomfortably drawn to Starrett’s wholesomely charming wife, Marian (Jean Arthur).

As tensions mount between the factions, Ryker hires Jack Wilson (Jack Palance), a skilled gunslinger. After Wilson kills another homesteader (Elisha Cook, Jr.) who stands up to him, Joe Starrett decides to take it on himself to go kill Wilson and Ryker and save the town; however, he is stopped by Shane who insists on going himself. Starrett and Shane fight over who should go on to face Wilson; Shane regretfully uses his gun to hit Joe over the head and knock him out, knowing this was the only way to prevent Joe from getting killed. Shane then goes to take on Wilson in a climactic showdown, killing him and Ryker, but being wounded in the shootout. After urging young Joey to grow up strong and take care of both of his parents, Shane rides away in a random direction.

As Shane rides away, Joey calls after him, “Pa’s got things for you to do! And Mother wants you. I know she does.” Shane slumps forward on his horse, presumably dead from his shootout wounds, but the horse keeps going. The movie closes with Joey shouting “Shane! Come back!” as he watches the horse with Shane on its back disappear into the distance.