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A Few of Mike Clark's Approximately 150 AFI Series


Whodunit
(January 5 - February 12, 1977)

Well, this is the name I gave the series, at least. Though, as I explained in the intro, "Several titles in this 50-film celebration of murder and mayhem are not whodunits in the strictest sense--{i.e. movies in which} Charlie Chan humiliates number one and two sons for six reels until they consider abandoning detective work for careers in hotel management." The title was kind of a commercial ploy and gave me the loose context to run a lot of movies I wanted shown. And it was a huge hit that helped make my career in programming.

  • The Thin Man (1934, W.S. Van Dyke)
  • High and Low (1962, Akira Kurosawa)
  • And Then There Were None (1945, Rene Clair)
  • The Lodger (1944, John Brahm) + Hangover Square (1945, same)
  • Sherlock Jr. (1924, Buster Keaton) + Paths to Paradise (1925, Clarence Badger)
  • Night Moves (1975, Arthur Penn) + Fog Over Frisco (1934, William Dieterle)
  • Charlie Chan at the Opera (1936, H. Bruce Humberstone) + Detour (Edgar G. Ulmer, 1945)
  • Madigan (1968, Don Siegel)
  • Green for Danger (1947, Sidney Gilliat) + Bulldog Drummond Comes Back (1937, Louis King)
  • The Mackintosh Man (1973, John Huston)
  • A Shot in the Dark (1964, Blake Edwards)
  • Out of the Past (1947, Jacques Tourneur) + Farewell, My Lovely (1975, Dick Richards)
  • Gunn (1967, Blake Edwards)
  • The Detective (1954, Robert Hamer)
  • Bullets or Ballots (1936, William Keighley) + The Lineup (1958, Don Siegel)
  • Stray Dog (1949, Akira Kurosawa)
  • Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back (1934, Roy Del Ruth) + Gumshoe (1972, Stephen Frears)
  • Dial M for Murder (1954, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • Laura (1944, Otto Preminger) + Crossfire (1947, Edward Dmytryk)
  • The Dark Corner (1946, Henry Hathaway)
  • G-Men (1935, William Keighley) + The Maltese Falcon (1931, Roy De Ruth)
  • Detective Story (1951, William Wyler)
  • The Long Goodbye (1973, Robert Altman)
  • The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939) + Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942, John Rawlins)
  • Bunny Lake Is Missing (1965, Otto Preminger)
  • A Study in Terror (1965, James Hill) + Phantom of the Rue Morgue (1954, Roy Del Ruth)
  • Kiss Me Deadly (1955, Robert Aldrich; Aldrich in person with his personal 35mm print)
  • The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936, Stephen Roberts) + Star of Midnight (1935, same)
  • I Wake Up Screaming (1942, H. Bruce Humberstone)
  • The Big Sleep (1946, Howard Hawks)
  • Gideon of Scotland Yard (1959, John Ford)
  • The Kennel Murder Case (1933, Michael Curtiz) + The Gracie Allen Murder Case (1939, Alfred E. Green)
  • The Maltese Falcon (1941, John Huston)
  • The Glass Key (1942, Stuart Heisler) + Murder My Sweet (1944, Edward Dmytryk)
  • The Drowning Pool (1975, Stuart Rosenberg)


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    They Went Thataway
    (April 1-30, 1977)

    Running a Westerns series in the Kennedy Center was commercial suicide, though this one did a little better than what I feared (I was not yet in a position to have "control" of the calendar, and this series--atop everything else working against it--got shunted to the back of the monthly programming guide). Good reviews--though it was pointed out that I neglected to run a single James Stewart-Anthony Mann entry. Explanation: None. I dropped the ball. This is also an example of how to--stupidly--do a Westerns series without High Noon or Shane. I think I was over-sensitive to the fact that Professor Everson didn't like either one of them.

  • Stagecoach (1939, John Ford) + Ride the High Country (1962, Sam Peckinpah)
  • William K. Everson in person with a B-Western clip show--plus a full print of George O'Brien in Mystery Ranch (1932)
  • Wagonmaster (1950, John Ford) + Directed by John Ford (1971, Peter Bogdanovich)
  • The Spoilers (1942, Ray Enright) + River of No Return (1954, Otto Preminger)
  • The Harvey Girls (1946, George Sidney)
  • How the West Was Won (1963, Henry Hathaway, John Ford & George Marshall)
  • Johnny Guitar (1954, Nicholas Ray) + Roy Rogers' The Gay Ranchero (1948, William Witney)
  • The Tall Men (1955, Raoul Walsh)
  • The Searchers (1956, John Ford)
  • Calamity Jane (1953, David Butler)
  • The Left-Handed Gun (1958, Arthur Penn) + Bad Day at Black Rock (1955, John Sturges)
  • Three Bad Men (1926, John Ford) + Tom Mix in Sky High (1922, Lynn Reynolds)
  • The Furies (1950, Anthony Mann)
  • Garden of Evil (1954, Henry Hathaway) + The Oklahoma Kid (1939, Lloyd Bacon)
  • Red River (1948, Howard Hawks)
  • Hoppy Serves a Writ (1943, George Archainbaud) + Gene Autry's The Last Roundup (1947, John English) + Roy Rogers' King of the Cowboys (1943, Joseph Kane)
  • The Gunfighter (1950, Henry Hathaway) + "The Three Mesquiteers'" Outlaws of Sonora (1938)
  • One-Eyed Jacks (1961, Marlon Brando)
  • Way Out West (1937, James V. Horne) + The Paleface (1948, Norman Z. McLeod)
  • The Ox-Bow Incident (1943, William A. Wellman)
  • Red Garters (1954, George Marshall)
  • Angel and the Badman (1947, James Edward Grant) + Decision at Sundown (1957, Budd Boetticher)
  • Junior Bonner (1972, Sam Peckinpah)
  • Ride in the Whirlwind (1966, Monte Hellman) + The Shooting (1966, same)
  • Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957, John Sturges)
  • Giant (1956, George Stevens)


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    The War Years
    (January 2 - February 17, 1979)

    A chronological World War II series--not in terms of the film's release dates but in terms (generally) of historical events portrayed.

  • Triumph of the Will (1934, Leni Riefenstahl)
  • The Great Dictator (1940, Charles Chaplin)
  • Dragon Seed (1944, Harold S. Buquet & Jack Conway)
  • Alexander Nevsky (1938, Sergei Eisenstein; made, in part, as a World War II rallying cry)
  • Under the Clouds of War (a March of Times compilation from 1935-40) + Why We Fight: Prelude to War, 1942, Frank Capra) + Subject for Discussion (a wartime short subject, scripted by Alexander Mackendrick, warning about syphilis)
  • The Mortal Storm (1940, Frank Borzage) + All Through the Night (1940, Vincent Sherman)
  • Caught in the Draft (1941, David Butler) + My Favorite Blonde (1942, Sidney Lanfield)
  • Foreign Correspondent (1940, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • A Yank in the R.A.F. (Henry King, 1941) + Target for Tonight (Harry Watt, R.A.F. documentary, 1941)
  • I Wanted Wings (Mitchell Leisen, 1941)
  • Why We Fight: The Battle of Russia (Frank Capra & Anatole Litvak, 1943)
  • The Cranes Are Flying (1957, Mikhail Kalatozov) + Forbidden Games (1951, Rene Clement)
  • In Which We Serve (1942, Noel Coward & David Lean)
  • Casablanca (1942, Michael Curtiz)
  • To Be or Not To Be (1942, Ernst Lubitsch)
  • You'll Never Get Rich (1941, Sidney Lanfield) + The Fleet's In (1942, Victor Schertzinger)
  • Why We Fight: War Comes to America (1945, Anatole Litvak) + December 7th (1943, long version, John Ford)
  • From Here to Eternity (1953, Fred Zinnemann)
  • Mrs. Miniver (1942, William Wyler)
  • Thousands Cheer (1943, George Sidney)
  • Bataan (1943, Tay Garnett)
  • They Were Expendable (1945, John Ford) + The Battle of Midway (1942, John Ford)
  • Hangmen Also Die (1943, Fritz Lang)
  • This Is the Army (1943, Michael Curtiz)
  • So Proudly We Hail (1943, Mark Sandrich)
  • My Love to the Swallows (1971, Jaromil Jires)
  • Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942, John Rawlins) + Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943, William Thiele) + Texas to Bataan (1942, Robert Pansey; a "Range Busters" Monogram Z-Western)
  • The Sorrow and the Pity (1970, Marcel Ophuls)
  • The Great Escape (1963, John Sturges)
  • Mission to Moscow (1943, Michael Curtiz)
  • Air Force (1943, Howard Hawks)
  • Twelve O'Clock High (1949, Henry King)
  • Two Women (1961, Vittorio DeSica)
  • Victory Through Airpower (1943, Walt Disney) + Fires Were Started (1943, Humphrey Jennings) + Desert Victory (1943, Roy Boulting)
  • Saboteur (1943, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • The Gang's All Here (1943, Busby Berkeley) + Star-Spangled Rhythm (1942, George Marshall)
  • The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957, David Lean)
  • Lacombe, Lucien (1974, Louis Malle)
  • The Negro Soldier (1944, Frank Capra) + Home of the Brave (1949, Mark Robson)
  • The Most Beautiful (1944, Akira Kurosawa)
  • Five Graves to Cairo (1943, Billy Wilder) + The Enemy Below (1957, Dick Powell)
  • The Diary of Anne Frank (1959, George Stevens)
  • Hollywood Canteen (1944, Delmer Daves)
  • Report from the Aleutians (1943, John Huston) + Memphis Belle (1944, William Wyler) + The True Story of Lili Marlene (1944, Humphrey Jennings)
  • Henry V (1944, Laurence Olivier; morale booster)
  • The Longest Day (1962; Andrew Marton, Ken Annakin & Bernhard Wicki)
  • Since You Went Away (1944, John Cromwell)
  • How I Won the War (1965, Richard Lester)
  • Eroica (1957, Andrzei Munk) + The Passenger (1963, Andrzei Munk)
  • To Have and Have Not (1944, Howard Hawks) + The Clock (1945, Vincente Minnelli)
  • Battleground (1949, William A. Wellman)
  • Patton (1970, Franklin J. Schaffner)
  • The Battle of San Pietro (1944, John Huston) + The True Glory (Garson Kanin & Carol Reed, 1945)
  • The Miracle of Morgan's Creek (1944, Preston Sturges) + Hail the Conquering Hero (same)
  • Sands of Iwo Jima (1949, Allan Dwan) + The Story of G.I. Joe (1944, William A. Wellman)
  • Anchors Aweigh (1945, George Sidney)
  • Fate of a Man (1959, Sergei Bondarchuk)
  • Stairway to Heaven (1946, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger)
  • The Emperor and the General (1967, Kihachi Okamoto)
  • The Bridge (1959, Bernhard Wicki) + Night and Fog (1956, Alain Resnais)
  • Hiroshima, Mon Amour (1959, Alain Resnais)
  • Sayonara (1957, Joshua Logan)
  • Ashes and Diamonds (1958, Andrzej Wajda)
  • The Best Years of Our Lives (1946, William Wyler)
  • The Memory of Justice (1976, Marcel Ophuls)


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    Francois Truffaut as Critic
    (February 19 - March 31, 1979)

    Films he admired, with the final selection approved by him. The series was in conjunction with a calendar of everything Truffaut had himself directed, up to that time.

  • Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles)
  • The Rules of the Game (1939, Jean Renoir)
  • Trouble in Paradise (1932, Ernst Lubitsch; screening introduced by Truffaut)
  • Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953, Howard Hawks) + Hollywood or Bust (1956, Frank Tashlin)
  • Johnny Guitar (1954, Nicholas Ray)
  • Foolish Wives (1921, Erich von Stroheim)
  • The Quiet Man (1952, John Ford)
  • Kiss Me Deadly (1955, Robert Aldrich) + The Honeymoon Killers (1970, Leonard Kastle)
  • The Mystery of Kaspar Hauser (1975, Werner Herzog)
  • Tristana (1970, Luis Bunuel) + The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz (1955, Luis Bunuel)
  • Summer Interlude (1950, Ingmar Bergman)
  • I Confess (1953, Alfred Hitchcock) + The Wrong Man (1956, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • Duel (1971, Steven Spielberg) + Fingers (1978, James Toback)
  • Notorious (1946, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • La Marseillaise (1937, Jean Renoir)
  • Zero for Conduct (1933, Jean Vigo) + L'Atlante (1934, Jean Vigo)
  • Shadow of a Doubt (1943, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • Marnie (1964, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • My Night at Maud's (1970, Eric Rohmer)
  • The Big Sleep (1946, Howard Hawks)
  • Verboten! (1958, Samuel Fuller) + The Naked Dawn (1955, Edgar G. Ulmer)
  • Toni (1935, Jean Renoir) + Casque D'or (1952, Jacques Becker)
  • Day of Wrath (1943, Carl Dreyer)
  • A King in New York (1957, Charles Chaplin)
  • The Magnificent Ambersons (1942, Orson Welles) + The Night of the Hunter (1955, Charles Laughton)
  • Rebecca (1940, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • Ugetsu (1953, Kenji Mizoguchi)
  • The Girl Can't Help It (1956, Frank Tashlin)
  • To Catch a Thief (1955, Alfred Hitchcock) + Dial M for Murder (1954, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • Touch of Evil (1958, Orson Welles)
  • My Life to Live (1962, Jean-Luc Godard) + The Testament of Orpheus (1959, Jean Cocteau)
  • Sunrise (1927, F.W. Murnau)
  • Orphans of the Storm (1922, D.W. Griffith)
  • It Should Happen to You (1954, George Cukor)
  • The Lady Vanishes (1938, Alfred Hitchcock) + Young and Innocent (1937, Alfred Hitchcock)
  • All the President's Men (1976, Alan J. Pakula)


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    Be True To Your School
    (November 3 - December 17, 1980)

    A huge flop programmed in the last six weeks of the year, always a very fallow period for attendance. It was supposed to be counter-programming against a series of "New German Cinema." But the over-achievers who populate Washington didn't want to be reminded of their high school/college days, as a friend even pointed out to me at the time. But I've always liked this series.

  • The Freshman (1925, Sam Taylor & Fred Newmeyer) + College (1927, Buster Keaton)
  • The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969, Ronald Neame)
  • Peyton Place (1957, Mark Robson)
  • Horse Feathers (1932, Norman Z. McLeod) + You're Never Too Young (1955, Norman Taurog)
  • The Cool and the Crazy (1958, William Witney) + Teenage Doll (1957, Roger Corman)
  • The Corn Is Green (1945, Irving Rapper)
  • A Yank at Oxford (1938, Jack Conway)
  • Peppermint Soda (1979, Diane Kurys) + Zero for Conduct (1933, Jean Vigo)
  • The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947, Irving Reis) + Take Care of My Little Girl (1951, Jean Negulesco)
  • The Belles of St. Trinian's (1954, Frank Launder)
  • The Male Animal (1942, Elliot Nugent)
  • Because They're Young (1960, Paul Wendkos) + Bernardine (1957, Henry Levin)
  • Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939, Sam Wood)
  • High School Confidential! (1958, Jack Arnold) + This Day and Age (1933, Cecil B. DeMille)
  • Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938, George B. Seitz)
  • Daddy Long Legs (1955, Jean Negulesco)
  • Splendor in the Grass (1961, Elia Kazan)
  • Our Miss Brooks (1956, Al Lewis) + American Graffiti (1973, George Lucas)
  • Butley (1974, Harold Pinter)
  • This Land Is Mine (1943, Jean Renoir)
  • The Blackboard Jungle (1955) + Rock 'n' Roll High School (1979, Allan Arkush)
  • College Humor (1933, Wesley Ruggles) + Crime School (1938, Lewis Seiler)
  • First Love (1977, Joan Darling) + One on One (1977, Lamont Johnson)
  • The Browning Version (1951, Anthony Asquith) + The Winslow Boy (1950, same)


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    Champions of American Sport
    (July 1 - Sep 2, 1981)

    We got approached by the National Portrait Gallery to do a tie-in sports series to its own exhibit of memorabilia (my favorite was a baseball bat the size of, and made out of a, telephone poll). My heart was enthusiastic, but my head said no. Sports movies were poison at the AFI Theater; the type of person who goes to the Kennedy Center to see a movie could care less. When I told my predecessor, the person who started the theater, I had decided to do it, he laughed for about five minutes.

    I figured, "If not in this gift context, in what possible other?" So I gulped, and we flopped, though I gave it my best. The black-tie opening night gala at the Smithsonian eased the future pain. Willie Mays, among many other stars, was there, and I met Archie Moore. I was standing with Barry Goldwater (just the two of us) at the portrait of Jim Thorpe. He turned to me and said, "Well, he got the shaft."

    Biographies:

  • Gentleman Jim (1942, Raoul Walsh) + The Jackie Robinson Story (1950, Alfred E. Green)
  • Jim Thorpe--All American (1950, Michael Curtiz) + Go, Man, Go! (1954, James Wong Howe)
  • The Winning Team (1952, Lewis Seiler) + The Joe Louis Story (1953, Robert Gordon)
  • Harmon of Michigan (1942, Charles Barton) + The Bob Mathias Story (1954, Francis D. Lyon)
  • Knute Rockne--All American (1940, Lloyd Bacon)
  • The Pride of the Yankees (1942, Sam Wood)

    Documentaries

  • Olympia (1938, Leni Riefenstahl)
  • Baseball Fourth of July (from Major League Baseball's Archives)
         a. 50 Years of Baseball Memories
         b. World Series Highlights 1937-57
         c. 1970 World Series (Orioles vs. Reds)
         d. It Don't Come Easy (Yankees' 1978 comeback to win the American League East)
  • World Series Highlights: The Post-war Era (from Major League Baseball's Archives; 3 1/2 hours)
         a. 1947 Yankees-Dodgers
         b. 1952 Yankees-Dodgers
         c. 1960 Pirates-Yankees
         d. 1969 Mets-Orioles
         e. 1973 Athletics-Mets
         f. 1975 Reds-Red Sox
  • The Endless Summer (1966, Bruce Brown)
  • The Legendary Champions (1968, Jim Jacobs)
  • Tokyo Olympiad (1965, Kon Ichikawa)

    Actors as Athletes, Athletes As Actors

  • Easy to Love (1953, Charles Walters)
  • Kid Galahad (1937, Michael Curtiz) + The Champ (1931, King Vidor)
  • Pat and Mike (1952, George Cukor) + The Caddy (1953, Norman Taurog)
  • Tarzan and His Mate (1934, Cedric Gibbons)
  • It Happens Every Spring (1949, Lloyd Bacon) + The Crowd Roars (1932, Howard Hawks)
  • The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933, W. S. Van Dyke II) + Easy Living (1949, Jacques Tourneur)
  • Damn Yankees (1958, George Abbott & Stanley Donen)
  • Sun Valley Serenade (1941, H. Bruce Humberstone) + Home in Indiana (1944, Henry Hathaway)
  • Junior Bonner (1972, Sam Peckinpah)
  • Tall Story (1960, Joshua Logan) + Alibi Ike (1935, Ray Enright)

    Debunking the Myths

  • Body and Soul (1947, Robert Rossen) + The Set-Up (1949, Robert Wise)
  • North Dallas Forty (1979, Ted Kotcheff)
  • The Harder They Fall (1956, Mark Robson)
  • Fear Strikes Out (1957, Robert Mulligan)
  • Slap Shot (1977, George Roy Hill)
  • Fast Break (1979, Jack Smight)


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