"Classic Moustaches For Movember" Blogathon.

Bette of Bette's Classic Movie Blog, is hosting a blogathon in support of Movember, an organization that educates and researches prostate cancer and other cancers that affect men. If you would like to learn more about the organization please check out her blog. Bettes Movie Blogspot.

Blogs participating:
Dear Mr. Gable
Java's Journey
Frankly, My Dear
In The Mood
Silver Screen Modiste
The Movie Projector
Noir And Chick Flicks
True Classics
Random Ramblings Of A Broadway, Film and TV Fan

When I first began thinking of what I could write for the "classic movie moustaches" blogathon, I really wanted to write about my favorite classic movie actor, Gary Cooper. I then remembered he had a mustache in the film, Peter Ibbetson (1935). Directed by Henry Hathaway. The movie is based on a novel by George du Maurier.

This very romantic story is about Gogo, an English boy growing up in Paris. His best friend was his neighbor, a little girl named Mimsey. After his mother dies, Gogo moves to England with his uncle, who gives him an English name based on his mother's maiden name.

Ibbetson, has studied to be an architect and now, is working on a restoration project for the British Duke of Towers. He falls in love with Mary, the Duchess of Towers. Peter then realizes that Mary, is his childhood best friend. All these years, Mary has kept, the dress she wore the last time she saw him.

The Duke becomes jealous and pulls a gun on Ibbetson. Ibbetson kills the Duke in self-defense. Ibbetson is sentenced to life in prison, thinking he will never see Mary again. However, the lovers are reunited in each others dreams.



The years pass by, Peter and Mary never get old in their dreams. Mary, eventually dies of old age, but she goes back one last time to say good-by to Peter.

If you like film,"The Ghost and Mrs. Muir", you may also like this romantic film.

The Winner Is... Silent Film: Wings (1927). It was the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture and the only silent film ever to win Best Picture.

Wings (1927), Silent film about World War I fighter pilots, directed by William A. It was the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture and the only silent film ever to win Best Picture. Cast: Clara Bow, Charles "Buddy" Rogers and Richard Arlen. Gary Cooper appears in a scene which helped launch his career in Hollywood and also marked the beginning of his affair with Clara Bow.

In 1917, in a small town, Jack Powell works on his car, while daydreaming about airplanes. Jack names his car the "Shooting Star" while Mary Preston, paints a star on his car. Oblivious to Mary's feelings for him, Jack invites Sylvia Lewis, to join him on the first drive. Sylvia goes along, but she is in love with David Armstrong, who comes from a wealthy family. Later, when the United States enters World War I, Jack and David enlist in aviation school. Before they leave, Sylvia signs a picture of herself and puts it in a locket for David, but Jack thinks it is meant for him, she does not have the heart to tell him the truth. David, is hurt, but Sylvia explains that, although Jack has her picture, David has her heart. Jack almost forgets to say goodbye to Mary, but then runs back to tell her that she can use the car. During basic training, problems come between Jack and David, will they put their differences aside and become friends?

The air battles in this film I thought were amazing.

Jobyna Ralston (November 21, 1900 – January 22, 1967), parents who named her after a famous entertainer of the time, Jobyna Howland. Ralston's mother, a portrait photographer, carefully prepared her daughter for a show business career.

Comedian Max Linder, saw her on stage and thought she would be perfect for Hollywood, where she appeared in a number of his films. She also co-starred in, Humor Risk (1921), the lost comedy short film debut of the Marx Brothers. Soon director Hal Roach began to star the actress in one-reel comedies. She left the stage for the screen in 1922 when her mother's health began to decline and she needed to make more money to help pay the medical bills.

She starred with silent comedian Harold Lloyd in, Why Worry?(1923) and for the next five years appeared in six of Lloyd's films as his leading lady. It is for her onscreen chemistry with Lloyd that she is best remembered today. She would start the trend for romantic comedies with, Girl Shy.

Ralston co-starred with Richard Arlen, in the first Oscar-winning film, Wings (1927), with,Clara Bow, Gary Cooper, and Buddy Rogers. She would star in eleven more films . Her film career ended after when she became a mother. Her last talkie, Rough Waters (1930), with co star, Rin Tin Tin.

The Pride of the Yankees(1942).

The Pride of the Yankees(1942). Biographical film directed by Sam Wood about the New York Yankees baseball player, first baseman Lou Gehrig, who had his career cut short at 37 years of age when he was stricken with the fatal disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (later known as "Lou Gehrig's Disease"). The film was released the year after Gehrig's death. Cast: Gary Cooper, Teresa Wright and Walter Brennan. Yankee teammates Babe Ruth, Bob Meusel, Mark Koenig, and Bill Dickey play themselves, as does sportscaster Bill Stern.

Columbia University student Lou Gehrig's, mother wants him to become an engineer, but.. Lou Gehrig has a gift for playing baseball. Sportswriter Sam Blake has a scout come out to see him play ball. Gehrig receives a contract offer from the New York Yankees. Lou Gehrig and his father decides to keep this a secret from his mother.

Gehrig wins over his teammates, and before long he is joining them in playing pranks on Ruth.

After a game in which he trips, he meets Eleanor Twitchell, who calls him a "Tanglefoot." It is not long before they fall in love and Lou and Ellie make plans to marry. The news, does not sit well with Gehrig's over baring mother. However, Lou finally stands up to her and marries Eleanor.

The Yankees start winning championships and all is going well for Gehrig. He hits two home runs in a single game as a promise to a sick boy in a hospital.(does that remind you of a Seinfeld episode?). But.. then without warning, Gehrig, baseball's "Iron Horse" begins to feel that somethings wrong.

Gehrig keeps on playing, keeping his illness a secret. But he is not the player he once was and one day he takes himself out of the game.

After an examination, a doctor tells Gehrig that he only has a short time to live.

In celebration at Yankee Stadium in his honor, Gehrig announces to his fans, saying that he has always felt like "the luckiest man on the face of the Earth."

I thought this was a wonderful inspirational movie and a nice way to remember Lou Gehrig.

Teresa Wright's first performance was in the stage play, Life with Father. It was there that she was discovered by a talent scout hired by Samuel Goldwyn to find a young actress for the role of Bette Davis' daughter in the film, The Little Foxes (1941). Which was the film that she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. The following year, she was nominated again, this time for Best Actress for The Pride of the Yankees, that same year, she won Best Supporting Actress as the daughter-in-law of Greer Garson's character in Mrs. Miniver. No other actor has ever has received an Oscar nomination for each of their first three films.

Please click here to read Teresa Wright's bio.

Gary Cooper

In 1925 the beginning of Gary Cooper acting career, he found work as an "extra", usually cast as a cowboy. It is reported that he has uncredited role in the Tom Mix Western, Dick Turpin (1925). The following year, he had screen credit in, Lightnin' Wins. After the release of this short film, Cooper accepted a contract with Paramount Pictures. He changed his name to Gary in 1925, following the advice of casting director Nan Collins.

"Coop," went on to perform in over 100 films. He became a major star with his first sound picture, The Virginian(1929). Virginian a foreman working on small ranch and his best friend Steve, soon become rivals for a school teacher. Steve joins up with bad guy Trampas and the Virginian catches him cattle rustling. As foreman, he must give the order to hang his friend. Trampas gets away, but .. returns in time for a shootout .



Cooper went on to play the lead in the film, A Farewell to Arms (1932). Set in Europe during World War I, the story is about a romance between Frederick Henry (Gary Cooper), an American ambulance driver serving in the Italian Army and English Red Cross nurse Catherine Barkley (Helen Hayes). Major Rinaldi (Adolphe Menjou)wants to end their relationship and has Catherine transferred to Milan. When Frederick is wounded, he ends up in the hospital where Catherine works. They continue their affair until he returns to battle. Catherine becomes pregnant and moves to Switzerland and when her letters remain unanswered, she believes that he has abandoned her. Frederick, travels back to Switzerland in search of Catherine.

Cooper, also performed in the title role, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town(1936). Directed by frank Capra, based on the story, Opera Hat by Clarence Budington Kelland that appeared in serial form in the Saturday Evening Post.

In 1942, Cooper won his first Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance as the title character in, Sergeant York. A biographical film about the life of Alvin York, the most-decorated American soldier of World War I. It was directed by Howard Hawks and was the highest-grossing film of the year.

In 1953, Cooper won his second Best Actor Academy Award for his performance as Marshal Will Kane in, High Noon . Directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. The film tells in real time the story of a town marshal forced to face a gang of killers by himself.

Some of his other box office hits: Friendly Persuasion (1956). The story of a family of Quakers in Indiana in 1862. It's not easy for them to hold to their beliefs when Southern troops pass though. Should they fight, or keep to their religious beliefs?

His final film, The Naked Edge(1961). The film Noir is about the aftermath of a theft and murder, especially the fears of Martha Radcliffe (Kerr), who, increasingly suspects her husband George Radcliffe (Cooper), whose testimony in court convicted the main suspect, of being the real culprit. Only at the end of the film we find out who the real killer is.



Among his final projects was narrating an NBC documentary, The Real West, in which he helped clear up myths about famous Western figures.

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936 ).

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936). Directed by Frank Capra, based on the story Opera Hat by Clarence Budington Kelland that appeared in serial form in the Saturday Evening Post. Cast: Gary Cooper and Jean Arthur in her first featured role. The screenplay was written by Kelland and Robert Riskin in his fifth collaboration with Capra.

In the middle of the Great Depression, Longfellow Deeds, co-owner of a tallow works, inherits 20 million dollars from his late uncle, Martin Semple. His uncle's attorney, John Cedar, locates Deeds and takes him to New York City.

Cedar gives his ex-newspaperman Cornelius Cobb, the job of keeping reporters away from the heir. He is outsmarted by reporter Louise Bennett, who gets to Deeds' by masquerading as a poor worker named Mary Dawson. She pretends to faint after "walking all day to find a job". She writes a series of articles calling him the "Cinderella Man". Meanwhile, Cedar tries to get Deeds' power of attorney in order to keep his plan a secret. Fortunately, Deeds outwits them all, but.. when he falls for a big-city girl anything can happen.



A wonderful fast pace film that never lets the viewer down. It shows the genius of Frank Capra that make us treasure films like this one.

Fun Fact: Carole Lombard was going to play the female lead but she backed out three days before production began to go work on, My Man Godfrey (1936).

Jean Arthur (October 17, 1900 – June 19, 1991). Discovered by Fox Film Studios while she was modeling in New York City in the early 1920s, Arthur debuted in the silent film, Cameo Kirby (1923), directed by John Ford. It was her distinctive voice, that helped make her a star in the talkies.

In 1935, at age 34, she starred opposite Edward G. Robinson in, The Whole Town's Talking, also directed by Ford. She was famous for being filmed almost always from the left, Arthur felt that her left was her best side. Frank Capra recounted that producer Harry Cohn described Jean Arthur's imbalanced profile as "half of it's angel, and the other half horse."

The turning point in Jean Arthur's career came when she was chosen by director Frank Capra to star in, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town. Capra had spotted her from the film, Whirlpool (1934) and convinced Cohn to have Columbia Studios sign her for his next film. Arthur co-starred in two other Capra films: You Can't Take It With You (1938) and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington(1939), both with James Stewart. She was re-teamed with Cooper, playing Calamity Jane in Cecil B. DeMille's, The Plainsman (1936) and the film, Easy Living(1937) opposite Ray Milland. In 1939, she was one of four finalists for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in, Gone with the Wind.

She continued to star in films such as Howard Hawks' Only Angels Have Wings(1939), with Cary Grant, The Talk of the Town(1942), also with Grant and The More the Merrier(1943), for which Jean Arthur was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Arthur remained Columbia's top star until the mid-1940s, when she left the studio. Stevens famously called her "one of the greatest comediennes the screen has ever seen", while Capra credited her as "my favorite actress".

Arthur "retired" when her contract with Columbia Pictures expired in 1944. For the next several years, she turned down many film offers, the two exceptions being Billy Wilder's, A Foreign Affair (1948), in which she played a congresswoman and rival of Marlene Dietrich and in the classic Western, Shane (1953), which turned out to be the biggest film of her career. The latter was her final film, and the only color film she performed in.

The Fountainhead(1949).

The Fountainhead(1949). film based on the book of the same name by Ayn Rand. Cast: Gary Cooper, Patricia Neal, Raymond Massey, Robert Douglas and Kent Smith. The film was directed by King Vidor, with the screenplay written by Rand.

Banner Critic Ellsworth Toohey, does not care for architect Roark new ideas and begins to write articles against him. Because of the articles, Roark can not find anyone who is willing to give him the oppertuity to build his own designs. He takes a job as a day laborer on a construction site, so he can make a living.

In my favorite scene Francon watches Roark from a distance and becomes immediately attracted to him and tricks Roark into her home on a pretense of a job, but is angered by his cool manor. She has no idea that he is Howard Roark, the brilliant architect.

He finally lands a job with Henry Cameron, unfortunately, within a few years Cameron drinks himself to death, warning Roark that the same fate will happen to him unless he compromises his dreams. Roark is determined to keep his integrity at all costs even when he goes on trial.

I thought the very young Patricia Neal was wonderful in this film. I also thought The handsome, Gary Cooper, was wonderful with his cool demeanor. You really can see the sparks fly between them. I have not read the book so I really do not know how the two compare.



Roark (Gary Cooper)'s courtroom speech was the longest in film history up until that time.

Patricia Neal, was best known for her roles as World War II widow Helen Benson in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), wealthy matron Emily Eustace Failenson in Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), and middle-aged housekeeper Alma Brown in Hud (1963), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress.