The Men Who Made the Movies: King Vidor

Overview of director King Vidor's filmography.

The Spoilers

On a voyage to Nome, Roy Glenister, one of the several owners of a rich mine, The Midas, is captivated by Helen Chester, while he both fascinates and disquiets her by his primitive nature. He arrives to find his partners, Slapjack Simms and Joe Dextry, befuddled by a trio of no-gooders: Voorhees, the U. S. marshal, Judge Stillman, and McNamara, a politician. Their racket is to cloud title to the various mine claims, eject the miners, and make McNamara owner of the disputed properties.

Variety Girl

Dozens of star and character-actor cameos and a message about the Variety Club (a show-business charity) are woven into a framework about two hopeful young ladies who come to Hollywood, exchange identities, and cause comic confusion (with slapstick interludes) throughout the Paramount studio.

The Adventures of Marco Polo

The Venetian traveler Marco Polo meets Kublai Khan and foils a plotter with fireworks in medieval China.

Operator 13

American Civil War, 1862. After the disaster of the Second Battle of Bull Run, Major Allen, chief of the Secret Service of the Union, asks actress Gail Loveless to become one of his operators and infiltrate enemy territory.

Barbara Stanwyck: Straight Down The Line

Born Ruby Stevens, she was orphaned when she was four. A chance audition led to a chorus job. By 17 she was a Ziegfeld Girl. At 20 she earned excellent reviews for a bit part in a Broadway play — and she had a new name: Barbara Stanwyck.

Lightnin' Wins

Lightnin' the dog and his master, Tom Harding are on to a group of smugglers who operate down at the harbor. Tom nearly bags them, but he's overwhelmed and they take flight. His girlfriend bluffs her way into the gang's hideout, but is discovered and held back. Tom is again overpowered by the crooks and thrown in a secret dungeon, but he fights his way out.

Lightnin' Flashes

Lightnin' tries to save agent Eileen Sedgwick and her rich boyfriend from the infamous webs of the Spider.

Only the Brave

Cooper is a Union Army officer who after being jilted by girlfriend, Virginia Bruce, volunteers on what could be a suicide mission. He volunteers to go behind enemy lines disguised in Confederate gray as a staff officer to Robert E. Lee. He's to ride to a certain plantation which is a local brigade headquarters and deliberately let himself be caught with maps showing false Union troop positions. Of course, the penalty, then as now, is execution.

Seven Days Leave

In London, during WWI, a lonely woman who wants to feel a part of the war effort pretends to her friends to have a son fighting in the war. She is shocked when he shows up on her doorstep, and they make an agreement that he will pretend to be her son. "Seven Days Leave" is a screen adaption of James M. Barrie's play, "The Old Lady Shows Her Medals."

Oops, Those Hollywood Bloopers!

A collection of bloopers and outtakes from an enormous selection of Hollywood classic productions spanning from the 1930s through the 1980s.

Three Pals

The daughter of a Kentucky colonel returns from her European finishing school to help prove his innocence as he is accused of killing a major with whom he had a feud over money.

Wolf Song

In 1840, Sam Lash heads west for adventure. He meets up with some Mountain Men, and they head for the Rockies to trap beavers and cats. In Taos he meets Lola, a beautiful Mexican girl from a proud and rich family. They fall in love and he persuades her to elope with him. After they get married, Sam is torn between his love for Lola and his yearn for traveling.

A Six Shootin' Romance

"Lightning" Jack inherits a ranch. Unfortunately, he is forced to share his inheritance with Donaldeen Travis, a snobbish debutante type who arrives from the East with her mammy and sister in tow. Donaldeen takes an immediate dislike to the uncouth "Lightning" and spends time instead with smooth-talking neighbor Currier King.

Breakdowns of 1944

Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1944.

Goldwyn: The Man and His Movies

The life and work of Samuel Goldwyn, a Polish-born glove salesman who became one of Hollywood's greatest independent producers, is remembered in this classy documentary created for the PBS American Masters series. Based on A. Scott Berg's acclaimed biography, the film includes new interviews with Goldwyn's surviving family members as well as vintage interviews with such luminaries as Bette Davis, John Huston, Laurence Olivier and others.

Memo for Joe

Documentary short film extolling the virtues of the American Community Chest charity program and its value to the Allied war effort.

Betrayal

André Frey, a bohemian artist, woos and wins a rustic Swiss maid, promising to return to her after a visit to the city. The girl, Vroni, finds herself pregnant and is forced by her father to marry Poldi Moser, the mayor of the small Swiss town. Moser and Vroni are happy together, and two sons are born to them. André returns to the village periodically and finally asks Vroni to go away with him. She refuses, and he writes her an angry note. That evening, Vroni and André are involved in a toboggan accident; Vroni is killed outright, and André ...

A Man from Wyoming

A story about a man from Wyoming who enlists in the Army and is sent to the front during World War I. There he saves the life of an American society girl working in the Ambulance Corps. Afterwards at a rest camp, they meet again, fall in love, and are secretly married.

The Legion of the Condemned

Finding his sweetheart, Christine, in the arms of a German officer, Price joins the French Air Legion. Christine is later revealed to be the spy whom Price has been ordered to drop behind enemy lines. They are reconciled, are captured by the Germans, and are rescued by his unit.