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The Film Programs of the Detroit Film Theatre, Michigan Theater, and Redford Theatre

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Gaylord Carter Plays at Redford (May 1981)

May Looking Back: 1925 1931 1932 1956 1957 1981 1982

Look What's Coming!

Get a world of laughs at the Alliance Francaise Comedy Film Shorts Series at the DFT May 31.
Learn more about the grieving process in the documentary Transforming Loss at the Michigan May 30.

The renovated Redford re-opens with Julie Andrews flying high as Mary Poppins July 12-13.

 

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Looking Back

March 1956

Step back in time to see what area movie theaters were presenting in March 1956. Film titles are linked to the Internet Movie Database.

For more information about these theaters, see Cinema Treasures or Water Winter Wonderland.


Popular movies at the Redford included the melodramatic All That Heaven Allows (with Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson), The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (Gary Cooper), and The Rains of Ranchipur (Lana Turner). On Saturday afternoons, Special Kiddie Cartoon Parties promised "Loads of Cartoons...Lots of Fun!"

On March 1, the Fox Theatre presented the musical Carousel, which had a 50th anniversary showing at the Redford on March 17 and 18, 2006. Carousel was described as the first motion picture in the new "richer, deeper, clearer" CinemaScope 55 format. Interestingly, another Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1955) continued at the United Artists as "the first motion picture produced in Todd-AO [a 70-mm widescreen format]...the most revolutionary of all screen inventions!"

The auditorium of the Detroit Institute of Arts hosted a 1955 German film about World War II, The Devil's General. Also in the auditorium was the premiere of Summer Cinderella by the Grass Roots Opera group. Pro Musica Antiqua performed medieval, renaissance and baroque music on period instruments.

The Michigan Theater had the good luck to be showing The Rose Tattoo the week that the film's star, Anna Magnani, won a Best Actress Oscar for her performance. A week later, the Michigan hosted the other Oscar-winning lead performance of 1955—Ernest Borgnine in Marty. Meanwhile, Ann Arbor area moviegoers got an early start on summer with the opening of the Ypsi-Ann and Scio Drive-In Theatres on March 16.


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This web site is not affiliated with the Detroit Film Theatre, the Michigan Theater, or the Redford Theatre.

Web Site copyright © 2013 by Robert Hollberg Smith, Jr.

Launched November 25, 2005.

Last updated May 15, 2013.

Graphics courtesy of the Absolute Web Graphics Archive and Christmas Graphics Plus.

Videos courtesy of YouTube and Turner Classic Movies.