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

Your Guide to Classic Movie Theater Fun!

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Looking Back

June 1931/1956/1981

Step back in time to see what our movie palaces were presenting in June 1931, 1956, and 1981. Also included is some interesting history about other area movie theaters and the Detroit Institute of Arts. Film titles are linked to the Internet Movie Database.

* 1931 * 1956 * 1981 *

1931

"The feature play of a motion picture theater is no more the place for advertising than are the pages of a novel," wrote Ann Arbor Daily News movie columnist Allison Ind on June 3, 1931. Ind was applauding the decisions by the Paramount and Warner Brothers movie studios to stop "sponsored screen advertising" (product placement), because of its possible negative effect on attendance.

In June 1931, Ann Arbor movie fans flocked to the Michigan Theater to see The Front Page, along with early films of Barbara Stanwyck (Ten Cents a Dance) and Spencer Tracy (Six Cylinder Love). Michigan audiences also enjoyed guest organist Don Miller, whose performances included original and classical compositions.

Both the Michigan and Redford showed City Streets, a crime drama starring Gary Cooper and Sylvia Sidney that was one of the most popular films of the year. The Redford lineup for Sunday, June 28 included two movies whose titles and stars haved faded into the ancient, obscure past: Young Sinners (with silent film star Thomas Meighan and Hardie Albright) and Sky Raiders (Lloyd Hughes and Marceline Day).

Also playing at the Redford was Norma Shearer in Strangers May Kiss, which appeared the same week that Shearer's widely publicized new film, A Free Soul, opened at the Paramount in downtown Detroit (Broadway and Grand Circus Park).

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1956

Melodies and mutants mixed it up at the Redford in a double bill of the Bing Crosby musical Anything Goes and the science fiction classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Humphrey Bogart made his last screen appearance in The Harder the Fall (on a twin bill with Mario Lanza's Serenade).

Box office powerhouses Carousel and Picnic also hit the Redford screen, long after they had opened in downtown Detroit. In a preview of the Redford's current programming, the clock was turned back a few years for a double feature of River of No Return (1954) and Titanic (1953).

Trapeze, starring Burt Lancaster and Italian sex symbol Gina Lollobrigida, opened on June 28 at the Michigan in Ann Arbor and the Madison in Detroit (Woodward and Grand Circus Park). Harold Heffernan of the Detroit News noted the trend towards Italian actors and actresses in Hollywood movies (which included Sophia Loren and recent Oscar winner Anna Magnani).

Also showing at the Michigan was D-Day the Sixth of June, a war film with Robert Taylor, Richard Todd and Dana Wynter. With summer heat rising, the Michigan touted its "perfection in modern cooling."

Detroit News Art Editor Joy Hakonson promoted a series of Detroit Institute Arts-related television shows on Channel 56 ("Detroit's Educational Television Station"). Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., host Franklin Page presented programs that included "Chinese Painting, Calligraphy and Porcelain."

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1981

With the Detroit Film Theatre on summer vacation, art film lovers enjoyed the Australian film Breaker Morant at the Maple 1-2-3 in Bloomfield Hills and at the Ann Arbor Theater (5th and Liberty). Also showing at the Maple was the Russian film Oblomov, while the Ann Arbor Theater screened a popular film from the most recent DFT season—Bye Bye Brazil.

At the Michigan Theatre, the Classic Film Theatre handled all of the programming in June 1981. The spotlight hit directors Francois Truffaut (The Wild Child (1970), The Man Who Loved Women (1977) and Two English Girls (1971)) and Alfred Hitchcock (The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), The 39 Steps (1935) and Secret Agent (1936)).

Double bills of films starring prominent current actors also were featured at the Michigan. Al Pacino starred in Serpico (1973) and Dog Day Afternoon (1975), while Gene Wilder appeared in Silver Streak (1976) and The Producers (1968).

On June 12, the Redford presented Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy in The Girl of the Golden West (1938). Two weeks later, Basil Rathbone was on the case in Sherlock Holmes and the Scarlet Claw (1944) and Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943). A Giant Garage Sale at the Redford on June 5 and 6 promised "Hundreds of Bargains!"

All of these theaters tried their best to compete with the flood of new summer movies, which included For Your Eyes Only, The Cannonball Run, Superman II and (biggest of all) Raiders of the Lost Ark.

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