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

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Looking Back

July 1932/1957/1982

Step back in time to see what our movie palaces were presenting in July 1932, 1957, and 1982. Also included is some interesting history about other area movie theaters. Film titles are linked to the Internet Movie Database.

* 1932 * 1957 * 1982 *

1932

"Wednesday is Bargain Day at Ann Arbor movie theaters, too," read a July 19, 1932 article in The Ann Arbor Daily News. "Swinging into line with the purveyors of dry goods, groceries, hardware, men's suits and babies' bottles, the sellers of entertainment and relaxation at the Majestic, Michigan and Wuerth theaters have been instructed to dispose of admission tickets for the afternoon performances for one dime each."

For this price, Michigan moviegoers could see Million Dollar Legs (Jack Oakie and W.C. Fields) or Jean Harlow's latest, Red-Headed Woman. Also showing this month were What Price Hollywood? (starring Constance Bennett and directed by George Cukor), Winner Take All (James Cagney), and Fast Companions, with Tom Brown, James Gleason, Maureen O'Sullivan ("That Tarzan Girl") and a young Mickey Rooney. The Saturday morning Children's Show on July 30 included Destry Rides Again (with Tom Mix) and a "5¢ Ann Arbor Dairy Frostbite for every child!"

Like some other Detroit movie theaters, the Redford closed down for part of the summer. The month started with the drama Man About Town (Warner Baxter and Karen Morley). Then came the mystery The Woman in Room 13, with Elissa Landi, who was "beautiful, capable and charming," but not a box office attraction (The Great Movie Stars, David Shipman). On July 6 and 7, George Bancroft and Miriam Hopkins headlined World and the Flesh, a drama about the 1917 Russian revolution. Then the Redford went dark until Oct. 7, when it re-opened with The First Year.

Other highlights of the Detroit movie month included the opening of the real life adventure Frank Buck's Bring 'Em Back Alive at the "Carefully Cooled" RKO Downtown. At the Fox, Marian Nixon starred as Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. At the Majestic in Ann Arbor, all seats were reserved for the three-day run of the heavily publicized Grand Hotel, featuring "the greatest aggregation of screen luminaries ever assembled before a motion picture camera as a picture cast." (Allison Ind, The Ann Arbor Daily News, July 8, 1932)

"A film that is expected by that portion of Hollywood who have seen portions of it, to prove one the season's hits, is 'Kong', " wrote George Schaffer in The Detroit Free Press on July 18, 1932. "It's a fanciful mystery thriller showing what happened to New York when a giant gorilla of antedeluvian size—25 feel tall—and other prehistoric beasts ran loose in Manhattan." So went the advance buzz for King Kong, which you can see at the Redford on July 20 and 21, 2007.

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1957

In Detroit movie theaters, two famous screen beauties rode a high wave of popularity. "What a transformation has taken place in the girl who came to Detroit eight or nine years ago!" wrote Helen Bower of the Detroit Free Press about Marilyn Monroe, starring in The Prince and the Showgirl at the Michigan. "She was colorless and inarticulate, the cocoon from which this brilliant butterfly has emerged." (July 5, 1957)

Sophia Loren seemed to be everywhere in Detroit. At the art film houses World and Studio, she starred with Vittoria De Sica in The Gold of Naples (1954). The Michigan premiered The Pride and the Passion (co-starring Cary Grant and Frank Sinatra). And the Redford screened Boy on a Dolphin, also with Alan Ladd and Clifton Webb (on a double bill with Funny Face, starring Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire).

Other popular movies at the Redford were Three Violent People (Charlton Heston, Anne Baxter); Designing Woman (Gregory Peck, Lauren Bacall); The Spirit of St. Louis (James Stewart, Murray Hamilton); and Gunfight at the O.K. Corrall (Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas). The Children's Matinee on July 20 included Stormy, the Thoroughbred (1954); Ben and Me (1953); Challenge to Lassie (1949); and a "Popeye Cartoon Jamboree".

"How to win wives and influence sweethearts!" read the July 1, 1957 Ann Arbor News advertisement for the Campus, State and Michigan theaters. "Butterfield Theatres' Summertime Hit Parade—Wonderful Pictures! Big Screen Thrills. Nothing like a good movie to 'Sweeten' a romance!!!"

The Michigan gave patrons Something of Value, with Rock Hudson, Dana Wynter and Sidney Poitier. In Man on Fire, ads said that "Bing Crosby performs as he did in The Country Girl—Brilliantly, Feelingly, Memorably!" Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis breathed in the Sweet Smell of Success. Other big hits were Fire Down Below (Rita Hayworth, Robert Mitchum, Jack Lemmon) and Billy Wilder's Love in the Afternoon, with Gary Cooper, Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier.

At the Music Hall in Detroit, the Cinerama feature Seven Wonders of the World entered its twelfth month. Other movies continuing their 1957-long runs in Detroit were Around the World in 80 Days (United Artists) and The Ten Commandments (Madison). At the Fox in Detroit, pop singer Pat Boone's first movie, Bernardine, was followed by Elvis Presley's latest, Loving You. On July 24, Detroit moviegoers picked between the openings of The Delicate Delinquent (Jerry Lewis) at the Fox and Silk Stockings (Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse) at the Krim.

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1982

Like in 2007, science fiction movies from the 1950s were shown in the afternoon at the Detroit Institute of Arts. The Afternoon Film Theatre launched a four-month tribute to sci-fi flicks with Destination Moon (1950) and The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). Later films in the series included two movies shown in the summer of 2007 as part of the Saturday afternoon film series of the Detroit Film Theatre—20 Million Miles to Earth (1957) and Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956).

Visitors to the 1982 Ann Arbor Art Fair found relief from the crowds at a continuous showing of short comedies at the Michigan Theatre (from noon to 11 p.m.). On Friday, July 23, the Three Stooges yukked it up, followed on Saturday by Warner Brothers cartoons starring Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd. Howard Hawks directed Michigan double bills of Only Angel Have Wings (1939)/Sergeant York (1941) and The Big Sleep (1946)/To Have and Have Not (1944). Foreign film fans enjoyed Children of Paradise (1945), which returns to the Michigan on Sept. 2 and 4, 2007.

At the Redford on July 16 and 17, moviegoers rode "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe", as Judy Garland, Ray Bolger and Virginia O'Brien starred in The Harvey Girls (1946). On July 30 and 31, a Laurel and Hardy Festival showcased this comedic duo in the silent movie From Soup to Nuts (1928) and the talkie Way Out West (1937).

The Redford's owner, the Motor City Theatre Organ Society, sponsored a July 9 Fox Theatre showing of the Douglas Fairbanks silent film Robin Hood (1922). The screening was accompanied by a 36-piece version of the Ann Arbor Chamber Orchestra and was part of the American Theatre Organ Society convention.

Along with the blockbuster E.T., summer movies included several sequels (Rocky III, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn, Grease 2 and Death Wish II). Other enduring favorites made their debut, like Diner, Blade Runner and Poltergeist.

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