Letter & Speech from ‘Meet John Doe’
A quick search yielded no hits, so here’s the letter from Frank Capra’s 1941 film, Meet John Doe.
“The Blockbuster,” a Primary Source Analysis
Note: The following short essay looks at Robert Lindsey’s “All Hollywood Loves a Blockbuster—And Chips Off the Old Blockbuster,” an article published in the New York Times in May 1976. The analysis was originally submitted for course credit at Queens College in October 2016. I later covered the topic in greater detail here. It has long
‘Play It Again, Sam’: Re-selling and Re-watching Hollywood’s Classics, 1946-49.
For most of the studio era in Hollywood, movies were defined by a particular sense of impermanence. Produced in a matter of weeks and circulated only until they failed to earn more than the potential of the new film on deck, the life of most motion pictures in the thirties and forties was decidedly short-lived.
The Emergence of the Modern Blockbuster in the 1970s
As Hollywood prepared to enter the 1970s, its future had never been less assured. Recognizing this, the National Association of Theatre Owners—the leading trade organization for film exhibitors—hosted their November 1969 convention centered around the theme: “The Challenge and Response to the Unconventional ’70s.” The organization’s president, Julian S. Rifkin, in his introduction to the