THE GIRL OF GOLD

MontbazillacBeautiful actress Shirley Eaton was born in London, England, on January 12, 1936. Her acting career began during her teenage years on early television in the BBC comedy series Parent-Craft (1951; with Robert Morley). Her film career got going a few years later, mainly in comedies, in which she often portrayed a blond bombshell; unlike many of her American contemporaries, however, she didn't portray the stereotypical dumb blonde. Standing 5' 10", the statuesque actress easily found roles befitting her talent and beauty. Some of her comedies include Sailor Beware! (1956), Carry On Nurse (1959; with Kenneth Connor), and Eight on the Lam (1967; with Bob Hope). Into the 1960s, however, she began moving away from comedies and starred in a number of thrillers and action adventure flicks, such as The Girl Hunters (1963; with Mickey Spillane), Ten Little Indians (1965; with Hugh O'Brian and Fabian), and The Million Eyes of Sumuru (1967; with George Nader and Frankie Avalon).In the late 1960s, following the release of The Girl from Rio (1969; with George Sanders), Eaton walked away from acting after nearly 20 years as a working actress, giving up her career to raise her two children. Married in 1958, today the still-gorgeous Eaton is a widow and remains retired from the screen but is a frequent interview subject regarding her films. Eaton published an autobiography in 2000 titled Golden Girl, which is now out of print but is available used and a must-read for her fans.The Girl Hunters (1963) is a British-made film, adapted from the 1962 Mickey Spillane pulp novel The Girl Hunters.

Mickey Spillane played Mike Hammer, one of the few occasions in film history in which an author of a popular literary hero has portrayed his own character. It also starred Bond girlShirley Eaton (Goldfinger), actor Lloyd Nolan, and Hy Gardner as himself. The film features examples of product placement in a film when Spillane and Nolan share a couple of cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Also, during the first newsstand scene, Mad Magazine #77 (March 1963) is clearly visible.

Spillane recalled meeting crime figure Billy Hill in London and invited him to the film set. According to Spillane, Hill provided firearms that were used in the film. Spillane also noted that the producers surrounded him with actors who were shorter than he was.Hill was born into a London criminal family and committed his first stabbing aged fourteen. He began as a house burglar in the late 1920s, then specialized in "smash-and-grab" raids targeting furriers and jewellers in the 1930s. During World War II, he moved into the black market, specializing in foods and petrol. He also supplied forged documents for deserting servicemen and was involved in West End protection rackets with fellow gangster Jack Spot.

In the late 1940s, he was charged with burgling a warehouse and fled to South Africa. Following an arrest there for assault, he was extradited to Britain, where he was convicted for the warehouse robbery and served time in prison. This was Billy's last jail term. After his release he met Gypsy Riley, better known as Gyp, who became his common-law wife.

In 1952, he planned the Eastcastle St. postal van robbery netting £287,000 (2010: £6,150,000), and in 1954 he organised a £40,000 bullion heist. No one was ever convicted for these robberies. He also ran smuggling operations from Morocco during this period.

In 1955 Hill wrote his memoir Boss of Britain's Underworld. In it he described his use of the shiv:

I was always careful to draw my knife down on the face, never across or upwards. Always down. So that if the knife slips you don't cut an artery. After all, chivving is chivving, but cutting an artery is usually murder. Only mugs do murder.

Hill was the mentor to Ronnie and Reggie Kray, advising them in their early criminal careers  and relations remained cordial throughout.Producer Robert Fellows intended on following the film with Spillane's The Snake but it was never made
The Blood of Fu Manchu (1968) as Black Widow

The Million Eyes of Sumuru (1967) as Sumuru

Around the World Under the Sea (1966/I) as Dr. Margaret E. 'Maggie' Hanford

Goldfinger (1964) as Jill Masterson

Rhino! (1964) as Miss Arleigh

Our Man in the Caribbean (1962)

Dentist on the Job (1961) as Jill Venner

Carry on Constable (1960) as Sally Barry

Carry on Nurse (1959) as Staff Nurse Dorothy Denton

Carry on Sergeant (1958) as Mary Sage

The Naked Truth (1957) as Melissa Right

Doctor at Large (1957) as Nan

Three Men in a Boat (1956) as Sophie Clutterbuck

Sailor Beware! (1956) as Shirley Hornett

Charley Moon (1956) as Angel Dream

The Belles of St Trinian's (1954) (uncredited) as Sixth Former

Doctor in the House (1954) as Milly Groaker

you talking to me cos I dont see anyone else here?

the most horrible villain in the history of cinema

lesbo vampire film

joan bennett

Bennett came from a famous acting family. Her father Richard was a very popular stage star. Her sister Constance was a big movie star in the 1930s, starring in the first Star Is Born-style film, What Price Hollywood?. Bennett was the youngest of three girls, and she followed her famous sister into films as a blond ingénue in such hits as Little Women. She was pretty and a nice leading lady as a blond, but no movie star. Then in her 1938 film Trade Winds, Bennett dyed her hair black in the middle of the film, and with her Hedy Lamarr hairstyle she emerged as a femme fatale.

Bennett started getting better roles in such costume dramas as The Man in the Iron Mask and The Son of Monte Christo. The turning point in her career came in 1941 when legendary director Fritz Lang cast her in Man Hunt. Playing a cockney streetwalker helping Walter Pidgeon escape the Nazis, Bennett was charming if not totally believable—but she was gorgeous.

 Finally a major star, Bennett made The Macomber Affairwith Gregory Peck and the last of her four Lang films, Secret Beyond the Door.... She ended the 1940s with the excellent The Reckless Moment directed by Max Ophüls and co-starring James Mason. Bennett then started the ‘50s playing Elizabeth's Taylor's mother in Father of the Bride, which was another big hit.Scarlet Street has been claimed by film noir. 

The real break came in 1944 with Lang’s masterpiece The Woman in the Window, co-starring Edward G. Robinson. The exciting film noir was a smash hit with a twist ending and for the first time Bennett was not only sexy, glamorous and box office, but she was fascinating as the title character opposite the superb Robinson. Bennett, Robinson and director Lang followed this hit with the classic Scarlet Street, a film so bleak and despairing that it was banned in some US states. Many film critics consider this not only Lang's greatest American film but also the peak of Bennett's career. Playing a conniving tramp with Dan Duryea in fine support, Bennett was mesmerizing as the evil Kitty.

This attribution is understandable.
The lighting is dark, with heavy use of shadows.
The characters are all shady as well.
Kitty is certainly a femme fatale, although hints are dropped that she is an inherently decent person who has become completely corrupted by Johnny.
Being the most naive, Robinson is also the most sympathetic.
But even he eventually turns to crime to fulfill his passions.

But while Scarlet Street has elements of film noir, it is in reality a black comedy.
While Robinson plays it straight throughout, Bennett and Duryea camp it up marvelously.
Bennett laughs when Robinson claims to be a painter: "And here I had you pegged as a cashier!" She also has to suppress laughter when Robinson reveals that he is married, and shock when Duryea passes her off as the mysterious painter.

Then in 1951 Bennett became involved in one of the biggest scandals of the decade. She and her agent, Jennings Lang, were in a parked car "discussing business" when Bennett’s husband, producer Walter Wanger, 

discovered them and shot Lang in the "groin," as the LA press coined it. The resulting scandal sent Wanger to prison and caused Bennett to be virtually blacklisted in Hollywood. (Bennett denied any romance, and she and Wanger remained married until 1965.)

Bennett's friend Humphrey Bogart insisted that she be his leading lady in We're No Angels, but due to the scandal and her advancing age her film career was over. Bennett’s career entered a new phase when she was cast in the Gothic TV soap Dark Shadows, which ran 5 years and earned her an Emmy nomination. Bennett died in 1990 at the age of 80.

Bennett's four films with Fritz Lang and her other 1940s work are a living testament to the beauty and talent of this lovely lady. If you have to rent one DVD from her career check out The Woman In The Window. It is a classic and more than enough to justify Bennett’s position as one of the great Hollywood stars.

edwige fenech

in like flynn

Errol Flynn was born in Hobart, Tasmania, where his father, Theodore Thomson Flynn, was a lecturer (1909) and later professor (1911) of biology at the University of Tasmania (UTAS). Flynn was born at the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Battery Point. His mother was born Lily Mary Young, but dropped the first names Lily Mary shortly after she was married and changed her name to Marelle.Flynn described his mother's family as "seafaring folk"^[ and this appears to be where his life-long interest in boats and the sea originated. Despite Flynn's claims, the evidence indicates that he was not descended from any of the Bounty mutineers. Married at St John's Church of England, Balmain North, Sydney, on 23 January 1909,^[7both of his parents were native-born Australians of Irish, English and Scottish descent, with convict links to Tasmania long before Flynn's birth Flynn, living at Mclean Avenue Chatswood, Sydney in 1926, attended Sydney Church of England Grammar School (Shore School)^[

 where he was the classmate of future Australian Prime Minister, John Gorton. He was expelled for fighting and, allegedly, having sex with a school laundress.He was also expelled from several other schools he had attended in Tasmania. At the age of 20 he moved to New Guinea where he bought a tobacco plantation, a business which failed. A copper mining venture in the hills near the Laloki Valley, behind the present national capital, Port Moresby, also failed.

In the early 1930s, Flynn left for the United Kingdom and, in 1933, snagged an acting job with the Northampton repertory company at the town's Royal Theatre, where he worked for seven months. He also performed at the 1934 Malvern Festival and in Glasgow and London's West End^]

In 1933, he starred in the Australian film In the Wake of the Bounty, directed by Charles Chauvel, and in 1934 appeared in Murder at Monte Carlo, produced at the Warner Bros. Teddington Studios, UK. This latter film is now considered a lost film. During the filming of Murder at Monte Carlo, Flynn was discovered by a Warner Brothers executive, signed to a contract and immigrated to America as a contract actor. He became a naturalised citizen of the United States in 1942, eight months after America entered World War II.

 

Flynn as Captain Blood

Flynn was an overnight sensation in his first starring role, Captain Blood (1935). Quickly typecast as a swashbuckler, he followed it with The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936). After his appearance as Miles Hendon in The Prince and the Pauper (1937), he was cast in his most celebrated role as Robin Hood in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). He went on to appear in The Dawn Patrol (1938) with his close friend David Niven, Dodge City (1939), The Sea Hawk (1940) and Adventures of Don Juan (1948).

Working throughout his career with a cross section of Hollywood's best fight arrangers, Flynn became noted for his fast-paced sword fights as seen in The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Sea Hawk and Captain Blood.

Flynn co-starred with Olivia de Havilland in eight films: Captain Blood (1935), The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), Four's a Crowd (1938), Dodge City (1939), The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939), Santa Fe Trail (1940), and They Died with Their Boots On (1941)

While Flynn acknowledged his attraction to de Havilland, film historian Rudy Behlmer's assertions that they were romantically involved during the filming of Robin Hood (see the Special Edition of Robin Hood on DVD, 2003) have been disputed by de Havilland. In an interview for Turner Classic Movies, she said that their relationship was platonic, mostly because Flynn was already married to Lili Damita. The Adventures of Robin Hood was Flynn's first film in Technicolor.

During the shooting of The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939), Flynn and co-star Bette Davis quarrelled off-screen, causing Davis to allegedly strike him harder than necessary while filming a scene. Although their relationship was always strained, Warner Bros. co-starred them twice. Their off-screen relationship was later resolved. A contract was even drawn up to lend them out for the roles of Rhett Butler and Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind, but that prospect failed to materialise.

Flynn was a member of the Hollywood Cricket Club with David Niven. His suave, debonair, and devil-may-care attitude toward both ladies and life has been immortalised in the English language by author Benjamin S. Johnson as, "Errolesque," in his treatise on the subject, An Errolesque Philosophy on Life.

As Capt. Nelson in Objective, Burma! (1945).

When Flynn became a naturalised American citizen on 15 August 1942, he also became eligible for the military draft, as the United States had entered World War II eight months earlier. Grateful to the country that had given him fame and wealth, Flynn attempted to join every branch of the armed services. But Flynn had several health problems. His heart was enlarged, with a murmur, and he'd already suffered at least one heart attack. That was not all: he had recurrent malaria (contracted in New Guinea), chronic back pain (for which he self-medicated with morphine and later, with heroin), lingering chronic tuberculosis, and numerous venereal diseases. Flynn, famous for his athletic roles and promoted as a paragon of physical beauty, was classified – unqualified for military service for not meeting the physical fitness standards.

This created a public image problem for both Flynn and Warner Brothers. Flynn was often criticised for his failure to enlist while continuing to play war heroes in films. The studios' failure to counter the criticism was due to a desire to hide the state of Flynn's health.

By the 1950s, Flynn had become a parody of himself. Heavy alcohol and drug abuse left him prematurely aged and bloated, but he won acclaim as a drunken ne'er-do-well in The Sun Also Rises (1957), and as his idol John Barrymore in Too Much, Too Soon (1958). As a curious postscript to his life of adventure, Flynn went to Cuba in late 1958 to meet with the rebel leader Fidel Castro. Flynn was a great supporter of Castro and narrated a short movie titled Cuban Story:The Truth About Fidel Castro Revolution,one of his last works as an actor. His autobiography, My Wicked, Wicked Ways, was published shortly after his death and contains humorous anecdotes about Hollywood. According to one literary critic, the book "remains one of the most compelling and appalling autobiographies written by a Hollywood star, or anyone else for that matter".Flynn wanted to call the book In Like Me, but the publisher refused. In 1984, CBS produced a television film based on Flynn's autobiography, starring Duncan Regehr as Flynn.

Flynn starred in a 1956 anthology series The Errol Flynn Theatre that was filmed in England, where he presented the episodes and sometimes appeared in them. About this time he also guest starred on NBC's comedy/variety show, The Martha Raye Show.

Flynn and Beverly Aadland met with Stanley Kubrick to discuss appearing together in Lolita.
Flynn's adventure novel Showdown, was published in 1946. His first book, Beam Ends, an autobiographical account of his sailing trips around Australia, had been published in 1937.
Flynn had a reputation for womanising, consumption of alcohol and brawling. His freewheeling, hedonistic lifestyle caught up with him in November 1942 when two under-age girls, Betty Hansen and Peggy Satterlee, accused him of statutory rape. A group was organised to support Flynn, named the American Boys' Club for the Defense of Errol Flynn (ABCDEF); its members included William F. Buckley, Jr The trial took place in January and February 1943, and Flynn was cleared of the charges. The incident served to increase his reputation as a ladies' man, which led to the popular phrase "in like Flynn."

 

Flynn and first wife Lili Damita at Los Angeles airport in 1941.

Flynn was married three times: to actress Lili Damita from 1935 until 1942 (one son, Sean Flynn, born 1941, reported missing in Cambodia in 1970 and presumed dead); to Nora Eddington from 1943 until 1949 (two daughters, Deirdre born 1945 and Rory born 1947); and to actress Patrice Wymore from 1950 until his death (one daughter, Arnella Roma, 1953–98). In Hollywood, he tended to refer to himself as Irish rather than Australian (his father Theodore Thomson Flynn had been a biologist and a professor at the Queen's University of Belfast in Northern Ireland during the latter part of his career). Flynn lived with Wymore in Port Antonio, Jamaica in the 1950s. He was largely responsible for developing tourism to this area, and for a while owned the Titchfield Hotel, which was decorated by the artist Olga Lehmann. He also popularised trips down rivers on bamboo rafts.
Flynn was a long-time friend of the painter Boris Smirnoff, who painted his portrait several times, as well as those of Lili Damita, Patrice Wymore and celebrity friends such as Edward G. Robinson, Jean Harlow, Norma Shearer and Barbara Stanwyck.

In the late 1950s, Flynn met and courted the 15-year-old Beverly Aadland at the Hollywood Professional School, casting her in his final film, Cuban Rebel Girls (1959). According to Aadland, he planned to marry her and move to their new house in Jamaica, but during a trip together to Vancouver, British Columbia, he died of a heart attack at the age of 50.

His only son, Sean, an actor and later a noted war correspondent, disappeared in Cambodia in 1970 during the Vietnam War while working as a freelance photojournalist for Time magazine.Flynn was presumed dead in 1971, probably murdered by the communist Khmer Rouge. In 1984, he was officially declared dead in a granted petition of declaration sought by his mother, Lili Damita. Sean's life was recounted in Inherited Risk by Jeffrey Meyers (Simon & Schuster), and he is also mentioned on page 194 in the Colleagues section of Dispatches by Michael Herr.

Flynn's daughter Rory has one son, Sean Rio Flynn, named after her half-brother. He is an actor.^[Rory Flynn has written a book about her father entitled The Baron of Mulholland: A Daughter Remembers Errol Flynn.

Errol Flynn's coffin on Los Angeles Union Station train platform in 1959.

Flynn flew with Aadland to Vancouver on 9 October 1959, to lease his yacht Zaca to millionaire George Caldough. On 14 October, Caldough was driving Flynn to the airport when Flynn felt ill. He was taken to the apartment of Caldough's friend, Dr. Grant Gould, uncle of pianist Glenn Gould. A party ensued, with Flynn regaling guests with stories and impressions. Feeling ill again, he announced "I shall return" and retired to a bedroom to rest. A half hour later, Aadland checked in on him and discovered him unconscious. Flynn had suffered a heart attack. According to the Vancouver Sun (16 December 2006), "When Errol Flynn came to town in 1959 for a week-long binge that ended with him dying in a West End apartment, his local friends propped him up at the Hotel Georgia lounge so that everyone would see him." The story is a myth; following Flynn's death, his body was turned over to a coroner (George Brayshaw), who performed an autopsy, and released his body to his next of kin.

In 1961, Florence Aadland co-authored with Tedd Thomey The Big Love, a book alleging Flynn was involved in a sexual relationship with her 15-year-old daughter, actress Beverly.It was later made into a play starring Tracey Ullman.

In 1980, author Charles Higham published a controversial biography, Errol Flynn: The Untold Story, in which he alleged that Flynn was a fascist sympathiser who spied for the Nazis before and during World War The book also alleged he was bisexual.The only problem with this is that bisexuality doesn't exist as a sexual state.In 2000, Higham wrote an article that also claimed that Flynn was previously accused of sympathising with Adolf Hitler based on his association with Dr. Hermann Erben, an Austrian who served in the German military intelligence, and that declassified files held by the CIA show that, in an intercepted letter in September 1933, Flynn wrote to Erben: "A slimy Jew is trying to cheat me… I do wish we could bring Hitler over here to teach these Isaacs a thing or two. The bastards have absolutely no business probity or honour whatsoever."Unreleased MI5 files held by the British Home Office were claimed in 2000 to demonstrate Flynn worked for the Allies during the war. That Flynn was bisexual was also claimed by David Bret in Errol Flynn: Satan's Angel, although Bret denounced the Nazi claims.

Subsequent biographies – notably Tony Thomas' Errol Flynn: The Spy Who Never Was (Citadel, 1990) and Buster Wiles' My Days With Errol Flynn: The Autobiography of a Stuntman (Roundtable, 1988) – have rejected Higham's claims as pure fabrication. Flynn's political leanings, say these biographies, appear to have been leftist: he was a supporter of the Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War and of the Cuban Revolution, even narrating a documentary titled Cuban Story^[ shortly before his death. Flynn defended his visit to Cuba in an appearance on a Canadian Broadcasting Company television game show Front Page Challenge early in 1959. According to his autobiography, he considered Fidel Castro a close personal friend and drinking partner.