October 1951
Step back in time to see what area movie theaters
were presenting in October 1951. Film titles are linked to the Internet
Movie Database.
For more information about these theaters,
see Cinema
Treasures or Water
Winter Wonderland.
The
Day the Earth Stood Still with Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal,
and Hugh Marlowe opened in Detroit at the Fox Theater on Friday, October
12, 1951. It had earlier opened in New York City on September 18, 1951
and in Los Angeles on September 28, 1951.
Also
on the bill with The
Day the Earth Stood Still at the Fox in
Detroit was Obsessed
(David Farrar, Geraldine Fitzgerald). These movies succeeded a twin bill
of Meet
Me After the Show (Betty Grable, Macdonald Carey) and Corky
of Gasoline Alley (Jimmy Lydon).
"Out
in space inhabitants of other planets are watching the earth with great
apprehension," wrote Detroit Free Press movie reviewer Helen
Bower on October 13, 1951. "Or so 'The Day the Earth Stood Still'
at the Fox Theater would have us believe. Probably this movie is a 'first'
as a science-fiction 'message' picture."
"If
we get to monkeying around with atomic power aggressively enough to bother
other planets, our hash is going to be settled in short order, according
to this science fiction thriller, undoubtedly the best of the cycle to
reach the screen thus far," wrote Al Weitschat in The Detroit
News on October 13, 1951. "'The Day the Earth Stood Still' is
excellently done in its technical aspects, and it has a provocative theme
to go with its weirdly exciting doings. It achieves a realism highly essential
in films of this type."
Other
downtown Detroit movies when The
Day the Earth Stood Still opened were The
Man with a Cloak (Joseph Cotten, Barbara Stanwyck, Louis Calhern,
Leslie Caron) at the United Artists; Jim
ThorpeAll American (Burt Lancaster) at the Palms; A
Place in the Sun (Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, Shelley
Winters) at the Michigan; David
and Bathsheba (Gregory Peck, Susan Hayward) at the Madison; and
Texas
Carnival (Esther Williams, Red Skelton, Howard Keel) at the Adams.
The
Redford was screening a double feature of On
Moonlight Bay (Doris Day, Gordon MacRae) and Warpath
(Edmond O'Brien). The Senate was showing a twin bill of Captain
Horatio Hornblower (Gregory Peck, Virginia Mayo) and Secrets
of Monte Carlo (Warren Douglas). Art house films in Detroit included
Tales
of Hoffmann (Moira Shearer) at the Cinema and Jean Cocteau's Orpheus
(Jean Marais) at the Studio.
The
Day the Earth Stood Still played for one
week at the Fox until October 18, before being replaced with The
Desert Fox (James Mason, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Jessica Tandy)
and The
Son of Dr. Jekyll (Louis Hayward).
The
Day the Earth Stood Still began its Detroit
neighborhood run on Sunday, November 25, 1951, when it opened at the Redford
and other theaters. It played at the Redford with The
Hollywood Story (Richard Conte) for three days until Tuesday,
November 27.
Ann
Arbor audiences were treated to the opening of The
Day the Earth Stood Still at the State on
Sunday, November 18, 1951, after a run of A
Streetcar Named Desire. The
Day the Earth Stood Still played at the
State for four days with the cartoons Brooklyn
Goes to Beantown and Vegetable
Vaudeville. It was replaced on November 22 with Sunny
Side of the Street (Frankie Laine).
Also
in Ann Arbor on November 18 were The
Desert Fox (James Mason, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Jessica Tandy)
at the Michigan; That
Midnight Kiss (Kathryn Grayson, Mario Lanza) at the Orpheum; The
Burning Question (AKA Reefer Madness) and Guilty
Parents at the Whitney; and Mr.
Belvedere Rings the Bell (Clifton Webb) and Passage
West (John Payne) at the Wuerth.
The
Day the Earth Stood Still returned to Ann
Arbor on January 1, 1952 for a four-day run at the Wuerth with Lullaby
of Broadway (Doris Day, Gene Nelson).
PDF
of newspaper images relating to the opening of The
Day the Earth Stood Still.
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