June 1957
Step back in time to see what area movie theaters
were presenting in June 1957. Film titles are linked to the Internet
Movie Database.
For more information about these theaters,
see Cinema
Treasures or Water
Winter Wonderland.
Fifty
years before Andy Griffith's delightful performance in Waitress,
he made his film debut in Elia Kazan's A
Face in the Crowd (with Patricia Neal) at the Michigan in Ann
Arbor. Also at that theater was Gun
for a Coward, with Fred MacMurray, who in the mid-1950s "emulated
Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea and kept his career going with budget-price
actioners, mostly Westerns" (The Great Movie Stars, David
Shipman).
Also
popular at the Michigan were The
Iron Petticoat (Bob Hope and Katharine Hepburn) and The
D.I., starring Jack Webb (Joe Friday on the television show Dragnet).
Making their film debuts were Anthony Franciosa in This
Could Be the Night (with Jean Simmons and Paul Douglas), and James
MacArthur in The
Young Stranger. Sci-fi fans enjoyed a twin bill of 20
Million Miles to Earth and The
27th Day. Cartoons included To
Catch a Woodpecker (Woody Woodpecker) and Piker's
Peak (Bugs Bunny).
At
the Redford's screening of Oklahoma!
(1955), moviegoers could "Enjoy This Great Musical With The Benefit
of Full Stereophonic Sound". Other Redford highlights included The
Wings of Eagles (John Wayne); Heaven
Knows, Mr. Allison (Deborah Kerr and Robert Mitchum); and The
Rainmaker (Burt Lancaster and Katharine Hepburn). Second features
included The
Halliday Brand (Joseph Cotten) and The
Tall T (Randolph Scott, Maureen O'Sullivan). Children enjoyed
a double bill of Cinderella
(1950) and The
Brave One.
For
art film fans, the Studio and World in Detroit cashed in on the success
of Federico Fellini's La
Strada (1954) with that director's earlier film The
Young and Passionate
(1953), which played as I Vitelloni at the Detroit Film Theatre
in January 2004. Also showing Italian movies was the Temple Art CinemaThe
Bicycle Thief (1948) and Paisan
(1946). At the Krim, Invitation
to the Dance followed Funny
Face. In Ann Arbor, the Campus showed The
Most Noble Lady (Yang Kwei Fei), starring Machiko Kyo,
"the Japanese Enchantress of Gate
of Hell and Rashomon".
In
downtown Detroit, the Grand Circus Park underground parking garage opened,
which made it easier for visitors to the Madison, Adams, Fox, United Artists
and other downtown theaters. At the Michigan in Detroit, Debbie Reynolds
sang her hit song "Tammy" in Tammy
and the Bachelor, which Helen Bower of the Detroit Free Press
called "hot weather entertainment for the family trade." (June
27, 1957)
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