On Area Movie Screens – Sept. 30, 1953

We'll close out the week (and September as well) with a look at what was playing on local movie screens seventy years ago this month. Above is the movie page from the September 30, 1953 Lorain Journal. 

Opening the next day at the Ohio Theatre were perennial Lorain favorites Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall and the Bowery Boys in Loose In London. 

In this installment of the popular movie comedy series, the gang travels to London so that Sach (Huntz Hall) can claim his inheritance. Here's the movie trailer:

(I remember the first time I saw the Bowery Boys was in the early 1970s, when Channel 43 showed the old comedies on Sunday mornings, billing them as the Dead End Kids. My brothers and I were soon imitating Huntz Hall, wearing our baseball caps with the brim turned up as we shouted, "Hey, Chief!")

For theater goers who preferred more mature movie fare, there was Gentlemen Prefer Blondes at the Tivoli with Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell. (Contrary to the movie title, and I'm probably in the minority, but I prefer Jane Russell to Marilyn, especially since Miss Russell made a lot of appearances in Westerns.)

It's interesting that Howard Hawks was the movie's director. He was also the director of some of John Wayne's best films, including Red River, Rio Bravo and El Dorado, as well as Hatari and Rio Lobo.

Elsewhere on the movie page, we had Audie Murphy (another GRIT TV favorite of mine) in The Duel at Silver Creek (1952) playing at the Lorain Drive-in. It was a pretty good Don Siegel-directed movie – with Lee Marvin in it too! (BTW, during her last few years living at home, Mom was a real Audie Murphy fan too, watching all of his movies on GRIT.)

But what about the Duke?

Contrary to his normal Western roles, at that time John Wayne was starring as The Quiet Man at the Dreamland. It's one of my favorite John Wayne movies, and I watch it on DVD (or TV if it's on) every St. Patrick's Day like a true Irishman.