TCM's 31 Days of Oscar

The calendar turns to February 1 tomorrow, and that means that Turner Classic Movies kicks of its annual "31 Days of Oscar" programming, wherein every movie shown will be either an Academy Award winner or nominee, and you know what that means, don't you?  Plenty of DVR alerts from The Grandstander.

So here are a couple to get you started....

Saturday:

2:00 PM - "Stagecoach" (1939)  This John Ford western is generally considered the movie that made John Wayne a big star.

10:00 PM - "Gone With the Wind" (1939)  I'll be honest with you, I may light on this one while clicking the remote, and spend about 15 or 20 minutes watching, but that's going to be it.  I will probably never again watch this entire movie from start to finish again, but it is a movie that everyone has to see - and from start to finish - at least once.  I'll never for the life of me see why everyone went gaga over a wimp like Ashley Wilkes.  However, the scene of the camera panning away from the train yard in Atlanta is unforgettable.  One of the best scenes ever.

Sunday:

6:15 PM - "Twelve Angry Men" (1957)  A lone voice in a jury room, Henry Fonda, tries to convince the other eleven that maybe, just maybe, the kid on trial ISN'T guilty of murder. Tremendous cast and a terrific drama.  Fabulous, fabulous movie.

8:00 PM - "The Lost Weekend" (1945) Billy Wilder's story of an alcoholic, played by Ray Milland, won Oscars for Picture, Actor, Director, and Screenplay, and the movie holds up amazingly well almost seventy years later.

Yeah, I know that these last two movies go up smack dab against the Super Bowl, so nobody is going to watch them when they air, but this is why I call it a DVR Alert.

Also airing on Saturday night at 8:00 is a TCM original documentary called "And The Oscar Goes To..."  This is a "behind the scenes look at the Academy Awards and Oscar winning films through the eyes of Hollywood insiders." The TCM documentaries are always very well done.  It will air severla time throughout the month on TCM.