CATCH A CLASSIC
TCM Spotlight: True Crime TCM, Beginning at 7 p.m.
Each Thursday night this month, Turner Classic Movies spotlights famous films that either re-created or were inspired by notorious real-life crimes. The evening begins with Alfred Hitchcock’s acclaimed 1948 psychological thriller Rope (pictured). The drama, led by James Stewart, takes place in a Manhattan apartment and is shot in a series of clever long takes that give the impression that the production was filmed in a single shot. Rope is based on the play of the same name that was inspired by the 1924 murder of Bobby Franks by Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb in their attempt to get away with “the perfect crime” and prove their intellectual superiority, similar to the characters portrayed here by John Dall and Farley Granger. Next, Best Director Oscar nominee Arthur Penn’s Oscar-winning 1967 biographical crime film Bonnie and Clyde depicts the violent criminal career and end of infamous 1930s outlaw couple Clyde Barrow (Best Actor Oscar nominee Warren Beatty) and Bonnie Parker (Best Actress Oscar nominee Faye Dunaway). Following that, in Badlands (1973), writer/director Terrence Malick’s directorial debut, Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek play lovers who go on a killing spree in a story loosely based on the real-life 1958 murder spree of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate. The lineup comes to a close in the early morning hours with The Honeymoon Killers (1970),
The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976) and The Hitch-Hiker (1953).