These are films that qualified for the 1945 Academy Awards but for which I could only find 1944 release dates. Nine in all - consider this our last hurrah for '44 and our first bit of '45:
Frenchman's Creek
release: September 20
wins: Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration - Color (Hans Dreier / Ernst Fegte / Sam Comer)
dir: Mitchell Leisen
pr: David Lewis
scr: Talbot Jennings, from the novel by Daphne Du Maurier
cin: George Barnes
Daphne Du Maurier's timeless tale of a wealthy woman horny for danger - she may be married, but she falls for, and joins in the ventures of, an infamous pirate! Joan Fontaine is a lot of fun in this one, she's great in heat. Would I watch it again? Probably not, but a fun diversion.
The Woman in the Window
release: November 3
nominations: Best Score (Hugo Friedhofer / Arthur Lange)
dir: Fritz Lang
pr: Nunnally Johnson
scr: Nunnally Johnson, from the novel by J.H. Wallis
cin: Milton R. Krasner
Edward G. Robinson falls for a femme fatale and, ah-ha, it ruins his life. I will sppil the ending for you right here, right now, and it's fine that you know it: it was all a dream. I say that to save you from watching a genuinely suspenseful film that ends in the greatest last-minute cop-out I've seen in years. How can I take the rest of the movie seriously when the ending disowns it?
Dark Waters
release: November 24
dir: André de Toth
pr: Benedict Bogaeus
scr: Joan Harrison & Marian B. Cockrell, original story by Francis "Frank" M. Cockrell & Marian B. Cockrell, additional dialogue by Arthur T. Horman
cin: John J. Mescall / Archie Stout
A woman survives a U-boat attack and returns to a family estate in the deep south, only to find that her relatives may be targeting her for murder. Led by two actors I usually think are just fine, but I liked them here: Franchot Tone and Merle Oberon. Thomas Mitchell leads the villainy, with Elisha Cook as his sidekick: great fun, and Cook gives a climactic scream that sticks with you.
Guest in the House
release: December 8
nominations: Best Score (Werner Janssen)
dir: John Brahm
pr: Hunt Stromberg
scr: Ketti Frings, from a play by Hagar Wilde & Dale Eunson and a story by Katherine Albert
cin: Lee Garmes
Guy brings his girl home, she proceeds to turn the family against each other. Anne Baxter plays a less controlled variation of Eve Harrington, five years before All About Eve (even her character here is named Evelyn) - less effective here, probably because she does everything but twirl a mustache to convey her wickedness. Indeed, much the film is rather obvious and flat, until Aline MacMahon as the old aunt finally confronts Baxter, and then it's suddenly a daring, provocative picture, even Lee Garmes seems more inspired.
The Keys of the Kingdom
release: December 15
nominations: Best Actor (Gregory Peck), Best Score (Alfred Newman), Best Cinematography - Black-and-White, Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration - Black-and-White (James Basevi / William S. Darling / James Little / Frank E. Hughes)
dir: John M. Stahl
pr: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
scr: Joseph L. Mankiewicz and Nunnally Johnson, from the novel by A.J. Cronin
cin: Arthur C. Miller
An old Scottish priest reflects on his days establishing a Catholic community in a Chinese village. I think it is difficult, sometimes, to wrestle with the good intentions of many missionaries versus their work as satellites of colonialism, arriving in foreign lands they do not understand not to educate themselves but rather to learn how to manipulate the people into converting to their own way of seeing the world. The best such movies, like this and The Mission, acknowledge that those challenges may be insurmountable, but that while the priest is working to complete his "mission", he has somehow stumbled into forming and maintaining a community. Gregory Peck's Father Francis Chisholm is often frustrated, and - not really a spoiler - never really succeeds in converting the locals; yet how can we measure success, if not by challenges met and faced honestly, or in the loyalties won and the friends made? Is not his very survival for over 50 years a testament to something working - if not the Church, his faith? His community? It's a story of Father Francis's slow realization that this outpost has, surprisingly, become home...and his desire for something more to be done.
Experiment Perilous
release: December 18
nominations: Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration - Black-and-White (Albert S. D'Agostino / Jack Okey / Darrell Silvera / Claude E. Carpenter)
dir: Jacques Tourneur
pr: Warren Duff
scr: Warren Duff, from the novel by Margaret Carpenter
cin: Tony Gaudio
Set in the early 1900s, a man becomes fascinated by a marriage where the woman is believed to be going slowly mad...but the husband may be doing it intentionally. Wait, didn't we see this movie already?
Here Come the Waves
release: December 18
nominations: Best Original Song ("Accentuate the Positive")
dir/pr: Mark Sandrich
scr: Allan Scott and Ken Englund and Zion Meyers
cin: Charles Lang
Twin showbiz sisters join the WAVES and fall for a popular singer waiting for his enlistment to be accepted. Complications ensue when the audience realizes Betty Hutton is playing both twins, and so must endure scene after scene of her bellowing nonsense to herself. Tensions rise when the movie's biggest hit, "Accentuate The Positive," is performed by Bing Crosby (yay!) in blackface (oh no!). You can tell the war's coming to a close because no one even pretends to be in a hurry to face the enemy, why no, in fact, they're putting on a show!
Music for Millions
release: December 18
nominations: Best Original Screenplay
dir: Henry Koster
pr: Joe Pasternak
scr: Myles Connolly
cin: Robert Surtees
A pregnant member of a touring all-female orchestra doesn't know she received a telegram saying her husband has been killed overseas - instead, her bandmates keep the secret for as long as it takes. As far as inventing reasons to showcase musical performances - many led here by the inescapable Jose Iturbi - this is one of the better ones. Even the usually frustrating conceit of a "good lie" makes sense in this scenario: with work, a baby, and a kid sister to think of, who needs the extra (literal) grief? Little Margaret O'Brien is top-billed, Jimmy Durante is a lovely paternal figure to her, it's a nice movie.
Can't Help Singing
release: December 29
nominations: Best Musical Score (Jerome Kern / Hans J. Salter), Best Original Song ("More and More")
dir: Frank Ryan
pr: Felix Jackson
scr: Lewis R. Foster and Frank Ryan, story by John D. Klorer and Leo Townsend, from the novel Girl of the Overland Trail by Samuel J. Warshawsky & Curtis B. Warshawsky
cin: Elwood "Woody" Bredell / W. Howard Greene
A senator's daughter chases the soldier she loves across the country, just in time for the California gold rush. Deanna Durbin, whom I love, is the star, her first and only time in color, and isn't she a treat? Good songs are sung, some laughs are had, Durbin gets to wear some real knock-out costumes, and the set for Sonora is a colorful mirage.
Tomorrow, January brings the first Best Director nominee...
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