You know we're getting closer to "Oscar Season" because every single movie here - even the Hal Roach barracks comedy Tanks a Million, which runs a mere 50 minutes - got an Oscar nomination. Inevitable when most of the categories allow for ten nominees, at least...
Among the films this month: Hold Back the Dawn and Sergeant York. The former, nominated for six Academy Awards including Best Picture, has Charles Boyer once again romancing someone he shouldn't and Olivia de Havilland making good on her Gone with the Wind breakthrough. Sergeant York was more of a phenomenon: the #1 film of 1941, making over $8.3 million on a $1.7 million budget; nominated for eleven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay (even though the titular hero's source memoir is credited right there on screen); winner of two Academy Awards; and did more to encourage enlistment than any propaganda or attack on US soil could. Even if this was a year of only five nominees, Sergeant York would have had a spot here.
It's not the only war-themed movie here, either. At this point, America was just waiting for a reason to join the fight, and Hollywood was doing its part to get everyone ready. Besides Sergeant York, you have Tanks a Million, about draftees; You'll Never Get Rich, about voluntary enlistees; and A Yank in the R.A.F., about individual Americans going overseas to join in the fight against fascism. It's interesting that they're all comedies or "light" in tone: don't worry, boys, we're not at war yet, it's a bit of an adventure, a jape, come serve your country and have a ball while doing so. At this point, we are just three months away from reality hitting us in the face.
The films:
