You're evil. I'm a little lazy. I think our relationship works because we accept each other's flaws.
Looking at the promo poster for the Ray Milland/Ann Todd thriller So Evil My Love, we expected a standard 1940s crime drama, but we didn't look closely enough. The clothes reveal, if we'd used our eyes, that this is a period piece set in the late Victorian era. Milland plays a man sailing from Jamaica to England who picks up a case of malaria and is nursed back to health by recently widowed missionary Todd. Later, in Liverpool, he looks her up and moves into her boarding house. Milland is a painter, but he's more lucratively an art thief and forger. His real crime, and the reason he was leaving Jamaica, is a murder he committed. Trouble is soon to follow.
Once ensconced in Todd's rambling residence, Milland does the romantic full press, manipulating, flattering, and even dominating her until she falls in love with him. From that point it doesn't take much time or effort for Milland to draw poor, lonely Todd into his criminal schemes. Some viewers might become frustrated with her pliability and helplessness, but that's the 1890s for you. She eventually manages to act of her own volition, and her evolution into a woman who embraces power is what the movie is about. We thought it was good, for its type. It premiered in London today in 1948.
Tabloid conjures yet another imaginary woman who can't say no. Midnight fabricates an actress named Barbi Simms on this cover from today in 1968. She's supposedly sixteen and unable to control her sex urges, which is common enough in cheapie tabloids. And she supposedly gained this appreciation from being raped, also common in cheapie tabloids. But unusually, Midnight editors revealed the title of a film she was starring in: The Lights Are Cut, which she was shooting in Liverpool when interviewed. This is not common. Generally, details subject to confirmation are lacking in these phony tabloid stories. It was easy enough to determine that The Lights Are Cut never existed, nor did any actress named Barbi Simms. And even if she had, she would never have claimed to be more-or-less okay with being sexually assaulted. Duh. As we've pointed out before, these tales spring wholly from the minds of second-rate male editors. We picture them hunched over typewriters in smoky offices above neon lit liquor stores, coughing up phlegm and chortling, “Oh, this is good. This is gold. Our readers'll love this.” The weird part is they must have been right—Midnight was a very successful tabloid.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1927—Mae West Sentenced to Jail
American actress and playwright Mae West is sentenced to ten days in jail for obscenity for the content of her play Sex. The trial occurred even though the play had run for a year and had been seen by 325,000 people. However West's considerable popularity, already based on her risque image, only increased due to the controversy. 1971—Manson Sentenced to Death
In the U.S, cult leader Charles Manson is sentenced to death for inciting the murders of Sharon Tate and several other people. Three accomplices, who had actually done the killing, were also sentenced to death, but the state of California abolished capital punishment in 1972 and neither they nor Manson were ever actually executed. 1923—Yankee Stadium Opens
In New York City, Yankee Stadium, home of Major League Baseball's New York Yankees, opens with the Yankees beating their eternal rivals the Boston Red Sox 4 to 1. The stadium, which is nicknamed The House that Ruth Built, sees the Yankees become the most successful franchise in baseball history. It is eventually replaced by a new Yankee Stadium and closes in September 2008. 1961—Bay of Pigs Invasion Is Launched
A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in southern Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro. However, the invasion fails badly and the result is embarrassment for U.S. president John F. Kennedy and a major boost in popularity for Fidel Castro, and also has the effect of pushing him toward the Soviet Union for protection.
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