After the death of her father and the loss of his fortune, Selina takes a job teaching school in the Dutch community of New Holland. She stays with the Pools and teaches young Roelf piano. ... See full summary »
Emotions are ignited amongst the complacent townsfolk when a handsome drifter arrives in a small Kansas community on the morning of the Labour Day picnic.
Two aging playboys are both after the same attractive young woman, but she fends them off by claiming that she plans to remain a virgin until her wedding night. Both men determine to find a way around her objections.
Director:
Otto Preminger
Stars:
William Holden,
David Niven,
Maggie McNamara
A naive nineteen year old widow becomes coarsened and cynical when she is sent to a woman's prison and is exposed to hardened criminals and sadistic guards.
Director:
John Cromwell
Stars:
Eleanor Parker,
Agnes Moorehead,
Ellen Corby
Avery Bullard, President of the Tredway Corporation has died. But he never named a clear successor, so the Board members must choose a replacement. The most likely is Loren Shaw, a skilled businessman, but some of the others don't like his calculating ways. But to stop him, they'll have to find someone else they can back. Will it be the engineer Don Walling? That will take convincing, they don't trust his youth and idealism. And he isn't even sure he wants the job, he might be happier creating rather than politicking.Written by
Ken Yousten <kyousten@bev.net>
Producer John Houseman wanted Henry Fonda for the role of McDonald Walling. Fonda turned him down to star in a Broadway musical that never reached the stage. See more »
Goofs
Mic shadow on curtain of Shaw's office when Shaw is trying to persuade Caswell to vote for him as company president. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
[pre-opening-credits sequence; views of skyscrapers]
Narrator:
It is always up there, close to the clouds, on the topmost floors of the sky-reaching towers of big business. And because it is high in the sky, you may think that those who work there are somehow above and beyond the tensions and temptations of the lower floors. This is to say that it isn't so.
See more »
If you ask me, director Robert Wise could do no wrong. He hardly ever set a foot wrong, and 'Executive Suite' is vintage Wise.
Mr. Bullard, bullying president of a huge furnishing corporation, dies, leaving everyone in doubt as to who should take over. The vultures are closing in, the major stockholder, a loose canon, is shamelessly wooed, dirty deals are struck, and there is even some insider trading taking place. It sure ain't pretty, but it's the name of the game and anything goes.
Robert Wise sets a steady pace, a brisk, business-like unfolding of a drama that deserves comparison with Shakespeare. It is done with quick cutting, drab, corporate sets, and filled to the brim with those covert glances that, in the end, decide the outcome. "Efficiency has become a dirty word, budget control has a bad odor", says prospective new manager Fredric March (another brilliant, Oscar-worthy performance) when he senses that he is losing the battle, and young gun William Holden rises to the occasion with an attention-grabbing speech that is not likely to be quickly forgotten: "We will never again ask a man to do something to poison his pride in himself or his work".
'Executive Suite' is an ensemble film, and one could go on praising every single member of the cast. And yet Robert Wise remains the engineer of this masterpiece of dynamic and still highly relevant cinema.
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If you ask me, director Robert Wise could do no wrong. He hardly ever set a foot wrong, and 'Executive Suite' is vintage Wise.
Mr. Bullard, bullying president of a huge furnishing corporation, dies, leaving everyone in doubt as to who should take over. The vultures are closing in, the major stockholder, a loose canon, is shamelessly wooed, dirty deals are struck, and there is even some insider trading taking place. It sure ain't pretty, but it's the name of the game and anything goes.
Robert Wise sets a steady pace, a brisk, business-like unfolding of a drama that deserves comparison with Shakespeare. It is done with quick cutting, drab, corporate sets, and filled to the brim with those covert glances that, in the end, decide the outcome. "Efficiency has become a dirty word, budget control has a bad odor", says prospective new manager Fredric March (another brilliant, Oscar-worthy performance) when he senses that he is losing the battle, and young gun William Holden rises to the occasion with an attention-grabbing speech that is not likely to be quickly forgotten: "We will never again ask a man to do something to poison his pride in himself or his work".
'Executive Suite' is an ensemble film, and one could go on praising every single member of the cast. And yet Robert Wise remains the engineer of this masterpiece of dynamic and still highly relevant cinema.