Memorial Day weekend briefs

Did anybody else watch Esther Williams in The Unguarded Moment on Thursday night? It seemed to me as though there was something wrong with the print; the color looked partially washed out. I was also wondering whether or not it was partially panned-and-scanned from a Cinemascope-style aspect rating to fit in the new TV standard of 16:9, but the movie was actually filmed in a roughly 5:3 aspect, and based on the placement of the TCM bug in the bottom right corner of the screen, the picture did appear to be 5:3. The Unguarded Moment is one I wish I could have liveblogged, as it's a riot. Unfortunately, it's not on DVD and I don't know when TCM will get the rights to it again, since it's from Universal International (at least, as the studio was known in the 50s). I'd guess TCM got the rights to it in exchange for the ads they run for the Audie Murphy collection.

I've recommended From Here to Eternity on a number of occasions, but it's airing again tomorrow at 8:30 AM, and is always worth watching. However, I don't think I'll be watching it, largely because I'm interested in a movie over on the Fox Movie Channel that I haven't seen before; Seven Cities of Gold (9:30 AM) about Junipero Serra, the founder of a bunch of missions in 18th century California.

One of these days I'll have to do a full-length blog posting of some of the other movies that are airing on TCM tomorrow, such as All Quiet on the Western Front at 10:45 AM, or Sergeant York at 1:00 PM.