Billy Wilder – Stream On Demand

Last chance: Billy Wilder’s WWII thriller ‘Five Graves to Cairo’ on Criterion Channel

!Featured, Academy Award nominee, based on a play, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Criterion Channel, DVD, Hollywood Classic, spies and espionage, suspense, VOD, war 08/01/2022 Sean Axmaker

Franchot Tone and Anne Baxter star in this espionage thriller set in North Africa and Erich von Stroheim is German Field Marshall Rommel.

Last chance: ‘Double Indemnity’ – Barbara Stanwyck, femme fatale on Criterion Channel

!Featured, Academy Award nominee, based on a novel, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Crime, Criterion, Criterion Channel, DVD, film noir, Hollywood Classic, National Film Registry, suspense, SVOD 08/01/2022 Sean Axmaker

Billy Wilder’s 1944 film of James M. Cain’s pulp crime thriller is a masterpiece of film noir double dealing.

Kirk Douglas stars in Billy's Wilder's noir-tinged newspaper drama from 1951

‘Ace in the Hole’ – newspaper noir on Amazon Prime Video and Criterion Channel

!Featured, Academy Award nominee, Amazon Prime Video, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Criterion, Criterion Channel, Cult Movies, drama, DVD, film noir, Have You Seen...?, Hollywood Classic, suspense, SVOD 11/06/2021 Sean Axmaker

Billy Wilder is the American cinema’s most famous cynic, but nothing in his career is as scathing as this noir-tinged newspaper drama, an indictment of the American media circus.

TITLE: SUNSET BOULEVARD PERS: VON STROHEIM, ERICH / SWANSON, GLORIA YEAR: 1950 DIR: WILDER, BILLY REF: SUN025AL CREDIT: [ THE KOBAL COLLECTION / PARAMOUNT ]

‘Sunset Boulevard’ on Amazon Prime and Criterion Channel

!Featured, Academy Award, Amazon Prime Video, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Criterion Channel, Cult Movies, drama, DVD, film noir, Hollywood Classic, movies about movies, National Film Registry, SVOD 09/07/2021 Sean Axmaker

William Holden and Gloria Swanson star in this Gothic Hollywood noir, the darkest of Hollywood’s self-portraits, directed by Billy Wilder.

Colin Blakely is Sherlock Holmes in the film by Billy Wilder

‘The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes’ on Amazon Prime

!Featured, Amazon Prime Video, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Comedy, Cult Movies, DVD, Have You Seen...?, Mystery, Romance, SVOD 08/25/2021 Sean Axmaker

Bill Wilder’s sly, bittersweet, autumnal film approaches the Holmes legacy with both a sense of humor and a sense of respect.

Jack Lemmon and Juliet Mills star in the Billy Wilder comedy

‘Avanti!’ with Jack Lemmon

!Featured, Amazon Prime Video, based on a play, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Comedy, DVD, Romance, SVOD 07/17/2021 Sean Axmaker

Billy Wilder was one of the great directors of classic American comedy. Avanti! (1972), based on the play by Samuel Taylor, is one of the director’s attempts to adapt his trademark mix of wit, romance, and sex to the more permissive era of the 1970s and one of the best films in the last act […]

Dean Martin in ‘Kiss Me, Stupid’ on Amazon Prime

!Featured, Amazon Prime Video, based on a play, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Comedy, DVD, music, SVOD 03/04/2021 Sean Axmaker

Billy Wilder was a master at sneaking sex into films like The Apartment and Irma la Douce in the years before the ratings system, but this is his most gleefully cynical and brash sex comedy Kiss Me, Stupid (1965) was so maligned on release it almost sunk Billy Wilder’s career. Dean Martin plays a parody […]

Marlene Dietrich and Charles Laughton in Billy Wilder's adaptation of the Agatha Christie play

‘Witness for the Prosecution’ with Charles Laughton and Marlene Dietrich on Amazon Prime Video

!Featured, Academy Award nominee, adapted from the stage, Amazon Prime Video, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, DVD, Hollywood Classic, Mystery, SVOD 11/23/2019 Sean Axmaker

Based on the stage play by Agatha Christie, Witness for the Prosecution (1957) isn’t opened up for the screen so much as it is perked up with witty dialogue and wily characterizations, two strengths of filmmaker Billy Wilder and writing and producing partner I.A.L. Diamond. Charles Laughton plays the legendary barrister who defies doctor’s order […]

‘People on Sunday’ on Amazon Prime Video

!Featured, Amazon Prime Video, Blu-ray, Classic Movie, Criterion, Documentary, DVD, Have You Seen...?, International Cinema, Romance, silent film, SVOD 10/30/2018 Sean Axmaker

People on Sunday (Germany, 1920) is a delightful, effervescent rarity from the late silent era with irresistible bona fides. Not only did this low-budget 1930 German film influence a generation of filmmakers, it launched the careers of some mighty impressive talents who, as hungry young filmmakers, collaborated on this buoyant little portrait of a lazy […]