1945 in film - WikiHQ

The year 1945 in film involved some significant events. With 1945 being the last year of World War II, the many films released this year had themes of patriotism, sacrifices, and peace. In the United States, there were more than eighteen thousand movie theatres operating in 1945, a figure that grew by a third from a decade earlier.

Events

January 26 – The film National Velvet, starring Mickey Rooney, Elizabeth Taylor, Donald Crisp and Anne Revere, is released nationally in the United States. The film is an instant critical and commercial success, propelling 12-year-old Taylor to stardom and earning Revere the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
January 30 – Restricted release of Kolberg, an historical epic which is one of the last Nazi Germany propaganda pieces, in war-torn Berlin. Given its cast of 187,000 (including serving military personnel), probably fewer people watched it than appeared in it.
April 20 – Release of Son of Lassie, the 2nd Lassie film and the first film ever to be filmed using the Technicolor monopack method, where a single magazine of film is used to record all of the primary colors. Prior to this method, the most popular recording method was 3-Strip Technicolor, which simultaneously used 3 individual film magazines to record the primary colors.
August 10 – Animated Donald Duck short Duck Pimples is released.
September 27 – Release of Roberto Rossellini's Roma Città aperta marks the beginning of Italian neorealism in film.
October 5 – A strike between the set decorators' union and the studios boils over and becomes known as the Hollywood Black Friday.
October 31 – Spellbound, a psychological thriller directed by Alfred Hitchcock, premieres in New York City.
November 16 – Paramount Pictures releases theatrical short cartoon titled The Friendly Ghost, introducing a ghost named Casper.
November 29 – At the Nuremberg trials a documentary on the Nazi concentration camps directed by John Ford is exhibited as evidence.
December 20 - A Hollywood film, Call of the Yukon, is released in Japan for the first time since July 1941.

Awards

{| class="wikitable"

! style="width:20px;"| Category/Organization !! style="width:250px;"| 18th Academy Awards March 7, 1946 !!" style="width:250px;"| 3rd Golden Globe Awards March 30, 1946

| Best Film || colspan="2" | The Lost Weekend

| Best Director || colspan="2" | Billy Wilder The Lost Weekend

| Best Actor || colspan="2" | Ray Milland The Lost Weekend

| Best Actress || Joan Crawford Mildred Pierce || Ingrid Bergman The Bells of St. Mary's

| Best Supporting Actor || James Dunn A Tree Grows in Brooklyn || J. Carrol Naish A Medal for Benny

| Best Supporting Actress || Anne Revere National Velvet || Angela Lansbury The Picture of Dorian Gray

Top-grossing films (U.S.)

The top ten 1945 released films by box office gross in North America are as follows:

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto; margin:auto;"

|+ Highest-grossing films of 1945

! Rank !! Title !! Distributor !! Domestic rentals

! style="text-align:center;"| 1

|The Bells of St. Mary's

| RKO

| $8,000,000

! style="text-align:center;"| 2

|Leave Her to Heaven

| 20th Century Fox

| $5,550,000

! style="text-align:center;"| 4

| The Valley of Decision

| rowspan="4"|MGM

| $4,566,000

! style="text-align:center;"| 5

| Anchors Aweigh

| $4,498,000

1945 film releases

January–March

January 1945
4 January
This Man's Navy
8 January
Frenchman's Creek
18 January
A Song to Remember
26 January
National Velvet
February 1945
2 February
Here Come the Co-eds
15 February
The Seventh Veil
March 1945
3 March
The Picture of Dorian Gray
16 March
The House of Fear

April–June

April 1945
7 April
Brewster's Millions
17 April
Rockin' in the Rockies
20 April
The Horn Blows at Midnight
29 April
Tarzan and the Amazons
May 1945
25 May
The Clock
June 1945
1 June
That's the Spirit
23 June
Murder, He Says
30 June
Conflict

July–September

July 1945
13 July
The Story of G.I. Joe
19 July
Along Came Jones
27 July
The Woman in Green
August 1945
11 August
Christmas in Connecticut
30 August
State Fair
September 1945
22 September
Rhapsody in Blue

October–December

October 1945
20 October
Mildred Pierce
26 October
Love Letters
31 October
And Then There Were None
Spellbound
November 1945
1 November
Vacation from Marriage
10 November
Confidential Agent
December 1945
7 December
House of Dracula
8 December
The Enchanted Forest
20 December
Dick Tracy
25 December
A Walk in the Sun
28 December
Scarlet Street
31 December
They Were Expendable

Notable films released in 1945

United States unless stated

A

The Abandoned (Las Abandonadas), starring Dolores del Río and Pedro Armendáriz – (Mexico)
Abbott and Costello in Hollywood, starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello
Allotment Wives, starring Kay Francis
Along Came Jones, starring Gary Cooper and Loretta Young
Amok – (Mexico)
Anchors Aweigh, starring Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra
And Then There Were None, starring Barry Fitzgerald, Walter Huston, Louis Hayward, Judith Anderson

B

Back to Bataan, directed by Edward Dmytryk, with John Wayne
A Bell For Adano, starring Gene Tierney and John Hodiak
The Bells of St. Mary's, directed by Leo McCarey, starring Bing Crosby and Ingrid Bergman
Blithe Spirit, directed by David Lean, starring Rex Harrison and Constance Cummings, based on the play by Noël Coward – (GB)
Blood on the Sun, starring James Cagney
The Body Snatcher, directed by Robert Wise, starring Boris Karloff
Boule de suif (Angel and Sinner) – (France)
Bougainvillea (Bugambilia), starring Pedro Armendariz and Dolores del Río – (Mexico)
Brewster's Millions, starring Dennis O'Keefe
Brief Encounter, directed by David Lean, starring Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard- (GB)

C

Caesar and Cleopatra, directed by Gabriel Pascal, starring Vivien Leigh and Claude Rains – (GB)
Captain Kidd, starring Charles Laughton
The Cheaters, starring Joseph Schildkraut and Billie Burke
The Cherokee Flash, starring Sunset Carson and Linda Stirling
Children of Paradise (Les Enfants du Paradis), by Marcel Carné, starring Arletty, released following the liberation of France
Christmas in Connecticut, starring Barbara Stanwyck
Circus Cavalcade (La cabalgata del circo) – (Argentina)
The Clock, starring Judy Garland
Confidential Agent, starring Charles Boyer and Lauren Bacall
Conflict, starring Humphrey Bogart
Counter-Attack, starring Paul Muni and Marguerite Chapman
The Corn Is Green, starring Bette Davis and John Dall
Cornered, directed by Edward Dmytryk, starring Dick Powell

D

Dakota, starring John Wayne
Les dames du Bois de Boulogne, directed by Robert Bresson – (France)
Dead of Night, Ealing Studios chiller compendium starring Mervyn Johns and Googie Withers – (GB)
Death Mills, directed by Billy Wilder
Detour, starring Tom Neal and Ann Savage
Diamond Horseshoe, starring Betty Grable
Dick Tracy, starring Morgan Conway and Mike Mazurki
Dillinger, starring Lawrence Tierney
The Dolly Sisters, starring Betty Grable

E

The Enchanted Cottage, starring Dorothy McGuire and Robert Young
The Enchanted Forest, starring Harry Davenport
Escape in the Fog, starring Otto Kruger and Nina Foch

F

Fallen Angel, directed by Otto Preminger, starring Alice Faye in her last major film role, Dana Andrews and Linda Darnell
Flame of Barbary Coast, starring John Wayne

G

The Great Flamarion, directed by Anthony Mann, starring Erich von Stroheim
Guest Wife, starring Claudette Colbert and Don Ameche
Gun Smoke, starring Johnny Mack Brown and Jennifer Holt

H

Hangover Square, starring Laird Cregar, Linda Darnell and George Sanders
Here Come the Co-Eds, starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello
High Powered, starring Phyllis Brooks and Robert Lowery
The Horn Blows at Midnight, starring Jack Benny
Hotel Berlin, starring Faye Emerson and Raymond Massey
The House I Live In, a short film starring Frank Sinatra, awarded a special Oscar for its message of tolerance