Midjourney at the Movies

It's been quite a while since we posted our last "Midjourney at the Movies" feature so this time we have quite a few images to share. It is fun creating pictures on Midjourney but it is equally entertaining seeing what other members decided to create with this powerful tool. If you are not familiar with Midjourney, it is one of the leading Ai art generators and v7 was recently released which has definitely made its images more detailed and much more precise to what you input. There are new features that let you upload photos and keep the likeness of what is in the photo, so replicating old Hollywood stars is even easier now (and much more scary-realistic). A few days ago, Midjourney also released video output, so now you can upload an image and get a 5-second video generated. Gadzooks! 

Anyway, here are some images that we discovered over the past few weeks. The captions are our own, so you have to click on the photo itself to be taken to the Midjourney site if you want to obtain the image "prompt" to experiment with for yourself. 

On a side note: please don't leave hateful comments about AI art and its usage. It's only a tool and if you do not like it, just skip over this post. Thank you! 

Leonard Nimoy as Spock in a scene from the TV series "Star Trek"

What is George Washington appeared as a guest on Star Trek? He may have looked like this. 

It looks like this user may have combined Anne Heywood with a scene from The Children's Hour to get a Hollywood scene like this. 

Here's a cute one of a Scarlet O'Hara-ish film still. She looks a bit like Susan Hayward, who was actually offered the part in Gone with the Wind. 

This one is amazing! This handsome heartthrob looks like a blend of Sean Connery, Richard Burton and Guy Madison. Now you have to give him a Hollywood name. 

Click here to see this image "videofied" -it's frightfully good!

Speaking of Sean Connery....what if there was a Bond film set in Greece with Mr. Connery playing 007? One member prompted this. 

If Sean doesn't look quite like himself in the above still, he sure does in this poster rendering. Although, he isn't carrying his favorite Walther PPK. 

Of course, Marilyn Monroe is a popular topic, here she is wearing a frothy low-cut jeweled dress in what looks like a 1950s publicity photo.  

Audrey Hepburn is another popular actress in Ai creations....someone cleverly thought to imagine her as a 5-year old girl. Even "Toto" took on some of Audrey's features. 

Now if Audrey appeared in a black-and-white period film, she may have looked like this. 

This looks like a 1980s TV promo photo with that lovely soft glow....note the extra finger on this woman and her upside down pen. By v8, I'm sure even these small mistakes will be ironed out of Midjourney, it is progressing so fast. 

A Superman publicity photo from 1980 - I wish this fellow had starred in a TV version!

If you prefer Batman - here's a great shot of an Adam West-like actor playing the caped crusader. 

A vintage trading card for a BBC Henry James production from 1968. 

Midjourney can do "character sheets" to give you inspiration....

... and animation "cels" to see what the final result looks like. Nifty. 

Lastly, a book illustration of a 1960s Michael Caine type character in London. 

I've been using Midjourney primarily for book character creations (like the one above) and only today did I try out their new video feature (below). It's like having a book character come to life when you see the illustration "you" created start moving. Exciting! 

Have you experimented with Midjourney? We'd love to hear what prompts you tried out and which ones you are excited to test out soon. 

Weekend with Father (1951)

Today is Father's Day and to celebrate all of the wonderful daddies of the world, we picked a rare but wonderful daddy movie to review - Weekend with Father (1951). This Universal Pictures comedy stars Van Heflin and Patricia Neal and tells the story of widower Brad Stubbs and widow Jean Bowen who meet while taking their children to a summer camp. Even though sparks of love instantly fly between the happy couple, getting their children to accept a blended family proves to be more difficult...but "Daddy Stubbs" gives it his best try to make it work. 

"Mommy, is that Schmoe gonna be our father??"

Yes, unfortunately, Bowen's two boys see their new father as a failure, especially when compared to He-Man Don Adams (Richard Denning), the camp counselor, but Mrs. Bowen knows what a gem she found. Stubbs' two daughters are disappointed with "mother" as well.... they were hoping their dad was going to marry the glamorous TV star Phyllis Reynolds (Virginia Field) whom he has been dating for over a year.

Ironing up the difficulty with their children and trying to shake off the two cardboard idols makes up with the bulk of the film and provides ample opportunity for comedic moments, many of which were provided in Joseph Hoffman's script. Incidentally, this script feels like it was tailor-made for Fred MacMurray and Claudette Colbert. I wonder if they weren't initially planned to be the stars of this vehicle. Colbert would have been wonderful as Mrs. Bowen, but Patricia Neal does what she can with the role and what she does is rather good. 

Universal released so many entertaining comedies in the late 1940s and early 1950s and just about every actor on their payroll ended up appearing in at least one during their tenure with the studio. Van Heflin and Patricia Neal are generally considered serious actors, but they do a good job with these light-hearted roles.... especially Heflin, who should have gone on to make more comedies. 

Weekend with Father was directed by Douglas Sirk, who was such a versatile director. He made a series of comedies before switching to adventure films and later mushy romance pictures starring Rock Hudson. This film plays out quickly and keeps the laughs going. 

You can't help but feel sorry for both parents as they put up with their children's antics but faced with the same situation, I guess most couples would bend backward trying to get their children to like their newly chosen spouse. It's worth checking out this little-known classic and, to make the film extra special, why not pair this with Walt Disney's short cartoon "Father's Weekend" featuring Goofy?

Happy Father's Day!

Fanthom's Big Screen Classics 2025

Every year, TCM had released a monthly selection of classic films back on the big screen in movie theaters across America as part of their "Big Screen Classics" series. Last year, Fanthom bought this series out and they did a great job of continuing it on. Instead of Ben Mankiewicz introducing each film, Fanthom brought in Leonald Maltin to share his thoughts and give a little behind-the-scenes commentary prior to the picture. 

This year, the Big Screen Classics continues with some interesting selections as well as some old-and-true classics: 

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade - June 14, 15 and 18 (Father's Day weekend)

Clueless (30th Anniversary) - June 29, 30

This is Spinal Tap - July 5,7

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (50th Anniversary) - July 13, 16

Sunset Boulevard (75th anniversary) - Aug 3, 4

The Sound of Music (60th Anniversary) - Sept 13, 14 and 17

Rocky IV - Rocky vs Drago - Nov 5, 9

Oddly, there are no films listed for the month of October or December but sometimes they issue a film at a short notice, so check out Fanthom's website to see what the latest releases are. 

From the Archives: Around the World in 80 Days (1956)

 
David Niven and Cantiflas as Phileas Fogg and Passepartout pose for a photograph before embarking on their extraordinary adventure around the world in this scene from Around the World in 80 Days (1956). 

From the Archives is our latest series of posts where we share photos from the Silverbanks Pictures collection. Some of these may have been sold in the past, and others may still be available for purchase at our eBay store: http://stores.ebay.com/Silverbanks-Pictures

Check it Out! - Ciao Italia Archives Online

Every Saturday afternoon for the last 20 years, I've enjoyed the routine of watching cooking shows on PBS. These include Julia Child, Jacques Pepin, Lidia Bastianich, and of course Mary Ann Esposito, who hosted Ciao Italia which ranks as the longest-running cooking show on PBS. 

Ciao Italia first premiered in 1989 and ran for over 35 years...that's a lot of Italian cooking! Since Mary Ann Esposito has cooked so many authentic Italian favorites over the years she has built up quite a library of recipes and cooking footage from the series. If you head over to www.ciaoitalia.com you will find that she has shared many (if not all) of these recipes online in a wonderful database where you can click on any season and any recipe and view the recipe in full along with the film clip from the episode where it appeared. Simply click on "Seasons" and you will find them all. This is such a great site so be sure to check it out! 

Film Albums: Miyoshi Sings for Arthur Godfrey

If you grew up watching the television series The Courtship of Eddie's Father, then you probably best remember Miyoshi Umeki as Mrs. Livingston, the housekeeper to Eddie and his father, but prior to this series she made a name for herself in the films Sayonara, Flower Drum Song, and comedies such as Cry for Happy and The Horizontal Lieutenant. Miyoshi was also a regular guest star on The Arthur Godfrey Show in the 1950s and it was through this show that she was introduced to American audiences...as a singer. Ms. Umeki began her career in Japan as a nightclub singer and she had a beautiful deep sultry voice that was quite unlike the soft speaking voice she used in her films. 

For her first US album (from Mercury Records) she performed some of her personal favorites in a mixture of Japanese and English languages. Personally, I favored her Japanese renditions and was hoping to find an album of hers in Japanese but no such luck...even in the 1950s, Japanese audiences wanted to hear American songs in English!

There are some lovely orchestra arrangements with these songs but what makes them especially wonderful is Miyoshi's rendering of these classics. She puts such heart in her singing. 

Click here to listen to the full album on Youtube. 

Track Listing:

Side A

If I Give My Heart to You

China Nights

I'm in the Mood for Love

My Baby's Comin' Home

How Deep is the Ocean

Slowly Go Out of Your Mind

Side B

Teach Me Tonight

Hanna Ko San

Can't Help Lovin' That Man

S'Wonderful

Over the Rainbow

Sayonara

Top Picks: China Nights, I'm in the Mood for Love, Hanna Ko San, Can't Help Lovin' that Man, Sayonara

To Paris with Love (1955)

Alec Guinness is usually regarded as a serious actor due to his roles in The Bridge on the River Kwai, Tunes of Glory and Star Wars, but he was primarily a star of light comedies throughout the 1940s and 1950s and he made a number of entertaining films... one of which was To Paris with Love, released in 1955. 

In this film, Guinness plays Sir Edgar, a middle-aged Scotsman who is on holiday in Paris with his grown son John (Vernon Gray). He is secretly hoping that his son would find romance in Paris with a young pretty Parisian, while John is hoping his father would find romance with a rich middle-aged woman. They meet Lizette (Odile Versois), a salesgirl at a fashionable boutique, the first day they arrive and Sir Edgar thinks she is ideal for John so he arranges a meeting with her for lunch the next day. Meanwhile, John meets Sylvia (Elina Labourdette), the owner of the same boutique, and thinks that she is ideal for his father so he, too, arranges a meeting with her for lunch the next day. Before they know it, John is dating Sylvia who is twenty years his senior and Sir Edgar is dating Lizette, who is twenty years younger than he! Both found romance in Paris in an unexpected way and how the twosome work out their mixed-up affairs makes up the remainder of this short and delightful Parisian holiday. 

To Paris with Love is another one of those classic British comedies that in recent decades has somehow been overlooked stateside, yet at the time of its release it was quite popular in the U.S. The film was shot in Eastmancolor on location in Paris and the city looked lovely. The characters kept referring to "springtime in Paris" although it was clearly shot in the autumn with the color changes of the trees evident. 

Alec Guinness didn't show much display of emotion in this film yet his feelings for young Lizette seemed genuine and one can easily see how she can find him attractive. He was especially good in his little bits of humor, such as when he got his badminton birdie up in a tree and thought he was agile enough to climb up and get it. That he did...but getting down was a different story! Vernon Gray was the likeable young chap in Now and Forever and he played a similar character here, although this time he found an older woman more attractive than Janette Scott. 

Odile Versois made several good comedies in the early 1950s and this wasn't her first British production. The following year she starred in the entertaining crime drama Checkpoint (1956) with Stanley Baker. In To Paris with Love there is a secondary romance between her and a young postman who is enamored with her and a nice side comedy about her father being a taxi-driver. Also in the cast is Austin Trevor, Jacques Francois, and Claude Romain. 

To Paris with Love is currently available on DVD and it is worth checking out. It is one of those amusing light-hearted comedies that has such a relaxing pace and beautiful Paris setting that you'll end up rewatching it every few years.