Holiday was such a huge hit in 1930 that they remade it eight years later. Ironically, the much better 1938 version was a flop at the time, but has long since been considered one of the greatest sophisticated comedies of all time whereas the 1930 version has been all but forgotten.

Based on Philip Barry’s 1928 play, the 1930 version faithfully follows the stage version except that it adds a brief scene at the end where the New York heroine gets in a car to go to the docks to join the hero on his cruise to Europe. It leaves it to the audience to figure out whether she will get to the ship in time. The 1938 version eliminates the uncertainty by adding another scene in which the hero and heroine are reunited.

Ann Harding received an Oscar nomination for the 1930 version with her portrayal of the younger sister of Mary Astor whose fiancée Robert Ames turns down her wealthy father’s offer of a job because he wants to take time off before settling down, causing Astor to dump him and Harding to jump at the chance of joining him in his carefree lifestyle.

This type of film would soon be shunned by audiences of the Great Depression, but by 1938 audiences had become used to films in which fun was poked at the rich, and although no one in the audience would be cavalier enough to turn down a job they desperately needed, they could fantasize about being in the position of the hero now charmingly played by Cary Grant who is much more relatable than Ames. Katharine Hepburn as the sister of the girl he is engaged to is now the older, rather than the younger of the sisters, adding a layer of complexity to her character.

George Cukor directed the 1938 version with more verve than Edward H. Griffith did the original. Doris Nolan was good as the other sister, but aside from Hepburn and Grant, acting honors in this version went to Lew Ayres as the girls’ alcoholic brother, the role played in the 1930 version by Monroe Owsley who died of cardiac arrest following a car accident in 1937. The impromptu party given by Hepburn and Ayres for Grant’s friends Edward Everett Horton and Jean Dixon while the rest of the house is attending Grant and Nolan’s New Year’s Eve engagement party is the film’s highlight. Grant, who began his career as an acrobat, gets to show that he can still perform some of his old tricks.

The Criterion Blu-ray includes a 4K digital restoration of the 1938 version, as well as the Blu-ray debut of the 1930 version and a conversation between filmmaker Michael Schlesinger and critic Michael Sragow on the differences between the play, the first film version, and the remake. Hepburn, Grant, and Cukor would reunite two years later for The Philadelphia Story co-starring James Stewart in his Oscar-winning role.

Criterion has also released a Blu-ray edition of Sidney Lumet’s 1960 film of Tennessee Williams’ The Fugitive Kind starring Marlon Brando, Anna Magnani, and Joanne Woodward with all the extras from the previous DVD release. One of Williams’ lesser works, this is no A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, or Sweet Bird of Youth, though it does have its fans. Unfortunately, I am not one. I have never been able to get through the entire film despite multiple attempts.

Kino Lorber continues to supply a slew of upgraded Blu-ray releases. Among the latest are The Good Fairy and The Great McGinty from brand new 4K masters and House by the River, Room at the Top, and The Whisperers from brand new 2K masters. All five films feature audio commentary by various film historians

One of the romantic comedies made between the two versions of Holiday that drove audiences to theatres was 1935’s The Good Fairy starring Margaret Sullavan as a naïve girl fresh from a Budapest orphanage who wants to help strangers by being a “good fairy” to them. The whimsical film, which was adapted by Preston Sturges from a play by Ferenc Molnar, co-starred Herbert Marshall, Frank Morgan, and Reginal Owen and was directed by William Wyler who was married to Sullavan at the time. Sullavan and Morgan would reunite for two 1940 films co-starring James Stewart, Frank Borzage’s The Mortal Storm and Ernst Lubitsch’s The Shop Around the Corner. The latter would also take place in Budapest.

Preston Sturges made his debut as a director with the 1940 comedy The Great McGinty, which provided veteran bad guy Brian Donlevy with his first starring role in this political satire the year after receiving his first and only Oscar nomination for menacing Gary Cooper in Beau Geste. His co-star was Akim Tamiroff who received an Oscar nomination of his own for menacing Cooper in 1936’s The General Died at Dawn. Sturges would soon have even greater success with such films as Sullivan’s Travels and The Palm Beach Story.

One of the lesser known films from the legendary Fritz Lang (Metropolis, Scarlet Street), 1950’s House by the River is an atmospheric thriller about the accidental killing of a maid by deranged writer Louis Hayward (And Then There Were None) who convinces his brother, Lee Bowman (Smash-Up: The Story of a Woman), to help him bury the body in the river behind his house. When the body is found, he tries to frame his brother for the killing. A tense nail-biter, the film should have guaranteed a bigger career for Bowman who steals the film from Hayward, but it was instead his last major film role before spending most of the remainder of his career on TV where he soon became a major star in The Adventures of Ellery Queen. Jane Wyatt (TV’s Father Knows Best) co-stars as Hayward’s wife.

The definitive British New Wave film, 1959’s Room at the Top, stars Laurence Harvey as the angry young man who loves and leaves older woman Simone Signoret for boss’ daughter Heather Sears on his way to the top. Directed by Jack Clayton (The Innocents), the still potent film won Oscars for Signoret and Neil Paterson’s screenplay and nominations for Best Picture, Director, Actor (Harvey), and Supporting Actress (Hermione Baddeley as Signoret’s friend).

Bryan Forbes (The L-Shaped Room, Séance on a Wet Afternoon) wrote and directed the film version of Robert Nicholson’s The Whisperers specifically for legendary British stage actress Edith Evans whose previously best-known film roles had been as haughty aristocratic characters in such films as The Importance of Being Earnest, Tom Jones, and The Chalk Garden. Dame Edith was a sensation the world over as the impoverished, delusional old lady who is victimized by the return of a thieving son, a vagrant husband, and other lowlifes. It’s no wonder she won every existing acting award except the Oscar, which she shockingly lost to Katharine Hepburn in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.

Filmed in Manchester, England, Gerry Turpin (Oh! What a Lovely War) won a BAFTA for his stunning black-and-white cinematography. Also worthy of note is John Barry’s score, one of three in a row, along with The Lion in Winter and Midnight Cowboy, that cemented his reputation as the greatest film composer of his day.

This week’s new releases include Pain and Glory and the Blu-ray release of The War Lord.