Those Golden Years

Clara Bow and Buddy Rogers in GET YOUR MAN (1927)

"Still playing, Kid?"

"No, I´m through"

The Cincinnati Kid (1965)

The elusive, post-retirement Greta Garbo walking in New York (1955, photo by Lisa Larsen for LIFE)

“I have no plans, not for the movies, not for the stage, not for anything. I’m sort of drifting…Sometimes I put on my coat at 10 in the morning and go out and follow people. I just go where they’re going. I mill around.”

Top Row: Jean Hersholt, Eleanor Powell, Arlene Whelan, Marie McDonald, Fay McKenzie, Karin Booth, Eleanor Roosevelt, Frances Gifford, Frances Longford, Elyse Knox, Cary Grant, Claudette Colbert, Bob Hope, Ray Middleton, Joan Bennett, Bert Lahr, Stan Laurel, Jerry Colonna, Groucho Marx and seated: Oliver Hardy, Joan Blondell, Charlotte Greenwood, Charles Boyer, Rise Stevens, Desi Arnaz, Frank McHugh, James Cagney, Pat O'Brien at the White House as part of the Hollywood Victory Caravan which was a group of stars who toured 13 US cities to raise funds for Army and Navy relief during WWII in March 1942

In that one year we got SIX of the most defining and iconic film villains making each of the actors bona fide movie stars at least when viewed with hindsight and in each of them the villain was eirther the draw or was so good he walked away with the film

Edward G Robinson as  Caesar Enrico "Rico" Bandello forever leaves a mark on how we see film gangsters in Little Caesar ,which tells of his rise and fall with a dose of queer coding

Bela Lugosi brings to life an unreal threat,a centuries old vampire masquerading as a Gentleman in Dracula ,opening up supernatural bad guys as more of a possibility for Hollywood while also being a seductive character

James Cagney as Tom Power in the Public Enemy is another film gangster ,but who sets the building blocks up for the charismatic psychopath we see in later films

The next villain is the most disturbing,Hans Beckert the child killer in M ,brought to life by Peter Lorre .Beckert is interesting cause he is a pitiable villain ,a reluctant monster who feel compelled to do awful things which is an intriguing take for the early 30's

Next we have the Frankenstein Monster from Frankenstein,who back in the day WAS seen as a villain ,in that he is a threat and he kills people but what makes him one of the great characters in cinema is the performance of Boris Karloff and the decision to protray him with sympathy,that the monster has a soul and a beating heart ,making him a sympathetic antagonist .Heck personally I dont see him as a villain but dramatically he fits and is needed for the discussion

And finally we have the monster within us all,Fredric March as Mr Hyde from Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.A loathsome abusive fiend who lets his worst qualaties fome to the forefront and revels in them ,the hidden brute behind the facade of a gentleman ,Jekylls worst qualties made manifest in a performance so good it arned March an OScar

If I am missing any 31 villains feel free to add them

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