Cinema Essentials

Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman) and Buddy “Cloudy” Russo (Roy Scheider) are two undercover cops working for the New York Narcotics Bureau, dealing with small time hoods and drug dealers on the streets of New York. Cloudy is the more sensible and low key of the two; Doyle is a loose cannon with a nose for trouble and the veteran cop's sense for when something's not right.

In My Favorite Wife , Cary Grant plays successful lawyer Nick Arden, a man who is about to marry his second wife, Bianca (Gail Patrick). But first he has to have his first wife declared legally dead. She has been missing, presumed drowned, for ten years after her ship sank on an anthropological expedition in the Pacific. Arden manages to get the legal issues sorted without too much trouble, promptly marries Bianca, and they set off on their honeymoon to Yosemite.  There’s just one problem, Nick's first wife, Ellen (Irene Dunne), isn't really dead. And (wouldn't you know it?) she reappears as soon as he has remarried, now leaving him with two wives (sort of). She rushes off to Yosemite to gatecrash their honeymoon before, it's implied, the marriage is consummated.

If there's one thing we can all learn from the cinema of the 1970s, it's never to embark on any kind of luxury travel. The films of the decade were diligent in warning us of the dangers of cruise ships, transcontinental railways and especially airliners. For good measure, they also took care to remind us of the hazards of gold mines, roller coasters, swarms of bees and very tall buildings.