Best Movies of 1952

In 1927 Hollywood, a silent film production company and cast make a difficult transition to sound.

A fading music hall comedian tries to help a despondent ballet dancer learn to walk and to again feel confident about life.

High Noon is about Will Kane, the sheriff of a small town in the New Mexico Territory, who learns a notorious outlaw he put in jail has been freed, and will be arriving on the noon train. Knowing the outlaw and his gang are coming to kill him, Kane is determined to stand his ground. He attempts to gather a posse from among the local townspeople.

Sean Thornton has returned from America to reclaim his homestead and escape his past. Sean's eye is caught by Mary Kate Danaher, the beautiful spinster and younger sister of ill-tempered "Red" Will Danaher. The riotous relationship that forms between Sean and Mary Kate, punctuated by Will's pugnacious attempts to keep them apart, form the plot, with Sean's past as the dark undercurrent.

Told in flashback form, the film traces the rise and fall of a tough, ambitious Hollywood producer, Jonathan Shields, as seen through the eyes of various acquaintances, including a writer, James Lee Bartlow; a star, Georgia Lorrison; and a director, Fred Amiel. He is a hard-driving, ambitious man who ruthlessly uses everyone on the way to becoming one of Hollywood's top movie makers.

Barnaby Fulton is a research chemist working on a fountain of youth pill for a chemical company. One of the labs chimps, Esther, gets loose in the laboratory and, having watched Dr Fulton do something similar, mixes a beaker of chemicals, but then pours the mix into the water cooler. Later, when trying one of his own samples sample, washed down with water from the cooler, Fulton begins to act just like a 20-year-old and believes his potion is working. Soon his wife and boss are also behaving like children.

To ensure a full profitable season, circus manager Brad Braden engages The Great Sebastian, though this moves his girlfriend Holly from her hard-won center trapeze spot. Holly and Sebastian begin a dangerous one-upmanship duel in the ring, while he pursues her on the ground.

In 18th-century France, a young man masquerades as an actor to avenge his friend's murder.

An emotionally remote recovering alcoholic and his dowdy, unambitious wife face a personal crisis when they take in an attractive lodger. Doc Delaney (Burt Lancaster) and wife Lola (Shirley Booth) had an indiscreet affair, she became pregnant and, compelled to marry her, he gave up his medical studies, forfeited his future and settled down to a life of quiet desperation with the simple, frumpy Lola, who lost the child but has remained Doc's steadfast if slatternly wife. Now a chiropractor, recovering alcoholic, and active member of his town's AA chapter, Doc's sobriety is severely tested when Marie (Terry Moore), a young college student becomes their boarder, bringing new life and long-dormant hostilities to the surface of Doc and Lola's troubled marriage.

Algernon Moncrieff is surprised to discover that his affluent friend -- whom he knows as "Ernest" -- is actually named Jack Worthing. Jack fabricated his alter ego in order to escape his country estate where he takes care of his charge, Cecily Cardew. Cecily believes that Ernest is Jack's wayward brother and is keen on his raffish lifestyle. Algernon, seeing an opportunity, assumes Ernest's identity and sneaks off to woo Cecily.

Actor Lester Blaine has all but landed the lead in Myra Hudson's new play when Myra vetoes him because, to her, he doesn't look like a "romantic leading man." On a train from New York to San Francisco, Blaine sets out to prove Myra wrong...by romancing her. Is he sincere, or does he have a dark ulterior motive?

A tough cop meets his match when he has to guard a gangster's widow on a tense train ride.

When a secret marriage is planned between Othello, a Moorish general, and Desdemona, the daughter of Senator Brabantio, her old suitor Roderigo takes it hard. He allies himself with Iago, who has his own grudge against Othello, and the two conspire to bring Othello down. When their first plan, to have him accused of witchcraft, fails, they plant evidence intended to make him believe Desdemona is unfaithful.

A down-on-his-luck ex-GI finds himself framed for an armored car robbery. When he's finally released for lack of evidence--after having been beaten up and tortured by the police--he sets out to discover who set him up, and why. The trail leads him into Mexico and a web of hired killers and corrupt cops.