TCM's A Night At The Movies: The Suspenseful World of Thrillers

TCM is going to launch a new series, A NIGHT AT THE MOVIES, which are one-hour specials that will provide a Film Studies 101 look at top cinematic genres.

The first episode, "The Suspenseful World of Thrillers," will premiere on October 2 at 8pm.

Other episodes will look at other genres, including a December special on epic cinema.

This is a great chance to discover movies that you hadn't heard of before and learn more about them. I would call the cheap "film school."

The special will feature interviews with such figures as TCM host Robert Osborne; Ken Follett, author of Eye of the Needle; Bryan Singer, writer and director of The Usual Suspects and Valkyrie; Diablo Cody, writer and producer of the upcoming film Jennifer's Body; Kenneth Branagh, director and star of Dead Again; Mel Brooks, writer, director and star of the Hitchcock spoof High Anxiety; David Koepp, writer-director of Stir of Echoes; Norman Lloyd, star of Hitchcock's Saboteur and producer and director for the Alfred Hitchcock television series; Martin Landau, co-star of Hitchcock's North by Northwest; Ileanna Douglas, co-star of Cape Fear and Stir of Echoes; Scott Frank, screenwriter of Minority Report and director of The Lookout; Heywood Gould, screenwriter of The Boys from Brazil; Paul Hirsch, editor of Brian De Palma's Obsession and Blow Out; Hawk Koch, assistant director on Marathon Man and The Parallax View, and producer of Untraceable; Guy Hendrix Dyas, production designer for Indiana Jones & The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull; and John McCarty, author of the books Thrillers and Bullets Over Hollywood.

You can see the complete schedule of A Night at the Movies: The Suspensful Wordl of Thrillers, which premieres in October, below:

Friday, Oct. 2 – Thrillers and Hitchcock

8 p.m. A Night at the Movies: The Suspenseful World of Thrillers (2009) – premiere.
9 p.m. Rear Window (1954), starring James Stewart and Grace Kelly.
11 p.m. A Night at the Movies: The Suspenseful World of Thrillers (2009) – encore.
Midnight Shadow of a Doubt (1943), starring Joseph Cotten and Teresa Wright.

Friday, Oct. 9 – Political Thrillers

8 p.m. The Manchurian Candidate (1962), starring Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Angela Lansbury and Janet Leigh.
10:15 p.m. The Parallax View (1974), starring Warren Beatty and Hume Cronyn.
Midnight The Boys from Brazil (1978), starring Laurence Olivier and Gregory Peck.

Friday, Oct. 16 – Crime Thrillers

8 p.m. The Narrow Margin (1952), starring Charles McGraw and Marie Windsor.
9:30 p.m. A Night at the Movies: The Suspenseful World of Thrillers (2009) – encore.
10:30 p.m. Lured (1947), starring George Sanders, Lucille Ball and Charles Coburn.
12:30 a.m. The Lodger (1944), starring Merle Oberon and George Sanders.

Friday, Oct. 23 – Gothic Thrillers

8 p.m. The Night of the Hunter (1955), starring Robert Mitchum, Lillian Gish and Shelley Winters.
10 p.m. Dragonwyck (1946), starring Gene Tierney, Walter Huston and Vincent Price.
Midnight Rebecca (1940), starring Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier and Judith Anderson.

Friday, Oct. 30 – Psychological Thrillers

8 p.m. Gaslight (1944), starring Charles Boyer, Ingrid Bergman, Joseph Cotten and Angela Lansbury.
10 p.m. Night Must Fall (1937), starring Robert Montgomery, Rosalind Russell and Dame May Whitty.
Midnight Psycho (1960), starring Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh, Vera Miles and Martin Balsam.