This Spanish-language film is currently only available on YouTube’s premium channel, but it is worth trying a free introductory membership just to see it. Based on an actual event, the wonderful Gael García Bernal (from Mozart in the Jungle) stars as a bored young man who robs the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City. The aftermath of guilt and confusion when the artifacts can’t be fenced is beautifully developed, and the moment he realizes the treasures might actually go to Britain because of his actions is especially poignant.
Stars: Gael Garcia Bernal, Simon Russell Beale, Lynn Gilmartin
Juan and Benjamín, who are well into their thirties, do not seem to be prompt to finish their university degree in veterinary. As if that was not enough, they are not so keen to fly the nest any time soon either. Thirsty of some long and much sought-after renown, one ill fated Christmas Eve they decide to loot the iconic National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico.
Melina Mercouri (later the Greek Minister of Culture and leading proponent of returning the Parthenon Marbles from the British Museum to Greece) leads a bumbling effort to rob the national museum in Istanbul.
Stars: Melina Mercouri, Peter Ustinov, Maximilian Schell
Professional jewel thief Elizabeth Lipp (Melina Mercouri) reunites with her former lover and partner Walter Harper (Maximilian Schell) for the score of her life – the theft of an exquisite jeweled dagger from the Topkapi museum, located in the former Ottoman imperial palace in Istanbul. Walter recruits the team, which includes alarms expert Cedric Page (Robert Morley), strong man Hans Fisher (Jess Hahn), and circus acrobat Giulio “the Human Fly” (Gilles Ségal). Since the museum’s floor is completely pressure-alarmed, it will be necessary to lower Giulio by rope from a rooftop window and raise the heavy glass cover enclosing the mannequin on which the dagger is displayed. Giulio will then replace the dagger with a copy and leave the scene intact in the hope that the theft will not be discovered until the thieves leave the country. This method will require two strong men, Hans and Walter, holding ropes – one to raise the glass cover and the other to hold Giulio.
The plan calls for shooting out a searchlight and exploding smoke grenades to distract the guards when the team leaves the museum. Walter hides a rifle and some smoke grenades inside the door jamb of a convertible limousine. In Greece, he hires a small-time hustler named Arthur Simpson (Peter Ustinov) to drive the car to Istanbul. When Simpson arrives at Turkish customs, he is detained for an expired passport and the officials become suspicious of his disjointed personal history. The car is searched and the contraband discovered. Simpson is now accused of abetting terrorism, a capital offense.
Simpson manages to convince Maj. Ali Tufan (Ege Ernart) that he knows nothing of the supposed terrorist plot. He agrees to redeem himself by infiltrating the gang as a spy for Turkish security. Upon arriving in Istanbul, he informs Walter and Elizabeth that, due to a bureaucratic mixup, only the person who brought the car into the country is allowed to drive it. Walter and Elizabeth reluctantly agree to hire Simpson as their chauffeur during their “touristic” visit, so he joins them at their rented villa.
Simpson does his best to ferret out information, leaving messages for the police in discarded cigarette packs, but he learns little. One evening, the drunken and obnoxious cook Gerven (Akim Tamiroff) annoys Hans to the point that a melee breaks out. In the confusion, Hans manages to break his hands when a window is slammed shut. With Hans out of commission, the plan cannot go forward without a second rope holder, and Cedric demurs that he is not strong enough.
Walter and Elizabeth put Simpson through a test of strength, which he passes, barely. They decide to offer Simpson $10,000 to participate in the robbery. Simpson agrees, but then let’s slip that he is working for Turkish security. Walter decides to go through with the robbery anyway but to move it forward to that same evening.
Though the group is being tailed by police, they manage to slip away one by one at a crowded wrestling match. Since they can no longer shoot out lights or use smoke grenades, Elizabeth, with Cedric’s help, will distract the guards using her feminine wiles. Walter, Guilo and Simpson enter the museum just before closing time, hide, and eventually make their way to the roof, where Simpson announces that he has a fear of heights. They manage to get across the roof anyway, and as soon as darkness falls Guilio is slipped in through a high window. The plan almost fails when Simpson lets the rope slip, but he recovers just in time. As planned, Guilio switches the daggers and the three depart the museum.
The dagger is brought to the courier who will take it out of the country. It looks like everything has gone according to plan, but of course, there is an unexpected twist at the end.
Gabey, Chip and Ozzie are among one wave of US Navy sailors from their ship on a twenty-four hour shore leave in New York City, where none of the three has ever been. With a forty-five year old guidebook in hand, Chip wants to see the sights, but gets sidetracked when he gets in the sights of smitten cabbie Hildy Esterhazy, who won’t let him go as long as he’s in the city. Ozzie, who is basically following his mates, may instead want to follow anthropologist Claire Huddesen, who is into prehistoric looking men like Ozzie. Unlike his two friends, Gabey purposefully wants to spend his time with a beautiful, sophisticated New York gal. He believes he’s found that girl, at least her photograph, when he sees a poster for the subway system’s newly crowned Miss Turnstiles for June, Ivy Smith, who he mistakenly believes is the belle of New York high society. Based on the bio on the poster, Gabey goes on a search for her. His two pals help him, but manage equally to spend quality alone time with their respective new female friends. The questions become if Gabey will be able to find Ivy, if so if she will give him the time of day, and if he would feel the same about her if he knew that she’s just a working girl from small town USA trying to make it in the big city. Through it all, the six get into one misadventure after another – largely based on Hildy’s long overdue cab and Ozzie causing a mishap at a museum – as they take in all New York City has to offer.
A hilarious turn by Cary Grant as a paleontologist working at the American Museum of Natural History in New York (which is disguised here as the “Stuyvesant Museum of Natural History,” but uses the AMNH façade).
Stars: Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Charles Ruggles
Bringing Up Baby is a screwball comedy about a paleontologist, David Huxley (Cary Grant), involved with a scatterbrained woman, Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn), and a tame leopard named Baby (Nissa the Leopard). Baby, in Susan’s temporary care, is a gift from Susan’s brother to their aunt Elizabeth (May Robson), who David hopes will make a large donation to his museum. David is about to marry Alice (Virginia Walker).
David is piecing together a brontosaurus skeleton that is missing one bone (the fictitious intercostal clavicle), which Susan’s dog, George (Asta from The Thin Man (1934)) steals and buries. David and Susan try to recover the bone and Baby, who got away. Meanwhile, a psychiatrist (Fritz Feld) believes that both of them are off their nut and have them put in jail. Susan escapes. While she’s gone, George leads Baby to the jail. A few minutes later Susan comes back with a leopard at the end of a rope, not realizing that it is not Baby, but a dangerous circus animal (also played by Nissa the Leopard). George corrals the wild leopard in one of the jail cells and saves the day.
Several weeks later, Susan finds David (who has been jilted by Alice because of her) working on his brontosaurus reconstruction at the museum. After giving him the missing bone (which she found by trailing George), she tells him she has persuaded her aunt to make the large donation. Against his advice, Susan climbs a tall ladder next to the dinosaur to be closer to him. When the ladder starts swaying dangerously, she climbs onto the skeleton. Before it collapses, David grabs her hand. Surveying the wreckage of his work, David gives up and admits that he cannot live without her.
Mary Malloy is the author of both historical novels and non-fiction history. She has a Ph.D. from Brown University and infuses her books with well-researched details and richly textured writing. As a teacher and writer, she works to bring the past alive by exploring the lives of both ordinary and extraordinary people.
Mary Malloy is the author of both historical novels and non-fiction history. She has a Ph.D. from Brown University and infuses her books with well-researched details and richly textured writing. As a teacher and writer, she works to bring the past alive by exploring the lives of both ordinary and extraordinary people. 
