Mjeteconer Just perfect...

RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

alice-694-394640 Never saw the original Thin Man until recently when I bought the set, ALL of the William Powell and Myrna Loy films. I loved them but felt oddly disappointed, and didn't know why. Also, the series that I thought I loved seemed oddly unfamiliar.There is ONE episode of the Lawford/Kirk TV Thin Man on the final disk, the one that includes a biography of Powell, another of Loy. Seeing this single episode made me realize that my nostalgia for The Thin Man was actually for the TV series, not the original. I had never before seen the original. Seeing that single episode of the Kirk/Lawford TV version REALLY brought it all back! It was light yet engrossing, with good production values for the day and a plot that really kept my attention.Both versions have great charm, but I still like the TV series better. If Acorn or Movies Unlimited or some such company were to issue a set of the TV version, I'd buy it in a heartbeat! IF ANYONE READING THIS IS IN THE OLD MOVIE DVD INDUSTRY, PLEASE OFFER THIS!

blanche-2 I was a child when "The Thin Man" was on television but for some reason, I remember it very clearly. I think I was completely captivated by the sheer sophistication of Nick and Nora Charles and the fact that they lived in an apartment in New York City. Growing up in a house and not in New York City, this was fascinating to me.What I remember most is how beautiful Phyllis Kirk was and what glorious clothes she wore. I wish I could see this series today to find out if it's as I remember it. Kirk and Lawford seemed a most glamorous couple, and I have a feeling their relationship colored my own ideas about an ideal marriage - rich and childless.This show was an attempt by MGM to get into TV and capitalize on one of their properties, and it didn't make it. Many years later, I had a chance to see the wonderful movies on which the series was based. I can't draw a comparison because I only remember the clothes and sophistication from the TV show. I guess that says something.

dencar_1 Not everyone realizes that THE THIN MAN television series from 1957 starring Peter Lawford and Phyllis Kirk is a part of the tragic story representing the final chapter of a legendary studio. For years MGM studio boss Louis B. Mayer believed television to be a passing fancy and said it would never last. He refused to acknowledge the medium was a permanent phenomenon and the wave of the future. He never recognized it for what it was and for what it would eventually mean to the entertainment industry.The movie studio system was beginning to dissolve by the mid 1950's and musicals, MGM's signature product, was on its last legs, too. As television gained ground against movies, Mayer remained in complete denial about the medium. He ridiculed it and said it would never last. Even after Mayer was replaced by Dore Schary in the early 1950's who brought in a completely different view of picture making, television wasn't part of the equation. MGM did launch THE MGM PARADE, a weekly television variety show hosted by George Murphey, but it was a bleak attempt to recycle the studio glory days and shriveled up quickly. THE THIN MAN series in 1957 was a weak attempt to gain a foothold in television by flipping pages from the William Powell--Myrna Loy 1930's photo album. But MGM failed to create anything fresh for the new medium and the studio's efforts were too little, too late.As a show, THE THIN MAN was a perky, but superficial recreation of the Powell--Loy classic. Though Lawford, Kirk, and Asta were pleasant, the show flopped. In contrast to all of the aforementioned, consider what WARNER BROTHERS was doing at that same time: recognizing the impact of getting into every living room in America by producing television shows. For WARNER BROTHERS wisely began churning out a cavalcade of productions--particularly westerns and detective shows that capitalized on the era's programming trends. MAVERICK, SUGARFOOT, LARAMIE, 77 SUNSET STRIP, HAWAIIAN EYE, SURFSIDE SIX, BOURBON STREET BEAT, CHEYENNE, COLT .45--all were WARNER BROTHERS productions. The corporate market share must have been staggering. The successes of those shows bolstered WARNER BROS. for years.By the late 1960's, MGM was caught in the winds of change. The final nail in the coffin occurred when congress decreed that studios could no longer own movie theatres. Las Vegas Hotel magnate Kirk Kerkorian purchased MGM primarily for its trademark name and Culver City real estate. He later issued a statement that the studio was now a relatively insignificant producer of motion pictures. MGM tore down its legendary back lots and sold the land. Then it auctioned off many collectibles from its vast studio archives. Since then MGM has been bought and sold by so many people there is not enough space here to list either the names or corporate intrigue (even Ted Turner took over and couldn't make a go of it).THE THIN MAN wasn't just another innocuous 1950's television series that bombed. It is a deceivingly important piece of the story of a great studio beginning a slow descent into oblivion. By failing to recognize that one either adapts to change or becomes extinct, MGM made a catastrophic miscalculation. This is not to say that failure to produce television shows was the primary reason for a great studio's collapse, for other important issues were most assuredly at play. But THE THIN MAN represented just one example of a once great studio falsely believing that sitting on the laurels of past successes holds the key to future survivability. Dennis Caracciolo

tjonasgreen In the early '60s before TV ad rates became astronomical and before small local stations joined large syndicated networks, the airwaves were full of old movies and TV series reruns because no one much cared about the ratings during off hours. Among the antique TV shows from the early and mid '50s that were endlessly repeated were (probably terrible) chestnuts like MY LITTLE MARGIE, OH, SUSANNAH!, PRIVATE SECRETARY, THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE, AMOS 'N' ANDY, THE LIFE OF RILEY, December BRIDE, TOPPER, I MARRIED JOAN, OUR MISS BROOKS, LOVE THAT BOB, and one that I remember especially fondly, THE THIN MAN starring Peter Lawford and Phyllis Kirk and with the sexy and incomparable Nita Talbot in a recurring role.I remember virtually nothing about it except the impressions it left me with: Peter Lawford and Phyllis Kirk seemed dry, pleasant and sophisticated and had a nice chemistry together. I knew nothing of Powell and Loy and the original series of films at the time, so Lawford and Kirk seemed delightful. And even in childhood, I LOVED Nita Talbot, who guested on lots of other series of the period. Tall, with a model's figure and bearing, she usually wore a Veronica Lake pageboy and had a wry, slinky beauty which suggested a cross between Lauren Bacall and Anne Francis. But her voice was honking and grating and she had a N.Y. accent as thick as a slice of corned beef. The incongruity was delicious and she was wonderful.The only plot I remember in the series was one in which it was implied that a murdered woman (I seem to remember her as a waitress) had been hacked to pieces and hidden in a trunk -- precisely the kind of grisly detail a child would remember.While I'm willing to believe this series was awful (certainly most or all of the others I listed must have been) I'd love to see several episodes again, and I'd love to know whatever happened to Nita Talbot.