Myrna Loy and William Powell Collection

William Powell and Myrna Loy were truly a class act: an embodiment of style, wit, and grace that also allowed for artful physical comedy. An ideal companion to the bestselling The Thin Man collection, this set features five films. Manhattan Melodrama (1934) is perhaps best known as the film John Dillinger was watching just before he was gunned down outside Chicago's Biograph Theater, but it's also the first of 14 films that Powell and Loy would star in together, a ripping melodrama with rat-a-tat dialogue featuring Powell and Clark Gable as boyhood friends who grow up on opposite sides of the law—one a crusading D.A. with ambitions for higher office, the other a gangster—with Loy costarring as a former party girl who switches allegiances from Gable to Powell. I Love You Again (1940) is an ingenious romantic comedy starring Powell as a staid, buttoned up solid citizen who is conked on the head during a cruise and discovers that he is actually a con man who has had amnesia for nine years! Loy costars as his divorce-bound wife who finds herself attracted to her "husband's" newfound charms and free-spending ways. Love Crazy (1941) is a similarly-themed screwball comedy, with Powell pleading insanity to put the kibosh on wife Loy's divorce plans. This set's real sleeper is Evelyn Prentice (1934), a melodrama in which Loy stars as the neglected wife of a prominent defense attorney (Powell) whose latest case—involving the murder of a blackmailing louse—hits closer to home than he suspects. Double Wedding (1937) is more of a trifle, but Powell as a bohemian and Loy as a control freak still provide plenty of star oomph. It may be a cliché, but they truly don't make 'em like this anymore. DVD extras for each film replicate a classic night out at the movies, complete with coming attraction, cartoon, and live-action short (Love Crazy also includes a "Screen Directors Guild Playhouse" radio adaptation of the film with Powell). Highly recommended. (D. Liebenson)