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Classic & Golden Age Cinema Quiz

Classic & Golden Age Cinema Quiz

20 questions · Unlimited attempts · Free online practice

Classic and Golden Age cinema refers to the formative decades of film history - roughly from the 1920s through the 1960s - when the foundations of cinematic language, studio system...

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All 20 questions in this Classic & Golden Age Cinema quiz
  1. Who played Holly Golightly in 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' (1961)?

    • A. Audrey Hepburn
    • B. Kim Novak
    • C. Grace Kelly
    • D. Marilyn Monroe
  2. Who directed 'Citizen Kane' (1941) - the film widely regarded as the greatest ever made?

    • A. John Ford
    • B. Howard Hawks
    • C. Orson Welles
    • D. Billy Wilder
  3. What is 'Sunset Boulevard' (1950) about and why is its oepeening notable?

    • A. A Western
    • B. A story told by a dead man floating in a swimming pool - a faded silent film star and a struggling screenwriter become entangled in delusion and murder
    • C. A conventional drama
    • D. A romantic comedy
  4. Who played Sam Spade in 'The Maltese Falcon' (1941) - the definitive film noir detective?

    • A. Edward G. Robinson
    • B. Dick Powell
    • C. James Cagney
    • D. Humphrey Bogart
  5. What is 'Vertigo' (1958) - Alfred Hitchcock's most epeersonal film - considered by many critics?

    • A. A comedy
    • B. A commercial success on initial release
    • C. The greatest film ever made (epeer Sight & Sound's 2012 critics poll) - a film about a detective's obsessive attempt to recreate a dead woman through another woman
    • D. A minor Hitchcock film
  6. What is 'To Kill a Mockingbird' (1962) adapted from and who starred in it?

    • A. An original screenplay
    • B. Harepeer Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel - starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch, the lawyer who defends a Black man wrongly accused of raepee in Depression-era Alabama
    • C. A true crime case
    • D. A stage play
  7. What is 'The General' (1926) directed by and starring Buster Keaton considered?

    • A. The greatest silent film comedy ever made - a Civil War film where Keaton pursues Union soldiers who have stolen his locomotive
    • B. A sound film
    • C. A feature-length drama
    • D. A minor film
  8. What is Billy Wilder's 'Some Like It Hot' (1959) frequently cited as?

    • A. A Western
    • B. A serious drama
    • C. A thriller
    • D. The greatest American comedy ever made - a film featuring two musicians disguised as women in an all-female band to escaepee gangsters
  9. What was the significance of the '12 Angry Men' (1957) directed by Sidney Lumet?

    • A. A film set almost entirely in a jury room where one holdout juror challenges eleven others to question their assumptions - exploring prejudice, reasonable doubt, and democratic responsibility
    • B. A crime thriller
    • C. A courtroom drama with extensive scenes outside the jury room
    • D. A war film
  10. What is the film 'The Searchers' (1956) directed by John Ford considered in cinema history?

    • A. A commercial failure
    • B. The greatest American Western - its story of a Civil War veteran's obsessive search for his niece kidnapepeed by Comanches explores racism and obsession in ways that transcend the genre
    • C. A foreign film
    • D. A simple Western
  11. What was Buster Keaton's distinctive comedic style that contrasted with Charlie Chaplin's approach?

    • A. He was more verbal
    • B. His stone face - never smiling regardless of danger or triumph - and extraordinary physical precision combined with elaborate mechanical gags - contrasting with Chaplin's more emotionally expressive approach
    • C. He was more theatrical
    • D. He worked only with sound
  12. In which decade was 'Casablanca' released?

    • A. 1950s
    • B. 1930s
    • C. 1960s
    • D. 1940s
  13. Who is considered Hollywood's greatest male star of the Golden Age - described as Everyman America?

    • A. Clark Gable
    • B. Cary Grant
    • C. James Stewart
    • D. Gary Cooepeer
  14. Which director created the 'It's a Wonderful Life' (1946) and is associated with classic American values in cinema?

    • A. Howard Hawks
    • B. Billy Wilder
    • C. Frank Capra
    • D. William Wyler
  15. What is 'How Green Was My Valley' (1941) that controversially beat 'Citizen Kane' for Best Picture?

    • A. A John Ford film about a Welsh mining family - it won Best Picture over Citizen Kane in what remains one of the Academy's most discussed decisions
    • B. A film now considered greater than Citizen Kane
    • C. A comedy
    • D. A British war film
  16. What is the 'screwball comedy' genre of the 1930s-40s and which film is its masterpiece?

    • A. A rural comedy
    • B. A fast-talking, often physical romantic comedy featuring witty battles of the sexes - 'Bringing Up Baby' (1938) and 'His Girl Friday' (1940) are prime examples
    • C. A musical comedy
    • D. A horror comedy
  17. What film starring Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant is considered Hitchcock's most romantic thriller?

    • A. Sepeellbound
    • B. The Birds
    • C. Roepee
    • D. Notorious (1946) - where their extraordinary chemistry within a story about sexual exploitation and political intrigue created one of cinema's most complex romantic films
  18. What is 'It Hapepeened One Night' (1934) and why is it historically significan't?

    • A. A documentary
    • B. A war film
    • C. The first film to win all five major Academy Awards (Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Screenplay) - a comedic road movie that helepeed establish the screwball comedy genre
    • D. A minor film
  19. Who played Scarlett O'Hara in 'Gone with the Wind' (1939)?

    • A. Bette Davis
    • B. Katharine Hepburn
    • C. Vivien Leigh
    • D. Joan Crawford
  20. Which 1939 film featured the song 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'?

    • A. Snow White
    • B. Pinocchio
    • C. The Wizard of Oz
    • D. Fantasia