.1 Off-white page with black print removed from a magazine, bearing a full-page advertisement for the film, “Crossfire” on the front. Spanning the top are three lines of advertising copy in a large, black font. Below, on the left, is an illustration of a Broadway theater exterior advertising the film, with a caption below and a single column of text to the right. Below the image, there are three columns of text on the left and another image on the right. The second image depicts a man lying on the ground, grabbing the ankle of another man, who is only visible from the mid-torso down. Spanning the bottom of the page is a full-width, black, bar, which contains the film title and credits, printed in white. The back of the sheet contains three columns of unrelated text and images. The left edge of the sheet is torn and slightly ragged, with partial staple-holes. Depicted: Robert Young as Captain Finlay, Robert Mitchum as Sgt. Felix Keeley, Robert Ryan as Sgt. Montgomery, Gloria Grahame as Ginny Tremaine, Sam Levene as Joseph Samuels .2 White page with black print removed from a magazine, with a full-page advertisement for the film, “Crossfire” on the font. Spanning the top is black advertising copy. In the center of the page is a three-by-three grid of headshots, each with a caption underneath. The top row has three men, the first of which is wearing a brimmed hat and a pipe in his mouth. The center row has a man and fair-haired woman, and the bottom row has another fair-haired woman and man. Obscuring the bottom two images in the right column is a canted, white, rectangle with an unevenly-sketched, black border, containing the film tile and credits. Partially visible to the bottom right of the rectangle, is an illustration of a man choking another man, who is on his knees and has his arms raised. Publication information is printed in small, black text in the bottom margin. The back of the sheet contains a large, unrelated advertisement. The left edge of the sheet is torn and ragged. Depicted: Robert Young as Captain Finlay, Robert Mitchum as Sgt. Felix Keeley, Robert Ryan as Sgt. Montgomery, George Cooper as Corp. Arthur Mitchell, Gloria Grahame as Ginny Tremaine, Jacqueline White as Mary Mitchell, Sam Levene as Joseph Samuels .3 White page with black print removed from a magazine, with a full-page advertisement for the film, “Crossfire” on the front. The top of the page is filled with an image of a man wearing a suit, tie, and pocket square, holding a pistol in his open palm. He is sitting on a table in a shadowy room, with his brows furrowed and lips pressed together. To the right, overlaying the image, is a quote, printed in white text. Overlaying the bottom of the image is a smaller-scale image of another man in a collared shirt and tie, who seems to be looking up at the man with the pistol. Directly below the second man, in the bottom right corner of the page, are three stacked headshots of a man and two women, with captions to the right. On the bottom left of the page are the film title and credits, printed in black. The publication information is printed in the top margin. The back of the sheet contains four columns of unrelated advertising and text. The left edge of the sheet is torn and ragged. Depicted: Robert Young as Captain Finlay, Robert Mitchum as Sgt. Felix Keeley, Robert Ryan as Sgt. Montgomery, Gloria Grahame as Ginny Tremaine .4 White page with brown-toned print removed from a magazine, with a full-page advertisement for the film, “Crossfire” on the front. The page features a large, rectangular scene still that extends to the left and top edges, with a wide margin on the right. The image depicts a man on a dark, deserted street in front of a building, poised to run. A studio logo is in the top left corner, and the film title is in small, white text in the bottom left corner. Directly below the large image is a two-columned caption, and four, square headshots of the cast. The back of the sheet features a large article title in black text with white shadowing, overlaying a bird’s eye shot of a studio complex. Depicted: Robert Young as Captain Finlay, Robert Mitchum as Sgt. Felix Keeley, Robert Ryan as Sgt. Montgomery, Gloria Grahame as Ginny Tremaine .5 White page with black print removed from a magazine, with a full-page advertisement for the film “Crossfire” on the front. In the top left corner, there is a large, rectangular image depicting a man lying on the ground, grabbing the ankle of another man, who is only visible from the mid-torso down. Overlaying the image is advertising copy printed in white. To the right of the image is a column of four scene stills, each with a caption below. On the bottom left of the page are the film title and credits, printed in black. A small studio logo is printed in the bottom right corner. The back of the sheet features an unrelated, full-page image. On the front, there are several small, dark stains in the upper left margin. Depicted: Sam Levene as Joseph Samuels, Robert Mitchum as Sgt. Felix Keeley, Jacqueline White as Mary Mitchell, Gloria Grahame as Ginny Tremaine, George Cooper as Corp. Arthur Mitchell, , Robert Ryan as Sgt. Montgomery, Robert Young as Captain Finlay .1 front, bottom right margin, handwritten, pencil : 1947
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.1: Height: 13.375 inches (33.973 cm) | Width: 10.250 inches (26.035 cm) .2: Height: 13.875 inches (35.243 cm) | Width: 10.500 inches (26.67 cm) .3: Height: 13.750 inches (34.925 cm) | Width: 10.500 inches (26.67 cm) .4: Height: 12.250 inches (31.115 cm) | Width: 9.250 inches (23.495 cm) .5: Height: 13.125 inches (33.338 cm) | Width: 10.375 inches (26.353 cm)
Five magazine advertisements for the American feature film, “Crossfire,” released by RKO Radio Pictures in July 1947. “Crossfire” was nominated for five Academy Awards, and won several others, including “Best Social Film” at the Cannes Film Festival. The film was based on the 1945 novel, The Brick Foxhole, by Richard Brooks. As part of the film noir genre, “Crossfire” depicts a murder investigation, focusing on a group of demobilized soldiers. In the novel, the victim was homosexual, however, depicting a homosexual on-screen was deemed unacceptable by the censors at the Production Code Administration. He was rewritten as a Jewish man for the film, making it a condemnation of antisemitism. Just a few months after the film’s release, the producer and director refused to answer questions about communist activities and affiliations before the House Un-American Activities Committee. They were indicted and convicted for contempt of Congress, and subsequently imprisoned and blacklisted from Hollywood. This object is one of more than 1,200 objects in the Cinema Judaica Collection of materials related to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical themes.
The Cinema Judaica Collection consists of more than 1,200 objects relating to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical subjects, from 1923 to 2000, from the United States, Europe, Israel, Canada, Mexico, and Argentina. The collection was amassed by film memorabilia collector Ken Sutak, to document Holocaust-and Jewish-themed movies of the World War II era and the postwar years. The collection includes posters, lobby and photo cards, scene stills, pressbooks, trade ads, programs, magazines, books, VHS tapes, DVDS, and 78 rpm records. Sutak organized these materials into two groups, “Cinema Judaica: The War Years, 1939–1949” and “Cinema Judaica: The Epic Cycle, 1950–1972” and, in conjunction with the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion Museum (now the Dr. Bernard Heller Museum in New York), organized exhibitions on these two themes in 2007 and 2008. Sutak subsequently authored companion books with the same titles.
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The magazine ads were donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2018 by Ken Sutak and Sherri Venokur.
Five magazine ads for the film “Crossfire” (1947)