It Happened One Night

Columbia Pictures was considered a minor studio, but studio head Harry Cohn had major ambitions when he put everything behind "It Happened One Night," Frank Capra's now quintessential road-movie romance with Clark Gable as a street-smart reporter and Claudette Colbert as a sexy runaway heiress. When it swept the Academy Awards in 1935 and copped Best Picture, it turned Columbia into one of the majors. All 11 of Columbia's Best Picture winners (representing a grand total of 64 Academy Awards) are collected in this handsome, booklike case with slip-sleeves. Time hasn't been that kind to all of them (Capra's fun but slight 1938 "You Can't Take It With You" and the elephantine musical "Oliver!" from 1968), and some are more serious than cinematic ("A Man for All Seasons" with Paul Scofield, "Kramer vs. Kramer" with Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep, and Richard Attenborough's epic biography "Gandhi" with Ben Kingsley). Oscar has not always been so good at picking pictures that stand the test of time.

The rest of the set includes some of the best and most memorable films that Hollywood turned out, from Robert Rossen's dark, cynical "All the King's Men" (with Broderick Crawford's blustery charm and oversized performance) to "On the Waterfront," which earned actor Marlon Brando his first Oscar. "From Here to Eternity" is Hollywood class and cool at its best. Capping the set are two by David Lean: his 1957 war drama "The Bridge on the River Kwai"; and his sweeping epic "Lawrence of Arabia," one of the most beautiful big-screen films ever made, and the most finely crafted and brilliantly directed epic of the Hollywood era. The latter films (as well as "Gandhi") are spread over two discs, and most films feature commentary, featurettes and other supplements.