Twentieth Century (film)

Twentieth Century is a 1934 American Pre-Code screwball comedy film. Much of the film is set on the 20th Century Limited train as it travels from Chicago to New York. The film was directed by Howard Hawks, stars John Barrymore and Carole Lombard, and features Walter Connolly, Roscoe Karns and Edgar Kennedy. Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur adapted their Broadway play of the same name – itself based on the unproduced play Napoleon of Broadway by Charles Bruce Millholland – with uncredited contributions from Gene Fowler and Preston Sturges.

Along with Frank Capra's It Happened One Night, also released in 1934, Twentieth Century is considered to be a prototype for the screwball comedy. "Howard Hawks' rapid-fire romantic comedy established the essential ingredients of the screwball – a dizzy dame, a charming but befuddled hero, dazzling dialogue and a dash of slapstick." Its success propelled Lombard into the front ranks of film comediennes. The film was added to the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress in 2011.

20th century

The 20th century was a century that began on January 1, 1901 and ended on December 31, 2000. It was the tenth and final century of the 2nd millennium. It is distinct from the century known as the 1900s (sometimes written as 19XX), which began on January 1, 1900 and ended on December 31, 1999.

Dubbed the "short twentieth century", this century in human history was dominated by chain of events that heralded significant changes in world history as to redefine the era: World War I and World War II, nationalism and decolonization, the Cold War and Post-Cold War conflicts, cultural homogenization through developments in transportation and communications technology, world population growth, awareness of environmental degradation, ecological extinction and the birth of the Digital Revolution. It saw great advances in communication and medical technology that by the late 1980s allowed for near-instantaneous worldwide computer communication and genetic modification of life.

Overview

The century had the first global-scale total wars between world powers across continents and oceans in World War I and World War II. Nationalism became a major political issue in the world in the 20th century, acknowledged in international law along with the right of nations to self-determination, official decolonization in the mid-century, and nationalist-influenced armed regional-conflicts.

Twentieth century (disambiguation)

Twentieth century may refer to:

20th century (disambiguation)

The 20th century of the Common Era began on 1 January 1901 and ended on 31 December 2000, according to the Gregorian calendar.

20th century may also refer to: